The Lonely by Ainslie Hogarth Page B

inhaled. Our lungs are probably ravaged. Now, if for some reason I wanted to, I could never be an athlete, that stupid fucking bitch. She stole everything from us, do you realize that?”
    I hadn’t. And I still didn’t. Julia could be dramatic.
    She’d been lying on the bed all night after dinner, soaking up the moonlight like a cat on a stoop. She got up and leaned two stiff arms onto the radiator, letting them support her body, which she was craning to get a better view of the porch from the window. Phyllis was down there all right. Watching over her lawn, sipping vodka from her teacup.
    â€œWe should do something to the lawn, Easter.”
    I raised my head out of the carpet to reply:
    â€œNo Julia. Absolutely not. We’ve got a whole week with that woman.”
    â€œSo what? What could be worse than what we’re already doing? What could she possibly punish us with?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œPlease, Easter. Why do you always have to be such a stick in the mud?”
    â€œNo Julia.”
    â€œPlease, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please”—
    â€œNo! No, no, no, no, no. I won’t do it, Julia, so just stop. Why do you always want to make things worse? Why do you always have to make us do these awful things? We wouldn’t even be staying here if you’d let us have a friend. We’d be at staying at The Friend’s house, like a normal girl.” I wanted to cry again.
    Goddammit. I hate when crying just happens to you. Like when you’re being yelled at by someone or you’re very nervous, there’s a hostile takeover of your face and chest and all of a sudden you’re a crying baby.
    â€œEaster, you’d never do anything fun if it weren’t for me. You’d never stand up for yourself or fight back. You’re always so worried about ‘ making trouble’ and ‘acting normal.’ We would barely be human if it weren’t for me.”
    â€œJulia, that isn’t true,” I replied weakly.
    â€œWell, I suppose that’s right. You certainly do all of the crying for us.”
    â€œI know you’re just mad because I won’t let you ruin Phyllis’s lawn. You’re mad at me so you’re trying to hurt my feelings. I know you don’t think what you’re saying is true.”
    â€œFine. I hate you. I hate you just as much as I hate Phyllis, maybe even more. I hope you drown in The Cube tomorrow, Easter, I really do.”
    I knew she didn’t mean it, really I did, but it hurt my feelings anyway. I lay as still as I possibly could, until the carpet sucked me all the way under.
    At first it was hard to breathe green carpet because it didn’t feel like real air. It felt thick and itchy like wool or bushes but after a few terrifying seconds I got used to it, and after a few seconds more, I loved it. Better than air. It invaded me like water up your nose or campfire smoke in your face, but in a fantastic way. I took full, deep, delicious breaths and did back flips in the green. It moved me around like hands, scooping me up under my arms, passing me along, over and under, sideways, upside down, all the while filling me up and scraping a little bit of me off with it when I exhaled. I wanted to be sucked up by every colorful carpet in this whole house. I wish there was a pair of hands like this to move me through Phyllis’s basement cube. Cube, cube, cube. I wondered if the basement was actually the shape of a cube. It might be. There’s really no way to tell when you’re inside of it.

Crush
    My cigar-butt legs felt like they were filled with lead, and they felt like lead to my fingers, too. So stiff that I could knock on them. I guess muscle death had already occurred. Coincidentally I’d just read all about “crush syndrome” in my