The answer is no. The sisters, vain and consumed with their own internal lives, blind to the suffering of others,
drunk on the hot liquor of the desire for parental approval, desperate for love and validation— they see Cinderella as competition.
The stepmother replies that Cinderella may not go to the festival because she does not have a dress. Everyone leaves without her.
So Cinderella goes to the grave of her late mother. Above the grave, there is a bird in a hazel tree. The bird throws down a golden gown for Cinderella to wear.
We all know how the story goes from there. After dancing with the prince, Cinderella runs away. She runs from the prince because she is ashamed of being the unloved, ash-covered sister.
She drops a slipper.
The prince picks it up. He searches for her.
When he comes to their home looking for the woman whose foot will fit the slipper, the stepsisters try for his affection. They maim their own feet, trying to please their mother (who wants them to marry well) and hoping to find love.
One cuts off her big toe.
The other slices off the back of her heel.
They slide their butchered feet into the slipper, but the blood seeps out each time. The prince can tell they do not really fit the shoe.
When the prince asks if the third daughter might try on the shoe, her own father replies that she is only a “deformed little Cinderella.”
But she does try it on, and her foot slides into the blood-caked slipper easily. She is not deformed at all.
The prince recognizes her and takes her off to be married.
* * *
—
THIS IS MY story.
That is, I am Cinderella.
I am the good sister,
the outsider,
the one who mourns.
Like me, Cinderella is made over from deformity to beauty and social elevation.
Her new appearance is my new appearance.
But I am also a stepsister.
I am vain and consumed with my own internal life,
drunk on the hot liquor of the desire for parental approval, desperate for love and validation,
self-mutilated,
seeing my sisters as competition.
Bloody.
PART FOUR
The Boys
15.
A COUPLE DAYS after Rosemary first appears, my uncle Dean arrives with his kids, Yardley and Tomkin (full name: Thomas). Dean brings Penny’s friend Erin Riegert with him as well. Gerrard drives them all over in the big boat, which has a cabin below.
Dean is a good time. He lives in Philadelphia. He’s a lawyer, though he doesn’t seem to work that much.
When he divorced his wife eight years ago, he let her have the kids during the year. He gets them for the summers and brings them to the island. He’s the fun dad, making up for lost time. When he’s here, Luda does his laundry, unloads his dishwasher, and rinses the soap scum out of his bathtubs, but Dean has always been the grown-up who did the most things with us kids. He happily takes us sailing or to Edgartown for ice cream, when Tipper is busy with domestic matters and Harris on the phone with his office. Dean seems to be fully on holiday when he’s here. He horses around with Tomkin in the water. He lives large, drinks beer, slaps backs.
He and my father own Beechwood together, but today, Harris greets Uncle Dean like a guest. The boat arrives at noon. We all go down to the dock.
“Where ya been?” Harris calls jovially as Dean disembarks. “We had to start the summer without you.”
“Business got messy,” says Dean. “Is there lunch? I could eat a Cadillac.”
“Sandwiches and potato chips,” says my mother. “Should be ready at Clairmont in an hour.”
“That sliced beef I like with the horseradish?”
“On sourdough. And tuna salad. Your own fridge is full if you can’t wait.” Pevensie has been aired, cleaned, and restocked.
“Tomkin has to pee,” says Dean. “Bess, will you take him up to pee?”
“I can pee by myself,” says Tomkin. He is narrow and freckly, with brown hair and a nose that turns up. His eleven-year-old legs are covered with scrapes and bug bites. Here on the island, he spends his time staring into tide pools and climbing rocks. Last year, he and Rosemary built a collection of fairy houses around a stump at the back of Pevensie. Some were made of stones, and others were held up by twigs and roofed with leaves, fitting homes for Rosemary’s smallest dolls but mostly left empty for actual fairies. They were furnished with shells and bits of moss, plucked rose hips and beach roses. Tomkin is good that way. He’ll go along with girls. This year he hardly seems taller than before.
Bess goes with him, carrying his suitcases.
Penny is already gone from the dock. She captured Erin and the two of them ran toward the house squealing, lugging Erin’s bags. Erin could sleep in Rosemary’s old room, of course, but Penny wants her. There are twin beds in Penny’s room anyhow.
My mother nudges me. “Yardley.”
I am hanging back. I have not seen any of these people since Christmas, before my operation. I did talk to Yardley on the phone a couple times. She sent a card when I first had the procedure. I know her mother must have made her write it, but it was well done. Yardley’s fat, bouncy handwriting filled the whole inside of the card, both sides, and spilled over to the back.
That %&$* sucks about the liquid diet. I only just now thought about how attached I am to chewing. I’m like, obsessed with chewing, actually. Gum! Licorice! Only the red kind. Other chewy stuff like caramel! Or crunchy things like nuts!
Okay, I don’t give a poop about nuts. But I do chew a lot of gum.
Sorry. I don’t mean to make you jealous about all the chewing I do. This card is meant to cheer you up!
Oh, here is something fun. New boyfriend! I got rid of Reed that I was talking about at Christmas because he was NOT supportive about my college application angst. He kept wanting to come over and make out when I was literally applying to Harvard and the form was due the next day.
So I said, no more Reed.
New boyfriend = George.
George wants to make out all the time, too, but my college applications are in now, so it doesn’t matter. He’s a canoe racer, which I didn’t know was even a sport, but apparently it is.
Okay, out of room now, write back soon.
Love,
Yardley
She didn’t get into Harvard. She is going to Connecticut College and wants to be pre-med.
Dean is disappointed. He and Harris are Harvard men. But in general, Yardley is a “credit to the family.” She’s narrow of face and body, efficiently built, with strong, sturdy legs. Her face is freckled, with a snub nose like Tomkin and very thick brown hair, so that she radiates health and American sportiness. Her voice is firm and arresting; her jaw a sharp line from chin to ear.
Yardley has seriousness of purpose and knows how to work hard, but she can be extremely silly. She’s not creative—she herself says that—so she’s sweetly in awe of my mother’s summer parties and extravagances, and even of my occasional sketches and woven friendship bracelets.
“Carrie!” shouts Yardley, climbing off the boat with a tote bag full of Pop-Tarts and tennis ball canisters. “Get over here, cutie. Oh my god, you look amazing.”
I hug her. “Welcome to another summer.”
“This one’s going to be different.”
“Not that much.”
“Oh yes it is. Come meet the boys.”
I squint at her. “What boys?”
“I brought you a present.”
“What?”
“Just kidding. But also not.” Yardley drags me onto the boat and down into the cabin, where two teenage boys are hovering over a third, who has clearly just puked into a green bucket. “Terrible sailors but cute as hell,” she says.
“I’m a good sailor,” says one. He’s broad-shouldered with light skin, thick black hair, and high cheekbones. His nose looks like it’s been broken several times. He wears a Live Aid music festival T-shirt and baggy seersucker shorts.