“He’ll think I did it,” Francesca said.
Mira’s forehead shot up. She hadn’t considered what Daddy might think: that Francesca had tried to do what their mother had done, but a nonnarcotic version, messy and overblown. All that was missing were razor blades in the sink.
“Then stick your fingers in the holes,” Mira cried. “In the palms. Do it.”
Francesca nodded mutely and let the towel fall, dropping her middle fingers delicately to the centers of her palms.
“Press harder,” Mira breathed. “It’s not going to stop unless you press harder.”
Francesca bit on her lip and balled her fists. “There’s so much blood. It’s not going to stop. You need to plug both sides.”
Mira dug her fingers into the pulsing stars on the backs of her sister’s hands, taking jackhammer breaths to stem the shock that was catching up with her. “Oh, Francesca.” She leaned in until their foreheads touched. “What now?”
Their heads snapped at footbeats on the stairs, slow and reluctant. Their father usually receded from his daughters’ before-school manipulations, which were fraught with higher emotions than other times of day. But this morning, there had been no drawers slamming, no rumble of hair dryers, only whispers: Francesca’s, harsh; Mira’s, pleading. He cleared his throat. More whispers, rushed. He pushed open the door, eyes still cast down.
“Time for school!” he called.
“Daddy!” Mira cried.
He gaped at the sight of his girls attached at the hands, blood between them. Mira was never to see their father in his bathrobe. It was an unwritten rule of their house, one of many bodily-related vagaries, like when he showered, or what he slept in. Mira was surprised by her overwhelming wish that he cover himself, put on his uniform—suit, shiny wingtips, black socks—so that she didn’t have to see him in this state. She tried to look away from his body, barrel-chested in his robe, thin legs below. He was her beloved dad, but somehow she was disturbed by his swollen parts. What was it about Mira that gave her weird, out-of-place thoughts? A normal girl didn’t hear the T coming and back away from the urge to leap onto the rails. She didn’t cradle a baby and consider how easy it would be to hold its nose for a minute, maybe two. Didn’t know the smell of gypsy moth caterpillars when they burned in an aluminum watering can filled with lighter fluid. Sometimes the only thing that stopped Mira was her mother’s voice in her head, reminding her that where she was, it was quiet.
He pushed past Mira and scooped the towel off the floor, blotting Francesca’s hands clumsily. Mira thought it was not like their father, to seem clumsy, but Francesca wasn’t making it easy for him, twisting and drawing away.
“Should I call an ambulance?” Mira said, her voice small.
His cheeks flapped as he shook his head. “Why, baby? Why would you do this to yourself? Why?”
“I didn’t slit my wrists!” Francesca said. She flipped her hands to expose the backs and threw them under his nose. “I have holes, Daddy! I have holes in my hands!”
He held her hands, turning them over and over, examining them for what seemed like an eternity to Mira.
“I didn’t make them,” Francesca whimpered. “They were there when I looked down.”
He raised his eyes. “Do they hurt?”
Francesca nodded, wincing. As their stare deepened, her wince dissolved until her face was neutral.
“I’m going to ask you again. Do they hurt?” he said.
She shook her head no.
“Good. That’s good. Mira: get the long ACE bandages from my bathroom, under the sink,” he said, never dropping contact with Francesca’s eyes.
Mira ran into her parents’ bathroom and dug around the tiny vanity, knocking over old bottles of her mother’s hairspray, nozzles encased in amber globules. It was touching that Daddy kept these relics, but it also seemed sort of lazy to Mira. She found the bandages and ran back to find Francesca with her face buried inside their father’s shoulder, his big hand cradling the back of her head. Mira felt the familiar sting of envy, and then shame. Francesca was her blood.
“Daddy,” Mira whispered.
He released Francesca and unfurled the bandages, wrapping them swiftly around her hands. Francesca cried softly.
“I’m sorry, baby, but we have to stop the flow,” he said.
“I can’t go to school like this,” Francesca cried.
“You’re not going anywhere until we sort this out,” he replied.
Mira crept closer, breathing in her father’s smell of coffee and eggs, aftershave and sleep.
“Are we going to the hospital?” Francesca sniffled.
“No!” he said, catching himself and saying more softly, “No.”
“Dr. Amendola, then?” Mira said.
He drew Francesca close to him, shooting Mira a pointed look past her sister’s head that meant yes and stop talking now. Mira frowned. He pushed Francesca away and held her chin.
“You’re going to be okay, do you understand? You’re going to go downstairs and Mira is going to make you a nice breakfast. Orange juice, too. I’m going into my office to make some phone calls,” he said.
Francesca broke into sobs. “But what if it starts up again?”
“We’ve got it under control. Don’t use your hands for anything for a while.” He steered her into the hall and down the stairs. Mira followed. When they got to the bottom landing, he turned before his office door. “It’s nowhere else, right?”
Francesca looked back at him, her face blanched. “The blood? No!”
“Good.” He shut the door.
Francesca slipped into the red leather banquette. Mira opened the refrigerator and spoke quietly into the sterile space. She needed to prepare her sister, who hated doctors keenly. “I think he’s calling Dr. Amendola.”
“Daddy wouldn’t,” Francesca said sharply.
Mira flinched, tossing her father’s cold eggs and toast from his plate into the trash. She dropped fresh slices into the toaster and topped his mug with sludge from the pot, staring at the ombré coffee as it swished inside, catching the light, gradations of black and brown. As she swept away the crumbs from around the toaster, she felt the grainy sharpness of each tiny morsel under the soft side of her pinkie. The toast popped exuberantly, it seemed, and she placed it on a plate, dragging the knife across the rough surface, the butter melting fast into sharply defined crevices. She looked over her shoulder at Francesca, her head bowed above her bandaged hands crossed in front, prayerful. Mira had noticed that in times of shock, life’s details became overly distinct, scoring themselves into her memory. She first noticed it the morning after her mother didn’t wake up. Her ordinary world took on a surreal quality, with higher colors, textures, and distinctions. It was a cruel trick her mind played, because those moments were the ones she wished to rush past, yet somehow they were made more vivid.
In those times, she’d hear her mother’s voice too, commands reminding her of thing she already knew.
You can make it stop, Mira.