wild and blind to all reality. His sickness has turned him into a shadow of a person. His guilt has flayed the meat from his bones. His mind has warped like a wax figure left to melt in the sun. He has been destroyed by this house, by the church, by his humanity in the face of impossible expectations.
I grab hold of either side of the tub then and pull myself up. I breathe with needles in my lungs.
“Stop it!” I yell again. “Dad, please, you don’t have to do this.”
“The glory of the Lord is risen upon you!” he shouts. “I cast you out!”
He tries to push me down again, but I shake myself free.
“It wasn’t your fault,” I yell. “What happened to Sister Margaret—you didn’t know what he was going to do to her. You didn’t know he was going to kill her.”
Hearing my words, my dad falls to his knees at the side of the tub. His eyes fill with blood and he cries with tears of blood streaming down his face.
“Silence, evil spirit,” he shouts. “You will not trick me. I will not listen.”
“Dad, it’s the truth,” I tell him.
He raises up then and he gnashes his teeth together and he shouts with a terrible high-pitched cracking to his voice, “I cast you out, devil!”
And then he puts one hand on my stomach and one hand on my head and I plead with him, “Dad, no. You don’t have to . . .”
But he will not hear me. He presses his weight down on me and my head goes under again and water fills my mouth and he holds me there with the strength of ten men. I cannot move. I cannot even struggle. And I know if I swallow this water I will die.
I close my eyes.
I remember Rose’s words.
I remember everything—every moment of my life—it plays like a sped-up film reel running through a projector. I see it all unfolding to this moment.
Not only that, but I see my father’s life.
And my mother’s, too.
I see the history of Harmony House passing before me in half a second.
And then I focus on the spark of hope—of flame—of smoldering fire at the base of my spine. I focus on it spreading from vertebra to vertebra—engulfing me—transforming my body into a pyre of burning embers.
Around me the water begins to steam and come quickly to a boil. My father yelps and withdraws his scalded hands. But I let the fire burn in me ’til the water is at a rolling boil and the shower curtains erupt in flame and the fire climbs the walls and the mirror shatters and the windows combust in a fireball of raining glass.
A noise tears through the house louder than anything that has come before—a terrible wrenching sound, like wood and metal being pulled slowly away from its foundation.
And then I hear my mother’s voice.
She whispers softly to me.
I can’t make out the words.
But they comfort me.
And soon the fire dies out.
And I curl onto my side.
Everything goes black around me.
And my mother’s voice whispers.
Two perfect words.
“Thank you.”
And then it all fades out.
CHAPTER 18
I open my eyes.
And I am in Harmony House.
The rain and wind has stopped.
I sit up and look.
A tree branch lies splayed across the bathroom—having broken through the side window and drywall. It’s the twisted branch of an oak tree. And my dad is lying prostrate, crushed beneath it. He is dead. His mouth is open and his tongue is lolling. Blood pools beneath him.
Then I look down at myself—the blood dried and caked on my jeans. My stomach aches.
My father is dead.
And I must’ve miscarried.
The sun shines brightly now through the break in the wall. The smell of wet grass and rotted leaves and mud is thick in the air. I lean on the sink, then make my way over to my dad’s crumpled body.
Stepping out into the hall I see that the roof has been torn off and the sky is blue and clear. The side of the house facing the street, too, has collapsed completely, so walking down the hallway is like walking in a giant doll’s house.
I go to the room that was mine, the horrible pink walls stripped away. I grab a bag from under the bed and throw some clothes in it. I take off my blood-soaked jeans, too, and put on a pair of corduroys.
I hoist my bag up on my shoulder, climbing carefully down the collapsed stairwell, walking around Sheriff Jarrett’s