I’ve been trying to find the moment I became a bad person for a few hours now.
It could have been any instant from the day I was born, so I’ve had to look carefully. But it must have been before today, before the hospital. I didn’t mean for this to happen—I was good once, or at least not bad. Somewhere along the way I just got stuck, I suppose.
A good person wouldn’t have let her go so far. When we were little, my sister and I made up this game with an old plastic storage bin. She would climb inside, lay on her back, and drag on the lid, filling the dim space with exhales and anticipation. Then, I would climb on the top and press the cover down as she screamed and kicked, either until our mom came in to yell at us or until she finally pushed hard enough to leave the darkness. I’ll never forget the face she would make when she escaped; the panting tiger. I think it was her favorite part, the defiance.
I remember thinking, a couple weeks ago, I hadn’t seen that face in a long time. Something was gnawing at her. We hadn’t been talking much, not unless she had a cigarette to pull on between the silences. If you watch any of these talks closely, you might see the moment I became bad. Each meeting dotted with the free passage of nevermind, nevermind, nevermind.
A good person wouldn’t have waited. The air was muggy as I walked home.
Wait one moment, I’m sorry. I have to tell you something, and it’s about me this time; I’ve been living behind an invisible wall. No one else can feel it except for me, but I promise it’s there. It’s always there. It stops me from doing things. Things like clubs and sports. Things like friends. It’s why I could go straight home from school. If I had to describe it, it feels like that day, like pressure in the atmosphere.
There was no breeze to stir my hair.
After school I tended to follow a routine. Take your shoes off, eat your leftovers, do your work. It was something she sometimes teased me about, when we had those talks on dust-covered stoops—that I didn’t know how to live, not like she did. That I cared too much. Here’s another thing I’ve relayed over and over; there was nothing different about that day. The house was empty, and every action was swathed by a familiar quiet, the kind that makes me want to tip-toe. But look carefully right here. A moment that may have been the beginning of my badness. Walking back to my room, I saw her flip phone, split on its hinge, snapped. It was unusual and I knew that. But something inside of me bit its tongue to prevent that sense of wrongness from reaching my brain. The house was so still. I reached down silently, and slid the halves into my pocket. Would a good person do that?
The steam was what did it. What made me stop pretending. Sometimes on especially bad days, she would crank her shower knob as high as it could go, just to watch the way the room filled with dancing, trapped air. That day, it must have been going for a long time. That day, the carpet was wet—little condensed beads clinging to the shag. Moisture curled up the wood of the door and slipped back down like tears. I crouched to watch them disappear into the bright gap between the ground and the door. Mom will be upset if the wood warps, squeaked through the biting on my brainstem. She’ll yell at your sister again. Every other week they would decide to argue over something small, as if only to make sure they could still hurt each other. Afterwards, my sister would swear to us that she was going to run away, to never see any of us ever again, only to crawl to dinner at an early hour because that was how my mom liked it. Something is wrong. The carpet might mold, and then they would have to tear it out and replace it. Often when I remember my sister, the image conjured is one of her on that floor. She used to curl up in the small space between her nightstand and the wall and talk on the phone for hours, even though I knew it hurt her back sitting there. I remember when her boyfriend asked her out on that phone—she told him yes, yes of course, it didn’t meet her eyes. Something is wrong. If the water bill gets too high we’ll never hear the end of it. I have heard too many times of her ability to drink anything with a straight face, to stunt and dare at parties all night. Once at a classmate’s pool, she slipped and snapped two fingers, getting grounded for a month. I spent it watching her from a distance, wondering if she liked the stripes she wore. If she could escape them. I wished I had asked her if she ever really didn’t care and something is wrong. I’m not sure how long I stood at the door before reaching for the handle.
In the dissipating fog, I waited for one final defiance, but it never came.
Everything smelled like flowers outside the hospital. There were these big trees that danced falling petals wherever they wanted. I had just made it to today in my memories, tracing the divots in the invisible wall as my guide.
Suddenly everything feels very real. There are birds chirping in the eaves and gnats buzzing everywhere. There’s the sound of impatient families bickering and wheels turning under gurneys from inside the gleaming white building. I scratch at my palms and realize how long my nails have gotten. I listen to the sound of my lungs beneath my ribs.
I’m counting my 'should's. I should have knocked down that wall years ago. Or maybe I should never have had it at all. If it wasn’t there, I could have sat by my sister and looked her in the eye and made her explain what was wrong, really wrong, and never have accepted a nevermind ever again. I would have tackled her and hugged her and told her I loved her and that she didn’t have to care what all those people thought, and did she remember the tiger and our laughter and how we used to play together?
It takes my blotchy reflection on a polished beam for me to realize how my tears are falling around the edges of a smile. You just care too much. I start giggling and find I can’t stop. I laugh and laugh until the hospital security guard starts eyeing me, which just makes me laugh harder. I think it’s directed at myself. How even now I’m stuck, or maybe it’s at the memory of our laughter, how happy we were. I think you’re right, you know. When I stop for a moment, the wind blows through and I breathe light and easy as the breeze.