Simona Zaretsky's work has been featured in Lilith, The Normal School, and other publications. She holds an MFA in fiction from The New School. Find her on Instagram at @simona_zaretsky
MONSTROUS
Lyra pushed the scraps of her lunch into the kitchen sink: spongy shiitake mushrooms, the thick foreheads of carrots, green skin on purple onions. The creature burbled up from the recesses of the drain and hungrily slurped the entrails down into its shiny pink maw. It waited a moment, as though to be sure nothing else would be served, then dripped back into the drain, its skin tight and lumpy like the guts of insulation or uncooked chicken.
“Tam better not come in the kitchen tonight to tell me how I’m cutting broccoli incorrectly, or roasting brussels sprouts the wrong way.” She directed her words to the gaseous, burping noises emitting from the drain. “But then again, what are the odds she’ll want to leave New Boyfriend alone in my chaotic household?” Lyra’s voice turned nasal on the last two words, mimicking Tam’s cadence and pitch.
She swept her hand over the counter, brushing breadcrumbs into the sink. “I even called her on Monday, but I just couldn’t say it, you know—the words felt stuck somewhere between my heart and my throat. Tam—my dream’s about to come true; Tam—I’m going to be a substitute in the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra; Tam—everyone knows that’s the pipeline to a permanent position; Tam—the second chair is 65 and her arthritis is giving her hell.” Lyra paused, her breath coming in a little short. The hum of the refrigerator filled the air.
“I couldn’t get the words out,” she repeated, softer, wondering how to dislodge them tonight. She imagined the way her sister’s expression would shift (surprise to admiration? shock to pride?) as she finally began to see Lyra as something other than a bumbling younger sibling. She’d put the news off for weeks, until it grew so large and roiling in her gut that she was surprised she didn’t vomit. At first there was a kind of greedy pleasure, the good news hers alone, and then a kind of trembling worry shook itself into outright doubt as she began to wonder if perhaps this thing, this success, would slip through her calloused fingers like rosin down a dry bow.
Tam would be the first to remind her of the brutality of a dream realized.
But tonight was the perfect opportunity to meet the New Boyfriend and confess her gorgeous, glittering secret.
A few weeks ago, Lyra’s neighbor, Gretchen, had called to see if she could come over for tea and Lyra had agreed lazily, her viola held loosely, her mind still wandering the loops of notes. Five minutes later she realized the ramifications of her decision and rushed around her one-bedroom apartment shoving stray music notebooks under the couch; into the empty spaces in kitchen cupboards. She scrubbed the pots and pans in her sink (with their calcified pasta remains and crusty oatmeal skin) until her fingertips were red and burning, hoping to make room for the teapot. Debris always collected thickest around the drains in this apartment, slippery and chunky. She reached into the gullet of the sink to scrape out soggy leaves and bloated broccoli heads, but the sodden mass lurched away from her hand. Lyra wasn’t sure if it was skin, didn’t know what she was seeing. She leaned in closer, the smell souring like fast-forward rot.
Three small slits opened, exposing wrinkled black eyes that rotated until all three focused on Lyra. The creature chewed tentatively on the wet remains in the sink and then slid its pink body back down the drain. Her shock and fear were swept into its small mouth as Gretchen arrived. They sat on her couch, which faced the bookcases and her newly-cleared dining table. Every now and then Lyra glanced to her right, able to see through the open pocket door to the kitchen. She forgot to drink her tea, which sat cooling on the coffee table before her.
Lyra’s feet tapped out an upbeat, panicked tempo and sweat collected at her hairline. She imagined she looked dewy. Even Gretchen remarked that she looked rather flushed; it was odd for Gretchen to invoke Lyra’s presence at all. Lyra felt a surge of warmth, appreciation for this dollop of compassion, never mind that it quickly dissolved into Gretchen’s tales of her boss’s unkept promises. As per usual, Lyra wondered how long Gretchen would wait for her wishes to come true.
The unease Lyra felt began to shift and it became a thrilling afternoon for her. She wondered if the creature would poke its slick head up out of the drain as she walked into the kitchen to refill the newly-washed teapot with trembling hands. Gretchen’s words buzzed dully against her, like flies against a window.
In the coming weeks, when Lyra spoke out loud to herself, she found herself directing her words to the creature. The creature was the first to know Lyra’s magical news: she’d hung up the phone and spun around the apartment, squealing and playing the air-viola to Bartók’s Viola Concerto.
Now, as she placed crusty, small slices of bread in a basket, she realized that she had never been afraid of the creature; never considered how its mouth might easily stretch around her hand, her wrist. Short-sighted, Tam would say in a half-teasing voice, but with a furrowed brow.
Tam’s visit tonight was unaccompanied by the excitement, the simmering thrill of a secret, that there had been with Gretchen. There was, instead, uncertainty. A twisting sense of dread in her gut.
And the added weight of her phone call with Tam on Tuesday; her sister’s demand not to discuss the nature of their parents’ death—albeit years ago—in front of New Boyfriend: that monstrous storm, that scientific quest for glory.
The strings trilled against her fingertips, ringing out in shades of cobalt blue.
Lyra knew she should put away her viola—affectionately named Lucifer—and wipe a rag through the dust on her TV and the overstuffed bookshelves flanking it, but the grey gritty layer was universal and if she started to scrub one section, well then it would make the rest of the dirt and detritus stand out.
She needed to focus. Tam and New Boyfriend, Johann, would be over soon. She couldn’t stop the raucous clanking of the kitchen pipes, or the steady drip of water under the bathroom sink, but she could try to keep the creature in the sink safely out of Tam’s sight. She could present herself as the adult she wanted Tam to see her as. If she could manage to share her news.
The sky outside Lyra’s window was tilting into shades of sunset: notes of amethyst and orange. She brushed the horsehair bow across all four strings one last time, letting the sound settle her nerves. She laid the viola gently in its velvet blue case, worn a bit thin over the fifteen years she’d been playing, and slid the soft straps over Lucifer’s thin neck and wide base. She lowered the lid with a soft clap. A sound that filled her with a burst of melancholy, as it always did.
Lyra tucked the case onto the bottom bookshelf and hurried across the room, heading for the kitchen. On her way, she switched the hallway light off. No need to invite them in further.
Retrieving bowls of food from the faux-granite of her narrow kitchen’s countertops, she walked back out into the living room and hastily slid arugula, warm quinoa, and steaming tofu onto the blonde wood of the dining table, along with a basket of crumbly bread. She usually ate at the coffee table in front of her scratchy grey couch, but three years ago Tam had insisted she needed a proper dining table for when she entertained. Lyra could count the number of times she’d sat to eat a meal at the table and each time coincided with Tam blustering through the front door with fresh tales of a friend disregarding her fashion advice or a confession that Die Hard was her new date’s favorite movie.
Lyra used the table as a backdrop for her sheet music, splayed out based on what threads of a song were weaving through her head. She’d furtively stacked all that in the cabinet under the kitchen sink—despite the clanging and shuddering of the looping pipes; despite the pink creature who slept snugly within—because if Tam gave Johann a tour she might bend down to look beneath the bed, the couch. Lyra took a deep breath, trying to steady her nervous popping energy at the thought of her stashed music in its vulnerable location.
Maybe she had a few minutes more to spend with Lucifer—but then her buzzer went off and a deep sigh escaped her chest. She cast a last glance at the shut case before crossing the room and opening the apartment door.
Tam flew into the apartment like a spring leaf, smelling of lavender and rose oil as she enveloped Lyra in a hug. Her chin-length hair was cut severely, and wisps of it were loosely held back in a clip. Behind her shuffled Johann, taller than Lyra and Tam by at least a foot. His cargo pants’ bottom halves were zipped off and his tan tee shirt read Bacon is for Bastards around the image of a crying piglet.
“Lyra, this is Johann. Johann, this is Lyra!” Tam smiled widely. “I’m so excited you two can finally meet.”
“I’ve heard so much about you,” Johann said, shaking her hand.
“Me too.” Lyra’d heard nonstop about Johann and his efforts to end climate change, meat consumption, plastic bag use, cops, corporations, Tesla, etc. He must be extremely busy, seeing as he was also a creative director.
“What can I get you guys to drink? A 2017 Merlot, Tam?” Lyra added honey to her tone.
“2018 is really the vintage you’re after. The grapes weren’t stressed that year by rain or heat,” Tam answered, with a slightly wrinkled nose. “But it’s the thought that counts.” She smiled magnanimously and squeezed Lyra’s shoulder.
With her back to Tam and Johann, Lyra rolled her eyes retrieving the glasses and open bottle from the kitchen. She returned, placing them gently on the coffee table.
“I’ll have a glass, thanks, Lyra.” Johann winked at her as he plopped down on the far side of the couch, pushing pillows aside as Lyra poured wine generously into three glasses, feeling the same quick spark of closeness she felt when she threw some chocolate chips into the drain as an after-dinner treat for the creature. Lyra leaned forward, handing them each a glass, as Tam nuzzled up beside Johann.
Johann yawned widely. “Oh, man, I’m sorry—I had a gig that went late last night. The crowd was crazy.” He’d tied his long, brown hair into a bun, emphasizing his angular cheekbones.
“What kind of gig?” Lyra swung a chair from her dining table over to the coffee table and perched on the edge of it, facing the couple now cuddling on her couch. She had never shared an intimate moment on the cushions, unless an evening with her laptop counted. She glanced at the kitchen doorway, a sound like thick bubbling water reaching her ears though there was nothing on the stove.
“I’ve been getting into the DJ’ing scene, nothing super serious, you know. Music has always been a huge passion of mine. Last summer I kept having these moments where I heard one song on the radio and could feel exactly where it fit into another. The beats, the melody, the harmony. I could weave each individual strand together, stitch it into something new, something larger than all the little parts.” Johann was gesturing with his wine glass.
And Lyra was nodding, she realized, bent towards him like a daffodil. She understood perfectly how one song spoke to another and a whole golden echoing past, melodic phrases creating a new symphony that only she heard. Her fingers tapped restlessly on the base of her glass. She cast a glance over her shoulder at the bookshelves where Lucifer lay.
“I hear you’re a music aficionado as well?”
Her laugh was the awkward scrape of a bow on the wrong side of the bridge. Tam hadn’t heard her play in years.
"I’ve played viola since we chose our instruments in fourth-grade music class. Not exactly professional yet—I give lessons to kids in the school district, though.” Her cheeks were heating up and she knew she was looking more and more like her wine. Now was the moment to share her announcement about the philharmonic. She opened her mouth again, willing the words to leap out. To believe in this future she so desperately yearned for.
“I seem to recall your tenure in the Finely Tuned quartet a few years ago.” Tam’s eyebrows rose, a mimicry of their grandmother’s arch looks.
“Oh, well that didn’t last too long really—” Lyra mumbled. Of course Tam wanted to talk about Lyra’s failures. Then again, how could you really even fail at a minor hobby, right?
“You rehearsed with them for months, didn’t you? The cellist was particularly enchanted by your vibrato.” Tam smiled and gave a wink to Johann that nearly set Lyra on fire, sweat and embarrassment oozing from her pores. Sometimes she felt like all they had in common was the dark hairs on their pale arms and the twisting genetic strands from their parents.
“I couldn’t commit to it,” Lyra muttered into her glass. “Like you couldn’t stick with the flute.” The last words slid out. It was true, but it was a childish jab at an evening billed for getting to know Johann and please see me as an adult. Shame coiled in her gut.
Johann was nodding between them both, squinting.
“You’re leaving out the most interesting part: your inspiration,” Tam said, her voice higher, sharper. “Our grandparents were musicians who met in World War II. Grandpa was the company bugler and grandma a visiting singer. When the war was over they both ended up at Eastman. The notes on the wall are Lyra and me, so to speak.”
The words were a smoothly delivered tour of their family’s past; their grandparents had loved to tell the tale, trading sentences back and forth in a sweet duet. Their parents were never part of the story: they were the long silences.
“We practically slept in xylophones and ate our dinners with recorders.” Lyra grudgingly added the familiar lines. “They were always staying late for rehearsals, shows, or anyone who wanted to learn to drum.”
Tam snorted, hand flying to her mouth. “Why did everyone want to learn to drum?”
Johann fixed several strands that were flopping out of his bun. “I’m actually an extremely proud drum player. My parents hated it, though.” His smile was largo and Lyra sensed a question about parents in the pause. Her stomach twisted uncomfortably. The truth was a peach pit rough and puckered in her mouth.
“Shall we eat?” She stood too abruptly, gesturing to the table where all the food had already gone cold.
“I’m going to the bathroom. Play nice.” Tam scooted around the coffee table, patting her only slightly mussed hair as she fluttered down the hall. Johann plopped into the dining chair facing the bookshelf and Lyra sat opposite as he idly grabbed a piece of bread from the basket, breaking it into crumbs on his plate.
“That’s impressive how long you’ve been playing viola,” he said. “We could create some sick tracks if you let me record you. Mixing orchestral and electronic sounds makes vibrant, multi-faceted music.”
“How do you know I’m a talented violist?” Lyra asked him.
He laughed in staccato bursts. “I guess I don’t—but that’s a long time to commit to a hobby you’re not good at.”
“Lyra, what is going on in your bathroom,” Tam said, returning to the room. “It looked like you tried to squeeze a block of old tofu down the sink drain. I couldn’t even look in the tub. You can hire cleaning people. If it’s the money that’s stopping you, just tell me because I’ll happily send it over.” There was a lilt to her voice, as though she was telling a joke the three of them were in on, but Lyra felt like the punch line. Tam sat beside Johann and surveyed the cold food before her.
My drains are behaving badly because a creature lives in them—it's a great listener.
Tam didn’t usually mind the physical mess. Typically, satisfaction leaked from Tam’s pores as she sorted through Lyra’s stacks of ancient mail, Swiffered her kitchen floors into another color, folded clothes that had become a carpet.
But Lyra was going to sit on the Kodak Hall Eastman Theater stage in a black pencil skirt, a starched white button up left open to show just the top of her lacy black bra, Lucifer tucked magnificently beneath her chin. She was going to march soldiers into a dire battle on Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture and leave burned, echoing cities in her wake. She was ascending.
“Were your parents musicians, too?” Johann asked, stuffing a forkful of cold tofu and limp arugula into his mouth. Quinoa fell to the plate. The music in Lyra’s mind abruptly cut off.
“No, not really musically inclined. Lyra, is this gluten free bread?” Tam’s shrewd gaze reminded Lyra of raisins, something about the texture and sourness.
“I mean, sometimes this kind of talent and inclination skips a generation,” Johann said. “It’s that reaction to your parents' habits and lifestyle, that strong desire to emulate them at first and then to surpass them; or instead to defy them—to turn completely from their talents and careers. So if they’re an artist, then you’re an engineer, a scientist, a doctor.”
“Math and science have their own artistry, though,” Lyra said. “Just as music and sound can be broken down into energy, waves, equations even. One area doesn’t exclude the other; there’s constant overlap and a nourishment between the two.” Lyra had only wanted to shift the topic back to common ground—to music—but she found herself believing her own words. She had to share her news, the words beginning to foam and froth in her mouth, choke all other thoughts off. The Rochester Philharmonic Orch—
She took a quick breath but Johann spoke first.
“Your parents were the other side of the musician equation, then.” Johann’s bright eyes shifted back and forth as though watching the sound waves of his words shimmy in the air. He grinned triumphantly.
Tam’s smile was tight. “Personally, I like to think people are more than the careers they pursue. You’re sounding so capitalist, hon.” The last words were punctuated by Tam’s fork in the potatoes.
Exasperation passed over Johann’s face and he turned to Lyra, looking for an ally.
“Someone's job is a means to an end—food, shelter, all that. I just want to know more about them; they were clearly so important to you. And I know they passed when you were both so young but I just want to know you better. I’m a part of your life and so were they.” Johann’s voice became quieter and Lyra sensed this was a conversation they’d had before.
“How bad could it be, Tam? Were they arms dealers? Meat manufacturers?”
His voice cracked at the end, showing a soft, tender center that made Lyra uncomfortable. The intimacy made her want to slink below the table, wait for their anger to burn out. She pushed the dry quinoa around her plate. She had forgotten to add seasoning. How long had Johann and Tam been together?
A popping noise emanated from the kitchen like a bottle of soda shaken and opened. Lyra flicked her gaze to the kitchen’s pocket door, but she only saw a piece of the counter, the edge of the window above the sink.
“They were marine biologists,” Lyra said simply, guessing this would not be enough, and the couple turned towards her abruptly, Tam’s mouth falling open.
Johann’s face was a mask of confusion; there was not much secret-worthy in that. “That’s, uh, pretty dope. I’ve always loved the ocean.”
“Lyra, sweetie, this is not a conversation for you to insert yourself into.”
“They’re our parents, Tam.”
“This is between me and my boyfriend, Lyra, so if you can stop being a child and remove your head from the viola case it lives in, you might see that not everything requires your two cents.” Tam’s words erupted out, surprising them all with the heat.
Lyra turned to Johann, whose wide-eyed gaze darted between them, his hand tentatively reaching toward Tam who quickly clasped her palms in her lap.
But it was not just Tam’s story, Tam’s life. Lyra wanted this solo. Finally a chance to perform her own life.
“They got a tip one night about a kraken, a massive tentacle spotted far off the coast of Oregon. So they went out. Despite the storm coming in and the warnings not to.” Lyra’s tongue felt rough, her throat a little achy. A silence inky and deep lay in the room. “It was probably a giant squid, but they weren’t able to recover any data from the ship. Only one crew member survived. He came to the funeral and all he could say to us was it was a giant squid again and again and again.”
Lyra had always wanted it to be a mythical monster, a kraken with arms miles long and a thousand stories written in its thick skin. She’d never seen the crew member again; heard he drowned in a bottle of rum.
“There are no monsters, only bad decisions.” Tam’s voice was the steel hull of the boat, reinforced and weather-beaten. Yet fallible.
Lyra hadn’t realized she was standing, waiting for an encore. Her skin felt itchy and hot all over from her sister and Johann’s stares, from the vulnerability that gaped like an open wound from the story of their parents’ demise. She rushed into the kitchen, shaking her head with a rage that simmered just beneath the surface. With a queasy sense of victory.
She turned and saw a trail of light pink up the center of the window, almost like a line of spray-paint, but puffy. The rotting smell arose.
And the sink was full of pink shifting flesh, its lumpy edges rising toward the top of the basin.
“What happened to you?”
Lyra reached a hand in, unsure where the mouth was. Her fingers brushed the creature, hot and moist, and its shiny skin shuddered, tightening and releasing. Lyra’s hair slipped forward and she tipped back quickly, heart stuttering. Strands of her hair dangled on her cheek, spread a thick viscous substance on her skin. The smell of white bread gone green and orange peels withering in the sun clung to her.
How did it get so large so fast?
A loud pop and this time Lyra felt the air rush against her neck, her arms. She stepped back quickly and the spray landed lightly on her face, speckling her shirt. When she blinked her eyelashes were heavy with wetness, unease crackling along her shoulders.
The creature began to spill onto the counter, or rather pull itself up with pinched and bulging limbs. Three eyes pulled the flesh apart and opened. The cabinet doors clattered against their frame as another stream of gelatinous liquid spewed upwards, coating the window, gilding the ceiling.
Tam and Johann sat at the table, fingers interlaced. Their heads swiveled nearly as one at the noise but Lyra was already yanking the pocket door shut. It stuck and juddered and pulled nearly to a close with only an inch to spare as she tried to shake the image of those six oblong eyes out of her mind.
Tam’s eyebrow’s nearly disappeared in her hairline as she raked her gaze over Lyra. She moved swiftly from her seat at the table to stand beside her sister.
“Lyra, a word.” Tam pinched Lyra’s shirt between thumb and forefinger and pulled her away from the kitchen, away from Johann, to the shadows of the little hallway. “I asked one thing of you, Lyra, one thing, after years of cleaning up after you. I thought this dinner invitation was a step in the right direction. What the hell are you covered in? I told you I could help pay for takeout.” Tam’s voice was low and strained. “And you smell like old fruit.”
“I’m trying to get to know Johann. I’m trying to tell you that I’ve got a job with the RPO. And I’m not exactly messy. I have a system.” She was messy, she was dirty, but she wasn’t a child; her youth was as distant as the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. And her voice was not sotto voce.
Tam assessed the wetness dotting Lyra’s cheeks, her neck.
“Woah—that’s amazing, Lyra! Seriously, congrats.” Johann said from the table, a pair of drumsticks in his hands snapping and tapping against the empty chair backs, the dinner plates, a bowl half-filled with quinoa. “You’ve got to play for us tonight.”
Tam shook her head, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Just please clean yourself up and then let’s talk. What were you possibly cooking for dessert?” Lyra was only a clogged drain, a malfunctioning pipe. “Hon, I didn’t know you had drumsticks with you,” Tam said distractedly over her shoulder. She pushed Lyra further down the hallway, to the bathroom. “That’s nice about the RPO.”
Lyra nodded. She had imagined Tam’s grudging admiration, her shock and awe, the slow smile that might spread across her face. Perhaps even the disbelieving light to wink out in her eyes, the respect that would enfold Lyra in a hug.
She hurried to the bathroom, wanting to stand in the shower with her clothes on. Instead, she stood in front of the oval mirror, the harsh light carving deep purple and greens beneath her eyes. Perhaps I have crawled out of the drain, she thought, noting the limp strands of hair, chewed fingernails.
Her fingers brushed the liquid from her cheek to her neck, where she saw on her collarbone a thicker layer of pink glinting like raw, packaged salmon. It was vile, it was the sweating back of the witch’s neck as she pushed Hansel and Gretel into glimmering red coals. Revolting and mesmerizing, she felt her heartbeat keeping a steady time now.
Lyra turned the silver knob of the faucet; no water poured out to chime against the ceramic bowl. Looking down, she saw round rivulets of the creature slowly falling from the faucet to join the ring of pink that already sat there, shifting wetly, reflecting the light in shades of yellow. Her skin felt too tight.
On impulse she pulled back the faded shower curtain and sucked in a breath. All along the length of the beige tub lay the creature, smelling of yeast and boiled eggs. Near the drain it bubbled and churned, gathering itself. Lyra threw the curtain back and closed the bathroom door. In the hallway, she pressed her ear against the door, as though she could eavesdrop on the creature’s plan. Was the whole building infested?
If she could let her fingers glide over the strings of Lucifer, or just hold the bow, then she would know what to do. How to feel. She swallowed, taking the bottom of her shirt to try and rub the worst of the creature off her face, her arms. She pulled her hair back tightly, hoping the streaks would look like unwashed greasy hair. Someone Tam was familiar with.
She could get them out of here. Then she would figure this out, come to some understanding with the creature—she had been feeding it, sustaining it, there was certainly some common language they could speak.
But did she know all of the creatures that had spawned tonight? Did they think with one mind? Lyra barely realized she’d walked back into the living room, stood uncertainly by her chair.
“Lyra, how about your audition set for the RPO?” Johann cajoled her. In her peripheral vision, Lyra thought she saw the kitchen door quiver. “I know you probably hear it all the time, Tam, but I’ve been playing with the idea of incorporating Bach with this one Avicii track. Lyra, do you know any Bach? Or Avicii?”
His tone was warm. Lyra wanted his bone deep confidence to rub off on her, to lather her in its patchouli sweat.
Tam interrupted her contemplation: “I wish we could, but I have a feeling Lyra has some serious kitchen clean-up to do after this dinner.”
Lyra asked quietly, “Do you remember what kind of music our parents liked?”
She heard Tam’s jaw snapping shut, decades-old anger and grief trickling out of her eyes, her ears, her mouth, “They died chasing a fantasy, trying to prove sea monsters were real. They chose myths over us, Lyra. You and me. It doesn’t matter what kind of music they liked.”
Lyra was certain she saw the kitchen door quivering now, a vibrato hum pushing her into action. She was ravenous to have someone else sit with her as notes washed over and through the room. Was she a monster? She searched her heart for betrayal but only felt a stuttering longing for her parents.
“I bet we have time for one song though, I have to hear a professional violist solo performance.” Johann’s half smile was a gentle pluck on the C string of her center—low and steady.
The gurgle of piping. Coming from everywhere in the apartment now.
“I’ll play this piece I’ve been working on. It’s what I used for my audition for the RPO.” Lyra nodded in Johann’s direction and he bobbed his head even as Tam busied herself at the table—stacking dishes, shoving the remaining tofu and arugula and quinoa into the large serving bowl.
“She should really start cleaning the kitchen, if the sticky-looking shit all over her is anything to go by.” Tam’s soft words were punctuated by the clatter of forks and knives into a single pile. Lyra swallowed her nervousness down, eyes flicking to the white wooden kitchen door bursting with new splinters up and down its length.
With her back to the couple, she crouched to ease Lucifer out. The case was worn thin where her fingers unzipped it, clicked open the locks and picked up the sleek, caramel colored body. The tightening of the bow, an inhalation of breath. She felt her heartbeat in her fingers, palms suddenly clammy.
Lyra took a few steps from the table towards the pulsing, vital thickness of the shadows in the hallway. She fit Lucifer snugly into the spot between her chin and shoulder.
And then she put the bow to the four strings and began to play: waves lapping on the side of a rusted metal boat; engines humming, moon hanging wistful in the velvety night; laughter suffusing the air with jasmine as Motown played, hands clapped, hips swayed, and briny ocean water gorged itself on every CD, dirty sock, heaving lung. She wanted this for her parents desperately and with every breath she’d taken since they died. A less monstrous end.
Lyra didn’t realize she was crying until she felt the tears slide between her face and the black chin rest. She opened her eyes to see a stunned Johann, eyes round and red and wet too.
Tam’s gaze was locked on the kitchen door, which had stopped shaking. With a beleaguered groan, the wood cracked open and the creature began to ooze through, long splinters stuck in its sides. Heavy, humid air wafted into the room as Johann jolted to his feet. Panic hung in the purple circles beneath Tam’s eyes.
“We need—” Tam’s voice was wooly with fear.
Lyra could see that it was only her and her sister, trying to float through the long nights of dimpled waters so deep her song would never reach the gritty bottom.
She raised Lucifer to her chin, closed her eyes, and continued her song.