Trees Do Not Grow To The Sky

HEARTBREAKER

The voice detonated in the lobby. Fragmented curses rattled against the glass doors of Hydrotherapy. Darla winced so hard she almost lost her grip on Mrs. Pond's wet shoulders. Mrs. Pond's mouth wobbled in alarm. Before Darla could tune her own voice to one of the three soothing pitches that worked on Mrs. Pond, her pager beeped.

Darla strapped Mrs. Pond's unresisting body into the protective harness and pressed the button, submerging the screams from the lobby in the roar of the whirlpool jets. Darla checked her pager to see what Hair And Nails wanted now.

"I can't go help with intake." Darla sometimes talked back to her pager, since she couldn't talk back to her boss. "I just got her into the tub."

From behind Mrs. Davis's wheelchair, Aimee called out, "Go on, Darla, I'll look out for Mrs. Pond. Sounds like we got a live one."

Usually people didn't turn up at Whitechapel Acres till they were mostly dead. Aimee would never say that, of course. No matter how little was left inside a "guest's" withering husk, Aimee always treated her as if her feelings could still be hurt.

Darla's knees complained again as she descended the stairs. She hadn't been to her doctor about it. He'd just hit the replay button: diet and exercise, lose weight, blah blah blah. Like it was that easy. Like all you had to do was make a wish.

Another volley of curses ripped up the stairwell, followed for the first time by an intelligible and complete sentence.

"You're only dumping me in this hole cause you don't have the guts to kill me!"

Darla stopped on the landing, and peered down into the lobby to assess the situation.

Mrs. Helen Augusta Neville--that was how she introduced herself, though in Darla's mind she went by Hair And Nails--stood near the entrance, her smile as rigid and as laminated as her name badge. She was trying to talk with a woman Darla had never seen. At thirty or thereabouts, this other woman was too young to be the new arrival, and she couldn't possibly be on staff. The sheen of her long ash-blonde hair, the subtlety of her makeup, and the extreme cruelty of her shoes all spoke of real money. So did the charcoal suit jacket and skirt that flattered her toned and slender body. On what Whitechapel paid, even Hair And Nails couldn't afford to look that good.

The stream of high-volume, high-octane profanity was erupting not from the unknown ash-blonde, nor from Hair And Nails, but from the hissing, cussing, scratching hag who was grappling with Andy from Assisted Mobility. From the wasted flesh around her jaw, the withered eye sockets, and the wattles in her neck, the old woman had to be past ninety. But her lungs were in excellent condition, and she wore a black leather trench coat and black boots with stacked heels which were no doubt leaving bruises on Andy's shins. A bony finger at the end of a long arm stabbed past Andy to accuse the ash-blonde.

"I should never have brought you out of my body alive, you rotten-holed whore!"

Hair And Nails's eyes bulged. The ash-blonde remarked, "Grandma gets me confused with my mother."

Hair And Nails turned toward the stairs, smiling as if Darla's red sweating face and mouse-colored hair were delightful to behold. Hair And Nails always smiled that way at people she hated.

"Darla, we need your help with our new arrival."

Andy moved gratefully aside. Darla leaned over.

The old woman punched her right in the breast.

Darla turned her broad back, blocking Hair And Nails's sight line. She stiffened the fingers of her hand and jabbed them hard into the old woman's belly. The hag collapsed with a shriek. Andy snapped the guards on, locking down her wrists and ankles. The chair vibrated with the old woman's chained fury.

"She broke her right wrist recently, and she's very frail," said the ash-blonde. "Her short-term memory's good, but her mind wanders when she's under stress."

"You lying bitch!" shouted the old woman.

"We have her history," said Hair And Nails. "We'll make sure she gets all her medications."

The old woman filled her lungs for another blast.

"There's only one medicine does me any good and you won't let me have any!"

The ash-blonde allowed herself one martyred sigh.

"We'll take good care of your grandmother, Ms. Embry," said Hair And Nails.

"Thank you, Mrs. Neville," said the ash-blonde. "I appreciate your finding a place for Regina. She's quite a handful."

"We're pleased to have her, Ms. Embry."

Hair And Nails dropped to one knee by the chair. She was a great believer in eye contact. The old woman glared back, as if she were also a great believer in eye contact.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Embry," chirped Hair And Nails, laying a hand on the old woman's gnarled fingers. "I'm Mrs. Helen Augusta Neville, and I'm the community director here at Whitechapel Acres. Now Mrs. Embry, I want you to know, we're not a nursing home. We're a community of mature Christians who happen to require assistance in their day-to-day lives. It's a difficult passage, but with the Lord's help, I think you'll be very happy here."

The old woman's head inclined toward Hair And Nails. In soft and not unpleasant tones, she said, "If I had my strength, I'd rip your larynx out through your nostrils."

Darla covered her mouth to stifle her laugh. For the first time, the ash-blonde looked at the old woman with something like affection. Hair And Nails stepped briskly away from the chair.

The ash-blonde leaned over to kiss the still-fuming hag on the forehead. Darla noticed a crystal pendant dangling from the end of a gold chain around the younger woman’s neck. It was a teardrop shape, faceted and sparkling. It couldn't be a diamond, though; it was the size of something you'd find on a chandelier.

"Goodbye, Regina," said the ash-blonde. "Try not to be your own worst enemy."

The old woman snorted. "I wouldn't stoop to do your work, Caroline."

The lobby doors slid shut on the departing ash-blonde. Hair And Nails relaxed visibly. It was all so much easier once the relatives left.

"Darla, would you take Mrs. Embry up to Pearly Meadows?"

Exhausted by her last stand, Regina Embry barely moved as Darla piloted her into the elevator.

"I don't think that's anatomically possible," Darla said, after the doors closed.

"What?" said Regina.

"Ripping someone's larynx out through their nostrils."

Regina twisted in the chair, trying to get a good look at Darla's face.

"What's your name again?"

Darla snapped back into her routine servility.

"It's Darla, ma'am."

"You ever tried it, Darla?"

Darla could only answer, "No ma'am, I haven't."

"Then you don't know, do you."

Darla wheeled her out of the elevator and down to the Pearly Meadows Suite. Whitechapel Acres advertised itself as the best retirement community in North Carolina; it had to be the most expensive. The Constant Care Suites were much nicer than Darla's own apartment. Still, nobody was ever happy to see them.

"Your granddaughter's had your things sent up," said Darla, nodding at the suitcase that lay open on the luggage rack.

"Those aren't my things."

Darla unlocked the restraints. Regina's hands trembled on the armrests. Her shoulders dropped as she managed to lift her hips a few inches. Then she let herself back down into the chair, panting.

"Let me help you up, ma'am."

She allowed Darla to boost her out of the wheelchair, unbutton the leather coat, and slide it off her shoulders.

Beneath the coat Regina wore black leather pants and a black corset laced up the front. And nothing else.

Darla's horrified eyes sought refuge in the old woman's face.

"That crap in the suitcase isn't mine," repeated the old woman. "Caroline ordered it all from Talbots."

Regina tottered toward the armchair. Darla caught her arm and lowered her into it. She was surprised to feel metal. Around her right wrist, Regina wore a tight iron cuff--several inches wide, half an inch thick, and rough to the touch.

Aimee stepped through the doorway. "My name's Aimee, Mrs. Embry. Mrs. Neville sent me to help--"

The corset rendered Aimee speechless, but she rallied.

"Well, ma'am, now aren't you the fashion plate!"

Regina's shriveled mouth spewed a stream of filthy words. Aimee didn't turn a hair. She was used to worse. A lot of the Whitechapel residents looked upon racial equality as a fad that would pass away long before they did.

"I'll get your bath started, ma'am," said Aimee.

"I don't want a bath."

"We bathe everyone on arrival, ma'am." Aimee strode into the bathroom and turned on the taps.

"Shall I take your bracelet off for you, ma'am?" Darla said.

Regina's left hand moved to cover the cuff. Her lips twitched in a half-smile.

"You hate her," said Regina.

"Ma'am?" said Darla.

"Aimee. You hate her, and you don't know why. You want to know why? Cause it's not just because she's black, precisely."

"Ma'am, I don't—"

"All Aimee's life and all her mother's life and her mother's mother's life Aimee's people have been treated like dirt by our people. Now here's Aimee, cleaning up after rich old white women who can't wipe their own asses," the old woman spat. "She has every doddering old bitch in here at her mercy, and look at her. Drawing me a bath. All this vengeance laying around, and she won't lift a hand to pick it up. That's why you hate her. Cause she could, and she won't. Where you would, and you can't. Cause what you hate isn't cooped up in this dump."

Darla decided not to have heard any of that. She knelt by the chair and began unlacing the boots.

"I like you, Darla," said Regina. "I'm going to make you my project. I've got nothing else to do."

Regina took Darla's chin in one hand and tilted it so she could stare into Darla's face. Her hand trembled, but her gaze was steady.

"You've got a real pretty face, Darla. Too damn bad about the figure."

Sunday morning, while the other residents were at services, Darla brushed out Regina's hair. It was the color of spoiled milk and a yard long.

"Course I never went to college," Regina observed. "Women didn't in my day. Did you go, Darla?"

"One year at Carolina."

"One year? What happened?"

"I got sick of it."

True enough. She got sick of watching herds of women troop along the red brick paths, all blonde hair, laughter, and flirting. Sick of sitting invisible in the back of the classroom as the professor fawned over the petite twitterers in the front. Sick of hearing her father complain about money.

Regina's head jerked. "You're pulling on it."

"Sorry, ma'am."

Regina sighed.

"Come sit. I'll show you how to brush a lady's hair."

Darla hesitated, but she handed Regina the brush and sat on the floor at her feet.

Regina ran the palm of one hand over the back of Darla's head.

"Start at the bottom. Nice and slow, small strokes."

Regina's voice matched the brush's rhythmic, repeated, downward slide and the whisper Darla's hair made running through the pliant bristles.

"Caroline's no blonder than you are," said Regina. "Gets her hair frosted. Puts all that sleek'n'shine'n'hold'n'junk in it too. It's all craft. Youth, beauty. All craft."

Regina's free hand followed each brushstroke, smoothing the hair down. With her eyes closed Darla could forget that the hand belonged to an ancient foulmouthed harpy. It could belong to anyone--to Dr. Burke from Intensive Care, for instance.

Something bit her.

Darla jumped to her feet, shouting in pain. Her scalp throbbed. But her anger sickened into shame as she looked down at poor old Regina, scrabbling with shaking hands at the brush's bristles.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Embry."

"Haven't I told you to call me Regina?" she said, folding her hands. "I've never been anyone's wife."

Darla went to the closet for Regina's clothes.

In the mirror above the bureau, Darla saw Regina hunched in her chair, hands working in her lap, twining something around her bony fingers.

"My goodness, Mrs. Embry! What a lovely necklace."

Bill Jenkins, who ran a piece goods store out in Durham, came to Whitechapel once a week to lead crafting classes. The old women loved his eunuch's treble and soft hands. Regina despised him, but she never missed a session.

Regina picked up the string of beads from her tray and clutched it to her chest.

Darla advanced from the doorway. "Time for lunch, Regina."

Regina turned. Her hands separated, each holding one end of the necklace between thumb and finger.

"There's the birthday girl," said Regina. "Here, Darla, I made this for you."

It was in fact Darla's birthday. She had no plans. Her father would call and talk to her awkwardly. Her brother would send an email from his base in Kuwait. This thing Regina had made would be her only present.

It was an assortment of glass and plastic baubles in unconvincing jewel colors threaded on nylon. In the center was an enormous plastic carbuncle, dyed a garish red and flashing like a disco ball. Cheap, chunky, and ugly. Just like Darla.

"Put it on," said Regina. "Humor an old woman."

Queasily, Darla took it from Regina's hands. She brought the ends behind her neck and shut the clasp.

The red carbuncle lay warm against her skin. Darla stroked the beads, confused by sudden emotion. Crazy old bitch that Regina was, she was genuinely happy to see Darla wearing this hideous thing. And Darla was happy to see Regina happy.

The thread circling Darla's neck swooped invisibly toward Regina's throat. We're together, Darla thought. We're made of the same bitter stuff.

Regina smiled.

"You like it, Darla?"

"Yes, ma'am, I do."

Darla leaned across the washroom sink, studying her reflection.

Her face was pretty. At least it had been. Her cheekbones were buried now, her jaw line spoiled by fat.

The red carbuncle winked at her from the mirror.

She was twenty-five. If she worked hard, she could have a couple hot years before she hit thirty. And then she wouldn't have to die knowing she'd never been a heartbreaker.

How did one go about it?

Simple enough. Eat less and exercise.

She'd go home and unplug the refrigerator, then go out. Come back when the ice cream was melted, the cheese soft and sweating. Throw it all out. Clean house.

Her apartment complex had a pool. Swimming was non-weight-bearing exercise, she'd start with that. Pilates, weight training, yoga, there was no end to the ways people had invented to waste their energy. Too much food and not enough hunger, nowadays.

She'd make herself her own project. Take care of herself first. About time.

III

Damn the cold weather.

It works. It still works.

Blood welled from the gashes, gumming up the torn wool. Extra-thick, her luck, one of those sweaters the Irish women knitted for their men on the islands. Each family had its own pattern so they'd know the bodies when they washed up. Hell of a time they'd have figuring out this pattern. Third jab now and it still wasn't cutting clean. Her arm ached all the way to the shoulder. It was never this hard. Were his ribs hewn from solid rock?

One more time.

Pain shot from her wrist to her burning brain. Trying to disengage the points only made her body scream. Her hand, his chest, the cracked asphalt, the sodden wool, her screams, his screams--the whole night melted into one sickening flux of pain given and pain returned.

Oh no. Didn't I tell you? Didn't I fucking tell you not to?

That voice was better than an alarm clock. It never failed to propel Darla out of bed and into the bathroom, where she tried to erase the dream as fast as she could. She never woke knowing who she had been trying to kill or why it wasn't working or who was yelling at her; all she knew was that the faster she got up the quicker she stopped seeing scarlet when she closed her eyes. Brush, floss, then on with the sports bra, T-shirt, shorts, and running shoes, and into the darkness.

The beads around Darla's neck bobbed as she broke into a trot. The plastic carbuncle beat time against her chest. Four months of this and she was still only down to 197 pounds. A minor miracle; but still a long way from heartbreaking.

Come on, Darla. You're a lot stronger, and the hotness is coming. Anyway you don't want to wind up like Hair And Nails. Size 4, size 2, they sell junk in size 0 now, what the hell is that? You're invisible, but you still need clothes? Forget numbers. Time was a man wanted a bosom on a girl. A real one, not this plastic inflatable trash they pump into people. You won't turn out all bony and dead-looking. You'll be a real heartbreaker.

"You mind if I join you?"

Darla glanced at the man who had just pulled out the chair across the table from her. When her eyes got past the white coat, she almost choked on her steamed broccoli.

"Go right ahead, Dr. Burke."

"Thanks."

Darla's blood pressure went up as he sat down. She reminded herself that the cafeteria was very crowded at this time of day, and that she was sitting at one of the only tables that wasn't full.

"How are you, Darla?"

"Can't complain, Dr. Burke."

"You look good," he said. "Have you lost weight?"

People were starting to say that to her now.

"Yes, I have. Thank you, Dr. Burke."

"How's Mrs. Embry holding up?"

"Kind of low in spirits, Dr. Burke, but she's hanging in there."

"She's a fighter," he nodded, scooping up his mashed potatoes. "In not bad shape for ninety-two--or however old she really is."

Darla laughed. Dr. Burke shook his head.

"You think I'm kidding. These women never stop lying about their age. The cotillion never ends."

She laughed. He picked up his can of Diet Coke and raised it to her. "Cheers."

She watched his throat work as he drank. She could almost see the blood beating in the angle of his jaw, almost follow the bloodstream back to its spring, the heart pumping inside its cage of bone.

Darla's right hand lifted off the tabletop. She gave her wrist a shake.

The metallic scales cascaded soundlessly from the iron lips of the cuff. Teeth raked the air beyond her mailed fist, all six of them, jointed but sinuous, tipped at their razor edges with obsidian. Awake again, hard and beautiful, the heartbreaker.

Darla squeezed her eyes shut. She laid her right hand on the table. There was no clank of metal. She felt hard plastic against her palm. She opened her eyes.

It was just her hand. No talons, no jointed metal glove, no iron cuff.

"Are you all right, Darla?"

Glancing at Dr. Burke's face did things to Darla that she couldn't name.

"I'm all right, Dr. Burke," she stammered, pushing back her chair. "But I've got to get back to work. It was nice talking to you."

"The pleasure's mine," said Dr. Burke. "Take care now."

Walking away like a coward. But no, no, keep walking. A doctor and handsome too, he'd have an army of people out looking for him. Find him again when you're not so hungry. Everything doesn't have to be food.

"What are you looking at?"

Regina had caught Darla staring at the iron cuff again.

"Nothing, ma'am," said Darla, settling the pillow behind Regina. Regina got out of bed these days only to go to the bathroom, but she liked to sit propped up.

"Is it cold out?"

"Not too cold."

"Course in here it's all the same day," said Regina. "Hunting season year round."

"Hunting, ma'am?"

Regina's voice sharpened.

"Your daddy never took you hunting?"

"No ma'am, he always took my brother."

"That's appalling. Every girl ought to learn to hunt."

"I never liked guns."

"No more do I," Regina answered. "Killing hadn't ought to be done by cowards and idiots. You've got to respect your prey, or else it's junk. You eat junk, you are junk."

"I suppose that's true, Regina," Darla said.

"I taught Caroline how to hunt," Regina said.

Regina hadn't mentioned Caroline in months. Darla had wondered what that was about. She knew from Aimee that

Caroline still came to visit, but she and Darla always missed each other.

"Did you, Regina?"

Regina's voice lost its edge. Her gaze traveled into the sunlit air outside the window.

"Caroline, I said to her, that's not how we do it in this family. I don't care what all the boys are doing. You're an Embry girl and you hunt alone. Not in packs like those animals. That’s all they are under those white sheets. Meat on feet out for cheap nasty thrills. Call themselves wizards. Wizards my eye. You know better."

Darla's mouth went dry.

There was no way. You still heard about the Klan once in a while, but Caroline couldn't be much over thirty. Surely…all that…wasn't still going on…

"I taught her everything," Regina repeated. "And she sticks me in a home. The Embry girls are bone-evil all the way back to year one, but never has any Embry girl done something so unnatural."

Regina's anger saturated the room. Darla inhaled it, savoring it, hating Caroline too. Sleek little bitch. So proud of herself and what was she but bile poured into a frozen shell, cool and creamy and beautiful till you tried to take a bite.

The breakfast cart rattled outside the door. Regina went on murmuring to herself as Aimee wheeled it in. Darla picked up Regina's tray.

"That liar Caroline says she doesn't want to kill me," Regina shouted. "Course she wants to kill me, I'm her mother. But to starve me into this dump! Least she could do is kill me outright. I taught her how to hunt!"

Regina's jaw trembled. Tears stood in her eyes.

Darla's brain skipped a groove and spun in circles. I'm here, she's there, I'm there, she's here, this makes no sense but it does.

Aimee said, "Caroline's your granddaughter, ma'am."

Regina blinked. It was the click of a camera shutter, ending the exposure.

"What is it today, Darla?" Regina said. "Scrambled eggbeaters or yogurt parfait?"

Pavement hard against her back. That wasn't right. Night sky above her. That wasn't right either. Wrist felt like a horse had trampled it, rest of her body throbbing in sympathy. That she remembered. Heartbreaker back to sleep.

How'd she get it out of his chest?

A blurred constellation sharpened into a single falling star. Teardrop shaped, diamond bright, exploding into eight crystalline rays that sliced the scream right out of the bleeding man's breast.

Every nerve in her body lit up as she wriggled onto her side.

In black from neck to heels, blonde hair tucked under a black knit cap, Caroline dug one knee into the man's squelching gut and yanked on the golden chain with her gloved right hand. The diamond, grotesquely swollen, tore a hole through the man's bloodied white sweater and burst into the air. Inside the bloated teardrop the man's heart expanded, squeezing against the walls of its transparent prison.

With a flick of the wrist, Caroline sent the diamond spinning. Gobbets of flesh and blood scattered in circles as the diamond shrank till it was a pendant again, clean on the outside but with a dense red heart.

She wanted to tell Caroline how beautiful it was. All she could force out was a cough.

Caroline dissected her with one angry glare.

"Damn it." Caroline slipped the chain around her neck and tucked the pendant inside her leather jacket. "This is the last straw."

Through a haze of pain she watched Caroline drag the body toward the dumpster. His heels dragged in the cooling blood, painting the pavement. Caroline must be livid; she hated mess like she hated danger. Even if it had been clean, this kill would have broken most of Caroline's rules. Nobody making over $20,000 a year, nobody with a family, nobody from the suburbs, no cops, no lawyers.

The body banged against the hollow metal side of the dumpster as Caroline shoved it in. Flames burst from the dumpster. Caroline was fanatical about disposing of the bodies. Read too many yellow backed novels, worried too much about the police. Anyway the blood was everywhere.

Caroline threw her blood-soaked gloves into the fire. Now Caroline was coming back to kill her.

She tried to shake out her wrist.

The heartbreaker woke, scale on scale cascading from the wristband. The pain unstrung her. Iron clattered onto the pavement. The heartbreaker's talons retracted.

"Oh, momma."

Caroline laid the broken wrist across her bosom and lifted her off the sticky pavement. In Caroline's arms she felt almost safe, though her own hands were damp and sticky, and though each step felt like it was breaking her wrist all over again.

You've got to stop, momma.

Darla thrashed, and broke the surface of the dream.

The clock said 4:37 a.m. Darla was covered in sweat. She flexed her right wrist, anxiously, already not remembering why.

Would you stop telling everyone I'm trying to kill you?

That morning Darla hadn't been able to get the voice out of her head. It had followed her all the way to the Whitechapel grounds.

What's the point? They don't believe you.

Darla parked and started the walk toward the entrance to Constant Care. The walk was much less of an ordeal now, even in the heat.

Do you have any idea what I had to pay just to get you in here?

When she got upstairs, the door to Pearly Meadows was closed. Darla reached for the handle.

Everybody dies, Regina.

The voice came from inside the room. And also from inside her head.

Darla froze. From both places, Regina's voice blasted an answer.

"I wouldn't be dying if I could make my medicine!"

The voice from Darla's dreams replied. "I told you I'd share mine if you'd stop hunting. You wouldn't have it."

"Yours isn't any good! Anyway I bet you're poisoning it."

"It's all the same damn potion, Regina, brewed from the same secret ingredient. It works on me. It works on you too, you're just so old now it's a drop in the bucket."

"If you made it right—"

"Regina, death's got more patience than we've got power. All the Embry girls have ever been able to do is slow death down. You are going to die, no matter how many hearts you break. I'm paying top dollar so you can die in comfort instead of breaking your hip in a dark alley and lying there till the rats eat you. And don't ask me why I bother, because I'm sure I don't know."

"You put me in a home," Regina bleated. "No Embry daughter ever did such a--"

"They never let their mothers live that long. Virginia was barely ninety when you killed her. You're twice her age now. You have to accept--"

"I will never accept a God damned thing from you!"

"You know what, momma?" The voice was colder than it had ever been in Darla's dreams. "I'm done. I've been taking the same shit from you every day since 1931 and I'm sick of it. Enjoy your stay. I'm not coming back."

Not knowing why--not knowing anything except that she was consumed by anger--Darla threw the door open.

Caroline Embry faced Regina's bed, her pale ponytail bisecting the back of her cocoa-brown sweater. Darla's eyes followed its line to the cream-colored wool slacks that smoothed out the curves of a perfect ass, clinging to her thighs before flaring out just above the insteps of her brown mules.

It wasn't desire that swamped her. It was greed. Everything Darla was killing herself for was encased in Caroline's scented, moisturized, unblemished skin. That body was perfect. She'd been born with it. Never had to work for it. Darla was the one busting her hump every day. Darla was the one who deserved that body.

Caroline turned. Crystal glittered as the pendant swung.

"It's Darla, isn't it?" she said.

"Yes ma'am," said Darla, trying to keep the hatred out of her voice.

Caroline's eyes locked onto Darla's necklace.

"Darla," Caroline said, "I'd like to speak with you in private about Regina's care. Is there somewhere we can talk?"

Her voice raised hairs all down the back of Darla's neck. But if she refused, Caroline would complain to Hair And Nails. You couldn't risk your job over an animal shudder and a half-remembered dream.

Darla led Caroline to Hydrotherapy. It was empty, but they would be visible through the glass doors to anyone in the hallway.

Caroline's steps echoed from white basin to white tiled wall. Darla sat on the edge of the first tub. Caroline sat near her, swinging one leg across to straddle the edge. Darla blinked as Caroline let her take a long look into her cold green eyes.

"I almost didn't recognize you, Darla. Have you lost weight?"

Caroline's manicured hand fingered the thin gold chain around her neck.

"Yes ma'am," Darla said.

"You look great."

Darla's jaw clenched. "Thank you, ma'am."

"I appreciate everything you've done for her, Darla," said Caroline. "I know how hard Regina is to take."

Caroline's voice softened.

"I can't tell you how long I spent trying to penetrate her alligator hide. I went through a phase when I was obsessed with botany, because it gave me hope. No matter how hairy and hard the bark is, everything that grows has pith. White, soft, fibrous, yielding. Slit open any stalk and there it is, waiting to be found by the blade."

The pendant twirled back and forth on its chain, slicing light into rainbow shards.

Darla's heart hiccupped, stuttered, slammed into overdrive. Her mind was screaming at her to look away, look away you stupid bitch, but her eyes were riveted on the pendant. She needed to know if there really was a green flame inside the crystal.

"We wear our pith on the outside," Caroline said. "And on the inside too."

A green shoot with eight leaves uncurled from the narrow end of the pendant, thrusting tendrils along pointed ribs that sprang open like the rays of a star.

Darla's vision broke into flashes of lightning. Her head caught fire. Her stomach boiled. There was a snap, the stink of burning hair, and a rapid patter like dried peas falling onto a barn floor.

"Don't trust Regina, Darla."

Darla hung over the tub, nauseous, as Caroline's heels snapped across the tiles.

"She doesn't give a damn about you. All she cares about is what she can use."

When Darla's vision cleared, she was staring at the white bottom of the whirlpool tub. It stared back with a dozen glittering eyes.

Beads. They were beads. The necklace had broken, and the beads were strewn along the bottom of the tub. There was the big red one, grimy and dull. And there was the string the beads had been threaded on, burnt through.

Darla picked up the string and sniffed at the blackened ends.

It wasn't nylon. It had been braided out of strands of mouse-colored hair.

"I won't have that bitch in here!"

"Mrs. Embry, she's your legal guardian," said Hair And Nails.

Darla's head was still throbbing, and Regina's fussing was pushing the needle back up to migraine.

"She only comes in here to gloat!"

Regina's passion flared into a coughing fit. Darla brought a glass of water to the head of the bed.

Regina's hand lashed out. Cold water struck Darla in the face. The glass bounced off Darla's cheekbone, landing unbroken on the carpet.

"Get out!" Regina screamed at Hair And Nails. "You think I don't know what death looks like, you have to parade your skeleton in front of me? Go to hell and take this fat-assed lump of nothing with you!"

Regina's head nodded on its drooping stalk. Her hands trembled.

Hair And Nails went for the Blackberry. Darla knew exactly which words were flying through the walls to Dr. Burke's pager.

Help stroke PearlMead HAN.

The bottom of the container was now visible.

On TV, the next American Idol strained toward climax. Darla was more interested in the fact that an entire pint of Chunky Monkey had found its way down her gullet.

In the melting trickle tracing the circular bottom of the carton, Darla saw her future. Same as her past, bar the last few months. Ben & Jerry's, Time Out Chicken, burgers, barbecue, Whitechapel. No running at 5:00 a.m. No tofu, no sprouts.

No nightmares. No breaking hearts.

In theory, she could go back to chasing that other future tomorrow morning, if she wanted it enough. In practice, here Darla was, staring into the carton, trying to understand why all of a sudden she didn't want it enough.

Regina's stroke had been mild. Her speech centers were not affected. After consulting with Hair And Nails, Dr. Burke called Caroline and convinced her that a visit would only upset Regina and slow her recovery.

Darla's encounter with Caroline in Hydrotherapy remained a painful blur. All she remembered was that Caroline been going on about pith. Darla had looked it up. It could be a noun or a verb. It could mean the spongy inner core--of a plant stem, or of your spine. It could mean to pierce or to extract that same inner core.

That's it, Darla thought. I've been pithed. Everything has fallen into a big hollow shaft, the empty space inside me where a person would otherwise be.

They had Regina on oxygen. The ICU nurses let Darla in and then kept their distance. The stroke had not diminished Regina's capacity to inspire hatred.

Regina's eyes followed the plastic carbuncle as Darla rolled it in one palm.

"Months now I've been having the same weird dream," Darla said. "What I remember is this young woman's voice, trying to talk some stubborn old bitch out of something."

Regina turned her head away.

"I haven't had the dream since Caroline broke that necklace you made me."

Regina's breath sighed inside her mask.

"I don't know what you two are," Darla said. "Witches or vampires or cannibals or all of the above. I just know you stole my hair, you made that necklace, and after I put it on, I wasn't me."

The angrier Regina looked the more convinced Darla was that she was right.

"You want to stay alive and your body's dying. So you figured you'd fix mine up and move in. You had to make me do the work, cause I'd never have done it on my own. That was what the necklace was for, to get you into my head so you could work me till my body was fit to live in. And then Caroline broke the necklace, and you left."

"Begrudger," Regina murmured, more to herself than to Darla.

"You kept me out of the way when Caroline visited," Darla said. "Cause you knew she'd figure it out as soon as she saw me."

"You're crazy," Regina said.

"Crazy or not, I have something to say to you."

Regina's unrepentant, glittering eyes met Darla's.

"Do it now," Darla said.

Regina gave Darla a look of deep suspicion, cut with a little hope.

"You're waiting for me to get fit. You don't have that long. Do it now."

The lines etched around Regina's mouth moved as she whispered.

"What, Regina?"

"I'm not strong enough to take you now," Regina rasped. "You've got to take me. You willing?"

"Yes."

Regina's left hand unclasped, slowly.

"Put the stone in my hand."

Darla pressed the carbuncle into Regina's dry palm. Something bright and red awakened in its heart.

"Touch the stone."

Darla laid her hand over Regina's palm.

"Talk me in," Regina said, closing her eyes.

"What does that mean?"

"Invite me. Say why you want me. Not out loud, in your head."

Darla felt the hard knobs of Regina's knuckles as she closed her fingers.

Come in, Regina, Darla thought. Take me since you want me. I'm sick of myself. Twenty-five years of this life and I can't ever remember taking pleasure in it. Pleasure is getting what you want. I don't want. I envy. I covet what I'm too weak to fight for and too scared to steal.

Well I want you, Regina.

I want you because you're a hundred and eighty years old and greedy like a newborn. You think life is worth killing for. I need that greed.

I've been a big disappointment to this body. All I've ever done is feed it, and I can't even do that right. You'll know what to do with me. I don't.

Come in. Know my body like I've never known it. Fill my gut with strange cravings. Thread my veins with lightning. Crush my heart with desire. I am your heartbreaker, hard and beautiful. I am Regina, born again, and I will rake the heart of this world for its very last drops of life.

THE END