Francine Witte
Practice
Pill-dead, but not real dead. Twelve years old and too beautiful. Ringlet hair and blue eyes and boys buzzing. One of those boys gets her happy with Seconals, Quaaludes, whatever. Tolerance goes up to 28 pills at a time. They make her more Billie Holiday than she already was. Next thing, my parents find her in the closet, passed out and heaped like a dress that fell off its hanger. Later, in the ICU, she lies there like a corpse. All of this kills my parents’ marriage, too many arguments, too much blame. My grandfather, who came over to Ellis Island, and sees his baby granddaughter closer to death than even he is, stands over her bed, calling her name. Wake up, he is saying, wake up.
***
Metaphor
She does wake up. Goes on to psych meds that plump her out of her perfect body. She will have the word “suicidal” stamped on her for the rest of her teenage years. Our parents, divorced now, act like it didn’t happen. We never had any guidance, my sister will say over and over each time we talk about them. She goes on to the wrong men, some married, some drunk. One day, I meet someone who I will later marry and who will ask me to live in a different state. The day I leave, my sister says we will never be the same. We will not be in the same city. She seems to think it’s the death of us as sisters. From now on, we will be telephone, we will be holiday visits. I put a kiss on my finger and press it to her cheek. In the air all around us, I hear our younger selves falling asleep. Wake up, I tell our younger selves, wake up, we are princesses, wake up.
***
Real
We do wake up, but it’s only after so much of our lives has passed. Kids and marriages, our parents gone. We still live in different cities and are always too busy to visit. Our marriages, too, are gone. She is widowed; I’m divorced. Her kids have moved out, so she is alone. We talk on the phone. We say things like, okay, let me know a good time to come out. We talk about our parents. When she gets sick again, not head-sick but body-sick, I make plans to go see her when she is feeling better, but she never gets better. The day of her funeral, I make it out there. I put my finger to my lips, blow the kiss on her face, the face that looks so much like it did that hospital time. In my head, I am screaming, wake up, wake up, wake up…
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Francine Witte is a flash fiction writer and poet, and the author of the flash collection RADIO WATER. Her newest poetry book, Some Distant Pin of Light, was published by Cervena Barva Press. Her story “Plate Spinner” won a Pushcart Prize. She lives in New York City. Please visit her website francinewitte.com. She can be found on social media @francinewitte.