Eppie had never been beautiful, so what did it matter if fate had decided to be cruel?
The scars crisscrossing her body told but another story of ugliness. Hid the real truth of it. For if a woman was born ugly, she was a pariah, set apart from her peers as one marked. But if the ugliness came by trials of an angry god, then she was almost forgiven for it, sometimes made a saint—made wise. A statue carved from an old ancient mountain, pebbled and ragged. Revered—but watched only from afar.
The morning before her second accident, she’d brushed her hair into a low ponytail, and considered the contradiction of that one grace—her mother’s accidental gift to her. It fell to her waist, a dark waterfall, and if she closed her eyes, Eppie could pretend she was someone else. Someone who deserved hair like that. Opening her eyes quickly, she knew what to expect instead. The reality of the everyday of her reflection had ceased to shock her long before anyone refused to look at her.
There was a time when she’d been younger and stronger, but never more hopeful at any time than another. Her legs were sturdy, never long and waxed. Her father often told her she had Roman soldier legs. Then he’d laugh, slapping his fat hand against his knee, beaming in misplaced pride, a tease of familial ignorance. She pretended to ignore him; it was her defense. Yet, she watched, she learned beyond her father’s gaze. Eppie became wise to the way even beautiful people pretended and ignored. It was a commonality she’d seen often.
Tracing a puckered scar along her jaw line, Eppie remembered the day of the burning. Felt the heat, saw the surreal aura of flames as they surrounded her. Her skin had sounded like waxed paper crinkling, and an awful awe came over her, as if she was witnessing something horribly sacred. Her burning. The physical pain came later. But it was his burning which hurt her most. His life that took on a heavier burden of remembrance.
Could it be twenty-two years had passed since that first metamorphosis? She’d been only seventeen, full-strong and young, running to save her brother, her Roman legs pumping hard. It had been as a horrid dream, one where she pulled up her heavy legs and placed them down, breath caught hard in her chest, her bare feet moving forward, but in a fatalistic slow motion, except unlike a dream, no waking came to save them.
Her little brother, only twelve then, Jon Peter. He was the beautiful one. He and their mother. She bestowed many more gifts upon him, accidental and on purpose gifts. Her dancer’s body and grace, her ability to laugh like fine crystal goblets clinked together in a toast, her theater friends, her love.
Much of the hair Eppie had brushed to copy her mother, when she was young and thought it still a possibility to be beautiful, was lost that day except for a wild frizzled mess snarling out around her head like Medusa’s younger sister. Without the heaviness swinging against her back, an ancient Biblical irony where a woman’s crowning glory swung across full-promised hips, she was left humble and meek without her crown, but only for a time. Only for as long as it took to know that stubborn strength would be her only saving.
That spring day, when the once-full and luscious azalea garden petals were scattered in mounds under plain bushes, Eppie had run to Jon Peter, screaming his name. She saw him, ablaze, running toward her, across their backyard, his arms flapping and his mouth stretched wide open with his keening cry, his eyes round and insane with pain. The flames were hungrily devouring his lower body, his beautiful face yet untouched. When she reached him, too late, he had already disappeared into the fire, given into it as it ravaged him. Eppie had thrown herself on top of him, and the flames, still hungry, still angry, had begun to consume her as well.
Her mother found them there. Jon Peter as he lay on the grass, unrecognizable. And their mother had stopped, stared at her son, feet planted as she rocked back and forth on her slender legs, rocked her body back and forth, hands held to her mouth, holding in a mother’s terrible scream. Still rocking, she slid her eyes to Eppie, as Eppie rolled over and over upon the grass, afraid if she stopped moving the fire would return, bursting out of her pores and once again dancing over her blackened skin. And at last, her mother, released from her awful spell, ran to him, the animal cries gurgling up from her womb as she embraced the remains of her only son. She went only to her son.
Eppie watched as her mother draped her body over her brother, watched as the neighbor screamed to them that paramedics were on the way, and watched as the officials arrived, sirens obliterating moans and cries, their white coats blazing in the afternoon sun. She watched as they pulled her mother from Jon Peter’s body, watched as they came to her with a stretcher. And though she could not understand it on the day of her burning, later, when her mother’s silences grew louder, Eppie knew the blame had been placed upon the living one. But that day, she’d only turned from the sight of her mother’s wailing, and lay still; lay until she felt a lightness that would be her saving, felt the light of who she was drift up and over her body. The thought of dying comforting, grandmother arms of warmth. Yet, even in her state, she knew she was not ready, since living still held a curious attraction for her.
From across her hospital room, Eppie heard her Uncle Dirk tell Aunt Peggy how it would be easier for Eppie to survive the fire’s remodeling of her body, since she was not pretty, and had never been. But, Jon Peter, well, he was good-looking, special.
“Maybe it was better he didn’t survive, huh honey?” he said in a whisper, that really wasn’t a whisper at all. If Eppie was thought invisible in her drugged state, it was no different from her waking one. She envisioned them trying not to look at her, for to look at Eppie meant a remembering, and no one wanted to remember. Her uncle continued, “At least most of her face is okay, and I suppose her hair will grow back.”
“That doesn’t matter . . . she’s ruined. No one will want her now,” Aunt Peggy said, her voice thick and full of regret. “What happened? How could this happen?”
“Jon Peter was in the shed, starting fires again.”
Her brother had always been fascinated with the burning glow of flame and what remained when it died away. Sometimes, he showed Eppie his creations. The way the metal twisted into grotesque versions of itself, or how different woods smelled when alight. Sometimes the objects were made more beautiful, if the burning shaped instead of destroyed.
Jon Peter once said to her, “I want to know what stuff will get on fire and what stuff will turn to liquid and evaporate. And other stuff, you know, like, what’ll certain things look like after they’re burned up.”
She told him, “This is dangerous. I wish you’d stop.”
He only laughed at her, and tickled her fat stomach. “Aw, come on, Sister. Come watch. I’ll be careful.”
And she smiled at him; usually giving in, because Jon Peter saw her, saw how she was a tangible person, a whole being, saw that she was a sister. She stood over him, made sure he was safe, made sure nothing happened.
But who can be a god?
That day, she wasn’t around when Jon Peter was building his own lamp from tin cans, kerosene, wire and string, the remains of which still lay on the workshop table, waiting for their creator to never return.
Eppie couldn’t attend his funeral. She lay swathed, otherworldly with pills, in a universe deep-full of a physical pain, of mental agony, that shoved away anything left of her. She missed her brother’s farewell, but she didn’t miss her mother’s release from living only two years later. The goodbye-I-can’t-take-it-anymore-can’t-you-understand-how-I-miss-him note, placed under her teacup, also left instructions for her mother’s remains to be taken to the crematorium. She thought it would bring her closer to her Jon Peter. The sharing of the flame between mother and son. The ashes then tossed out to the same sea, where the particles would find each other and bond once again into a whole as they’d been before Jon Peter’s birth.
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The day her mother quit living, Eppie had arrived home for the holiday, her college papers with all the staunch A’s held in her hand, so she could try again to win her mother over by the sheer will of her intelligence. The house was silent. All the edges looked sharper. The smell of Clorox stung her nostrils and she remembered her mother’s frenzied cleaning. What was she washing away, Eppie often wondered. The smell of burning?
She stood in the kitchen, heard her father’s car pull into the driveway, as she twice read the note under the cup; the cup stained with Earl Grey and Pink Lady Passion lipstick. As her father’s footsteps rang sharp upon the entryway steps, she hurriedly left the house through the back door. It was the cruelest, most selfish act Eppie had ever performed, leaving her mother there in the silent tomb of her home to await her husband. But Eppie could not bear the blame of the living once again. She could not bear her father’s accusing stare, as if she were responsible for her mother’s denial of her own husband, denial that he would be enough to keep his wife from ascending the stairs, drawing a warm bath, lying fully clothed to her chin in the water, and placing the razor against her moon-pale wrists.
Her father found her mother there, floating in an ocean of red, her features in their stillness holding the beauty in, never releasing it from her father’s face. Eppie’s mother had been his last chance, his last hope of owning something that was after all, unattainable; a thing of beauty like fine china, a rare find from Egypt or Spain, or Saturn’s rings. His money would find other lovers, but none would ever remove Aurelia’s image from his memory.
Eppie shook away her parents and her brother, down to the spot in her memory reserved for painful things, that dark and distant planet in the solar system of her brain-universe. She concentrated again on getting ready for work, clasped the barrette onto her ponytail, and swiped on ChapStick. Then, in a fit of frivolity, she wiped off the waxy smear, and picked up the cinnamon-red lipstick she’d purchased on a whim from the drug store. She opened the tube, touched the tip with her index finger, and rubbed the color in between her thumb and finger, feeling the satin smoothness stain. She had never worn lipstick before.
Perhaps the day was the day for firsts, she considered. Carefully placing the tip against her bottom lip, she filled in, and then filled in the top. Tilting her head, she studied the result, smiled with even white teeth, good strong teeth, and turned away from the mirror before she changed her mind. Striding barefoot into her bedroom, she turned to her closet and selected the light khaki pants and white button up that was her usual uniform. Her white coat stayed at the office, ironed, ready, hers.
Her veterinary clinic was only ten minutes away and she knew she had a particularly difficult day ahead of her. Mrs. Beaucamp’s poodle was to be put out of the misery that age and cancer placed upon its tiny body. She never became used to putting the old or sick animals down. She studied their owner’s faces, recognizing the grief of loss, yet envying the devotion and love they offered to those creatures. Her human clients trusted her because she was good; yet, they also trusted her because of her looks. She saw in their faces the certainty that one who looks as she did must surely have spent all her time studying, all her time among animals, all her time away from worldly vices and distractions. And the animals loved her because they sensed her needs, and more, they sensed her truths and strengths.
Never before allowing herself a pet of her own, Eppie stroked her animal patients and thought it enough. Until the Golden appeared. A homeless stray someone had left at her clinic door. The dog had hopped about on three legs; her silky fur once matted had become shiny and thick from Eppie’s brushing. Deidra, her receptionist, began calling the dog Sera before Eppie could stop her. She knew the naming would seal the dog’s existence in their hearts. And so it was; Sera began keeping Deidra company when Eppie was busy, greeting the other patients, lowering her head for pats, and barking once sharply for treats. When it was quiet, she laid her head on Eppie’s knee, looking up at her with soft brown eyes.
That morning of firsts, of stained lips, of her second metamorphosis, she closed the door behind her, breathed in the morning air, fished the keys from her purse, and quickened her steps. Her Subaru stood steady on its tires. She touched the metal, warm from the sun, and brushed away a mimosa flower. The flowers looked like dancers, with their bright pink skirts and slender bodies. She hovered between the now and then, recalling her mother dancing on stage, her long shapely legs suspended over the floor, then lightly making contact, flex, extend, bend, straighten, float, her arms arcing up and over and around. Perfection.
Backing from her driveway, turning left, right, and then straight through the green light, onto the busy street out of her neighborhood, she never saw the young mother in a blue van reach back to swat her restless boys. Never saw as the van raced though the red light. Never saw the pale young mother’s mouth turn into an O of surprise. She saw Jon Peter again, wings aflame, as her face made contact with the steering wheel.
“Eppie?” Her father’s voice. “Eppie? Wake up.” Eppie smelled her father’s soap and something else. Perfume, spicy and rich, but too thickly applied.
“Where do I put these flowers, sweetie?”
“For Christ’s sakes, Suzanne, put them anywhere.” Eppie felt her hand taken roughly. Her father’s hand, swallowing her own, engulfed. She wanted to feel comforted.
“You don’t have to talk mean to me, Paddy.”
“Woman, here’s my daughter all torn up and you go whining.”
Torn up? Eppie was confused, until her mind shifted and clicked together from the morning’s events. Oh yes, an accident. The van. Eppie remembered, she was on her way to work and didn’t want to be late. She wanted to ask how the others were, but her lips wouldn’t work.
“Poor thing,” the woman named Suzanne said.
“I know. Look at my girl, all bandaged up again.”
Again. Another layer of ugliness for her father to shake his wooly head about. Eppie wondered what devastation her body had taken this time.
“Maybe they can make her pretty. There’s all kinds of stuff they can do now, you know?” the woman added.
Her father spoke sharply, “Go wait for me in the lounge while I visit Eppie. I’ll be there shortly.”
“Oh, all right.”
She sounds so young, Eppie thought. She couldn’t turn her head to look, and so imagined a life-like Barbie doll walking stiff-legged out the door, as her father watched, assessed, compared her to Eppie’s mother-image.
“Ep, don’t try to talk, okay? You had an accident.”
I know, Father. You can go now. Thank you for coming.
“Your head’s all bandaged up. They had to cut your hair.”
No. Not that. Why not let me have that one thing? she cried to a god. Just that one thing to go with my red lips. She fell backward in time and space, and saw her mother as she leaned over Eppie’s bed where Eppie lay with the covers pulled to her chin. Her mother’s hair pooled on Eppie’s chest and upper stomach, the lighter strands blowing across Eppie’s face, caught by the breeze from the open window, the long side-swept bangs a curtain over the left side of her mother’s face. She flipped her hair back, away from Eppie, and smiled tightly. “Sit up a minute, okay?”
Eppie sat up, and looked at her mother, waiting for whatever would come next.
From her pocket, she produced a tube of Clearasil that she placed on Eppie’s bedside table, next to the tattered book of Shakespeare plays. “Just try this cream. And why don’t you wear one of those new dresses to school tomorrow? Honestly, you could try a little harder.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“I bought you some of that diet soda, and threw out the candy bar you had stashed in your dresser drawer. Do you see me eating candy?”
“No, Ma’am.”
She pushed back Eppie’s hair. “And keep this hair off your face. Must you hide behind it?”
“Yes, I mean, no, ma’am.”
“What will I do with you?”
When her mother left the room, Eppie fell asleep; slept her mother away as she’d always done. In Hospital, she fell asleep and slept her father away, too.
Eppie heard him before she saw him. His voice. A finger tracing velvet. Satin as it slides over the powdered body. The voice made her feel heavy and full. Like a woman who wants something. He called her name and she tasted it. The drugs must be making her silly, she thought.
“Miss Wallace? Epamene? Wake up now. Come on; open up those beautiful green eyes.”
Ah, you must be flirting. Who are you?
He stroked her hand and the touch felt intimate because she decided it so. At what harm? Her face remained bandaged, he couldn’t see her ugliness, she could pretend.
“I’m Dr. Randall. Can you hear me?” Her doctor. He knew then. She felt the bed rising, and the nurse bustled around the room, chatting to her, or the doctor, or another nurse, just chatting, patting at her intravenous line, plumping her pillows, rubbing lotion on her arms. Eppie supposed most people had experienced these things, these ministrations, niceties, and mother-loving care. But to Eppie it was new, and to her embarrassment she felt the sting of tears.
“Are you in pain, Epamene?”
Am I in pain? She wondered and laughed. It came out as a puff of air and made her face hurt, but in an alive way. In an alive way.
“Ah, a laugh from our girl. Good, you must be feeling better.”
Eppie wanted to nod, wanted to let him know she appreciated his inclusion, the use of the words, our girl. It made her feel connected, as if she had a place in the moment. As if she were meant for more.
She thought of how it felt to matter, to belong to something outside herself. How it began with Jon Peter, and when her brother had died, she was no longer a sister, she was only Eppie.
Yet.
There was the possibility of more firsts.
Her head began to feel lighter, as if the weight of her mother’s hair wasn’t holding her down any longer, and thoughts of leaving it short became a new option.
She knew Sera was waiting for her, tail wagging as she made her determined way to Eppie’s office door to await her return. When she got out of Hospital, she’d take Sera home with her. Yes. Her first pet.
Other possibilities rose up before her, rose up as ghosts, backlit spirits that continued up and around her. The possibility that she did matter, that her solid being held weight. She was aware of her very body pressing upon the sheets, into the mattress. She took in a breath, let it out, and again, and kept breathing. She accepted the possibilities of the rest of her life.
