Island of Lost Girls - Jennifer McMahon [47]
When Lizzy stopped talking after Daniel left, nobody took it very seriously at first. She was upset, naturally, and if she was reacting a little dramatically, well, shed always been dramatic, hadnt she? Shed talk when she was good and ready. Aggie herself was so distraught about Daniel, she barely seemed to notice Lizzys new silence. Eventually, though, there were doctors visitsa speech therapist, a psychiatrist, even a pediatric neurologist over at Dartmouth, who ruled out a physical cause and called it elective mutism. But the diagnosis was essentially the one the laypeople of Pikes Crossing had already made: Lizzy would talk when she was good and ready.
Months went by, and then years, and she continued to choose muteness. Then one morning, two weeks after theyd started high school, Lizzy disappeared. Peter had offered her a ride to school, but she waved him on. He was the last one to see her, her book bag slung over her shoulder, as she made her way down Lake Street.
But the Lizzy in Rhondas drawing was from a time well before that. It was the Captain Hook Lizzy shed put in the submarine, just as it had been in her dream. The Lizzy who hung from her closet for fifteen minutes each day, trying to make herself grow. The one whose voice was good and strong as she belted out crazy songs or threatened to make you walk the plank. The girl who wanted, more than anything, to grow up to be a Rockette.
The drawing was done in pencil first, then gone over in thin black pen lines. She used cross-hatching to shade the submarine, making it a few shades lighter than the dark sea. Rhonda had used a blotchy, swirling ink wash for the water, and filled the ocean with terrible, nightmare creatures whose features could barely be seen in the wild, writhing water. It was like one of those drawings shed been given in school years agoa landscape where you were supposed to find the hidden images: a wheelbarrow, a clock, a shovel, and a tea pot. Only in Rhondas ocean, monsters lurked. A giant squid, a toothy shark, a dragon with fins. And there were ghosts in the waves, horrible phantoms, their bodies lacking true form, only open-mouthed screaming faces.
Through the portholes of the submarine, the rabbit and two girls could be seen looking out into the dark sea. The rabbit, huge and looming with paws the size of the girls heads, stood at the front, working the controls. His eyes twinkled with mad fury as he urged the submarine on. The girls looked like theyd resigned themselves to fright, like theyd given up on being saved.
So whats it supposed to mean? Peter asked, brushing hair back from his face, showing his scar, the mark that bound him to her, as he turned away from the drawing to look Rhonda in the eye.
Her heart rose up into her throat, filling it, rendering her unable to speak. She wanted so badly for Peter to understand the drawing. She half-hoped he would tell her what it meant. But he looked a little irritated about the whole thing, like it wasnt worth him driving all the way into town for. She wondered what he would tell Tock about it. If hed speak in patronizing tones
Poor, crazy Rhonda. Rhonda and her fucked-up drawing. Rhonda who cant let shit go. Poor thing.
Its just a drawing, Peter, Rhonda managed to blurt out, her words crisp and defensive. Just a picture.
She wanted to remind him how he used to love her drawings. How he had once encouraged her artistic endeavors. When they were kids, he would pose for her, usually in one of his costumes. How well she knew his body then, each contour, each tiny imperfection. She filled sketchbooks with pictures of him. She could do entire pages of just his nose, trying to perfectly capture its gentle slope. Or his mouththe thin lips, the slight gap between his two front teeth, which he could whistle through.
Afternoons when theyd go swimming at Loons Cove, Rhonda would connect the dots of the freckles on his back and shoulders, now untouchable to her, and tell him they were like constellations, then describe each picture she saw there. Sometimes it seemed his