The Dead Girls of Hysteria Hall
By: Katie Alender
“No more debate,” Dad said. “We’re staying. Cordelia had a small apartment, separate from the rest of the institute, and that’s where we’ll be living. No more discussion. Right, Lisa?”
Mom took a few long seconds to think before she spoke. “Okay,” she finally said, turning away. Her usually sleek hair was starting to fuzz out from its perfect ponytail.
I hate to admit it, because it highlights a certain amount of adolescent self-absorption, but that was the first time it occurred to me that maybe this wasn’t my mother’s ideal way to pass the summer—that maybe she’d been roped into it, just like I had. Ordinarily, Mom’s idea of a good time was an evening spent in the air-conditioned den of our house, eating takeout Chinese and following obscure threads of Internet research on her laptop. Maybe being locked away in the middle of nowhere was almost as much of a punishment to her as it was to me.
I caught my mother’s eye. The briefest hint of mutual understanding passed between us, but then she turned away, smoothing her hair. A dim light of hope began to glow in my heart. Maybe Mom would be my ticket out of this place. But I knew her better than to press the issue when she was exhausted and irritated.
Finding out what a wardress was would just have to wait, because Dad opened another door on the far side of the room and held it open for us. “Mesdames,” he said grandly, “I present the main hall.”
Janie screwed up her face. “How do you know that?”
“There’s a sign on the door, madame,” Dad said.
“I’m a mademoiselle,” my sister said, rolling her eyes.
“I should hope so.” My father gave me a goofy wink.
I wanted to roll my eyes at him, too, but his dumb sense of humor always made me feel a stab of tenderness. He couldn’t help it if all his jokes were dad jokes.
The “main hall” wasn’t quite as grand as its name implied. It was a long, low-ceilinged passageway with several doors leading off of it. Even the lush wallpaper and hanging brass lamps didn’t dampen the claustrophobic feeling, and I was relieved when Dad opened the first door on the right.
“The superintendent’s apartment,” he said. “I guess that makes us the new superintendents.”
We stepped into a good-sized living room. There was also a dining area, a tiny kitchen, a bathroom, and a single bedroom. Once upon a time it had been a luxurious space, with gilded wallpaper and checkerboard floors, but now it felt old and worn—basically, like an old lady had been living there alone for decades. There were deep ruts in the floor from Aunt Cordelia’s walker, which was still stashed in the corner of the bedroom, a medical-looking metal tray on the kitchen counter, and a lavender couch in the living room. A table in the corner held a small, old-fashioned TV set, but for all her frantic channel flipping, Janie couldn’t get a signal.
“Not as bad as you thought, is it?” Dad asked, looking from Mom to me. “It’s pretty clean, considering. Toward the end there was a home-care nurse who cleaned up even though Cordelia ordered her not to. The place was a wreck. She’d poured salt everywhere and scratched up the wood floors pretty badly.”
“Like this?” Janie asked, looking down at her feet. We all walked over to see the word DON’T carved into the wood in letters about a foot tall.
“Wow,” Mom said. “That’s not going to buff out.”
“Don’t what?” Janie asked.
“Don’t worry about it,” Dad said. “We’ll sand it down. You’ll never even know it was there.”
“Sounds super fun,” I said. “Can’t wait to get started on that. Anyhoo, I’m going to go look around. I’ll see you guys later.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Mom said. “You can’t just wander off.”
“I’m not wandering,” I protested. “I just want to see what’s here.”
My mother’s glance at Dad was clearly an appeal for backup, but Dad shrugged. “I don’t see how it can hurt. It’s probably just a bunch of empty rooms.”
“Maybe Janie can go with you,” Mom suggested.
“No way!” Janie shrieked. She’d already retreated to the couch to play games on her phone.
“Well …” My mother peered out the window at the line of dark gray clouds that had appeared on the horizon. “Just don’t go outside.”
“I’m not looking to get struck by lightning,” I said, grabbing the key ring off the stained wood dining table. I slung my army-green messenger bag over my shoulder and pushed through the door to the hallway.
Maybe I was more annoyed than I had any right to be, but I was sick of being treated like a flight risk.
Okay, yes, I’d messed up.
Yes, I’d messed up in a really big way.
But no, I was not a delinquent. No, I was not a liar. No, I was not looking, at every turn, for a chance to run off and end up living on the streets, picking pockets and sleeping in bus stops.
I just made one bad call.