My Husband Let His Wife Push Me From the Balcony

It happened on a Wednesday, in the foyer I had tiled myself.

I was coming down the main stairs. The scarf was still around my neck. Hezekiah sat in the leather armchair by the fireplace, both hands folded on his gold-topped cane. Mrs. Pell stood near the door with his coat. Denise was polishing the hall mirror.

Giselle stood at the bottom of the stairs in a pale lavender dress. She was waiting for me. I could tell by how still she was.

"Emory," she said softly. "Can we talk? Please?"

"No."

I stepped past her. She caught my sleeve. Her fingers were cold.

"I know what you heard," she whispered. Only I could hear it. "In the laundry room."

I looked at her. She smiled.

Then she bit down.

I saw her jaw move. Something small cracked between her teeth. A dark red line ran from the corner of her mouth down her chin. It dripped onto the lavender silk.

She let go of my sleeve. She swayed. She grabbed the banister with one hand and pressed the other to her chest.

"Please," she gasped, loud now. Loud enough for the whole house. "Please stop. I can't… I can't do this anymore."

Then she folded onto the marble like a dropped ribbon.

Denise screamed. Mrs. Pell dropped the coat.

"She hasn't touched her," I said. My voice sounded far away. "I didn't touch her. It's a capsule. Look in her mouth."

Nobody looked in her mouth.

Giselle coughed. More red came up. She curled toward Hezekiah's chair and reached for him with a trembling hand.

"Every day, Grandfather," she wept. "Every single day. She threatens Noah. She threatens me. I'm so tired. I can't live under the same roof as her. I'll die. I know I'll die."

A door opened upstairs. Barrett came to the second-floor railing. He looked down. He saw the blood.

His face went white.

Hezekiah rose from his chair. Slowly. He was eighty-one, and he still filled a room like smoke.

His cane came down on the marble once.

Crack.

The sound went up the stairwell. All three floors. I had designed it that way.

"Remove the Collins girl from this house."

He didn't look at me when he said it. He looked at the wall.

Two men in dark suits came out of the hallway. I had seen them before. They drove his car. They never spoke.

They took my arms.

"Let go of me." I twisted. Pain shot through my back, right where the ladder had dropped me. "Barrett. Barrett!"

I found his eyes across the foyer. Up on the railing. Hands gripping the wood.

I didn't say anything else. I didn't need to. Seven years were in that look. The library. The blueprints. The chapel steps. *I'll come back to you. I swear it.*

He looked at me.

Then he looked at the floor.

That was the moment. Not the fall. That.

They didn't take me out the front door.

They took me up.

I kicked. I dragged my heels on every stair. My scarf came loose and slid away down the steps. The bruises on my throat showed. Nobody cared. We passed the second floor. We passed Barrett. He stepped back to let them by.

"You're making a mistake," I said to him. "You know what she is."

He rubbed his temple with two fingers.

The third floor. The little hallway. The French doors to the balcony I'd drawn on graph paper sophomore year. I'd wanted a place to watch the snow. Barrett had kissed my pencil hand and said, *Add a railing. I don't want to lose you.*

They opened the doors. Cold air hit my face. The sky was flat and white.

"Please," I said to the man on my left. "Please. Just put me on the street."

He didn't answer. His grip didn't change.

They lifted me.

My hip hit the iron railing. My hand clawed for anything. The bracelet caught for one second on a curl of ironwork, my grandmother's emeralds holding on when no one else would.

Then it slipped free.

There was no sound when I fell. Just wind. Just the windows going past, one, two. The nursery. Barrett's study.

The limestone courtyard came up fast.

I chose that stone. Pale. Indiana limestone. I thought it looked soft.

It wasn't.

—

After that, there were only pieces.

A siren. A man shouting numbers. Bright lights rushing over me, one after another, like a train in a tunnel.

A mask over my face. Someone saying, "Pelvis. Left femur. Spleen. Get her in now."

Then nothing for a long time.

Then beeping. Slow and steady. A tube in my throat. I couldn't move my legs. I couldn't move anything. I couldn't open my eyes. But I could hear.

Two nurses were talking near my feet.

"Nobody's called her family?"

"Mr. Harrison is listed as her contact. He signed for everything."

"She has parents, though. It says Seattle on her license."

A pause. A clipboard clicked.

"He said no outside calls. Family wishes. Admin approved it."

"That's not right."

"It's the Harrisons." The second nurse lowered her voice. "Just do your job."

Their shoes squeaked away.

I tried to scream. Nothing came. The machine breathed for me. In. Out.

*Dad,* I thought. *Mom.*

I had promised to call if anything happened.

I tried to move my right hand. Just one finger. I felt the weight on my wrist. Cool. Heavy.

They hadn't taken the bracelet.

I held on to that the way I'd held on to that railing.

The days ran together. Surgeries. Fever. Dark. I learned the time by the shift changes. I learned that nobody brought flowers. Nobody sat in the chair.

Once, very late, I heard the door open. Familiar footsteps. Leather shoes. They stopped at the foot of the bed for a long time.

Then they left.

He never said a word.

Across town, I knew the brownstone was still standing. The lights were on. Someone was setting the long walnut table for dinner. The stairwell was carrying their voices up and down, warm and easy.

And nobody in that house was listening for me.