Shotgun Opera

and pointed the Cadillac toward Oklahoma City.

25

Elizabeth ?Lizzy? Cornwall was a real piece of work. Clear, Goth white skin, a shock of hot pink hair sticking out in all directions. A silver ring in her nose connected to another near her eye by a thin silver chain. Deep burgundy lipstick. A tattoo of a thorny vine around her neck. She wore a black T-shirt, ripped jeans, and combat boots.

She sat at a table, popping potato chips into her mouth and crunching loudly.

The table and two chairs were the stark white room?s only furnishings. A second later, a man entered, bland and sallow, thinning, sandy hair. A brown suit. Round glasses. He sat in the chair across from Lizzy with a felt tip pen and a clipboard.

?Good morning, Elizabeth.?

?Good morning to you, Dr. Bryant.? She popped another chip into her mouth. Crunch.

?And how are you?? Bryant asked. ?I?m told you assaulted one of the orderlies and took his cigarettes.?

?Yup.?

?Uh-huh. Uh-huh.? Bryant scribbled on the clipboard. ?I mean, it?s just that I thought we were making progress.?

?Did you?? Crunch.

?You broke Brad?s jaw. I mean, that?s just uncalled-for. Honestly. If you?d asked, I?m sure he?d have given you a cigarette.?

?If you?re going to have an entire ward for patients with violence and anger problems, you really should have tougher orderlies.?

?Brad is six-foot-four. He wrestled for Louisiana State.?

?He smokes menthol cigarettes,? Lizzy said. ?He?s a sissy.?

?Are you unhappy here? Is that it? Is there anything you want??

Lizzy said, ?All I want, Dr. Bryant, is to eat Lay?s Kettle Cooked Jalapeno chips and to kill you.? Crunch.

Bryant squirmed in his chair, tugged his tie loose. ?Yes, well.? He cleared his throat. ?You might not have to worry about me or the institute any longer. Your sister is here to sign for your release.?

Lizzy froze, a potato chip halfway to her mouth. ?I?m getting out??

?Possibly,? Bryant said. ?Your sister wants to have a word with you first.? He stood, tucked the clipboard under his arm and the pen into a shirt pocket. He backed toward the door, reached behind him, and knocked, always keeping his eyes on the ferocious girl with the pink hair.

?Personally, I think you should go. I?ve really tried my best, you know? Honestly. You don?t want to get better.? He scuttled through the door and shut it quickly behind him.

Lizzy wasn?t listening. She was thinking about getting out. It had been eight months since her sisters had dumped her into this cushy, overpriced loony bin. Admittedly, she had been blind with rage and out of control. Eight months of therapy had told her what she already knew. She hated her dead father, resented her addle-brained mother, and absolutely despised her sisters.

Lizzy Cornwall was eighteen years old. Mother and Father had decided to have her late in life. A feeble attempt to bring something warm and familial to a marriage that had gone cold and platonic. It hadn?t worked.

Father had nearly always been gone, off somewhere, subverting a Third World government or pulling the plug on uncooperative dictators. When home, he seemed to regard her as this thing always underfoot, this eating, sleeping, playing obligation. His perfunctory attentions were stiff and formal. Hello, Daughter, how was school today? What? A problem with a teacher? Ask your mother about that.

And if Father was cold and distant, then Mother smothered her. With Lizzy?s sisters grown and gone from the house, and Father off to unknown corners of the globe, Mother had made Lizzy her twenty-four-hour-a-day project. It somehow became Lizzy?s job to fill Mother?s time and mute her heavy gray loneliness. When Lizzy should have been playing dolls with the neighborhood kids, she was instead learning to throw knives or listening to her mother