Patsy
Patsy
Jillian is thirteen and hyperventilating into the elbow of her jean jacket when a strange and wonderful thing happens.
It starts out as just a regular bad morning- a particularly nasty eruption of the tension brewing in number 15 Tarwin Street for certain- but nothing that hasn’t happened before. She’s a lazy bitch because she forgot to put the washing out for three weeks in a row, and the trash hasn’t been emptied this morning, again. Rich wouldn’t mind Jillian’s messing about with electronics or guitars or radios or language books so much if any of it were actually reflected in her grades, but it isn’t, because dammit she’s just like her mother. Fuck, why can’t his daughter just grow up and be responsible?
Jillian shifts awkwardly on the edge of her seat at the kitchen table where her breakfast sits untouched. The fruit-loops in her Wile E. Coyote bowl are bleeding rainbow plumes into the milk. Her whole body feels like a live-wire, and the words all start to blur together like her blood-brain barrier is arresting the flow of language and not just toxins, so that sounds can’t enter right now to be processed.
Is she even listening to him?
The question is sharp and it pierces the seal. Swallowing thickly as she tries to regulate her breathing, Jillian brings her sleeve up to wipe the snot from her nose, and she can feel her tear ducts revving up again. And that’s when the thing happens.
She can sense the shift instantly, and so can the yelling man who happens to be her father. Her ears might have popped but she’s not sure because her whole head feels heavy and messy from crying so hard. Like the changing wind has sealed it in wax, her Dad’s face is frozen mid-contortion, a frightening half-grimace. Reality snaps around them, and it’s as though the moment itself is an air bubble trapped in synovial fluid.
But then it’s over just as quickly, and now Richard Holtzmann is dashing from where he stands at the table, headed towards the sink where he bends over to let tap water gush over a bloody tear that’s materialized on his forearm. A stunned silence fills the room, broken only by the sound of running water, and Jillian's quieting breath.
Phone calls are made. They can't reach her Mom because she's at work right now, and emergency instructs Rich over the phone to use a towel to stem the bleeding. Jillian is sent to school, Rich goes to the hospital.
Jillian scuffs her boots along the gravel driveway as the sun begins to set. Coming back home on nights like this generally makes her nauseous- but she's particularly uncertain now because of the weird, so-far unexplainable occurrence in the kitchen.
What made the air buzz like that?
Would it happen again?
Did invisible, bloodthirsty aliens live in their coffee pot?
The injury itself wasn't her fault, but she guesses the lead up to it was. Trying to imagine whether she could feasibly be blamed for the wound, Jillian seriously considers for a moment the possibility of having supernatural gifts like the kids in YA novels, and that her potential preternatural telekinetic skills might be of some value to the government. She's thirteen years old and has seen every X-Files episode- she's young enough to not realize why she finds Dana Scully so fascinating, and also to truly believe that anything is possible. Telekinetic abilities would actually be kinda awesome...
[aside: eventually, long after Holtzmann has had enough time to figure out the crotch-centric origin of her Dana Scully feelings (hint: it doesn't take her much longer), she will also come to realize that she's always going to be young enough to truly believe that anything is possible]
Jillian needn't have worried quite so much that evening though, because true to form, not a word is said about the incident when she gets home- the household simmers with only its regular level of unease, the highly charged presence from that morning evaporated. [and, most importantly, there do not appear to be any aliens in the coffee pot when she checks]. Rich Holtzmann nurses a beer in front of the television, his injured arm wrapped in a thick, white bandage. He gives her a perfunctory nod when he sees her quietly shuffle the trash out of the house.
In her room that night, Jillian slumps on her bed, pondering the events of the day. She is dying to know what her father has made of the incident, what the doctors at the hospital said to him- but the terse silence made it beyond clear that this was going to be one of those Things of which they Did Not Speak. Her Mom is working a night shift, which means she can't volley her with questions either. She's lonely.
Gradually, the flurry of the day has settled into a dull, heavy sadness in her gut, so Jillian decides to do her best to make anger take up residence there instead [she'd picked up this particular technique early in life, and would spend time un-learning it later. she would spend time un-learning a lot of things later.]- but as she reaches for the cardboard box stocked messily with her well-loved tapes and begins scanning the song titles for something suitably vitriolic, she catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror.
Curly blonde hair that she doesn't know what to do with, check. Strong, straight nose, check. Rabbit teeth, check. Just like her mother. Looking down at the assortment of tapes, she chooses a different one than originally intended, slotting it into her cassette player with a satisfying click.
Jillian always makes sure to use headphones at night, when she blasts her music and lets the lyrics sear themselves into her skull.
I got a new fire burnin' in my eyes, lightin' up the darkness, movin' like a meteorite. All fired up!
She's been told once or twice that she's a 'loud dancer'- on nights like this, Jillian tries to dance quietly. Maybe, if she's careful, she can stop the flow of electricity from leaking out of her every pore. Maybe one day she wont need to, and she'll be able to dance as loudly as she wants, whenever she wants. Just not yet.
As her head hits the pillow, Jillian promises herself this: things will be okay in a few days, she'll fix it somehow. She'll fix herself somehow. And at least now she has an interesting puzzle to solve.
In a few days the white bandage comes off, and a little thrill shimmies up Jillian’s spine when she sees the raw wound, because the solution finally hits her.
After spending some time in the paranormal section of the local library, Jillian had found a slim, recent publication which listed eyewitness reports of encounters with 'spectral entities'. It had been squished between several disintegrating volumes about Wicca and dowsing, and had given her a lot to think about. Reports of strange scents and sensations, ears popping and aggressive spirits had all matched up with what she'd seen and experienced.
But the red punctures that trace out an ellipse on Richard Holtzmann's arm, forming an unmistakable bite mark, seal the deal. Jillian is sure now that she knows what- who snapped at Rich Holtzmann's arm, and why.
She has to test her theory, and she knows what to do.
As quickly as she can, Jillian makes a trip to the butcher, where she buys as many off-cuts as Freddy will give her for the $8.50 she amassed in change by rummaging through every backpack and pair of pants that she's ever owned. Back home, determined, ready, and supplies in hand, Jillian dashes out past the creaky wooden fence marking the perimeter of their yard, and into the grassy field which stretches out behind the house before being swallowed by a thick line of trees. Jillian slows when she reaches the right patch in the grass, hovering beside the mound where she and her parents had buried Pat Benatar, their twelve year old Doberman, just two weeks prior. Jillian had bawled for three days straight, but Patsy was an old dog, and there was nothing the vet could do.
This is nuts, Jillian thinks, but of course.
She pulls a big, beaten-up, blue dog bowl out of her backpack, and fills it with the raw meat, mixing in some of the treats she'd found left over in the pantry.
“Thanks Patsy” she says, before placing her gift with flourish over the still fresh soil.
She waits for a moment, nothing.
And then, just as she begins to deflate, a warm crackle ripples through the clean air, and Jillian swears in that moment she can feel a familiar snout, solid and protective, ghosting beneath her fingers as the grass rustles around her.
She grins wide, "You're such a good girl Patsy, you've still got my back, huh?"
Eventually she’ll wander back to the house- there's a report she guesses she should write if only to spare herself the constipated-crow expression Mrs. Clifford's face will assume if she shows up to class without it- but she can't quite muster the momentum yet. She’d started reading this super cool book about black holes last night and gotten so lost in it that she only surfaced around 4:30 am and damn why does that always happen?- so she’s kind of woozy from the no-sleep thing. Her Mom had always joked that she was too smart for her own good- "you're gonna have to work some day, Jilly, you can't zip through math class on your rocket ship forever". Amelia Holtzmann was definitely on to something with this advice, and Jillian is quietly becoming all too aware of it.
But for now, Jillian sits in the field by the mound and lets the happy, fuzzy feeling buzz over her skin. It's a beautiful day, and this little experiment in paranormal investigation has opened up a whole new realm for her imagination to explore. She pulls her trusty cassette player out of her pack, picks a song, and presses play. Jillian Holtzmann dances as loudly as she wants to, right here and now.
I knew it, she thinks. I knew it.