Free Cold Quiet Country by Clayton Lindemuth

Mother wiped her cheek on her shoulder and kept her face angled away. Her hands shook. “It’s a small cut. Just needs a Band-Aid.”
    Gwen steadied her mother’s bleeding index finger under the water. “Does it sting?”
    “A little.”
    “You see what he’s doing, right? You see it, Mother?”
    “I’ll get this. Just a little old Band-Aid.”
    “Why did you hate Grandpa? Grandma?”
    “Stop, Gwen. Please stop.”
    “Because of what he did to you? And because your mother knew, and did nothing?”
    “Please…”
    “How can you be so weak?”
    “You don’t know—”
    Gwen released her mother’s hand.
    Mother stopped shaking, and Gwen found her eyes in the mirror. They dipped, and Mother said, “I’ve got this. Go back to supper.”
    * * *
    Liz had been late to start school in the fall. This morning, weeks into the school year, she carried a new blankness, a dazed shock that eclipsed the wounds that had fed the girls’ silent commiseration. After much hesitation, Gwen leaned across the aisle between their schoolroom desks, and tossed a note onto Liz’s open textbook.
    Liz read the note.
    She looked down at her blouse, muffled a shriek with her hands, covered her bosom with her elbows, and ran from the room. Boys and girls twittered.
    Gwen snatched the note off her desk and raced after Liz.
    Mister Fitzsimons glanced up from his lectern. Alarm flashed across his face. “Girls!”
    Gwen closed the door. She followed Liz into the restroom. Cornered Liz and pulled her hands from her chest. “How do we make them stop?” Gwen said.
    “I don’t know.” Liz blinked away spaced-out tears.
    Gwen gathered toilet paper into a ball. “Can you squeeze it out?”
    “It’s going to stain,” Liz choked. Her face was red, her eyebrows dimpled. Mucus dripped from her nose and tears fell from her cheeks and she coughed.
    “It won’t stain,” Gwen said. “It’s only…milk?” Gwen pressed the ball of toilet paper to Liz’s leftward wet spot and wiped. She tossed the paper to the trash and put her arm across Liz’s shoulder.
    “Everybody saw,” Liz said.
    “No one saw.”
    “Mister Fitzsimons gawked at my boobs.”
    “He’s a boob gawker. Yours, mine. Everything’s going to be fine. And if he says a word, I’ll kill him.”
    Liz smiled, and it was repugnant, almost. Her face was red and her eyes bloodshot and far-off, and the white spots on her forehead were still there, and here was this silly simper on her face while the dark circles at her nipples expanded. She was interested in talk about killing. Dare Gwen go farther?
    “I’ve killed two so far.”
    Liz glanced beyond Gwen to the entrance. It was a doorless restroom, privacy provided by two ninety-degree turns. Voices easily echoed into the hallway. Liz canted her head sideways; her face betrayed credulity and candor. “Two? Tell me how.”
    “Didn’t anyone tell you how to get them to stop leaking?”
    Liz unbuttoned her blouse. “Look what they said to do.” She pulled a flaccid, pale leaf from the cup of her bra. “Cabbage. The nurse said this would dry me up.”
    “Can’t you press the milk out?”
    “You’re not supposed to. You make more.”
    The bell rang. In seconds, the restroom would swirl with girls crowding in front of the mirror. Waiting outside a stall.
    Gwen took Liz’s hands. Hurried her into a stall and swung the door as giggles and gossip rushed closer. She wrapped the half-undressed Liz in her arms and shushed her. Gwen waited for the light pressure of Liz’s hands on her back, her side, anywhere. Liz let her arms hang. “You have to tell me how you did it,” Liz whispered into Gwen’s ear.
    “I’ll go to the nurse for some pads,” Gwen said. “It’ll be okay.”
    They waited three minutes until the traffic cleared. Gwen listened to the silence and rubbed Liz’s shoulder, and when she was sure the restroom was empty and the next class had begun, she said, “I’ll go now.”
    “You said you killed two