Why? Why?! You ask me that question as if there’s some kind of mystery involved here. Because it had to be done. Is that a good enough answer for you? Because I couldn’t take it anymore, knowing what I knew and seeing what I saw. So go on sitting there, smugly taking down notes in your little blue book. You think you know how it was but you don’t, you can’t. You can’t know because you didn’t see. Do you want specifics? A list of because this and because that? Fine then. I knew Morgan Mansfield because she was my sister. I killed her because I could.
She was such a snitch when we were children, always running off to Mama with her ready-made tears, hell bent on getting me into some kind of trouble or other. I tried to be nice, for in my childish naiveté I believed in the sanctity of sisterhood. But was it my fault my friends didn’t want to play dolls with her because she was so bossy? Like a doll herself she would look, sitting on our father’s lap, with her long yellow hair, and eyes big enough to eat her face. Oh yeah—Morgan had those special eyes, “leakin’ peepers” I had heard my granny call them once, as I eavesdropped from the stairwell.
“That girl’s got the leakin’ peepers, Margo,” granny had warned. “She’ll be a dangerous sort when she learns to use ‘em against a soul.” If you ask me though, Morgan didn’t need to learn a damn thing; she was born knowing every trick in the book. Even as a little girl all she had to do was bat those eyelashes of hers and the world was laid at her feet. Imagine, grown men losing their minds over a four-year-old child! And if smiles didn’t work, Morgan would weep like her heart was breaking. It didn’t take me long to realize that Morgan’s tears were her weapon—spilling over her endless lashes so easily it seemed almost magical. I could tell you any number of stories about the things those big, leaking, cerulean-blue eyes won for my little sister, and all the things they stole from me. For a while, I tried to be her friend. I thought that maybe if my parents realized that Morgan liked me, they would start liking me again too. But they never did. I was never pretty enough, or happy enough, or *Morgan* enough for them. And as far as Morgan herself was concerned, she was simply indifferent. She never acknowledged my overtures at friendship, although she wasn’t ever directly mean either--as long as I kept out of her way. She was simply uninterested in me. Her displays of charm were saved for folks she was trying to butter up in one way or another and I wasn’t worth the effort. She didn’t want my friendship or my concern—she made that abundantly clear. Morgan didn’t deserve anything from me except a sharp blade to the jugular; can you really blame me for finally giving it to her?
As we grew older, things got worse. I had lost a total of seven boyfriends to my sister by the time I graduated from high school. Morgan must have been able to smell them coming, for she never failed to be in some hopelessly lovely situation whenever I walked through the door with a boy on my arm. In ninth grade she stole Tommy Miricle from me with a pink gingham apron and a tray of fresh-baked cookies. In tenth grade, Wally Croup took one look at her curled up in the window seat with *my* kitten and never once looked back in my direction except to ask me Morgan’s name. Playing piano in the parlor, her hair swept up like a lady’s; reading poetry by firelight; drinking pink lemonade on the porch—Morgan was a master at advertising herself. I couldn’t ever really bring myself to blame the boys she lured away from me. Poor little things--dating them was not her aim, she wanted only to ruin things for me. She would shamelessly reel them in and then turn them down flat. They would come through our door with wide dopey grins and leave looking as if they had just been castrated. For all I know, they had been.
I left home as soon as I could, of course, trying to escape, trying to start anew. For two years I lived on my own. I’d spend all day waiting table in a horrid little diner for lousy pay and even lousier tips and then go home to my empty apartment for another lonely night spent wishing things were different. Mama would call often in those days. She always said she was just checking on me, but what she was really doing was rubbing Morgan in my face, just like always. Morgan’s dates, her pageants, her volunteer work at the pediatric ward. As if Morgan ever once in her life worried about a sick child. Down there chasing after doctors is what she was doing! I know you probably think I was jealous of my sister, but you are wrong. So wrong. I didn’t envy my sister, I hated her. I wanted to be her friend but she made me hate her. My sister was a menace hiding behind a beautiful face. What I did was no worse than putting down a rabid dog, or shooting a rouge lion.
Maybe if I hadn’t lost my job last year and had to move back home, things would have been different. Maybe I would have escaped. Maybe if Morgan hadn’t been such a hypocrite on my return—all sunny smiles and big hugs and “welcome home”s. Maybe if I hadn’t been so able to recall with perfect clarity all those times she had wronged me, maybe if Morgan had been a better person, or if I had been granted a more forgiving soul… And of course, the biggest maybe of all. Maybe if Morgan hadn’t laughed that day she walked into my room and found me crying. If she hadn’t smiled her sweet little smile, and cooed that everything would turn out all right, all the while gloating over the mess I had made of my life. Maybe if she hadn’t pretended to care that day, as if she knew anything about me, or my life, or my pain. It was all too much. I lost my mind, blew my gasket, popped my cork—you pick the metaphor. Truthfully, the whole thing bores me anymore.
Maybe, maybe, maybe…You could maybe a whole new world into existence with half a brain and two minutes of your time. What happened, happened. Don’t try to make my sister out to be some kind of saint. Her perfection was a sham. I know this. I saw her blood run just as red as yours and mine. And when I drew that knife across her throat the look in her eyes was the most satisfying thing I’d ever seen in my life. It was all the betrayals she had ever subjected me to, all the hurt and confusion suddenly turned around and concentrated and poured into her hated blue eyes. It felt right. When those eyes closed for the last time, it was like a pair of stone lids closing off two deadly wells the neighborhood children had been falling into. My sister had dangerous eyes, she was a dangerous girl. And after those eyes closed, and my breathing finally slowed, I