Siren Suicides (Second Edition)

Chapter 1. Marble Bathtub

I chose to die in the bathroom because it's the only room in the house I can lock. And because water calms me. I have to be calm to pull the plug on my life. Nothing would irritate my father more than finding his sixteen-year-old daughter on the morning of her birthday, floating in his beloved antique marble tub—a ridiculous Bright family relic. Each corner is held up by one of four carved sirens,their mouths open in lethal song, their hands turned up in worship to the Siren of Canosa, a bronze faucet figure. How fitting. Ailen Bright, the deceased,guided into the afterlife by a tap. Do you hear me, Papa? This is my morbid joke.

Eight. Nine. Ten.

Ten seconds since I took the plunge, submerging into the bathtub full of water, wearing faded jeans and my favorite bright blue hoodie. Big white letters spell Siren Suicides across the front; they're my favorite band, because their music kicks ass, because they make me want to sing.

Blue is my favorite color. Three is my favorite number. It takes three minutes for an average person to drown. Only two minutes and fifty seconds left. I hold my breath.

Six years ago today, my mother jumped off the Aurora Bridge. I heard Papa scream at her, heard her run out of the house slamming the front door. And that was it. I hadn't seen much of my mom during my childhood, but after that day, I lost her forever. For this, and for all of the pain he's caused me, I want to hurt my father the only way I can—by sending him a message as twisted as his soul. By ending my life in the very place he delivered me, on a rainy September morning.

The tub is a central feature in our large bathroom; its plumbing is hidden beneath the floor, and its lack of a shower curtain adds to its authenticity. In some perverted sense, as far back as I can remember, its carved sirens were the sisters I never had. While I hid in the bathroom during my parents' fights, I talked to them for hours. I even had fitting siren names from mythology for each one.

Pisinoe, the one with the persuasive mind, is the youngest of the five. We both want a pet, so I like her best for that. Teles is the perfect one; her cute, yet slightly chubby, face makes me like mine so much better, thank you. Raidne symbolizes improvement. With hair that's long and curly, it's the envy of my life; my hair has been dubbed "chicken-feathers" by the kids at school. Ligeia is the shrill one, perhaps due to her voice. Her perfect breasts were the source of my secret admiration since the day I understood that being flat-chested would be my fate.

These are my four marble sisters. They stand two feet tall. Their bare bodies protrude from four corners of the tub, their knees on the floor, their arms spread wide as if they're the wings of birds getting ready to fly. At the head of the tub, with long hair covering her body and legs dangling from the rim, sits the Siren of Canosa, my big bronze sister. The way the others worship her says she's the boss. Her left hand holds the faucet, and her right arm is raised over her head in a gesture of mourning. She's the funerary siren whose job as a mythological creature is to lead the souls of the dead into the afterlife. But I'm forgetting to count.

45. 46. 47.

My clothes feel oddly warm and clingy. I close my eyes. I press my hands into the sides of the tub to keep myself from floating up. I can't do this, I can't. I'm scared. I sit up and gasp, grabbing my head with both hands to prevent it from spinning. No, to prevent the bathroom around me from spinning. Water rushes down my face. Wet cotton sticks to my skin in thick, soggy layers.

I hear the doorknob as someone tries to turn it. Then, after a puzzled pause, it rattles several more times.

Click-click-click.

"Ailen?" Papa's voice.

My muscles constrict as if freeze-dried. My heart attempts to beat through layers of ribs, exploding in my head with a pounding migraine.