The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein

by Kiersten White

Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay To mould me man? Did I solicit thee From darkness to promote me? —John Milton, Paradise Lost

“Oh, he was horribly depressed for months afterward. I believe his exact phrasing was that he ‘languished in valleys of incomprehensible despair.’ ”

She did not really know him. No one did, except me. I liked it that way, but I wanted them to love each other as I loved them both.

He tried on a smile like I tried on castoff clothing, shifting it around until it mostly fit his face.

I lived with the Frankensteins. I was not one. And I never forgot it.

I, however, was perfectly aware of my beauty. I considered it a skill, alongside speaking French, English, Italian, and German. It was a language of its own, in a way; one that translated well in different circumstances.

I might have been his, but he was mine.

I had become this girl in order to survive, but the longer I lived in her body, the easier it was to simply be her.

I used smiles like currency. They were the only currency I ever had. My dresses, my shoes, my ribbons—they all belonged to the Frankensteins. I was a guest in them, just as I was a guest in that house.

Henry had asked if I was happy. I was safe, and that was better than happy.

“Thank you for your quick thinking and action,” Judge Frankenstein said. “You saved my son.” I could not tell which son he spoke of, and I suspected I was not intended to.

Red leaves. Red knife. Red hands. But white dresses, always.

I would lie silent and still, like a corpse, as he studied me. His careful, delicate hands explored all the bones and tendons, the muscles and tracings of veins that make up a person. “But where is Elizabeth?” he would ask, his ear against my heart. “Which part makes you?” I had no answer, and neither did he.

I WILL DEFEAT DEATH.

Besides, I already knew how to be Victor’s. I did not want to learn how to be anyone else’s.