Notes on an Execution

by Danya Kukafka

Motherhood was, by nature, a thing you did alone.

Tragedy was undiscerning and totally unfair.

Seventeen, and the world had new edges.

Shawna is a woman made up of other people’s perceptions. The most malleable type.

How senseless, to reveal even a corner of yourself—when that self, they say, is monster.

As the years faded, Saffy remembered less and less about her mother. The tiny things had slipped away without saying goodbye.

She glimpsed that same craving in Jenny Fisk—an ask, for suffering. It was the scariest thing about being a woman. It was hardwired, ageless, the part that knew you could have the good without the hurt, but it wouldn’t be nearly as exquisite.

It was only a matter of time. Saffy knew you could not hide your real self forever, no matter how normal you looked; the truth would come out eventually.

You shouldn’t have done it. You were sick and wrong. Most devastatingly, you were unchanged.

Lavender wanted to tell them what she had learned about demons. Often, they were not demons at all—only the jagged parts of herself she’d hidden from the sun.

Of course I still love her, you said. But the good parts of the story are nowhere near the end.

She had known from a young age that everyone had darkness inside—some just controlled it better than others. Very few people believed that they were bad, and this was the scariest part. Human nature could be so hideous, but it persisted in this ugliness by insisting it was good.

The truth feels stupid, in the shadow of tonight. Heartbreakingly simple. You had not known, until the Blue House, what you were capable of becoming. It was fleeting, ethereal. It was tragically uncomplicated. At the Blue House, you were free.

Forgiveness is flimsy. Forgiveness is like a square of warm sun on the carpet. You’d like to curl up in it, feel its temporary comfort—but forgiveness will not change you. Forgiveness will not bring you back.

Love? she calls. I’m home. The texture of Jenny. Fruit shampoo, hangover breath. You remember how she used to tease you, hands on your cheeks. It’s okay to feel things, she liked to say with a laugh, and this always irritated you. But if you could go back now, you would clap your hands over hers, relish in the knobby warmth of Jenny’s fingers—the only person who dared to stand between the world and yourself. Please, you would beg. I’ll feel anything. Just show me how.

Grief was a hole. A portal to nothing. Grief was a walk so long Hazel forgot her own legs. It was a shock of blinding sun. A burst of remembering: sandals on pavement, a sleepy back seat, nails painted on the bathroom floor. Grief was a loneliness that felt like a planet.