Folie A Deux
by Payton McCall
“Let go of me!” Anna snapped. Her voice echoed off the tiled walls. She shook loose of my grip and crossed her arms over her chest.
“What the fuck are you doing, Anna?” My blood steamed and popped beneath my skin, boiling rapids coursing through my veins. “You never come home anymore, and I know you’ve been skipping school.”
“How do you know that?”
“I’m paying attention.”
“I’ve been at Margaret’s,” she mumbled. She rubbed her arm where crescent moons formed from the bite of my nails. She looked down at her loafers that I knew belonged to Margaret. “I get my homework emailed to me, so everything’s fine, okay?”
“I don’t like what’s going on between you two. You act the same, dress the same. It seems,” I searched for a word that wasn’t too cruel, wouldn’t scare her away, “co-dependent.”
“Margaret and I—” Anna trailed off. She stomped her foot and looked around like a cornered animal searching for an escape. “I’m happy, okay?”
I took her shoulders, holding her at arm’s length. She finally looked at me, her glacier eyes soft and watery. There was nothing I could say to make her weary of Margaret, nothing to make her understand how strange their relationship was. I dropped my arms and said, “Okay.” She turned and skittered out of the bathroom, leaving me alone, never looking back.
Our conversation consumed my mind, scraped and clawed against every corner of my brain for the rest of the school day. I replayed it: Anna nearly in tears, unwilling to hear my concerns, protecting Margaret. She used to tell me everything, and now she wouldn’t even give me scraps.
After school, I snuck into Anna’s room, using her absence as an opportunity to search for clues into her increasingly private life. I opened drawers, dug through her closet, lifted her mattress. I didn’t find anything of interest until I noticed her laptop sitting on her desk. I sat down and typed in the last password she had given me. The screen came to life, and I released a breath I didn’t know I was holding. I opened her messages, swatting away the thought that I was invading my sister’s privacy.
I scrolled through countless texts between Anna and Margaret dating back to the start of the school year. They started off innocently: questions about homework assignments, complaints about teachers, grievances about their parents. Around the time that Margaret started driving Anna home from school, the texts turned into love letters: paragraphs about how beautiful the other was, how they couldn’t wait until lunch when they could hook up in the theater, how devoted they were to each other.
I paused, hovering the cursor over their proclamations, over the answers to all of my questions written in plain text. I hadn’t realized how deep their bond—their mutual obsession— went. People do drastic things for love, and Margaret was Anna’s first.
My fingers turned cold and numb as the texts grew darker and more perturbing. Margaret told Anna how they couldn’t rely on anyone else. She said that it was them against the world, no one would ever love Anna the way she did, they would be together forever. Anna’s responses reaffirmed the sentiments saying Margaret didn’t need to worry about her loyalty, they only needed each other, no one could come between them— “not even Sylvie.” When I saw my name, fear swallowed any other emotion I had. If Margaret successfully isolated Anna from me, I didn’t know how to bring her back.
The final texts in their strand of messages triggered a chill that snaked down my spine. I read and reread them, attempting to process the weight of their meaning.
Margaret wrote: my parents just told me my dad got a new job, and we have to move. i won’t go, not without you
Anna responded: we’ll figure something out, i promise
From Margaret: you said you’d follow me anywhere, right? that you’d do anything for me?
From Anna: of course, M. i am desperately, fiercely, gravely in love with you
From Margaret: then we need to come up with a plan that will keep us together. forever.
The texts were dated earlier that morning, just before I’d dragged Anna into the bathroom. I slammed the laptop shut and picked up my phone to call Anna. It went straight to voicemail. I tried again and again, but she wouldn’t answer. I felt jittery, my nerves frayed, my reason fracturing into panic.
I rushed down the stairs and threw open the door to Mom’s study. She shifted her glasses down the bridge of her nose and peered over them.
“You should knock. You know I’m working.”
“Have you talked to Anna today?”
She glanced at her phone. “She just texted and said she’s staying at Margaret’s. We shouldn’t expect her for the next few days. Why?”
“I’m worried about her. And she’s not answering my calls.”
Mom sighed. She placed her elbows on her desk and tented her fingers. “You have to let this go. We talked about how this is good for her. Socialization, remember?”
I clenched my fists to keep myself from screaming. “Do you know where Margaret lives?”
“You’re not going over there.”
“I need to find Anna. Make sure she’s okay. Please.”
“Drop it, Sylvie. Now, go. I have a client in a few minutes.” She pushed her glasses back up her nose and waved me away.
I felt crazed, unstable, out of my mind. No one believed that this relationship was devouring my sister, but I had proof that we were losing Anna. I grabbed my keys and ran to my car. I drove through the neighborhoods surrounding our house, knowing that Margaret must live nearby. I scanned driveways for Margaret’s car, the red Honda Civic that Anna left in on the days she came to school. I called Anna’s phone every few minutes, but I only spoke to her voicemail.
“Anna, call me,” I repeatedly begged. “I need to know you’re okay.”
I drove until the early hours of the morning, until the neighborhoods molded into one nebulous mass, and I couldn’t tell any of the houses apart. I never found Margaret’s car. Never saw any trace of Anna. The sun rose, dusting the world in pale yellow light. I wanted to keep searching, but I forced myself to give up and drive home. I parked in our driveway and slammed my forehead into the steering wheel. I screamed until my throat was raw, seething at myself for not finding Anna.
I crept up the stairs to avoid my parents' interrogations about where I had been. I slipped into Anna’s room, locked the door behind me, and crawled into her bed. I burrowed my head into her pillow, into the scent that clung to her belongings.
I slept through the next two days of school, succumbing to dark, dizzying dreams where I followed Anna. I yelled for her, reached for her, but I couldn’t catch up. I was finally awoken by Mom hammering at the door.
“Sylvie!” she screamed as she pounded. “Sylvie!”
I shuffled out of bed and unlocked the door. Mom pushed her way into Anna’s room and sat on the bed.
“They can’t find Anna,” she said. Rivulets of tears rolled down her cheeks. She pulled her legs to her chest and put her forehead on her knees—a sitting fetal position, cowering away from reality. She repeated, “They can’t find her.”
Police found Margaret’s car parked off a road that crossed over a bridge. They dragged the river, searching for bodies, but none were uncovered. Volunteers helped police grid search the woods bordering the river, but they didn’t find any evidence proving Anna and Margaret had been there.
Even after the search parties ceased and the case turned cold, I walked through the woods. I looked for anything that those who didn’t know Anna might have missed—a ribbon from her hair tied to a branch as a breadcrumb for me to follow, or a marking carved into a tree so I would know she had been there. I walked by the river to see if a shoe or a barrette had washed to shore. Surely Anna wouldn’t leave without letting me know where she was going, wherever she ended up, whatever happened to her.
“What the fuck are you doing, Anna?” My blood steamed and popped beneath my skin, boiling rapids coursing through my veins. “You never come home anymore, and I know you’ve been skipping school.”
“How do you know that?”
“I’m paying attention.”
“I’ve been at Margaret’s,” she mumbled. She rubbed her arm where crescent moons formed from the bite of my nails. She looked down at her loafers that I knew belonged to Margaret. “I get my homework emailed to me, so everything’s fine, okay?”
“I don’t like what’s going on between you two. You act the same, dress the same. It seems,” I searched for a word that wasn’t too cruel, wouldn’t scare her away, “co-dependent.”
“Margaret and I—” Anna trailed off. She stomped her foot and looked around like a cornered animal searching for an escape. “I’m happy, okay?”
I took her shoulders, holding her at arm’s length. She finally looked at me, her glacier eyes soft and watery. There was nothing I could say to make her weary of Margaret, nothing to make her understand how strange their relationship was. I dropped my arms and said, “Okay.” She turned and skittered out of the bathroom, leaving me alone, never looking back.
Our conversation consumed my mind, scraped and clawed against every corner of my brain for the rest of the school day. I replayed it: Anna nearly in tears, unwilling to hear my concerns, protecting Margaret. She used to tell me everything, and now she wouldn’t even give me scraps.
After school, I snuck into Anna’s room, using her absence as an opportunity to search for clues into her increasingly private life. I opened drawers, dug through her closet, lifted her mattress. I didn’t find anything of interest until I noticed her laptop sitting on her desk. I sat down and typed in the last password she had given me. The screen came to life, and I released a breath I didn’t know I was holding. I opened her messages, swatting away the thought that I was invading my sister’s privacy.
I scrolled through countless texts between Anna and Margaret dating back to the start of the school year. They started off innocently: questions about homework assignments, complaints about teachers, grievances about their parents. Around the time that Margaret started driving Anna home from school, the texts turned into love letters: paragraphs about how beautiful the other was, how they couldn’t wait until lunch when they could hook up in the theater, how devoted they were to each other.
I paused, hovering the cursor over their proclamations, over the answers to all of my questions written in plain text. I hadn’t realized how deep their bond—their mutual obsession— went. People do drastic things for love, and Margaret was Anna’s first.
My fingers turned cold and numb as the texts grew darker and more perturbing. Margaret told Anna how they couldn’t rely on anyone else. She said that it was them against the world, no one would ever love Anna the way she did, they would be together forever. Anna’s responses reaffirmed the sentiments saying Margaret didn’t need to worry about her loyalty, they only needed each other, no one could come between them— “not even Sylvie.” When I saw my name, fear swallowed any other emotion I had. If Margaret successfully isolated Anna from me, I didn’t know how to bring her back.
The final texts in their strand of messages triggered a chill that snaked down my spine. I read and reread them, attempting to process the weight of their meaning.
Margaret wrote: my parents just told me my dad got a new job, and we have to move. i won’t go, not without you
Anna responded: we’ll figure something out, i promise
From Margaret: you said you’d follow me anywhere, right? that you’d do anything for me?
From Anna: of course, M. i am desperately, fiercely, gravely in love with you
From Margaret: then we need to come up with a plan that will keep us together. forever.
The texts were dated earlier that morning, just before I’d dragged Anna into the bathroom. I slammed the laptop shut and picked up my phone to call Anna. It went straight to voicemail. I tried again and again, but she wouldn’t answer. I felt jittery, my nerves frayed, my reason fracturing into panic.
I rushed down the stairs and threw open the door to Mom’s study. She shifted her glasses down the bridge of her nose and peered over them.
“You should knock. You know I’m working.”
“Have you talked to Anna today?”
She glanced at her phone. “She just texted and said she’s staying at Margaret’s. We shouldn’t expect her for the next few days. Why?”
“I’m worried about her. And she’s not answering my calls.”
Mom sighed. She placed her elbows on her desk and tented her fingers. “You have to let this go. We talked about how this is good for her. Socialization, remember?”
I clenched my fists to keep myself from screaming. “Do you know where Margaret lives?”
“You’re not going over there.”
“I need to find Anna. Make sure she’s okay. Please.”
“Drop it, Sylvie. Now, go. I have a client in a few minutes.” She pushed her glasses back up her nose and waved me away.
I felt crazed, unstable, out of my mind. No one believed that this relationship was devouring my sister, but I had proof that we were losing Anna. I grabbed my keys and ran to my car. I drove through the neighborhoods surrounding our house, knowing that Margaret must live nearby. I scanned driveways for Margaret’s car, the red Honda Civic that Anna left in on the days she came to school. I called Anna’s phone every few minutes, but I only spoke to her voicemail.
“Anna, call me,” I repeatedly begged. “I need to know you’re okay.”
I drove until the early hours of the morning, until the neighborhoods molded into one nebulous mass, and I couldn’t tell any of the houses apart. I never found Margaret’s car. Never saw any trace of Anna. The sun rose, dusting the world in pale yellow light. I wanted to keep searching, but I forced myself to give up and drive home. I parked in our driveway and slammed my forehead into the steering wheel. I screamed until my throat was raw, seething at myself for not finding Anna.
I crept up the stairs to avoid my parents' interrogations about where I had been. I slipped into Anna’s room, locked the door behind me, and crawled into her bed. I burrowed my head into her pillow, into the scent that clung to her belongings.
I slept through the next two days of school, succumbing to dark, dizzying dreams where I followed Anna. I yelled for her, reached for her, but I couldn’t catch up. I was finally awoken by Mom hammering at the door.
“Sylvie!” she screamed as she pounded. “Sylvie!”
I shuffled out of bed and unlocked the door. Mom pushed her way into Anna’s room and sat on the bed.
“They can’t find Anna,” she said. Rivulets of tears rolled down her cheeks. She pulled her legs to her chest and put her forehead on her knees—a sitting fetal position, cowering away from reality. She repeated, “They can’t find her.”
Police found Margaret’s car parked off a road that crossed over a bridge. They dragged the river, searching for bodies, but none were uncovered. Volunteers helped police grid search the woods bordering the river, but they didn’t find any evidence proving Anna and Margaret had been there.
Even after the search parties ceased and the case turned cold, I walked through the woods. I looked for anything that those who didn’t know Anna might have missed—a ribbon from her hair tied to a branch as a breadcrumb for me to follow, or a marking carved into a tree so I would know she had been there. I walked by the river to see if a shoe or a barrette had washed to shore. Surely Anna wouldn’t leave without letting me know where she was going, wherever she ended up, whatever happened to her.
Payton McCall is a Creative Writing MFA candidate at Randolph College, where she also serves as Fiction Editor for the literary magazine, Revolute. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee with her fiancée and their four cats, Lucifer, Nox, Ghost, and Wednesday.