Chapter 5: The Glass House Shatters
The doorbell didn’t just ring; it sounded like a funeral knell.
I stood paralyzed on the bottom step, my hand still white-knuckled on the banister. Carol was already smoothing the front of her dress—my dress—preening for the arrival of her next audience member. She looked at the door with a predatory hunger, her lips pulled back in a grin that showed too much gum.
“I’ll get it!” she sang, practically skipping to the door in her silver heels.
“Carol, don’t,” I whispered, but the word was drowned out by the heavy thud of the oak door swinging open.
Marcus stood on the porch, a vision of teenage nerves in a charcoal suit, clutching a corsage box like it was a live grenade. He started to smile, his “wow” already forming on his lips—and then he saw her.
He froze. His gaze traveled from Carol’s face—caked in foundation and desperation—down to the midnight blue satin, and then over her shoulder to where I stood, a mirror image of his confusion.
“Wow,” Marcus said, but the word lacked air. It sounded like a slow leak. “Jocelyn. You look… incredible. And… Mrs. Vance?”
“Isn’t it a hoot, Marcus?” Carol chirped, reaching out to tweak his cheek with a crimson nail. “We’re twins! Double the trouble tonight! David, get the camera. We need the ‘sisters’ shot!”
Dad hovered in the background, his face a mask of grey defeat. He raised the DSLR, his hands shaking slightly.
“Step closer, Joss,” Dad muttered.
I moved forward like a mechanical doll. Carol slung an arm around my waist, pulling me into her side with a grip that felt like a vice. She angled her hip forward, her leg jutting out of the slit in a pose that was aggressively youthful, effectively blocking half of my skirt.
“Smile, sweetie!” she hissed through grit teeth. “Don’t ruin the memory.”
Flash.
The light blinded me for a second, a white void in the center of my vision. In that moment, I realized the memory was already ruined. It was no longer about my mother’s earrings or the dress I had saved for; it was about the middle-aged woman clinging to my side, trying to siphon off my youth like a vampire.
“We have to go,” I said, my voice suddenly sharp, cutting through the oily atmosphere of the room. I grabbed Marcus’s arm—harder than I intended. “The limo is waiting at the end of the drive. We’re late.”
“Oh, don’t be a party pooper!” Carol cried, but I didn’t stop. I practically dragged Marcus toward the door.
“Nice seeing you, Mr. Vance,” Marcus stammered, his eyes darting back to the ‘twin’ in the foyer with a look of genuine alarm.
As we hit the cool evening air, the scent of azaleas rushed into my lungs, clearing the cloying lilies of Carol’s perfume. We didn’t speak until we were inside the car, the door clicking shut on the world of that house.
Marcus turned to me, his expression softening into profound sympathy. “Joss. That was… that was actually clinically insane. I thought you were exaggerating about her, but she literally bought your dress? To wear? At the same time?”
“She dug through my trash, Marcus,” I said, a single tear escaping and tracing a hot line through my foundation. “She spent four hundred dollars just to make me look like a joke.”
“Listen to me,” Marcus said, taking my hand. “She didn’t make you look like a joke. She made herself look like a circus act. You look like a movie star. She looks like… well, she looks like someone who’s losing a war with time and taking it out on you. Forget her. Tonight belongs to the class of ’26.”
I wanted to believe him. I really did. I leaned back into the leather seat, watching my house recede in the window. The lights were on in the living room, and for a fleeting second, I saw Carol’s silhouette in the window, still posing, still preening for a husband who was too tired to see her.
I thought I had escaped. I thought the trauma was behind me at the end of the driveway. But as we pulled into the hotel valet, I noticed a white SUV two cars behind us. A white SUV with a familiar license plate and a driver whose rhinestone tiara caught the streetlights.
Carol wasn’t done. She hadn’t just come to ruin the departure; she had come to colonize the arrival.
