Hysterical Strength

Contains references to suicide, infant death, and physical injury

Olivia’s house screamed exactly at eight.

As usual, she woke to the sound of her alarm and the whirring of steel outside her bedroom window. The automatic shutters rolled up every morning, letting in whatever faint sunlight winter produced.

Olivia didn’t like those shutters, but Paul had argued fiercely that they were needed.

“Windows and doors will be impenetrable, Oli. Once the shutters are locked, no burglar, extreme weather, or bear will be able to come in.”

There were no bears in these mountains, but Paul had been so passionate about them that she agreed in the end, as she always did. Even after he left her.

Olivia checked the baby monitor. A grainy black-and-white image of Ellie appeared. She was fast asleep.

She grabbed her phone and checked the latest news. The first headline immediately caught her attention.

MOTHER (33) INCINERATES INFANT (1) INSIDE HOUSE FIREPLACE BEFORE TAKING OWN LIFE

The article briefly mentioned the details: a distressed single mother who decided one day it was going to be her last. The woman took her sleeping son, put him in the fireplace, and lit it. She sat down on the sofa to watch the flames engulf her child before shooting herself.

Olivia understood her—and that frightened her.

The next article took Olivia out of her stupor and she got out of bed. A reminder of what was coming.

RED WARNING FOR SNOWFALL IN THREE COUNTIES

Authorities were urging citizens to move to sheltered areas and avoid the mountain range. Olivia had agreed to stay at her mum’s, who lived in the city, while the storm passed. Even though she still had time, she needed to move. Ever since Ellie arrived, life had gone faster.

A faint cry from the baby monitor pushed her forward. Ellie was awake.

The baby’s puffy face lit up when she saw Olivia, greeting her mother with a smile. No matter how hard it was, Ellie always managed to lift Olivia’s black veil. Like a lighthouse beam cutting through a foggy sea, sometimes the light was there, but once it turned away, the dark night swallowed everything again.

Olivia held her daughter in her arms. She smelled of fresh cotton and innocence.

“Hello, little monkey.”

The baby cooed, staring at the window, watching the snow fall outside. It was getting heavier.

“We’re going to Grandma’s house today. We need to get ready. Are you excited?”

Ellie just stared at her.

Olivia loved her daughter—of course she did—but sometimes she felt like Ellie was a stranger she still needed to get to know.

After a quick breakfast, Olivia checked herself in the mirror. She was wearing a grey tracksuit and running sneakers, her hair pulled into a high ponytail, no makeup. Dark circles under tired eyes.

She then began the leaving-the-house ritual. Every time she left, the same steps.

Ellie went into the car seat. She was focused on the squeaky rubber giraffe that stared at her between her little hands. Olivia held the car seat with her right arm. With her free hand, she grabbed the green rucksack stuffed with spare clothes, nappies, snacks. The car keys hung from her left ring finger. Her phone rested between thumb and middle finger while her index tapped the security code into the panel by the door.

The keypad beeped twice.

SYSTEM SETTING: LOCKDOWN IN 240 SECONDS

Olivia opened the door and a blast of ice-cold wind slapped her face, almost making her lose balance. She hurried to the car. The dry air clawed at her nostrils like dead, bony fingers. She then stopped.

Her nasal spray.

She’d been using it since she was fifteen. She couldn’t sleep without it. She knew she had a problem but didn’t care. She’d left it upstairs, next to her bed.

Shit.

She considered getting back in, canceling the lockdown, leaving Ellie and everything where it was, going upstairs for the spray, then starting over. Or she could move fast, get Ellie into the car, leave everything there, rush back, grab the spray, and be gone before the system armed.

She knew she could do it. She’d done it before.

Behind the house, trees swung as snow thickened. The December air was crisp, colder than she’d expected. She dropped the rucksack into the boot, tossed her phone and keys onto the driver’s seat, secured Ellie—still hypnotised by her giraffe—then left the door slightly ajar so the snow wouldn’t bother her before running back toward the house.

The countdown read 125 seconds now.

She had plenty of time.

Olivia climbed the stairs two steps at a time, reaching the landing in seconds, kicking toys out of the way. Grabbing the banister, she pulled herself toward the bedroom. Her nasal spray sat on the night table, almost glowing like a trophy at the end of a level in the video games she used to play with Paul.

A loud bang from downstairs made her jump.

A gust of wind had slammed the front door shut.

She spun on her heels and headed back downstairs in one swift movement.

She leapt from the top of the staircase and everything went wrong. Fast.

She stepped on one of Ellie’s toys and twisted her ankle. A loud snap sent a sharp pain up her leg and into her spine. Her body lurched forward, her head striking the wall before she tumbled down the stairs, the world turning upside down as the sharp edges of each step battered her body.

The fall ended at the bottom of the stairs, her head colliding with the corner of a table. Her vision blurred. Warmth spread through her hair, and the smell of iron filled the room.

She was bleeding.

The front door was twenty steps away, but she couldn’t move. Her body wouldn’t respond.

She could see the faint glow of the panel beside the door.

SYSTEM SETTING: LOCKDOWN IN 5 SECONDS

A pit opened in her stomach, a knot tightening in her throat, replacing any other pain she might have felt.

3.

The world was fading, but she couldn’t let it swallow her. She couldn’t die here with Ellie outside in the cold.

2.

She should have canceled the lockdown. She shouldn’t have come back for the stupid nasal spray. Her baby was going to die out there because of her.

1.

A long beep thundered through the house.

The panel read: SYSTEM ARMED.

The sharp metallic crack of the three bolts securing the front door rang like bullets in Olivia’s skull.

Bang.

Bang.

Bang.

Then the familiar whirring of the shutters joined the deadly symphony. Doors and windows began to seal, steel sliding into place. The house slowly sank into darkness.

And Olivia let herself be swallowed by it, until there was no sound, no pain.

She was nothing.

Olivia jerked awake, the cold hardwood floor pressed against her cheek. A hammer was drilling into her skull, and she could feel her heartbeat pulsing through her broken right ankle.

Ellie.

The wall clock hanging in the hall read 10:16. She had been out for just over ten minutes. Relief washed over her. It could have been worse.

She imagined Ellie confused and scared, crying until her energy drained away. Her lips and tiny hands turning pale purple, the cold slowly claiming her.

But the reality was probably different, and that thought calmed her slightly. She had read somewhere that babies were warmer than adults, and she had wrapped Ellie in layers before leaving the house. Ten minutes outside wouldn’t have been enough.

She pushed her torso up with her arms, the faint glow of the panel casting a green, opaque river across the dark floor. She had to get to it and disable the lockdown.

Something was wrong.

The house was eerily dark and silent. From where she lay, she could see into the kitchen. Then she realised what was missing; the ever-present red glow of the microwave clock was gone. She couldn’t hear the familiar low hum of the fridge.

Grabbing the table beside her, Olivia pulled herself upright, her mind screaming, her body barely responding.

Instinctively, she flicked the light switch. Nothing happened. She flicked it again, harder this time, as if brute force might bring the light back. It didn’t.

There was no power in the house.

Shit, shit, shit.

Outside, the wind howled. Angry and vengeful.

The storm must have taken a power line.

Panic surged through her. She lurched toward the door, forgetting for a moment that her right foot was useless. She put weight on it, and an invisible dagger tore through her leg. She screamed like a wounded animal, tears streaking down her face.

Hopping on one leg, she reached the panel. With shaking hands, she entered the code.

A loud beep.

SYSTEM UNSET

The three bolts retracting from the door sounded like a miracle. Olivia laughed, a broken, breathless sound.

Oh, thank God.

Relief flooded her, dulling the pain. She was going to be with her baby.

She pulled the door open.

The steel shutter was still down.

She turned back to the panel. It still read SYSTEM UNSET. This time she noticed a small blinking icon above the text, a triangle with an exclamation mark. She pressed it carefully, as if afraid of breaking something sacred.

A message appeared. Her stomach dropped.

EMERGENCY BATTERY IN USE

RESTORE POWER TO ACTIVATE SHUTTER MOTORS

The world collapsed beneath her. Her knees buckled and she hit the floor hard.

A sound rose from the deepest part of her chest, something between a moan and a sob. Olivia cried like she never had before.

She looked up at the shutter. A faint glow leaked through its narrow crevices. Only one layer stood between her and her daughter.

It couldn’t end like this.

Olivia realised she would rather burn the house down and die inside it if that was what it took to draw attention, to save her child.

She wasn’t sure if Mrs. Margaret was home. Like everyone else around, she had probably gone to one of her children’s houses to escape the storm. But it was worth a shot. She lived in the house across from Olivia’s, maybe if she screamed, she could get her attention.

They were the only two houses in the cul-de-sac. Mrs. Margaret was her only option.

Olivia stood and pressed her face against the shutters. She grimaced in pain as the smooth, cold surface burned her lips. Then, with all her strength, Olivia screamed for help.

The wind kept howling outside, probably carrying her cries somewhere far away, never reaching Mrs. Margaret’s house—who probably wasn’t even there.

She rattled the shutters like a caged animal trying to break free. Tears poured from her tired eyes without stopping.

Desperately, Olivia tried lifting the shutters with her hands. Her broken foot rested uselessly on the floor while her good leg took all the weight. She pushed upward, fingernails cracking under the pressure, the muscles in her back tightening like ropes about to snap.

She remembered reading about mothers lifting cars with their bare hands to save their trapped children.

The shutters didn’t move.

She guessed she wasn’t one of those mothers.

A knot exploded in her back and she released the shutters, collapsing onto the floor.

She wanted to stop trying and wait for someone to rescue her, to tell her what to do. Like she always had. Always the passenger, never the driver.

But she couldn’t do that now.

Nobody was coming.

She had to keep trying.

Something in the corner of her eye caught her attention. A tiny, faint green glow on the ceiling just outside the kitchen.

Olivia pushed herself up and made her way toward it. She opened the drawer beneath the hob and grabbed a lighter, then went to the recycling bin and gathered a handful of discarded paper bags, plastic wraps and small cardboard boxes. She took a large steel pot and positioned herself beneath the tiny green light.

The smoke detector.

She shredded the rubbish into smaller pieces and placed them inside the pot, then flicked the lighter. A small flame caught at the corner of one paper bag, darkening and curling its edges as it ate its way through. She lit another corner, then another, until the flames began to grow, feeding on the oxygen and releasing thin wisps of black smoke.

The acrid smell of burning paper and plastic stung her eyes. For a second, she found herself mesmerised by the fire. The article she had read that morning surfaced in her mind, and a wave of anguish rolled through her for that little child.

A knot tightened in her throat.

Olivia lifted the pot closer to the detector and waited.

She hoped it would work. Trigger the alarm, alert the fire department. They would call her, and when she didn’t answer—her phone still in the car—they would send help.

Please. Work.

Her shoulder muscles began to burn as she held the pot overhead. The steel grew hotter with every second. Despite the cold house, sweat mixed with blood and ran down her face, tasting of salt and copper.

A long, sustained beep echoed through the house.

Olivia let herself smile.

The smoke thickened. She lowered the pot onto a chair and fed the flames with more rubbish, making sure the smoke wouldn’t die out.

As the alarm continued to scream, her thoughts raced. How long would the fire department take to get here? With the storm raging, would they even be able to respond in time? Would anyone come at all?

She couldn’t sit and wait while Ellie was outside in the unforgiving cold.

She began mapping the house in her head: doors, windows, vents, anything that might lead outside.

She had to escape.

Olivia watched the smoke rise toward the second floor, crawling up the staircase that had almost killed her, slipping past the banister, staining the white ceiling. A black, deadly trail pointed toward a wooden square carved into it.

She realised what she had to do.

Every window and door was sealed by steel shutters. All but one—the small roof window in the attic.

Olivia limped toward the staircase, accidentally bumping the flaming pot. Metal clattered against the wooden floor as its burning contents spilled out. She didn’t bother trying to fix it. She had a clear goal now.

She climbed the stairs, every step slow and agonising. A stark contrast to her first attempt, before everything went wrong.

Behind her, the fire began to spread, but she barely registered it. Her eyes stayed fixed on the hanging cord above her. She pulled it, and the attic ladder rolled down, stopping at her feet.

She used her right knee for balance while her arms and left foot did the work of lifting her upward.

Pain dominated her body. Smoke burned its way into her lungs, each breath harder than the last, but she refused to give in. She was close.

The attic was freezing and relief washed over her, cold meant outside. The dark space was barely lit by daylight filtering in from the far corner, a small rectangle of light calling to her like a beacon.

She shoved at the chest-high window. The wood and glass resisted. She pushed again, using her whole body, until it finally gave way. A rush of icy air burst inside, snow spilling in, the crisp cold filling her lungs.

She climbed out onto the roof. The wind slapped her face again, but this time it didn’t push her back, it woke her up.

She sat on the snow-covered roof, the mountains and trees below coated in a translucent white as the storm swallowed everything. The smoke alarm screamed even louder out here.

Mrs. Margaret’s house stood dark.

And she could see her car.

Almost there, Ellie.

It was a long way down. She only had one working foot. But there was no time to reconsider.

She began to slide.

Slowly at first. Then faster. The snow turned the roof slick beneath her, speed building quickly, the edge rushing toward her.

The roof vanished beneath her. Her stomach dropped as the world opened up, a white mouth ready to swallow her.

As she fell, she never took her eyes off the car. Her purpose. Her goal. The only thing that mattered.

She hit the ground with a crack that knocked the air from her lungs. The world went black and cold.

Ellie.

She blinked, gasping. The blue car came. back into focus.

The snow had softened the fall, but a sharp pain bloomed in her chest, joining the rest of the damage. Breathing was agony. Still, she pushed herself up and staggered toward the car.

In movies, people open the car door slowly, savouring the moment. Olivia thought it might be like that.

It wasn’t.

She yanked the door open without hesitation.

Ellie sat in her car seat, eyes closed. Still and silent.

Her little face was streaked with dried tears, and Olivia’s heart shattered, hurting more than any broken bone ever could.

She fumbled with the straps and pulled her daughter into her arms.

Please. God. Please.

Olivia shook, numb and shivering. She tried to tell if Ellie was breathing, but her hands wouldn’t stop trembling. Everything was too much.

She sobbed, clutching her baby.

Then Ellie stirred. She lifted her head and burst into tears. Loud, furious, alive.

Joining her mother’s.

The pain vanished. All of it. Ellie was there. Crying. And it was the most beautiful sound Olivia had ever heard. She never wanted it to stop.

She sank to the ground, holding her tight, her back against the car. Behind her, the house burned. Through the narrow slits of the shutters, orange flames danced, consuming everything.

Olivia laughed and tilted her face toward the sky.

The blaring alarm, Ellie’s cries and then another sound joined them.

The familiar wail of a fire engine, cutting through the storm.