Fault Lines
by Monique Chinenye Ezeh
New York University
Monique Chinenye Ezeh is a nineteen-year-old writer from Macon, Georgia. She currently attends New York University, where she is majoring in Politics and double minoring in Creative Writing and Journalism. Her main areas of work are poetry and creative nonfiction. You can find more of Monique’s work at https://linktr.ee/moniqueezeh.
When my family lived in New Jersey, I used to pee the bed a lot. Like, a lot a lot. And far beyond when I should have stopped. It was my greatest shame, my biggest secret, my most frustrating shortcoming.
It happened so often that I’d developed a routine:
1) Wake up soaking wet. Sniff the air. Let the shame set in.
2) Silently get out of bed and tiptoe to the bathroom to empty my bladder of whatever pee was left.
3) Dry off so I don’t get a rash. Change into new PJs.
4) Quietly strip the sheets from the bed and pat down the damp mattress with a towel.
5) Wake up my sister.
“Michelle… I think I peed.”
“You think?”
“I mean, I did. Can I sleep with you?” I knew what the answer would be, always, but I had to ask. “I changed my PJs already.”
We followed a script, Michelle and I, and she knew her part well. Sighing, she recited her line. “Fine. Get in.” She rolled over to the other side of her twin bed, making room for me. I climbed in, nestling into her warm 9-year-old body; we fit together like two long-lost puzzle pieces.
“Get off me,” she said. “Why are you so close?”
“Sorry.”
***
Every time my mother took my siblings and I to a store, I was on my own personal shopping trip. Eyes just above the edge of the check-out counter, I would scan the assortment for whatever was most appealing. I particularly loved seasonal gift cards, though you could never go wrong with a good old fashioned “happy birthday.” My collection was vast: TJ Maxx, Marshalls, A&P, Macy’s, Best Buy. My tiny hand would select a card and stick it into my pocket after a thorough examination; I didn’t think what I was doing was wrong, so I didn’t try to hide it. Despite my brazenness, no one ever said anything. I suppose people don’t usually suspect a six year old of shoplifting. When I told Michelle, she was dumbfounded.
“You mean you can just take them?” she asked, wide-eyed. Her surprise filled me with smug satisfaction; I was three years younger and teaching her about gift cards-- ha!
“Of course! Why do you think they call them gift cards?”
And so began our season of sisterly shoplifting. We weren’t really stealing anything of value since the cards weren’t activated, though at that point, I didn’t even know that they could be activated. I assumed people liked the pretty plastic like Michelle and I did. We would end each week seated on the carpet of our shared bedroom, the pink walls and Disney Princess comforters setting the unassuming backdrop of our pilfered-card trading session.
“I’ll give you my Marshalls “Happy Birthday” card if I can have the “Congratulations” one from Old Navy,” I offered.
“Which “happy birthday”?”
“This one.” I gestured at a periwinkle card with rainbow confetti and “Happy Birthday” written in a fun block font. A cupcake adorned with a lit candle was superimposed on the card.
“No.” She pointed at a deep red card with a pretty gold calligraphic font framed by lit sparklers. “I want that one, the Macy’s ‘Happy New Year’ card.”
“You know that’s my favorite, Michelle!”
“Well, the “congratulations” is my favorite.”
“No, it’s not! You told me before that you like the TJ Maxx--”
The bedroom door swung open, interrupting our bargaining.
“What are you guys doing? Where did these all come from?” Mom asked.
“The store,” I responded. “Well, a few stores.”
“You just… took them?”
“Yeah,” I sighed, exasperated. “They’re gift cards, Mom.” Michelle nodded in agreement.
“That’s not what that means.” She looked like she was stifling laughter, and I had no clue why. I looked to Michelle, whose confused expression mirrored mine. Finally, Mom let out the guffaw she’d been holding back. “Babe, they’re called gift cards because you buy them for other people. As a gift. They’re not free, princess, and they’re not worth anything until you load them with money.”
I looked at Michelle, then at my collection of cards, then up at my mom, then back at the cards. The pieces of plastic I’d been accruing for months were worthless. Sure, I hadn’t planned on using them for anything, but suddenly, the rose-colored glasses with which I’d viewed them were roughly snatched away. They were no longer beautiful collector’s items, carefully curated pieces of portable art. They were junk. Michelle and I had been hoodwinked. Worse yet, we’d hoodwinked ourselves. Mom laughed again and let us know that dinner would soon be ready, that she’d just wanted to see what we were up to.
Silently, I grabbed a plastic bag and began filling it with gift cards. I gave it to Michelle to throw in the kitchen trash.
***
“Michelle,” I gently shook her shoulder. “Michelle.” She wouldn’t wake up so I shook her harder and whispered louder. “Michelle!”
“What?” She rolled over to face me. “Did you pee?”
“Yes.”
“Again?”
“Yes.”
“Did you already change?”
“Yes.”
“Get in.”
I climbed into the bed, careful not to invade her space. We’d watched Bride of Chucky with our uncle earlier that day, unbeknownst to our mother. Clearly, I was the only one affected by his mangled face.
“I’m scared, Michelle,” I whispered, half-hoping she wouldn’t hear me.
“Of what?”
“Chucky,” I somehow whispered even quieter.
“It’s a movie, Mo.”
“I know. But it was scary. His face…” I sighed, resigned to how juvenile I sounded. “Can we sing a song so I can sleep?”
“Monique.”
“Please?”
Michelle sighed, but she knew her line: “Okay. What song?”
I pretended to think for a moment. “Jesus Loves Me,” I decided.
We whispered the lyrics to each other in the dark, facing each other but unable to see a thing.
“Okay, Momo, goodnight. Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
I stared at the nightlight across the room, lids growing heavy as I repeated the hymn’s lyrics in my head. Little ones to Him belong, they are weak but He is strong. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me for the Bible tells me so. My lids finally gave in and I fell fast asleep.
Early the next morning, a rough shove off the bed woke me from my slumber.
“Are you kidding me, Monique? What is your problem?”
Confused, I rubbed my eyes and sat up. The smell of urine was wafting off me, off the bed, off my sister. I’d peed in her bed after already peeing in mine. The realization set in, followed by the shame.
“How do you pee yourself twice in one night? Literally what is wrong with you? Mom!”
“I’m so sorry, Michelle. I’ll clean it all up, I promise. Don’t tell Mom. Really, I'm so, so sorry.”
I began to cry, apologizing profusely through my tears as I stripped my sister’s bed. To make a bad situation worse, my mom walked in and Michelle immediately filled her in.
“She peed in my bed and hers, Mom!”
Usually, I could convince Michelle to keep my incontinence a secret. She wouldn’t help me clean up, but I could always count on her to keep her mouth shut unless lying was futile. This betrayal opened a fissure in our relationship, activated a fault line I’d hoped would stay dormant. I tuned out of the conversation as my mom calmed her down, told me what to do to clean up, and began to take the laundry downstairs. Michelle’s words, timbre distorted by my dissociative state, repeated in my mind like a refrain, a mantra, a certainty: What is wrong with you? What is your problem?
***
Michelle didn’t have a first period class during her senior year of high school, so she was never very concerned about getting there early. It was my freshman year, however, and I had to show up bright and early for my journalism class. I could’ve taken the bus, I suppose, but if Michelle drove me to school, I could get up almost an hour later than if I’d taken the bus. Every morning was a fight: I’d yell at Michelle for getting up late, then go eat breakfast, then yell at Michelle again, then she’d yell something especially hurtful back at me, then I’d go to my room and pinch my inner arm until it bruised, then I’d tell on her to Mom (who would tell me to respect my elder sister, but also tell Michelle to hurry the hell up), then Michelle would begrudgingly come downstairs, muttering under her breath how she couldn’t stand me and I was a snitch, then I’d cry in the bathroom and pinch my inner arm until it bled before walking out and pretending I didn’t care what she thought. Rinse, repeat.
One sunny Thursday morning, everything was going surprisingly smooth. We got dressed and left a bit early so we could get Starbucks or McDonald’s before school instead of after; Michelle had track practice after school and I would be taking the bus back home. The sky was blue, the sun was high in the sky, and the temperature was a beautiful sixty-five degrees. We got in the car and put Justin Bieber’s Purpose on shuffle; the album had come out a few months prior and was still center-stage in the cultural zeitgeist.
We always sped through our neighborhood. Yes, the speed limit was technically 30 miles per hour, but if the roads were empty, who cared that you hit 50, 55, 60? We were also always late to whatever our destination might be, so we depended on hidden shortcuts that we’d zigzag through twenty miles above the speed limit. We were belting “Sorry” as Michelle whipped around a bend in a Fast and Furious-esque maneuver. I screamed with glee and she laughed, regaining control and slowing to 45 as the road straightened out.
“Is it too late now to say sorry? Yeah, I know-ow-ow that I let you down; is it too late to say I'm sorry n--”
Our unison belting was cut off as a car came speeding out of a side street slammed into the passenger side of the car. Our vehicle skidded, leaving black tire tracks in the road. Michelle and I reeled from what had just happened while Justin Bieber continued to croon from the car speakers. The other car’s driver stepped out, a middle-aged man with tousled hair, wearing nursing scrubs. He walked toward our car, berating us for speeding on the boulevard and denying culpability for having run a stop sign. A man ran out of the house we were in front of, rushing to check if everyone was okay. I called Mom while Michelle called 911.
When the cop arrived, he separated us from the other driver, explaining that it was to keep tensions low. Mom arrived, calming down Michelle’s righteous fury as the cop spoke to the other party.
“The good thing is that everyone’s okay,” Mom said.
“I know,” Michelle’s voice rose, and I could tell she wanted the man to hear her. “But I can’t believe he’s trying to freakin’ blame us.”
“Were you guys speeding like he said?”
“A little,” I admitted at the same time Michelle exclaimed, “No!” Apparently, our strategy moving forward was to deny, deny, deny.
Ever the peacemaker, I knew I needed to side with Michelle, even if she wasn’t completely in the right. “We were maybe going, like, 40 or something. But that guy didn’t even stop at the stop sign; I saw him speed through it! And the cop said that we had the right of way, anyway, since we were on the boulevard-- even if we were speeding.” I dug my nails deep into the pads of my thumbs, watching the red crescent marks appear on my skin. The palms of your hands can take more than the fragile skin elsewhere so it was my go-to for grounding in times of stress. It was also fairly discrete. I watched Michelle glare daggers into the man’s head before continuing. “Anyways, even if we were speeding, why is he yelling at literal children instead of checking that everyone is okay?”
“Yeah, I agree,” Mom sighed, closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose. “I’m just concerned about his story because if he’s not held liable, I’ll have to figure out a way to pay for this. It’s okay, though. At least no one is hurt. I’ll figure it out; don’t worry.”
I didn’t know how much car repairs cost, or how insurance worked, or how you could prove liability unless there was a witness; to be fair, I still don’t really know any of those things. I did know, however, that this accident was, at least in some part, our fault. I should’ve told Michelle to slow down. She would’ve yelled at me and it would’ve ruined our pleasant morning, but it would’ve also prevented an accident. Michelle should’ve been paying more attention to the road. That stupid middle-aged man should’ve stopped at his damn stop sign and accepted liability instead of admonishing children that weren’t even his. I guess there were better decisions to be made on all sides of the situation.
In the end, Mom drove Michelle and I to school after we dropped off her (still driveable) car at the dealership to be repaired. We turned the radio to 95.1, the local pop station, where-- you guessed it-- a song from Justin Bieber’s Purpose was playing. As a treat after our stressful morning, Mom stopped at the McDonald’s across the street from our school and bought us breakfast. I was going to be even tardier than usual today; I looked at the time on the dashboard and saw we were already forty minutes late. But today, I had an excuse from the Sheriff’s office. I also had my mom and a medium iced caramel mocha; I was invincible. I licked my thumb and wiped dried blood from my inner arm, humming along to “Love Yourself” on the radio.
***
She picked up the phone on the third ring.
“Hey, Michelle,” I said through stifled sobs.
“Hey, Mo. What’s up?”
“I’m just so sad.”
“What do—”
“An-and I just ruin everything, and I make everything worse, and everyone is always upset with me, and I’m just so sad, Michelle.” I choked on a sob. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Have you considered why they might be mad at you? I know Mom gets upset sometimes about the dishes or other things but you have to see their perspective, too, Mo.”
“I just feel like I can never do anything right, no matter how hard I try.” I dry heaved, retching before vomiting a reddish liquid onto my bedsheets. “I just don’t know wha-wha-what’s wrong with me.” I retched again.
“Monique, just breathe. Stop crying, just breathe. It’s gonna be okay. Nothing’s wrong with you; we all love you. You just have to do your part and everything will be fine. Just try to calm down.”
“Michelle.” The tears were really coming down, now, and my head felt hot. I dry heaved again, only producing a bit of saliva this time. “Michelle.” Her name sounded mournful from my lips.
“Monique, just listen to me, okay? Just calm down before—”
“Michelle.” It was now or never. “Michelle, I took an entire bottle of aspirin.”
“What? Monique! Why would you do that, Monique!? Oh my God.”
“Be-because I just—”
“Monique, go tell Mom. Now.” Her voice was stern, like she was counting on her assertiveness to compel me to listen despite the miles of distance between us. She was in her apartment in Kennesaw, while I was home from college, back in Macon for Thanksgiving break.
“I don’t want to, Michelle, she’ll be so mad. She’ll be so mad, Michelle.”
“I don’t care, Monique. Go tell her or I’m going to hang up and call 911.”
“But, Michelle—”
“Go!” Her voice reverberated through the phone, cracking with emotion as she continued. “Go downstairs, now, Monique. I’m not playing with you! This is literally a question of your life.”
I wish more of that night was a blur, but it replays in my mind in vivid prismacolor. I stumbled down the stairs and broke the news to my mother. At the hospital, things happened in quick succession: I was admitted, questioned, assigned a sitter, given a hospital gown and rubber-soled socks. They ran test after test after test and gave me a cup of thick sludge to drink (activated charcoal makes you purge the toxins from your insides). I was painfully dehydrated, but not allowed to receive water until I finished the charcoal. I projectile vomited for fifteen minutes that felt like fifteen hours, filling three plastic bags with black bile. They finally gave me water, hydrating me enough to run urine tests every hour. I lost my hearing, for a bit; apparently, 32,500 milligrams of aspirin will do that to you.
My phone had been at 10% battery when we arrived, and I depleted it further with rapidfire texts to Michelle:
Me: at the hospital
Me: mom is so mad michelle she’s so mad
Michelle: i promise she’s not as mad as she seems
Michelle: everything will be ok
Me: she’ll never forgive me
Me: oh my God she’ll never forgive me
Me: i shouldn’t have told anyone
Me: she’ll never forgive me michelle
Michelle: stop saying that.
Michelle: yes she will she loves you
Michelle: she’s not mad she's just scared
Michelle: can i call you?
Me: i don’t think so a lot is happening and my phone is almost dead
Me: maybe later
Over the course of the next hour, I heard my mom on the phone with just about every member of my immediate family, in quick succession. After several minutes of hushed conversation, she walked to the bed where I was hooked up to several machines and an IV.
“Your sister wants to talk to you.” She handed me the phone, avoiding eye contact.
“Hey, Mo. How are you feeling?”
“I’m okay. I mean, I’ve definitely been better.” I laughed humorlessly. “How are you?”
“I’ve also been better.” She took a deep breath, letting out a shaky exhale. After a beat, she continued, “You scared me so much, Monique.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. I just—,” She took another heavy breath. “I was just so scared. Do you know how scary it was to hear you say those words? How helpless I felt knowing that there was nothing I could do?” Her voice cracked and she choked on a sob. “I’m just so sorry that you felt like you had to do this.”
“I know, Michelle, and I’m so sorry. I just-- I ju--,” I paused and began to cry. Taking a deep breath, I tried again. “I love you.”
“I love you too, Monique. I’m so glad you called me, okay? I love you so much. We all do.”
We remained on the phone in silence for a moment, the air heavy with what we could and couldn’t say. As our sniffles began to subside, I felt my sternum crack open with emotion. Our breathing slowed until we knew, in the way that sisters do, that we were okay as long as we had each other. We also knew, in the way that Michelle and I do, that I’d gone off-script for a bit; all I had to do was say my line and Michelle would follow suit.
“Bro, I smell so bad,” I laughed, sounding audibly choked up. “I was sweating when we got here and now I feel like the nurses are at their station like ‘That nigga in the psych ER stinks.’”
She laughed and relief washed over me. “Not you being musty.”
I snorted, attracting looks from my mom and a few nurses. “Girl, I smell sour.”
“Ew, Mo, what the fuck? You are so gross.”
She laughed again, joining mine in perfect harmony. I closed my eyes and listened to her voice talk about everything and nothing. Elsewhere, the ground closed up, sealing a crevice I’d tenuously walked for years. In the rift’s place simply lay a pale scar on the ground: a fault line, a reminder.
Interview With The Author
1. What was your inspiration for this piece?
I wanted to write a piece about my sister, but also about the larger complexities of our relationship. After going through some pretty traumatic things that ended up bringing us close, the piece kind of just poured out of me at 2 am one night.
2. What is your creative process?
I definitely write way more poetry than anything else, and for me, that process usually consists of me getting struck by inspiration, writing and editing nonstop for like an hour, then coming back to it the next day with fresh eyes; at this point I go through round two of editing, which is often when I try to push the boundaries of form and language to something that surprises even me. Often, a random line will pop into my head that I just know I need to use at some point, so I write them in my notes app and refer to them later. Creative nonfiction tends to function more as a form of catharsis for me, as I generally write prose when struck with some kind of intense emotion and realize that writing is the only way for me to even begin getting through it. I also carry many of my poetic sensibilities into the way I write prose. On a more general level, I get some of my best ideas after watching movies or reading other writers' work that I find really striking. I'm also a big fan of writers' workshops, though I don't always have the time to have another set of eyes on my work.
3. What are some influences on your artistic process?
Other writers, for sure! I read a lot of poetry and I'm always getting ideas on what literary experiment I want to try next. I've also been lucky enough to take writing classes with spectacular professors and classmates who inspire me and push me to grow in my art. My lived experiences and the intersections of my identity are also big influences on what and how I write.
4. Is there anything more you’d like our readers/viewers to know about you or your work?
My work is largely influenced by my lived experiences and an appreciation of the people who have come before me; I'd be remiss if I didn't take this moment to honor my ancestors, my support system, and all the gifted writers (specifically women of color) who came before me.