She props herself up on the sink in her parents’ bathroom, leaning in toward the mirror so that she can better see the knot in her hair. She has charcoal on her face, she notices, but when she goes to rub it off she only spreads more on; her fingers are still black. She hops down from the sink so that she can wash her hands, and then she leans back in toward the mirror, frowning as she pulls at her hair. The knot is a stubborn one, and it is difficult to have to work from a reflection; when she means to move her right hand, she moves her left, and when she means to move her left hand, instead she moves her right. She grits her teeth in frustration and unleans herself from the sink. Out the window beside her, she can see the back of Mr. Sullivan’s old house. The kitchen door opens as she’s watching, and a man steps outside, followed by a smaller person, she can’t tell whether a boy or a girl for all the layers the person is wearing. Her initial feeling is one of curiosity, but this is immediately replaced by dread. One time, in the past, she might have delighted in the prospect of a playmate just across the way, but now, under the circumstances, her mother will want her too badly to be friends with this other child. She can feel her mother’s hand on her neck even now, guiding her through the door, brightly making introductions while Isabelle herself withers in shame that she will not speak and yet withdraws further into her silence anyway, removing herself as best she can.

The small person lies down in the snow and makes a tidy angel, just as Isabelle would do. The man helps the angel up, and they disappear together around the side of the house.

She looks away from the window and back at her reflection—at the charcoal still staining her face and the knot, which seems only bigger now than it did before. She takes a breath and turns to the medicine cabinet behind her, but she pauses before opening it up. Their medicine cabinets are never well supplied, especially in the country. Her father keeps them stocked with stomach things—antacids, laxatives, and Pepto-Bismol—but always she has to search when she needs tweezers to pluck a splinter, or a needle to dig one out; there are rarely things like Band-Aids and ointment. And so, she thinks, the chance of her finding scissors in the cabinet is slim. If, as she suspects, there are no scissors inside, she will go downstairs and get her mother’s help, but if she does find scissors, she tells herself, she will cut her hair.