Skyler Melnick

‌ ‌ My sister is teaching me to squish myself up as small as possible. She says it is a useful skill, and I must acquire it before I go away to school.

‌ ‌ If you get it just right, she says, no one can see you.

‌ ‌ I roll around my bed, condensed like a matzo ball. I roll off the mattress and keep rolling. Out of our room and down the hall, into the bathroom.

‌ ‌ My sister finds me, unravels me. Almost, she says.

We go downstairs for dinner. My sister limping, using me to steady herself. Our parents talk over our heads and we slurp noodles fast as we can, checking each other’s bowls to see who’s slurping fastest.

‌ ‌ Don’t do that, our mother says.

‌ ‌ Be ready at 7 A.M. sharp, she tells me.

‌ ‌ Mother has had it with me and so I am going. My sister can’t come with because of her ailments. Her ailments do not allow her to leave the house.

‌ ‌ She is in her bed, and so am I. The machinery is everywhere.

‌ ‌ Is this one new? I hold up a thin little wire wrapped around her wrist.

‌ ‌ I won’t be gone long, I tell her. I promise.

‌ ‌ I squish myself up beside her. We squish together, for the rest of the night, beneath a web of wire. When our mother wakes us, we’re sore all over. I have to crick myself open like a rusty door.

At school, I write letters to my sister, three a day. I tell her the people are dreadful, and no matter how tightly I squish, they can still see me, and I can still see them.

‌ ‌ The headmaster refuses to send me home, so I refuse to speak. Teachers try to get me to talk. I blink my eyes wide, like I don’t understand. Sometimes I open my mouth like I’m going to say something, and they get ready, then I snap it shut. Open and shut and open and shut. Like a fish.

‌ ‌ If you don’t speak, they say, we can’t help you here.

‌ ‌ I move little parts of my face. An eyebrow, a lip curl, a nostril flare.

‌ ‌ Don’t play with me girl, they say.

‌ ‌ When I finally speak, it is meaningful and it is loud. A scream, a howl, neverending, surging through classrooms, ear drums.

I am sent home, and Mother is not happy. Her face droops, like it’s going to slide off.

‌ ‌ Look what you’ve done! she says.

‌ ‌ Look at the stress you’ve caused your sister!

‌ ‌ My eyes go to my sister, spooning oatmeal at the kitchen table. She smiles at me, mouth crooked.

‌ ‌ Her vitals went up today, Mother says. Up through the roof!

‌ ‌ Honestly, she says, running the sink water, drowning dishes in it. What are we supposed to do with you?

‌ ‌ She gets in bed, tangles with the wires of her machinery. Wires like spaghetti. There weren’t that many before.

‌ ‌ You don’t want to scrunch, my sister says. You want to EXTEND yourself.

‌ ‌ We spend the following day working on extension. There’s no school, because of her ailments and my delinquency.

‌ ‌ It’s simple. My sister flanks her arms out wide. You want to take up SPACE.

‌ ‌ Yes, but––our particles can expand to fill negative space.

‌ ‌ Really? I stretch my legs, filling the gap between our beds.

‌ ‌ Absolutely, she says. I’ve thought a lot about this.

‌ ‌ What do you think I do all day!

‌ ‌ This has always been my question. When I’m at school, birthday parties, soccer practice. She gets homeschooling packets, but does them real fast, a whole month’s worth, the day they arrive in the mail.

The next week is a series of trial and error. When extension is unsuccessful, we try horizontality, verticality, diagonality, reverse gravity. None of them produce the desired outcome. This outcome is not so clear to me anymore, but my sister is intent on it. Says we are going to be the best, most perfect versions of ourselves. Optimized.

‌ ‌ In the middle of the night, my sister jolts up in bed, causing her machines to beep like crazy. We have to twist, she says, then falls back onto her pillow.

. I write the words on the wall with sharpie. Our mother does not like to come into the bedroom, to see the machinations of my sister’s ailments. Our father won’t mind.

‌ ‌ Motion, my sister says. Write down motion.

‌ ‌ This is not one of her good days. She is bedridden, so I am her scribe.

‌ ‌ No, she says, use the red marker.

‌ ‌ The red marker is dry, I show her.

‌ ‌ Red marker, she says, through gritted teeth.

‌ ‌ My sister gets angry on her bad days. She would get violent too, would like to get violent, if she had the strength. Instead she describes all the ways she might incite destruction.

‌ ‌ Just one match, she likes to tell me. Just one match is all it would take to incinerate this whole house. And then I nod and make sure no matches are in the vicinity.

‌ ‌ I write down motion, pressing the red pen until a light semblance of ink comes out. My sister lolls her head, rests her eyes. They pop open every now and then, and I remind her what we’re doing. Then they close again. I consider holding the lids open for her. Dabbing her skin with Mother’s makeup, so she’s not as translucent. Combing her hair, so it’s not so stringy. Medusa’s snakes. She says she likes it that way. I kiss her on the forehead, and go downstairs for dinner.

How do you twist girls? I ask Mother. My sister can rest––I will take over her research.

‌ ‌ Have more peas. Mother hands me the bowl.

‌ ‌ I don’t want peas. I want to twist.

‌ ‌ Mother scoffs, spoons peas over my pasta.

‌ ‌ I slurp a noodle and feel it slide down my throat.

‌ ‌ Don’t do that. Mother saws my noodles with fork and knife. We found a convent school that will take you, she says. They ought to whip you into shape.

My sister doesn’t cry this time and neither do I. She says she’ll have it all figured out by the time I get back. But her eyes barely open, eyelashes fluttering desperately, trying to hold up the lids.

Soon, sisters are everywhere I look. Nun sisters. Little ones, stretched ones, tilted, spherical, trapezoidal. I think of all the possibilities for my sister and I––to optimize. I think of how I’ll get out of this new school, how I’ll get out quickly, before it’s too late.

‌ ‌ There is class then lunch then class then prayer. I pray for optimization and butter noodles that slide smoothly down my throat. My throat, my mouth, my stomach, my chest. It’s too much for one person. Take some, I want to tell my sister. I’ll squish myself small, make space.

‌ ‌ The head mother calls me into her office, says she wants to meet me, talk to me.

‌ ‌ I squint my eyes until the room narrows. I imagine my sister, her narrow bed, her narrow world.

‌ ‌ The head mother does a chest cough that goes on and on and sounds animal.

‌ ‌ I am squinting, but I see through my slits, the head mother coughing, coughing, and coughing, until she collapses, falls down dead at her desk. Or at least, dead enough to get the students sent home while she recuperates. The student body, headless.

‌ ‌ Her head is in my lap. We’re on her bed like no time has passed at all. Except for the wires. I can hardly see her through all the wires. Her hair is somewhat gone, but the wires are plentiful.

‌ ‌ Twist INTO each other, she clarifies. Her eyes close, her mouth softens, like reciting a prayer: limbs, fingers, toes, thoughts. Complete tangle.

‌ ‌ COMPLETE TANGLE, she screams, her voice hoarse.

‌ ‌ My body isn’t useful, she sniffles. I hope you don’t mind me using yours.

‌ ‌ After dinner, she says, grabbing my head and bringing it down to hers. Our foreheads kiss.

‌ ‌ I leave the bed, but she doesn’t follow. Come, I say.

‌ ‌ I’ll drag you on the carpet the way you like.

‌ ‌ She shakes her head. Can’t leave the bed.

‌ ‌ I’ll bring dinner up, I tell her, but she’s already rolled onto her stomach, face-down, snoring faintly.

Skyler Melnick

Skyler Melnick

Fiction

Summer 2026

HOW TO TWIST GIRLS