#laura anders

Her parents had not at all accounted for the simple fact of her existence until it was staring right at them; they prepared the house and tended to her physically, but mostly they just pawned her off to Josh (17), Delia (12), or Laura (9) or left her to her own devices. Celeste was already very temperamental by nature, and this was exacerbated by the fact that no one exactly taught her how to behave and that she could turn vicious in search of attention. Her daycares would regularly call or send notes about her most recent disruption, which frequently involved any combination of her kicking, biting, hitting, scratching, throwing things, or knocking over chairs. None of the facilities could keep her for long, and she was once again treated as a problem for Delia and Laura to deal with. (Josh had moved out by then and was thus able to escape this.) Neither of them were exactly the most patient with her (the whole situation was one they didn't appreciate--they didn't really want to make it easy for their parents to do nothing) but managed to argue, threaten, or punish her into line. Delia and Laura moved out at 18 with the mentality of "I'm leaving this hopeless Anders household as soon as I possibly can," and Celeste plans on doing the same. Overall, the Anders family operated something along these lines with regards to her.

She sustains her silence and gets used to screaming and crying in the seclusion and anonymity of stalls in public bathrooms, or later, while she breaks her pottery in the shed behind the house she lives in with him. Apart from that, she has no recollection of her own voice.

Her participation grades wind up abysmal and so do her grades for other assignments that she couldn’t bring herself to complete. Her parents deem this the school’s problem even though no one has gotten anything out of her.

She alternately clings to Thomas when she’s seen Emma and tries to avoid rocking the boat with him any other time. She continues making art and looks for ways to sell it without his knowledge. He keeps her between his arms when she’s not tending to his house, and he hits her and destroys her work if he feels she hasn’t met his requirements. Her version of Emma frequently joins in. He twists her efforts at self-defense to turn her into the instigator. He still tends to the injuries he causes.

She does not reach satisfaction with the state of her body. Every so often, he threatens to put her away for some behavior of hers with which he finds fault. She’s terrified to share a bed with him in case she wakes up screaming. He forces her to do it and sometimes tries to calm her and other times tries to shut her down or ignore her when she wakes up sobbing in terror.

She sometimes considers visiting Emma’s grave, but doesn’t want to risk his ire. Her Emma batters her mercilessly for it.

She keeps all the shards from every clay piece that she and Thomas have ever broken in boxes organized by work in the hopes she can fix them one day. She stores them in a location only she knows, somewhere in the shed.