“So. . .this face that you told us about,” he says, and he peers over his glasses at me, “it talks to you and no one else.”

         I sit still.  Silent.

         “Can you get it to talk to me?”

         I am solid, I tell myself.  I am strong.  I will not break.  He must not hear.

         “Can you talk to me?”

         I am strong.

         “Phillip?  Can you hear me?”

         I will not break!

         You will not break, the face told me late that night.

         “What?”  I looked around for the source of the voice.

         You will not break, it repeated.

         “Break what?  What will I not break?”  My eyes darted around the room like flies around sugar.  I was afraid.  As the shadows on the walls danced for me, I was afraid.  The clock downstairs chimed three in the morning.

         You will not break, the face told me again.

         Pulsing, ripping, tearing.  I am afraid, I thought.

         You are not afraid!

         There.  Yes, that’s where it was.  Must stop it.  Must shut it up!

         “I am afraid!”

         The noises disgusted me.  The smell made me nauseous.  But where did it go?

         Screaming, crying, at last whimpering, I ground to a halt.

         I am strong, it said, sickeningly sweet.

         “You are strong,” I repeated.  My voice sounded dead.

         You are strong, it insisted.  I could hear that tenacious cackle.

         I am strong.

         “What kind of place do you think I’m running?”

         She wouldn’t shut up.  It had to shut her up.  It had to.  It would.  It couldn’t stand her.

         “Answer me, Phillip!”

         I was sitting on the toilet, fully clothed again with a bandaged left forearm, as she scrubbed at the rust-colored bathtub.

         “Can you hear me?”  She finally turned around.  “Are you listening to me?  Answer me, Phillip!”  I stared at her with eyes of ice.  “Look at yourself!”  She thrust a handheld mirror in front of my face, scratched and bloody.  “Goddamnit, Phillip!”  Before she slammed the mirror back down onto the counter, a shadow that was not mine flickered across my face.  “What kind of place do you think you live in, that you can do that to yourself?  Damnit, Phillip, I’m your mother!  I deserve better!”  She turned on the faucet, let steaming water pour into the basin, went back to scrubbing the stained porcelain.

         You’re strong enough, the face whispered encouragingly.  You are strong.

         “I am strong,” I murmured, and I shoved my mother forward over the water; there was a sound like a thunderclap as the crown of her head collided with the tile on the far side of the bathtub.  She slumped forward, face-first into the water and bounced once.  New blood mingled with old and flowed down the drain never to be seen again.

         The mirror on the counter was shattered; shards of glass were everywhere.  I left a trail of blood in the shape of bare footprints as I left the house behind me.

         You can do it! the face urged.  The skin on the back of my hand rippled, like when I was little and would toss pebbles into the lake, and small rings would emanate from where the rock disappeared.

         “No I can’t,” I said.  I was trying to get it to come back out, come out so I could do something.

         Yes you can! it screamed.  There was an air of nausea to its voice, one that I shared.  I keeled over right there on the sidewalk by the bus stop and emptied the contents of my stomach.  Even when that was done, my body kept revolting.  In between dry-heaves, I screamed, clawed at my already scarred face.

         People stopped to watch.  Watch me.  Watch a boy go mad.  Watched until order seemed to be restored to my body and I collapsed onto the ground.  Blood dropped steadily from a gash above my eyebrow onto the concrete rough against my face; drip, drip, drip.  I clenched my fists until bloodstained fingernails dug into my palm.

         You are not this weak, it told me.

         I closed my eyes.

         You are strong! the face said forcefully.

         Someone was standing over me, blocking the sun.  “Are you okay?”  Some kind-hearted stranger that wanted to help.  I tried to tell her to go away, opened my mouth to say, “Run!” but the face stayed my words.

         “Could you help me up?” it made me say instead.

         “Of course,” Stranger-woman said.  She kneeled and put an arm around my shoulders.

         “No,” I whispered.  Battle.  Fight it!  “No!”

         “No what?”  She stopped, stared at my bloody face in concern; her throat was just in reach, so close that I felt the face shudder in delight, so close that the face’s emotions were stronger than mine were, so close that I began to salivate.  “No what?” Stranger-woman asked again.

         “Nothing,” it said with a smile warm enough to melt the heart of a Yeti.  “Help me up, please.”

         She returned to her position, an arm around my shoulders and a hand clutching mine.  I wanted to cry, and as the face – no, as I tore out her throat with my own teeth and scampered into an alley, I did.  Tears of utter shame and defeat rolled over my cheeks as the face made me swallow the blood in my mouth.  It rejoiced at the havoc it had caused in the street.

         See how strong you are! it exclaimed.  And as it bounced inside of me, I watched a police car and an ambulance drive up, a mother shielding her four-year-old’s eyes talk to an officer, and I saw her point into the alley in which I was hiding.

         I fled.

         I was not strong.

         After that, I had no desire to be strong.

         “What does it mean to be strong?” I asked it.  I had asked this question many times, in many places.  All it ever did was repeat over and over:  You are strong.  You will not break.  It had never answered me before, so under the light of the moon on some stranger’s roof, I didn’t expect it to cooperate.

         But it did.

         Sort of.

         Strength is relative, it hissed, cackling.  The face was bouncing, somewhere in my left leg by the feel of it.  You are strong.

         “All right,” I said slowly, appreciating the fact that it was talking to me.  “What do you think strength is?”

         Strength is strength, I am strong, you are weak, I made you strong.

         It was singing.  Singing at me, teasing me and my weakness.

         “How did you make me strong?” I asked.

         The face was silent for the rest of the night.

         So much for cooperation.

         The lady at the next table edged away from me.  I guessed that my clothes reeked; it had been at least a week since the last time it had rained, since my last shower.  Probably the day I left home had been the last I had washed.

         But she didn’t matter.

         I was watching the news on a television stationed above the bar.

         “In other news, two middle-aged women were murdered last week by who the police say is the same person.  Lab work done on blood and vomit left at the scenes rather carelessly by the killer has identified him as teenager Phillip Crosby, now the main suspect in this murder case.  The Head of Investigation assures the public that it is only a matter of time before Crosby is apprehended.  One of the women murdered was Crosby’s own mother.  Meanwhile, the holiday season sure is–”

         I stopped listening.  I didn’t care what the holiday season was – busy, nearing, hectic, I didn’t care, and neither did the face.  It was fuming.  It was angry.  It was mad as all hell.

         They will catch you, it spat.  But you are strong.  You will not break.

         I no longer questioned its orders.

         If it said I would not break, then I would not break.

         As predicted both by the face and by the Head of Investigation, the police caught me within a matter of two days.  I saw the news report the day after; it flashed by in silence with subtitles in the stark-white interrogation room at the police station.  “Police have captured Phillip Crosby, the main suspect in the murders of Anne Salas and Jennifer Crosby, who was the suspect’s mother.  He was apprehended yesterday afternoon behind a supermarket after trying to fight off four police officers, and–”

         Enough! the face screamed.  Stop reading!  I obeyed, turning my gaze to the floor.  I counted the lines in the rotting linoleum instead.  They will come soon, it said, much calmer now.  They will come, and they will then go, but you are strong.  You will stay long after they are gone.  It laughed as the door opened and a man in a business suit stepped into the room.

         “Phillip – can I call you that?”  He smiled at me.  He looked warm.  Trustworthy.  I opened my mouth to grant permission, but the face shut it, hissing, No!  So there I sat, dirty, cold and silent.

         “Well–” the man said.  He pulled out the chair opposite mine and sat, leaning his elbows on the table between us.  “I’ll take that as a yes, then.  I want you to understand, Phillip, that I’m here to help you.  If you need any help, we’ve got people who can take care of you.”  A patronizing grin came with those words.

         You will not break! the face said.

         “Phillip,” the man said, “I just want to be your friend.  Don’t you like having friends?”  He smiled again.

         This too was met with silence.

         “I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.”  His smile disappeared as his looked at me with his eyebrows raised.  I tried to fight past the face.  “What made you do these things?”

         The face growled at me.  You will not break!  You will not break!  It became a mantra.  You will not break.  He must not hear.  You will not break!

         “Phillip,” the man said sternly.  He leaned farther across the table until his face was inches from mine and contorted from meeting my stench.  “Why did you kill your mother?”

         You will not break!

         Time stood still.  I stopped breathing.  The room ceased to be, and it was just me and the officer in a blank white void until. . .

         “The face made me do it,” I whispered, and the real world crashed back down on us.

         “I’ve never heard of anything like this,” a white-coated man said to another.  “Schizophrenia, yes, but a physical manifestation of another personality?”

         “I know,” said the second man, glancing discreetly back at me.  It was obvious they were talking about me and trying not to show it, so I stared, uninterested, at the ceiling.  “That’s why I came to you.  You know I’m new in this field, and I know you’re not; I figured you might know something I didn’t.”

         What fools, the face said to me.  We are not insane.

         Of course, I knew that, and the face knew that, but would anyone listen?

         Insanity is an absolute! the face snarled.  You either are or not, and you are not.  You are strong.

         No, they wouldn’t.

         They will try to break you, those coat-wearers, it said.  Its voice was full of contempt.  You can’t trust them.  They will try to convince you that you are weak.

         “He doesn’t even seem disturbed by his actions,” a new female voice said.

         “I know – look at him.  You’d think he would be doing anything but emulating the behavior of a five-year-old,” said the first man.

         You are not weak.  You are strong, and you will not break.  They will not break you, no matter how they try.  The face giggled.

         “Who’s brave enough to take him into therapy?” the woman asked.

         They all laughed.

         “So. . .this face that you told us about,” he says, and he peers over his glasses at me, “it talks to you and no one else.”

         I sit still.  Silent.

         “Can you get it to talk to me?”

         I am solid, I tell myself.  I am strong.  I will not break.  He must not hear.

         “Can you talk to me?”

         I am strong.

         “Phillip?  Can you hear me?”

         I will not break!