Petals on the Wind (Dollanganger 2)

Oh, yes, our Carrie was a doll with an exquisite face, sensational Goldilocks hair and, the pity of it all, this beauty hovered above a body much too thin, too small, and a neck too delicate to support a head that belonged on someone bigger and taller.

Yellow dominated Sissy's side of the room; yellow spread, yellow slip-covered chairs; her dolls were blondes wearing yellow, her books wore yellow jackets, homemade. Sissy even wore yellow sweaters and skirts when she went home. The fact that Sissy looked unbecomingly sallow in yellow did not lessen her determination to annoy Carrie with the color-- come what may. And on this day, for some trifling reason that was never explained, she began to taunt Carrie in a mean, spiteful way.

"Carrie is a dwarf . . . a dwarf. . . a dwarf," sang Sissy in a sing-song chant.

"Carrie should be in a circus . . . a circus. . . a

circus," Sissy chanted on and on. Then she jumped up

on the top of her desk and in the loud, brassy manner of a barker touting a freak show at a carnival Sissy really began to shout, "Come one! Come all! Come pay your quarter to see the living sister of Tom Thumb! Come see the world's smallest woman! Come, pay your money and see the little one with the huge, huge eyes--like an owl's! Come view the huge, huge head on the little, scrawny neck! Come pay your

quarter to see our little freak naked!"

Dozens of little girls crowded into the room to

stare at Carrie who crouched in a corner on the floor,

with her head hanging low and her long hair hiding

her shamed, terrified face.

Sissy opened up her small purse to receive the

quarters the affluent little girls dropped in willingly.

"Now take off your clothes, little dwarf-freak," ordered Sissy. "Give the customers their money's

worth!"

Quivering and beginning to cry, Carrie

crouched into a tighter ball and pulled up her knees

and prayed that God would somehow open up the

floor. But floors never graciously open up and

swallow you when they should. It remained hard and

unyielding beneath her as the taunting voice of Sissy

went on and on.

"Look at her tremble . . . look at her shake . . .

she's gonna make . . . an earthquake!"

All the girls giggled, except one average-sized

girl of ten who looked on Carrie with pity and

sympathy. "I think she's cute," said Lacy St. John.

"Leave her alone, Sissy. It's not nice what you're

doing."

"Of course it's not nice!" Sissy said with a