Everyone dated the demise of our neighborhood from
the suicides of the Lisbon girls. People saw their
clairvoyance in the wiped-out elms and harsh
sunlight. Some thought the torture tearing the
Lisbon girls pointed to a simple refusal to accept
the world as it was handed down to them: So full
of flaws. But the only thing we are certain of
after all these years is the insufficiency of
explenation.

"Obviously doctor, you've never been a
thirteen year-old girl."

The Lisbon girls were 13, Cecillia, 14, Lux, 15,
Bonnie, 16, Mary, and 17, Therese. No one could
understand how Mrs. Lisbon and Mr. Lisbon, our
math teacher, had produced such beautiful
creatures.

From that time on, the Lisbon house began to
change. Almost every day, and even when she wasn't
keeping an eye on Cecilia, Lux would suntan on her
towel wearing a swimsuit that caused the
knife-sharpener to give her a 15-minute
demonstration for free.

The only reliable boy who got to know Lux was Trip
Fontaine For only 18 months before the suicides
had emerged from baby fat To the delight of girls
and mothers alike.

But few anticipated it would be so drastic. The
girls were pulled out of school, and Mrs. Lisbon
shut the house for maximum security isolation. The
girls' only contact to the outside world was
through the catalogs They ordered that started to
fill the Lisbon's mailbox with pictures of
Find more similar lyrics on http://mp3lyrics.com/lA4high-end fashions and brochures for exotic
vacations. Unable to go anywhere, the girls
traveled in their imaginations: To gold-tipped
Siamese temples or past an old man, the leaf broom
tidying the maw carpeted speck of Japan. And
Cecelia hadn't died. She was a bride in Calcutta.

Collecting everything we could of theirs, we
couldn't get the Lisbon girls out of our minds,
but they were slipping away. The colours of their
eyes were fading, along with exact locations of
moles and dimples. From five, they had become
four, and they were all, the living and the dead,
become shadows. We would have lost them completely
if the girls hadn't contacted us.

Lux was the last to go. Fleeing from the house, we
forgot to stop at the garage. After the suicide
free-for-all, Mr. and Mrs. Lisbon gave up any
attempt to lead a normal life. They had Mr. Hedly
pack up the house, selling what furniture he could
at a garage sale. Everyone went just to look. Our
parents did not buy used furniture, and they
certainly didn't buy furniture tainted by death.
We of course took the family photos that were put
out with the trash. Mr. Lisbon put the house on
the market, and it was sold to a young couple from
Boston.

It didn't matter in the end how old they had been,
but that they were girls. But only that we had
loved them, and that they hadn't heard us calling;
still do not hear us. Calling them out of those
rooms where they went to be alone for all time.
alone in suicide, Which is deeper than death, And
where we will never find the pieces to put them
back together.