Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Augusten Burroughs is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Dry, Magical Thinking, and, most recently, Possible Side Effects, which were also New York Times bestsellers. Augusten has been named one of the fifteen funniest people in America by Entertainment Weekly. He lives in New York City and western Massachusetts.

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Running with Scissors

Picador USA

Chapter One

My mother is standing in front of the bathroom mirrorsmelling polished and ready; like Jean Nati, Dippity Doand the waxy sweetness of lipstick. Her white, handgun-shapedblow-dryer is lying on top of the wicker clothes hamper,ticking as it cools. She stands back and smoothes herhands down the front of her swirling, psychedelic Pucci dress,biting the inside of her cheek.

"Damn it," she says, "something isn't right."

Yesterday she went to the fancy Chopping Block salon inAmherst with its bubble skylights and ficus trees in chromeplanters. Sebastian gave her a shag.

"That hateful Jane Fonda," she says, fluffing her dark brownhair at the crown. "She makes it look so easy." She pinchesher sideburns into points that accentuate her cheekbones.People have always said she looks like a young Lauren Bacall,especially in the eyes.

I can't stop staring at her feet, which she has slipped intotreacherously tall red patent-leather pumps. Because she normallylives in sandals, it's like she's borrowed some other lady'sfeet. Maybe her friend Lydia's feet. Lydia has teased black hair,boyfriends and an above-ground pool. She wears high heelsall the time, even when she's just sitting out back by the poolin her white bikini, smoking menthol cigarettes and talkingon her olive-green Princess telephone. My mother only wearsfancy shoes when she's going out, so I've come to associatethem with a feeling of abandonment and dread.

I don't want her to go. My umbilical cord is still attachedand she's pulling at it. I feel panicky.

I'm standing in the bathroom next to her because I needto be with her for as long as I can. Maybe she is going toHartford, Connecticut. Or Bradley Field International Airport.I love the airport, the smell of jet fuel, flying south tovisit my grandparents.

I love to fly.

When I grow up, I want to be the one who opens thosecabinets above the seats, who gets to go into the small kitchenwhere everything fits together like a shiny silver puzzle. Plus,I like uniforms and I would get to wear one, along with awhite shirt and a tie, even a tie-tack in the shape of airplanewings. I would get to serve peanuts in small foil packets andoffer people small plastic cups of soda. "Would you like thewhole can?" I would say. I love flying south to visit my grandparentsand I've already memorized almost everything theseflight attendants say. "Please make sure that you have extinguishedall smoking materials and that your tray table is in itsupright and locked position." I wish I had a tray table in mybedroom and I wish I smoked, just so I could extinguish mysmoking materials.

"Okay, I see what's the matter," my mother says. She turnsto me and smiles. "Augusten, hand me that box, would you?"

Her long, frosted beige nail points to the box of Kotex maxipads on the floor next to the toilet bowl. I grab the box andhand it to her.

She takes two pads from the box and sets it on the floorat her feet. I notice that the box is reflected in the side of hershoe, like a small TV. Carefully, she peels the paper strip offthe back of one of the pads and slides it through the neck ofher dress, placing it on top of her left shoulder. She smoothesthe silk over the pad and puts another one on the right side.She stands back.

"What do you think of that!" she says. She is delightedwith herself. It's as if she has drawn a picture and placed iton her own internal refrigerator door.

"Neat," I say.

"You have a very creative mother," she says. "Instant shoulderpads."

The blow-dryer continues to tick like a clock, countingdown the seconds. Hot things do that. Sometimes when myfather or mother comes home, I will go down and stand nearthe hood of the car to listen to it tick, moving my face inclose to feel the heat.

"Are you coming upstairs with me?" she says. She takes hercigarette from the clamshell ashtray on the back of the toilet.My mother loves frozen baked stuffed clams, and she saves theshells to use as ashtrays, stashing them around the house.

I am fixated on the dryer. The vent holes on the side havehairs stuck in them, small hairs and white lint. What is lint?How does it find hair dryers and navels? "I'm coming."

"Turn off the light," she says as she walks away, creating asmall whoosh that smells sweet and chemical. It makes me sadbecause it's the smell she makes when she's leaving.

"Okay," I say. The orange light from the dehumidifier thatsits next to the wicker laundry hamper is looking at me, andI look back at it. Normally it would terrify me, but becausemy mother is here, it is okay. Except she is walking fast, hasalready walked halfway across the family room floor, is almostat the fireplace, will be turning around the corner and headingup the stairs and then I will be alone in the dark bathroomwith the dehumidifier eye, so I run. I run after her, certainthat something is following me, chasing me, just about tocatch me. I run past my mother, running up the stairs, usingmy legs and my hands, charging ahead on all fours. I make itto the top and look down at her.

She climbs the stairs slowly, deliberately, reminding me ofan actress on the way to the stage to accept her AcademyAward. Her eyes are trained on me, her smile all mine. "Yourun up those stairs just like Cream."

Cream is our dog and we both love her. She is not myfather's dog or my older brother's. She's most of all not myolder brother's since he's sixteen, seven years older than I, andhe lives with roommates in Sunderland, a few miles away. Hedropped out of high school because he said he was too smartto go and he hates our parents and he says he can't stand tobe here and they say they can't control him, that he's "out ofcontrol" and so I almost never see him. So Cream doesn'tbelong to him at all. She is mine and my mother's. She lovesus most and we love her. We share her. I am just like Cream,the golden retriever my mother loves.

I smile back at her.

I don't want her to leave.

Cream is sleeping by the door. She knows my mother isleaving and she doesn't want her to go, either. Sometimes, Iwrap aluminum foil around Cream's middle, around her legsand her tail and then I walk her through the house on a leash.I like it when she's shiny, like a star, like a guest on the Donnieand Marie Show.

Cream opens her eyes and watches my mother, her earstwitching, then she closes her eyes again and exhales heavily.She's seven, but in dog years that makes her forty-nine. Creamis an old lady dog, so she's tired and just wants to sleep.

In the kitchen my mother takes her keys off the table andthrows them into her leather bag. I love her bag. Inside arepapers and her wallet and cigarettes and at the bottom, whereshe never looks, there is loose change, loose mints, specs oftobacco from her cigarettes. Sometimes I bring the bag to myface, open it and inhale as deeply as I can.

"You'll be long asleep by the time I come home," she tellsme. "So good night and I'll see you in the morning."

"Where are you going?" I ask her for the zillionth time.

"I'm going to give a reading in Northampton," she tellsme. "It's a poetry reading at the Broadside Bookstore."

My mother is a star. She is just like that lady on TV,Maude. She yells like Maude, she wears wildly colored gownsand long crocheted vests like Maude. She is just like Maudeexcept my mother doesn't have all those chins under herchins, all those loose expressions hanging off her face. Mymother cackles when...