Author's Note: The rest of Daria's day.
Disclaimer: Daria Morgendorffer and Amy Barksdale were created by Glenn Eichler. Faith was created by Joss Whedon. The plot is mine.
X X X X X
The rest of Daria's day, to her great surprise, was not the anticlimax she expected. After her time in the yard ended, she was asked if she wanted to go to the prison library. Feeling an urge to read something that wasn't a textbook, she said yes.
The prison library, though, was mostly law books, textbooks, and study books. Most of the rest of the books were as mainstream as it gets -- Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Stuart Woods, and romance novels. And while Daria wasn't as down on Stephen King as a lot of critics were, under the circumstances she didn't feel much like going the horror-novel route. (She still couldn't fully admit that Faith had been telling the truth about the vampires and supernatural, but it was looking more and more like Occam's Razor was telling her that was the way to go.)
As she browsed through the bare handful of books remaining, she was brought to a dead halt by one in particular: April 10, 1997, by Amy Barksdale.
Hesitantly, she picked it up. The photo on the back cover was that of her aunt -- as though Daria had had any doubts.
The front cover had a slightly out-of-focus picture of the Morgendorffer family, taken when Daria had been about nine.
Daria flipped open the book and began reading.
X X X X X
Before April 10, 1997, I was doing just well enough to get by. I was then, as now, a freelance writer; but then, I was writing only when I had to, to pay my bills. Not that I'm lazy; I just felt I had better things to do, and if my life wasn't one of luxury, well, I got to go to the library, and the museums, and socialize occasionally; and that was enough.
Before April 10, 1997, I was only in sporadic contact with my family. The Barksdales defined the word "dysfunctional" when I was growing up. My sisters Helen and Rita were opponents in a war -- a war otherwise known as sibling rivalry. Rita was "the pretty one" who got the lion's share of our parents' attention; Helen was the smart one, who never tired of rubbing her intellectual achievements in Rita's face.
I was the odd girl out. Ten years younger than Helen, eleven years younger than Rita, the paths of brains and beauty had already been taken, and I was never one to follow a path someone else had already trodden. So I went my own way, and made myself into the sarcastic one, not as pretty as Rita, not as smart as Helen, but better at the combination than either of them.
Once I reached an age where I was able to give as good as I got, they were perfectly willing to include me in their war -- and, I'm ashamed to say, sometimes I fought in that war.
I got out as soon as I could, and have very rarely looked back.
This cost me the chance to know my sisters' families.
Before April 10, 1997, I thought my niece, Daria Morgendorffer (Helen's daughter by Jake Morgendorffer), was on the verge of college, and that her sister Quinn was only a year or two away. I thought my sister Rita's daughter Erin was still a teenager.
I thought a lot of things before April 10, 1997.
Today, I know that my niece, Daria, was 16; my niece, Quinn, was 14; and my niece, Erin, was 21, and is now 23.
Today, my sister Rita and I get along better than we ever did. I'm not going to utopianize (and I realize that's not a word) everything and claim that our lives are free of turmoil, but the war has long since ended. I see my surviving sister and her daughter on a semi-regular basis, and we don't bring back the old arguments.
Today, I write as though my soul were on fire. I wrote this book in three months. It should be in your hands less than one year from the date I first started it. Since April 10, 1997, I have done more writing, accomplished more, than I did in the previous 37 years of my life.
This is all due to Willard Jay Harbaugh and what took place in the Morgendorffer residence in Highland, Texas, on April 10, 1997.
I do not thank him for this.
X X X X X
"Whoa," Daria murmured as she finished the introduction. There seemed to be a photo section in the middle of the book. Daria flipped to it.
There were photographs of all of Willard Jay Harbaugh's victims -- and one of him. In addition, there were pictures of the Barksdales and Morgendorffers.
The final picture was one of her at the age of 15: Her final high school yearbook photo, taken in early March of 1997. She was staring straight forward into the camera and her face was devoid of any expression except possibly mild irritation. (She'd spent most of the time in line waiting next to one of the two morons -- at this point, she couldn't remember which one -- who had alternately amused her and annoyed her during her tenure in Highland. That her face showed only mild irritation was an expression of stoicism at its finest.)
Daria looked like she'd remembered. Somewhat like Faith. Anyone who looked at this photograph and then at Faith, if Faith looked like she had in their shared dream, would have noticed a resemblance, but then moved on.
Under her picture was a caption: Daria Morgendorffer. My niece. Still missing.
Daria read the book until it was time to leave the library. Then, under the watchful the eye of the guard, she took it to the prison librarian to check it out. The librarian raised an eyebrow when she saw the book. "This isn't your usual kind of book, Faith," she said.
"All work and no play makes Faith a dull girl," Daria said. "I've been studyin' my butt off, and when I haven't been doing that, I've been talkin' with Dr. Vaughn or doing my job. I realize I'm not here to play, but still."
"True. But reading isn't supposed to be fun. Reading is supposed to improve your mind."
"I won't tell if you don't," Daria said.
The librarian laughed, then said, "Enjoy it."
Daria nodded and left.
When she got back to her cell, she kept reading it. So far, Aunt Amy was alternating chapters between the story of Daria's family's life and the story of Willard Jay Harbaugh. She wasn't even pretending to objectivity; this was a personal narrative first and a true-crime story second.
One thing became clear: If Aunt Amy had written this in three months, she must have done nothing else in that time. It was amazing. Well written, thoroughly researched, and intense. Extremely intense. Daria had never realized that her aunt was so good a writer.
Before dinner was called, she'd gotten to the chapter titled "The Night of April 10."
She'd put the book down and just sat there on her bed, reflecting. She couldn't bring herself to read that part. Not yet.
Truth be told, she was already tremendously saddened by the parts of the book she'd already read. They made her family seem alive again. And Amy had done the best she could to not paint them as plaster saints. Here Dad was, in all of his clueless, short-tempered but good-hearted glory; here Mom was, working, working, working, always on the go but always willing to stick up for her children when she felt they were being mistreated (of course, Daria hadn't always been able to convince her of that); and here was Quinn, cute, adorable, loveable, and doomed to be popular.
No, Amy hadn't been able to make them come to life again. But she had awakened those parts of Daria that loved her family, despite all of their faults, despite how much they annoyed her at times.
And there she was. Bright, cynical, and withdrawn, or so Amy described her. It seemed a fair description. Daria wasn't sure how Aunt Amy had described them so well; she hadn't seen the Morgendorffers in person for at least ten years, although she and Mom talked occasionally, and she wrote to both Daria and Quinn.
But she had done them justice.
After dinner -- and prison food, for what it was worth, was roughly the equivalent of high school food, only there was no point in not eating it, because it wasn't like she could order out for a pizza instead -- she went back to her cell to finish reading the book.
She still couldn't read "The Night of April 10." She already knew what had happened to Jake, Helen, and Quinn; she really didn't want to know the details. And, truth be told, part of her didn't want to read it because she didn't want any possible memories of that night to be triggered by reading the book. Daria knew they were within her somewhere -- Dr. Vaughn had told her as much -- but wanted to avoid reliving in any fashion the events that had turned her into Faith.
So she skipped the chapter. The next chapter segued directly into Amy, Rita, and her grandmothers' reactions.
Grandma Barksdale was dead?
Apparently. Of a massive heart attack at hearing the news of the deaths.
Not that she'd really known the woman, but still, she was Daria's grandmother, and she mourned her briefly for that.
Grandma Morgendorffer had immediately taken to her bed, but she survived. Anyone who'd survived being married to Dad's father, the infamous "Mad Dog Morgendorffer," was tough enough to survive this. The book was published in 1999, so Daria had no idea whether she was still alive.
Anyway, from there, Amy continued to switch off between describing her family's reaction, and the continuing spree and subsequent capture of Willard Jay Harbaugh.
Amusingly -- if anything about this could be said to be in the least amusing -- Harbaugh's capture wasn't the result of diligent police work, no matter that the police had initially claimed this. It had been sheer luck that sent two Arlen, Texas, police officers into a convenience store just as Harbaugh was buying a bag of chips and a Jolt Cola. Now, to their credit, they recognized him and arrested him without incident, but still, they'd been looking for some snack food of their own when they'd lucked into the biggest arrest in the state in years.
The rest of the book covered the trial, Aunt Amy's reaction to it -- she was there for the entire thing -- and how Rita and Amy had grown closer in the years since the tragedy.
The epilogue once again got intensely personal.
X X X X X
They say the best stories never end. The same must be true for the worst ones.
Willard Jay Harbaugh is in the middle of what promises to be a lengthy appeals process. While he's still in prison and is likely to die there, this brings me no comfort. It does not bring my sister back, my brother-in-law, or my niece Quinn.
I have always been opposed to the death penalty. I still am. While Willard Jay Harbaugh's death will bring me no joy, neither will I waste one second mourning him. Nor should anyone else.
Do I contradict myself in this, that when my own ox has been gored I am willing to abandon my principles? I don't think so. If you feel differently, let me respond with the words of Walt Whitman: "Very well then. I am large. I contain multitudes."
The other families involved -- the Severances, the Malinowskis, the Odoms, the Hills -- their murders leave a corresponding absence in other families. I do not pretend to know the future, of what these people might have done, or their children. I do wish we'd had the chance to see it.
But, as the world never tires of reminding us, life isn't fair.
And I still have no idea what happened to Daria.
As for that -- I've always considered myself a woman who puts reason first.
I could come up with half a hundred different reasons why I believe my niece is still alive.
Willard Jay Harbaugh swears he had nothing to do with it. In this, I believe him. It doesn't fit his pattern.
She was seen boarding a bus to Nashville, wearing a black leather jacket. So she was still alive after the crime.
Daria is a survivor -- she's smart enough to find a way to stay alive.
Her body has never been found.
Countless other rationalizations are on the tip of my pen, waiting for me to scribble them out. But they wouldn't be the truth. The truth is, I believe Daria is alive.
Why she ran, why she got on that bus to Nashville, is something only she can answer.
And someday, she will.
I know it. I feel it.
I have faith.
X X X X X
Daria was not an emotional person.
She never had been.
Still, when she closed the book, she had tears in her eyes.
They were there long after the lights went out and she was supposed to be asleep.