1503951200

by Camille Griep

  Len is in tears. I hand him the blue handkerchief from the pocket of my jeans and head upstairs to retrieve my mother’s long-sleeved velvet dress, the one Cas and I had twirled around the room my first morning here. I hand it to him, wordlessly. I want to tell him it’s special, and by giving it to Cas, I’m telling her that she is special. I feel a profound sense of loss and I can’t quite figure out why. I’ve never been attached to “things” before.

  He nods, takes the dress, and walks into the glaring sunshine. He clears his throat, but doesn’t turn around. “Happy trails, Syd Turner.”

  Pious drives us over to the Willis mansion in the car that is still barn-primer gray. I flatly refuse to give him any more painkillers until we’ve arrived, and he promises me on the spot not to have any wine. He prattles on about another goodwill dinner he attended years ago, shortly after Perry returned with the headmaster of his school. The headmaster was fascinated by New Charity and wanted to start a big research project into the town’s immunity. But the Bishop put the kibosh on it and no one really knows where the headmaster went once he left New Charity. Pi says he thinks the man was well on his way to losing his mind, but “One never knows, does one? Some people are just naturally strange.”

  “No comment,” I say, staring at the jewelry box in my hand.

  “Well, do they?” Pi asks in a conspiratorial whisper.

  “Do they what?”

  “Make you happy?”

  I thread the earrings through my earlobes. “Yes.”

  While our ranch house is beautiful, a handcrafted relic built by my late grandfather, the Willis mansion is something else entirely. Five wings branch from the central ballroom overlooking the modest skyline of New Charity, with elaborate gardens in between each wing. It’s an easy place to get lost—on purpose or accidentally.

  The Willis men are standing in the door of the foyer, escorting ladies inside. Troy heads toward us before we’re even parked. His face falls when I nod him toward the driver’s side, where Pi needs a gentle hand getting out of the car. Len looks downright stormy, taking my arm to escort me down the stairs into the ballroom. I look back toward Troy, and push my hair back over my ears to reveal his present. He breaks into a wide grin.

  Under the lights of ten bleached antler chandeliers, the faux royalty of New Charity is sitting down to dinner. I breathe a sigh of relief as Len guides me past the Bishop’s table, where my uncle feigns good-natured surprise at being seated.

  “Still not finished disrupting lives, I see?” Len’s been drinking, but doesn’t smell heavily of it. Gin, if I had to guess.

  “I’m attending a dinner I’ve been invited to, Len. Get a grip.”

  “You follow directions so well, Syd. No wonder you were a big dancing star.”

  I yank my arm away from his. “How was it going to look if I just took off and didn’t show?”

  “I don’t care how it looks,” he half growls, giving me a small shove.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Troy turns Len around by the shoulders. Len just waves at him dismissively and disappears behind a tapestry on the wall.

  “That’s Cas’s spot next to you,” Troy says, pointing to a silver scarf on the chair next to mine. “Do you need anything else?”

  “No, I’m fine, thank you.” At the other end of the room, ladies are queuing up in the doorway, awaiting their escorts. Heaven forfend they walk themselves to a table.

  Troy pauses. “I’m sorry about Len. I don’t know what’s gotten into him.”

  “It’s okay,” I say. “I’m sorry if yesterday . . . I didn’t mean to cause you trouble.” I don’t know how to say the rest of what I should. I didn’t mean to kiss you. I didn’t mean to toy with your emotions. I didn’t mean to keep changing my mind about you.

  He finishes for me. “You’re worth it, Syd.”

  I disagree, but I’m not sure how to argue without sounding ungrateful. “I really like the earrings. Thank you.”

  He blushes and backs away a few steps before Perry collects him with a slap on the back on the way up the stairs.

  The tapestry Len disappeared behind is moving. I can hear Len and Cas bickering. I have no doubt I am the cause of their current disagreement. I could continue to pretend I don’t hear, but at this point, I prefer a reduction in subterfuge.

  “What are you doing in there?” I ask, prodding the curtain at shoulder level until something yelps. “You’re doing a shitty job of hiding, because I can still hear you.”

  Cas looks out from behind the curtain to show me her face. Her hair is in a lopsided updo and her eyes are so heavily rimmed she looks more raccoon than young woman. “Help.”

  I slip behind the tapestry, which conceals a long hallway—one I haven’t been down before, at least recently. “Where am I?”

  Len pulls out his flask and leans against the adjacent wall, talking to himself. “I give up. What do I know? Screw you, Len!” He turns to a potted tree, boxing the leaves.

  “Let him work this out,” Cas says. She hustles me down the hall, which somehow connects to the hallway to her room. I make her carefully blot everything off her face, avoiding the cuts on her cheeks. Underneath her base makeup, she sports the traces of a shiner. While she works, I pin her hair up in soft blonde loops.

  “Thanks for the dress,” she says. “I know it was your . . . it was special.”

  I hold my hand out for more bobby pins. “It is special. You look way better in it than I ever would. You should keep it.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Sure you can.”

  “I’m sorry I told you that you should change, Syd. I hope you know I don’t want that.”

  I put the pins down and grab her hand. “Do you want to talk about it? Who did this?”

  “Not right now.”

  “Okay, prizefighter. But I can’t put makeup on your eyes if you won’t quit with the waterworks.”

  “I’m never going to be good at this,” she says, dropping her eyes from the mirror and picking at a piece of lint on her thigh.

  “You don’t have to be,” I say. “Look.” I turn her face back to her reflection. “This is already beautiful.”

  “Mama will kill me for wasting all this makeup.”

  “And so we’ve found the one thing New Charity is short on, eh? We’ll make sure she’s impressed.” I brush rose and brown shadow over her eyelids and finish with a brown mascara to show off her gray eyes. “Frowns make wrinkles. Quit it.”

  “You know I want to be your friend, Syd. I’ve always wanted that. But I’ve never really known if it was possible, even when we were young.”

  I want nothing more than to find a way to put things back together for Cas, Len’s blame still stinging deep in my chest. Even though I arrived with a bunch of preconceived notions about the way to solve things, I’m not going to leave New Charity in the crosshairs of Nelle Harris Mangold. “You’re my friend. Whether or not we want the same things, okay? Whether or not we’re fighting. After all these years . . . look at us. We’ll figure it out.”

  Doubt creases her forehead, even though she nods at me.

  “But since we’re on the subject, why did you ask Len to tell me to leave?” I ask.

  “I was afraid. I am afraid. For you, for everyone.”

  I finish my handiwork, and we make our way down the hall and back through the heavy curtain, just in time to see Troy seating Nelle at our table. I start toward them, but Cas stops me.

  “I don’t want to tell you how to live your life,” she says, holding me back until Troy has set off for the foyer again. “But at least tell him what you want,” she says, softly. “Don’t you think you owe him that much?”

  I smooth the fabric of my simple blue silk shift dress over my thigh, making sure my flask and pocketknife aren’t bulging awkwardly, then lead the way toward the table, avoiding a reply. I don’t know what I owe anyone anymore, what anyone owes me. All I know is I’d really like to drink the glass of wine sitting in front of my plate.

>   We situate ourselves in the ruffled organza-draped chairs.

  “Evening, Nelle,” I say, wondering if I can cut the tension with my steak knife.

  Nelle looks at Cas approvingly. “So, did you know one another when you were children?”

  Cas nods. “We were all best friends, actually. Until Syd left for the City.”

  “Why ever would you leave this charming place?” I know what the edge in her voice means, but Cas is glancing at Nelle with mild offense.

  “Syd was a ballerina,” Cas says, beaming with pride. I wish I could kick her.

  Nelle throws back her head and starts to laugh. “A ballerina, eh? Did you get a lot of science education when you were at ballet school?” She laughs some more, and Cas cocks her head, realizing I’m being insulted, but not why.

  Len interrupts the awkwardness by adding some of his own. “What’d I miss?” He pulls out his chair but drops himself short of the seat. Sighing, Perry hauls him from the carpet up into his chair. It’s too early for him to be as drunk as he is.

  The guests have mostly arrived, which is a good thing, as Len’s no longer in shape to be an usher. The room is too loud for the surrounding tables to notice the commotion.

  I count ten large tables in total, each seating between eight and ten people, all dressed to the nines. The people who own the storefronts downtown—the guy who owns the bank, a few doctors from the clinic, Bill’s parents representing the mercantile. Pi is affably chatting with a few of the big ranch owners. I don’t see any of the families from the trailer park development, or the tobacco farm. No fisherfolk or brick masons or Sanctuary daycare workers. Only the people whose voices are moneyed and privileged enough to be heard by the Governor, and therefore the Sanctuary.

  Len looks around the table, adjusting his lopsided bow tie so that it’s now listing to the opposite side. “Two Survivors and his troublemaking kids. Good old Governor Dad, minimizing the damage.”

  “Perry, can you please go find a cup of coffee for your brother?” Nelle says, quietly. Perry grumbles, but heads across the long room to the kitchen.

  She levels her gaze at me and I find myself understanding how Perry fell for her. She’s arresting in a sleeveless silver gown, courtesy of Beah Willis. “I thought I told you to go.”

  “I told her the same thing,” Len slurs. “She didn’t listen to me either. But don’t worry, she knows better than everybody. She can totally see into the future. No, wait. That’s us!” He reaches across me to clumsily hit Cas on the arm. I manage to grab my wineglass before he upends it.

  “Len, take it easy,” Cas says.

  “No, let’s take a vote. Who here thinks Syd should leave?” He waves his hand in the air until a waiter comes by and he orders another whiskey.

  Nelle shakes her head at me. “Don’t forget your valuables, Syd.” She nods toward Perry, who’s stumbling our way, trying to silence the clattering coffee cup and saucer.

  I want so badly to ask her what their relationship means, why she’d bother saving Perry and not his family. Why her husband was at the gates with a gun, yet here she is, acting as if she’s been Perry’s paramour for years instead of days.

  “I can leave my valuables right here,” I say. “That is, if you’re willing to stop and think a minute instead of bulling your way through the china closet.”

  “You think you’re clever, don’t you?” she says.

  At this moment I hate Nelle and, what’s more, the part of me who, days earlier, thought just like her. Thankfully, Len is too drunk to follow our cryptic conversation about their future, and Cas is too distracted, glancing around the room like a spooked animal.

  “Where’s your other brother?” Nelle asks Cas.

  Cas points toward the Bishop’s table, narrowly missing the caterer who is dropping the salad course onto her charger.

  I catch Troy’s eye and smile. He gives me a quick wave.

  “I’m sure the arrangement makes sense to the Governor somehow,” Cas says between bites of romaine.

  The Governor breaks off his conversation with Pi and the Bishop, swiveling around to follow Troy’s line of sight. When he sees me, his face twists the same way it did the night before, when Len had to hold Troy back from the gate.

  “If I were a betting woman,” I say, “I’d wager the Governor is trying to protect his other son from the wiles of a Survivor.”

  Everyone laughs. But this time, I regret to say, the Governor might just be right.

  Sometime before dessert, Perry and Len begin to bicker. Len is sauced and Perry has had several glasses of wine, and neither is making a whole lot of sense. At first they fight over stupid things, like Perry’s preference for riding English over western. Then it’s whether boarding school prepared Perry for life better than New Charity High prepared Len. Cas is oblivious, ensuring that no matter where the Bishop placed himself in the room, her back is never to him.

  At least that answers one of my questions. He’s liable to hurt anyone who gets in his way, whether it’s Cas or my dad. But I’m still not sure why. Maybe my dad was helping the Survivors, but Cas certainly isn’t.

  I hear the Governor’s voice over my shoulder. He’s introducing Perry and Nelle to a Mrs. Dwight, a retired professor of some sort. “My son, Perry Willis,” the Governor says, “and his fiancée Nelle, here, went to school back east. She’s now a member of the City Diplomatic Science Corps. She’s here to talk to us about the City’s growth and to help us get our own power back on. She’s a whiz at computers, this one.”

  I nearly choke on my wine. Governor Willis refers to Nelle as if she is a vaunted guest, instead of a captive.

  “May I ask her a few questions?” Mrs. Dwight asks, as if Nelle is a curio instead of a person.

  “This should be good,” I whisper to Cas.

  “Shh.” Len makes to cover my mouth. “You’re not the only one who thinks she knows everything, Syddie.”

  I swat him away. “Don’t call me that.”

  Mrs. Dwight’s first few questions are perfunctory. What does the City really look like? How many Survivors are there? In the City? In the whole country?

  “Hundreds of thousands, probably,” Nelle says. “The important thing is they rely on help from one another. For example, two Survivor Communities down the coast trade produce for timber. Some have factories up and running. Others, like the City, are only just hanging on because they’re missing some piece of crucial infrastructure.”

  The room has fallen quiet around us, and though the Governor seems to be trying to politely haul the guest away from our table, the woman is leaning over the back of my chair, causing me to lean forward, awkwardly. Len can’t stop giggling.

  “Are the people sad?” someone at the table behind us asks.

  “Syd can probably answer this better than I can,” Nelle says. “I’ve lived in one camp or another for about four years now. But Syd is fresh from the City.”

  “We do what we can,” I say. “Like the party last night. The rest of the time, we mourn the parts of the past we have no place for. Art, for example. As a former dancer I find it disheartening at best. But people adapt. I’ve built a family out of a neighbor, a stray child, and my boss. Others aren’t so lucky.”

  Someone blows her nose, and yet another lets out a dry sob.

  The Bishop stands and approaches, trying to compose his furious features. “My flock, do not feel guilty for the bounty which the Spirit has bestowed upon you. These Survivors suffer what they’ve sown. Let us remember: days without the Spirit are days numbered.”

  Len beams and slaps the table. He’s lit up on whiskey and even though Cas flings out an arm to still whatever’s coming next, she’s too late. “Is that what you told Cal Turner before you got rid of him?”

  There is a beat of silence—several beats for me—as the room absorbs the absurdity of his question. My eyes fill with bright spots as the room roars to life; people are standing and demanding explanations. The Bishop is trying to calm everyone down and th
e Governor is ordering Cedar to do a hundred things. I try to grip the edge of the table but it isn’t there. I stumble back, over my chair. Cas is grabbing at me, and Perry has a look on his face like he might be sick. Cas pushes me toward the tapestry, and both she and Len follow me through. On the other side, Cas wraps her arms around me, murmuring apologies.

  I push her off. “What is he talking about?”

  “It’s time, Cas,” Len slurs. “Come clean.”

  A small buzzing starts in my ears. “What?”

  “Remember at the social hall when you asked what Len and I were worried about?”

  Their conversation without words after the party. So much has happened it seems weeks ago instead of twenty-four hours.

  “You know how the Bishop’s Hindsight is the inverse of our powers? He says looking back drains him if he does it too often, but he touched me and I saw back in time. And Syd, I think the Bishop was responsible for your father’s death.”

  “You think?” I sit down hard on a delicate sideboard. “What exactly did you see?”

  I listen, though it’s like trying to hear her words through radio static or bees. She describes a hallway and my dad crying for help. She describes the gust of wind he created—power he’d secreted away—and the revolver he didn’t use after the Bishop poured the poisoned wine down his throat. I’m not sure I want to hear anymore. “Stop, Cas.”

  “I wanted to find some sort of proof before I went to Sheriff Jayne. Something concrete to give you. And after that, I guess I was afraid. I should’ve told you the minute you got here, but I just didn’t want to believe that the Bishop could . . .”

  “So how can you be sure tonight? Why would you tell me now, and not before? Gusts of wind, poisoned wine? This sounds like a bad novel, not real life.”

  “Syd, please.” The expression on her face is agony. “The Bishop. He cursed me so no one would believe me, but please try.”

  Part of me wants to trust her, but it’s just so . . . incredible.