“Will there ever be peace?” Phoebe asks. “I mean, really? It’s never going to end.”
“It will end,” says Eleanor. “I have faith.”
“We killed Madame Arnaud. We were good, and then they took this trip to France and we’re in trouble again. What happens next year when they go to Italy or back to the States or to Ireland? Are we just going to find evil people we have to kill wherever we go?”
“I don’t believe so,” says Eleanor.
“Me, either. I think this is it. Madame Arnaud had a twin, and we don’t hear anything about any other siblings.”
Phoebe wrenches her hand out of mine. “I wish I was back in San Francisco and none of this ever happened!” she yells. “I hate British accents and signs written in French!”
“You have culture shock,” I inform her. “And actually, you really like my sexy accent.”
Although she’s deeply upset, I find it ever so slightly . . . just a sliver . . . amusing. She’s got culture shock on top of being dead. This girl needs an infusion of American pop culture.
“I wish I had a hot dog to hand you,” I say.
“You’re an idiot,” she says.
“And some crisps, oops, I mean potato chips . . .”
“Seriously, hot dogs and potato chips are America to you?”
“What else is there?”
“Miles, you’re not helping her with this insensitive talk,” says Eleanor, but as I look at Phoebe’s eyes flashing at me indignantly, I know I helped her out a lot. I shook her out of her spiral of sadness.
“At least we keep our teeth straight!” she says.
“Now that’s a stereotype and you know it,” I say. “Check out this glossy row.” I lift my lip and show her my teeth.
“One of the lucky and the few,” she says.
“And you think the Day-Glo glare from Americans’ bleached smiles is anything but painfully artificial?”
“I’ve never bleached,” she says.
“Oh, you will, American, you will,” I promise her.
She stops, puts her hands on her hips, and collapses into a bout of laughter that includes perhaps eight percent crying.
It’s intense, I’m telling you what, this being dead. It doesn’t ever end.
Eleanor gives me a baronial look of scorn that makes me think again, as I often have, that she has something royal or special in her background. She wears an apron, yes, even now, but she’s no one’s serving girl.
“What?” I say to Eleanor. “I cheered her up.”
“Let’s look at the rock grotto again,” says Tabby’s dad.
We’ve been walking for a long time now. Phoebe’s no longer mad or sad or whatever complex cocktail of emotions described her a half hour ago. Tabby’s fallen asleep in her buggy.
The grotto’s another thing Phoebe and I missed yesterday, but I remember visiting with my parents. It’s a man-made rock with carved entrance and exit, and a peephole for Marie-Antoinette to see people coming. She was reading on a stone bench inside when they brought word to her that a mob was coming from Paris for her and her family: the beginning of the end.
We cross a rickety bridge over water to approach it. It looms above us, a dark rock with many secrets. As we approach the metal bars that now block the entrance to the grotto, I sense it coming.
The wavering. The rock developing shadows, then brightening.
I whirl around and look at Phoebe. I’m too far away to grab Eleanor as we promised . . . and it looks like Phoebe is, too.
“Grab her!” I yell. “The light is changing!”
Eleanor’s face looks panicked, and she runs toward Phoebe. But not fast enough.
We’re tripping.
Just me and Phoebe.
I scan the area, pulling Phoebe off to the side. I can’t see anybody yet, but that doesn’t mean they can’t see us.
The entrance is now open, the metal grille gone. We enter a cave of sorts, a narrow passageway that smells of dampness, of objects kept from the sun. Seems like the best place for us to hide. The walls are dark with moisture, and I think for a moment about how tortured Marie-Antoinette must’ve been, that she preferred to crawl into so forbidding and primeval a place rather than linger with the golden furnishings of the palace.
From farther inside the cave, I hear a moan. I share a glance with Phoebe and we carefully and slowly twist around the corner.
The lovers are here, standing pressed against each other, kissing like crazy. Etienne is lifting Giraude’s skirts and this time she’s not stopping him. He hoists her up, and her legs encircle his waist. Her legs are beautiful, muscular, and end in slippers so thin they show her individual toes curling. They stop kissing as she leans back in a swoon and he pulls her bodice to the side. He furiously works at her buttons and laces to get to her breasts.
“The mole!” whispers Phoebe.
My first thought is that it’s a trick. We know the French royals painted beauty spots or even pasted on brown circles, moving them around to please the eye. Possibly Giraude has created a mole where her sister has one. But then Etienne speaks and I realize it’s a betrayal.
“Giraude must never know,” he mutters. “You promise?”
“I promise,” Yolande breathes. “I’ve wanted you for so long . . .”
“She won’t give it to me,” he says. What a liar.
“I will!” she says exultingly. Her face is filled with passion and also triumph. She’s seducing her sister’s lover.
His hands disappear under her skirts to take off whatever undergarments prevent him from moving further, and of one accord Phoebe and I move backward around the corner so we can’t see them anymore.
“Awkward,” mouths Phoebe.
I whisper into her ear, “I’ve always noticed a variety of yogurt at French supermarkets. Do Americans enjoy yogurt? If so, what kind?”
She shakes, holding in her laughter.
“Another thing I’ve been puzzling over,” I whisper. “How much emphasis do you place on making your handwriting legible? Is it even important in this era of keyboarding?”
She waves her hands in front of her face to make me stop, her face bright with suppressed amusement.
Around the corner we hear the cries of ecstasy; it seems Etienne and Yolande may have taken things to a whole new level. Phoebe puts her hand over her mouth, and I’m just about to suggest we vacate the grotto when the cries behind us are overcome by another sound, a sinister buzzing.
A black cloud bolts past us. Phoebe and I both leap to the wall and flatten ourselves against it. The smudged blur goes around the corner.
“What was that?” gasps Phoebe, her eyes wild.
Although every instinct tells me to run, I want to see what happens. I peer around the corner to see hundreds of hornets descend on Etienne.
“No!” cries Yolande. She bats at the insects, but only gets stung for her trouble, shrieking and jumping away each time.
Etienne has leapt away, his trousers loose at his hips, and Yolande scrambles against the rock wall to keep her balance. The hornets completely hide his face with their black and yellow, writhing bodies. Their wings waver in frenzied time with their stinging. He’s wearing a black, moving mask.
“They can’t get us,” says Phoebe. “They’re his. It’s his fate.”
I can’t help myself, though, from stepping backward, keeping myself between Phoebe and the hornets.
Yolande is screaming as loudly as Etienne, and she has pulled off her fichu to flap at the hornets and get them to leave him alone. It doesn’t help.
In another moment, it’s over. Phoebe and I back up as the hornets come toward us again, but they have no interest in us. They fly off as quickly as they had descended. Etienne’s face is unrecognizable, a swollen mass of throbbing bites. There’s nothing human about it. He sinks to his knees and falls flat on his face.
We watch in horror as Yolande crouches to touch his wrist, seeing if he has a pulse, and then howls in anger.
�
�It’s the work of Giraude,” she says as she rises. Phoebe jumps back out of sight, but I remain there to see what transpires. I’m invisible to Yolande.
Yolande’s face is tight. She isn’t necessarily heartbroken, and she sheds no tears. She didn’t care for Etienne other than to screw over her sister.
“So your love is dead, poor dear sister,” she says as she smooths her skirts and begins undoing the damage to her elaborate hairstyle. “You have taken a knife to your nose to spite your face.”
Phoebe takes my hand as the light readjusts, and the noise of present-day visitors penetrates again, people lining up photographs and selfies and sharing snacks from their backpacks. People peer in through the grille, not seeing us.
“Unbelievable,” says Phoebe. “Do you think he was really dead?”
“I don’t think they had antihistamines back then,” I say.
“What a way for it all to end,” she says in disbelief.
“Kind of makes you rethink the safety of getting so close to someone,” I joke just because there’s nothing we can do about it. “I won’t ever touch you again.”
Eleanor shows up, her face stricken. She’s heard what I said.
“I’m sorry,” I say quickly. “I tried to reach you but we weren’t close enough.”
“It is simply unfortunate,” she says, “that I am not prey to the same magic you are. But what a lovely rock chamber.”
She’s so polite, the fault of her century and her social standing. I don’t know what to say to that. I myself am still reeling from all the changes. Eleanor’s known she’s dead for a lot longer than I have. I’m not comfortable yet. And I hate feeling guilty for things that aren’t my fault.
“So what happened?” she asks. “Or did anything?”
Phoebe looks at me unhappily. “A lot happened,” she says. “Yolande was fooling around with Etienne. Somehow Giraude knew and sent hornets to kill him.”
“So much for chasing each other through the trees,” I say.
“But why not kill both of them?” Eleanor asks.
“A bit of sibling loyalty?” says Phoebe.
“Versailles was hard on lovers,” I joke. Both girls give me a stare.
I sigh. “What’s our plan? Vigilance followed by fireworks?”
“That’s about it,” says Eleanor. “Unless you’d like to vanish for a few hours.”
“It’s not our fault!” says Phoebe. “I tried to run to you! You saw me trying!”
“I did,” says Eleanor glumly. “I saw that. I’m just wishing we were treated the same.”
It wasn’t so long ago that Eleanor treated us like we were in a social class above hers. She was a servant and we were not, but she has made leaps and strides toward a sense of self-worth. I’m dying for the day she finally discards her cap.
“Me, too,” says Phoebe. “I wish the magic whisked you along, too. But maybe it’s best you stay and look after—”
I can see where her sentence is going, and I can see the scowl starting on Eleanor’s face. She’s meant to watch over Tabby, a nursemaid, a governess, while we play at leisure. She’s still the help, and she doesn’t get what we get. I’m breathing in, preparing to do some damage control, when the light doesn’t change so much as it goes dark instantly— I whirl around and grab at Eleanor, but I’m still too slow—and Phoebe, too, reaches out her hand to me, but I’m gone—
I’m gone . . .
And back with Gillian in her bedroom.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Sun King attended mass in the chapel every morning, and each day a new musical work was performed, composed specifically for the half-hour service.
—Nooks and Crannies of Versailles
It’s just her this time. Her and a candle.
She’s not crying but there’s an intensity in her face that seems even worse.
“Miles,” she’s whispering. “Miles . . .”
“I’m here,” I say. “What do you want to say?”
“Miles, do you think about me? Where are you? What is it like?”
I feel like an idiot, but I answer her in steady tones. “Of course I think about you,” I say. “I’m still here, some version of here. I’m just not completely here.”
“I miss you. Your birthday was hard. Do you even know it was your birthday?”
“I knew because you called me to you.”
“School is weird. Everyone thinks of me as your girlfriend still. Everyone’s always hugging me. Reminding me.”
I don’t say anything.
“Did you know your locker is all decked out? All these messages scrawled on it and photographs and lipstick kisses? I couldn’t remember your combination.”
Neither can I.
I hope there’s no tuna fish sandwich in there slowly decomposing.
“I have so many memories of you. I miss you.”
“I miss you, too,” I say softly.
“My mom and dad want me to apply to university. That seems like I would completely leave you behind.”
“You should,” I say. “You should go to university. You should have your life.”
Poor Gillian. Her lower lip is trembling and she’s fighting tears again. She’s completely dyed her hair since yesterday to flame red. She matches her candle.
“I need to make some fresh starts,” she says.
“Okay,” I say.
“It’s year twelve.” She says it with such a pang that I realize there’s a whole missed year of our life together. We were supposed to go to the prom together, we were supposed to either plot to go to university together or talk each other into staying and working or traveling. I’ve always kind of fancied the idea of going on safari. I guess I can do it now—using intention, I could be on a safari in the next second—but without really experiencing it.
Gillian and I will never get a flat together, never have another row, never kiss. I’ll never have her lips on mine again. She’s lost to me . . . or more like, I’m lost to her. I’m vanished to everybody except Phoebe and Eleanor. I’m the original lost boy.
“Do you remember Chris Chadding?” she asks. “Of course you do. What a stupid question.”
But it’s funny—it takes me a few moments to remember him. The dude on the outskirts who doesn’t talk much. Dark hair and always slouching into his oversized T-shirts.
She pulls out a school photo from her back pocket. She briefly reads the inscription on the back, too quickly for me, and turns it back to the front. Oh yeah, him.
“He likes me, Miles,” she whispers. “Is that okay? Is that okay?”
Oh, poor Gillian.
But I have to admit, something’s rising in me, too. That was fast, I think. Did you mourn me for all of what, two months?
I’m not even sure how long I’ve been dead.
I look contemptuously at the photograph of Chris. The photographer must’ve made him sit up and have good posture. He looks decent. Maybe the time I’ve spent dead, he’s spent working out and getting better-looking.
Something else arises. Who’s taken my place on the swim team? Who’s the fastest, who’s the leader?
So glad I meant something to you, Gillian, I think bitterly. Was yesterday’s birthday séance really just softening the blow before this? How had she changed so much just in twenty-four hours, or had she? Maybe Chris’s photo was in her back pocket the whole time.
“Take him, I don’t care,” I say aloud. “Be my guest.”
“I’m really sorry,” she says. “I wish I had a way to know you were okay.”
“I’m fine! Things are totally going my way!”
“I’ll never forget you, Miles. You were really special.”
“Present tense, harpy!”
Now I don’t like myself, either. It’s not her fault. She should move on . . . maybe just not so fast. But the fact is, crying over a candle isn’t going to change anything. Maybe a few kisses with Chris Chadding will make all the difference. Gillian will be good for him, and she’ll heal and forget me a
nd I’ll just be that sad thing that happened before her A-level exams.
“Miles?”
It’s Phoebe.
“Hey,” I say briefly.
“You okay here?”
“You’re not the only one who wants to know,” I say.
“Who’s he?” Phoebe’s looking upside down at Chris’s photograph as Gillian sits looking at it.
“My replacement.”
“Seriously?” Phoebe’s eyes widen. “You haven’t been . . .”
“. . . dead very long! I know!”
“Sorry.”
“She wants permission to date him. From me, the dead bloke.”
Phoebe smirks. “I say, big thumbs-up!”
Reluctantly, I laugh.
“Eleanor’s probably super ticked off I’m here, but you were gone long enough I got worried.”
“Thanks for checking on me.”
“I feel awful sometimes,” she says, and while she talks I’m aware that Gillian’s in the background crying over the photograph. “But she’s right. It’s like we’re linked in a way that doesn’t include her. I wonder if we’ve had other lives or other . . . I don’t know . . . representations of ourselves. Maybe I did betray her once.”
“Well, you’re nice to her now,” I point out.
“I get worried that once we figure everything out, that’s it.”
A long silence falls. “I know,” I say. “It’s scary to think about it all ending.”
“She’s had a couple hundred years to mentally prepare,” Phoebe says. “But I’m not ready to let go.”
I nod. “Especially when we don’t know what the next stage is.”
“It looks like the universe wants us to kill Giraude. We’re like the twin killers. It would make a great show on the Discovery Channel.”
“On what?”
“Oh right, I forget you Brits only get three channels.”
“Take it back!”
“Sorry,” she smirks.
“So . . . how do we go about it?”
“Same trick twice?” She’s thinking about how we fought off Giraude’s sister in England.
“I don’t know how we’d arrange that again.”
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