It was the rain that woke me up, I think. I lay in bed, listening to it pour down onto the roof and drip off the gutter, blessing it silently. Maybe the humidity would finally ease off now.
I closed my eyes, waiting for sleep to take me, but it my stomach rumbled and my mind raced and after an hour or so of lying on my stomach I realized that I had my teeth tightly clenched. I loosened my jaw, trying to get comfortable on my bed. The rain beat down on my head, roaring off the slanted roof, pounding into the gravel below.
Rain in summer was a good thing. Why was I so awake?
The rain continued on and off for the rest of the next day. After I'd roused myself, late, and wandered around the house for a couple hours, I found myself staring out the window, following the line of the driveway as it disappeared down the road, and, peeking around me to make sure no one would notice and call me back in, I slipped out the door and into the rain, making a beeline for the gate.
I trudged for a long time, head down, staring at my soaked sneakers, until the tight, fluttery feeling that had been sitting in my stomach all day began to subside. Water poured down my forehead and into my eyes and I shook it out, and shook it out, and shook it out. It ran down my shoulders and my chest and in rivers down my legs, splashing back up onto my shins and my calves with every step I took, and eventually, slowly, I began to get tired of my headlong dash. When I slowed, and slow I did, panting, I looked up to find that I was in the middle of nowhere.
It was a part of the road to town that I'd never really paid attention to before. The bank of the forest ran up steeply to my right, and the road took a little dip around the hill before it flattened out and headed right into town. I had no thoughts about my own safety, really, not even on a road in the middle of a rainstorm, water lashing my eyes. Very few cars ever came this way, since it fed almost directly into Mansfield proper.
I looked up the bank of trees to my right, peering past the first layers of pines, trying to see-what? A person? An animal? An escape? I didn't know. A sudden, ravenous urge sprang up in me to rush up that hill, pulling myself hand over hand past the treeline, and further until I hit something new. Another rash impulse pulled me back along the road, back to Mansfield, where I would throw my arms around Ned's neck and kiss him on the lips the way Henry had kissed Mireille in the show. The mere thought of that sent my thoughts skiddering in another direction, down the road in the opposite direction that I'd come, turning right out of the Mansfield gate rather than left, down past the few houses I knew about, into whatever lay on the other side of the woods. What was it? Was it the university? Another town? I realized, suddenly, that I didn't know much beyond the two square feet I had managed to explore. Not for the first time, my ignorance bothered me.
I glanced back up the hill, up through the trees, waiting for something to appear. When it didn't, and didn't, and didn't, I took the first few, tentative steps up the hill face, stepping on the brush and moss, pulling myself up on the tree trunks. I took step after step, tree after tree, until I was fifteen feet or so past the treeline. The rain was pooling around my sneakers, and as I took my last step up the hill my toe slipped, sending me sliding down on my knees, coating my jeans with mud along the shins.
I pushed myself back to a standing position, dividing my weight between two saplings. Up the hills was nothing but more trees, more rocks, more moss. What was I trying to get to? What was I even doing?
I glanced down at my sodden feet. I must be crazy. I must be out of my mind. What if someone came along and found me here, clinging to underbrush, soaked to the skin? What would they tell Dr Bertram? What would I tell Ned?
I hurried up the driveway, hoping that I would be able to sneak in the side door and up into my room without anyone seeing me or knowing that I had been gone in the first place. I felt like a fool, and I felt that foolishness creep up the back of my neck. What was wrong with me? A day ago I had been happy to be here, happy that Dr Bertram was home. Now I was making half-baked escape attempts in the middle of rainstorms and dreaming stupid things. I was glad no one had seen me.
As I passed the Grants' house, though, a voice called out my name. I jumped, startled, then looked up to see Mary standing at an upstairs window, waving at me.
"Fawn! Come on up!"
I hesitated. I was soaking wet, cold, and uncomfortable. All I wanted was to take a hot shower and put on my pajamas and pretend I didn't exist.
Mary had other ideas. "Don't go anywhere! I'm coming down!" Her smiling face disappeared from view. I waited, stupidly, as rain poured over the bridge of my nose and into my eyes and mouth and ears. An impossibly short time later, Mary flung the door wide open and beckoned me inside.
The moment the door closed behind me, the reality of my wetness sunk in. A puddle formed on the doormat at my feet, and the air-conditioning made shivers run up and down my spine. Goosebumps formed along my arms and chest.
"Look at you!" Mary said, touching my elbow affectionately, rubbing her hand briskly along my upper arm. "What were you doing out in this? It's like a typhoon outside!"
My teeth were chattering so hard I couldn't have answered if I'd been able to speak. Mary looked at me with concern, her eyebrows raised ever so slightly. "Well, never mind. Let's get you some dry clothes, okay? Come on up with me." She turned to go back up the stairs.
But I had lived in this house with Aunt Nola for ten years, and I wasn't ready to traipse mud through its halls just because it belonged to someone else now. I stood planted on the doormat, determined to confine my mess to as little space as possible.
Mary made it to the eighth step before she realized I wasn't behind her. She turned back around, seeing me standing resolutely by the door, then came back down again.
"What's the matter? Come up with me! You can't stay in those clothes all day." I shifted my weight, my left sneaker squelching noisily. Her eyebrows shot up again, this time as she tried to conceal a smile.
"Don't worry about the floors. We'll grab them when we come back down. You're more important than the hardwood, anyway." She held out her hand for me to take. Hiding my surprise at this estimation of my value, I put my hand in hers and let her draw me up the stairs and into the best guest bedroom, which was obviously hers now.
Mary was six inches taller than me, a discrepancy that became more and more apparent the more pairs of pants I tried on. We finally settled on yoga pants, folding down the waistband and rolling up the cuffs. I dried my hair with a towel as she rummaged through her shirts.
"Sorry I don't have a bra your size," she said for the third time. "You'll just have to go commando until yours dries." She held up an oversized sweatshirt, the kind I'd seen in the movies from the 80s that I'd watched with Ned, only prettier. She glanced down at me, then back to the shirt. "You're so damn skinny, I don't want to put you in something that'll drown you. Do they feed you over there?" She meant it as a joke, I think, but I looked down at my feet anyway, determined not to give anything away.
If she noticed my discomfort, she didn't say anything. Eventually she found a shirt for me, a long-sleeved t-shirt with STANFORD emblazoned across the front. The sleeves were too long for my arms, but I pushed them up to my elbows, rolling the cuffs again when they slid down. I looked up to find Mary appraising me.
"Well, it's not bad considering the limited resources. At least you're dry." She flopped down on her bed and sat, cross-legged, looking up at me expectantly. I glanced around her room, taking in the beautiful photographs on the walls, the plush armchair in the corner, the well-organized closet, the bookshelves. Compared to this room, my room was bare.
I looked back at Mary, embarrassed to be staring at her possessions. She was watching me with that look again, that slightly-bemused look of someone not quite sure if they're hearing a joke. Seeing my face, she smiled. "You can look around if you like. Feel free. Make yourself at home."
I had never been in another girl's room before. Though I supposed Mary was a woman, not a girl like me. But then I'd never been in another woman's room before, either. What I remembered from my parents house was old off-white wall-to-wall carpeting and a closet door with mirrors on one side and a bed that had taken up the majority of the room. Julia had never invited me into her room, and I'd been too afraid of Mireille to even consider the possibility. What I knew of bedrooms, I knew from the rooms that had been set up for me, and from Ned's room with its tall windows and comfortable, shabby old couch.
None of Mary's furniture was old. The carpet was plush, and big enough to furnish the room without completely hiding the beautiful wood floors beneath. She had a bed frame with a fabric headboard, and clean, surprisingly wrinkle-free blankets. A bank of pillows were arranged at the head, so many that I thought it would be impossible to lie down flat on her bed. How did she sleep at night with so many pillows? Did she need them to feel comfortable?
The artwork on her walls was the most interesting to me, though. It was all photographs, something I'd never really seen before. I'd only ever painted, and even then I'd used supplies that Mireille and Julia didn't want anymore, so my color choices had been limited. The idea of my asking for a camera was laughable. But these photos were beautiful. Some black and white, some color, mostly of things in cities. Or maybe one city I didn't recognize.
I must have stared at the photos more intently than I'd intended, because Mary said, "You like those? Henry actually took them."
That surprised me. I turned to look at her, and she laughed. "I know. He doesn't seem like the artistic type. Not when he's spending all his time flirting and generally being useless," she said this with real affection, as if being useless was endearing. "But I guess being an artist and being a player aren't mutually exclusive, right? I mean, Manet died of syphilis so he must have gotten some action."
I had no idea who Manet was. I turned to look back at the photos. Mary continued, "Those are of Los Angeles. We grew up there, Henry and me." There was something wistful about her tone. I glanced at her again, and she smiled. "It probably doesn't make any sense to you, living in this beautiful house and having all this space and these trees and things, but I really miss the city. There's so much more to do there, and see there, people to meet, places to go, you know."
Would she go back there if she could? I wondered. She looked up at me and grinned. "You know, sometimes the things you think are so clear, it's like you don't even have to speak, did you know that? Maybe you're just telepathic or something. But to answer your question, yeah, I'd like to go back. Eventually. I'd love to be back on the West Coast. Different place, different culture." She gestured out the window, where the rain was slanting down nearly horizontally. "It doesn't do this all the time, for instance. This is a little new for me." She glanced back up at me and smiled again, as if expecting a response, but I turned away. I didn't like the thought of people being able to read my face.
It was strange, since I'd spoken to Henry before, and Dr Bertram, without being prompted. In my distress after Party Castles! had gone south, I had even spoken to Ned in Mary and Mireille's presence. But this was different. I couldn't speak here, and I knew it.
After a pause, Mary filled the silence again. "He's actually a really good guy, my brother. A little flaky, maybe. A little bit of a playboy. But he means well. And he's talented. I just think maybe he needs to find the right person to settle him down. Make him want to come home to the same person. He's only twenty-one, you know. He just needs to apply himself, but I think he needs inspiration to help him do that. A muse, if you will. It can't come from inside himself, because then he'll just ignore it."
Why were we talking about this? Was I supposed to agree? Should I seem interested? I didn't know, but I nodded anyway, as if what she was saying made perfect sense to me.
She clicked her tongue, and shook her head, but it was clear that she wasn't reprimanding me. "I'm sorry, that's all really personal stuff. You don't need that. I'm just unloading, I guess. Ned doesn't really like to talk about Henry that much. Don't understand why."
I did. And I thought that Mary did, too.
"Anyway, it's just nice to have someone else to talk to about it. And it's good to talk to you, since I haven't really had you to myself in a long time. Come here, sit down." She patted the bed next to her. Not knowing a way around it, I sat down next to her.
"Do you mind if I ask you a question?" Unlike Guy Fearsome, she waited for my nod to give her permission, then said, "Does Ned really want to be a minister?"
I nodded, my heart dropping. I didn't want to start talking about Ned.
"Do you know why, though? I mean, he's smart, and he's serious, and he's charming and respectful and he argues well. He could be a lawyer or a business man. He could take over BerTech, or start his own company no problem. Don't you think it's a waste?"
I shook my head.
"No? Well, maybe you know better than I do." She leaned back on her hands, watching me for a moment, then leaned forward again and said, "I know I shouldn't be asking you this, I know that it's super unfair. But could you help me out? There's no one else I can talk to about this." Her eyes were soft with concern. I waited, not knowing what exactly she was asking of me. She leaned a little closer. "If I give you a piece of paper and a pencil, do you think you could...? Please? I'll never ask it of you again, but you know Ned better than anyone, and I need your help."
It took me a moment to realize what she meant, and once I did I had no idea how to respond. It seemed reasonable of her to want me to be able to answer with more than a yes and a no, but I wasn't sure how I felt about it. And my spelling was probably atrocious, and I wasn't sure about my handwriting or how long it would take for me to answer.
This time, though, Mary didn't wait for my permission. She picked up a notebook from her nightstand, tore out a piece of paper, and gave me a larger book to rest it on while I wrote. Then she handed me an enameled turquoise pen, the kind of pen you make sure you never lose, and settled back, a light awakened in her eyes.
"Are you ready?"
"So you don't think it's a waste for Ned to be a minister?"
No.
"Why not?"
Because it's what he wants to do.
"But he's smarter than that, don't you think? He's smart enough not to believe in useless superstition."
Super stition?
"And I mean, we can both see that Tom isn't going to be taking up the family business on his own. The two of them could run it together. Though they probably have people to run it for them anyway."
Ned's never wanted to work at BerTech. He's only ever wanted to be a minister.
"Well, that's disappointing."
?
"Maybe we can get him to change his mind, huh? Hey, do you want to hear a song?" She turned around and grabbed a guitar case from behind her bed, taking out a beautiful instrument, adjusting the keys at the top of the neck.
I stood up. I was ready to go home.
"Oh, no, please stay, Fawn. I want you to hear this. And this is Ned's favorite song. Please stay. Please listen."
If I left, I would be mean. If I stayed, I would probably regret it. I sat down. She smiled and started to play a song I had never heard before. This was Ned's favorite song? I realized I didn't even know what kind of music he liked. She played beautifully. I felt, not for the first time that day, the desire to go as far and as fast from there as possible, to forget I had ever heard her play the guitar, forget I had ever said anything about Ned. Forget how inadequate I felt here, in her room, in her clothes, her walls decorated with gifts from her family, playing a song I had never known was my best friend's favorite.
The final chords of her song died off slowly, and she smiled at me, gauging enough positive reaction from my face to make her happy. She turned and put the guitar back in its case, and turned to me again.
"Do you have a dress?"
Figuring she meant a dress other than the old black one I'd worn to Norris's funeral, I shook my head.
"Ah, I thought not. I was going to give you one of mine, since I have way too many, but I think our dress up session shows us that you shouldn't take anything of mine unless you want to drown in it. And besides, I think you should have something that's yours, don't you?"
She held out her hands to me, wrists on her knees. I hesitated, then put mine on top of hers, palm to palm.
"How about you and I go to the mall tomorrow and find you a dress for your party? Something special in your size that you love? Not a hand-me-down from some trend-conscious cousins?"
The proposition brought me up short, and I blinked at the sudden prickling in my eyes.
"Would you like that, Fawn?"
Breathing deeply, around the tightness in my chest, I nodded. Why did she do this? Why did she make me feel uncomfortable and then turn around and do the one thing I hadn't realized I needed someone to do? I wished she would go away. I wished she would never leave.
She smiled fondly, bouncing our hands together, up and down. "You and me, then. And Ned, if he wants to come. It'll be a day about you, okay? Just the three of us, together. Celebrating you."
She reached up and played with a strand of my hair, tucking it back behind my ear.
"I've always wanted a little sister."