Helen got into bed and closed her eyes.
There was no salsa music tonight. In fact, it was quiet. Everyone had probably paired off. Everyone was making love. She found that she could not remember the feel of Scott’s kisses or touches or what exactly it was like in the instant when he entered her, before movement began. She had forgotten. No. She could almost remember the way his hand felt resting on her leg when they slept, the light weight of it, flesh on flesh.
At some point in the night, she woke herself, sat upright in her bed, said out loud, “What is wrong with you anyway?” felt her heartbeat quicken as if an answer might really come, as if she would feel a crash, go airborne, know something more. But she sat like that, waiting, until she fixed herself in that place, that cabin, that cot, alone.
AT FIRST, HELEN thought she was dreaming, that it was still night and she was asleep. But slowly she came to realize that someone really was in the cabin touching her forehead with their fingertips.
“Hi,” Danielle said when Helen opened her eyes. “That’s how I like to wake up. By someone writing me messages on my head.”
Danielle had on some kind of white lace bonnet and looked vaguely Amish.
Helen’s mouth was cottony.
“You were writing me messages on my head?” she said.
“Just like ‘Hi’ and ‘Ellen’ and stuff,” Danielle giggled.
By the cast of the sunlight streaming through the window, Helen realized it was already afternoon.
“My name is Helen. Not Ellen,” she said, struggling to sit up. Her side throbbed.
“Really?” Danielle said, surprised. “I thought Helen was an old person’s name. But I know a lot of young Ellens.”
Helen got up and went to look at her terra-cotta hair in the light. Besides being flat from too much sleep, her hair looked the same.
“I’ve got a confession to make,” Danielle said.
Helen realized she had missed both breakfast and lunch. She looked at Joanne’s unslept-in bed, then out the window where, in those woods, the studios sat. If Joanne was still with the sculptor, maybe Helen could go and steal her brown bag lunch.
“Remember that guy Jerry I told you about?” Danielle was asking.
“The phantom limb?”
“Cool,” Danielle said. “You’re a good listener.” She pointed at Helen happily.
“What about him?” Helen wanted Danielle to leave. The bonnet was bothering her. Danielle was bothering her.
“I did it,” Danielle said. “I shot him.”
Helen took a step backward. “It wasn’t a hunting accident?” She had seen made-for-TV movies about crazy women who stalked men and shot them. She had seen Fatal Attraction.
“It was a hunting accident,” Danielle said. “I thought he was a wild turkey, you know? It was right before Thanks-giving and we were turkey hunting and I shot him.”
Knowing that Danielle wasn’t deranged, Helen wondered why she didn’t feel more relieved.
“He was my boyfriend,” Danielle added. “Then I felt really guilty for breaking up with him because he, like, only had one leg and stuff. What a nightmare. Anyway, I decided not to hide it anymore. I shot him and he lost a leg and then I broke up with him, and maybe that makes me a bad person, but that is what happened.” She exhaled loudly. “I feel better telling you the truth.”
They stood looking at each other across a shaft of sunlight filled with dancing dust motes until Danielle remembered that she was supposed to take Monday and Tuesday swimming.
That was when Helen saw that the Amish bonnet was actually a bathing cap.
On her way to steal Joanne’s lunch, Helen tried to figure out why she hadn’t told Danielle about Scott. It was the same kind of situation, in a way. Except Scott had died and they hadn’t gotten the chance to break up and this guy Jerry lost a leg and got his heart broken. Was one worse? Helen wondered.
Joanne’s lunch was already gone, which meant she was probably inside her studio.
Helen peeked in the window.
There was Joanne, not working, the brown bag empty, crumpled.
She saw Helen looking at her and waved.
“You know,” Helen said, “people end up in a lot of unusual situations. It doesn’t make them bad.”
Joanne frowned.
“I can’t believe you fucked the wire man,” Helen said.
“His work is very sensitive,” Joanne said, sounding haughty. “He spins it. Like cotton candy.”
It was Helen’s turn to frown.
“It might do you some good to make contact with another man,” Joanne said.
Helen felt like an alien. Make contact. Take me to your leader.
“Who?” Helen said. “Andrew?”
Joanne ignored her. “I thought you were getting your hair colored.”
“I did,” Helen said. “Terra-cotta.”
Joanne shrugged.
Beside the bag was an apple core and cookie crumbs.
“It cost seventy-five dollars and it looks exactly the same,” Helen said.
“Actually,” Joanne said thoughtfully, “it looks worse.”