I remembered Arthur’s warning. So what if I wasn’t alone here? This was worse; I was lonesome as they come, not a soul I knew in sight.
I quickly set off on the way back, half expecting the damn corridors in this maze to change direction—after all, you never knew here—but thank goodness they stayed where they were. Not so very much later, with a sigh of relief, I turned into the corridor where my own door lay.
There was still no sign of Henry. Now what? Did I stand around waiting for him, or stand him up so that at least I could get a bit of sleep? No, I’d made up my mind to talk to him, and I wasn’t going to let another night go by.
With my own door less than forty yards away, I felt safe enough to try turning into a jaguar again. You never knew, practice might make perfect. Sad to say, I couldn’t concentrate properly, so once again it went wrong. My pajama bottoms now had a jaguar pattern, but that was all. Oh, and I saw a tail too. Oops! I waggled my behind a bit, giggling. It wasn’t a bad jaguar tail, but I’d better get rid of it. However, before I could do that, someone put his arm around my shoulders from behind.
“Making yourself beautiful just for me?”
Henry. Now, of all times.
I hated it when he came quietly up behind me. And I hated myself for not hearing him. Who knew how long he’d been watching me while I fooled around with my jaguar tail?
He drew me close, and I almost went weak at the knees, it felt so good. So familiar, and right, and as if there weren’t any problems at all.
“Where’ve you been?” I tried to put a little distance between us, but I failed miserably. “I met Arthur just now. On my own.” I hoped that last bit came out in a suitably accusing tone.
Henry covered the top of my head with kisses. That felt good, too, I’m afraid. In between, he murmured, “What a good thing my beautiful, clever girlfriend can do kung fu in a tight spot. And you’d have everyone scared to death with that cheetah tail, anyway. So what did Arthur say?”
“Jaguar,” I corrected him. “It’s supposed to be a jaguar tail. And Arthur didn’t say much, just made a couple of cryptic remarks. And of course he didn’t laugh at my jokes. Do you know what l?yly? means in Finnish?”
Henry laughed and took my face between his hands. “Kiss me?” he suggested with a gleam in his gray eyes.
“No!” I pushed him away from me. Talking, no making out, that was my new mantra. Although right now it seemed to me a pretty stupid mantra.
However, that was no help with all the questions I had.
For instance, Where were you going in such a hurry just now? Or How come we’ve never met at your house? Are you serious when you say you love me, and if so, why don’t you tell me what’s weighing on your mind? How is it that Grayson and Emily know something about your mother and her problems? And what was the idea of giving me that beckoning Japanese cat?
None of them passed my lips. Instead I asked, “How did Secrecy know what happened in the school toilets at Berkeley?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Honestly, Liv, you don’t want to worry what that silly cow writes about you.”
“But that’s the point. She wouldn’t write about things that she can’t really know, unless…” I stopped.
“Unless what?”
“Unless someone told her about them.”
“That makes sense,” said Henry, shrugging again.
“Does it? But I haven’t told anyone but you, Henry.” It came out much more seriously than I intended, maybe a little too dramatically. “So…” I bit my lower lip.
For a moment Henry looked puzzled, and then his eyes widened. “Are you saying that I’m hand in glove with Secrecy?”
I didn’t answer that. I just chewed my lip as eloquently as I could manage.
Henry’s eyes widened a little farther. “Oh—unless maybe you think I could actually be Secrecy myself?” And although he was obviously struggling not to, he burst out laughing. His laughter came spilling and gurgling out of him in his own typical way, and unfortunately it was infectious. I felt the corners of my mouth beginning to twitch. Henry leaned forward to kiss me. “You’re so sweet! I love you, Liv! I love you so much.”
Then we didn’t say anything else for some time, while I sent that silly mantra off to Nirvana, or wherever mantras go when you’ve finished with them.
Until … yes, until we heard the laughter. Someone else’s laughter. Like something out of an old horror movie, deep and echoing, with a good deal of craziness in it. It was rolling down the corridors toward us, so much of a cliché that I didn’t feel at all afraid as I moved away from Henry’s arms to look for the cause of it. If this was Arthur’s way of proving that we weren’t alone here, it didn’t work very well.
Far down the corridor, we saw a figure that seemed to grow a little as we stared at it.