Grayson: “Silly sport? Basketball? Because it doesn’t entail tormenting horses by plaiting their manes into little braids?”
Emily: “Because it means practicing three times a week with a bunch of weak-minded idiots and the effect is catching.”
Short pause.
Grayson: “Okay, that sounds super. Put it in the magazine.”
Emily: “Grayson. I didn’t mean it like that. Wait…”
Grayson: (has gone already).
As I always say, couples shouldn’t work together. It’s bound to end in tears.
Can’t wait to see the report that will appear in reflexx on Wednesday. Or maybe it won’t appear at all. ?
See you later!
Secrecy
PS—Liv and Mia Silver, a.k.a. the ax murderesses, a.k.a. the spectacled snakes who go around chopping down trees, weren’t there to watch the game—and I for one didn’t miss them. My heart still bleeds when I think of that beautiful topiary peacock. How about all of you?
19
MR. WU WAS STANDING in his fighting gear outside Mia’s door like a soldier of the Royal Guard, except that instead of a gun he had the gong beater over his shoulder. However, I wasn’t sure whether he had been on duty while I was awake as well. After all, he was my dream creation, and if I was not asleep, then how could he exist here?
“No intruder has ventured to come to blows with the Tiger’s Claw of the sky,” he informed me.
“Did anyone try it, then?” I asked intently, although at the same moment I thought that a figure whom I had only imagined could hardly have seen anything that I hadn’t seen. (Yes, I know, a rather complicated thought. The kind to be avoided if you don’t want to get your brain tied in knots.)
“All crows under the sun are black.” Mr. Wu nodded his head back and forth. “There was that stranger with the hat.…”
Hat? The stranger could only have been Senator Tod. Or rather, Dr. Anderson, Anabel’s psychiatrist. And did that mean that he had really been here, or just that Mr. Wu, as part of myself, was only saying what I was afraid of? But what could Senator Tod want from Mia? Maybe he had just passed by in search of someone else—me, for instance.
“This really is complicated,” I murmured, casting a quick look at Henry’s black door. When I had stepped into the corridor and saw that it was still right opposite mine, my stomach had contracted painfully. Although I told myself I was here only for Mia, I mustn’t pretend—secretly, I’d hoped to meet Henry.
I’d refused to speak to him all Saturday. After sleeping in until eleven, I ought to have jumped out of bed fresh as a daisy, but you don’t jump out of bed fresh as a daisy when you’ve caught your own boyfriend in a whirlpool with a naked woman and cried half the night. I for one had the feeling that there was lead in my veins instead of blood. Or poison.
In spite of the extra practice and the basketball game, Henry had left me seven voice mails and tried the landline three times, but in the evening, when the game was over and I finally felt strong enough to face him without instantly bursting into tears, or screaming, or doing both at once, radio silence suddenly set in. No more calls, no texts.
And when someone rang the doorbell, it was only Emily, wanting to see Florence and discuss plans for the twins’ birthday party, of course without Grayson. They were taking over the living room for that, so Mia and I had to leave it ourselves. Although I didn’t really mind, because all I wanted to do this evening was lie in bed, staring at the ceiling and feeling terrible. First I took a bath, staring at the bathroom ceiling, and likewise feeling terrible. Maybe it was the effect of the hot water, or maybe it was also because I still had to catch up on sleep, or it was a kind of protective function of the body simply to switch off in stressful situations, but anyway, my eyes closed as soon as I was in bed. My last thought was for the dream corridor. In no circumstances did I want to go into it today. For one thing, I didn’t know whether Henry would be waiting for me there, and for another, I wanted him to wait in vain. If he was waiting.
Yes, well. Here I was, in spite of my good intentions—and here Henry wasn’t.
“First words get confused, then ideas get confused, and finally so do the facts,” said Mr. Wu.
“I guess you’re right about that.” I sighed and patted his shoulder. “Go on guarding this door, please. You’re doing fine.”