Scarlett didn’t know if she wanted to sit down. She had never been asked to come and sit on Marlene’s bed. It seemed unwise to say no.
Like Spencer, Marlene had her own room. Hers was the only one in the hotel that had truly been redecorated. The walls had been redone in light yellow, because that was her favorite color. Marlene was propped up by her massive supply of pillows and stuffed animals. Scarlett was never really clear where all the pillows had come from, but the stuffed animals were a byproduct of her illness; they are just what people bring when they visit a kid in a hospital. She had well over a hundred. Most of them were in a box in the attic. She kept the choicest ones in her room to form her strange little throne. Scarlett stared at the little monkeys, bears, fish, tigers, and other strange creatures that were smooshed under her weight, yet still looked happy to give their stuffing to support their queen. She was holding a large biography of Princess Diana, one thick with glossy photos.
“Lola’s home.”
“Oh,” Scarlett said, nodding in the direction of the Jazz Suite. “That’s what’s going on.”
Marlene nodded sagely.
“They’ve been in there for an hour. She’s in trouble.”
“Yeah,” Scarlett said, “I figured.”
They both ran out of things to say at this point, and a tense silence fell.
“So,” Scarlett said. “Princess Diana, huh? Is that for school?”
“I bet if Princess Diana had been alive when I was little, I could have met her,” she said. “She went to a lot of hospitals all over the world. She was always going to hospitals.”
“Maybe,” Scarlett said. “I think she went to a lot of hospitals in England.”
“She went to hospitals everywhere,” Marlene said firmly.
“You’re the one reading the book,” Scarlett quickly conceded.
“And she touched people with AIDS when a lot of people were afraid to. She showed people it was okay.”
“That’s…great?”
“Prince Charles never loved her. I think he just married her because she was pretty and his mom said he had to get married. He cheated on her with that woman he married…”
“Camilla,” Scarlett said.
“Right, so she made her whole life about charity because she knew she would never be happy. So she made everyone else happy.”
“Oh. Right.”
Marlene played with the book a bit, opening it a bit wider until the spine creaked.
“When I was sick,” Marlene went on, “I could always tell the people who really wanted to be there visiting us, or giving us stuff, and the people who didn’t. A lot of celebrities do it just to get their picture taken. They’re nice and all, but you can tell they only want to get it over with. The ones who mean it, you can always tell. I think she really meant it.” With that, she slammed the book shut and set it aside.
“I have to go. We’re going to a Yankees game. They’re letting us catch balls with the players before it starts. What are you doing tonight…nothing?”
“Homework,” Scarlett said rigidly. She held out her very heavy bag to prove her point. It was important to remind Marlene that she was older and a sophomore at a very hard school and at least try to give the impression that she had a lot to do, at all times. Otherwise, Marlene would quickly get out of control. If she was making these kinds of remarks at eleven, she would only get more dangerous as time went on.
Of course, when Scarlett got back to her room, she dropped the heavy bag to the floor and promptly ignored it in favor of getting out her computer and checking to make sure Eric hadn’t sent her a message, and to generally track his whereabouts online. There was no message, though. She pushed the computer aside. Dakota was right. She was going to drive everyone away from her if she couldn’t find a way to stop. Of course, that sounded good on paper. It sounded like something you should just be able to do—just not care anymore. Just forget.
Still, there was something in Dakota’s manner today that Scarlett had never seen before, and it alarmed her. She had pressed her friends a bit too far. She quickly texted Dakota an apology, and a response of forgiveness came right back. No major damage there.
There was a bang at the end of the hall, the sound of the elevator gate being pushed back with extreme force. The only person this could be was Spencer, but he wasn’t normally home this early, and he wouldn’t normally slam the gate in that manner. He appeared at her open door a moment later. There was some kind of substance slicking down his hair and glossing his face on one side. Whatever it was, it had run down his shoulder and arm in a long pinkish stain on his shirt.
“Ask me about my day,” he said. “Go on. Ask me.”
“How…was your day?”
“My day was fine up until about ten minutes ago. They let me go early, so I thought it was a nice day out. Had a couple errands I wanted to do. Thought I’d walk, you know, get some exercise, save the environment. I had my sunglasses on. I figured no one would recognize me. Guess I was wrong.”