The St. Regis was one of the major grande dame hotels of New York, with a massive white and gold lobby bursting with uniformed staff and hung with massive chandeliers that were actually clean and operational. When she arrived at the plush, cream-colored room, Mrs. Amberson was splayed out on her bed. All visible parts of her were covered in something sticky and brown and wrapped in plastic, the rest was covered by a plush robe. Her chipmunky hair had been wound in a pink turban, and a woman in a long-sleeved tunic and flowing yoga pants was jamming her thumb into her right ear.
“Scarlett!” she said. “Don’t mind Katiya…my God, Katiya, I think you just resolved all the problems from one of my former lives…She came over at a moment’s notice, bless her, to unblock one of my chakras. Help yourself from the minibar, and boil some water in that kettle and make me a nice, hot cup of rosehips tea, will you? Bags are on the side table.”
She was trying to act like nothing had happened that morning, just hours before—like the show hadn’t exploded or she hadn’t moved out. But Scarlett could hear the tension running underneath the sudden chakra crisis. She filled the little coffeepot from a bottle of spring water and took a soda from the minibar.
“Ginger wrap,” Mrs. Amberson explained, pointing her chin at her wrapped body. “I do love ginger, but it…”
“Stings,” Scarlett said. “I know.”
Katiya got up on the bed, stepping onto the thick pillows, and straddled Mrs. Amberson’s reclining figure like a triumphant warlord.
“Do you want your chakras done as well? You seem off-kilter.”
Scarlett watched a smiling Katiya grind her elbow into the top of Mrs. Amberson’s head.
“I’m good,” she said. “Can we talk?”
Scarlett looked at Katiya meaningfully. Katiya didn’t notice this. She had closed her eyes and started vibrating her lower jaw in a silent chatter.
“Of course,” Mrs. Amberson said. She reached up and tugged on Katiya’s long sleeve. “Katiya? Katiya, darling? I hate to break your meditation…I think I’m done for today. I’ll unwrap and bathe myself, thank you. Same time on Friday?”
Katiya smiled, but didn’t speak. She swayed a bit, then raised her hands high before collapsing, bowing to both Mrs. Amberson and Scarlett.
“She’s just taken a temporary vow of silence and is only communicating through interpretive dance until the next lunar cycle,” Mrs. Amberson explained after Katiya had slipped out of the room. “Trust me, it’s actually a relief that she’s not talking. I’m not sure I could get through another one of her analyses of my aura without killing her. Sweet girl, though. Magic hands. Come sit over here. I can’t move.”
Scarlett came over to the foot of the endless white bed and sank into a deep, high-quality mattress. It was amazing what other hotels offered.
“Why did you leave?” Scarlett asked.
“I told you, O’Hara. I never overstay my welcome. Now, I need to shower off these toxins. They’re just flooding from my pores. Unwrap me, will you?”
She extended one plastic-wrapped arm to be helped up, but Scarlett did not budge.
“We need to figure out where to do the show,” Scarlett said.
“I’m serious, Scarlett. The toxins will get back into the opened pores. I really need a hand out of this bed.”
She continued extending her hand for help. It took a minute before she realized it wasn’t forthcoming.
“Don’t you think I’ve already caused enough problems?” she said, sinking back into the pillows. “With the show, you and Eric, your brother. And there is nowhere for the show to go in the next twenty-four hours. A week, two weeks, maybe…”
“Not a week or two,” Scarlett said. “We’re doing the show when we said we would. But the only way that’s going to happen is if you and Donna get to the bottom of whatever has been bothering you for the last thirty years or however long its been.”
“It’s not that simple.”
There was a knock on the door.
“Actually,” Scarlett said, “it kind of is.”
THE FINAL BATTLE
“That is a lovely, lovely look, Amy,” Donna said. “It’s so nice to see you twice in one day.”
Mrs. Amberson was frozen, somewhat literally, in horror.
“Well, O’Hara,” she said darkly, “this, I did not expect. I may have taught you a little too well.”
“Yes, Amy.” Donna took a seat on one of the blue French-style chairs opposite the bed. “I’m sure you deserve all the credit.”
The pot hissed, signaling that the hot water was ready. Scarlett made two cups of the tea, handed one to Donna, and brought the other to Mrs. Amberson. They didn’t speak; they just stared. Donna, with her cropped head and Mrs. Amberson, wrapped tight in plastic, unable to flee—together at last.
“Why has it been so long, Amy?” she asked.
“I’ve lived abroad for some time,” Mrs. Amberson replied.
“You never called. You never wrote. It’s been years and years. And now, this.”
“And now, this,” Mrs. Amberson said.
“Until the two of you settle your problem, other people are going to keep getting run over,” Scarlett said. “What is so bad that you have to keep sabotaging each other?”
“I didn’t sabotage anyone,” Donna said.
There was a loud snort from the bed.
“All right, O’Hara. You want the story? I’ll tell you the story. Have a seat.”
Scarlett sat at the bottom of the bed, between the two, in case she had to get up and separate them.