None of it, then.)
Rowan carried me home in his rucksack—to Radha’s house, not Myrna’s. Gustav answered the door. Behind him Radha was practicing a choreographed dance with Petrushka and Loco Dempsey, jumping in and out of different pairs of shoes.
“I’m sorry,” Rowan said, as he set me down on the doorstep.
“For what?” Gustav asked, laughing, but Rowan just plugged his earphones in and sauntered off.
—
TYCHE AND MYRNA came back from Scotland with tender new constellations, one tattooed on Tyche’s left arm and the other on Myrna’s right. They’d chosen a configuration of four brilliant stars collectively called the Chameleon. Rowan looked on impassively as Myrna tucked notes into Tyche’s locker for her to read later. Tyche whispered her replies into Myrna’s ear and Myrna smiled in a way that most onlookers took as confirmation of erotic intimacy, though knowing what I did about Myrna’s aversion to flesh I doubted it. As for Radha, the fight never quite went out of her—she admired the tattoos, continued to fluster Myrna by cheerfully calling her “wife” to her face, and invited Tyche and Myrna puppet shopping, though she returned from those trips empty-handed. Music was the only thing that exposed her; she found that she was too easily brought to tears by it, and skipped so many tracks on her playlists that I lost my temper and switched the music off altogether, leaving her to work at her desk amid a silence she looked grateful for. At times she held her head in her hands and laughed softly and ruefully. She found notification of a missed call from Gustav on her phone one night and made no attempt to return the call but stayed up late, very very late, in case he tried again. (He didn’t.) Ah, really, it was too annoying how bold these ones were when they were in each other’s company and how timid they were when apart. It was beneath me to knock all their pretty heads together and shout, “Exactly what are you trying to do with each other?” but it was my hope that Rowan would. Rowan was more interested in knitting a snowflake shawl, so Radha continued writing for Gustav’s puppets unhindered. She was scripting her contribution to the school’s end-of-term show; the working title was Polixena the Snitch and all that I was permitted to know about it was that it was mostly set in a karaoke bar for gangsters.
—
THE SEGMENT following Polixena the Snitch belonged to Tyche and Myrna, who were working on an idea of Tyche’s they called The shock of your life or a piece of cheese. We, the audience, received cards in advance: One version of the card read Shock, and beneath that word was an instruction to write a name (CANNOT BE YOUR OWN). The other version of the card read Piece of Cheese, and again there was space to write a name that was not your own. These cards provoked shudders of euphoric terror that only increased as the day and then the hour itself drew ever closer. The cards spoke to a suspicion that many whose work is play can never be free of: that you can only flaunt your triviality for so long before punishment is due. A date has been selected, and on that day there will be a great culling . . .
—