Paris sat opposite me; hooked her leg over the side of her chair. She fidgeted for a second, then leaned over and grabbed a piece of purple paper from a pile on the end table. She started folding it—some kind of origami.
When it was done, she held it up in front of her, and it obviously passed inspection because she smiled.
“What’s that?” I said. My best guess was some kind of bird—pointed head, arched wings.
“Crane,” said Paris.
“Cool. You like origami?”
She shook her head. “Not really.”
“So …”
“Oh,” she said. “It’s this thing. The thousand cranes? You have to make a thousand of them, and when you do, you get one wish. It’s like this old Japanese—I don’t know what you would call it—folk tale or belief or meditation or some kind of mix of all of them.”
“A thousand?”
“Yeah. If it were easy, it wouldn’t be worth a wish.”
“I guess not. So how many have you made?”
“Two hundred and sixty,” she said. She glanced at the purple crane in her hand. “Two hundred and sixty-one.” Abruptly, she got up from the chair—a motion like a spring uncoiling, quick and elastic. “Come look,” she said.
Paris led the way to a door at the other end of the room. She opened it and flicked a switch—bright electric light burst into being, illuminating a room that was obviously hers. Mess of clothes on the floor, a king-size bed nearly disappearing under books and magazines and plates of food—just a kind of tunnel to climb under the covers like a rabbit.
And all over the shelves on the walls, in among the beer glasses and photos and teddy bears, standing on every available surface: cranes. Paris pointed up and I looked; there was a string from the light shade to the wall, and on it more cranes were hanging. It seemed like more than two hundred and sixty. They were all colors—mostly white, but also red and green and blue and silver and gold.
“Whenever I get the chance, I make one,” she said. “Should hit a thousand in … I don’t know. A year, maybe?”
“Serious commitment.”
“I know. Worthy of an Austen heroine, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
I imagined a thousand cranes, in all colors, filling the room. It was going to be beautiful. I could understand why someone would want to do that.
She picked up a small white crane and pressed it into my hands. “This was the first one I made,” she said. “See how it’s not folded so crisply?”
I looked down at it. I nodded. It was a little misshapen.
She took it back and put it down, gently, on the bookshelf where it had been.
“What will you do with your wish?” I asked.
“If I said, it wouldn’t come true,” she said seriously.
“Oh. Yeah, of course.”
She smiled, and for a second I was dazzled by her smile: it was so warm, so beautiful, so totally unguarded, as if it for no single second occurred to her to think about what anyone else thought of her; very few people smile like that. “A lot of people would have laughed at me there. Probably even Julie, even though she would feel bad about it afterward. But not you.”
“Why would I laugh?”
“Because it’s stupid, believing in wishes. Childish. Crazy, even.”
“I hear a voice that isn’t there,” I said.
She laughed. “Touché.”
A pause.
“Are you okay, Cassie?”
“Huh?” I said. I felt like the world had blinked—a fraction of a second gone, some gap in the film, a shudder. It was disconcerting. I was leaning against the wall of the room now, and I felt light-headed. What happened?
“You look pale,” said Paris.
I closed my eyes. And when I did I saw a bowling alley, a bowling alley of my imagination, yawning open in front of me, front wall peeling up, to reveal the lanes stretching back like tongues into darkness, the pins standing up like teeth.
“Uh … I think I’m just nervous,” I said, when I opened my eyes. “About the … you know. The meeting.” My heart was beating wildly.
Her eyes grew.
I mean, of course they didn’t grow. But they seemed to. “Oh, ****,” she said. “Of course you are.” She reached into a cupboard and took out a bottle with a white label—vodka. She handed it to me. “Here. Take a gulp of that. Liquid courage.”
I held the bottle in my hand. “I can’t. I don’t—”
“You’re worried about the risperidone? Because—”
“No. I’m just … well. Underage.”
She rolled her eyes. “Drink. You need to calm down a little.”
“Don’t even think about it,” said the voice. “I will make you whine like a dog.”
I hesitated.
“Yes. Give it back,” said the voice. “And then go home. Or you will pay.”
Oh, **** it, I thought. I’m going to pay anyway, for going to this group thing.
I tilted the bottle back; swallowed. It was like swallowing fire: it seared down my throat and warmed my stomach. A beeping came from the kitchen.
“Time is up for you, *****,” said the voice. “I swear I’m going to—”
“Ah!” said Paris. “Cookies.”