and he was not greatly curious about it. But the circumstance was sufficient to lead him to select Tess in preference to the other pretty milkmaids when he wished to contemplate contiguous womankind. XIX In general the cows were milked as they presented themselves, without fancy or choice. But certain cows will show a fondness for a particular pair of hands, sometimes carrying this predilection so far as to refuse to stand at all except to their favourite, the pail of a stranger being unceremoniously kicked over. It was Dairyman Crick's rule to insist on breaking down these partialities and aversions by constant interchange, since otherwise, in the event of a milkman or maid going away from the dairy, he was placed in a difficulty. The maids' private aims, however, were the reverse of the dairyman's rule, the daily selection by each damsel of the eight or ten cows to which she had grown accustomed rendering the operation on their willing udders surprising easy and effortless. Tess, like her compeers, soon discovered which of the cows had a preference for her style of manipulation, and her fingers having become delicate from the long domiciliary imprisonments to which she had subjected herself at intervals during the last two or three years, she would have been glad to meet the milchers' views in this respect. Out of the whole ninety-five there were eight in particular--Dumpling, Fancy, Lofty, Mist, Old Pretty, Young Pretty, Tidy, and Loud--who, though the teats of one or two were as hard as carrots, gave down to her with a readiness that made her work on them a mere touch of the fingers. Knowing, however, the dairyman's wish, she endeavoured conscientiously to take the animals just as they came, expecting the very hard yielders which she could not yet manage. But she soon found a curious correspondence between the ostensibly chance position of the cows and her wishes in this matter, till she felt that their order could not be the result of accident. The dairyman's pupil had lent a hand in getting the cows together of late, and at the fifth or sixth time she turned her eyes, as she rested against the cow, full of sly inquiry upon him. "Mr Clare, you have ranged the cows!" she said, blushing; and in making the accusation symptoms of a smile gently lifted her upper lip in spite of her, so as to show the tips of her teeth, the lower lip remaining severely still. "Well, it makes no difference," said he. "You will always be here to milk them." "Do you think so? I HOPE I shall! But I don't KNOW." She was angry with herself afterwards, thinking that he, unaware of her grave reasons for liking this seclusion, might have mistaken her meaning. She had spoken so earnestly to him, as if his presence were somehow a factor in her wish. Her misgiving was such that at dusk, when the milking was over, she walked in the garden alone, to continue her regrets that she had disclosed to him her


as Sunday, and they had roast chicken and a gooseberry tart. "I suppose you haven't thought about a tombstone yet?" said the churchwarden. "Yes, I have. I thought of a plain stone cross. Louisa was always against ostentation." "I don't think one can do much better than a cross. If you're thinking of a text, what do you say to: _With Christ, which is far better?_" The Vicar pursed his lips. It was just like Bismarck to try and settle everything himself. He did not like that text; it seemed to cast an aspersion on himself. "I don't think I should put that. I much prefer: _The Lord has given and the Lord has taken away_." "Oh, do you? That always seems to me a little indifferent." The Vicar answered with some acidity, and Mr. Graves replied in a tone which the widower thought too authoritative for the occasion. Things were going rather far if he could not choose his own text for his own wife's tombstone. There was a pause, and then the conversation drifted to parish matters. Philip went into the garden to smoke his pipe. He sat on a bench, and suddenly began to laugh hysterically. A few days later his uncle expressed the hope that he would spend the next few weeks at Blackstable. "Yes, that will suit me very well," said Philip. "I suppose it'll do if you go back to Paris in September." Philip did not reply. He had thought much of what Foinet said to him, but he was still so undecided that he did not wish to speak of the future. There would be something fine in giving up art because he was convinced that he could not excel; but unfortunately it would seem so only to himself: to others it would be an admission of defeat, and he did not want to confess that he was beaten. He was an obstinate fellow, and the suspicion that his talent did not lie in one direction made him inclined to force circumstances and aim notwithstanding precisely in that direction. He could not bear that his friends should laugh at him. This might have prevented him from ever taking the definite step of abandoning the study of painting, but the different environment made him on a sudden see things differently. Like many another he discovered that crossing the Channel makes things which had seemed important singularly futile. The life which had been so charming that he could not bear to leave it now seemed inept; he was seized with a distaste for the cafes, the restaurants with their ill-cooked food, the shabby way in which they all lived. He did not care any more what his friends thought about him: Cronshaw with his rhetoric, Mrs. Otter with her respectability, Ruth Chalice with her affectations, Lawson and Clutton with their quarrels; he felt a revulsion from them all. He wrote to Lawson and asked him to send over all his belongings. A week later they arrived. When he unpacked his Canvases he found himself able to examine


are?" "The Hand of the King," Ned told her with icy courtesy. "Charged by your own lord husband to keep the king's peace and enforce the king's justice." "You were the Hand," Cersei began, "but now-" "Silence!" the king roared. "You asked him a question and he answered it." Cersei subsided, cold with anger, and Robert turned back to Ned. "Keep the king's peace, you say. Is this how you keep my peace, Ned? Seven men are dead . . ." "Eight," the queen corrected. "Tregar died this morning, of the blow Lord Stark gave him." "Abductions on the kingsroad and drunken slaughter in my streets," the king said. "I will not have it, Ned." "Catelyn had good reason for taking the Irnp-" "I said, I will not have it! To hell with her reasons. You will com- 376 GEORGE R.R. MARTIN mand her to release the dwarf at once, and you will make your peace with Jaime." "Three of my men were butchered before my eyes, because Jaime Lannister wished to chasten me. Am I to forget that?" "My brother was not the cause of this quarrel," Cersei told the king. "Lord Stark was returning drunk from a brothel. His men attacked Jaime and his guards, even as his wife attacked Tyrion on the kingsroad." "You know me better than that, Robert," Ned said. "Ask Lord Baelish if you doubt me. He was there." "I've talked to Littlefinger," Robert said. "He claims he rode off to bring the gold cloaks before the fighting began, but he admits you were returning from some whorehouse." "Some whorehouse? Damn your eyes, Robert, I went there to have a look at your daughter! Her mother has named her Barra. She looks like that first girl you fathered, when we were boys together in the Vale." He watched the queen as he spoke; her face was a mask, still and pale, betraying nothing. Robert flushed. "Barra," he grumbled. "Is that supposed to please me? Damn the girl. I thought she had more sense." "She cannot be more than fifteen, and a whore, and you thought she had sense?" Ned said, incredulous. His leg was beginning to pain him sorely. It was hard to keep his temper. "The fool child is in love with you, Robert." The king glanced at Cersei. "This is no fit subject for the queen's ears." "Her Grace will have no liking for anything I have to say," Ned replied. "I am told the Kingslayer has fled the city. Give me leave to bring him back to justice." The king swirled the wine in his cup, brooding. He took a swallow. "No," he said. "I want no more of this. Jaime slew three of your men, and you five of his. Now it ends." "Is that your notion of justice?" Ned flared. "If so, I am pleased that I am no longer your Hand." The queen looked to her husband. "If any man had dared speak to a Targaryen as he has spoken to you-" "Do you take me for Aerys?" Robert interrupted.


The warning seemed not unnecessary, so uplifted and aerial was Anne's expression and attitude as she sprang to her feet, her face irradiated with the flame of her spirit. "Oh, Marilla, can I go right now-without washing my dishes? I'll wash them when I come back, but I cannot tie myself down to anything so unromantic as dishwashing at this thrilling moment." "Yes, yes, run along," said Marilla indulgently. "Anne Shirley-are you crazy? Come back this instant and put something on you. I might as well call to the wind. She's gone without a cap or wrap. Look at her tearing through the orchard with her hair streaming. It'll be a mercy if she doesn't catch her death of cold." Anne came dancing home in the purple winter twilight across the snowy places. Afar in the southwest was the great shimmering, pearl-like sparkle of an evening star in a sky that was pale golden and ethereal rose over gleaming white spaces and dark glens of spruce. The tinkles of sleigh bells among the snowy hills came like elfin chimes through the frosty air, but their music was not sweeter than the song in Anne's heart and on her lips. "You see before you a perfectly happy person, Marilla," she announced. "I'm perfectly happy-yes, in spite of my red hair. Just at present I have a soul above red hair. Mrs. Barry kissed me and cried and said she was so sorry and she could never repay me. I felt fearfully embarrassed, Marilla, but I just said as politely as I could, `I have no hard feelings for you, Mrs. Barry. I assure you once for all that I did not mean to intoxicate Diana and henceforth I shall cover the past with the mantle of oblivion.' That was a pretty dignified way of speaking wasn't it, Marilla? I felt that I was heaping coals of fire on Mrs. Barry's head. And Diana and I had a lovely afternoon. Diana showed me a new fancy crochet stitch her aunt over at Carmody taught her. Not a soul in Avonlea knows it but us, and we pledged a solemn vow never to reveal it to anyone else. Diana gave me a beautiful card with a wreath of roses on it and a verse of poetry: "If you love me as I love you Nothing but death can part us two. And that is true, Marilla. We're going to ask Mr. Phillips to let us sit together in school again, and Gertie Pye can go with Minnie Andrews. We had an elegant tea. Mrs. Barry had the very best china set out, Marilla, just as if I was real company. I can't tell you what a thrill it gave me. Nobody ever used their very best china on my account before. And we had fruit cake and pound cake and doughnuts and two kinds of preserves, Marilla. And Mrs. Barry asked me if I took tea and said `Pa, why don't you pass the biscuits to Anne?' It must be lovely to be grown up,


run and everything, we must have the police of half the Galaxy after us by now, and we stop to pick up hitch hikers. OK, so ten out of ten for style, but minus several million for good thinking, yeah?" He tapped irritably at a control panel. Trillian quietly moved his hand before he tapped anything important. Whatever Zaphod's qualities of mind might include - dash, bravado, conceit - he was mechanically inept and could easily blow the ship up with an extravagant gesture. Trillian had come to suspect that the main reason why he had had such a wild and successful life that he never really understood the significance of anything he did. "Zaphod," she said patiently, "they were floating unprotected in open space ... you wouldn't want them to have died would you?" "Well, you know ... no. Not as such, but ..." "Not as such? Not die as such? But?" Trillian cocked her head on one side. "Well, maybe someone else might have picked them up later." "A second later and they would have been dead." "Yeah, so if you'd taken the trouble to think about the problem a bit longer it would have gone away." "You'd been happy to let them die?" "Well, you know, not happy as such, but ..." "Anyway," said Trillian, turning back to the controls, "I didn't pick them up." "What do you mean? Who picked them up then?" "The ship did." "Huh?" "The ship did. All by itself." "Huh?" "Whilst we were in Improbability Drive." "But that's incredible." "No Zaphod. Just very very improbable." "Er, yeah." "Look Zaphod," she said, patting his arm, "don't worry about the aliens. They're just a couple of guys I expect. I'll send the robot down to get them and bring them up here. Hey Marvin!" In the corner, the robot's head swung up sharply, but then wobbled about imperceptibly. It pulled itself up to its feet as if it was about five pounds heavier that it actually was, and made what an outside observer would have thought was a heroic effort to cross the room. It stopped in front of Trillian and seemed to stare through her left shoulder. "I think you ought to know I'm feeling very depressed," it said. Its voice was low and hopeless. "Oh God," muttered Zaphod and slumped into a seat. "Well," said Trillian in a bright compassionate tone, "here's something to occupy you and keep your mind off things." "It won't work," droned Marvin, "I have an exceptionally large mind." "Marvin!" warned Trillian. "Alright," said Marvin, "what do you want me to do?" "Go down to number two entry bay and bring the two aliens up here under surveillance." With a microsecond pause, and a finely calculated micromodulation of pitch and timbre - nothing you could actually take offence at - Marvin managed to convey his utter contempt and horror of all things human. "Just that?" he said. "Yes," said Trillian firmly. "I won't enjoy it," said Marvin. Zaphod leaped out of his seat. "She's not asking you to enjoy it,"


"if they're just sitting there in the studio looking very relaxed and, you know, just mentioning that they happen to know the Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything, and then eventually have to admit that in fact it's Forty-two, then the show's probably quite short. No follow-up, you see." "We have to have something that sounds good," said Benji. "Something that sounds good?" exclaimed Arthur. "An Ultimate Question that sounds good? From a couple of mice?" The mice bristled. "Well, I mean, yes idealism, yes the dignity of pure research, yes the pursuit of truth in all its forms, but there comes a point I'm afraid where you begin to suspect that if there's any real truth, it's that the entire multi-dimensional infinity of the Universe is almost certainly being run by a bunch of maniacs. And if it comes to a choice between spending yet another ten million years finding that out, and on the other hand just taking the money and running, then I for one could do with the exercise," said Frankie. "But ..." started Arthur, hopelessly. "Hey, will you get this, Earthman," interrupted Zaphod. "You are a last generation product of that computer matrix, right, and you were there right up to the moment your planet got the finger, yeah?" "Er ..." "So your brain was an organic part of the penultimate configuration of the computer programme," said Ford, rather lucidly he thought. "Right?" said Zaphod. "Well," said Arthur doubtfully. He wasn't aware of ever having felt an organic part of anything. He had always seen this as one of his problems. "In other words," said Benji, steering his curious little vehicle right over to Arthur, "there's a good chance that the structure of the question is encoded in the structure of your brain - so we want to buy it off you." "What, the question?" said Arthur. "Yes," said Ford and Trillian. "For lots of money," said Zaphod. "No, no," said Frankie, "it's the brain we want to buy." "What!" "I thought you said you could just read his brain electronically," protested Ford. "Oh yes," said Frankie, "but we'd have to get it out first. It's got to be prepared." "Treated," said Benji. "Diced." "Thank you," shouted Arthur, tipping up his chair and backing away from the table in horror. "It could always be replaced," said Benji reasonably, "if you think it's important." "Yes, an electronic brain," said Frankie, "a simple one would suffice." "A simple one!" wailed Arthur. "Yeah," said Zaphod with a sudden evil grin, "you'd just have to program it to say What? and I don't understand and Where's the tea? - who'd know the difference?" "What?" cried Arthur, backing away still further. "See what I mean?" said Zaphod and howled with pain because of something that Trillian did at that moment. "I'd notice the difference," said Arthur. "No you wouldn't," said Frankie mouse, "you'd be programmed not to." Ford made for the door. "Look, I'm sorry, mice old lads," he said. "I don't think we've got a deal." "I rather think we


and bribery and embezzled funds, for bold tax evasion, for selling national defense secrets to the government of China, for rape or murder or, in two cases, treason. Indicted by their own emails and recorded phone calls and bank records, they face such mountains of evidence that only a few escape prison; none has held on to his or her previous office or position. These developments have resulted in much outrage and threats and limited violence. The most egregious criminals are those who issue the loudest, most bitterly insistent denials of their guilt. Because the wicked often have a charisma that the naive view as godliness, rather than demonic suasion, some miscreants for a time raise mass movements in their defense. In those cases, Superhacker exposes them again—and as before—with their own voices and with video of them engaged in conspiracies to deceive. Of the naive who join those crusades, most fall away when they see they have been duped, and only the most self-blinded cling to their faith in their faithless manipulators. If, for a while, the social cohesion of the nation seemed sure to break from the strain of these changes, a new and better order asserted itself sooner than Superhacker hoped. Once depressed or cynical judges of an honest bent were heartened by the impeachment and conviction of their colleagues whom they knew to be corrupted by money or ideological passion. They found the courage to take over their state bar associations, state attorneys general offices, and even the justice department of the United States to strive for a fairer system swept clean of spoils and wild unreason. Institution after institution is evolving, not always with enthusiasm, because it has lost the power to define truth. The power of the state to rule by fear and moral exhortation based on lies is fading in a society where raw truth is available for everyone to see and where lies are quickly revealed by the liars’ own indiscretions and a narcissistic certainty of their cleverness. Superhacker is expanding operations to other nations, where changes have already been occurring in dreaded anticipation of his or her intention to broaden the mission. What will be will be, but what was before had become intolerable. There are those who say that the human heart is deceitful above all things (which is true) and that lying is essential to grease the often grinding wheels of human relationships (which might be true as concerns relatively harmless falsehoods like insincere compliments, even flattery). But when Superhacker began to press the case that truth and the derivative of truth called “common sense” were in such short supply as to threaten the world, civilization had been fast sliding toward an abyss from which there might have been no return, a future of lawlessness, ginned-up hatred, irrational ideologies, and war. Perhaps this experiment in veracity will ultimately fail, but all polls show that a large majority of the populace finds that life is better these days, and polls can’t be fudged in this new world. Winter has arrived in Idaho.


night--." She looked at him quickly. "Yes, dear. Something about yourself?" "About myself. You say you're not tired: well, I am. Horribly tired . . ." In an instant she was all tender anxiety. "Oh, I've seen it coming on, Newland! You've been so wickedly overworked--" "Perhaps it's that. Anyhow, I want to make a break--" "A break? To give up the law?" "To go away, at any rate--at once. On a long trip, ever so far off--away from everything--" He paused, conscious that he had failed in his attempt to speak with the indifference of a man who longs for a change, and is yet too weary to welcome it. Do what he would, the chord of eagerness vibrated. "Away from everything--" he repeated. "Ever so far? Where, for instance?" she asked. "Oh, I don't know. India--or Japan." She stood up, and as he sat with bent head, his chin propped on his hands, he felt her warmly and fragrantly hovering over him. "As far as that? But I'm afraid you can't, dear . . ." she said in an unsteady voice. "Not unless you'll take me with you." And then, as he was silent, she went on, in tones so clear and evenly-pitched that each separate syllable tapped like a little hammer on his brain: "That is, if the doctors will let me go . . . but I'm afraid they won't. For you see, Newland, I've been sure since this morning of something I've been so longing and hoping for--" He looked up at her with a sick stare, and she sank down, all dew and roses, and hid her face against his knee. "Oh, my dear," he said, holding her to him while his cold hand stroked her hair. There was a long pause, which the inner devils filled with strident laughter; then May freed herself from his arms and stood up. "You didn't guess--?" "Yes--I; no. That is, of course I hoped--" They looked at each other for an instant and again fell silent; then, turning his eyes from hers, he asked abruptly: "Have you told any one else?" "Only Mamma and your mother." She paused, and then added hurriedly, the blood flushing up to her forehead: "That is--and Ellen. You know I told you we'd had a long talk one afternoon--and how dear she was to me." "Ah--" said Archer, his heart stopping. He felt that his wife was watching him intently. "Did you MIND my telling her first, Newland?" "Mind? Why should I?" He made a last effort to collect himself. "But that was a fortnight ago, wasn't it? I thought you said you weren't sure till today." Her colour burned deeper, but she held his gaze. "No; I wasn't sure then--but I told her I was. And you see I was right!" she exclaimed, her blue eyes wet with victory. XXXIV. Newland Archer sat at the writing-table in his library in East Thirty-ninth Street. He had just got back from a big official reception for the inauguration of the new galleries at the Metropolitan


okay. “Penguins, for example,” he said, “don’t have that same amount of facial variability. Most penguin faces look pretty much the same.” “I wonder if the penguins would disagree,” I said. He went on, “The location of your cavernoma was very close to an area in the brain called the fusiform face gyrus…” He waited to see if I’d heard of it. I hadn’t. “It’s a deep temporal structure—a specialized area of the brain that allows people to recognize faces.” I nodded and kept my eyes on my blanket. He went on. “Humans have evolved highly specialized brain systems for recognizing faces, and most of us have near-photographic memories for them. The minute you see another human face, it triggers a flood of instant information about that person: name, profession, biographical data, memories you have together … and the fusiform face gyrus is crucial to that process.” I nodded, like, Interesting. Like he was just telling me random brain facts. Then he said, “Your cavernoma was located close to the FFG. Not in it and not touching it, but close.” “Did you nick it or something? That’s why it’s not working?” Dr. Estrera turned my MRI scan on the lightboard and circled on a gray area. “We believe the normal postsurgical swelling is pressing on the fusiform face area right next to it and causing some mayhem.” “Causing some mayhem” seemed like a rather cutesy way to describe my situation, but I let it go. “What can we do about it?” I asked. “Ice it, maybe? Take some ibuprofen? Stop drinking water for a while and dehydrate myself?” “There’s not much we can do about it,” Dr. Estrera said. “We just have to wait.” “Wait?!” I didn’t have time to wait. “For how long?” “People can vary quite a bit,” Dr. Estrera said pleasantly, like we were just chitchatting. “I’d say it’s likely to resolve in two to six weeks.” Two to six weeks? I looked up. “I’m looking at you right now, and you’re like an upside-down Mr. Potato Head. Are you saying my brain could be doing that for six weeks?” “I’m hoping it’ll resolve before that,” he said. “Assuming it does resolve.” I felt a sting of adrenaline. “Assuming it does resolve?” I echoed. “Are you saying it might not resolve?” “I think it’s very likely to resolve. Most postsurgical edema does. I can’t guarantee it, of course. But I’d be surprised if it didn’t.” Okay, okay. “But assuming it resolves … what happens then? Everything goes back to normal, right?” “Then…” Dr. Estrera said, “we’ll see.” Come on, man! He must’ve thought he was striking a balance between being comforting and not making promises he couldn’t keep. But since the possibility that it might not resolve hadn’t even occurred to me, he was absolutely doing the freaking opposite. “I just don’t understand,” I said then, my panic making me a little breathless, “how you could explain every minuscule head-clamp detail to me, and every aspect of the hair-sparing technique, but somehow fail to mention that the brain surgery


look suspiciously happy.” Joe coughed. I smiled and looked down. “What’s going on there?” she asked, pointing at our clasped hands. We broke them apart, like we’d been caught. “What just happened?” Sue asked. “Did you two—? Are you two—? Hey, I know it’s very pretty and romantic up here, but—” “Funny story,” I jumped in before she got too outraged at the notion of me just giving in to a man who had cruelly ghosted me. “And this is going to sound so crazy…” “Nothing could be crazier than what’s going through my head right now,” Sue said. “Wanna bet?” Joe said. “Remember,” I said, “how I was totally crushing on my veterinarian, but then he stood me up for our first date and then I wound up—how to put it—transferring my affections to Joe from the building?” “Yes,” Sue said, like, Hurry up and get to the point. “Turns out,” I said, “as impossible as it sounds…” Sue put a hand on her hip, like, Move it along. “They’re the same guy.” Sue froze. Then she shook her head. So I nodded mine, trying to help her get there. “The dashing veterinarian, whose face I couldn’t see … and the douchey guy in the building—” “Hey!” Joe protested. “Whose face I also couldn’t see…” I let Sue catch up. “Were the same guy?” she finished for me. Joe and I nodded at her. Then he grabbed the moment to take my hand again. “How is that possible?” Sue asked, still shaking her head. “My brain’s been a little wonky lately,” I said with a shrug. “This isn’t wonky,” Sue said. “This is…” But then she didn’t know what it was. “Dr. Nicole kept warning me about stuff like this,” I said. “About how the five senses really work together, and if one of them is suddenly altered, it can throw your whole perceptual game off for a while, especially if you throw in our human love affair with confirmation bias.” I was gearing up to do a whole TED Talk, but Sue was pulling out her phone. “What’s the vet’s name?” she demanded as she started googling. “Dr. Oliver Addison,” Dr. Oliver Addison supplied. “Are you googling him?” I asked. “What’s more likely?” Sue said, scrolling. “That you thought one person was two fully different people—or that this guy…”—she gestured with her phone—“is some kind of scammer trying to lure you into his sex dungeon?” “Likely?” I started. But then before I could refer her back to the intricate workings of the ecosystem of the brain, Sue said, “Oh,” and held up her phone for us to see. And there was Dr. Oliver Addison. In a photo on the vet clinic’s Meet the Staff page on their website. In that white vet coat and tie, with his hair back in that Ivy League do. Looking utterly dashing, legitimately crush-worthy, and exactly like the guy standing next to me. It was hitting Sue now. “You are Joe from the building?” she asked him. Joe nodded. “And you are also this guy?”


knows.” Britt said, “When did it become clear they were investigating the death as a murder?” “Not for a few days. They did an autopsy, which I guess is standard for accidental deaths, and after that the State Police showed up.” Britt referred to her notebook. She said, “So, the State Police came on Tuesday, and the family’s own investigators did, too. That’s three full days after the body was found, and meanwhile the Granby police hadn’t even secured the scene.” I said, “Well, they thought it was an accident.” “You’re supposed to secure the scene, but apparently they just left. They didn’t even take good pictures. And the school didn’t keep kids out of the gym.” I nodded slowly. “They actually drained the pool. You knew that, right?” Britt hadn’t known. Her eyes went wide and she covered her mouth, but she ought to say something, for the sake of the podcast. I nodded at her phone. What she said was, “Holy wow.” “What I remember,” I said, “was Alumni Weekend was coming up, I think that next weekend. The last thing they wanted was yellow tape around the gym.” Leave it to Granby to schedule Alumni Weekend not for a gorgeous spring day but for the end of ski season, so alumni could day-drink at the Granby Invitational. I said, “You’d think they might have canceled the weekend, but they went right ahead. They strung up those Welcome Back banners. I remember they had the State Police park behind the gym so no one would see.” We’d rolled our eyes at the time, but saying it aloud in 2018, I found myself kind of shocked. By the school’s callousness, but also by the way the police apparently just did whatever Dr. Calahan asked. “So that same weekend,” Britt said, “that’s when they started interviewing students. A whole week after her death.” Was that right? I remembered people missing class right away, but maybe that was to meet with counselors rather than detectives. I wouldn’t have dared to sign up for counseling on the bulletin board. Nor was I one of the girls with just enough claim to Thalia that I could walk around the next few weeks collapsing whenever I wanted out of a test. Perhaps that’s unkind, but really—there were a few girls vying for Oscars that spring. I was on the detectives’ list, though, and one night I was called into Miss Vogel’s apartment to sit at her table with two men from the Major Crimes Unit, Miss Vogel’s parakeet chirping in a cage over the sink. The detectives were both tall—one beefy, one gray-haired. They were far too loud for that little kitchen. I told Britt, “They interviewed me for maybe ten minutes. I remember they asked if I knew of anyone she was fighting with. In the past few days I’d heard other kids talk about Omar, but it was secondhand so I didn’t bring that up. I did tell them this random story, and I thought it was surreal how they wrote down whatever I


was set up. To take the fall.” “The fall?” Montoya repeated, his eyes narrowing as sunlight bounced across the hood of his car. “For whom?” “Hey, man, that’s all I’m sayin’.” “Where is Cruz now?” “Don’t know. Don’t wanna know.” “Can I get back to you at this number?” Montoya asked. The fucker hung up. Quickly, Montoya called back, and—big surprise—got no answer. Damn. He’d try to locate the guy, but he knew in his gut that “Jazz” or whatever the hell his real name was had called on a burner phone and even now that cell was probably at the bottom of a river, maybe the damned Trask River. “Shit.” He saw the pack of Marlboros on the console, grabbed it, shook out a filter tip, and lit up. After taking a deep drag, he crushed the pack in his fist. This is how it always was with Cruz. Never easy. Always trouble. Though that trouble usually didn’t involve homicide. “Son of a—!” Montoya tromped on the accelerator and, with his light on his dash still flashing, drove straight to the station. CHAPTER 23 Montoya strode into the office, kicked out his chair and dropped into it, the smell of smoke from a recent cigarette clinging to him. “Bad news?” Bentz asked. “Is there any other kind?” Montoya muttered, then recounted his visit to the crime lab. “So once we hear back on the Rosary Killer’s blood type, we’ll most likely know if he killed Jay McKnight. It’s not a hundred percent, of course, we won’t have that until the DNA test results come back, but this will be a strong indicator. In my mind, we’ll know. B neg was left at the scene. It isn’t all that common.” “So if we find out Father John is B negative, it only means he was possibly there,” Bentz said, then added, “Probably.” “We’ll see.” “Yeah.” He brought Montoya up to speed on what he’d learned at the church. “So back to the Laroches.” “Right.” Bentz glanced at the clock. “They should be here any minute. Coming in with their lawyer.” And he’d no more said the word, than he got the call that the Laroche family had arrived. He glanced at Montoya. “Showtime.” “Good.” Montoya didn’t smile, just got to his feet. Yeah, he was bothered. Big-time. And whatever was eating at him wasn’t explained by what he’d learned at the crime lab. Bentz got it. He didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to put two and two together; whatever was bothering Montoya was personal and most likely his brother. Again. As he climbed to his feet and grabbed his jacket, Bentz said, “By the way, I took a call. Detective from a county in Oregon. He wanted to talk to you, but when you weren’t here they asked for your partner.” Montoya tensed, his face turning to granite. “What did they want?” “For you to call them back.” “You didn’t give them my cell?” Bentz shook his head. “Figured you could do that.” He pulled out the notepad, ripped off


had confirmed the wraiths were once the target of the Nine, forewarned as dangerous by their artists. Whoever was guiding the wraiths’ hands was clever enough to know how to hide from the all-knowing muse-born. There were other clues they could follow—such as tracking the wraith or looking into a possible link between the wraiths and their other victims, like there had been with Horatio—but the thread that now lay between Io’s fingers called for more immediate attention. The man had followed them from the House of Nine, assaulted them with his phobos-born powers, and appeared particularly interested in the possibility that the Nine might know who was behind the wraiths. Something connected him to these undying women, and Io intended to find out precisely what. She hadn’t dropped the Quilt for a moment, in fear that the phobos-born’s thread would slip out of her fingers. A gray sky greeted them as they stepped out of the domed market. Io could already taste rain in the air. It was nearly summer, when neo-monsoons migrated from the south up to Alante, pelting the city with acid rain. They would need to find the man quickly and take cover somewhere inside, in case the weather turned ugly. Edei must have had the same thought, looking from the darkening sky to her. Even with the Quilt casting the silver light of dozens of threads across her vision, Io recognized the tension in his face. “Where to?” he asked. Io glanced at the thread. “East, to Newtown.” Newtown District was reconstructed a few years ago, its streets smoothed to accommodate automobiles. The frail constructions rack-rack-racketed on the uneven asphalt, honking at each other and pedestrians. They were mostly trucks carrying products, but there was also the odd private vehicle, its windows tinted, its drivers in shiny caps and elegant button-downs. Io’s father had been in a private automobile once, an occasion he had narrated as though it had been the most marvelous fairy tale, complete with a beautiful princess and a fairy godmother. He had been crossing the street on Cardamom Avenue, not far from here, and the driver hadn’t seen him. Nearly took his kneecap off. The owner of the car, a young lady clad in chimerini furs—the detail always made Io’s mother roll her eyes—had been so distressed she insisted they drive him to the nearest hospital. Traffic was bad, and the ride took so long his knee had stopped hurting by the time they arrived. But as Baba watched the car take off, he vowed that one day, he’d get an automobile himself and take his girls on road trips in the countryside, and wouldn’t that be lovely? And one day, Mama had always replied, I will get you girls chimerini furs, and we can all sit like princesses in the back while your baba drives us around. The memory brought a smile to Io’s lips. Ava could make fun of her all she wanted, but the entire Ora family was obsessed with one day, with the adulation of more. Ava liked to


and wander past shop windows. I have no idea where to begin. I’m hoping I’ll know it when I see it. So far, the best option seems to be matching T- shirts that say GOT LOBSTAH on them, or matching T-shirts that say MAINEIAC over a lobster wearing aviators. I follow a window display filled with lamps and cutesy tea towels around the corner, right to a window display filled with colorful buoys that have been turned into all manner of yard ornaments. I pause to let a grimy Subaru breeze through a stop sign at the next cross street, and that’s when I realize where I am. Easy Lane. The backdrop to our fight last night. Up ahead, I spot the tattoo shop on the left. My first inclination is to get away from the scene of the crime. Then I notice the glossy gold shop number over the door on my right: 125. Number 125, on Easy Lane. It takes me a second to figure out what’s so familiar about that. When I do, I backtrack and check the number of the buoy store. 127. Wrong direction. I’m looking for 123. I wait for another car to pass through the intersection, and then jog across. 123 Easy Lane. The site of my personalized surprise. On the door, a decal reads EARTHEN, along with some hours of operation, but in the glare of bright sunlight, I can’t make out much through the windows. I check the time on my phone: 9:16 a.m. If I remember correctly, the itinerary said Sabrina’s “personalized surprise” for me would start at nine. I waffle for a moment about going in, then bite the bullet and push the door open. A gust of warm air meets me. “Harriet?” a woman’s voice says. I blink as I wait out my pupillary dilation from the sudden change in light. “Yes, hi!” I turn toward the voice, wondering if she can tell I can’t see her, or anything at all, yet. “Your space is all ready in the back,” she says. “Great.” For some reason it doesn’t occur to me until a half second too late that I could tell her I have no idea why I’m here. Or where here is. My vision resolves as she leads me to the back of the shop, the floating oak shelves that line the walls coming into focus along with all the kitchenware for sale on them. Bowls, plates, cups, all in candy-colored tones that pop against the gallery-white walls. The shop’s attendant—a woman with blunt fringe, flared pants, and hoop earrings, all of which look plucked from the seventies—leads me down a hall to a room twice the size of the first one. I pull up short, no less shocked than when I walked into the cottage and saw Wyn there. “Feel free to take whichever wheel you want,” the woman says. “No one else has space booked until four.” I still haven’t managed a syllable when the bells over the shop doors ring behind us, and the seventies demigoddess


be anything wrong with it, but Faux is a fake-dating app, which you’d know if you read the terms and conditions you agreed to when you signed up. But you’re too busy whacking balls around with a crowbar to learn basic literacy or how to treat your fellow humans with respect. Step away from me, or—” “At least I’m not some kind of hooker who doesn’t even bother to fuck her clients—” “Hey.” Jack’s palm closes around my arm and pulls me back into him, like I’m an unruly child who might walk into traffic. His voice is low and menacing, and I feel it reverberate through my own skin. “Austin. You heard her. She asked you to step away.” Austin lets out an ugly laugh. “This is my house.” “Then go to your room and play with your Transformers figurines. Leave her alone.” “Jack, I paid her to go out with me. You don’t understand—” “I understand what I’m seeing, so listen to me, asshole.” Jack’s tone is chilling. Terrifyingly calm. Austin pales and takes a small step back, and I almost feel sorry for him. “You’re harassing a woman who asked you to get out of her personal space while she’s at a work function. Because she rejected you.” “But I paid her to—” “I don’t care. She asked you to leave. Get the fuck out of my sight.” Austin doesn’t want to leave. It’s clear in his flared nostrils, in his twitching jaw while he stares at the place above my shoulders where Jack has taken up residence. But he doesn’t stand a chance: after a few frustrated seconds he mutters “Fuck this” and finally, finally takes a step back. My heart starts beating again. “And one more thing,” Jack adds. Austin swallows. “What?” “If you say anything about this, to anyone, including your mother, I’m going to make sure you regret it for a long, long time. Understood?” Austin presses his lips together and nods once, tight. Then he disappears into the crowd, into another room, and— I free my arms and turn around, meaning to . . . I don’t know. Thank Jack? Explain myself? Play off what just happened as a fever dream? Problem is, he’s staring down at me. Watching me with sharp, inflexible eyes that miss nothing, and— He sees everything. Every molecule I am built of—he could list it, describe it, reproduce it in a lab. He sees the rebar structure in me, and I . . . I see nothing. I understand nothing. I still have no idea what he wants me to be. “Jack,” I say. A barely there whisper, but he can hear me. He can hear everything. “Jack. I . . . I just . . .” I shake my head. And then I can’t stand to be seen anymore, so I take a step back and weave my way through the room, looking for Monica to make my excuses. 10 INERTIA I N HINDSIGHT ,” C ECE MUSES WHILE NIBBLING PENSIVELY ON A piece of gouda, “we should


itself. The only milestone that seemed to matter was that it was my first birthday without both my parents. Sometimes, though, I feel more vulnerable in my own skin because my parents are gone, as if I am a person to whom anything might happen now that they are no longer here to guard me—“To take / the first blows / on their shoulders,” as poet Linda Pastan wrote. It doesn’t help to know I’ve entered the decade when they both faced different life-changing diagnoses. Routine physicals, unheard of for much of my youth, have become a new source of anxiety. My doctor orders blood work and screenings, noting “baselines,” values that could be higher or lower, things we should keep our eye on. I experience pain that drives me to seek out physical therapy, massage therapy, my heating pad, my value-sized bottle of ibuprofen. Friends near me in age listen to me complain and then share their own symptoms, aches, therapies, diagnoses. I imagine telling my mother that I find aging empowering in one sense, humbling in another—I don’t mind the number, it’s everything else—and I can almost hear her laughing at me: Don’t be ridiculous, you’re still young. How much of a difference would it make now, I wonder, if she were here to talk to about this? Would aging feel any easier if I could also watch her grow old? I remember telling her that my doctor and I were watching my blood sugar. By the time I crossed a line I’d been dancing along for years since having children—I barely squeaked through the three-hour-fasting glucose test during both pregnancies, and my sugar never returned to normal after that—she had so little time left, and whether she would be upset or remind me of what Dad had gone through or offer nothing but support, I couldn’t bear to tell her that I’d been diagnosed with the disease responsible for his death. There was no opportunity to slow down and process what it would mean for me; the truth was, I didn’t know. I took my medication, tried to follow my doctor’s advice, tried not to think about it otherwise. This was easier than it sounds, because I did not feel sick, and because all my worry was for my mother. My father was sixty-seven when he died. My mother was sixty-eight. I tell myself it is irrational to think that their fates might in any way reflect or predestine mine—every bit of my genetic code is built from others. And yet sometimes it is impossible for me to imagine living longer than they did, making it to seventy and beyond. How could I live to see an age my parents never saw? I can see myself traveling as far as they did, but no further. * * * A few months after I turned forty, I left the publisher I’d been with for five years. I loved my editorial work and my team, but grief and overwork had worn me down in ways I was no longer able to


with which you greet the offer.' 'Your behaviour has ever been kind and noble.' said Rose, mastering the emotions by which she was agitated. 'As you believe that I am not insensible or ungrateful, so hear my answer.' 'It is, that I may endeavour to deserve you; it is, dear Rose?' 'It is,' replied Rose, 'that you must endeavour to forget me; not as your old and dearly-attached companion, for that would wound me deeply; but, as the object of your love. Look into the world; think how many hearts you would be proud to gain, are there. Confide some other passion to me, if you will; I will be the truest, warmest, and most faithful friend you have.' There was a pause, during which, Rose, who had covered her face with one hand, gave free vent to her tears. Harry still retained the other. 'And your reasons, Rose,' he said, at length, in a low voice; 'your reasons for this decision?' 'You have a right to know them,' rejoined Rose. 'You can say nothing to alter my resolution. It is a duty that I must perform. I owe it, alike to others, and to myself.' 'To yourself?' 'Yes, Harry. I owe it to myself, that I, a friendless, portionless, girl, with a blight upon my name, should not give your friends reason to suspect that I had sordidly yielded to your first passion, and fastened myself, a clog, on all your hopes and projects. I owe it to you and yours, to prevent you from opposing, in the warmth of your generous nature, this great obstacle to your progress in the world.' 'If your inclinations chime with your sense of duty--' Harry began. 'They do not,' replied Rose, colouring deeply. 'Then you return my love?' said Harry. 'Say but that, dear Rose; say but that; and soften the bitterness of this hard disappointment!' 'If I could have done so, without doing heavy wrong to him I loved,' rejoined Rose, 'I could have--' 'Have received this declaration very differently?' said Harry. 'Do not conceal that from me, at least, Rose.' 'I could,' said Rose. 'Stay!' she added, disengaging her hand, 'why should we prolong this painful interview? Most painful to me, and yet productive of lasting happiness, notwithstanding; for it WILL be happiness to know that I once held the high place in your regard which I now occupy, and every triumph you achieve in life will animate me with new fortitude and firmness. Farewell, Harry! As we have met to-day, we meet no more; but in other relations than those in which this conversation have placed us, we may be long and happily entwined; and may every blessing that the prayers of a true and earnest heart can call down from the source of all truth and sincerity, cheer and prosper you!' 'Another word, Rose,' said Harry. 'Your reason in your own words. From your own lips, let me hear it!' 'The prospect before you,' answered Rose, firmly, 'is a brilliant one. All the honours to which great talents and powerful


wondered about it, in some broken expressions, several times, in the short remainder of our walk; and only seemed to forget it when the light of fire and candle shone upon us, seated warm and merry, at table. Littimer was there, and had his usual effect upon me. When I said to him that I hoped Mrs. Steerforth and Miss Dartle were well, he answered respectfully (and of course respectably), that they were tolerably well, he thanked me, and had sent their compliments. This was all, and yet he seemed to me to say as plainly as a man could say: 'You are very young, sir; you are exceedingly young.' We had almost finished dinner, when taking a step or two towards the table, from the corner where he kept watch upon us, or rather upon me, as I felt, he said to his master: 'I beg your pardon, sir. Miss Mowcher is down here.' 'Who?' cried Steerforth, much astonished. 'Miss Mowcher, sir.' 'Why, what on earth does she do here?' said Steerforth. 'It appears to be her native part of the country, sir. She informs me that she makes one of her professional visits here, every year, sir. I met her in the street this afternoon, and she wished to know if she might have the honour of waiting on you after dinner, sir.' 'Do you know the Giantess in question, Daisy?' inquired Steerforth. I was obliged to confess - I felt ashamed, even of being at this disadvantage before Littimer - that Miss Mowcher and I were wholly unacquainted. 'Then you shall know her,' said Steerforth, 'for she is one of the seven wonders of the world. When Miss Mowcher comes, show her in.' I felt some curiosity and excitement about this lady, especially as Steerforth burst into a fit of laughing when I referred to her, and positively refused to answer any question of which I made her the subject. I remained, therefore, in a state of considerable expectation until the cloth had been removed some half an hour, and we were sitting over our decanter of wine before the fire, when the door opened, and Littimer, with his habitual serenity quite undisturbed, announced: 'Miss Mowcher!' I looked at the doorway and saw nothing. I was still looking at the doorway, thinking that Miss Mowcher was a long while making her appearance, when, to my infinite astonishment, there came waddling round a sofa which stood between me and it, a pursy dwarf, of about forty or forty-five, with a very large head and face, a pair of roguish grey eyes, and such extremely little arms, that, to enable herself to lay a finger archly against her snub nose, as she ogled Steerforth, she was obliged to meet the finger half-way, and lay her nose against it. Her chin, which was what is called a double chin, was so fat that it entirely swallowed up the strings of her bonnet, bow and all. Throat she had none; waist she had none; legs she had none, worth mentioning; for though she


sick when I heard. I knew I would go mad myself if I didn’t get out of that place. People imagine that the worst thing about incarceration is the thought of being locked inside, but there is another trauma to endure. Whilst some of the women were simply anxious or depressed, I was now living with women suffering all types of physical and mental disability and not only that, was considered to be one of them. That has a profound impact on one’s sense of self; of what is true. That night, I thought my time for escape had come. The pains in my stomach felt as though I were going into labour and the water that wet my bed confirmed it. I called out to Mary and asked her to alert the nurse. She banged on the door and shouted, but no one answered for a very long time. Of course, it happened in the early hours of the morning, as these things often do, and there was only the elderly nun on duty. She thought I was exaggerating the agonising pain of labour and said she would not wake the poor doctor from his sleep to come and tend to a spoilt English brat like me. ‘Stop your play-acting,’ she said, through the grille in the door. ‘I don’t want you to call the doctor, I need to go to a hospital!’ I was so excited at the thought of leaving, that I hardly noticed the pain. ‘Hospital? Sure, didn’t the cat have a fine litter the other week and managed it all on her own.’ That was her final word on the matter, and all I could hear were her footsteps fading away. ‘They’re not going to leave me here, are they?’ I asked Mary, who now sat at the end of my bed, patting my back. ‘Not to worry,’ she said. Another contraction came and I groaned my way through it, twisting the ends of the blanket tight around my wrists. The night carried on that way and I must have slept in between contractions. Mary stayed with me all the while. Any time I asked a question, she would tell me again not to worry, in a way that made me very worried indeed. As though all hope was futile. At six o’clock, Nurse Patricia came to get us up and when she saw the state I was in, called for the doctor. ‘Please,’ I begged her, all pride forgotten. I was in agonising pain and hadn’t had so much as a glass of water. ‘Please get me to a hospital.’ ‘You don’t need to go to hospital to give birth. Maybe that’s how things are done in England, but not here. Childbirth is the most natural thing in the world,’ she said, pulling my nightdress up and shoving her cold hand between my legs. ‘Get your hands off of me!’ I spat at her and she responded by slapping me across the face. I’m not sure what would have happened if Dr Hughes hadn’t arrived at


her French lesson-book. The Mouse gave a sudden leap out of the water, and seemed to quiver all over with fright. `Oh, I beg your pardon!' cried Alice hastily, afraid that she had hurt the poor animal's feelings. `I quite forgot you didn't like cats.' `Not like cats!' cried the Mouse, in a shrill, passionate voice. `Would YOU like cats if you were me?' `Well, perhaps not,' said Alice in a soothing tone: `don't be angry about it. And yet I wish I could show you our cat Dinah: I think you'd take a fancy to cats if you could only see her. She is such a dear quiet thing,' Alice went on, half to herself, as she swam lazily about in the pool, `and she sits purring so nicely by the fire, licking her paws and washing her face--and she is such a nice soft thing to nurse--and she's such a capital one for catching mice--oh, I beg your pardon!' cried Alice again, for this time the Mouse was bristling all over, and she felt certain it must be really offended. `We won't talk about her any more if you'd rather not.' `We indeed!' cried the Mouse, who was trembling down to the end of his tail. `As if I would talk on such a subject! Our family always HATED cats: nasty, low, vulgar things! Don't let me hear the name again!' `I won't indeed!' said Alice, in a great hurry to change the subject of conversation. `Are you--are you fond--of--of dogs?' The Mouse did not answer, so Alice went on eagerly: `There is such a nice little dog near our house I should like to show you! A little bright-eyed terrier, you know, with oh, such long curly brown hair! And it'll fetch things when you throw them, and it'll sit up and beg for its dinner, and all sorts of things--I can't remember half of them--and it belongs to a farmer, you know, and he says it's so useful, it's worth a hundred pounds! He says it kills all the rats and--oh dear!' cried Alice in a sorrowful tone, `I'm afraid I've offended it again!' For the Mouse was swimming away from her as hard as it could go, and making quite a commotion in the pool as it went. So she called softly after it, `Mouse dear! Do come back again, and we won't talk about cats or dogs either, if you don't like them!' When the Mouse heard this, it turned round and swam slowly back to her: its face was quite pale (with passion, Alice thought), and it said in a low trembling voice, `Let us get to the shore, and then I'll tell you my history, and you'll understand why it is I hate cats and dogs.' It was high time to go, for the pool was getting quite crowded with the birds and animals that had fallen into it: there were a Duck and a Dodo, a Lory and an Eaglet, and several other curious creatures. Alice led the way, and the whole party


transparency, especially regarding who’s funding them. He claims to have the Agora’s support, but there’s no official statement from them. And besides, if the horae-born wanted to form a new judicial force, why involve someone non-powered like Saint-Yves? A month ago, the Commissioner’s office started seeking other-born protection for a case. I got the job then and there.” “Other-born protection for a case—you mean the wraiths, don’t you?” Io asked. “Ew.” Rosa’s upper lip twisted. “Don’t call them that. Yeah, the women with the severed life-threads. Saint-Yves took me on after the first attack, for extra protection against these raving murderers. So I worked as his bodyguard for two weeks—until I got posted at an Initiative meeting.” Her gaze fell to a woman on the street below, walking two perfectly white dogs. “They are, surprisingly, a very nice group of people. The consulting officers are the rare honest kind, and the other-born truly want to save the city. I told Xeno I found nothing suspicious, that I actually liked the people there. He told me to keep looking. At the next meeting I worked security for, Thais walked in.” Io held her breath. Thais was a dangerous topic, especially with Rosa. Sharp as a blade, and just as swift: one word, one thought, and those carefully secreted memories would come spilling out, warm and sleek as blood. Their socked feet tiptoeing over creaking floorboards. Their hands cupped over their mouths under the covers, ears straining to hear. Io’s cheeks sticky with tears, Rosa’s jaw set hard as marble. “What,” Io said slowly, “did Thais say?” “She was ecstatic to see me, asked about my sisters and cousins, told her friends she’d always known I would end up protecting the people. When I mentioned you and Ava, she changed the subject, but I didn’t blame her, you know? She left you that note, Leave me alone, and all that drama.” Io’s heart thumped a deafening tempo, like a drummer’s beat before the earth-shattering crescendo of the show. “Up until two days ago, I didn’t even know she was back. She asked Ava not to tell me. Ava thinks she’s still upset about our argument.” “Yeah, she was very awkward when I mentioned you.” Io pressed her knuckles against her eyelids. The thought of Thais being angry still held power over her. Despite everything, all the secrets, Io had the urge to run all the way to Hanover Street, fall to her knees, and apologize. “Then, four days ago,” Rosa continued, “Xeno tells me he found out that Saint-Yves has pulled all the other-born records from the public registry. Which is odd, right? So I worked my charm on his first lieutenant—they’re gorgeous, by the way, best ass you’ve ever seen on a person—” “Rosa!” Io smacked her friend on the shoulder. Rosa smacked her back. “Don’t be a prude, Io. We all have asses and they’re all gorgeous. Anyway, while I’m flirting with them, I manage to sneak a peek at the papers on their desk. A report from specialists affirming the murderers


you ask, all I can give you is a rough guesstimate as to their basic emanation point.” “Send those coordinates to the helm station. Now go kill some beetles for me.” Chapter 50 Liquilid Empire Star System USS Adams Hardy Hardy’s metallic frame reverberated with a hum as he raced through deserted Adams passageways. The once-bustling corridors now echoed only with the clomp clomp clomp of his heavy footfalls. Most of the crew had abandoned ship, seeking refuge on nearby Lincoln, leaving Hardy to face this imminent threat alone. Rounding a corner, Hardy skidded to a halt, his sensors detecting movement up ahead. Three colossal beetles, their metallic exoskeletons gleaming under the flickering emergency lights, blocked his path. Each beetle, a Liquilid nanite construct, while not dwarfing Hardy’s imposing frame, was close in girth if not size. Their massive mandibles, capable of cleaving a man in half with little effort, snapped hungrily as they locked their compound eyes on the ChronoBot. “Hey, creepy crawlies … guess what? The local exterminator has arrived.” Knowing he faced formidable opponents, Hardy initiated his defenses. He deployed all five of his small, turret-mounted plasma cannons. Two cannons snapped into place on his upper thighs, two on his forearms, and one atop his left shoulder, each laser-sited, red-glowing pin-dots now tracking the bug-like invaders. The passageway hummed with anticipation as the weapons charged, ready to unleash their destructive force upon the encroaching threat. Without hesitation, the first beetle lunged forward, its mandibles snapping shut like a steel trap. Hardy sidestepped with lightning reflexes, narrowly evading the crushing jaws. In response, he unleashed a barrage of plasma fire, streaking blue bolts of energy toward the beetle’s armored hide. The shots impacted with explosive force, chipping away at the metallic exterior, but the construct remained undeterred. The second beetle joined the fray, charging from Hardy’s blind spot. Its mandibles aimed to impale him. Reacting swiftly, Hardy swung his arm, cannons blazing, launching a salvo of plasma blasts that collided with the beetle’s chitinous armor. The explosive impact staggered the creature, momentarily halting its advance. Seizing the opportunity, Hardy pivoted on his heel and unleashed a fierce kick, sending the beetle crashing into the bulkhead. However, even with his advanced weaponry, Hardy struggled to gain the upper hand. The beetles possessed the ability to dissimulate and deconstruct, their nanites allowing them to reform and adapt at a moment’s notice. Whenever Hardy’s plasma bolts seemed to find their mark, the beetles would splinter and reform, evading the brunt of the attack. As the relentless battle raged on, each movement and strike became a breathtaking dance of survival. Hardy weaved through the chaotic onslaught, his metal frame whirling with precision and purpose. His plasma cannons unleashed torrents of energy, colliding with the constructs’ exoskeletons, their explosive bursts illuminating the dimly lit passageway. Hardy analyzed the patterns of the beetles’ movements, searching for weaknesses to exploit. He identified a brief moment when their nanites were momentarily distracted, shifting their focus to regeneration. Seizing the opportunity, Hardy directed all his firepower at one beetle,


of my fosterson. At this parting ask for any gift, and I will not deny it to you.' 'I ask then for a sword of worth,' said Beleg; 'for the Orcs come now too thick and close for a bow only, and such blade as I have is no match for their armour.' 'Choose from all that I have,' said Thingol, 'save only Aranrth, my own.' Then Beleg chose Anglachel; and that was a sword of great worth, and it was so named because it was made of iron that fell from heaven as a blazing star; it would cleave all earth-delved iron. One other sword only in Middle-earth was like to it. That sword does not enter into this tale, though it was made of the same ore by the same smith; and that smith was El the Dark Elf, who took Aredhel Turgon's sister to wife. He gave Anglachel to Thingol as fee, which he begrudged, for leave to dwell in Nan Elmoth; but its mate Anguirel he kept, until it was stolen from him by Maeglin, his son. But as Thingol turned the hilt of Anglachel towards Beleg, Melian looked at the blade; and she said: 'There is malice in this sword. The dark heart of the smith still dwells in it. It will not love the hand it serves; neither will it abide with you long.' 'Nonetheless I will wield it while I may,' said Beleg. 'Another gift I will give to you, Cthalion,' said Melian, 'that shall be your help in the wild, and the help also of those whom you choose.' And she gave him store of lembas, the waybread of the Elves, wrapped in leaves of silver, and the threads that bound it were sealed at the knots with the seal of the Queen, a wafer of white wax shaped as a single flower of Telperion; for according to the customs of the Eldali the keeping and giving of lembas belonged to the Queen alone. In nothing did Melian show greater favour to Trin than in this gift; for the Eldar had never before allowed Men to use this waybread, and seldom did so again. Then Beleg departed with these gifts from Menegroth and went back to the north marches, where he had his lodges, and many friends. Then in Dimbar the Orcs were driven back, and Anglachel rejoiced to be unsheathed; but when the winter came, and war was stilled, suddenly his companions missed Beleg, and he returned to them no more. Now when Beleg parted from the outlaws and returned into Doriath, Trin led them away westward out of Sirion's vale; for they grew weary of their life without rest, ever watchful and in fear of pursuit, and they sought for a safer lair. And it chanced at a time of evening that they came upon three Dwarves, who fled before them; but one that lagged behind was seized and thrown down, and a man of the company took his bow and let fly an arrow at the others as they vanished in


the cover and left what they believed was a worthless manuscript under a sod of turf.’ I couldn’t help wondering about the lives of the people who wrote the text, all in Latin. Still, there wasn’t much time to ponder as the crowds kept coming and it was time to move on to the Long Room Library. I don’t know what I expected, but my skin flushed with goosebumps at the sight of it. It was like a cathedral of books; wooden galleries arched upwards from floor to ceiling, filled with leatherbound books. I’d never seen anything like it. As we walked along the central corridor, marble busts lined the way; philosophers whose names sounded vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t have said what any of them were known for. Surrounded by all of this learning, it was hard not to feel like, no matter how much you studied, you would never have an inch of the knowledge contained in this room. ‘Impressive, isn’t it?’ he said. I hadn’t been aware that he was watching for my reaction. I turned to face him, ignoring the crowds pushing us ever forwards. ‘Why did you really bring me here?’ He took a moment, shoved his hands in his pockets and looked up to the highest mezzanines where conservators were working with gloved hands. ‘I wanted to show you that anything is possible.’ He stepped out of the way of a group of American students, noisily making their way past. Then he stepped back a little closer to me, so I could feel his breath. ‘After that day in the library, I could see you wanted to belong. And I just wanted to show you that you do.’ I stopped hearing the people around us, barely even noticed them filing past. No one had ever seen me the way he just had. And even if they did, they certainly didn’t do anything to try and help me. I was lost for words and my throat felt thick with a sadness I’d never allowed myself to feel. He ran his hand through his hair, which unfailingly fell into his eyes when he bent his head, as he was doing now. ‘Do you want to grab a pint somewhere?’ I just nodded and smiled as he stood back and cleared a path for me to walk ahead. He’d found a pub on a small side street that looked as though it hadn’t changed its decor in a hundred years. All dark wood with layer upon layer of varnish, smoothed down over the years, and little snugs lit by low-hanging glass pendants. It was quiet enough, just a couple of regulars at the bar, and so we sat in a snug that even had a little door, if you wanted complete privacy. We left it open and ordered two pints of Guinness and two shepherd’s pies. A light rain began to fall outside and as the drops hit the windowpane and passers-by took out their umbrellas, I felt a warmth inside that I hadn’t felt for a long time.


on Sefa’s face by the river and the High Counselor’s lies. Checking the empty hall, I darted out, wincing at the slap of cold air. The Jasadis who stayed here before us had enchanted the walls to glow in the evening as a clever alternative to lanterns. The magic left over was faint, however, and did little to illuminate my path. I rounded the corner and crashed into a firm body. A hand clamped over my mouth, shoving me into the wall. I clutched my towel. The waning light outlined Vaun’s sneer. “If you reveal your magic to anybody again, I will decorate these halls with your blood and tears,” he growled. “The Heir will not be incriminated by you.” I licked a long stripe over his palm. He yanked his hand away with a sound of disgust. “Should the need arise, the Heir can say he didn’t know I was a Jasadi,” I snapped. I had plastered myself to the wall already, but Vaun stepped closer. “His Highness will not be made to look like a fool, either. A reputation like his will not be tarnished by atrocities like you.” He leaned in, close enough for me to distinguish each bristly hair at the crown of his forehead. “And if you ever raise a knife to the Commander again—” “You’ll… what?” I met his glare with a maniacal one of my own. “Scold me in secret again?” Vaun spat at my feet. With another hateful glare, he turned the same corner I had come from. I glanced at my cuffs. Not a trace of heat or pressure. “Helpful as always.” If the Alcalah’s outcome depended on my magic, we were all doomed. CHAPTER FIFTEEN History has a twisted sense of humor. The day Jasad’s fortress rose was remembered for all the wrong reasons. The newly appointed Qayida Hend had stood shoulder to shoulder with Malika Safa and Malik Mustafa. Behind them, a sea of Jasadis gathered on the hill that would become the courtyard of Usr Jasad. As one, they lifted their hands and poured their magic forth. Back then, magic was still as powerful in their veins as it was rich in the land. A conductor stood centered in the masses, guiding the flow of magic to the Qayida. They say on the day of the fortress’s rise, the Qayida’s entire body had burned silver and gold as she read the enchantment the Malik and Malika had toiled for years to produce. The fortress had been a dream for Jasad since shortly after the age of the Awaleen. Protection. Peace. The monsters in Essam stalked their borders. Visitors came to stand at the edge of Sirauk, gazing upon the misty bridge and leaving bizarre offerings littered in Janub Aya. Trade had become unreliable, and the skirmishes with Omal were escalating. A fortress tuned to the unique magical marker of each of Jasad’s citizens would allow us to move freely, but keep our kingdom secure from anyone—or anything—else. The ground had quaked, knocking everyone but the Qayida to the ground. She


barely taller than I am.” I try to read his face. Is he serious? “I love that you are happy and comfortable there and that Henry has known that house as home his whole life.” He pulls me to him. “I love that my parents are two blocks away and that we can walk to Lanier’s bookstore and your office. I even love that Steven will be a few houses down so that Henry can see his dad whenever he wants.” I lean into him, my head on his chest. He leans down and kisses me when he sees my eyes fill. I want to tell him he’s right, but I don’t want to cry. Henry tears into the pristine kitchen and eyes us curiously. “Mommy, are you sad?” I shake my head and pick him up. “No, baby. I’m happy. I’m so, so happy.” I look at Huff, and I realize we haven’t planned to tell Henry yet. It hasn’t been as long as I assumed we needed, and I haven’t thought about what I want to say. But I’m standing here with this man who sees my messy little life as superior to his fancy, shiny one, and I feel like there’s no better time than right now. “Sweet boy, there’s something that Mommy wants to tell you.” He nods. “Mommy and Huff are going to get married. It won’t be for a few months, which is a long, long time. But Huff is going to come live at our house with us one day.” Henry looks from me to Huff and back to me. “Is he going to bring the trains?” This is not the question I’m expecting, but he’s four, so I guess this seems fitting. “Oh, yeah, man,” Huff says. “I’m bringing the trains.” Henry nods. “So, are you and me and Huff going to all live in one room together?” I am puzzled by this. “No, sweetie. You’ll still have your room and Huff will live in Mommy’s room with her.” “Oh, okay.” “Why would you think we’d all live in one room?” Huff asks. “Well, because Aunt Becky and Uncle Jesse and Alex and Nicky all live in the attic on Full House.” I want to burst out laughing. Full House is one of the only shows Henry and I both like. It was my go-to rerun as a kid. Henry and I have just made it to season six, and Henry loves the twins. Huff looks at me questioningly. “You haven’t seen Full House?” He shakes his head and Henry says, “Huff, you have to see it! Uncle Joey has a woodchuck and Uncle Jesse rides a motorcycle and Danny has a little vacuum to clean his big vacuum.” Huff laughs. “Sounds like quality TV to me.” “Do you have any other questions?” I make the mistake of asking. “Yes. Is Daddy going to marry us too? And then he will live at our house all the time?” I grimace. “Well, no. Daddy is going to be staying at our house a little less


should not have done this. A look of terror crosses his face. “I can’t.” Sadness and guilt flood through me all at once. “I know,” I say quickly. “I’m sorry. We shouldn’t—” He interrupts me. “No. I can’t be apart from you again. I need you, Daphne. Seeing you these last few weeks has reminded me that what I have with you, I don’t have with anyone else. Not this,” he points from himself to me, and I know he means our chemistry, our physical connection. “But the way we see eye to eye, the way we challenge each other. Leave Steven. We should be together.” Now I am panicking, and I try to make a joke. “You are ruining our cool, nostalgic, super-hot wedding sex.” It sort of works. He flashes me a small smile, and I absolutely melt. “Besides, I’m not with Steven,” I say. “I haven’t been with Steven for years. I thought you knew that.” “But Lanier said…” His face registers his sister’s lie, and he bangs the heel of his hand on the wall. “Damn it, Lanier.” I am, I have to admit, upset now too. She told him I was with Steven? The tiniest part of me has hoped she would approve of this relationship now, if there ever was one. But Lanier apparently still doesn’t trust me. “Daph, forget Lanier. Let’s do this. Finally.” I consider his offer briefly because, well, it’s what I want to do. But I shake my head. “If we get together right now, Lanier will know it’s because we met up at the wedding and she’ll blame me. She’ll be furious.” Huff sighs and rolls his eyes. “Damn, Daph. Why do you care so much? What happened back then was a long time ago. She has to realize that.” He is partially right. But our big breakup, when we were twenty-three and twenty-five, had less to do with her and more with what I’d thought was the right thing. But it was easier to blame her than to blame myself. Seven years ago, I still had my mother’s voice in my head—and her addictive nature in my body. I was afraid then that love would drown me, just like it had my mother. Lanier pleaded with me not to take Huff down with me. I loved him too much to do that. The irony that I later found myself sober, pregnant, and starting a family with a man I didn’t love as much wasn’t lost on me. But instead of saying that, I say, “Huff, you have this big, magical, amazing family. I have Lanier. So losing her would be like losing everything and everyone.” He wraps me in a hug. “You have me, Daphne,” he whispers. “You always have.” He pulls back and kisses me. “You are all I care about. I’m not going to lose you again.” I look up into his sad eyes, and I start to feel that same thing I have always felt for him. And I realize: As much as I’m trying to deny


and it’s instantly, violently, mortifyingly present in my mind that the last time we met, I acted like a toddler with little bitch disorder. “I . . .” I look around like an idiot, in search of . . . what? A teleprompter? This is mortally embarrassing. “I didn’t know you were here.” “Just got here. Faculty meeting ran late for no reason—the entire thing could be summarized in two fifteen-second TikToks.” She shrugs, moving closer. I clutch my almond wrapper like it’s a terry cloth monkey. “Georgina—” “George, please. Georgina is my mother. And my grandmother. My greatgrandmother, too, probably. We should invest in a baby names book.” “Oh.” I clear my throat. My contributions to this conversation are priceless. “Jack’s in there, if you—” “I know. Like I could miss him when he’s standing next to Adam Carlsen. They’re the Mount Rushmore of STEM academia. Anyway—will you have lunch with me next week? I want to chat with you, but not in Sunny’s home.” She shudders. “I can’t be in here without thinking of the urine sample.” Professionally, my life sucks a bit. Psychologically, I’m not, as some would say, “healthy.” Musically, I should hire a tuba to follow me around. But on the upside, I’ve been killing it in the lunch invite department. “You want to chat with me,” I repeat. Just to be sure. “Yes. Partly because Jack is my closest friend, and it would bug him if I stole you from him even just a bit. But mostly because the last time we met, I acted like a total bitch, and I want to make it up to you.” What? “No, no, I’m the one who ran away like a lunatic. My first reaction to finding out that you’d gotten the job was unforgivable and incredibly messed up. I acted like a bitch—” “Yes, you totally did.” George’s smile is triumphant. “To make it up to me, you will let me take you out for lunch.” “That’s . . .” I slow-blink. “Very well played.” “Thank you.” She dusts nonexistent specks off her shoulder, and I laugh. “I see why Jack likes you so much.” “I see why Jack likes you more.” Her smile softens. “Next Wednesday okay?” I nod. “Sounds great.” Jack and I leave a few minutes later. I exchange numbers with Olive, and Sunny hugs me goodbye while Jack is getting the car, whispering that any urine sample rumors I might have heard have been greatly exaggerated. She also swears that if Jack and I break up, she’ll side with me, because she already likes me more. I laugh on the doorstep. “It makes me feel guilty for stealing your almonds.” “Oh, they must be someone else’s. No nuts in this house—they’re, like, so gross.” In the car, I’m contemplating the idea that Jack researched, bought, and packed a diabetes-friendly snack just for me when he asks, “Where to for dinner?” “Oh.” Something happy and surprised flips in my chest at the idea of the night not being over yet. “I like everything.” He


relief. I take stock of my injuries. My head hurts, my chest aches where Jack kicked me, and my side throbs where he pushed me to the ground. Plus I’m thirsty and hungry. Jeez, really hungry. I finish up, thankful that I don’t have to get up to wash my hands, as the sink is close. I just don’t have the strength to stand. “I’m done,” I call, drying my hands on the towel. Christian turns and comes back in and before I know it, I’m in his arms again. I have missed these arms. He pauses and buries his nose in my hair. “Oh, I’ve missed you, Mrs. Grey,” he whispers, and with Nurse Nora fussing behind him, he lays me back on the bed and releases me—reluctantly, I think. “If you’ve quite finished, Mr. Grey, I’d like to check over Mrs. Grey now.” Nurse Nora is mad. He stands back. “She’s all yours,” he says in a more measured tone. She huffs at him then turns her attention back to me. Exasperating isn’t he? 446/551 “How do you feel?” she asks me her voice laced with sympathy and a trace of irritation, which I suspect is for Christian’s benefit. “Sore and thirsty. Very thirsty,” I whisper. “I’ll fetch you some water once I’ve checked your vitals and Dr. Bartley has examined you.” She reaches for a blood pressure cuff and wraps it around my upper arm. I glance anxiously up at Christian. He looks dreadful—haunted, even—as if he hasn’t slept for days. His hair is a mess, he hasn’t shaved for a long time, and his shirt is badly wrinkled. I frown. “How are you feeling?” Ignoring the nurse, he sits down on the bed out of arm’s reach. “Confused. Achy. Hungry.” “Hungry?” He blinks in surprise. I nod. “What do you want to eat?” “Anything. Soup.” “Mr. Grey, you’ll need the doctor’s approval before Mrs. Grey can eat.” He gazes at her impassively for a moment then takes his BlackBerry out of his pants pocket and presses a number. “Ana wants chicken soup . . . Good . . . Thank you.” He hangs up. I glance at Nora whose eyes narrow at Christian. “Taylor?” I ask quickly. Christian nods. “Your blood pressure is normal, Mrs. Grey. I’ll fetch the doctor.” She re- moves the cuff and, without so much as another word, stalks out of the room, ra- diating disapproval. “I think you made Nurse Nora mad.” “I have that effect on women.” He smirks. I laugh, then stop suddenly as pain radiates through my chest. “Yes, you do.” “Oh, Ana, I love to hear you laugh.” Nora returns with a pitcher of water. We both fall silent, gazing at each other as she pours out a glass and hands it to me. “Small sips now,” she warns. “Yes, ma’am,” I mutter and take a welcome sip of cool water. Oh my. It tastes perfect. I take another, and Christian watches me intently. 447/551 “Mia?” I ask. “She’s safe. Thanks to you.” “They did have her?” “Yes.” All


landscape move beneath them. The immensity of time worried him, he could feel it as a presence. He cleared his throat. "Well, even supposing it is ..." "It is," said Zaphod. "Which it isn't," continued Ford. "What do you want with it anyway? There's nothing there." "Not on the surface," said Zaphod. "Alright, just supposing there's something. I take it you're not here for the sheer industrial archaeology of it all. What are you after?" One of Zaphod's heads looked away. The other one looked round to see what the first was looking at, but it wasn't looking at anything very much. "Well," said Zaphod airily, "it's partly the curiosity, partly a sense of adventure, but mostly I think it's the fame and the money ..." Ford glanced at him sharply. He got a very strong impression that Zaphod hadn't the faintest idea why he was there at all. "You know I don't like the look of that planet at all," said Trillian shivering. "Ah, take no notice," said Zaphod, "with half the wealth of the former Galactic Empire stored on it somewhere it can afford to look frumpy." Bullshit, thought Ford. Even supposing this was the home of some ancient civilization now gone to dust, even supposing a number of exceedingly unlikely things, there was no way that vast treasures of wealth were going to be stored there in any form that would still have meaning now. He shrugged. "I think it's just a dead planet," he said. "The suspense is killing me," said Arthur testily. Stress and nervous tension are now serious social problems in all parts of the Galaxy, and it is in order that this situation should not in any way be exacerbated that the following facts will now be revealed in advance. The planet in question is in fact the legendary Magrathea. The deadly missile attack shortly to be launched by an ancient automatic defence system will result merely in the breakage of three coffee cups and a micecage, the bruising of somebody's upper arm, and the untimely creation and sudden demise of a bowl of petunias and an innocent sperm whale. In order that some sense of mystery should still be preserved, no revelation will yet be made concerning whose upper arm sustained the bruise. This fact may safely be made the subject of suspense since it is of no significance whatsoever. ================================================================= Chapter 17 After a fairly shaky start to the day, Arthur's mind was beginning to reassemble itself from the shellshocked fragments the previous day had left him with. He had found a Nutri-Matic machine which had provided him with a plastic cup filled with a liquid that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea. The way it functioned was very interesting. When the Drink button was pressed it made an instant but highly detailed examination of the subject's taste buds, a spectroscopic analysis of the subject's metabolism and then sent tiny experimental signals down the neural pathways to the taste centres of the subject's brain to see what was likely to go


one a-piece all round. `But she must have a prize herself, you know,' said the Mouse. `Of course,' the Dodo replied very gravely. `What else have you got in your pocket?' he went on, turning to Alice. `Only a thimble,' said Alice sadly. `Hand it over here,' said the Dodo. Then they all crowded round her once more, while the Dodo solemnly presented the thimble, saying `We beg your acceptance of this elegant thimble'; and, when it had finished this short speech, they all cheered. Alice thought the whole thing very absurd, but they all looked so grave that she did not dare to laugh; and, as she could not think of anything to say, she simply bowed, and took the thimble, looking as solemn as she could. The next thing was to eat the comfits: this caused some noise and confusion, as the large birds complained that they could not taste theirs, and the small ones choked and had to be patted on the back. However, it was over at last, and they sat down again in a ring, and begged the Mouse to tell them something more. `You promised to tell me your history, you know,' said Alice, `and why it is you hate--C and D,' she added in a whisper, half afraid that it would be offended again. `Mine is a long and a sad tale!' said the Mouse, turning to Alice, and sighing. `It IS a long tail, certainly,' said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse's tail; `but why do you call it sad?' And she kept on puzzling about it while the Mouse was speaking, so that her idea of the tale was something like this:-- `Fury said to a mouse, That he met in the house, "Let us both go to law: I will prosecute YOU. --Come, I'll take no denial; We must have a trial: For really this morning I've nothing to do." Said the mouse to the cur, "Such a trial, dear Sir, With no jury or judge, would be wasting our breath." "I'll be judge, I'll be jury," Said cunning old Fury: "I'll try the whole cause, and condemn you to death."' `You are not attending!' said the Mouse to Alice severely. `What are you thinking of?' `I beg your pardon,' said Alice very humbly: `you had got to the fifth bend, I think?' `I had NOT!' cried the Mouse, sharply and very angrily. `A knot!' said Alice, always ready to make herself useful, and looking anxiously about her. `Oh, do let me help to undo it!' `I shall do nothing of the sort,' said the Mouse, getting up and walking away. `You insult me by talking such nonsense!' `I didn't mean it!' pleaded poor Alice. `But you're so easily offended, you know!' The Mouse only growled in reply. `Please come back and finish your story!' Alice called after it; and the others all joined in chorus, `Yes, please do!' but the Mouse only shook its head impatiently, and walked a little quicker. `What a pity it wouldn't stay!' sighed the


the sound I hear coming from my throat is not quite a laugh, but it is close. A friend points out that my parents’ deaths were inversions of each other, from the duration of their illnesses to my ability to provide practical assistance to whether and how I was able to be with them and engage in public mourning after they died. Put them both together, I think, and I got to experience one whole loss as expected. Is it any wonder that I often struggle to experience these losses as distinct, to grieve for each of them separately? I have never had enough time. * * * Sometimes I almost imagine that there must exist some ideal state of mourning, a perfectly balanced equation that will allow me to miss my parents, feel sad that they are gone, but remain myself, somehow, in control, anchored in the life I have to continue living without them. But of course no perfect balance exists. There will be days ahead that are all joy and days that are all grief—right now, I know only the latter—and an infinite number of combinations and feelings in between. I will control none of it. I can only let it be what it’s going to be. So I go back to work, far sooner than I’d like. I return to therapy, though my sessions are now remote. My husband is still doing the lion’s share of the parenting, but I do my part to help our younger child get through the virtual school day, resuming my place at her side during her language-arts lessons. I try to keep alive all the plants I received as sympathy gifts, buying delicate stakes and clips for the orchids. I take long walks by the creek near our house, picking my way along the bank slowly and carefully, as if there are snags and hidden holes everywhere instead of a smooth trail. I wear the softest clothes I own, along with my mother’s rings, the ones she gave to me before she died. I’ve been back at work for a few weeks when a co-worker asks me where I’m most looking forward to traveling once this is all over. In the long silence that follows, I hear them apologize. They know that it is too late for the only trip I care about, the visit I wasn’t able to make. Our conversation moves on, mercifully, and I am not angry, though I cannot stop thinking about their question—about how it would feel to be able to look ahead, without fear, without this choking grief, to whomever I will see and whatever I will do and whoever I will be if a safer world ever opens up. I wonder if, no matter what lies ahead, I’ll spend the rest of my life looking backward, reliving the endless days and nights when my mother was dying and I couldn’t be with her. 22 The Priority Mail boxes begin arriving in June. Packed and shipped by my aunts, each box is stuffed with photos, documents,


of the old gentlewoman's attendance on her brother, while Phoebe took charge of the shop; an arrangement which the public speedily understood, and evinced their decided preference of the younger shopwoman by the multiplicity of their calls during her administration of affairs. Dinner over, Hepzibah took her knitting-work,--a long stocking of gray yarn, for her brother's winter wear,--and with a sigh, and a scowl of affectionate farewell to Clifford, and a gesture enjoining watchfulness on Phoebe, went to take her seat behind the counter. It was now the young girl's turn to be the nurse,--the guardian, the playmate, --or whatever is the fitter phrase,--of the gray-haired man. X The Pyncheon Garden CLIFFORD, except for Phoebe's More active instigation would ordinarily have yielded to the torpor which had crept through all his modes of being, and which sluggishly counselled him to sit in his morning chair till eventide. But the girl seldom failed to propose a removal to the garden, where Uncle Venner and the daguerreotypist had made such repairs on the roof of the ruinous arbor, or summer-house, that it was now a sufficient shelter from sunshine and casual showers. The hop-vine, too, had begun to grow luxuriantly over the sides of the little edifice, and made an interior of verdant seclusion, with innumerable peeps and glimpses into the wider solitude of the garden. Here, sometimes, in this green play-place of flickering light, Phoebe read to Clifford. Her acquaintance, the artist, who appeared to have a literary turn, had supplied her with works of fiction, in pamphlet form,--and a few volumes of poetry, in altogether a different style and taste from those which Hepzibah selected for his amusement. Small thanks were due to the books, however, if the girl's readings were in any degree more successful than her elderly cousin's. Phoebe's voice had always a pretty music in it, and could either enliven Clifford by its sparkle and gayety of tone, or soothe him by a continued flow of pebbly and brook-like cadences. But the fictions--in which the country-girl, unused to works of that nature, often became deeply absorbed--interested her strange auditor very little, or not at all. Pictures of life, scenes of passion or sentiment, wit, humor, and pathos, were all thrown away, or worse than thrown away, on Clifford; either because he lacked an experience by which to test their truth, or because his own griefs were a touch-stone of reality that few feigned emotions could withstand. When Phoebe broke into a peal of merry laughter at what she read, he would now and then laugh for sympathy, but oftener respond with a troubled, questioning look. If a tear--a maiden's sunshiny tear over imaginary woe--dropped upon some melancholy page, Clifford either took it as a token of actual calamity, or else grew peevish, and angrily motioned her to close the volume. And wisely too! Is not the world sad enough, in genuine earnest, without making a pastime of mock sorrows? With poetry it was rather better. He delighted in the swell and subsidence of the rhythm, and the happily recurring


we traumatized the kids and probably violated the Patriot Act.” “The what?” Richard asked. “I spent forty dollars on gas,” Sadie said. “You’re going to have to eat it,” Clark said. “They’re pretty angry.” “And for groceries,” she added. “It’s fucking unfair,” I chimed in. I felt like the situation warranted profanity. “I have spent 375 bucks on materials for this show,” Richard said. “I have the receipts. Whether they liked it or not, the least they can do is cover our expenses.” The school disagreed. We wound up having a pretty heated public debate with Mrs. Marsten and a few of her storm troopers in the parking lot. We tried to keep the focus on freedom of speech and the resilience of children, while they threw around inflammatory words like perverted and trespassing. Eventually, someone called the cops. By the time Mrs. Marsten finished explaining to them that the dispute revolved around payment for a puppet show performed for third graders about American culpability in 9/11, the cops had stopped listening to our side of the story. They made us unload the station wagon. The General was definitely going to need a new coat of paint before we used him again. Richard tried to explain the difference between glorifying drug use and demonstrating CIA narco-trafficking used to illegally fund American intervention in foreign wars, but the cops had already made up their minds. By the time they finished “searching” our car, there weren’t many puppets left we could salvage. On the one hand, it proved the power of puppetry; on the other hand, it was pretty fucking humiliating. By the time they let us go the kids had long since gone home and the school was empty. We were hungry and numb. Their cruiser followed us all the way to the township line to make sure we left, which was kind of overkill. I looked over at Clark in the passenger seat, and his face was white, his lips pressed together hard. His left hand shook from whatever emotions he was holding in, and he had his right hand tucked inside Pupkin, holding him in his lap. It gets dark early in the winter in Massachusetts, and by the time we got to his parents’ place outside town there was no light left. We went inside and started switching on fluorescents, but the house was freezing. The heat barely worked. Clark didn’t say a word to anyone, he just went upstairs to the big bedroom and closed the door. No one talked much. We ate instant mac and cheese and went to bed. I slept on the living room couch and I hadn’t felt this cold in a very long time. I woke up in the middle of the night to pee and on my way back I saw something orange pulsing in the kitchen. I looked out the windows and saw Clark in the backyard with Pupkin on his arm. They’d set the General on fire and were watching him burn, their pale faces glowing in the dark. The next


out at waist level to give her a hug, imitating a concerned partner. She didn’t have time for this. “It’s fine, honestly,” she said, sidestepping his proposed hug. “Where’s Poppy?” “She’s in her bedroom,” he told her. “Slow down. She’s fine.” She dodged Ian and semi-ran down the short, creaking hall to Poppy’s room and gave two quick knocks on the door. “Pop-pee!” she sang, pushing it open. Poppy stood in the middle of her brightly colored rag carpet. “Kakawewe!” Poppy screeched in a familiar, squeaky voice. “How do dee do?” Pupkin waved to Louise, dancing from side to side, on Poppy’s arm. Chapter 29 L ouise’s skin turned to ice. Sweat erupted from her pores. Her guts hollowed out. Her body caved in. She’d traveled across the country only to run in a circle. “Kakawewe!” Pupkin screeched, his voice forcing itself out of her daughter’s throat. “Pupkin home! Pupkin home! Pupkin home forever!” Louise heard the scream of the saw, she pictured a fantail of orange and white sparks as it bit into the concrete floor. The word no stuck to her lips, just a moan. Her knees felt weak. Her feet went numb. The shrieking inside her skull went up an octave as the saw bit into her brother’s bone. “Mom made it with her,” Ian said from behind her. “The Popster came up with it all by herself. She had a real vision.” “Pupkin here!” Pupkin said through her daughter’s mouth. “Pupkin here! How do dee do! Pupkin here!” Louise held Mark’s arm under one foot, crushing it to the floor, steel teeth biting into his infinity sign. She tasted her brother’s blood. She began to hyperventilate. “He’s a little creepy at first,” Ian said, “but he grows on you. And the Popster loves him to death.” “Pupkin home! Pupkin home!” Pupkin danced from side to side, chanting it over and over again, his voice higher because Poppy’s vocal cords were less developed, her lungs smaller, her palate softer. Louise heard Pupkin screaming through Mark’s throat, bringing the hammer down on her skull. The left side of her forehead gave a sharp, precise pang. Her lower body went numb and hot urine squirted between her thighs. “Pupkin home! Pupkin home!” The puppet danced toward Louise on the end of Poppy’s arm, then away, taunting her. “Lou?” Ian said. She wanted to stop. She couldn’t stop. Sticky, hot piss ran down her legs and soaked her socks, puddling in the heels of her shoes. “Lou!” Ian said. “Pupkin wants a kiss-kiss!” He pressed himself up at Louise’s mouth, leering, contaminating her daughter, corrupting her daughter, her daughter she’d sworn to protect, her daughter she’d failed. “No!” Louise shouted, way too loud, her wet pants already turning cold. “No!” She grabbed Pupkin and felt her daughter’s arm inside his sleeve. Pupkin felt different, rougher, made of cheaper fabric. She yanked, jerking Poppy’s arm with it. “Lou!” Ian snapped behind her. “Ow!” Poppy shrieked. Louise hauled on Poppy’s arm, over and over, standing there in her soaking pants, not caring how it