The Children(99)

Guinevere lifted her head at the sound of Jonathan cursing in the kitchen. She was curled in the great room’s window seat, hidden by its curtains.

Jonathan Froud never swore, was smug about the fact. It was the one thing Edith didn’t like about him.

“Apologies!” he said to someone, with a diamond chip of a laugh. “Things have been— No, no, we’re on track. I will make it work. No, it’s not the whole Maeve Carter— Right. Right. No, I agree, that was not ideal. I do think . . .”

He fell silent, and Guinevere realized he was on the phone. It had a super-long cord. She could hear his loafer heels drumming back and forth along the hall.

“Right. I hear you, I do.” His tone was absent, which she knew from experience meant he was boiling mad. “As I said, I will make it work. I always do . . . Yes, you, too . . . I will. I will. Tuesday at the latest. I want to keep our girl happy, don’t I? Book six is . . . coming along. Beautifully.” Another laugh. “Now that would be telling! Alright. Yes, I’ll see you next week. Ta.”

His loafers shushed back to the kitchen. She strained, but was too far to hear the click of the phone in its cradle.

“Fuuuuuuuuuck!”

He screamed it. No one called down to ask why.



* * *




Vogue. That was why.

The magazine had sent a journalist to the house a month ago to interview Edith and Llewellyn—and the children, but with Jonathan installed on the other side of the room, it wasn’t exactly a relaxed and honest conversation. Do you like the Ninth City books? Sure do. How does it really feel, to be Ennis and Guinevere Sharpe? Awesome!

Now the magazine was sending a photo crew. Tomorrow, in fact. The piece was set to run around the release of book five, The Wicked Few. The magazine wanted a major feature, covering not only Edith and her fandom but the life of the Farmhouse. Guinevere had heard her mother and Jonathan scheming their guest list for the party they’d throw after the shoot, all their most photogenic friends driving up for a chance at being pictured in a candid in Vogue.

Then Maeve Carter came to stay. Then Ennis stole Edith’s necklace and hid it—got rid of it?—so well she hadn’t found it in the three days since. Ennis wouldn’t crack. Not under Edith’s increasingly panicked threats, nor the intervention of both Jonathan and Llewellyn.

I don’t think he has it, Edie, Llewellyn said.

I don’t think you have balls because you’re not a man, she yelled, then ran out of the house in flip-flops and didn’t reappear for three hours.

Anyway. Not a person in the house had remembered the photo shoot before Hart & Crane called.

Now Jonathan was lead-footing it back to the city for a haircut and clothes. Llewellyn was—Guinevere caught him—standing sideways in front of mirrors, checking the curve of his gut. Ennis? Who knew. Since his multiple interrogations he’d been steering clear of everyone.

Overhead, the pipes screeched. That was Edith. Someone must have persuaded her to take a shower.



* * *




Guinevere was (she would admit it to no one) a tiny bit excited.

Llewellyn conscripted her into helping him clean the house. It was both incredibly unfair—Ennis kept well away—and almost fun. They took turns picking records. By dinnertime the first floor looked cozy shabby instead of just dirty. Llewellyn went out for pizzas, Jonathan returned wafting fancy barber shop. Then Edith descended the stairs.

Since her shower she’d been pacing around the third-floor room. She’d developed a nervous habit of knocking at its walls. She did it in an almost rhythm that made you twitch with the sense of something not quite done.

Now she walked into the kitchen, her fingers tapping that itchy rhythm against her sternum. She wore an old white dress she kept as a nightgown. Her eyes were circled in shadow.

Llewellyn eyed her up. “So you’re tonight’s human sacrifice.”

Ignoring him, she slunk over to Jonathan. He put an arm around her waist and a fresh cigarette between her lips, and they commenced murmuring. Together Guinevere and her dad watched Edith ash in the direction of a clean tray, scattering gray powder on the floor.

“Like pearls before swine,” Llewellyn muttered, then smiled at his daughter. “We’ll pick all the toppings off, won’t we? Leave them the worst pieces.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You got plain cheese, though, right?”

“Yes, I got your cheese.” Cleaning had energized him. He kept looking at the cleared-off surfaces fondly. “Go find your brother. We can’t have Vogue thinking we let you go hungry.”

Guinevere glanced at him sharply. He’d said it without a speck of awareness. A joke. Ha ha.



* * *




Where was Ennis? Not in his room or the attic or the orchard. Nor town—his bike lay prone on the grass. The woods, then. Well, she wasn’t going after him. If she got all sweaty, she’d have to wash her hair again. It took ages to dry, and the photographers would be here at eight in the morning.

She was so distracted by cleaning and pizza and nerves she forgot to be worried about sleeping until she lay down.

Their first summer at the Farmhouse Llewellyn took her and Ennis to a tiny amusement park attached to an apple orchard. Its crown jewel was a wooden roller coaster, cars painted to look like the sectioned body of a dragon. The best part was when it trundled up a steep incline, slowing, slowing, click click click—and paused at the top. You could look out at the parking lot and the apple trees and the doll-like people below, all of it filling you with delicious dread before you went hurtling down the track.