“What is this about?” Grace says. “What is she talking about, Miranda?”
“I felt it!” Briana screams, hysterical now.
“Briana,” I say calmly, as calmly as I possibly can. “I think surely you must be confused. You haven’t been well. Pain does that; I should know.”
“Oh, I’m not confused, Miranda. I’m very clear.”
She leans forward, toward me, wavering on her feet. I think she’s going to fall, but she grabs hold of the stage beside her for support. She looks at me with wild eyes, her body still leaning to the left like a wind-warped tree. Her breath is getting shallower, quicker. I can see what I think is her heart drumming wildly beneath her ribs. Suddenly she smiles.
“And I’m going to tell everyone. The dean. The VP. And you’ll get fired! You’ll get sued! You’ll go to jail maybe!”
She looks thrilled. And sick. Terribly sick. There’s a shine to her eyes that I recognize. Drugs. Take one for muscle stiffness. Take one for pain.
“Tell everyone what?” Grace says.
“I have witnesses!” she screams. “Grace, you were there, weren’t you?”
She turns now pathetically to Grace, pleading. Her eyes suddenly full of hideous hope.
“You saw! You saw what she did to me, didn’t you? Or does she have you under her power too? Are you both in on it together?”
“In on what?”
Then Briana begins to cry pitifully. It’s a loud, keening wail that reverberates through the theater.
Fauve comes running in as if on cue, from stage left. She gathers Briana’s frail body to her velvet drapery. “Oh my poor, poor dear,” she murmurs, or some such nonsense like that, meanwhile casting a threatening look at me, her eyes full of triumph. I’ve got you now.
“This is my fault. I suggested she come in today. Oh, let’s get the poor thing home, shall we? Poor dear.”
I watch Briana limp pathetically away, scowling at me from under Fauve’s dark velvet wing as she hobbles toward the hall, my whole body ringing with fear. What have I done? What have I done? What have I done?
CHAPTER 21
DRIVING TO THE pub. Sun a bloodred light over the blackening trees. Not even thinking. Not even seeing the road. Only seeing Briana’s pale face. Her white hands gripping the throne. Her shaking voice, her shining eyes. Faking, she had to be. Still. Convinced me. Convinced everyone. Grace looking at me. All of them looking at me. Like what? Like I did something. Ridiculous. Sun burns my eyes through the windshield. I think of my hand on Mark’s wrist. The way he fell backward into that patient chair, onto my sad coat, my musty clothes. My suddenly singing lips, my swinging limbs.
Pain can move, Ms. Fitch. It can switch. From house to house, from body to body.
I think of myself on the floor, full of the fat man’s pain, while he smiled and sang.
I’m going to tell everyone, Briana said. She will too. She’ll point her frail, shaking finger at me, scream my name from the heights, no gag could stop that hissing mouth. But tell them what exactly, Briana? Nothing to tell. Nothing at all. No proof of anything. You’re going to accuse me of what? Of magic? Ridiculous. Who’ll even believe you? “Who?” I ask the windshield. Not the dean. Not Grace. For sure not Grace.
Grace looking at me, looking at me after Briana left the theater.
Well, that was fucking crazy, I said, wasn’t it? Can you even believe that?
And Grace said nothing. And I said, I told you, didn’t I? I told you we shouldn’t trust her on the stage, didn’t I? And she proved my point, didn’t she?
And she said, Are you all right, Miranda? You’re shaking.
Do you think she meant it? I asked her. About telling the dean?
And Grace looked at me funny. Funny is what I would call the look.
What is there to tell? she said. I mean, it’s crazy. Isn’t it?
And she kept looking at me with that funny look.
I have to go, I said.
What? Where do you have to go?
Out, I said. Somewhere.
Miranda, don’t you think we need to talk about this? About all of this?
Of course we do. Of course we will. Just not tonight, because I have to go, I’m afraid.
Miranda, wait—
But I was already out the door. Bypassed Hugo in the hall too. Looking so amorous. Looking so like Paul it almost took my breath away.
Goldfish, I said.
Goldfish? he said. Who’s Goldfish?
You, I lied. Your hair, the color. Sort of reminds me of a goldfish. And just like that, his hair appeared pale, the color of wheat. He smiled.