The Party Crasher(63)

      And then, of course, there’s Joe. I feel a painful twinge as memories from this evening stream into my brain: Joe’s expression when he spotted me through the rosebush; Joe gazing at me in the cellar. He was about to explain himself, I’m sure of it. To tell me something. But what? What?

  I heave another great sigh and turn onto my side, burrowing my head into the pillow, feeling a sudden wave of exhaustion. I can’t think about it.

  I need to focus on my goal again, I resolve sleepily. I’ll search for my dolls first thing. They must be somewhere. In an attic? In the tree house, maybe? I just need to think…

  Anyway. At least I got some cheesecake.





  I wake up the next morning to a strange, unfamiliar sensation. I lie still for a moment, trying to work it out…then it hits me. I think it’s lightness. I feel lighter. Softer. Easier.

  It’s nice. It’s a relief.

  Life has felt pretty wretched for a while, I admit to myself, staring up at Bean’s ceiling. Maybe Bean’s right: The divorce did hit me harder than it did the others. And maybe Dad’s right too: I have been trapped. Trapped in a gray, miserable place. But maybe, at last, things are starting to shift? Just a little bit?

  I don’t know how else to explain the way I feel. Nothing’s changed tangibly since last night. All the problems I had then, I have now. But somehow they seem…different. More manageable. More in proportion.

  Even when the vivid cascade of divorce memories hits me—as it always does in the morning, like a gruesome feature film, starting with that awful Christmastime announcement—it doesn’t feel so visceral. I feel like I’m watching it with wry, almost detached sadness.

      Nor do I have my usual wrenching if only feeling. Bean’s right: I can’t turn back time. I can’t wish it all away.

  The world is as it is. And I have to move on within it. Which will be good. It will be good. I take a deep breath, feeling my whole body galvanize itself. I just need to be myself: Effie Talbot. Or maybe a new, improved Effie Talbot. Not a child crying about her parents anymore. Not the little one. But maybe the one who steps up to the plate. Who takes on responsibility.

  My eyes slide over to Bean, still asleep in a hump under her duvet, and on impulse I get out my phone. I’m going to order her some vitamins. There. Already, I’m taking action.

  I log on to a health-store website and am immediately baffled by the choice. What vitamins do people need, anyway? What’s chelated? What’s the difference between magnesium citrate and magnesium taurate?

  I’ll ask Bean.

  No, wait, don’t be stupid, I can’t ask Bean.

  I scroll through a bit more, then decide on a supplement called Super Skin Radiance. You can’t go wrong with Super Skin Radiance, can you? I pay for my purchase, feeling a glow of satisfaction, then look around Bean’s room to see how else I can help her. Maybe I’ll tidy up a bit. There’s a little suitcase on the floor, which Bean must have brought for the weekend, and some clothes have spilled out of it. I’ll sort those.

  Silently, I get out of bed and start folding up clothes. I’ll put them into her wardrobe, I decide. But I’m just carefully tiptoeing over to it when my foot catches on the open case and I crash onto her bed.

      “Ow!” She turns, still half asleep.

  “Sorry!” I whisper. “Didn’t mean to wake you. Go back to sleep.”

  “What are you doing?” says Bean blearily.

  “Helping you. Tidying.”

  “Well, don’t,” she says venomously, and turns over, pulling her duvet around her.

  OK, maybe I’ll put the tidying on hold for now. I’ll return to my original plan for this morning: finding my Russian dolls. I reach for my clothes, then recoil and decide to borrow some clean ones of Bean’s. As I search in her wardrobe, making only the tiniest of rattling noises, she opens her eyes and gives me a resentful stare.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to look for my dolls,” I whisper, pulling on a pair of her jeans. “Shh. Go back to sleep.”

  “What if you bump into Dad or Krista? Or Lacey? She’s sleeping in the turret room, by the way.”

  “Yes, I guessed she would be.” I nod. “And I won’t bump into anyone. I’m going round the attics. I might have hidden them up there and forgotten.”

  “OK, well, good luck.” Bean turns over as I pull down the loft ladder. “Don’t get caught.”

  Get caught? Not a chance. As I mount the ladder, I feel springy and determined. I roam around each attic in turn, peering into cases and into dark corners and under old, broken chairs. And all the time, my mind is on Joe. I just can’t help thinking about him.

      Last night was a revelation. I always knew Joe kept a part of himself tucked away, protected from outside scrutiny. But I never realized there was an anxious core to him. I’m still slightly stunned by this news.

  How many versions are there? I find myself wondering. How many Russian dolls are locked away inside the Doctor of Hearts? What does he still have hidden? And what was he about to tell me last night?