The Winters(45)

As I approached the third-floor landing, something was off. I thought perhaps I’d gone up the wrong way, that I’d stumbled upon a previously unseen level of Asherley, because though the gallery felt familiar, it was empty, cavernous, the walls scattered with dark red squares. Every single picture of Rebekah had been removed, every glamour shot, every sweetly posed close-up, every picture of her embracing Dani, their hair twining together, each was gone, leaving behind a shadow where the sun hadn’t hit the walls for years.

My stomach turned. Had Dani finally obeyed Max’s request, one he’d made even before I arrived at Asherley? Why this change and why now? Did this bode well for us or not? I could hear music coming from behind the door that led to the turret, a sort of tinny synth with a bass like a heartbeat, not loud, just insistent, like a faraway nightclub. I placed my hand on the knob and turned it, giving the door a little shove. It opened easily. Now the music got louder, bouncing off the walls of the spiral staircase. I was also hit with the smell of pot, my memory flashing to my roommates’ parties, when I’d walk in to a wall of smoke after my shifts. I didn’t know what to expect with a stoned Dani; she was bad enough sober.

My voice cracked when I called her name once, twice. I couldn’t quite muster the nerve to project my voice over the music, afraid of her still. I gently stomped my feet as I went up the first few steps, hoping this would announce my arrival.

It worked. She poked her head out the door at the top, then flung it open, not remotely concerned that she held in her hand a lit joint.

“Hey, you! Wait, wait.” She aimed the remote in her other hand over her shoulder to turn down the music. She was wearing the same flimsy nightie she’d had on the first time she confronted me at the top of the stairs.

“Come up.”

My feet were frozen on the steps.

“I don’t want to bother you, Dani. But I texted you to tell you tomorrow—”

“Come on, seriously,” she said, beckoning me with an arm. I took a tentative step up. “You know you want to.”

She was definitely stoned. I took a deep breath. I’d make it brief, then leave. As much as she was right about my curiosity, this wasn’t the time to take a tour.

To cover up my nervousness, I spoke as I marched up the rest of the stairs with as much confidence as I could rally. “I just wanted to tell you the bridal shop called and there was a cancellation so I have an appointment tomorrow afternoon if you still want . . . to . . . come . . .”

The room rendered me momentarily speechless, its majesty closing in around my shoulders. It was white and round, with curved, crisscrossed beams up above, as if we were suspended in a giant birdcage. The bed in the middle of the room was covered in clouds of white pillows, with a lamb’s-wool throw tossed across it, punctuated by a circle of peach fuzz curled in the center: Maggie sleeping. The bed was perched on a platform, as though just sleeping in here was an event. Around us were a dozen windows, each black with night, adding to the sense of disorientation, of not knowing which way was the sea, which the forest.

“It’s . . . stunning.”

It was, to be sure, the most beautiful room in the house. But why wouldn’t it be? Rebekah had designed it for herself, and of course for Max. Dani watched me as I walked over to the bed, my fingers moving slowly across the thick wool throw. Max once slept here. With her. They made love on this bed. She got ready at that dressing table with the blue satin skirt. He adjusted his ties behind her in that mirror.

My handed drifted to Maggie.

“Ack. Don’t wake the baby,” Dani said. Her face was garishly made up, her eyes weighed down by fake eyelashes. She took a final hit, struggling to focus.

“I only came to tell you about the appointment,” I said.

“Come on. You’ve wanted to come up here since you got to Asherley. You even tried the door a few times.” Her tone was confusing, both seductive and accusatory. She gave me a self-congratulatory shrug. “I baby-powdered the knob.”

This proved I wasn’t paranoid. She was not only watching me, she was setting traps.

“Yes, well, I was probably looking for you,” I stammered.

“Sure. I get it. I understand a lot about a lot of things, you know.”

She sauntered over to the dressing table and stabbed out what was left of her joint into an open jar of face cream, then gulped back what was in the coffee mug—wine, likely, from the fermented smell in the air. The dressing table was covered in makeup, the tops missing from lipsticks, broken clamshell compacts strewn about, potion bottles of varying heights and purposes like a tiny crowded cemetery. This was old makeup, dusty, probably Rebekah’s, some of the colors nearly used up. Her hand hovered over a clutch of lip colors, their tips glistening. She plucked a red shade from the crowd.

“Dior named this one after my mother. It’s called Rebekah’s Red,” she said, dramatically rolling her r’s.

She pressed it to her lips, smearing it over a pinker color, then handed it to me. “Go ahead. I want to see what it looks like on you.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Pleeease. I’m just trying to get to know you. We’re just hanging out. Like girlfriends.” She took my hand and placed the lipstick firmly in my palm and lifted the stick to my lips. “Go on.”

I was sickened by her strange prompt, but I gave my lips a few weak dabs with the flattened tip so as not to set her off.