Unbury Carol(3)

“Farrah.”

“The maid girl?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think I agree. You tell her and everybody’s going to know.”

“So what?”

“Well, it’s you who keeps it secret. I’m just thinking of you, dear.”

But he wasn’t. Carol could tell.

“Farrah is perfect,” Carol said. “She’s bright. She’s kind. And she’s close.”

“Her husband, Clyde, is a drunk. Loose lips.”

“Well then, that’s how it will be. And everybody will know.”

“Are you…are you sure?”

“Yes.” She thought of John Bowie. Whereas Hattie thought it wise to keep it a secret (they’ll take advantage of you, Carol, men from the Trail), John encouraged her to let everyone in: In the end, people are kinder than you think, Carol. Even the ones you thought were not. “Yes. I’m absolutely sure.”

But Dwight could tell she wasn’t. Carol had suggested others before.

As the coach rolled rocky over stones in the road, Dwight adopted a more serious posture. He placed a hand upon hers.

“Do you…feel it coming on?”

Some of the steam of the argument was released. Dwight sounded concerned after all.

“I don’t know.”

They rode in silence with this between them: the knowledge that Dwight believed her comas were caused by stress. Her many adamant refutations that they were not.

She’d gone under when Hattie died, yes, but she’d also gone many times when, it appeared, life was fine.

Home, inside, the discussion picked up again.

“Do you plan on telling her yourself, tonight, on your walk through the garden?”

Dwight removed his suit coat and hung it in the foyer closet. Carol crossed her arms. Her eyes, damp with half-shed tears, reflected the lit candle on the credenza.

“How about this,” she said. “If I haven’t told Farrah by the next time I go under, I’d very much like you to tell her.” She nodded. As if Dwight telling Farrah was easier than Carol doing it herself. Because, after all, it was. “You can bring her into the bedroom and show me to her in person. Have her feel my pulse. Show her how…dead I am. And yet…still living.”

Dwight nodded. This was more like Carol. Unsure after all.

“I promise,” he said. He wondered if Carol heard humoring in his voice.

“The next time it happens, let Farrah in.”

“I promise.”

Then, for Carol, the front door beyond her husband rippled. A slight rising wave from bottom to top.

She heard the hoarse breathing of Howltown.

Ripples didn’t always mean the coma was coming, but no coma had ever come without them.

“Maybe you should take it easy tonight,” Dwight said. “No walk.”

Carol saw real concern on his face. She stepped to him and kissed his forehead.

“Don’t plan so much, Dwight.” She placed a fingertip between his eyes. “It’s as if you’ve got an entire scene in there, the way things are supposed to play out, and you don’t want anything to change that.”

Dwight half smiled. “Just worried, dear.”

Carol left the foyer and found Farrah in the parlor.

“I’m sorry,” Farrah said. “About your friend.” By the way Farrah was doing nothing in the parlor, not a strand of her brown hair out of place, Carol understood that she’d been listening to the discussion.

How much had she heard?

“Let’s walk,” Carol said, and her voice betrayed her sorrow. “The air will do us some good.”

Outside, the sky was graying, but enough blue endured to show the pair the paths that wound through the perennials, the fruit-sprouting shrubs, the primary colors of the Evers estate. This, Carol knew well, was “the sweet time.” For as wonderful as the flowers looked under the sun, there was no debating the beauty of the grounds by storm.

And a storm, Carol saw, was coming.

“Carol,” Farrah said, and Carol knew what the girl was going to say. “I confess I overheard some of your conversation with Mister Evers.”

Pebbles crunched under Farrah’s plain shoes and Carol’s boots.

“Yeah? And what did you hear?”

Carol wanted Farrah to have heard it all. Then, just as suddenly, she didn’t.

“Only…a handful of words.” Farrah stopped walking and breathed deep. “I heard you telling him that it was time you told me…something?”

Carol stared long into the girl’s face. Her wide brown eyes spoke less of wonder and more of youth.

“Yes,” Carol said. “But maybe…not just yet. Let’s walk.”

Carol then sensed the ripple coming strong and looked up, expecting to see it inches from her eyes.

“Carol?”

“I feel a little strange,” she said as the pair reached the bottom of a limestone stairwell.

“Carol, we ought to bring you back inside if that’s how you feel.”

Carol raised a flat palm. “Not in peril, Farrah. Just…odd. Sad for my friend John.”

Farrah looked to her lady’s face, and Carol felt her looking. The girl was as sweet as a range rider brownie, Carol liked to say, and as much a friend as any in her life. Maybe, Carol weighed, it was time, the perfect time to tell her.