“She what?” I demand. I half rise out of my wicker chair. “What you do mean, Whitney Court isn’t dead?”
Mrs. Congreves just looks at me.
“If Whitney Court isn’t dead, then why is there a memorial scholarship named for her?” I ask, baffled.
Mrs. Congreves is still pressing her lips together like she’s trying to keep herself from talking. But she opens her mouth enough to say faintly, “I don’t think it’s called a memorial scholarship, exactly.”
Is she right? I remember that it was listed only as “The Whitney Court Scholarship” on both the information sheet that Ms. Stela put directly in my hand and the one I got from Ms. Darien, along with everyone else in AP lit class. There was no “memorial” in the official name. But I thought that was just another of Ms. Stela’s careless mistakes.
Didn’t the description of the scholarship say it was “in memory of” Whitney? I wonder.
Or was the wording more like, “in honor of Whitney Court”?
I can’t remember. I start shaking my head, just like Mrs. Congreves.
“Okay, I am totally confused,” I admit. “If Whitney Court didn’t die, then why’s there a scholarship in her name, whether it’s in her memory or her honor or whatever? Why didn’t anything about her current life show up on the Internet when I looked her up? What happened to her?”
Mrs. Congreves has her lips pressed together so tightly now that it seems like it’d take a crowbar to get her to open her mouth again.
“I thought you knew,” she finally mumbles. “I thought you were just being . . . tactful.”
“Tactful? About what?” I wail. “Why are you acting so mysterious? What did happen to Whitney Court?”
Mrs. Congreves goes back to shaking her head, more emphatically than ever.
“It’s not really . . . my place . . . to tell you that,” she says.
“Then whose place is it?” I’m almost begging now.
Mrs. Congreves keeps shaking her head. All the warmth has gone out of her eyes.
“You would have to talk to the Courts about that,” she says. “It’s really for the family to decide who they tell and who they don’t.”
She glances at her watch.
“Oh, dear, how did it get so late?” she asks, in a totally different voice than she’s been using with me all along. It’s like she’s not even trying to keep it from sounding fake. “I’m sorry, young lady, but I think we’re going to have to end this. I do have other obligations.”
This from the woman who assured me over the phone when I said I had a lot of questions, “Oh, that’s no problem! I’ve got nothing on my schedule this afternoon.”
“Please,” I say to her. “Please explain.”
“I really can’t,” Mrs. Congreves says, and it’s so odd: For someone who clearly loves to talk, it sounds like she’s relieved not to have to tell me anything else. It’s like a magician’s trick: She may still be sitting right in front of me, but she’s vanished from the conversation.
“Can I show you to the door?” she asks.
She stands up so abruptly, her wicker chair slams against the wall.
I am on autopilot now. I have a moment of flashing back to how I behaved during Daddy’s trial: Stand when someone tells you to stand; walk when someone tells you to walk. Your head may be spinning, but somehow your body can do what it’s supposed to.
Without quite realizing it, I propel myself out of my chair and stumble across the floor. Mrs. Congreves grabs my arm to help me—or, maybe, to make sure I keep moving.
My mind is stuck on repeat: But . . . But . . . But . . .
We reach the front door, and I resist the temptation to brace my feet against the doorframe and refuse to go. What good would that do?
“Good luck with your essay,” Mrs. Congreves says.
And then she gives me a little shove. I stumble out onto the front porch.
She immediately shuts the door behind me.