CHAPTER 74

Nisa took the first few steps of the wide stairway quickly, but slowed as she approached the landing. The memory of the carving returned—that woman being hunted like an animal—and she tightened her hold on the handrail. And then those terrible explosions, like a car crash. For a moment she paused, halfway up the stairs. Below, milky light from the snow outside dissolved the shapes of furniture, doors, walls, until they all disappeared into a blue-gray haze. A cold draft snaked along the staircase, sliding up the sleeves of Stevie’s too-big sweater, so that she shivered. She’d give it back to him, he might want it for himself, skinny wraith that he was.

She recalled the times they’d lain in bed together, skin to skin, Stevie luxuriating in the warmth of her body, his hands tangled in her curls. That was over, she thought, certainly while they were all here together, working. She’d forsake Stevie and anything else, to have the chance to hear herself sing again, as she had in the tower.

As quickly as they’d come, her fears melted away. The house was so beautiful, even now as night filled it. Especially now. What was that line Stevie used to quote to her, whenever she told him his pagan friends were irrational? Something about the mark of true intelligence being the ability to keep two opposed ideas in your head at the same time.

That was what she was doing now. What they were all doing.

She began once more to walk, until she reached the landing. Despite the lack of windows, somehow the same eerie light spilled into the corridor, but gentler now, moonlight on a dark pond. She paced carefully past the doors to Amanda’s room and the one she shared with Holly, the carpet muffling her footsteps as she drew near to Stevie’s room.

Like theirs, the door to his room was shut. Again she halted, listening for any sound inside. Not a peep. He might have his headphones on, listening to a playback of his recording. Or he might be napping. She raised her hand to knock, thought better of it as she glanced down at his baggy sweater, the frayed hem of her short skirt. She’d change first, into something nice. Remind him of what he was missing, even if she had no intention of falling into bed with him again.

She drew her arm to her face. The sweater’s soft wool still held a trace of Stevie’s scent, his acrid sweat and the warmer smells of bay rum mingled with cannabis. Oh, Stevie, she thought, and let her arm drop. Holly smelled sweeter, of musk and salt and burnt sugar. Holly’s mouth would taste of wine and her skin would burn from Nisa’s own heat.

A sound came from somewhere down the hall. A click, followed by a low whir and a voice singing. It was the same song she’d been thinking of earlier, from the empty cassette tape she’d found in the tower. “Sister Europe.”

Nisa yanked her head around and stared at the end of the corridor, where a seam of gray light emanated from beneath the far door. She’d seen Holly close the nursery door that afternoon, heard the latch click with relief.

Now she felt a sharp, electrical urge to walk there, open it and fling herself inside. Like the way she felt sometimes when she was onstage, gazing down at the upraised faces: at the longing and ecstasy they held, rapture or desire that Nisa herself had ignited, that she wanted to leap into, to let herself be swallowed by that sea of yearning. She’d never leapt, of course—folk singers don’t have mosh pits.

And there’d be nowhere to fly inside the nursery.

The singing stopped. Or perhaps she’d just imagined it? Frightened, she backed away from Stevie’s door and quickly walked to her own room. Inside, she turned on the lights, reassured by the ugly, too-bright glow of the incandescent bulbs behind their cheap shades, the scents of shampoo and Holly’s Jasmin et Tabac. She remembered her earlier resolve to dress up before she got Stevie. She’d brought her favorite vintage tunic, purple velvet with silver embroidery and tassels on each sleeve. She tugged off Stevie’s sweater and let it flop onto the floor, pulled on her tunic, black leggings, and purple pleather ankle boots.

She inspected herself in the mirror, swiped on some blusher and touched up her lips with her own rose-pink lip gloss. She couldn’t remember why she’d used Amanda’s earlier. No one had even noticed, except, perhaps, the house itself. Maybe that was reason enough? She brushed her hair, the black curls springing up even as she patted them down, dabbed her throat with her lilac and freesia perfume.

Turning from the mirror, she paused, then stepped to the window to look outside. Snow caked the glass. The cold draft moved the curtain, and she watched how the paper birches tossed in the wind, white gouts falling to the ground beneath them. Something moved among the trees. The boy? The hare? But this was only a hemlock branch, whipping upward as it dislodged its load of snow. Nisa pressed her face to the window, so cold that ice sheathed the glass. She scanned the ground below, but all had grown still, only her breath fogging the pane into ghostly shapes.

Satisfied, she moved away, picked up Stevie’s sweater from where she’d dropped it, and, leaving the light on behind her, returned to his room.

She still didn’t hear anything from inside. Usually, when Stevie played back and edited his recordings, he didn’t wear headphones. Sometimes it sounded like he had an entire party going on behind his door, and occasionally he really did.

But not now. He really must be hard at work, or asleep.

“Stevie?” she called out softly. He didn’t answer. “Dinner’s ready, you want to come down?”

Still no reply. She rapped at the wood, raising her voice. “Hey, Liddell—it’s wine o’clock! Everyone’s downstairs!”

Glancing down, she noticed bright light now glowing from beneath his door, and flickering hints of color. Was he watching a movie? Something he’d downloaded before they left the city?

She cracked the door and peeked inside. Clothes were strewn across his bed, amid rumpled blankets, his empty duffel. His closed laptop sat on top of a pillow. The bedside lamp was off.

But on the far side of the room, beyond the bed, a carnival swirl of light and shadow jumped and receded, like a lava lamp. It seemed to be coming from the floor, its source hidden by the bed. His phone? Some app he was playing? Maybe he did have his headphones on back there.

She knocked again, yelling his name as she pushed the door open and walked inside.

“Stevie! C’mon, we’re—”

It took her a few seconds to find him, once she’d rounded the bed—lying on the floor beside a bureau he’d shoved out of the way. His head was twisted, so she couldn’t see him clearly. Had he fallen, or hurt himself?

“Stevie?” she called, frightened. The sweater slid from her hands to the floor.

He noticed her then, and shouted something unintelligible, contorting himself as he moved away from the wall.

What the hell was he doing?

She felt hot, then cold, mortified: she’d caught him jerking off. She backed toward the door as he lurched to his feet, grabbed his duffel, and threw it against the wall right behind him.

It fell beside the bureau and the room dimmed. But not before Nisa saw the source of the carnival colors: a small gap in the wall, just above the floor. Stevie kicked at the duffel until it slumped firmly against the wall, and the light went out.

He raised his head to stare at Nisa. She couldn’t read his face clearly. Not embarrassment or shame. He looked more angry, and also furtive. High, maybe? His pupils shrunken, dark circles around his eyes.

She pointed to where the light had flickered moments ago.

“What—what was that?”

“Nothing!” He stumbled across the room and pushed her through the doorway, hard. She cried out, his fingernails biting into her arm as he held on to her. “Let’s go.”

She tried to escape but he was too strong. “But what was that?” she demanded, as he dragged her down the hall. “That light? Is something on fire?”

“Nothing is on fire!” His face contorted the way it had when they’d read the scene between Tomasin and Elizabeth. He wasn’t Stevie but some in-between thing. Like the hare, she thought in growing horror. “What the hell is wrong with you, barging in?”

“I knocked! I was shouting at you, you—”

“I was doing yoga.”

“Yoga?” she repeated in disbelief.

“Shut up. Let’s just go.”

They’d reached the top of the steps. Stevie held on to the newel cap, blocking her way so she couldn’t get past him to return to his room. “Let’s just go,” he said again, calmer now.

She waited for him to explain or apologize or laugh it off. But he only remained where he was, breathing hard. Staring at her yet somehow not seeing her. She bit her lip. Stevie was so sensitive, you never knew what might set him off. He might have smoked something stronger than weed or, god knows, taken some psychedelic, thinking it would improve his performance. Such a fucking Stevie thing to do.

She glanced down the hall again to his room. Out of nowhere, she felt that same urgent electricity, a low-level shock pulsing just beneath her skin. Her worry over Stevie’s odd behavior was replaced by an avid curiosity, powerful as the need for a drink or cigarettes.

“I’m sorry I barged in, okay?” She plucked at his sleeve. “I brought your sweater, I thought you might be cold. But I dropped it…”

She smiled at him in apology, pretending that she was looking at the wall, the floor, anything other than what she was intent on: the door to Stevie’s room. She knew him too well—he was hiding something. What?

What does he have in there?

“Don’t worry about it,” Stevie said after a moment. Only it didn’t sound like Stevie, but someone pretending to be him. Like an actor playing Stevie, she thought, even though that was crazy. An actor playing himself.

“Yeah, okay.” She looked at him and smiled, an actor playing Nisa. “We should go downstairs, they’re waiting for us to start dinner. Melissa came by a little while ago and told us about the big storm. Everyone thinks we should leave.”

“I’m not leaving.”

His voice was the same, almost robotic, though now he stared at her with an implied threat. Like he’d hurt her if she tried to make him go. Really?

“Nobody’s leaving, Stevie,” she reassured him, and pushed past him to head downstairs. “We all agree. We’re all finally having breakthroughs here. Maybe we started something this afternoon in the parlor, you and me.”

“That’s good,” he said. “I’d like to think that.” He walked beside her, clinging to the handrail like he might lose his balance as he ushered her down. He took a deep breath, then released it. “Wow. I really am hungry.”

Abruptly he sounded like himself again. Nisa took a few more steps, keeping her face composed and voice steady as she asked, “What was that light in your room? By the floor?”

“Just an app on my phone. I was meditating.”

“I thought you were doing yoga.”

“Same thing.”

She nodded, trying to feel relieved. She’d have to ask him if he’d taken something, once he’d had a couple of drinks. Maybe he’d share with her, later. In his room, where they could watch the light show.

They’d reached the bottom of the steps. Stevie appeared distracted. He looked in the direction of the kitchen, its blade of cheerful yellow light slicing through the darkness, and turned the other way.

“I’ll be right back,” he said, peeling off toward the other wing, where only the blue gleam of the snow filled the dark windows. “Meet you in the kitchen.”

Nisa watched him go.

He was lying.

As he walked away, she’d seen his phone in his back jeans pocket. He hadn’t picked it up from the floor. It had been there all along. That light had come from somewhere else. A crawl space behind the wall?

She dug her nails into her palms in mounting anger. Why had he lied, what was he hiding from her? Something special: something beautiful. They’d always shared with each other, always had so much in common. She and Holly were so different: Holly down-to-earth and ambitious, if often dogged. Whereas Nisa and Stevie were mercurial, their moods prone to change with the light.

Especially here.

And they’d never kept secrets. Not from each other. So why was he doing it now?

She’d see for herself, later. She deserved to have a secret, too.