Nick was there but disappeared. I tried to recapture him, I wanted to feel his hair.
David was back, and apologetic. It was always you. I didn’t want to believe him but he had the most wonderful trick of bringing memories back, things I had forgotten. Here’s my number, he said, and said it fast. I wrote it in pencil on my palm, bearing down hard. He was always so handsome.
A man said something that scared me. I wanted to destroy him. I smiled, turned away, and woke up.
We had made up our minds to go, and we went. It was danger disguised as a funhouse. Kids all around they aren’t old enough to handle this - edebroux was seemingly less afraid than I was, which kind of made me mad.
A decision between two doors. One was for beginning, one was for starting at the end. Usually we went through the right way, but sometimes it was safer to do it backwards. When we got to the school bus we were glad we had gone backwards. A yard full of fenced-in rooms, rather, an immense field with a network of fence. No gates in between. The only way out was to live through each level and go to the next one.
The school bus
was parked and would never move, that much was clear to our minds. Didn’t matter. We got in and were surrounded by crazy movement, blindingly fast, shuddering from side to side, dangerous. We held on to keep from being thrown off, though we could see the scenery wasn’t changing.
It took us to the ship – half a ship suspended in air above a box full of water. We walked up carefully. A boy was playing in the water and I knew he would lose at least one arm.
The woman was defending herself for indecent exposure – she’d raised her skirt on her first court visit. What was she thinking? She claimed she’d forgotten she had her hem in her hand when she reached to touch her mother’s face. Cheers from the crowd. She was only partly embarrassed. When edebroux and I left the courtroom, we knew from the appearance of the doors that the game had gotten more serious, that what we chose might decide our life now.
Back at the school bus, I did something no one else was supposed to see. Under the belly of the bus. There were books there – did I add one of my own? It was against the rules. While I was underneath I tightened the screws. How did the head of the screwdriver keep changing itself to what I needed? I climbed up into the bus, which wasn’t moving yet. Jeannie from ER was there (but I had just been her), leaning over me, her eyes boring in mercilessly. You aren't going to be very truthy for the next few minutes, are you. It wasn't a question. Yes. I could not look at her, I was terrified, she had singled me out. You're missing one lens, she said, and I was. edebroux climbed up and gave me a new pair of glasses. The bus started again.