Chapter Nine
CHAPTER NINE
POMPEII TURNED OUT to be more fun than Greg thought it would be. Also, a lot more grim.
“This shouldn’t have surprised me,” he said as they stood before plaster models of people who’d died with their arms raised before their faces.
Shelly advanced to the next exhibit. “Did you not know about the volcano?”
“No, I mean, it shouldn’t have surprised me that you’d choose something dark.” Greg chuckled. “I suggested going out because you’re always so serious.”
She replied, “Next time, suggest something lighthearted.”
Shelly thought there’d be a next time. Take that, Ezra.
The “immersive experience” consisted of a series of rooms they moved through in order. The first two had been a mockup of everyday life in Pompeii, complete with birdsong, a breeze of sea air emerging from a wall projection of the Mediterranean, and a Roman pool. They’d enjoyed mock-ups of Roman mosaics and even a Pompeiian marketplace, plus exhibits of jewelry and Roman clothing. In the background, every so often, Mount Vesuvius had put up a little puff of vapor, and he floor trembled. Immersive, indeed.
Then, between two rooms, was a tiny anteroom where, once the doors locked, the room went pitch black, the floor shook like crazy, and a roar sent Shelly jumping into his arms.
The next room was their current room, the air heavy with mist (one supposed, to mimic the smoky air after the volcano had gone off) and the temperature higher. The lights were red, and all around, were plaster people frozen in the moment of decision.
Shelly paused before two people, one who seemed to be protecting the other. She whispered, “It’s all so fragile.”
Greg said, “The world used to be a lot less predictable.”
Shelly didn’t move away from the two people. They might have been siblings, or lovers, or parent and child. One was shielding the other, but how had they even had the time to do it? Everyone seemed stalled out exactly where they’d been, except for their arms raised in a pugilistic response. Greg had read about that ages ago, how when faced with sudden heat, there’s a reflex to put up your arms.
If anything, that meant this had been sudden. No one would have known what hit them. It would be like him tossing a dough in the air and not being alive to catch it on the way down, and the dough would hit the countertop already cooked through.
Was she seeing herself in the protector, or the one protected?
He nudged her forward to where there was, actually, a loaf of bread. He said, “At some distance from the volcano, there would have been dough that got perfectly cooked.”
She murmured, “Not funny.”
He said, “I tried.”
She said, “Don’t. Some things are meant to be serious.”
They moved through the devastation. Something about the floor made it crunch with each step, as though the ground itself were brittle. The walls shone with projections of lava flows, as did parts of the floor. The audio had gone silent. No birds, no trickling water, and not even any sound from the liquid stone.
Afterward, standing in silence in the exit hall, adjusting to real life again, Greg wondered how long Shelly would want to stay serious, or if he should try cheering her up. She wore a stark silence. They took a quick pass through the gift shop, but how do you buy a t-shirt commemorating the sudden death of sixteen thousand people?
Greg drove Shelly to an ice cream shop he knew, except it was closed for the winter (he should have checked) and then they chose a second which did happen to be open. Shelly still hadn’t said much, so while she worked at her cone, he said, “What are you thinking?”
“How awful it must have been for the people who weren’t there. Like, if you drive back to Hartwell after dropping me off, only Hartwell isn’t there any longer.”
Greg said, “You divide your life between three places, right?”
“Mostly two. I don’t go back home much.” Yeah, Ezra didn’t seem to, either. “But even so.” She frowned. “Now I really want to help Rowan.”
How did it always come back to Rowan? Greg said, “Anything else going on with him?”
“The school is actually doing a little fund-raiser. I think that’s neat.” She looked up. “It’s not for him-for him.” (Contrastive focus reduplication, again.) “More like, they have a school-wide discretionary fund through the PTA where they can choose students who need help. I don’t know how much they’ll get, but it’ll probably pay the electric bill, at least until they get Rowan signed up with some help. They’re doing a bake sale.”
Greg said, “We can make cookies.”
Shelly laughed. “How?”
He said, “How, what? They’re cookies. You bake them, put them in bags, and deliver them. They sell them. They give the money to Rowan’s grandfather.”
She said, “But cookies?”
He hesitated. “Haven’t you ever made cookies?”
A shadow crossed her eyes. She said, a little hesitant, “No?”
His nose wrinkled. “How can you not know how to make cookies?”
She frowned. “And how can you not understand that no, we never did that?”
Oh. They hadn’t had a working kitchen. The oven was busted for years, and their mother didn’t really bring home groceries. If Shelly ever asked to make cookies, or bake brownies, or make a cake, had her mother complained that it would be impossible, not saying it would be impossible for them but not impossible for everyone else?
Shelly said, “If you’re so brilliant, how about this? You come to my house, and we’ll bake.”
Greg said, “Sounds good, but let’s do it at my place since we’ll have the whole kitchen to ourselves. I’ll grab my grandmother’s recipes.” He leaned forward. “What’s your favorite kind?”
“Chocolate cookies with chocolate chips in them.” She giggled. “Guess I didn’t have to think hard about that.”
“You’ve got it.” He smiled, and finally she’d begun cheering up. “When’s the bake sale?”
“Next Wednesday, January 29th. During a basketball game at the school.”
He flashed her a thumbs up. “So, Tuesday?”
Shelly pulled out her phone. “It’s going to snow Tuesday. We should do it Monday.”
“Tuesday will be fine,” he said. “You don’t want the cookies to get stale.”
She paused. “Do they get stale that quickly?”
“Well, no.” He shrugged. “Still, it’ll be fine.”
She tilted her head. “Maybe you should channel your ‘it’ll be fine’ energy into keeping the cookies fresh, and I’ll drive to Hartwell when it’s not snowing.”
He shook his head. “You need to trust me. Come to my house Tuesday. We’ll have butter, flour, sugar, and magic.”
She grinned. “Butter, flour, sugar, magic—and helping Rowan.” She extended her hand across the table and shook his. “You’ve got a deal.”