Chapter 34 #2
Tessa gave Nina a surprisingly hard look. “No, Nina. You love her. But the others think she’s … I don’t know, fickle. That her agenda doesn’t fit with theirs.”
By the look on Tessa’s face, Nina could see she wasn’t talking about someone obvious, like Summer, who even Nina knew wasn’t overly close to Fawn. If anything, Tessa seemed to be suggesting that the person Fawn’s agenda didn’t fit with was Tessa’s own.
“But—” Nina couldn’t think of how to voice her protest. “But I thought—didn’t you say…?” Nothing more dignified came to mind aside from but Daddy I love him!
“Look, compared to the rest of The House, I’ve got some …
particularly charged views about the purpose of the dinner.
” Tessa raised her hands in a portrait of sardonic innocence.
“And there’s probably a reason Fawn chose to invoke them, even though I wasn’t so sure she still agreed with me these days. ”
“But—”
“Maybe she does,” Tessa qualified with a shrug. “Or maybe she has something else in mind, and honestly, that’s her prerogative.” There was an unreadable tone to Tessa’s voice. Or rather, to a less informed ear, it might sound like Tessa harbored some resentment toward Fawn.
“But … you’re friends,” said Nina.
“Yep,” said Tessa. Her voice was edged with something, possibly sarcasm. Maybe disappointment. Maybe Nina had imagined it.
“But sisterhood,” Nina insisted with juvenile fervor, and then Tessa laughed.
“All sisters disagree,” she reminded Nina. “For most of The House, the important thing is the future. Their futures, specifically.”
“But isn’t the future important to everyone?” They’d all chosen the University before they ever chose The House. So wasn’t it obvious they all had aspirations?
“That’s not what I mean. It’s … you know, dogma. The ritual as, like, supplement. A juice cleanse. Some magical alternative to retinol or something.”
Nina made a face. “But it isn’t, because—?”
“You know my feelings on it.” Tessa shrugged. “The violence of the ritual isn’t just some unfortunate side effect. This isn’t a ‘thoughts and prayers’ situation. It’s a choice, which means it can be a meaningful one. It should be; it has to be.”
“But that’s how Fawn sees it, too,” Nina insisted, although in retrospect, she realized that Tessa’s explanation for the ritual on the night of initiation had blurred with her memories of being with Fawn.
Maybe Fawn hadn’t explained what she really felt about the ritual—maybe Nina had drawn conclusions from disparate pieces, unrelated parts.
“It’s more than that, honestly,” Tessa said with a shake of her head. “It’s not like Fawn’s completely uncontroversial. She’s still pretty close to Caroline—”
“Oh,” said Nina. Not that Fawn had any flaws in Nina’s mind, but with a gun to her head—if Nina had to pick one little nit when it came to Fawn’s judgment—The Country Wife was the obvious one.
Nina had scrolled through Caroline’s VidStar feed and marveled for a second at the raw physicality of her own reaction.
A low-boiling knot of rage had formed in Nina’s stomach, one that she couldn’t quite name or identify, so she had simply closed the app and told herself that Fawn was just a proponent of free speech, and anyway, real feminism meant not judging women who lived unconventional lifestyles—right?
The feminist choice was the one that every woman was empowered to make.
(Charitably assuming that Caroline was actually unconventional and not, in fact, the definition of convention itself.)
Something in Nina deflated for a moment, more tired or humiliated than sad.
She had thought of Fawn as a revolutionary, like Tessa.
That belief lived central to the canon of their joining, inseverable from their first meeting (which, Nina realized, was also the result of Tessa).
The more Nina searched her memory, replaying the last few weeks without the rosy veil of longing or things that Tessa had actually been the one to say, the only thing Fawn had explicitly gone to bat for was Caroline—which was either a strategy (depressing) or a personal favor (unbeneficial to The House as a whole; also depressing). What did Fawn actually want?
Nina shook herself. This wasn’t doubt. It was mere … consideration.
“Fawn’s made a lot of enemies over the course of her presidency,” Tessa went on with a grimace.
“She can be … opaque sometimes. It’s hard to tell whether she’ll be on your side or not when it comes down to it.
And she’s definitely had someone in mind for the ritual all year, so maybe this is her way of preempting it. ”
Nina realized there was one other thing aside from Caroline that Fawn had been adamant about—only one thing that she’d brought up multiple times. The ritual, and specifically Professor Villanueva as a candidate. But that was for Nina’s benefit, was it not?
Of course it was. “Isn’t that the whole point of the ritual?” Nina focused on Tessa’s latter critique, having no means to combat the former. “I mean, you said it, right? Justice? It’s not supposed to be just some random, spontaneous luck of the draw—”
“I explained it to you the way that I did because I knew you’d agree with me,” Tessa cut in gently, maybe even regretfully.
“But not everybody does. A lot of the girls want to focus on the first part Fawn talked about at chapter—the meal. Enrichment.” Tessa’s face belied some level of repulsion.
“There’s a reason it’s for the seniors. The meal is what’s most important to them, because for them, it’s their last chance to soak up as many nutrients as possible before they start the next phase of their lives.
But to me, the whole concept of the dinner…
” Tessa trailed off again. “It doesn’t last forever.
It can’t, and it isn’t meant to. Unless you’re willing to risk everything like Caroline, I guess, but even so, it has to be about more than just the meal. ”
Nina frowned. “I don’t understand. You’re saying that—”
“I’m saying that philosophically speaking, half The House would prefer to eat someone young and hot like you than a crusty old white dude, even if he’s actively more of a problem,” joked Tessa.
“To them, the point of the ritual is to take on some of the qualities you consume. Historical societies like the Tupi ate their enemies or even family members from a place of respect. And in terms of reaping a reward, a geriatric liver is less than ideal even if we could eat the Supreme Court. Though,” Tessa continued, “I happen to think there has to be a balance. Ritual aside—assuming for a second this isn’t about some flimsy concept of magic, but about real, actual power—then the decree of judgment needs to matter.
Strategy counts for something. The only thing that changes the system is a threat to the system itself.
“And Fawn … agrees,” Tessa said after a moment’s pause, though she didn’t sound like she’d profess to it in court. “Or seems to. The point is, it’s not that the ritual is either wellness or violence. It can and should be both.”
“But that wouldn’t actually happen,” Nina argued, stuck on the idea of eating someone to absorb their beauty or youth.
It felt cartoonish, vaguely Victorian, distorting the righteous sanctity she’d associated with the hunt.
“Right? Choosing someone young, or even a woman? Like, that’s—” Nina broke off, flustered, and fell back on the sharpest weapon she had the language for, unable to conceive of a more viable string of words. “Like, deeply unfeminist, right?”
“Feminism is a matter of structure,” came a voice behind them. “It’s about institutional resources and opportunities. It’s not some arcane throw pillow that says ‘live, laugh, love.’”
It was Alina, whom Nina hadn’t spoken to all that often since recruitment.
She was looking at Nina with a wry, condescending expression.
“Just wanted to check your vibes on something,” said Alina, addressing Nina with a mere fleeting glance before turning more conclusively to Tessa.
“I’d wait to catch you alone, but I’m pressed for time.
How do you think Sister Serrano would feel about the presidency? ”
“What?” said Nina.
“Slate wants to know,” Alina said in apparent explanation.
So then Alina was on the Slate committee—she was one of the girls tasked with selecting The House’s new leadership, something Nina hadn’t known until ten minutes ago was even relevant to her.
She’d thought Fawn’s second term as president was an obvious lock, a foregone conclusion.
“Alina. Are you serious?” Tessa shot Alina an odd glance. “You’re not trying to humiliate her, are you?”
“Humiliate Dalil?” echoed Nina.
“Come on, Tess,” said Alina, now negotiating with Tessa in some way that Nina couldn’t follow.
“You know I love Fawn—honestly, this is a compromise. It’s still keeping Fawn’s legacy intact.
She can announce she’s going abroad in the spring and use that as an excuse if she’s worried about her reputation.
And Dalil is a perfectly neutral candidate—”
To that, Tessa threw up her hands in apparent repulsion. “Come on, Alina! You know Dalil’s the one person Fawn can’t possibly run against—she’s her Big. And it’s not like Dalil can win against Summer—”
“That’s assuming Summer decides to run if she’s not Slated,” Alina said, cutting Tessa off before her rant could escalate. “And even if she does run, who cares? If Summer runs against Dalil and wins, that’s just democracy, baby.” Alina’s tone was grim.
“But I thought you guys weren’t sure about Dalil,” said Nina, glancing between Tessa and Alina with an utter absence of plot. “Right? I mean, during rush you said that thing about, you know, her social media or whatever—”
She broke off when she realized Alina and Tessa were busy having a wordless argument, one that seemed to have started long before Nina entered the conversation, or even The House.