Chapter 12 #2
Jonah put his free hand at her waist. She leaned toward him and when the man said he had taken three because someone always shut their eyes, she laughed. Lorraine asked to see them, examined the screen, and handed it to Summer for her approval.
The photograph was crooked, the window behind them reflecting other guests and a blur of lights. Her head was near Jonah’s shoulder. She bent closer to see his smile, as familiar as it had looked across their kitchen.
“Send me that one,” she said. Lorraine promised, then was called away before she could do it.
They moved into the refreshment room and found space near a window.
Summer put her bag on the sill, folding the wrap beneath it, and held her glass while Jonah brought them each a small plate.
The food was arranged along the long table, the sweets still covered farther down.
She could see the corners of her boxes beneath the sideboard and made herself look back at her husband before he caught her checking them.
“Try this,” Jonah said, handing her the plate. “Tell me if that’s cheese or something I ought to recognize.” He waited while she tasted the little tart, then took the last piece when she said it was good.
She took another pastry from his plate. They talked about the costumes around them. A man dressed as a naval officer had spent so long attempting to remove one glove that Jonah was beginning to watch with genuine concern.
Kylie passed through the hall doorway with a stack of folded programs. Lorraine was with her, pointing toward the ballroom.
They stopped beside a man Summer did not know, and Kylie handed him the programs while Lorraine explained something with both hands.
Summer watched until Jonah asked whether she wanted another piece of pastry, then looked back at her plate.
“No, thank you.” She drank more of the wine instead. There was still some left, though she could not remember how much had been in the glass when Kylie gave it to her. Jonah’s red wine was nearly finished. He set it on the sill beside their empty plates and reached for a napkin.
“I should have brought water,” he said. “Do you want some?” He had already turned slightly toward the bar when his father appeared in the ballroom doorway, holding the microphone with the resigned expression of a man who had been given an object because it had stopped working.
“Will you look at this?” he asked Jonah. “It was fine when we tried it earlier.” He pushed a switch and the room answered with a brief, unpleasant squeal.
Several people looked around. Jonah took the microphone, glanced toward the ballroom, then back at Summer. “Two minutes,” he said. “Don’t let anyone give you a box to carry.”
“Go.” She waved him away with her free hand.
“I’m going to stay here and drink what I’ve got.
” She watched him follow his father through the doorway, amused by how readily people assigned him things they wanted made to work.
She leaned against the sill while his father pointed out the sound equipment.
For a little while she stood beside the window and watched the room.
Her reflection was faint against the dark glass, a suggestion of pale skirt beneath the lights behind her.
She put the wine down beside the plates and pushed her loose hair back from her face.
The room did not seem airless enough to account for the sudden closeness at her throat.
She touched the lower edge of her mask. It was not tight. Nevertheless she lifted it away from her cheeks and let it settle again, hoping for a small movement of cooler air. Across the room someone laughed, and the sound seemed to arrive separately from the expression that had produced it.
Summer blinked and looked down at the sill. She’d eaten soup before leaving, then the tart here; she couldn’t blame an empty stomach. She reached for her bag and missed the strap, her fingers landing on the folded wrap instead.
She picked up her bag. The wrap slid against the sill, and she caught it before it fell, annoyed by the effort this required.
At the ballroom doorway she could see Jonah beside his father, listening to a man pointing toward the small sound console.
He had put the microphone down. There was no reason to interrupt him because she needed to take off her mask for a moment.
She made her way toward the hall. A waiter collected the plates and glasses from the sill as she left, and she was briefly relieved not to have abandoned something somebody else would need to tidy.
The relief was absurdly large. She stopped just outside the refreshment-room door and tried to decide whether she wanted the bathroom or merely a chair.
“Summer?” Kylie had come from the front room and was looking at her. Her own mask was pushed up on her forehead again, leaving her face easier to read. “Are you all right?”
“A bit hot.” Summer heard how unconvincing it sounded and tried to smile. “I think I need to sit down somewhere quieter.” She looked toward the front room, but the coat rails and people waiting between them left little room for anyone to sit.
“There’s the room upstairs.” Kylie came closer without taking her arm. “The one with the sofa. Do you want me to come with you?”
Summer nodded. Five minutes there would be better than trying to feel normal while people moved around her. She took the banister in one hand and gathered her skirt with the other, her bag looped over her wrist and the wrap held against it.
They went up slowly. Summer could place her feet where she meant to, but she disliked looking down the staircase, and kept her eyes on the next tread instead.
Kylie stayed beside her, matching her pace.
At the turn Summer stopped to let a man descend, then remained still for another breath after he had passed.
“Do you want Jonah?” Kylie asked. She was watching Summer now with a seriousness that made the question sound more alarming than it should have.
“Yes. He’s with his father by the music.” Summer turned her head toward the voices below, then looked back at Kylie. “Would you tell him where I am?”
“Of course. Let’s get you sitting down first.” Kylie went ahead at the top and turned right, holding open the sitting-room door while Summer came in.
The armchair was empty now, and both lamps were still on.
Summer crossed to the blue sofa beneath the window and sat carefully, glad to have something firm beneath her before she had to explain how she felt.
She set her bag and wrap beside her. Her fingers found the ribbons behind her head, but the knot was harder to distinguish by touch than it had been in the bathroom mirror.
Kylie asked if she wanted help. Summer said yes, and a moment later the pressure left her face and Kylie put the silver mask on the low table in front of her.
“Better?” Kylie asked. Summer could see the creased end of the ribbon lying near the base of a glass. It was a relief to look at something so easily recognized.
“A little.” She tried to sit straighter and found she preferred the support of the sofa back. “Please get him.”
“I’m going now.” Kylie took her own bag from beneath her arm and went to the door. She left it partly open behind her, narrowing the light from the corridor without shutting it out. Summer listened to her steps moving away, then took her phone from her bag.
She opened Jonah’s messages and typed that she was upstairs. She added, In the sitting room. Not feeling well. Please come. After sending it she kept the phone in her hand, looking at the last line while the screen dimmed and brightened beneath her thumb.
There was water on the table, but leaning forward to reach it seemed likely to undo the little steadiness she had found.
She would ask Jonah when he came. Below her the music stopped, and a voice began speaking through the microphone, clear enough that she knew he must have got it working.
She tried to follow the first sentence, lost it, and let her head rest against the sofa. She couldn’t seem to keep it up.