Lucy decides to stay for dinner. Camila has made us steaks with a side of mashed potatoes and asparagus. Graham and I are seated across from each other, and Lucy is between us, at the head of the table.
“Graham,” Lucy says, “did you have a chance to see
The Ivory Castle?”
Graham’s eyes light up. “I did. It was great, wasn’t it? A haunting performance by Higgins.”
I slice into the filet mignon Camila has placed on my plate. She said that they were cooked medium rare, but as the butter knife slices through the meat, it looks much closer to rare. It’s outright bloody. But Lucy and Graham don’t seem bothered by it. Maybe Graham likes his steak rare. How would I know—this morning, I couldn’t have even told you his name.
“I thought Charlie Devine was amazing as Roger,” Lucy says. “He is such a great actor.”
“It’s a shame about his personal life,” Graham says. Lucy giggles. “Do you believe those rumors?”
“Hard not to…”
The two of them chatter on about this actor Charlie Devine, who I never even heard of, and some rumor about him and some other actress I also never heard of. I don’t have any hope of participating in this conversation. So I mostly focus on eating my mashed potatoes and asparagus. And also, eating the part of my steak that isn’t still mooing. Mostly the edges.
“Camila is a gem,” Lucy comments as she nibbles on a stalk of asparagus. “Every time I’ve eaten here, I feel like I’m at a Michelin star restaurant.”
“I know.” Graham sips from the glass of wine he poured for himself. He’s the only one drinking alcohol—Lucy and I are just having water. “She’s worth her weight in gold. Don’t you think so, Tess?”
Those are the first words he said to me since I sat down. And he’s only including me to be nice. How would I know how good Camila is? I just met her this morning. “Yes…”
“If not for her,” Graham continues, “Tess probably would have set the house on fire by now.”
Lucy laughs, but I don’t appreciate the joke. “No, I wouldn’t,” I protest.
Graham chuckles. “Come on.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” I shoot back. “I would be fine by myself here all day. I wouldn’t set fire to anything. I would be fine.”
“Right. Sure. You’d be fine.”
I don’t appreciate the sarcasm in his voice. “What do you think I’m going to do? I might not remember yesterday, but I know how to work a stove. I know how to walk Ziggy around the block. You really think I can’t be by myself?”
“No,” Graham says patiently. “I don’t think that you can’t be by yourself. I know you can’t be by yourself.”
I look over at Lucy for help. She has made herself busy spearing one of the chunks of steak that has been shredded by the butter knife. Presumably, I am not to be trusted around steak knives.
“Lucy,” I say. “You spent the entire afternoon with me.
Do you think I would do something dangerous?”
Lucy sighs and puts down her fork. She reaches for my hand across the table. “Tess,” she says. “What’s the difference, really? Camila is amazing. Is it so horrible to have her around?”
I think about the locks on the front and back doors. The ones trapping me inside my own house. Then I think about the ten seconds when I was walking Ziggy, and my brain shut down and went to a completely different place. A
“seizure.” My skin starts to crawl and I snatch my hand out from underneath Lucy’s.
“This wine is unbelievable.” Graham swishes the red wine around in his glass, apparently done with this line of conversation. “I got it at Martha’s Vineyard.”
I think of the Cabernet, which was the last wine I remember drinking before this happened to me. It was the most expensive bottle of wine I’d ever had, but I suspect it was far cheaper than whatever Graham is drinking now.
“It has an earthy aroma, almost smoky,” he says. “And it has a soft, smooth mouth feel.”
What the hell is a mouth feel? Doesn’t all wine feel the same in your mouth? I mean, they are liquids.
I wish Harry were here. He would be poking me and whispering jokes about Graham in my ear. And laughing about “mouth feel.”
“It’s delicious,” Graham says.
Lucy reaches over and picks up his glass of wine. She takes a sip. “It is a bit smoky. Not bad.”
They share a look, and my stomach turns cold. That whole exchange was strange. She just picked up his glass of wine and drank from it like nothing. You don’t do that with somebody unless you know them very, very well.
Is it possible something is going on between Lucy and Graham?
No. Not possible. I have no idea what Graham is capable of, but Lucy would never do that to me.
I try to push my suspicions out of my head. I reach for Graham’s wine glass. “Let me try.”
Before I can wrap my fingers around it, he snatches the glass away from me. “Sorry, Tess. No alcohol for you with your brain injury. Could be dangerous.”
“What’s it going to do?” I say. “Wipe out my memory?
Oh, wait.”
I look over at Graham, who is raising his eyebrows at me. That’s when I notice that my speech has become
slurred. I reach for my water glass and take a gulp of the liquid. My head is starting to feel foggy. Much worse than earlier in the day.
“Tess?” His eyebrows knit together. “You getting tired?
Time for bed?”
“I’m fine,” I try to say, but my words are still slurred. Oh God, what is happening to me? “Just… a little… tired.”
Lucy’s chair scrapes back against the floor. “I should get going anyway. It’s getting late.” She reaches for my hand again and gives it a squeeze. “It was so good seeing you today, Tess.”
I still have about half of my steak left on my plate, but I’m too tired to even contemplate the effort of trying to slice and chew that bloody thing. Graham helps me out of my chair, and he leads me in the direction of the stairwell. I try to lift my leg to climb the stairs, but it feels impossible. My legs feel like they weigh a thousand pounds.
“Come on, Tess,” Graham says. “Up you go…”
I don’t know if I was able to do it last night, but I can’t do it tonight. After a few tries, Graham puts his arm under my legs and hefts me in his strong arms. He carries me up the stairs and down the hall to our bedroom. He deposits me gently on our queen size bed. It’s almost sweet and romantic until he comments:
“So you really think you’re totally independent, huh?”
He’s being a smart ass, but I don’t have the energy to reply. He rummages around in my drawer and pulls out a night shirt. He helps me take off my sweater and put on the night shirt. Then I shimmy out of my jeans. The effort it takes me is almost superhuman. I end up needing Graham to pull them off my feet because I can’t do it on my own.
“Thank you, Graham,” he says.
I try to mumble thanks, but it probably doesn’t even resemble a real word. I lie down in the bed and pull the covers over me. And then I pass out.
