When I wake up, the light in the Rabbit Hole looks weird, and I have no idea what time it is. I check my watch, and I’m flabbergasted to see it’s late morning. I’m usually up at sunrise with William, both to keep an eye on him and out of habit, all those mornings opening my store. Now I realize why I slept so late: The basement window is completely blocked by snow. The Rabbit Hole is almost as dark as if it’s night.
It also sounds like it’s trying to take off. The whole house is. The wind out there is so crazy it’s like I’m standing right next to a jet engine, not that I’ve ever flown, only heard them on TV. I thought I’d experienced blizzards in Augusta, but I’ve never heard anything like this.
It’s not the wind screaming that woke me, though. It’s William and Sam Vetiver, and it sounds like they’re having one motherf*cker of an argument. I can hear them even over the storm. I crawl out of my sleeping bag and tiptoe through the storage room, all the while happily imagining what Sam Vetiver could have done to p*ss William off so much.
But when I pop out into the basement I almost die, becausethey are right there. William and Sam Vetiver, coming out of his study. William’s face is turned away from me, he’s saying something to her over his shoulder, or he’d see me. I drop and push myself back into the storage room, my heart pounding in my mouth. Jeez. No wonder I could hear them. They were only feet away.
And wait. Sam Vetiver was in thestudy?!?!?!?!I have to admit I’m impressed. I’ve heard them talking about it, William lecturing Sam Vetiver,in that very solemn you-must-not-play-with-matches voice you use with a toddler, how she is never to go in there, ever. What a breach it would be of his priceless privacy. An assault on his creativity. And so on. And Sam Vetiver agreeing, meek as a Mormon wife,I hear you, William. I’m a writer too. I get it. Which, I realize now, is not the same as her promising she won’t do it. Maybe she has more in common with Mormon wives than I thought, because I bet under those skirts and head coverings are some bad-@$$ b*tches.
“I will not tolerate snoops,” William is saying. From behind a Flat William’s butt I watch him deposit his axe against the log rack and head toward the stairs. Since he has an actual furnace there really is no reason for him to chop so much wood, but William loves being a big man with an axe. “I was very clear about what will happen.”
“I know,” Sam Vetiver whines, following him. “I already said I’m sorry. What do you want me to do? I’d say it a hundred times if it’d help—”
“That won’t be necessary,” says William, stomping up the steps. “In fact quite the opposite. What I require now, Simone, is space. For my temper to come down. I won’t take responsibility for what might happen otherwise.”
“But—” Sam Vetiver says, as they reach the top of the stairs, and I think, Don’t argue with a man with an axe, girl.
“What. Did. I. Say,” he says. “You’re not listening.” And then the kitchen door slams and the argument continues above, muted now by the jet plane wind.
Huh. I sit back on my heels. This should be one of the best days of my life. Sam Vetiver going in William’s study is a dealbreaker, so soon she’ll hit the road. Forever! So he’s said.
Then again, he’s broken a lot of his own rules for Sam Vetiver. I don’t trust it. Or her.
And something else is bothering me. What is it?
What was she doing in the study?
Then it comes to me, and I want to smack myself in the face. DUH! She was trying to get into William’s laptop. There’s nothing else in there. I know because I’ve been in multiple times. Of course, Sam Vetiver was probablylooking for something other than I would—like trying to break into his social, see if he’s writing to other women. Which I’m sure he is, or would’ve been before Sam Vetiver moved in here. Spinning his pretty webs of words.
But I know something else to look for. Something that will end this whole situation right now. The solution to the Sam Vetiver problem. I’m such a dum-dum. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before. I’ve been trying the same old strategy I did with the others, but this has been in my face the whole time. Sometimes things are so obvious you can’t see them.
The final piece of the puzzle snaps into place.
I count to one hundred, then two hundred, then dart into the study.
Aside from William’s big wet boot prints on the floor, the room looks as it always does. Neat. Tidy. Weirdly sterile. The award on the desk. William and Pen on the wall.
And the laptop in the center of the desk, gleaming.
I flip up the lid and get the home screen with the passcode bar.
I don’t bother with William’s birthday, though I know what it is. That’s too obvious. I don’t try Sam Vetiver’s, either.
I start with his ego.
The other birthdays. The important ones. His book birthdays. His pub dates.
I’ve memorized them all. I start with just digits, then spell out the month names, proceeding methodically. I try the latest book first,Lambent Souls, and work backward, but the whole time I’m thinking of William’s first bestseller. And Becky. Poor dead Becky.
She was the only sort-of friend I ever had. I wasn’t very good at making friends. I’d never gotten much practice. Having the girls at your school call you the Human Can Opener or guys finger-f*ck you in a men’s room doesn’t do much for your people skills. But Becky and I got to know each other a little, and it wasn’t because we were the quietest and least hot women at Harrington, according to the Pig Scale. It was because of what happened in her workshop.
Which was what happened to everyone: She was massively humiliated. Her story was picked apart like a rotisserie chicken and called contrived andartless, and William tossed his copy onto the floor and said “Maybe I just don’t understand plebian stories meant to appeal to the masses, but this is literary drool,” and afterward, when everyone left to go to the Castle, Becky crouched on the floor, picking up her pages. Some of them had footprints on them.
I noticed she was crying, so I said, “Do you want some help?”
And she said, “No, that’s okay, thanks. I’m just being a big baby because it’s my birthday.” I stood there a minute more because I wasn’t very good at birthdays either, never having celebrated my own, but I knew you shouldn’t leave a person crying on the floor, especially on that day. So I helped her gather up her story, and then I said, “I have an idea, if you want to come with me.”
We went to the CamCo, and I used the last of my food points to buy a flat of cupcakes from the day-old table. It meant I wouldn’t eat tomorrow, but the dining hall dumpsters were full of perfectly good scraps, you wouldn’t believe how much food students waste. I held the cupcakes out to Becky and said, “I hope you like vanilla.”
