Frances’s thoughts began to feel muddled. Joan brought an invaluable skill set to the group. Like the ability to make fake IDs. To doctor passports. To create whatever they might need short of forging something in fire. And could still kick ass, apparently.
Exhaustion suddenly moved through Frances. She didn’t know if it was a sudden spurt of cancer growth or Joan’s marijuana, but she was floaty. She felt like her body was on the couch but that she was high above Joan and Irene somehow. At least her head didn’t hurt. She’d read about cancer patients using marijuana for pain relief. Maybe she would move out here to help Joan and smoke the profits until she died. Maybe she would just float off into the ether and people would say,Whatever happened to Frances Deluca?
A sudden slap to her arm startled her to the present. “Frances,” Irene hissed, and nodded to something in the room.
Frances sat up. Mrs. Harris was back with the ginger beer.
Joan handed them mugs of the stuff with a stern look, silently warning them they better drink up. Frances brought the mug toher lips and somehow managed not to gag—she could smell it before she tasted it. There wasn’t even a hint of ginger in that concoction. She could hardly choke it down.
“Well?” Mrs. Harris said once she’d settled into a chair with her mug. “Did you figure out what these ladies want?”
“I did. They would like me to go on a little trip with them.”
“A trip where?”
“They aren’t sure yet.”
Mrs. Harris frowned. “Why don’t they know?”
“It’s a girls’ trip, Mama. We’ll decide if we want to go, then decide where.”
“A swan song,” Frances said dreamily. She smiled and imagined herself floating away, like a swan. Irene glared at her.
“You can’t go now. What aboutLove Island?” Mrs. Harris demanded.
“Huh?” Irene had downed half of the ginger beer, much to Frances’s surprise.
Joan laughed. “We’re in the middle ofLove Island. UK, not US. There’s a difference.” To her mother, she said, “We’ll watch when I get back. If I go, I won’t be gone for more than a couple of weeks.” She looked at the other two for confirmation. They nodded in eager agreement. Frances couldn’t imagine she’d last much longer than that. She wasn’t sure she’d even be upright by then.
“Well, what about me?” Mrs. Harris said.
“I’ll get Norma to come,” Joan said. Frances assumed that was one of Joan’s many siblings.
“Not Norma. She’ll talk my ear off. I want Fred.”
“You said you were done with Fred.”
“Now why would I say such a thing? He’s my son. I want Fred.”
“I’m not even sure I’m going, Mama. I’m mulling it over.”
“I’m going to call Fred,” Mrs. Harris said, and took a flip phone out of the pocket of her skirt.
Flip phone.“Knew there was one in this house,” Frances murmured. No one heard her.
The discussion continued. Frances couldn’t follow any of it. She asked for a bathroom, and Joan pointed toward a hall as she continued to beg her mother not to call someone named Fred.
Frances managed to find the bathroom, but when she came out, she felt even more floaty. What she needed, she thought, was a nap. And she happened to notice a bed through a door that opened onto the hall. Frances walked into the room and looked around. It was dark and cool, and the bed had one of those thick blankets on it. She moved closer, then allowed herself to drop, face down, onto the bed. She giggled. Was she high? This was a terrible breach of etiquette, and if someone did this in her house, she and Marjorie would chew on it for weeks. She was just sosleepy.
Something sticky wet and cold was pressing against the skin under Frances’s eye, and she woke with a start. She cried out with alarm to find someone standing over her and tried to slap the person away before Irene—it was Irene—yelled at her to stop. But she continued to poke Frances’s face.
“What the hell, Irene?”
“Eye patches. You need them. Your bags are awful.”
Frances sat up on the bed, her head spinning. “How long have I been asleep?”
Irene consulted her watch. “Twelve hours?”
