At Briarwood School for Girls

by Michael Knight

  “That’s not good,” Lenore said.

  “Let’s see if we can’t get you to the bench.”

  A smattering of applause broke out among the players on the court and the couple of dozen spectators in the bleachers as Coach Fink helped Lenore to her feet. She hardly noticed Coach Fink handing her off to the team doctor, Brunhilde Shimmel’s grandfather, a retired podiatrist who lived nearby and never missed a home game. He flicked his penlight across her pupils, patted her knee, then turned away to watch Saint Mary’s kill the clock.

  Lenore was in bed reading The Phantom of Thornton Hall, 10,000 Maniacs jangling in her Walkman, when Coach Fink rapped on the door and pushed it open without waiting for a reply.

  “How do you feel?”

  Lenore pulled the headphones down around her neck.

  “Fine,” she said.

  Coach Fink picked up a can of Diet Coke on the nightstand and glared at the label like she’d caught Lenore red-handed drinking beer.

  “This stuff will eat a hole in your stomach.”

  She disappeared into the hall, still carrying the can, and Lenore returned her attention to the script. The play concerned a boarding-school student named Jenny March—pregnant, scared, confused—who is visited one winter night by the ghost of Eleanor Bowman. Lenore liked how Jenny hardly talked about how she was pregnant and Eleanor never talked about her suicide. They mostly just talked about little things, regular things. Eleanor’s ghost is creepy and sad, but eventually Jenny begins to take a kind of comfort in her presence. Lenore had been assigned the role of Bridget, Jenny’s roommate. Bridget didn’t have too many lines.

  When Coach Fink reappeared, she was holding a paper cup.

  “Drink this,” she said.

  “Now?”

  “I want to watch you drink it. You probably just got dehydrated.”

  Lenore forced the water down, dribbling on her chin. She wiped her mouth on her shoulder.

  “I’m sorry, Coach,” she said. “I wish I hadn’t fainted.”

  Coach Fink’s eyes dropped to the pages in Lenore’s lap.

  “Ah, screw it,” she said.

  She retrieved the cup from Lenore, crushed it into a ball, and with a flick of her wrist sent it spinning into the trash can by the door.

  “Let me ask you something, Littlefield. How do you think the play is looking so far? You think rehearsals are going OK?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Bull dook. We look like hell. There’s something wrong with the lineup, but I can’t figure what it is.” Coach Fink made a bitter face, as if she didn’t like the taste of what she’d just said. “Where’s your roommate?”

  Lenore glanced at Juliet’s bed, neatly made, a stuffed lamb propped on the pillow, so old and well loved its fur was nearly worn away.

  “Watching TV, I think. In the common room.”

  Coach Fink disappeared again, and Lenore lifted the headphones into place and let her eyes fall on the script. There were moments when all the things Jenny and Eleanor weren’t talking about caught her breath up in her throat. She set the script aside and clicked her Walkman off and replaced 10,000 Maniacs with the Cure. A minute later, Coach Fink returned, hauling Juliet Demarinis by the wrist.

  “Do you know what happened at the game tonight?”

  “I have no idea,” Juliet said.

  “Why am I not surprised?” Coach Fink said. “I’ll tell you what happened. Your roommate passed out during a fast break. I want you to stay here and keep an eye on her. If she acts funny, you come and get me. I’m up on Faculty Row, third house from the end. Clear?”

  “Not even a little.”

  Lenore heard their exchange beneath the music, gestures and expressions more pronounced than words.

  Juliet kept her alarm clock on the bureau across the room so she’d have to get out of bed in the morning to shut it off, one of many habits that had gotten under Lenore’s skin. The numbers on the clock flipped like a Rolodex when the time changed, the clock humming for an instant just before the change, as if gathering itself, as if advancing the time required tremendous effort, then rattling as the new minute or hour rolled into place, the sound itself as much a part of Lenore’s irritation as the position of the clock, and though she couldn’t actually hear it, because of the headphones, knowing it was making the sound was almost as annoying as the sound itself. She watched it now, that clock, watched the minutes roll past. Neither Lenore nor Juliet spoke, each in her separate bed.

  They didn’t have anything in common. That was the problem. Juliet was from Albany, Lenore from Charleston. Juliet’s parents had been married forever; Lenore’s parents had been divorced since she was eight. Juliet’s dad worked at a textile plant; Lenore’s dad worked in a bank. Juliet’s mom sold cosmetics out of her car; Lenore’s mom lunched with her friends. Juliet was a scholarship kid; Lenore’s mother and her mother’s mother were steadfast Briarwood girls. Juliet liked Snapple and overalls and Drama Club and Emily Dickinson and Rollerblades and flavored popcorn and stuffed animals, and Lenore liked none of those things. Now Lenore was stuck with Drama Club, and Poppy and Melissa had thirty hours of school service, akin to community service, except that it usually involved some chore like shelving books in the library—one reason it was so hard to find anything in the library when you needed it. On top of all that, because of the cigarette, Poppy was on campus restriction until the end of the year.

  Lenore shut off the music and looked at Juliet.

  “You don’t have to hang around,” she said.

  “Yes,” Juliet said, “I do.”

  “I won’t tell Coach Fink.”

  Juliet swiveled around so that her body was perpendicular to the mattress, facing Lenore. “You know she’s ruining the play. The first time in history The Phantom of Thornton Hall has been performed at Briarwood, and it’s going to be a disaster thanks to her.”

  Lenore didn’t like hearing her coach demeaned, not by Juliet Demarinis anyway, but it was hard to argue with what she’d said. Most of the cast were so intimidated by Coach Fink that they delivered their lines as if reading ransom notes at gunpoint. Juliet was playing Eleanor.

  “She asked me tonight how I thought rehearsals were going.”

  “What’d you say?”

  “I told her they were fine, but she thinks there’s something wrong with the lineup.”

  “The lineup? Did she mean the cast? Does she plan to make a change?”

  Lenore shrugged, savoring her roommate’s panic.

  “Oh God,” Juliet said, bolting to her feet, arms stiff at her sides. “She hates me. She’ll give Eleanor to someone else. You’re her favorite. She’ll probably give the part to you.”

  Now it was Lenore’s turn to be worried. She hadn’t considered that. Eleanor was one of the leads. Juliet bugged her eyes and snapped her fingers, inspiration striking so visibly a lightbulb might have popped into being over her head. She knelt on the floor and reached under her bed, emerging with a long, flat cardboard box.

  “We’ll ask the Ouija board,” she said.

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Do not mock that which you do not understand.”

  “I have a hard time believing that anything sold at Kmart has magical powers.”

  Juliet set the board on the floor between their beds. “The board doesn’t have magical powers. It’s just a conduit. Now get down here. I can’t do this by myself.”

  The board was faux wood grain, with the letters of the alphabet marked in two arches as if branded into the wood. Beneath the letters was a row of numbers, 0 to 9, and beneath the numbers the words Good Bye. In the top right-hand corner, Lenore saw a crescent moon and the word no; in the top left, yes and a sun.

  Juliet said, “Get the overhead, please. And light that candle on my dresser before you sit.”

  Lenore did as her roommate asked, using a book of matches by the candle. When she hit the switch, the effect was less a loss of light than as if all light in the room had concentrated
in the flame. She sat cross-legged like Juliet. Juliet scooched forward so their knees were touching. When they made contact, Lenore felt something like static passing between them, but it was only the prick of stubble on Juliet’s legs. She resisted the urge to flinch, to tease. She had to admit she was intrigued.

  Juliet balanced the board across their knees and held up a triangle-shaped wedge about the size of her hand. Through a hole in the center of the wedge, Lenore could see Juliet’s lips moving as she spoke.

  “This is called the planchette. If you’ve ever seen a horror movie then you know basically how it works.”

  She set the planchette on the board, the hole centered over the letter G, and instructed Lenore to touch it very lightly with her index and middle fingers.

  “You have to be respectful. Empty your thoughts and focus on the planchette. If you can’t be serious, the spirits won’t speak.”

  “I’ll try,” Lenore said. “I’m a little nervous.”

  Juliet smiled at Lenore, a real smile, then shut her eyes. She drew in a deep breath and held it a moment before exhaling.

  “Oh spirits,” she said, “we bring you greetings and good wishes from the living world. We do not wish to disturb your rest. We humbly ask for your help. Are you there, spirits? How many spirits are in this room?”

  The planchette didn’t budge. Juliet’s breath whistled in her nose.

  “Are you there, spirits?” she said again. “We beseech you to make your presence known.”

  This time, Lenore felt the planchette move under her fingers. She watched, heart pounding, as it made its way slowly, haltingly, up and to the right, until it settled over the moon.

  “You’re doing that,” she said.

  Juliet screwed up her face. “The moon means we’re in contact with a good spirit. Show some respect.” She straightened and relaxed her face again. “Oh spirit,” she said. “We thank you for revealing your presence on this night. My name is Juliet Demarinis. With me is Lenore Littlefield. We come to you with matters of concern to us both. What is your name, good spirit?”

  The planchette didn’t move. If Juliet was faking, Lenore thought, she had her routine down pat. She had the undeniable sense that someone was listening. Juliet tried again.

  “Is this the spirit of Elizabeth Archer?”

  The planchette jerked suddenly to the left, stopping over yes.

  Lenore whispered, “Holy shit,” and Juliet wagged her eyebrows.

  “Thank you, Elizabeth. It is a pleasure to be in your company again. Might we trouble you with a question?”

  The planchette skidded in a wide arc left and down and up again to yes. Lenore was sure of one thing: she wasn’t moving it.

  Juliet said, “We wish to know if Coach Fink—” but Lenore cut her off.

  “Wait,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. It just seems like, if this is real, I mean, doesn’t it seem a little silly to ask about the play?”

  “It’s not silly. The play’s about her life. You know Eleanor is based on Elizabeth Archer, right?”

  “I guess,” Lenore said, “but still.”

  “Well, what do you want to ask about?”

  Lenore could imagine a hundred questions, just none she was willing to ask in front of Juliet. Before she could think of anything, the planchette began to move. Down and left to B. Left again to A. Then a slow loop over the board before returning to B.

  “Is that you?” Juliet said. “You better not be screwing around.”

  Lenore shook her head. She couldn’t speak. The planchette inched to the right and drifted down, and Lenore jerked her hands away before it reached the letter Y. She scrambled backward onto her bed, upsetting the board, the planchette clattering under the nightstand.

  “What are you doing?” Juliet said. “She’s trying to send us a message.”

  Lenore said, “No fucking way,” and even after the lights were on, the board returned to its box, the box stowed out of sight, Lenore refused to tell her roommate what had spooked her.

  V

  Bishop avoided the dining hall on Saturday mornings because the girls tended to show up for breakfast in their pajamas. They didn’t seem to mind his presence, but he felt like he was witnessing something private. Instead, he fired up his old Subaru and hung a left after the gatehouse, his dog riding shotgun, his view split by a crack jagging from his inspection sticker down to the windshield wiper on the opposite side. They passed farmhouses with vinyl siding. They passed the place that called itself an antique market but sold mostly junk, novelty ashtrays and colored-glass bottles and board games in tattered boxes. They passed a hair salon in somebody’s garage. They passed three churches. Drive an hour in any direction and you ran across the boom and sprawl of DC bedroom communities or old plantations bought up by movie stars and tycoons, but Bishop knew that history had been less kind to this part of the state.

  Briarwood School for Girls had been founded in 1868 by the Reverend E. Rex Hanover on the estate of his friend and benefactor, the widow Charlotte Brunson, who had lost her husband and her three sons in the Civil War. Those original students received instruction on the first floor of Briarwood Manor, one of only a handful of structures in the vicinity spared the torch when Union troops passed through after Second Manassas. Widow Brunson had earned a reprieve by allowing her home to be used as a hospital. Most everything else in the town of Haymarket had been burned to cinder, every house and every stable, every business and every barn, as the Yankees hobbled back toward Washington.

  They passed a gas station advertising lottery tickets for sale and videos for rent. They passed the new McDonald’s and the old Dairy Queen. They rolled into Manassas—the barbershop, the florist, the funeral home, the Depot Diner. Bishop parked between a sheriff’s cruiser and a custom van with a mermaid painted on the panel, long wet hair covering her breasts. He left Pickett in the car with the window cracked, bought a copy of the Washington Post from the machine outside the door, and took a booth beside the window. The waitress, Regina, was chatting up a pair of sheriff’s deputies.

  “Y’all ever catch those boys,” she was saying, “that sprayed graffiti on the high school?”

  “’Fraid not.”

  “I wonder sometimes what y’all do over there. Do you even bother with police work or do you just come in here to bother me?”

  They laughed and blushed and dropped their eyes, and Regina bumped one of the deputies with her hip. She turned smoothly on her heel, eyes blank for a moment, glazed and bored, then flickering alive again as she scooped a menu from the rack and crossed to Bishop’s booth.

  “Hey, sweetie. Cup of coffee?”

  “And orange juice, please,” Bishop said.

  He watched her move around behind the counter to fill his drinks, her demeanor so blatantly carnal it seemed almost a put-on. The dye job, the short skirt, the tan and freckled cleavage. Her nose was large and hooked, a feature that would have overwhelmed the faces of most women but that somehow, like the figurehead on the prow of a ship, accentuated her allure.

  In the last decade, Bishop had had exactly two romantic relationships, both short-lived, the first with Debbie Wicker, a real estate agent in Manassas, the second with a former colleague, an algebra teacher named Rebecca Flood. He broke it off with Debbie when it became clear she wanted him to marry her, and Rebecca ended things with him when she decided to go back to grad school for her PhD. Neither had lasted longer than ten months. Both had ended amicably enough. He hadn’t heard from Rebecca since she left, but he still sometimes bumped into Debbie, married now, mother of two, and she treated him with fond pity, like a screwup younger brother who had plenty of potential but couldn’t get his act together. They’d met when Bishop had briefly considered buying a house of his own, and whenever they crossed paths, she mentioned a listing or two she thought he might like, but his ambitions toward ownership had faded.

  When Regina returned, he said, “Is that your van?”

 
; She cracked a smile, exposing the gap between her teeth.

  “You like it? My ex gave it up instead of alimony. I like it all right, but I’m still not sure it suits me.”

  Bishop didn’t know what to say to that. He ordered pancakes and bacon in lieu of a reply. Regina left to carry his ticket to the kitchen, and he opened his newspaper—an article about Aldrich Ames, who’d sold state secrets to the Soviets, another about Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding. He wasn’t interested. In the bottom right-hand corner of page three, however, he found an article headlined Reclusive Playwright Breaks Silence to Denounce Theme Park. Apparently, Eugenia Marsh had dashed off an angry letter to the editor, but her star had dimmed enough that it took the staff some time to make the connection between letter-writing crank and winner of the Pulitzer Prize. Now, they were running with the personal angle. There were excerpts from her letter—If we are defined by our past, doesn’t it follow that Disney’s synthetic version of history threatens our understanding of what it means to be human?—but it was not reprinted in full. Of greater interest were Marsh’s long silence and the rumors that she had spent time in a mental institution following the failure of her second play, juicy sidebar material to spice up an otherwise dry debate. Disney CEO Michael Eisner was unavailable for comment, but his media-relations team had issued a statement:

  We are disappointed by Ms. Marsh’s letter but not entirely surprised. Her personal issues are well documented and her unfounded statements situate her among the intellectual elitists who don’t seem to care about the thousands of regular people who will benefit from this project. Governor Allen, along with former Governor Wilder and dozens of local business leaders, recognize that Disney’s America will allow guests to celebrate the diversity of this great nation and to explore the conflicts that have defined our character in a way that is respectful to the past and to the region, while creating sorely needed jobs and investing in necessary infrastructure.

  They’d printed a photo with the piece, an old professional head shot by the looks of it, Eugenia Marsh twenty years ago, with her chin propped in her right hand, a cigarette between her fingers, hair clipped into a bob.