by Nancy Werlin
He shot her an incredulous look, but got willingly to his feet. For the first time Marnie felt his full weight on her shoulders and understood he hadn’t really been leaning on her before. She swallowed. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she registered how very, very dry her throat was. “Come on,” she said to the Elf. She knew now for sure that this was not going to work; they were not going to break the door down. But it didn’t matter.
They threw themselves against it several more times. With each attempt, the amount of force lessened. Impossibly, the door seemed to have gotten stronger. Marnie knew she wouldn’t stop until the Elf said to—and that this wouldn’t happen until he could not get up off the floor, even with her help.
When he finally did collapse, on his knees in front of the impervious door, Marnie—panting, on her knees herself—found she had to turn away, so that she wouldn’t see how his shoulders looked, hunched in defeat.
He surprised her, though, by talking again. “We had to try,” he said, somewhat uncertainly.
Marnie nodded. She looked over at him; his back was to her. She said creakily, “Yes.” Her eyes wandered across the room to the seltzer bottle. She couldn’t see the level of liquid clearly. She licked her dry lips. “Elf? Would you like a drink?”
Silence. She knew he had heard her. Finally he said, his voice as creaky as hers: “Okay. Maybe a little one.” A pause that went on a bit long. Marnie knew he didn’t have the strength to move yet. “In a minute,” he said eventually.
Marnie didn’t feel much like moving either. The seltzer bottle was a few feet away, near the cot. She could crawl there. She thought about that for a while and then suddenly realized she had done it. She was on her hands and knees next to the cot, reaching out for the bottle. Grasping it. She collapsed back onto her heels—realizing vaguely that her feet hurt; she’d scraped them even more raw on the cement floor, and her tights were in pieces around her ankles. She squinted at the bottle, at the water level.
Maybe two inches of seltzer left.
“It’s not much.” The Elf was at her elbow. Marnie turned her head; her eyes were almost level with his. He’d crawled too. His forehead was damp with sweat. Were his eyes looking a little clearer, though? His voice was a mere thread.
Feed a cold; starve a fever. Or was it the other way around? Either way, you were supposed to drink. Her fingers were trembling. She uncapped the bottle and held it out to him.
He didn’t move his eyes from hers. “You first.”
“Oh, no.” The word got trapped in her throat. She had to try again. “No. You.”
After a long moment, the Elf took the bottle and held it up, examining, like Marnie, the level. Still looking at it, not drinking, he said to Marnie, “It’s been a full day since she left us here.”
“No!” said Marnie. “It’s been a few hours.”
The Elf held out his wrist. There was a watch on it. Marnie wondered how she had missed noticing it before. It was the kind with a day and date as well as the time. She blinked in shock. Then she looked up.
The Elf rested the bottle on the floor, as if, even near empty, it was too heavy to hold. “How long between her visits before?”
Marnie knew where he was going. “I don’t know for sure. I wasn’t feeling very well some of the time.” Her hand drifted up to the still-tender lump on her head. Noticing that the Elf s eyes had followed the movement, she pulled her hand away and added quickly, “I think she probably checked in once a day.”
The Elf was looking grim. And tired, and a little crazed. Then his face smoothed out again, became blank. “Do you honestly think she’s coming back?” he asked.
Marnie found that her eyes had fixed on the seltzer bottle. She couldn’t drag them away. She watched the Elf’s hands as he lifted it again. All at once the bottle’s mouth was against her cheek. Her lips. She thought his hands were shaking slightly.
She turned her face away. “No.”
“Just a sip,” he said, still in that rasp.
The bottle was against her face. Its mouth against hers—
“No!” Marnie snarled. She grabbed the bottle, not caring that it meant grabbing his hand as well, and started to push. “Put it away!”
Somehow his other hand was over hers, on the bottle, stilling their battle. He said, “She knows it’s all the water we have, doesn’t she?” When Marnie didn’t answer, he said it again: “Doesn’t she?”
Marnie found she couldn’t actually say yes. “She’s crazy. Maybe she forgot.”
He sighed. “Have a small sip. Please, Marn. Go on. Good. Good girl.”
I’ll good-girl you, Marnie thought. She let the few drops of flat seltzer linger in her mouth as long as she could. Then she allowed them to trickle down her throat. She closed her eyes for a second. She had never appreciated how wonderfully wet liquid could be.
He was still holding the bottle near her. She pushed it away, and this time he let her. She watched him hesitate, then take a small sip as well. Then he twisted the cap back on and put the bottle down.
“How much did you pour over my stupid leg?” he said.
“As little as I could,” said Marnie quietly, and watched him nod.
After a while, she helped him back to the cot. He needed to lean fully on her to get there. She had hoped the sweat meant his fever was breaking, but his skin felt as hot as before. Most worrisome of all, after a few minutes she asked him to take another small sip of the seltzer … and he did.
CHAPTER
25
Weird how she wasn’t embarrassed anymore.
Worry and fear—and, yes, the tight tentacles of a ferociously controlled panic—had pushed that emotion right out. It seemed almost natural when the Elf automatically shifted over on the narrow cot, nearer the wall, to make room for Marnie. She hesitated only because she thought she should look at the bullet wound again first.
“Why?” said the Elf. “There isn’t anything more you can do.”
Marnie blinked. True, but … “I’d like to know,” she said. “Wouldn’t you?”
“No,” said the Elf. His hand clamped over the bandage as if to protect it from her.
She gave in. She moved to lie down, this time with her back to him. She could feel his breathing, harsh in the stillness. She guessed his eyes were shut. She guessed he was in pain. Her own body was beginning to ache from the attack on the door. It would be worse tomorrow, and even worse the day after that. Assuming they were still here. Assuming they were still alive …
How long, Marnie wondered morbidly, did it take to die of dehydration? “Hey,” she said. “You okay, Elf?”
“Yeah.”
Silence again. The room rang with it. Marnie felt she couldn’t endure it. “Talk to me,” she said desperately to the Elf. “Talk about anything. School, your parents, your family. Your friend David. Anything. Just—Just talk.” She flexed her right hand. It felt empty. She wished he had reached to hold it again. She knew she couldn’t reach for his. She just couldn’t.
“Maybe later,” said the Elf after another moment. Oh, God, Marnie thought. She was a selfish fool. Asking him to talk! Was his voice hoarser now? Should she make him drink again? There wasn’t much left, but …
“You talk to me,” said the Elf. And then: “Please.”
“Oh,” said Marnie. Her mind went blank. Beneath that, new panic bubbled. She knew what he wanted.
“You were going to tell me …” He paused for breath. “… a long story. Your side of how this happened. Remember?”
Marnie thought about talking, about telling him how—at least in part. And why. And as she thought, she breathed more and more shallowly. Where would she begin? What parts could she say; what should she leave out? Who was the Elf to her, to hear anything? To ask anything? She didn’t know him! She wasn’t the hired entertainment! Stories to die by … no, no …
“Or,” the Elf said, “don’t tell me anything.”
Oh, God. She’d hurt his feelings. But—
“Don’
t you try to guilt-trip me,” she snapped.
She actually felt his whole body go rigid with anger. He said nothing for a full minute. When he did speak, the words came out in a rush, as if he’d spent the time building up enough strength to get it all out.
“I’m part of this! You didn’t ask me to be, but I am. Deal with it! Grow up! This isn’t virtual reality. You’re not the high-scoring player! And I deserve to know what’s going on.”
Marnie reached for her own rage, but it had dissolved. He was right. She knew he was. What had made her angry, anyway? She couldn’t remember. She put her face in her hands. She took a deep breath, and then another.
She just didn’t think she could talk.
“You okay?” the Elf said. He sounded tired, so tired.
Tired of her, probably. Marnie couldn’t help that. She took another breath. She felt the cot move; the Elf was shifting, laboriously getting up on one elbow to look down at her.
“Okay,” he said after a moment. “It’s all right. Nobody’s going to make you. Ve do not haf vays … Look, never mind. Marn. You don’t have to. If it’s too difficult. I—I just want to help.”
Marnie didn’t remove her hands from her face. “Don’t talk to me like I’m a mental patient,” she whispered.
Silence. Then: “I’m not. How do you want me to talk to you?”
The trouble was, she didn’t know. She didn’t know. Like a friend? What was that? How was that? She didn’t know. He had a friend, this Dave. His buddy, he’d said. That was a stupid word, buddy. Buddy buddy buddy. Rhymed with bloody …
That crazy woman thought she was Skye’s daughter. Marnie’s sister. She really thought it. What if the Elf didn’t understand why the very idea made Marnie so frightened?
I deserve to know what’s going on, he had said.
“You’ve been here five days,” said the Elf after a while. He was still looking at her; Marnie could feel it. “It’s a long time.”
Marnie felt her head move in a nod. She wanted to raise her head. She wanted to look at the Elf. But she just couldn’t.
She was burningly thirsty again. She wondered, idly, if you could drink tears, or if, like seawater, they would make you all the thirstier. Now was not the time to find out. She suspected tears accelerated dehydration.
The Elf’s life was at stake here too. His and hers. Two lives involved in this ludicrous mess.
Three, corrected the Sorceress-voice unexpectedly. Be accurate. Leah Slaight is a living person.
Two, Marnie repeated to herself firmly. Only two, Me and the Elf.
The Sorceress was silent. Marnie removed her hands—and nearly recoiled off the cot. The Elf’s face was almost touching hers. He was leaning over her, frowning. For a moment she actually thought he was going to stroke her cheek. Reflexively she moved away a trace. He didn’t touch her. She was glad, glad.
“Crying?” asked the Elf.
“No,” said Marnie defiantly, but the Sorceress-voice was suddenly screeching at her. I am so tired of you, Marnie! You and your cowardly ways—
Shut up, Marnie thought. You—you icon. You’re nothing without me.
I am you, you drooling nitwit.
No, thought Marnie. No. Wrong. Wrong.
Skye would want you to be strong….
I don’t care. I hate Skye! Marnie thought suddenly. I hate her for leaving me.
The Sorceress did not reply.
The Elf was saying something, but Marnie wasn’t sure what it was. It took her a moment to find her voice. “I’m sorry,” she said then. “I didn’t hear you. I was … thinking.” She chanced a look up at the Elf. He was sweating again. He was sick.
And she, Marnie Skyedottir, was an ass.
“Are you all right?” she said. It was a stupid thing to say, but there was nothing else.
Predictably, the Elf nodded tightly. “Yeah.” But when Marnie turned and reached out to help him ease back down on the cot, he let her. And then he closed his eyes, for a long moment.
She discovered that she had made up her mind. She heard herself say, “You’re right. I’ll tell you everything, okay? And … And I—I apologize. You do deserve to know.”
“Apology accepted,” said the Elf without opening his eyes. He flung one arm over his forehead. “Talk. I’ll listen.”
CHAPTER
26
It felt to Marnie as if she talked forever. With her eyes closed, the blanket over her, her hands under her cheek, and the Elf breathing quietly yet audibly behind her, it was not unlike being in some hypnotic state. Dreamily, her voice barely louder than a whisper, she told the Elf everything she could articulate, without even trying to figure out what was and wasn’t important. The Elf didn’t ask questions or prompt or try to interpret or say anything at all beyond the occasional “yeah” or “uh-huh” whenever Marnie paused to say, “Does that make any sense at all?” or “Do you know what I mean?” Yet she knew he was listening, listening hard; she could feel his attention, sense his focus on her words, even—she imagined—sense him thinking.
She began by talking about being at the Halsett Grille with Leah Slaight but soon felt compelled to backtrack into her history with Leah. The Elf let out a snort of laughter when she related the covalent bonds/Matthew 5:39 episode. Then, as she told about the meeting with the dean and Mrs. Fisher, she could feel him tense and for a second she thought he would speak. But he didn’t.
He listened.
At first Marnie found it distinctly odd to speak at length like this, out loud, without having her words guided by—or, more likely, meant to defend against—someone else’s desires or expectations. She couldn’t help suspecting that if the Elf had been feeling better, he would have interrupted more. He was no saint of patience, and once or twice when she headed off on an apparent tangent, she could actually feel him move to speak and then stop. In the back of her mind, she found this amusing, even a little endearing. In his place, she thought, she’d never have been able to stay quiet.
If this was in fact what listening was, she knew no one had ever listened to her before in her life. Her stomach twisted and she felt her stream of words stumble for a moment before she gathered herself again.
She found herself helplessly diverting into tales of her history at Halsett, and then at the other boarding school, and from there to Max, and from there, of course, to Skye.
Skye. Back and back and back and back to Skye. Somehow, every branch of the story seemed finally to leave Marnie with Skye’s name on her lips. Marnie would hesitate, then jump away to another branch after speaking only the minimum, only what was necessary, only the facts. She’d firmly reconnect to the main thread of her story, only to wander off again on some byroad and there once more be confronted, inevitably, with Skye.
The third or fourth time this happened, she suddenly realized that she had circled and circled but had yet to speak of the days when she’d been imprisoned alone in this place. Or rather, of the talks, if they could be called that, with Leah. Instead she dwelled overlong on her development of the strategic plan to explode the seltzer bottle. She thought then, What am I doing? She fell silent.
The Elf said, “Seltzer?”
Marnie nodded automatically.
“I’d like some,” the Elf clarified, and Marnie sat up and reached for the bottle. She noted the water level. She watched the Elf prop himself up—was it her imagination or did he look less flushed?—and take a sip. A tiny sip. Still, it seemed somehow wrong to refuse again when he handed the open bottle to her. She upended it and allowed a small amount into her mouth. She let it rest there for a very long time before she swallowed. She wondered why she wasn’t hungry at all; and then wondered if the Elf was. She asked him, knowing that he’d say no. He did.
He said calmly, as if he could read her mind through all the surface-level chatter: “Okay. The thing you’re avoiding. Are you gonna tell me?”
He sounded better, Marnie thought. And she found she couldn’t lie, couldn’t evade, anymore. He deserved t
o know. She looked back at him, straight into those incredibly beautiful Elf eyes. She said, low: “She thinks—Leah thinks—she says—she’s my sister. Half sister. Skye’s daughter.”
It was like a cork exploding from a champagne bottle. After it came streams and streams of words, tumbling from her mouth.
There’s no way—just no way—but I couldn’t help doing the math, figuring out how old Skye would’ve been … and it’s not impossible—but I don’t believe it … but there’s so much, you see, that I don’t know about her. About Skye, I mean. I don’t even know her real name!
Maybe she didn’t mean to keep secrets from me, it’s that I was so little—
My father—my biological father—I don’t want to know—I really don’t, it doesn’t matter, but sometimes—I can’t help wondering—nothing to do with this, I know …
Leah Slaight’s a madwoman, she really, really is, I keep coming back to that, I know that’s true, but—but—what if …?
And this kidnapping; you asked why Max couldn’t figure it out … it’s because he doesn’t know a thing about me, not really, I don’t let him, he’s tried but I don’t let him … it’s my fault that he’d think I might run away, do something stupid … My fault we’re going to die.
I’m sorry, I’m so very, very sorry—what the hell were you doing online anyway, Elf, you’re one of the good kids, aren’t you? I can tell; good grades, going to a good college, I bet—wait, it’ll be April fifteen soon, right? That means college acceptances will come … I bet ten thousand of them will be waiting at home for you. My fault—I’m so sorry, Elf. I didn’t even ask, don’t you have a family … bet they’re worried … bet they’re sitting with all the college letters, out of their minds with worry—hey, why haven’t they come looking for you, didn’t you tell them where you were going? Oh, Elf, I’m sorry …
Later, Marnie never knew with certainty what she’d said aloud and what she hadn’t, or the degree to which any of it was coherent. She didn’t know when she started crying like a fool, nor when it was that the Elf grabbed her and held her so that she ended up babbling and sobbing and snuffling into the shoulder of his camouflage T-shirt. “Hey,” he kept saying soothingly. “Hey.”
