Locked Inside (22 page)

“No,” Marnie replied. And then, as if the words were pulled from her, she added: “I’m—for me … it’s something to do with my mother. Today, I mean.” She gestured aimlessly at her blotchy face. And then she blinked, astonished at how easily the words had emerged. How simple they were. But how inadequate … how almost silly … She hadn’t said a thing, hadn’t even begun to confide, not really … And yet …

“Oh,” said Jenna. She had been watching Marnie as closely as, a moment ago, Marnie had been watching her. “I see.” Jenna’s voice was gentle. “You loved her? You miss her? Especially now, after—after last week?”

Marnie’s mouth opened with something almost like shock. She stared at Jenna. It wasn’t so simple. Was it? She felt her eyes begin to fill again. Her throat had completely closed, all at once, and yet it was important—vitally important—to answer
Jenna. To share, even this tiny little bit. But she couldn’t speak.

She nodded instead.
Yes.

Oh, yes.

She looked up after a moment to find Jenna watching her. For what was only a few seconds, and yet seemed like much longer, they looked at each other. Marnie found that her throat had loosened.

And then Jenna said, calmly, still looking straight at Marnie, “Well. Okay. About hockey boy. It’s not what I think you’re thinking. It’s—I didn’t even like him, you see. That was what was wrong.” She paused. “I wanted a boyfriend. And he seemed to like me. Enough, anyway. And then …” She shrugged and looked away for an instant. “Stupid thing to get so upset about, huh? Nothing like what you’ve gone through … Anyway, there I was with him, and I suddenly realized. And when I told him, he got angry—which he should have, of course.
Stupid.
I was focused on all the wrong things.”

“No,” Marnie found herself saying. “Not stupid, Jenna.” She knew what Skye would have said. “Human.” But Jenna shook her head. “Okay, then,” Marnie said. “At least no stupider than anyone else. Than, say, me.”

Jenna’s lips twisted. She seemed to be hesitating over something else she wanted to say. She wasn’t looking at Marnie anymore. Finally she said it, almost in a whisper. “I felt so filthy. I can’t describe it. I still feel it … all along I was condescending to him, and then, when I realized what I was doing
… for no good reason, just because … I was the one who decided to go to a girls’ school, you know, I thought it would be better, no distractions except when
I
decided to be distracted. My parents expect … no,
I
expect … oh, God, I don’t even know what I’m
saying.
”

Marnie didn’t, either. All at once she had a real glimpse of how hard it could be—would be—opening up to people. Sharing what you felt. Listening to what they felt. She thought about curling up in the dirt again, bawling, alone. But that time was past. Past and over.

“You can’t know what I mean,” Jenna said finally, looking up. Her eyes were very dark. Haunted. “You can’t know.”

No, thought Marnie. No, not exactly. But … she knew enough.

“I know what pain is,” she said to Jenna. “And sometimes I feel overwhelmed. There’s a lot of …” She stumbled. “A lot of …” She gestured vaguely.

“Stuff,” Jenna said. “Just too much stuff to think about.”

They sat in silence, not quite understanding each other, but almost. Almost.

“Listen, we ought to start back,” Jenna said. She got to her feet and offered a helping hand to Marnie. “It’ll take a while because we’ll be walking, but if we go now we’ll probably make it there before the sun sets.”

Marnie let herself be pulled up. She brushed futilely at the dirt on her sweatpants. Something was
nagging her. “Jenna, before. When I was crying. You said something weird….” Marnie frowned, and discovered that she did, after all, remember precisely. She quoted to Jenna, “You said, ‘What’ll your boyfriend think if you fall apart like this?’ and then you said, ‘He’ll be sorry he ever wrote you that sonnet.’”

Jenna looked a little self-conscious. “So?”

Marnie shook her head. “What sonnet?” she asked softly.

Their eyes met. Jenna was looking acutely uncomfortable. “You left your e-mail on in my room. Remember?” Suddenly she flushed. “You were using my computer! What did you expect? That I wouldn’t check out what you were doing?”

“You read my e-mail that night. After I left.” Marnie felt like a fool. She’d known at the time it was likely. She had just … forgotten.

“No, not then. The next morning.” Jenna paused. “I deleted it all after I’d read it, too. There were several messages. Just the one poem, though.” Another pause. Then, defensively: “I’m sorry. I was angry … and … and confused. Well, you know.”

Marnie couldn’t seem to find anything to say.

“It was a very derivative sonnet,” Jenna said, after a minute or two of silence. “My guess is, he’d been reading a little too much John Donne.” And then: “Not that there’s anything wrong with John Donne. Anyway. I’m sorry.”

Marnie said, feebly, “Forget it.” She watched Jenna’s shoulders sag in relief.

“He’ll have a copy,” Jenna said. “You can just ask him for it.”

Could she? Marnie wondered. Could you ask for a poem that was written for you before the writer really knew you? Would the Elf want her to have it, now that he did know her? He hadn’t mentioned the e-mail recently.

Another thought flickered into Marnie’s head. “You were the one who told people I might’ve run off to visit a guy I met online.”

“You didn’t know that?” said Jenna, surprised.

“No.” Marnie flushed. She should have; it was obvious now.

“Let’s go,” said Jenna tersely.

They began walking. Something still felt unfinished, Marnie thought. Then she knew what it was, and she stopped in the road. Jenna stopped too, and turned, her face apprehensive.

“What now?”

“Just—thanks,” Marnie said with difficulty. She cleared her throat and said it again. This time it came out more strongly. “Thank you, Jenna.”

After a second, Jenna nodded. Shrugged.

“And … I’m sorry,” Marnie continued steadily. “For … you know. I misjudged you. I was … well, wrong. About a number of things.”

“Yeah,” said Jenna. For a long moment they looked at each other, still wary. “Me too,” Jenna said unexpectedly.

They walked the rest of the way back to school together in silence.

M
arnie felt unutterably weary. As she approached her dorm room, she wanted nothing more than to throw herself on the bed—without showering, without even undressing—and sleep, sleep, sleep. But when she pushed her open door wider and entered, there was her computer. And Marnie found herself sitting, turning the machine on for the first time since she’d come back. Yes, it was fine; it booted up smoothly. And now she ought to test the Internet connection … good … and e-mail … yes …

Nearly two weeks’ worth of messages downloaded smoothly into her inbox. Most of them were garbage. Nine of them, in a little cluster, were from the Elf. Nine, not fifteen. So Jenna had gotten into six of them, including the sonnet. But the rest …

Marnie felt as if her lungs hadn’t begun to recover from her mad run, after all.

I got interested
, the Elf had said, when they’d been talking in Leah’s basement, just before Marnie noticed that the door was open….

Your boyfriend
, Jenna had said.

He’s
still
interested
, whispered the Sorceress.
More than ever. You know it. Pick up the phone. I bet he left voice-mail today
.

Marnie moved the mouse pointer slowly over the message listings. But she didn’t click to open any of them. She closed her eyes, and her weariness overwhelmed her again. She’d fall asleep right here at the desk if she didn’t … didn’t get up … and …

Just for a minute, Marnie rested her forehead on her arms on the desk.

The Rubble-Eater was dead. All its inarticulate rage and pain finally expended, it lay in a heap on the stone floor of the cavern. Llewellyne stared stupidly at her sword, on which the Rubble-Eater’s blood had already begun to darken and congeal.

Abruptly she turned away. She leaned one hand against the cavern wall, closed her eyes, and breathed steadily, but it did no good. She kept seeing the Rubble-Eater deliberately hurl itself upon her sword … again, and again, and again. Llewellyne’s stomach twisted itself into an impossible knot and attempted to force its way up her throat. For a moment she thought she would choke.

But
, said the hawk cautiously,
It was him or you
.

Was it? Llewellyne wondered. Was it truly?

Then she remembered the truth glasses. Suddenly she could feel them, an insistent weight against her
chest where they hung on their string. They felt … warm. Pulsing. Dread filled her, but she knew she had to put them on.

She fumbled with the glasses, perched them on her nose, and turned back toward the Rubble-Eater. Then, and only then, did she reopen her eyes.

It wasn’t the Rubble-Eater there at all. It was a bird, a small hawkling. A baby. And as she watched, it began to stretch its wet, feeble wings. Then it looked up and she could see it fully.

On its head grew crudely bleached, chopped-off hair. And below that were eyes. Defensive eyes. Eyes ringed with black makeup. Human eyes.

Her own eyes.

Above her head, the cyber-construct hawk blinked its own red eyes and suddenly screeched in—fear? rage? No.

In triumph.

And then disappeared.

Startled awake, Marnie groaned. She remembered her dream clearly. She muttered, “Where are Freud and Jung when you need them?” If she really wanted, she supposed she could go into her Paliopolis dreams at great depth with that new counselor. Who, to her surprise, she rather liked.

Still, somehow, she didn’t want to talk about the dreams. They felt … intensely personal. And, oddly, rather separate from their setting. Whatever they were, they were not about Paliopolis, Marnie thought. Not really.

Speaking of Paliopolis, however …

In front of her, the monitor glowed in the near-dark.
You’ve been inactive for thirty minutes. Do you want to go offline?
it asked. Marnie glanced down at the little computer clock; it read 1:03
A.M.
She’d been inactive for a lot longer than thirty minutes. Polite little Internet server, waiting uncomplainingly for an answer hour after hour …

She groped for the mouse and clicked No. She was left staring, again, at her e-mail inbox and its list of Elfin messages. Quickly she clicked the e-mail program closed. Then, of its own accord, her hand moved to the Internet browser icon and double-clicked. She had Paliopolis bookmarked. A few seconds for it to load … and she was there, at the front gates. Take that, Mrs. Fisher, she thought, but without much malice.

Where are we going
? asked the Sorceress.

You know where.

On the way, however, Marnie paused to click through the latest ratings; the Sorceress Llewellyne was still on top, but more than two weeks of inactivity had cut severely into her lead. The Elf had lost ground too; he was way down in the thirties from his previous high of seventeen. She clicked on his name to see if he was currently online, and only after it reported that he wasn’t did she realize she’d been holding her breath.

Disappointed
? asked the Sorceress.
Maybe he won’t be here ever again. Maybe you’ll have to check voice-mail … or call … or see him in person. Maybe this part is over. Isn’t that what you want, anyway? Truly? But you’re scared … and if you’re not careful he’ll decide you’re a lost cause, give up,
find some smart college girl, some Harvard girl … and all because you’re scared
.

Shut up, Marnie thought. She clicked over to the list of Paliopolis chat rooms—the Thieves’ Den, Throgmorton’s Pub, and the Conclave of Magic—and stared at them. Early on, she’d stepped inside the Conclave and listened for a while, but it had just seemed dumb. She’d been interested in playing, in accumulating points, in winning. Not in chatter and gossip.

But … were they really talking about her in there, as the Elf—as Frank—had said? Were they wondering, these days, where she was? Why her rating was on the verge of collapsing? She’d spotted an e-mail from the Dungeon Master in her inbox, sent sometime last week; he was probably asking after her.

She was very aware of where she was, physically. In a chair. At her desk. In front of her computer, in her dorm room with its door still slightly ajar … at Halsett Academy.

I loved Paliopolis, she thought. It was safe there. But it will never be the same again. It’s like childhood. I won’t be able to go back….

I know
, said the Sorceress sadly.

Marnie took a deep breath. Then, for the last time, she clicked through to the entry chamber, activated her identity and powers, picked up her possessions, and became the Sorceress Llewellyne. It wouldn’t take long, she knew, to work her way to the Lair of the Rubble-Eater. She could do it in her sleep. In fact—for a second she wanted to laugh—she had, hadn’t she?

M
ethodically Marnie tricked one little guard dragon to sleep, beat three dwarves at poker, and—merely out of habit—exchanged a priceless diamond for an ancient text written in invisible ink. Mere minutes later she stood alone in the caverns below the mountains, next to the shaft that she’d leapt down once before, following the Elf. They’d had a narrow escape from the Rubble-Eater that night. Remembering, Marnie felt her lips move in an almost-smile. The cornered Elf had finally been forced to exchange the spellbook for her grappling hook, and had got himself out of the Rubble-Eater’s way only half a second in front of the beast’s teeth. Marnie, as the Sorceress, had been laughing so hard she’d actually needed to exchange ten thousand points for a quick resurrection.

Was that the last time she’d been in Paliopolis? She thought it was.

Well. She herself needed no grappling hook. She levitated down the shaft. Reaching the bottom, however, and seeing the screen shift into the familiar graphic, she was immediately aware of disappointment. It hadn’t changed; it was exactly what it was supposed to be, and what it ever had been. It was even more familiar since Marnie’s dreams. But the graphic held none of the feeling of the dreams. And the Rubble-Eater, a faint rumbling downwind at the left of her screen, held no terror.