Long May She Reign (25 page)

“So, like, how bad's your leg?” Simon asked, eating french fries three at a time. “Ligaments, cartilage, the whole deal?”

Nerve damage and bone chips, too. Which Dr. Steiner, her primary orthopedic surgeon, had described as “troubling multiple avulsions.” Meg nodded.

And this would be a really bad time to start thinking about how close the kicks had come to killing her.

“It hurts lots?” he asked.

She nodded. Hardly the proper, politic reaction, but—too late now.

“And you walked on that puppy?” he said. “In the woods and all?”

Walked, staggered, crawled. Entirely unaware that she was courting a fatal arterial rupture with every single movement. Meg shrugged, hoping he would change the subject.

Juliana was already frowning at him. “Eat your lunch, Simon.”

“Yeah, but that was
hero
shit,” he said. “That was pretty cool. And her hand and all?
Serious
hero shit. I mean,” he gave Meg a wide, infectious grin, “way to go! It was something.”

“Well,” Meg said, and looked down at her coffee.

“I mean, maybe people aren't supposed to mention it,” he said, “but
I
think it was cool.”

Meg tried to smile, her face feeling very hot. “Well, that's very nice of you, Skipper, but I—I'd really rather—”

“She wants you to put a sock in it,” Harry said.

Precisely.

“Okay.” Simon shrugged, undaunted. “Just wanted to tell you.”

Ideally, he would not feel the need to do so again.

But, it had been pretty nice to hear.

*   *   *

SHE WAS VERY
pleased, the next morning, to find out that her psychology class was large enough to meet in a big lecture hall, and that the professor had no interest in having them introduce themselves. Unfortunately, the same did not hold true for her Shakespeare class—and when she told them her name was Meg, someone actually said, “Hey, wait, no, it's supposed to be Meghan,” and most of the rest of the people in the room nodded. Since a guy named Jim hadn't described himself as “James,” and another guy named Bill hadn't said “William,” she wasn't sure why she fell under different rules, but merely said that they could all call her whichever one they preferred.

It was almost a relief when it was time to go over to North Adams for physical therapy, with Ginette in tow. A few reporters were following along, and advance word had it that others were waiting in a hastily assembled “media area,” at the hospital, to film her arrival. Christ.

Once they got there, a number of hospital officials came out to meet and greet her, and “show her the facilities.” Then, she met still more people—nurses and doctors and therapists, with everyone being “brought up to speed,” in great detail, on her condition. Or lack thereof. Which, to her way of thinking, kind of violated patient confidentiality, in the extreme.

By the time she had to start doing the physical therapy itself—her new hand therapist was named Cheryl; her knee therapist was Vicky—she was too drained to want to have anything to do with the ever-grueling exercises. But, the hospital was enforcing a “No Media” rule inside, much to her relief, so except for an audience of orthopedists, two neurologists, and a physiatrist, she was able to toil away in partial obscurity.

“I'm sure it won't be like that next time,” Ginette said, after they had negotiated past the group of remaining press stragglers outside, and were riding back to Williamstown.

Better not be. Meg nodded.

“It—” Ginette hesitated. “It looked very painful. The therapy, I mean.”

Meg nodded, and they rode the rest of the way without speaking.

She couldn't face the idea of going out again that night—so, she didn't, by simply telling Tammy a “no, thanks, I already ate” fib. Tammy didn't question this, even though the dining hall had just barely opened for dinner, and the odds of Meg already having been there and back were unlikely.

Later, Susan and Dirk each stopped by to see how, and what, she was doing—upon which she pretended she had been deeply engrossed by reading
King Lear
. Josh called from Stanford to say hello, and later on, Neal called, and her father came on the line to say hi, too. Meg lied to all of them, saying, “yeah, everything's fine, I'm having fun, I like it a lot.” Then, she—fuck it—covered the telephones with a thick pillow, so she could ignore them if they rang again. If the Leader of the Free World couldn't reach her for a few hours,
too bad
.

She spent the weekend keeping a very low profile, mostly staying in her room and studying. On Sunday night, there was an entry meeting in the second-floor common room, complete with snacks, with attendance just short of being mandatory. So, she went, allowing Susan to drag her around for a few minutes to meet people, because it was easier than refusing.

The meeting dissolved into an impromptu party, but she made polite excuses and returned to her room to stare at CNN. It was a little unsettling, whenever her mother popped onto the screen for one reason or another, but also strangely comforting, too. Made her feel slightly less homesick.

Late that night, she had an incredibly bad dream about—well, she wasn't exactly sure of the details, but it had definitely been frightening. She had had nightmares every night since arriving on campus, but this was one of the wake-up-shouting ones. As usual, when she opened her eyes, she wasn't sure where she was, but she could tell from the raw feeling in her throat that she'd screamed. Loudly.

There was an urgent pounding on the door. “Meg?” a male voice said. “Are you all right in there?”

Agents. School. Oh, Christ. “I'm fine,” she said weakly.

“You sure?” It sounded like Ronald. Or maybe Dave, or Larry. “I'm sorry, but can you open up for just a second?”

If she didn't, he would probably break the door down or some damn thing, so she hauled herself up, pulling on an old Stowe sweatshirt over her sweatpants and “In Bill We Trust” Patriots t-shirt. Then she opened the door to see a very concerned-looking Ronald.

“I'm all right.” She realized that her face was damp, as though she'd been crying in her sleep, and quickly wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “It was a bad dream, that's all.”

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I'll just take a quick peek inside, okay?”

What, in case some evil person hiding behind the door had made her say that under duress? She moved aside to let him go past her, and saw—acutely embarrassed—that Mary Elizabeth and Jesslyn, and a couple of people from Sage D, the next entry over, were all in the hall. Then, Juliana's door opened, and she and Mark came out.

Juliana yawned. “What's going on?”

“I really apologize,” Meg said, knowing how awful she must look, so humiliated that she thought she might die on the spot. “I—” she felt as though she might be running a fever, too—“I have nightmares sometimes. I hope I didn't disturb anyone.” A pretty stupid remark, considering that they were all standing there—and now, Tammy was on her way out of her room, too, making it a clean sweep of the entire third floor.

“Did something happen?” she asked, looking confused when she saw how many people were in the corridor.

“It's a party,” Juliana said. “Guess we should have invited you.”

Tammy must have still been half-asleep, because she looked even more confused.

Ronald left Meg's room, patting her on the shoulder. “Excuse me,” he said to Tammy, and moved past her, back to his desk.

Normally, she wouldn't have been too thrilled about having one of her agents touch her, but this situation was an exception. She needed a pat on the shoulder.

Hell, she needed a
hug
. And for one of her parents to pour her a fresh glass of water, and sponge her face off with a cool washcloth.

“So, you're okay?” Juliana asked.

Meg nodded, bright red.

“Well. Good night,” Mary Elizabeth said, and headed back to her room, Tammy and Jesslyn following suit.

It made things worse to realize that they all knew she had been crying, and she limped towards the bathroom to wash her face. She stayed in there for quite a while, out of sheer embarrassment, and when she came out, Juliana and Mark were gone, but Susan was leaning against the wall, in raggedy cut-off blue sweatpants, Nikes, and a Falmouth Road Race t-shirt.

“Hi,” she said.

Christ, had one of the others picked up the phone and asked her to hurry upstairs—or had the screaming been that loud?

“I just wanted to make sure you were all right,” Susan said.

Meg nodded. “Perfectly fine, thank you.” The fact that she felt lost and afraid and alone was really no one's god-damn business.

“Are you really?” Susan asked.

Meg nodded.

“Okay, as long as you're sure,” Susan said, sounding as though she didn't believe her at all. “You going to be able to get back to sleep?”

Not a chance in hell, but Meg nodded. “Um, you couldn't actually
hear
me, could you?”

Susan hesitated, which answered the question.

Great.

“It's no big deal,” Susan said. “I was already awake.”

At four in the morning? Yeah. Sure.

“I was just—I usually don't sleep that much,” Susan said. “So, I was reading. Anyway. Feel like hanging out for a while?”

God,
yes
. But, they barely knew each other at all, and what would they talk about? The vicissitudes of post-traumatic stress disorder? Meg shook her head. “No, that's okay. Thanks.”

“Well, I'll see you later, then,” Susan said.

Meg nodded, closed her door—and turned on C-Span.

*   *   *

OVER THE NEXT
few days, it happened almost every night. Fortunately, it wasn't always screaming, but it
was
always crying. And if she yelled, her agents felt compelled to check things out—or at least have her open the door briefly, immediately destroying the tiny illusion of privacy she'd managed to create for herself by spending so much time in her room.

Maybe the thing to do, would be to make a habit of sleeping through dinner, so she'd be awake at night, and wouldn't keep bothering everyone else.

She
wanted
to pick up the phone, call her parents, and beg to come home. Say that it had been too soon, she wasn't ready, she'd try again next year. Georgetown, maybe. Not someplace so far away. On the other hand, she would just end up sitting by herself in her room in the White House—and she might as well sit alone here in Williamstown.

She figured out pretty quickly that breakfast was the least crowded meal, so she decided that it was her favorite, because she had to do
some
eating. Coffee was rapidly turning into her new best friend, and she'd even found the nerve to start venturing into Goodrich, where there was a coffee bar, to buy lattes once or twice a day. Then, when she had to go get some money out of the cash machine at her new bank on Spring Street—sort of a foreign experience—she discovered a coffeehouse nearby, and ducked in to get yet more caffeine to go—an impulse promptly recorded by a couple of bored photographers hanging out across the street.

A lot of people tried to start conversations with her—after class, in the dining hall, near the mailboxes, while other people would see her and promptly head in the opposite direction. Seemed excessive, in both cases. And the damned Frisbee boys somehow always managed to catch sight of her, and hurl the stupid thing in her direction. Her agents didn't like it much. The Mr. California guy was in her psychology class, and he invariably sat in the middle of a group of girls who didn't seem to realize that they were fawning over him. Frankly, she questioned their taste in men.

Jesslyn spent hours hunched over her computer in her room, playing poker and blackjack on the Internet, and rarely interacted much with anyone, and Mary Elizabeth, of course, had yet to be friendly, but lately, Tammy seemed to be avoiding her, and even Juliana was sort of keeping her distance, which was depressing.

She was lying on her bed, resting from physical therapy, an ice pack tucked inside her brace and another one on top of her hand, when there was a knock on the door. It would be nice if the person went away, but when there was a second knock, she grimly got up.

“Hi,” Susan said, her hair wet from the shower, so she must have just returned from one of her daily runs, or a karate workout—Dirk had mentioned to her that Susan was a 2nd kyu brown belt, which was hard to picture, considering how small and, at first glance, unthreatening she was. “I'm going over to meet a friend of mine at Dodd—” another one of the dining halls, in one of the most desirable dorms on campus—“for dinner. Feel like coming along?”

Meg shook her head. “Thanks, but I've already eaten.”

Susan looked at her watch. “The hell you did.”

Oh. Meg frowned at her. “I had a late lunch.”

“
During
physical therapy?” Susan said.

Exactly who did she think she was? “Is it any of your god-damn business?” Meg asked, making an effort to keep her voice civil. A weak effort.

“As a matter of fact, it is,” Susan said. “This is what JAs do.”

“Yeah, well, don't worry, I'll give you a good evaluation,” Meg said.

Susan sighed, and ran a hand back through her hair. “Meg, I was only—”

“Who asked you to?” Meg said.

Susan didn't back down. “Thought it up
all by myself
.”

Yeah, well, screw her.

“Look, I'm sure you're really tired,” Susan said, sounding pretty tired herself, “but not eating isn't going to—”

“You don't know me,” Meg said. “You can't tell me what to do.”

Susan's expression tightened. “You don't know me, either. There's a chance I might know what I'm talking about.”