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Ann stays on the bank, fully clothed. "I'll keep a watch out," she says.
The rest of us link our arms for warmth and let our feet lick at the sandy bottom. We're like a band of floating nomads.
"What do you suppose Mrs. Nightwing would say if she could see us now in all our grace, charm, and beauty?" Pippa giggles.
"She'd probably fall over dead," Ann says.
"Ha!" Felicity says. "There's wishful thinking." She leans her head back, lets her hair float out on the water like a halo.
Pippa's head is up like a shot. "Did you hear that?"
"Hear what?" The lake water in my ears makes it hard to hear anything. But there it is. The woods echo with the sound of a tree branch snapping in two.
"There it is again! Did you hear it?"
"Criminy," Ann croaks.
"Our clothes!" Pippa scrambles out of the water on heavy legs and runs for her chemise just as Kartik steps out of the trees, carrying a makeshift cricket bat. I can't tell who is more shocked and surprisedKartik or Pippa.
"Avert your eyes!" she says in near hysteria, trying desperately to cover herself with the bit of lace and cloth.
Too astonished to argue, Kartik does, but not before I've seen the look in his eyes. Wonder and awe. As if he truly has seen a goddess made flesh. The visceral impact of her beauty is more powerful than any word or deed. The cloudiness of my mind clears long enough to record this.
"If this were ancient times, we would hunt you down and put out your eyes for what you've seen," Felicity snarls from the lake.
Kartik says nothing. As quickly as he came upon us, he's gone, running through the woods,
"Next time," Felicity says, moving to help Pippa, "we will put his eyes out."
The room is dark, but I know she's awake. There's none of her snoring.
"Ann, are you awake?" She doesn't answer, but I'm not giving up. "I know you are, so you might as well respond." Silence. "I won't give up until you do." Outside, an owl announces that he is near.
"Why do you do that to yourself? Cut yourself the way you do?" There's no answer for a good long minute, and I think that perhaps she has fallen asleep after all, but then it comes. Her voice, so soft I have to strain in the dark to hear it, to hear the faint cry she's holding back.
"I don't know. Sometimes, I feel nothing, and I'm so afraid. Afraid I'll stop feeling anything at all. I'll just slip away inside myself." There's a cough and a sniffling sound. "I just need to feel something."
The owl makes his call in the night again, waiting to see if anyone is at home.
"No more doing that," I say. "Promise me?"
More sniffles. "All right."
It feels as if I should do something here. Put my arm around her. Offer a hug. I don't know what to do that wouldn't horrify and embarrass us both.
"If you don't, I'll be forced to confiscate your needlepoint, and where would you be without the satisfaction of finishing your little Dutch girl and windmill in seven different colors of thread, hmmm?"
She gives a weak gurgle of a laugh, and I'm relieved.
"Gemma?" she says after a moment has passed.
"Hmmm?"
"You won't tell, will you?"
"No."
More secrets. How did I end up keeping so many? Satisfied, Ann shifts in her bed and the familiar snoring begins. I stare at a patch of wall, willing sleep to come, listening to the owl cry into a night that never answers.
