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She slept like the dead.
PART THREE
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE DREAM was always the same:
It was Pandy’s birthday, and SondraBeth Schnowzer was there, her face pressed next to Pandy’s as they laughed in the flickering orangish light from the hundreds of birthday candles on Pandy’s cake.
The dream vanished as Pandy gasped and hinged upright, the afghan clutched under her chin.
Where was she?
She took in the gloomy atmosphere and sighed. She was in the den. In Wallis. Her book about Lady Wallis was dead, and now the boathouse had blown up. Another great beginning to anothe
r fabulous day, she thought bitterly as she went into the kitchen.
She filled the electric kettle and clicked it on. She opened the cabinet, and, from among several different types of tea, she and Henry being aficionados, removed a sachet of double-bergamot Earl Grey.
Strong tea. She had that tiny thread of Englishness in her bones that believed the right cup of tea might possibly make everything better, no matter what the situation. Catching a whiff of the still-burned strands of her hair, she realized that in this case, “the situation” was as simple as being alive.
And that has to be something, right? she reminded herself as she poured hot water over the tea bag. In any case, for the first time in a long time, she was happy to feel her body. It actually felt like a bonus, as opposed to a large steamer trunk.
She sighed and dropped the tea bag into the garbage. She was alive, but the boathouse was gone. There had been an explosion. The volunteer firemen had come. And now she was supposed to go on some website to report that she was dead. Except, of course, she wasn’t.
It was just like life, she thought, meandering back into the den with her tea. Bad things came in threes.
What’s next? she wondered, plopping down on the couch and absentmindedly pulling out the knob on the TV. As the old television sprang to life, Pandy gathered the afghan around her and wished she could go back to sleep.
Forever. She yawned as her eyes slid toward the screen…
And once again, she was wide awake. And here came bad thing number three:
She was dead.
For there, on the screen of the old black-and-white TV, was that old black-and-white author photograph of her from ten years ago, when—she realized with a start—she had been so much younger.
“PJ Wallis, a longtime Connecticut resident, has died at her home in Wallis,” said the announcer; the same announcer Pandy recognized from when she was a child. “She was known to many as the creator of the popular character Monica. She was forty-six years old—”
“Forty-five!” Pandy shouted automatically.
And then her image was gone, replaced by a package of Depends.
“That did not just happen,” Pandy said aloud.
She stood up, uncertain about what to do. Surely, what she’d just seen had to be a mistake. Otherwise, Henry would have called.
Or would he? As she went into the mudroom to pick up the receiver, she remembered that the TV only got the local station. Apparently that nice fireman had filed his report, but perhaps the news hadn’t spread. Henry likely didn’t know she’d been declared dead.
She dialed Henry’s number. He answered with his usual drawling “Hellooooo?”
“Hello?” she demanded. “Have you noticed that I am dead?”
“Now why on earth should something that convenient happen to you?” Henry asked. “I saw a tweet from Publisher’s Daily that the author PJ Wallis has been reported dead by her sister, Hellenor…”
“And?” Pandy continued.
“That was it. Since we both know that Hellenor is in Amsterdam, I could only conclude this particular ‘Hellenor Wallis’ was actually PJ Wallis playing dead.”
