Laurie was holding forth—very amusingly, too—about how at State, girls never used words of more than three syllables when boys were around. “You’d never talk about dressing appropriately because ‘appropriately’ has five syllables. Instead, you’d say, ‘dressing the way you ought to,’ or ‘dressing the way people expect you to.’ You’d never say ‘conversationally,’ because that has six syllables. It’s not that a boy won’t understand a five-syllable word, it’s that it makes a girl sound too—oh, efficient, I guess—or too bright, as if she might be able to take care of herself. She won’t seem vulnerable enough. She won’t seem like she needs the big brave man enough.” And Laurie was having such a good time! A delightful smile played about the corners of her lips every time she opened her mouth.

Before dessert, Laurie and Mrs. Thoms got up to help Momma take the dishes off the table. Miss Pennington started to get up, too, but Momma said, “No, Miss Pennington, don’t you move. Many hands make light work, but we’ve got too many hands already. Kitchen’s not big enough.” Miss Pennington didn’t protest very hard.

Mr. Thoms was busy talking to Daddy about something. Miss Pennington said to Charlotte in the sincerest of voices, “It’s just so good to see you, Charlotte. I’ve thought about you a thousand times since you left. I’ve had so many things I was dying to ask you.”

“It’s so good to see you, Miss Pennington,” said Charlotte. She tried to smile but wasn’t a good enough actress, and that was that. She just stared at her old mentor and idly took note of the reticulated veins in her face.

“You’re awful quiet this evening, Charlotte.” Miss Pennington cocked her head slightly and smiled in the all-knowing way she had. “In fact, I can’t figure out if you’re here in this room or someplace else.”

“I know,” Charlotte said. She sighed, and as she let her breath out, she felt as if her whole bone structure were collapsing. “But it’s not that, Miss Pennington. I just feel so tired.” She slipped a little tarred into the pronunciation, and only afterward did she consciously face the fact that she was talking Down Home solely to solicit pity as a little country girl. “I had so much to do last week—we had a test in neuroscience that was worse than a final exam. I didn’t hardly get any sleep all week.” The implicit double negative was on purpose, too.

“I see,” said Miss Pennington in a tone that indicated she didn’t see at all.

The strategist in Charlotte figured this was the moment to start laying out some excuses to cushion the blow that was coming. “It was terrible, Miss Pennington. I found out at the last minute that a whole topic I thought wasn’t going to be on the test—about the relationship of the amygdala to the Wernicke’s and Broca’s areas of the brain and things like that?—was going to be on the test after all?—and I didn’t have any time left?—I mean, the way he teaches—Mr. Starling?—he introduces a subject, and then you’re supposed to do your own research on it?—and I misunderstood. I mean, I’m real worried, Miss Pennington. It was about forty percent of the test.” Tayest—likewise calculated.

Miss Pennington looked at her for a few beats beyond the ordinary…her head still cocked to one side…ironically?…before saying, “I’m your former teacher, Charlotte, but I hope you know I couldn’t be any more interested in how you’re doing than if you were my own daughter. I haven’t heard from you in quite a little while now.”

“I know…I’m sorry, Miss Pennington, but I get so caught up—and I don’t half know where the time’s gone…”

“If you want to—if you want to—why don’t you come by to see me while you’re here. Sometimes it helps to talk to somebody who knows you but now has a little distance, a little better perspective. If you want to.”

Charlotte lowered her head, then looked at Miss Pennington again. “Thank you, Miss Pennington. I do want to. That would be—I’d like to do that.” Try as she might to make it otherwise, the words came clanking out like empty bottles in a bag.

“Just give me a call, anytime you want,” said Miss Pennington. She said it a bit drily.

Dessert was a big hit: homemade pie and ice cream. Momma had baked the pie herself, mincemeat apple it was called, made of apples, raisins, cloves, and a couple of spices Charlotte didn’t know the names of, and Momma served it hot from the oven, along with some ice cream she had churned by hand, vanilla with bits of cherries in it. The aroma of the cloves and the apples was intoxicating. Even Charlotte, who had hardly touched the rest of the dinner, lit into the pie. Compliments from all around; Momma was beaming. It was so good that Daddy became very much the Man at the table and was saying things like, “Better have some more, Zach”—he and Mr. Thoms were Billy and Zach now—“it’s right out the oven—gon’ be better now’n it’ll ever be again!” It became a blissful hiatus, a time removed from all troubles great and small. Charlotte abandoned herself to the three irrational senses, the olfactory, the gustatory, and the tactile. She wanted it to last forever.

When it didn’t, the ladies got up again to help with the dishes, Miss Pennington among them this time—all but Charlotte, who remained in her chair trying to will the interlude to last longer. Mr. Thoms had moved down the table to talk to “Billy,” and Charlotte was gazing at them idly, trying to will her disasters from reoccupying her mind. She jerked alert to find Laurie slipping into Miss Pennington’s chair and leaning close to her with a big smile on her face.

Staring into Charlotte’s eyes from no more than eighteen inches away, she said, “Well?…”

“Well what?” said Charlotte.

“Well, I haven’t heard from you since we talked on the phone—it was almost three months ago. I believe we were talking about a certain subject.” Her smile grew even brighter.

Charlotte could feel her face turning scarlet, but she couldn’t think of a thing to say.

“I think I’m owed a little report,” said Laurie. “That’s my consulting fee.”

Laurie had put on some pounds, which made her cheeks and her chin, where it settled into the turtleneck of her sweater, look full. Somehow this made her prettier than Charlotte had ever seen her. She was happiness personified.

Blushing terribly, Agony Personified said, “There’s really nothing to report.”

“Really nothing?” said Laurie. “You know what”—her eyes seemed to brighten to about three hundred watts, and her smile became two weeks and three days wide—“I don’t believe you!”

Charlotte was speechless with panic. Mrs. Thoms had said something to her when they were both in the kitchen! Was Laurie now one of Death’s instruments—Laurie, who had always been her friend through the worst of times?

She spoke fearfully. “I don’t—there just isn’t anything…”

In a singsong voice Laurie said, “I don’t believe you, Charlotte…and I know you, Charlotte. This is your old friend Laurie, Charlotte…You can’t be gaming me, Charlotte…”

“Gaming me”—college slang.

Paranoia had a gun at her temple, but she wouldn’t just lie outright to Laurie. “Practically nothing,” she said with a dreadful tremor in her voice.

“What’s with you tonight, Charlotte? You are not happy. What’s going on?”

Just then everybody returned from the kitchen. Before she got up to return to her seat, Laurie said, “You and I have got to have a talk. Seriously.” Seriously. “Call me tomorrow,” said Laurie, “or I’ll call you. You and I’ve got to sit down and talk about life. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Charlotte. She nodded yes several times, dourly, as Laurie turned to walk away.

“Now—who’d like some coffee?” said Momma. “Miss Pennington—how about it?”

Part of Charlotte intended to call Miss Pennington and Laurie—she owed them that much, at least—but another, franker part of her, stiffened by fear, knew she wouldn’t. Laurie called Charlotte several times, and she put her off with this excuse and that, and a lifeless, moping voice, until she gave up. Day by day her guilt concerning Miss Pennington accumulated. Many evenings she vowed to call her in the morning, but in the morning she would inevitably put it off until later. That evening she would go to bed early to get away from the sidewise looks Momma and Daddy and even Buddy had begun giving her. She knew she would be lucky to get two hours’ sleep all night, but lying in bed immobile was better than being stared at or talked to.