Every Heart a Doorway(9)

"And that, children, is why sometimes we don't let the Addams twins out into the general population," said a voice. Nancy looked up. Kade, who was seated on one of the tree's higher branches, waved sardonically down at her. "Hello, Nancy out of Wonderland. If you were looking for a private place to cry, you chose poorly."

"I didn't think anyone would be out here," she said.

"Because back at home, the other kids were more likely to hide in their rooms than they were to go running for the outdoors, right?" Kade closed his book. "The trouble is, you're at a school for people who never learned how to make the logical choice. So we go running for the tallest trees and the deepest holes whenever we want to be alone, and since there's a limited number of those, we wind up spending a lot of time together. I take it from the crying that your orientation didn't go well. Let me guess. Lundy told you about lightning striking twice."

Nancy nodded. She didn't speak. She no longer trusted her voice.

"She has a point, if your world kicked you out."

"It didn't kick me out," protested Nancy. She could still speak, after all, when she really needed to. "I was sent back to learn something, that's all. I'm going back."

Kade looked at her sympathetically and didn't contradict her. "Prism is never taking me back," he said instead. "That's not a nonstarter, that's a never-gonna-happen. I violated their rules when I wasn't what they wanted me to be, and the people who run that particular circus are very picky about rules. But Eleanor went back a bunch of times. Her door's still open."

"How  …  I mean, why … " Nancy shook her head. "Why did she stop? If her door is still open, why is she here, with us, and not there, where she belongs?"

Kade swung his legs around so they were braced on the same side of the branch. Then he dropped down from the tree, landing easily in front of Nancy. He straightened, saying, "This was a long time ago, and her parents were still alive. She thought she could have it all, go back and forth, spend as much time as possible in her real home without breaking her father's heart. But she forgot that adults don't thrive in Nonsense, even when they're raised to it. Every time she came back here, she got a little older. Until one day she went back there, and it nearly broke her. Can you imagine what that must have been like? It would be like opening the door that was supposed to take you home and discovering you couldn't breathe the air anymore."

"That sounds horrible," said Nancy.

"I guess it was." Kade sank down to sit, cross-legged, across from her. "Of course, she'd already spent enough time in Nonsense for it to have changed her. It slowed her aging-that's probably why she was able to keep going for as long as she did. Jack checked the record books the last time we had an excursion to town, and she found out Eleanor was almost a hundred. I always figured she was in her sixties. I asked her about it, and you know what she told me?"

"What?" asked Nancy, fascinated and horrified at the same time. Had the Underworld changed more than just her hair? Was she going to stay the same, immortal and unchanging, while everything around her withered and died?

"She said she's just waiting to get senile, like her mother and father did, because once her mind slips enough, she'll be able to tolerate the Nonsense again. She's going to run this school until she forgets why she isn't going back, and then, when she does go back, she'll be able to stay." He shook his head. "I can't decide if it's genius or madness."                       
       
           



       

"Maybe it's a little bit of both," said Nancy. "I'd do anything to go home."

"Most of the students here would," said Kade bitterly.

Nancy hesitated before she said, "Lundy said there was a sister school for people who didn't want to go back. People who wanted to forget. Why are you enrolled here, instead of there? You might be happier."

"But you see, I don't want to forget," said Kade. "I'm the loophole kid. I want to remember Prism more than anything. The way the air tasted, and the way the music sounded. Everyone played these funky pipes there, even little kids. Lessons started when you were, like, two, and it was another way of communicating. You could have whole conversations without putting down your pipes. I grew up there, even if I wound up getting tossed out and forced to do it all over again. I figured out who I was there. I kissed a girl with hair the color of cabbages and eyes the color of moth-wings, and she kissed me back, and it was wonderful. Just because I wouldn't go back if you paid me, that doesn't mean I want to forget a second of what happened to me. I wouldn't be who I am if I hadn't gone to Prism."

"Oh," said Nancy. It made sense, of course, it was just an angle she hadn't considered. She shook her head. "This is all so much more complicated than I ever expected it to be."

"Tell me about it, princess." Kade stood, offering her his hand. "Come on. I'll walk you back to school."

Nancy hesitated before reaching up and taking the offered hand, letting Kade pull her to her feet. "All right," she said.

"You're pretty when you smile," said Kade as he led her out of the trees, back toward the main building. Nancy couldn't think of anything to say in response to that, and so she didn't say anything at all.

* * *

CORE CLASSES WERE SURPRISINGLY dull, taught as they were by an assortment of adults who drove in from the town, Lundy, and Miss Eleanor herself. Nancy got the distinct feeling that someone had a chart showing exactly what was required by the state and that they were all receiving the educational equivalent of a balanced meal.

The electives were slightly better, including music, art, and something called "A Traveler's History of the Great Compass," which Nancy guessed had something to do with the various portal worlds and their relations to one another. After hesitantly considering her options, she had signed up. Maybe something in the syllabus would tell her more about where her Underworld fell.

After reading the introductory chapters of her home-printed textbook, she was still confused. The most common directions were Nonsense, usually paired with Virtue, and Logic, usually paired with Wicked. Sumi's madhouse of a world was high Nonsense. Kade's Prism was high Logic. With those as her touchstones, Nancy had decided that her Underworld was likely to have been Logic; it had consistent rules and expected them to be followed. But she couldn't see why it should really be considered Wicked just because it was ruled by the Lord of the Dead. Virtue seemed more likely. Her first actual class was scheduled for two days' time. It was too long to wait. It was no time at all.

By the end of her first day, she was exhausted, and her head felt like it had been stuffed well beyond any reasonable capacity, spinning with both mundane things like math and history, and with the ever-increasing vocabulary needed to talk to her fellow students. One, a shy girl with brown braids and thick glasses, had confessed that her world was at the nexus of two minor compass directions, being high Rhyme and high Linearity. Nancy hadn't known what to say to that, and so she hadn't said anything at all. Increasingly, that felt like the safest option she had.

Sumi was sitting on her bed, braiding bits of bright ribbon into her hair, when Nancy slipped into the room. "Tired as a titmouse at a bacchanal, little ghostie?" she asked.

"I don't know what you mean, so I'm going to assume you want to be taken at face value," said Nancy. "Yes. I am very tired. I'm going to bed."

"Ely-Eleanor thought you might be tired," said Sumi. "New girls always are. She said you can skip group tonight, but you can't make a habit of it. Words are an important part of the healing process. Words, words, words." She wrinkled her nose. "She asked me to remember so many of them, and all in the order she gave, and all for you. You're not Nonsense at all, are you, ghostie? You wouldn't want so many words if you were."

"I'm sorry," said Nancy. "I never said I was from  …  a place like you went to visit."                       
       
           



       

"Assumptions will be the death of all, and you're better than most of the roommates she's tried to give me; I'll keep you," said Sumi wearily. She stood, walking toward the door. "Sleep well, ghostie. I'll see you in the morning."

"Wait!" Nancy hadn't intended to speak; the word had simply escaped her lips, like a runaway calf. The thought horrified her. Her stillness was eroding, and if she stayed in this dreadful, motile world too long, she would never be able to get it back again.

Sumi turned to face her, cocking her head. "What do you want now?"

"I just wanted to know-I mean, I was just wondering-how old are you?"

"Ah." Sumi turned again, finishing her walk toward the door. Then, facing into the hall, she said, "Older than I look, younger than I ought to be. My skin is a riddle not to be solved, and even letting go of everything I love won't offer me the answer. My window is closing, if that's what you're asking. Every day I wake up a little more linear, a little less lost, and one day I'll be one of the women who says ‘I had the most charming dream,' and I'll mean it. Old enough to know what I'm losing in the process of being found. Is that what you wanted to know?"