Not as dark as the foyer, but still dark. Torches on each side, every ten feet or so. Up close, they look like wooden clubs with flaming honeycombs on the end. Smoke curls off them, but I hardly smell it. A quick glance at the ceiling reveals what I expected: slits. It’s some kind of fan device, I think, drawing the smoke up and out.
Like Mother’s House.
Except…c’mon. When you’ve got torches in an enclosed space, there’s probably not that many ways to get the smoke out.
Just like when you’ve got a domed ceiling, it’s got to be pretty common to paint a sky on it.
Lana and Laura are engaged in friendly bickering about the purpose of our visit here when we come upon the next gut-punch. Off to our right, in a little alcove—circular, with a curtained, circular window reaching most of the way around it—is a replica of David. You know, the famous nude sculpture.
I can tell right off that Lana notices it, too. She slows almost to a stop and stares at it as if she’s never seen it before. I watch her brows scrunch as nausea spreads through my stomach and extends its sticky, sweaty fingers through the rest of me.
Her perceptive blue eyes shift quickly to mine. She smiles a little, warm but noncommittal, the kind of vacant smile she probably gives during psychoanalysis to encourage a patient to go a little further toward some painful memory.
I know that smile well, and I have one that answers it. I curve my lips up, conveying in our wordless triplet speak that I’m A-okay, and nod toward the rest of the hallway.
“Lead the way, smut sister.”
After a discreet, half-second x-ray stare, she does. Laura lags behind me, messing with her phone now, probably texting Todd to let him know that there hasn’t been any sinning just yet.
I’m glad Lana’s got her back to me and Laura is distracted, because I’m starting to lose my shit a little more with every step I take. I’ve noticed a rug under my feet, which probably went unnoticed until now because my psyche refused to acknowledge it. It’s green, with gold leaf flecks.
My hand reaches automatically into the right-hand pocket of my sexy-tight red jeans, fingertips fumbling desperately for the tiny pill I keep with me, just in case.
At that exact moment, Lana, still a step in front of Laura and me, looks over her shoulder at us. Her eyes collide with mine, then widen as they sweep down my body, to where my overeager hand incriminates me.
“Leah,” she says sharply.
“What?”
Her eyes widen only a fraction.
“What?” I say calmly, digging my hand deeper into my pocket. Sweat starts at my hairline and sweeps back over my scalp. I itch and tingle: phantom pains. I feel moisture at my nape; it pops up between my shoulder blades. Sweat and…hunger.
“Tell me you aren’t…”
I shake my head. “No way. Why do you think…?” I glance down at my hand, as if I’m still confused.
Laura puts her hand on my shoulder. “Leah, you are reaching for a pill, the way you said you always used to keep them in your pocket!” She grabs my elbow. “If you are—”
I jerk out of her grasp and stop in my tracks. “Jesus, you guys. No, okay? I wasn’t doing that!” Inside my pocket, I bring my ring finger on top of my middle finger and push at my middle finger’s nail, digging under it with the nail of my ring finger until I feel a sharp ache. I pull my hand out of my pocket and hold it up.
“Broken nail. See? Paranoid a little bit?” I jab my gaze from Lana to Laura.
Lana’s shoulders relax as she goes off high alert. Laura winces. “That looks jagged.”
“Yeah.” I let my breath out slowly.
We’re walking again, and I try my best to breathe in through my nose, out through my mouth.
“You seem edgy,” Lana says, as the last of the people who were behind us walk around us, leaving us at the back of the pack.
“Maybe because it’s so crowded,” Laura says, ignoring me and looking at Lana.
“Maybe because we’re going to watch sex,” I murmur.
I feel instantly guilty. This is what my sister wants to do on her last weekend as a single woman. I should be a good bridesmaid and keep my mouth shut.
Just because this place happens to remind me of Mother’s House doesn’t mean I have the right to ruin this night for Lana.
Let’s be honest, Leah; you don’t really remember. I entered The House, was led to my room, and left it seventeen months later. Without a visual memory to confirm the dread this place incites in me, I’m going on nothing but emotion, adrenaline, and a vague sense of anticipation.
I remember what I learned in rehab, where I spent three months almost a year ago: How, when this intense anxiety surfaces, it’s usually triggered by feelings. Feelings I haven’t dealt with. Ones that somehow relate to my experience as a captive.