Dairine’s frustration level was increasing so much that she started thinking out loud. “It’s almost like what already works isn’t good enough, like you have to find the perfect solution and so merely good won’t do, almost like . . .” She fumbled for words, turned away.
Like you’re sabotaging yourself, said something in the back of her brain. Like you truly don’t want to go any further. Like you’re planning to have things come undone now.
And in a horrified split second it all laid itself out in front of Dairine, clear as crystal, like a chess problem written down, like a maze solved. “Something didn’t go right” was what Mehrnaz had said at the end of the first round. But that, as Nelaid had warned her, was code. What Mehrnaz really meant was, I won when I was supposed to have lost. And more to the point: I want to lose.
She has some reason to want to fail this, Dairine thought, not for the first time. It’s something to do with the family, I know it is. And thinking this, Dairine started to get angry. We like each other, yeah, but she doesn’t trust me enough to tell me. That started to make her angry too.
Well, there are a couple ways to handle this . . . But Dairine knew instinctively that one of them was not going to be confronting Mehrnaz directly. Not yet, anyway. I’ve got to let her play it out, and just refuse to let her screw it all up. Who knows, she might give in to the idea of winning if I wear her down. But after all this work I’ve done, I will not lie back and let her screw it up on purpose!
“Like what?” Mehrnaz said.
“Sorry,” Dairine said, “lost my train of thought. Let me see the fault analysis routine again. There was something on the power-feed segment of that routine that got me confused.”
But wow, this is going to be a long, long day or two. Remind me again why I signed up for this?
On the morning of the semifinals, Nita sat up in her bed, gasping again. It was dawn.
It took her several minutes to get control of her breathing. “I’m starting to hate this,” she said silently to Bobo. “I can’t remember when I had a stupid meaningless dream anymore. Like being in school and suddenly realizing I haven’t studied for a test.”
Or that strange one where your teeth fall out.
Nita shuddered. “Why’d you have to remind me? I was just forgetting about that one.”
Sorry . . .
“Never mind,” Nita said.
Have you got context for me?
“Yeah,” Nita said. She had to take an instant to swallow—her mouth was dry at the memory of her dream from last night.
The imagery had been arresting, because when the dream started, it had seemed like one of those ordinary inconsequential dreams. She’d been heading over to Kit’s house because his mom was going to be making that chicken dish she did so well. And she got to the house, and she went in the back door, and Kit was there in the kitchen, getting something out of his refrigerator. He turned to her . . .
And his eyes were empty. There was no one there, no one inside. It wasn’t as if the stare was blank or zombielike. It was just that Kit was missing somehow. None of the expressions that normally lived in his eyes were there.
She shivered. That was not something she ever wanted to see again. And what was worse, in the dream she could hear echoes of that earlier dream with Carmela, where Kit’s sister had begged her “not to let them get Kit.” In this morning’s dream, she remembered being overtaken by a wave of utmost dread, because she realized that it was too late, they had gotten Kit, and there was nothing she could do about it. The sheer horror of it had snapped her awake and upright in a flash of hot and cold adrenaline.
Anything else? Bobo asked.
Nita shook her head. “Not sure I want anything else, frankly. It’s made me feel a little sick to my stomach.”
Probably you should have some of that peppermint tea.
“Better let my insides settle first,” she said.
Nita got up and got dressed. What’s this all about? she thought as she put the kettle on. Is this something to do with The B Word? Is my subconscious terrified that Kit won’t be Kit anymore if he’s my boyfriend instead of just my friend? Because there was no avoiding the whispers and rumors and suggestions, at school, in books, on TV shows, that if you took that extra step too far you could “ruin it” and never ever get back again what you had before. Usually, before this, she’d have scoffed at the idea. She and Kit had been through way too much trouble together, and though there’d been misunderstandings and disagreements along the way, they’d always come out okay on the other side.
But those eyes, those empty eyes . . . The memory of them creeped Nita out. They made her feel like the solutions that had worked in the past might not be good enough for the present, let alone the future . . .
She eventually managed to push the image away. But she wasn’t going to be terribly happy with life until Kit came over later in the morning and she saw his eyes, and that he was inside them.
She’d just finished making herself some of the peppermint tea and was halfway down the mug when her dad came in, found himself a mug, and started going through the cupboards. Nita was paging through her manual and not paying much attention to him until it occurred to her that the rummaging was taking a lot longer than it usually did for him. It’s not like he doesn’t know where the coffee is. Or else—“Coffee or tea?” Nita said.
“Coffee.”
“Did she drink it all already? Wow, she must really be having trouble with the zone lag.”
“What? Oh.”
Her dad was staring straight at the glass jar of Dairine’s coffee, but it was as if he couldn’t see it. Nita reached into the cupboard past him, grabbed it, and handed it to him. “Here,” she said. “I won’t let her know you had any. Just grab another jar of it from the store when you go by there.”
Her dad made himself some coffee, and then once it was made, leaned against the counter and stood staring into his mug for a while as he stirred. He looks so concerned, Nita thought. What’s going on with him?
“Nita,” he said. “You have a moment?”
“What? Sure.”
“Okay. Good.” And he took a breath. “You and Kit—”
With a shock Nita realized what was coming. Oh no, she thought. Not right now. Not on top of everything else!
Nita held her breath.
“How’s it been going?” her dad said.
She had no idea where he’d been planning to start, but this was so low-key, even for her dad, that Nita was tempted to laugh out loud. Except that would probably throw him right off his stride when he needed to talk to her about this, and she didn’t want to do that. This was going to be weird and difficult enough for them both as it was.
In any case there was no point in trying to pretend she didn’t know what subject he was trying to broach. “We’re fine,” she said. “A little freaked, maybe.”
“Both of you?” he said, giving her a curious look. “Kit’s been playing it pretty calm.”
“Playing it, yeah,” said Nita.
Her dad smiled half a smile. It was an expression that Nita remembered her mom wearing a lot, and now she found herself wondering which of her parents had come up with it first and how long it had taken to rub off on the other one. After a moment he said, “Has anything. . .”