Part 19 (1/2)

She gave me a kiss on the cheek in which her lips actually touched my face; she hadn't kissed me like that since my mother's wake. She must have been feeling contrite. ”So, what happened to you?” she asked.

I told her the entire story of my night with Peter Miceli, leaving out the part where he said that he was probably going to kill her.

”I have something to tell you!” she exclaimed before I could continue.

”Yes?” I said, waiting.

She suddenly broke into a huge smile, and the conversation turned to her favorite subject-herself. ”You'll never guess who I ran into last night,” she said, obviously excited.

I played dumb.

”Fred Wyatt,” she said. ”I ate at n.o.bu anyway, which was great, by the way, and as I was leaving the restaurant, he was standing right in front of the door. How weird is that? He was just standing right there, in front of the restaurant. It was almost like he was waiting for me.”

He was waiting for you, you idiot, I thought, but I kept it to myself.

”And then he walked me home. All the way up to my apartment door,” she said, a flush in her usually pallid cheeks.

”Did he come in?” I asked, flas.h.i.+ng back on Crawford's conversation with him.

She shook her head. ”Sadly, no.” She chewed her lower lip. ”But something tells me I'm going to see him again.” She picked up the papers on the table and began thumbing through them. She read the t.i.tle of one aloud: ”The Role of Guilt in Macbeth: 'Tis Safer To Be That Which We Destroy.” ”Wow,” she said. ”Heavy.”

”Actually, that's not bad.”

”It's not? I would have just called it 'Max's Macbeth paper' and left it at that.”

I took the paper from her hand. ”And, that, my dear Max, is why you were a math major.”

The paper was a muck-covered mess. ”Where was that written? A sewer?” she asked.

I flushed, thinking back to my dream on the train about who I now knew was Crawford. I kept my head down as I shoved the papers back into my briefcase, unlocked and opened my office door, closed my eyes, and tossed the briefcase in. I didn't want to see the destruction again. I took my purse from the table and asked her if she was ready to leave. We exited onto the little landing and went up one level to the chapel floor. We arrived at the Blue Room and were greeted by Sister Mary, who was the only one in the room, besides the food-services people.

”Alison. Maxine.” She gave a few orders to the food-services people and dismissed them with an imperious wave of her hand. ”Alison, I thought that we'd wait until about six-fifteen to give out awards. Let the guests have a bite to eat and a drink before the ceremony starts.”

I knew she wasn't looking for my input, so I just nodded.

”You look lovely, dear, except for that huge b.u.mp on your forehead,” she said, and swept off in her queen-sized panty hose, a cloud of Jean Nate, Aqua Net hair spray, and general p.i.s.siness.

Max rolled her eyes at me. ”She hasn't changed since we went here. There's a woman who really needs to get laid.”

I put my hand over Max's mouth and went over to the bar area, where Marcus, the head chef of the commuter cafeteria, was tending bar. Since I usually ate there, we had become quite friendly. He leaned in conspiratorially when I approached the bar and whispered in my ear. ”You'd better get a drink now. Sister Wicked Witch will be back before you know it.”

I introduced Max to Marcus. He took her hand and kissed her knuckles lightly. ”Enchante.” Although he was sixty-five if he was a day, he was all Jamaican cool and charm, with a head of white hair atop a face the color of teak. Max gave him a thousand-watt smile and asked for a couple of Cosmopolitans. She looked at me. ”They're so out they're in again.” Marcus whipped up a batch of the pink drink and handed them to us with a flourish. ”Ladies.” They had even broken out the martini gla.s.ses for tonight's festivities.

People began filing in, and I greeted a few parents who I had met before. I looked and saw Max at the bar, flirting with Marcus and starting her second Cosmopolitan. I had a nagging sense of dread as I saw her hoist the drink to her lips; the last thing I wanted to do tonight was peel Max off the floor of the Blue Room before my date with Crawford. That would certainly be a mood killer.

She caught my eye, and I drew a flat palm across my throat to signal ”Enough.” She smiled back at me and turned back to Marcus, who was now completely in her thrall.

A couple approached me-he, short and bespectacled, and she, a grown-up version of her daughter: redheaded, pet.i.te, and attractive. The Martins, I suspected. Mr. Martin held a gla.s.s of scotch, his wife a gla.s.s of white wine. He held out his hand but I could see his eyes travel to the b.u.mp on my forehead. ”Frank Martin. Are you Professor Bergeron?” I nodded. ”Our daughter raves about her Shakespeare cla.s.s with you. This is my wife, Genevieve Martin.”

With my ”date shoes” on, I towered over both of them by a good four inches. I shook hands with both of them. ”Nice to meet you. Fiona's had a wonderful year in my cla.s.ses.”

”We're very proud that she's in this honor society. She tells us that you were one of its first members on campus,” he said.

”I was.” I looked around. ”Where is Fiona?” I asked.

Mrs. Martin answered. ”She actually went to find you. She wanted to talk with you about the last paper she wrote for the Shakespeare cla.s.s.”

I decided to play it casual, an immense wave of guilt flooding over me at the thought of the papers in my briefcase. ”Oh, she did? We'll have to chat before the night's out.” I picked my drink up. ”Would you excuse me?” I headed over to the bar, where Max was picking peanuts out of a silver bowl and sipping her Cosmopolitan.

”Who are they?” she asked, draining her drink and motioning to Marcus to fix her another one.

”Parents of one of my students,” I said.

”It's kind of depressing when the parents start to look the same age as you, huh?” she mused. ”And we didn't even get pregnant in college like some people we know,” she said, referring to Gianna. Marcus set our drinks down in front of us, and Max continued picking peanuts out of the bowl. A waiter floated by with a trayful of canapes, and she picked two off the tray and popped them in her mouth one after the other. ”I'm starving,” she said, her cheeks bulging.

”I got that impression.” I took a sip of my Cosmopolitan and watched a few more sets of parents float into the room. Sister Mary returned and began greeting everyone with her usual mixture of officiousness and graciousness. Whatever she had, the parents ate it up. Maybe her bl.u.s.ter was part of her charm, or maybe it lent the school and our department some credibility. I had given up trying to figure it out.

She led a group of parents over to me just as I was hoisting my drink. I didn't know whether to take a sip or put the drink down, so I fumbled and spilled a little down the front of my dress and into my decolletage. I grabbed a napkin from the bar and mopped up as much as I could before shaking hands with the parents of several of my students. Sister Mary introduced everyone to each other.

”And, this is Maxine Rayfield, one of our ill.u.s.trious alumnae,” she said, her Latin conjugation impeccable. If Latin hadn't been a dead language, I'm sure Sister Mary would insist we speak it within the walls of the school. ”Maxine and Dr. Bergeron graduated in . . .” She looked to us for confirmation.

”Another decade,” Max chimed in, breaking up the group.

We stood and made idle chitchat for about fifteen minutes. The large windows were open facing the river, and as the rain began to fall in heavy, torrential drops, Sister Mary rushed over to close them. When she was done, she came over to me. ”I count fourteen students, and we have fifteen awards. Who's missing?”

I looked around the room and scanned the faces. ”Fiona Martin,” I said. ”I think she's looking for me to discuss a paper.”

Sister Mary's face turned grim. ”We need to start the awards ceremony in thirty minutes, latest. Find her,” she commanded.

I whispered to Max that I had to go back to my office for a minute. She was deep in conversation with Desiree Franklin's parents about her Tribeca neighborhood and property values. Apparently, they were looking for real estate. I felt comfortable leaving her side, knowing that a conversation about Manhattan real estate values would have Max talking for at least an hour. Besides s.e.x, that was one of her favorite topics, so I was glad that they had chosen real estate to chat about.

I entered the office floor and saw Fiona sitting at the prefect's table, alone. Her hands were folded in front of her, and she almost looked like she was sleeping. She must have heard my heels. .h.i.t the hardwood floors, because she looked up and then over at me, her reverie interrupted. The office floor was almost completely dark, and I switched on the light that hung over the table.

”Hi, Fiona,” I said. ”We're going to start the ceremony soon, and Sister Mary would like you to come to the Blue Room.”

She pushed her chair back, stood up, and faced me. She was more cute than she was beautiful, with wavy red hair, beautiful skin, and big blue eyes. She was smart and did well in school; she was on the dean's list each of the three previous semesters and she was just finis.h.i.+ng her soph.o.m.ore year. She was wearing a lovely blue-linen suit with beige pumps, a grown-up outfit for an almost-woman who looked like a little girl. She smiled at me. ”I really wanted to talk with you about my Shakespeare paper.”

I walked toward her. I felt guilty that I had to be tracked down by a student to discuss a paper. ”I'm so sorry, Fiona. With everything that's been going on here and at home, I've really let the ball drop on those papers.”

She smiled again. ”Well, I'd really like to know my grade, but at this point, it's not a big deal. Can I just have my paper back?”

I was confused. ”I still have to grade them, Fiona, even if they are a bit late getting back to you. If I give you the paper back, you'll have a missing grade for my cla.s.s.”

”I think I'd still do fine in the cla.s.s. I'll take that chance.” She pushed her chair in with her hip and moved closer to me.

I thought for a moment. ”Listen, I'll move you to the top of the pile and grade your paper tonight. You'll have an answer Monday. Just like I promised the other day in cla.s.s,” I reminded her.