Page 32 of The Narrow

She grabbed me, hadn’t she? The ghost grabbed my arm in my dream.

But her hand was small. This hand had wrapped easily around my forearm.

I shut my eyes. My tongue bumps against my teeth, and the taste of blood fills my mouth. The pain makes my thoughts sluggish, and through them comes the sharp-edged shadow of panic, rising toward me.

“Come with me,” Delphine says. She touches my right wrist lightly before walking away. Numbly, I follow.

In the bathroom, she opens the medicine cabinet. There are two dozen prescription bottles, all of them with her name on them. Some of the dates look old, probably expired. She turns them to inspect the labels until she finds what she’s looking for. She dumps out the pills and places them in my palm. I know exactly what they are without looking at the label.

I almost laugh. I almost throw up.Open your mouth and stick out your tongue, Dylan had instructed me before placing the pill in my mouth.Now chew. His fingertip tasted sour. “I don’t want these.”

“They’ll help with the pain,” she says. A question behind the words.

I close my fingers over the pills, feeling the shape of them in my hand.

“Take them just in case,” she suggests. “Unless—you’re not an addict or something, are you?”

I choke out a laugh. “No.” I don’t think so. If I was, I’d be craving them, wouldn’t I? All I want is to fling them away. I make myself slip them into the pocket of my scrubs.

“Why do you have these?” I ask.

“Surgery last year. You know, it was the only time I’ve left campus in years. I didn’t even stay the night. They had to get me back here right after. I guess not even a hospital is enough of a controlled environment.”

And yet a refurbished house at a boarding school is. Why is Madelyn Fournier so set on her daughter getting an Atwood education?

“What’s it like?” I ask. “When you’re exposed to water, I mean. What happens? Seizures?” I remember her collapsing in the dining hall.

“Sometimes,” she says. She leans against the sink, chewing at her lip. “It’s like getting pushed against the back of my skull. Like something else is filling me up. And then I can’t breathe. It feels like I’m drowning,” she says, a distant look in her eye. “The smallest drop of water makes me drown. Isn’t that strange? And no one can explain it.”

She doesn’t sound self-pitying. She sounds angry. She looks away and wipes an errant tear from the corner of her eye.

“But filtered water is fine,” I say. It doesn’t make sense.

“There are a few people who are allergic to water. It’s called aquagenic urticaria,” Delphine says. “But it just gives you hives on your skin. You can drink water just fine. And it doesn’t matter if it’s filtered or not.”

She fell in the Narrow. And now she drowns on dry land. Oster knows something, and her mother, and Clarke. And Aubrey knew something, too.

“Did Aubrey ever say anything about...” I trail off. If I mention the Drowning Girl, will Delphine think I’m crazy?

“About what?” Delphine asks. When I don’t answer immediately, she clicks her fingernails idly against the white quartz counter. “Aubrey was my friend, but she also felt like she needed to protect me. There were things she didn’t tell me. Like that my mom was paying her extra to report on me.”

My eyes widen. Delphine doesn’t look bothered at the idea that her one friend in the world was spying on her.

“She needed the money. I didn’t mind. It’s not like there’s anything to tell, except for the AtChat stuff, so I never showed her that.”

“You showed me.”

Delphine pauses. For a moment I think she’s going to tell me that it’s because I’m different. For a moment, I long for her to. Then she clears her throat. “You’re going to lie to my mother,” Delphine says. “When she offers you the same deal, you’re going to take it, and then you’re going to lie to her.”

“You sound pretty confident about that,” I say.

“You don’t need extra money like Aubrey did,” Delphine says. She sounds like she’s laying out a logic problem. “But youdoneed the tuition, so you have to keep my mom happy.”

“Why wouldn’t I just spy on you for real?” I ask.

“Because if you do, I’ll know. My mother doesn’t lie as well as we do. I’ll know, and I’ll tell her I can’t stand having you here,” Delphine says. “She’ll make you move out, and you’ll have to leave the school.”

“You’re a bit ruthless, aren’t you?” I ask, trying to hide how much it stings.

---