Page 68 of Deja Who
“Thanks!” Karen smiled, pleased. “My mom, she said the same thing, and all my sisters did, too.”
“Yes, well. You, and they, used to be comfort girls in Japan.Chinesecomfort girls in Japan,” she emphasized, assuming they would catch the reference. “Sometimes comfort girls volunteered. You didn’t. So in this life, you’re not interested in tolerating male bullshit.”
“That’s creepy,” Karen announced, “but you’re pretty good. Normally I’d be super pissy about being called a hooker. No offense,” she told Celia the Hooker.
“No, no.” Celia waved it away. “S’fine.”
2) Terry the Sociopathic Cat Cooker. Terry did not like being on the wrong end of unrequited love. Not that what she felt for her boyfriend was love, unrequited or otherwise. “He’s the only one that can make me come,” she explained.
“Who can make you come.”
“He can. Like I said.”
“No, you said ‘he’s the only onethatcan make me come’ and it’s ‘whocan make me come.’” At Terry’s long, unsettling stare (unsettling to someone unused to staring down socios once or twice a month), she added, “Never mind. Continue.”
“Right. Anyways—”
Good God. Anyway! Singular! If she says “towards” or “amongst” they’ll have to arrest me for homicide. Again.
“—he can’t make me feel that good all the time and then just take it away. He’s too big for me to hurt directly, so Muffin had to go.”
“He can, though,” Celia said. Leah concurred, but did not waste time or breath agreeing. “Just like you’ve got the right to dump anybody you want.”
“Yeah, that’s a totally different thing.”
“It’s not,” Celia tried again, to the same effect.
“And then that crybaby hostess calls the cops! Like Muffin muffins would be so much worse than the usual crap coming out of that kitchen.” Terry had indulged her anti-cat politics at her (former, Leah assumed) place of employment, Dan’s Diner. “Cat’s totally fine. Okay, a little singed. But otherwise fine. It’s not like I would have really done it.”
“Why lie tous, Terry?” Celia wondered. Oh, she wasadorable. Leah assumed it was either a) the sociopath’s instinctive, perpetual habit of lying even when it was easier to tell the truth, or b) television’s portrayal of what happened to those in jail who became, as John Cusack put it, “garrulous in the company of thieves.” Hmm. Is that why she was so taken with Archer? He did remind her of Cusack inBetter Off Dead, a bit, but not, thank heavens, Cusack inThe Raven.
“So, what is it? Who’d I used to be?”
Leah shrugged. “You were a sociopath then, and you’re a sociopath now.” Déjà vu. She’d said that earlier to Chart #6116.
“Yeah, I figured.” Terry preened a bit, ignoring everyone’s tandem eye rolls.
How I loathe that sociopathy now has cultural cache.
3) Brienne the Shoplifter. Brienne alternately claimed entrapment, absentmindedness, and drunken intent. “It can happen to anybody!” she protested. “I was thinking about the rest of my errands and took it without thinking.”
“Brienne.”
“You can’t tell me people don’t do that every damn week in this country.”
“Brienne.”
“It wasonething.”
“It was a ten-speed bicycle from Wal-Mart.”
She threw up her hands. “Without thinking! Can happen to anyone!”
“For God’s sake.”
She dropped her hands back to her lap, a petite blonde whocould not pull off a tube top. “So what’s the scoop? What’s my backstory?”
“I have no idea.” At the other woman’s glare, Leah added, “Sorry. Don’t believe what you see on TV; Insighting doesn’t explain everything. Sometimes people do silly things.” And that, too, sparked déjà vu; it reminded her of Archer. Although these last several days, few things didnotremind her. How irritating, while also comforting. “If you were my patient, I’d have to put you on reindyne and we’d likely have to do a few sessions. And even then I might not be able to help you.”And regardless, you would be responsible for your actions in this life, whoever you were in another life.
