Page 62 of Ink Blood Sister Scribe

Was that what she wanted?

Cecily had been asking her this question in various forms for years and Joanna had never truly listened; in part because it always came not in the form of a question but of advice, unsolicited and full of “shoulds.” A question left room for Joanna, while advice only had space for Cecily. Joanna needed space.

The cat finished his spit-bath and came over to investigate Joanna’s coffee cup. When she put her hand on his back, it was slightly damp from his ministrations, but the pleasure of being allowed to pet him was too great to deter her. Soon he was purring, a hoarse rumble.

“If you came inside,” she told him, “we could do this all the time. You’d have a million soft things to curl up in. There’s a woodstove and an ugly armchair you could scratch to pieces. I’d take care of you.”

But when she stood after a while and opened the door, again he refused. He twined around her legs, hopefully nosed the empty tuna bowl, then darted off toward whatever adventures awaited a small cat in a large forest. She tracked his streaking figure until she lost him amid the trunks and dead leaves and pine needles.

Joanna understood his reluctance to enter the house. For him, the forest was the known world. Its dangers and pleasures could be anticipated. And maybe he sensed with his wordless cat brain that coming inside would forever change his experience of outside. Cold was easier to bear when you’d never been warm.

20

Esther made it through Christchurch and onto her connecting flight to Auckland without a hitch, but the pitch of her nerves didn’t dip as she stepped off the runway into the bustling Auckland airport. She kept expecting her falsified documents to trip an alarm that would send people springing from the woodwork to arrest her, or tail her, or kill her, and “Emily Madison” had passed through the Christchurch check-in and security with a pulse so high she’d been worried the scanners would detect it somehow. But they hadn’t.

Now safely in Auckland and standing in line for flight 209 to Los Angeles, Esther shifted her bag on her shoulder and breathed deeply. To calm herself in the hours before boarding, she’d gone to a bar and parked herself at the counter and had two very strong beers, counting on the booze and the chatter and the muted rugby match to work their soothing magic on her, but the alcohol had the opposite effect. She felt twitchier than ever and kept overcompensating for beer-slowed reflexes by whipping her head over her shoulder at every movement, to catch the eyes she felt sure were on her.

“Step to the side, please, ma’am.”

Esther realized the gate agent was speaking to her, and she paused, one empty hand still held out for the passport that wasn’t coming. “Sorry?”

“I’m told you’ve been selected for additional security checks,” the gate agent said, handing Esther’s passport to the uniformed guard who’d appeared at her shoulder. “This gentleman will escort you.”

Esther gaped, too confused to be frightened yet. She had been anticipating this since she’d stepped into the airport with a forged passport, butit had come at the very second she’d stopped expecting it and now she was disoriented, unprepared.

“What is this about?” she said, pitching her voice to sound calm and authoritative but only making it halfway.

“Additional security checks,” the uniformed guard said, repeating the gate agent’s words, but instead of the comforting lilt of her Kiwi accent, his voice was all flat American. He had a bland white face with dark cowlicked hair and a defensive mustache, under which his mouth barely seemed to move as he spoke. “Come along, miss.” His hand hovered at her arm, a threat of physicality.

“But my flight,” she said, one last useless grab at control. “I’ll miss it.”

“This won’t take long,” the guard said. Esther didn’t move, her mind whirring for an out, imagining breaking into a run and dashing back through the airport, past security, out into the parking lot, running. Or maybe she could slip away from the guard somehow and sneak out without making a scene, maybe she could beg for the bathroom and maybe the bathroom would have a window and—and—

His fingers closed around her arm.

“Let go of me,” she said. “I’m coming.”

But his grip tightened instead of loosening, and he led her away, past the line she’d so recently been a part of. Curious faces swiveled to watch as they passed. A young Asian woman with enormous red plastic glasses took a few steps after them, and the expression of sympathetic concern on her face jump-started Esther’s own fear, as if it had needed a mirror to see itself. She felt breathless and dizzy as the guard brought her down the hall to a door set near-invisibly in a white wall, and before she could understand that she was losing her one chance to break away and run, he ushered her inside.

There she found a room of harried-looking people getting their shoes swabbed by security officers, along with a table spread with partially unpacked suitcases and a few big, beeping x-ray machines. Aside from her guard she was one of the lighter-skinned people in the room and she almostrelaxed, thinking maybe it really was just a random security check after all (and this was certainly the first time she’d ever found herselfhopingfor some commonplace racism), but the guard steered her past the security equipment and through another door, down a narrow hallway, and into a tiny room that held a desk, a computer, and a pink-lipsticked woman staring at the screen. She glanced up when they came in and nodded.

“Room four,” she said.

Room four was at the end of yet another hallway, and the guard pushed Esther in before him, then locked the door behind them with a click that echoed horribly through Esther’s nerves.

The gray room was bare but not empty: in one corner was a large cloth-covered object.

In the other corner was a person.

A grown man, sitting slumped against the wall with his head hanging onto his bare chest. He was in only boxers and socks and Esther felt a thrill of pure panic run up her spine. Would she, too, have to submit to being undressed and searched? The man in the corner raised his head and looked blearily up at her, and something about his face was so uncanny that at first she didn’t realize what exactly she was seeing—but when she did understand, she let out a small, involuntary noise.

Aside from a streak of drying blood on his forehead, he looked exactly like the guard. Exactly. Same bland features, dark hair, defensive mustache. Same face.

“Don’t mind him,” the guard said in that flat American voice. The man said nothing, eyes unfocused, head sagging back down.

“What is this?” Esther said, dropping her duffel bag and turning to the guard. She kept her voice firm to maintain some shred of dignity and control, but the guard merely smiled at her.

“He’s had a few sedatives,” the guard said. “He’ll be all right, don’t worry.”

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