Edible Woman - Margaret Atwood [32]
I slid out of my chair, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible, walked across the room avoiding the other tables with great care, and went out to the Ladies’ Powder Room. Checking first to make sure no one else was in there – I couldn’t have witnesses – I locked myself into one of the plushy-pink cubicles and wept for several minutes. I couldn’t understand what was happening, why I was doing this; I had never done anything like it before and it seemed to me absurd. “Get a grip on yourself,” I whispered. “Don’t make a fool of yourself.” The roll of toilet paper crouched in there with me, helpless and white and furry, waiting passively for the end. I tore some of it off and blew my nose.
Some shoes appeared. I watched them carefully from under the door of my cell. They were, I decided, Ainsley’s shoes.
“Marian!” she called. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” I said. I wiped my eyes and came out.
“Well,” I said, trying to sound controlled, “getting your sights set?”
“We’ll see,” she said coolly. “I have to find out more about him first. Of course you won’t say anything.”
“I suppose not,” I said, “though it doesn’t seem ethical. It’s like bird-liming, or spearing fish by lantern or something.”
“I’m not going to do anything to him,” she protested. “It won’t hurt.” She took off her pink bow and combed her hair. “But what’s wrong? I saw you start to cry at the table.”
“Nothing,” I said. “You know I can’t drink very much. It’s probably the humidity.” By now I was perfectly under control.
We walked back to our chairs. Peter was talking at full speed to Len about the different methods of taking self-portraits: with reflecting images in mirrors, self-timers that let you press the shutter-release and then run to position and pose, and long cable-releases with triggers and air-type releases with bulbs. Len was contributing some information about the correct focussing of the image, but several minutes after I had sat down he gave me a quick peculiar look, as though he was disappointed with me. Then he switched back to the conversation.
What had he meant? I glanced from one to the other. Peter smiled at me in the middle of one of his sentences, fondly but from a distance, and then I thought I knew. He was treating me as a stage prop; silent but solid, a two-dimensional outline. He wasn’t ignoring me, as perhaps I had felt (did that account for the ridiculous flight?) – he was depending on me! And Len had looked at me that way because he thought I was being self-effacing on purpose, and that if so the relationship was more serious than I had said it was. Len never wished matrimony on anyone, especially anyone he liked. But he didn’t know the situation; he had misinterpreted.
Suddenly the panic swept back over me. I gripped the edge of the table. The square elegant room with its looped curtains and muted carpet and crystal chandeliers was concealing things; the murmuring air was filled with a soft menace. “Hang on,” I told myself. “Don’t move.” I eyed the doors and windows, calculating distances. I had to get out.
The lights flicked off and on and one of the waiters called “Time, gentlemen.” There was a pushing back of chairs.
We descended in the elevator. Len said as we stepped off, “The evening’s young, why don’t you all come over to my place for another drink? You can take a look at my teleconverter,” and Peter said “Great. Love to.”
We went out through the glass doors. I took Peter’s arm and we walked on ahead. Ainsley had cut Len out from the herd and was allowing him to keep her safely behind.
On the street the