The Invisible Circus - Jennifer Egan [23]
“No, this is better,” Faith said. “This is history. You can’t stop it.”
“What? What is it?” Phoebe asked, frightened now.
Faith ran shaking fingers through her hair. “I don’t know,” she said. “But it’s going to be huge.”
“Don’t try and tell it,” Wolf said gendy, stirring the vegetables. “She’ll know when she knows.”
“It’s here,” Faith said, shutting her eyes and holding both hands suspended near her breasts. “Phoebe. Can you feel it?”
Phoebe turned to look at the room. The White Witch, the Queen of Spades and the Joker were all dancing now, moving their arms like swimmers. Phoebe tried to imagine what they felt, suspended in the warm, silky music—it seemed a pleasure she’d known herself, once, a long time ago. The music came faster, cymbals, voices, laughter. Candles dashed their light against the walls.
“Something happened,” Faith said. “I don’t know what it was.”
Phoebe found herself smiling. She was happy, a delicious warmth beginning in her stomach and seeping out through her limbs like the taste of a candy. “In the court of the Crimson King …” chanted the radio singers, the scene like something from an old book, Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere, Aladdin. The dancers’ bodies rippled like flames. Where am I? Phoebe thought, remembering nights at the amusement park in Mirasol, bathed in colored light, riding her father’s shoulders so high she could touch the paper Chinese lanterns with her fingers. Where am I? Wondering felt so much better than knowing the answer.
“I can,” Phoebe said, extending her arms as if to cross a tightrope. She was Alice, downing the potion, waiting to see what would happen. “I feel it.”
“Daddy would love this, wouldn’t he, Pheeb? He’d love it,” Faith said, and Phoebe knew instantly that Faith was right; whatever this was, their father would approve wholeheartedly. She pictured him leaning back against a counter, arms crossed, a look of hungry pleasure on his face. Phoebe stood on her toes, lifted from her chair by a swell of joy and comprehension: her sister knew the way, she always had.
There were footsteps on the back stairs. Barry appeared in the doorway, fully dressed. He stood a moment, taking in the candles, the strangers, the unrecognizable kitchen. Phoebe glimpsed the scene through her brother’s eyes and saw how strange and fragile it was, how it might whirl away as suddenly as those children stepping back through the wardrobe out of Narnia, into their real lives.
“Bear,” Faith said. “We’re making breakfast.”
Barry glanced at his watch. “Six-thirty A.M.,” he said, flicking on the overhead light. The bright, empty glare startled them, making everyone blink. Someone lowered the music, and the dancers fell still.
“All Mom’s Christmas candles,” Barry said. “All used up.”
“But we can buy more,” Faith said. “Christmas isn’t for almost a year.”
Barry eyed her grimly. “I think these people should leave.”
Wolf turned off the stove and went to him, slinging an arm around Barry’s slight shoulders. “Come on, man,” he said, “this is once in a blue moon.”
Phoebe watched the struggle in her brother’s face. Barry admired Wolf, wanted badly to be liked by him. But he hated giving in to Faith. “It’s not my blue moon,” he said, pulling away from Wolf. “Or Phoebe’s. We were just sleeping.”
“But you can be part of it, Bear,” Faith said. “Look, Phoebe’s helping us cook—you can join in, too, why not?” It seemed less an invitation than a plea.
Wolf tried to touch him again, but Barry withdrew, glancing fearfully at the strangers. “What’s going on, Faith?” he said. “Did you take drugs?”
“Aw Christ,” said the Queen of Spades, hoisting herself on a counter and crossing her legs in disgust.
Barry flinched. Then he stuffed his hands in his pockets and looked at the floor. “I want everyone to leave,” he said. “Now. Or I’m calling the police.”
Wolf shook his head. “That’s not the way.”
“Barry, please,” Faith implored.
But at the mention of police the group roused itself, the White Witch pulling a macramé bag from under the table, the sunburned Hatter smoothing his hair