A Nest of Nightmares

But the moment she stepped inside she broke into a sweat of fear. It was only Victoria’s physical presence at her back which kept her from bolting, and after another moment she realised that it was the smell of the house she had responded to so powerfully. It was the smell of her mother’s house, as if she had fallen back in time. But there was nothing mysterious or even unlikely about it – just an unfortunate combination of a particular brand of furniture polish, air freshener, and a whiff of bacon grease.

‘Keep quiet,’ Victoria breathed at her ear. ‘Just follow me. Mom’s asleep.’ Still shaken by the physical force of memory, Sheila obeyed. Victoria had told her in the car that she lived with her widowed mother.

‘Welcome to my sanctum sanctorum,’ said Victoria, and closed the bedroom door. Sheila was not usually bothered by claustrophobia, but as the door closed she felt her throat tighten and she began to have trouble breathing. The room was so crowded with books, furniture, and clutter that it felt more like a storage closet than a place to live. Sheila looked around, trying to relax by taking in details.

There was a fussy, pink and white dressing table with a lighted mirror; narrow twin beds separated by a chest of drawers; a slant-topped, professional drawing table and adjustable chair; and bookshelves covering two walls, overstuffed with books and seeming to strain at their moorings. Sheila looked at one of the beds and at the burdened shelves above it, and hoped that nothing would fall on her in the night. Where there was wall space not covered with books, paintings and photographs had been mounted. Sheila recognized various famous movie and television stars in customary poses, but the paintings were uninspired: landscapes in unlikely colours, and stiff, mannered depictions of dragons, unicorns, and strangely dressed people.

‘Most of the art is mine,’ said Victoria. ‘But I won’t bore you with my creations right now.’ She giggled. ‘Oh, it’s so exciting, having a real, live author in my very own room!’

Sheila realised suddenly that the bossy Victoria wasn’t as self-confident as she pretended – that she was actually shy – but the understanding didn’t change her feelings. Of course, it wasn’t Victoria’s fault that this house reminded her of her own past, or that in Victoria’s nagging and bossing of Grace Sheila heard her mother’s disappointment: Would it kill you to show a little interest? To be friendly?

Yes, she thought now, it would have killed her. If she had made friends and found contentment in the life her mother wanted for her it would have killed her soul. She would never have written. She would have felt no need to escape.

She looked at Victoria’s pinched, sourly hopeful face. Victoria was trapped, even if she didn’t know it, but Sheila had escaped. She could afford to show a little kindness.

‘It’s a very nice room,’ she said. ‘You’ll have to show me your designs in the morning . . . not right now because I’m too tired to appreciate anything but bed.’

‘Oh, silly me! Of course you’re tired – I forgot how late it is. It’s just that I’m so excited.’

Sheila decided she liked Victoria even less when she was giggly and excited, but there was no escape from her now except into silence and herself: the same old thing.

‘It’s like being a kid again, having someone spend the night,’ Victoria said in the darkness. ‘Didn’t you used to love going to slumber parties?’

Sheila had been to only one slumber party, attending under pressure from her mother. She did now what she had done then and pretended to sleep. But she lay awake for what seemed hours, listening to Victoria’s adenoidal breathing and hearing, behind it, her mother’s voice: Think you’re better than all the other girls? Too good to talk to them? You think you’re different?

She knew she was different. She knew she was better. The hard part was to hang on to that knowledge, and resist all those who tried to make her ordinary.

Sheila woke feeling as exhausted as if she had been struggling rather than sleeping all night, and when she saw herself in the bathroom mirror it was clear that she had lost the struggle.

There were days when she liked her face, but this was not one of them. Makeup didn’t really help, and her hair was hopeless. Confronted with the change in atmosphere and the dry, gritty wind of West Texas, it seemed the permanent had given up, leaving her with a lank, lifeless, mousy brown mop.