The Mare

Velvet

After they decided I could stay longer, I woke up in the middle of the night, I guess because I was excited. At first I thought it was late, but I saw light coming from under the door and I heard Paul and Ginger talking downstairs. Something about their voices made me feel like something was going on, and I wanted to know what it was. So I got up and went out of the room, walking quietly. I went half down the stairs and sat down right next to the wall. They were in the kitchen and I couldn’t hear them all the way; it was words, then pissed-off hiss-mumbling, then words. I creeped down the wall some more and I heard Paul say: “There’s a limit to what you can be to each other, and you are mumble mumble pushing that limit. It’s taking it out of the boundaries set by the organization mumble mumble personal!”

“It’s supposed to be personal!” Ginger mumble-hissed. “…families…the same kids up every year…even birthdays—mumble mumble!”

Paul didn’t answer. They just moved around. There were dish sounds and water running, which didn’t sound mad, and I thought that if they were really mad, I would hear it in the dishes: they would bang them around like when my mom is mad, when she’s mad, even the water runs mad. So I thought it was okay. But it didn’t feel okay. It felt like at the bus station, only harder to understand. Like I was in the Alice in Wonderful story where she is really, really tiny and then really, really big, like I was something tiny in their house and huge at the same time. I went back upstairs and lay down and tried to think like I wasn’t really sure what they said. But I was.