Page 20 of Persephone's Curse
“Hmm?” She didn’t turn to look at me. She was staring at a plant with two signs next to it.
The first said:
DEADLY NIGHTSHADE
ATROPA BELLADONNA
(SOLANACEAE)
The second said:
POISON PLANT
“Grandma’s watch. Did you say Clara could have it?”
“Isn’t it odd that they have that sign,” she said, pointing to the one that labeled the plant as poison. “I mean, it’s in the name, you know? Deadly Nightshade? You would think that would be enough of a warning for people.”
“Evelyn. Clara. The watch.”
“Yes,” Evelyn said, still not looking at me. “I gave it to her. She’s always wanted it.”
“But you love that watch.”
“And I also love Clara,” she said, and that was such a compelling argument that I didn’t know what else to say.
She went inside. I stood in the cloister, surrounded on all sides by impressive stone archways. Above me, the sky was a pale gray-blue. The air was crisp and smelled very clean. It smelled like my mother’s perfume. I lowered my gaze and there she was, in front of me.
“Status report, please?” she said, touching a hand to the braided tie of my hooded sweatshirt.
“Clara’s fine,” I said. “Evelyn’s fine. Bernadette is… mostly fine, I think.”
“And you?”
“Oh. I’m fine,” I said.
“Not a very thorough status report, I have to say.”
“Things are a little… weird.”
“I’ve picked up on that.”
“But I think it’s mostly okay.”
“Okay,” she repeated. “I trust you.” I had pulled my hood over my head; she gently pushed it down. “I wish you would stop wearing the same sweatshirt every day.”
“Well, I wash it,” I said.
“But still. You have so many beautiful clothes.”
And she wandered away without waiting for a response.
I found Evelyn an hour later, after spending some time with the Farthing ghost who always hung around the Merode Room, staring somewhat morosely at the Annunciation Triptych, nodding in my general direction as if to indicate she didn’t mind my company. This was nice because sometimes theydidmind my company, and they’d disappear or walk through a wall or sink dramatically into the floorboards to get away from me. That always made me feel a little weird, like I’m the only person left alive who can see you and you still can’t tolerate me?
Evelyn’s hands, when I found her, were stuffed into the pockets of her ochre-colored corduroy skirt, her head slightly tilted to one side as she stared, unblinking, at what had always been our favorite piece of art in pretty much the entire world—The Unicorn in Captivity. I didn’t have to look at my sister’s face to know that she was on the verge of tears again, in that in-between place where your nose is tingling and your eyes are burning but you could come back from it, if you wanted to.
“Evie?”
“He could get out,” she said, not taking her eyes off the tapestry. It showed a snow-white unicorn, legs folded, reclined in the middle of a beautiful, overgrown garden. The unicorn was chained to a pomegranate tree that was encircled by a wooden fence with no gate. But the fence was low, to Evelyn’s point. The tree was thin and weak. The unicorn could get out if she wanted to.
