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"Peachy. The Valentine's dance. Don't get too close and don't hold hands too long. And just when you get to meet someone, you have to say goodbye. And that stupid curfew, even on the weekends."

"Daphne's going to permit us to go off the campus. We'll meet boys in the city."

"You wouldn't do that," she said. "You're too head over heels in love with Beau. Wait a minute." She scrutinized me with her suspicious eyes. "Why are you trying to get me to go back to Greenwood? What's going on?"

"Whenever you want, I'll take trips into Baton Rouge with you," I promised, ignoring her question.

"There's more to this, Ruby. What is it? You better tell me. One thing's for sure, I'll never go back if you don't tell me the truth."

I sighed and leaned back against her door jamb.

"I asked Daphne to move Uncle Jean back to his private room. He's nothing more than a vegetable now. He's lost all desire to live, to communicate. He's retreated into his own world."

"So what? He was nuts anyway."

"He wasn't. He was making progress. If he had a loving family around him again . . ."

"Oh, stop being Miss Goody Two-Shoes. What does that have to do with my returning to

Greenwood?"

"Daphne said if I got you to go back, she would return Uncle Jean to his room."

"I thought there was something behind your sweettalk. Well, you can forget it," she said, turning away to look at herself in her vanity mirror. "I'm not going back to Greenwood. Right now I'm enjoying John, and I don't intend to give him up just so my crazy uncle can have his own room in a nut house." She smiled. "Daphne's going to let me stay for sure then. She doesn't want me to upset the apple cart. Good. Thanks for telling me."

"Gisselle . ."

"I said I'm not going back. That's final," she hammered. "Now stop thinking about sad things and help me plan out our New Year's Eve party. I've invited nearly twenty friends. Claudine and Antoinette are coming over to help decorate the living room tomorrow. For refreshment, I thought we'd have those twelve-foot po'boy sandwiches. We'll work up a fruit punch and wait until Daphne and Bruce leave. Then we'll spike it with rum. What do you think?"

"I don't care," I said glumly.

"You better not be a lump of swamp mud around here tomorrow night. I'm warning you not to spoil the fun."

"That's the last thing in the world I would want to do, Gisselle, spoil your fun. Heaven forbid," I spit out, then left her room before I pulled out each and every strand of hair on her head.

16

A Brave Front

.

Despite my gloomy feelings, I tried not to walk

about with downcast eyes and let everyone know just how unhappy I was. Gisselle's friends were very excited about the New Year's Eve party, and I had never seen Daphne so friendly and outgoing toward them. She came into the living room in the afternoon and made suggestions for the decorating. Of course, all the girls were in awe of her. I could see from the way they gazed at her that they thought she was akin to a movie star: beautiful, rich, elegant, and full of style.

But Gisselle kept herself the center of attention, revealing the miraculous recovery of her limbs and promising to dance for the first time since the accident. She got Edgar to bring in a ladder and then had the girls string streamers from one side of the ceiling to the other. They blew up balloons and placed them in a net to be released at midnight. While they worked, they gossiped about the boys who would be attending the party, and Gisselle described the girls of Greenwood, bragging about the things she had taught them concerning sex and boys. From time to time, she shifted her eyes toward me to see if I would contradict her, but I was barely listening after a while.

I was looking forward to spending the evening with Beau. I took my time choosing my dress and settled on a strapless black velvet gown with a deep, sweetheart neckline. The dress fit snugly at the waist and then had a full skirt that ended about six inches above my ankles. I had planned to wear a string of pearls around my neck but decided at the last minute simply to wear Beau's chain and ring, excited by the way the gleaming jewelry heightened that part of my bosom and cleavage. When I closed my eyes, I could almost feel his fingers softly gliding down, over my collarbone toward my breasts.

I put on a pair of delicate gold and pearl hoop earrings and decided to wear the ring that Louis had given me. Gisselle and I had each been given half a dozen different perfumes. I chose one that suggested the fresh aroma of blossoming roses. I had decided to wear my hair down but pinned back at the sides. My bangs needed a bit of trimming and I smiled to myself, recalling how Grandmere Catherine used to do it for me and even sit talking to me for what seemed like hours and hours while she brushed my long ruby hair, telling me again and again how she used to do the same thing for my mother.

Gisselle surprised me by choosing a dress similar to mine in dark blue. She bedecked herself with far more jewelry, wearing two strings of pearls, long dangling pearl earrings, a gold bracelet on one wrist and Bruce's charm bracelet Christmas gift on the other, as well as half a dozen rings spaced over her two hands. She wore a gold anklet as well. She left her hair down as well, not even pinning the sides, and she had caked on makeup, eyeliner, and lipstick so thick, she could kiss for hours before reaching her skin.

"How do I look?" she asked after coming to my doorway.

"Very nice," I replied. I knew that if I criticized her she would only resent it and rant and rave about how jealous I was.

"'Nice'? What's that like, 'neat'?" she said, grimacing. She studied me a moment, making comparisons. "Why don't you put on more makeup? I can still see those freckles on your cheeks."