I made my way to the armoire by imagining the robe, the way the silk would feel against my bare arms. It might still smell of my flat and the entrancing incense I’d found on Dorchester Boulevard one afternoon, the thin coil of smoke drawing me like a pied piper into the shop I would frequent after that first intoxication. As my head shot through with a piercing pain and I thought my knees might give, I held the memories of my home and my freedom at the forefront of my mind, like a carrot dangling before an otherwise immobile mule. Slowly, I progressed.

By the time Harvey arrived, I’d withdrawn my Elsie robe and slung it across my shoulders, working in one arm with stiff apprehension. Camille stood frozen in distress, cupping her mouth with one hand and separating he and I, until Harvey finally stepped around her and helped me finish dressing myself. I closed the armoire’s long doors and held myself there for a moment, breathing deeply while I let it support my weight.

“That’s all she wanted,” Harvey said to Camille without turning around. “No harm done.”

“But let’s get her back in bed at once,” she said, the directive giving Harvey permission to take me by the hand and shoulder and return me there. “I was afraid she’d grow faint and hurt herself. You could’ve given me some warning, Dolores.” Her laugh was forced and hopeful, even as I winced at the name again, but at least the splitting was done.

“I’m sorry.” I took her hand after Harvey moved away. It was easy to smile now and surprisingly easier to cry, but I would not allow myself. It was our first reunion and Camille had already been upset.

“No,” she said. “It’s me who’s sorry. I knew this place was wrong for you. I should’ve...” The words or the intention gathered too quickly in her throat and she struggled to express them. “...done something more. I should’ve insisted we keep you out of here.”

“You couldn’t have, Madame Toutant.”

Harvey was right, but Camille shook her head anyway. With each moment that she didn’t speak, the horizon of tears in her eyes swelled higher and higher.

“It isn’t fair.” Her shoulders fell forward then, tiny droplets sprinkling our entwined hands. “You’ve no idea what she’s like, Dolores. She isn’t fit to decide what becomes of you.”

My stomach somersaulted.

“What is she like?” I managed to ask, but Camille hadn’t known the real Walter Gordon. She hadn’t known any of the clients I’d observed with the Professor. She’d no idea that I truly wanted to know—not what she thought of my Source, but what my Source had become.