“Agnes, tu ne m’as pas dit que tu m’apportais un cadeau,” he said with a bow as he took hold of Emily’s hand and kissed it slowly, then escorted her to the corner of the room and sat her down.

“I don’t…” Emily said, vaguely recalling that cadeau was French for “present.” She looked across to Tyler for an answer, only to find him glaring at them.

“Ignore Frederic,” Agnes said as she shut the door. “He flirts with everyone.”

The soft thud of wood, the decisive click of a lock and Emily’s heart jumped back and forth as she tried to breathe, tried not to panic.

You’re fine. Emily began to tap her fingers against her thigh. You’re fine, she repeated to herself as she stared at the door, at where a moment before there had been a line of sight to a staircase but now there was no window, no light other than the artificial glare coming from a TV screen.

“You okay?” Frederic sat down beside her, but any attempt Emily would have made to reply was lost as the tune of “Single Ladies” blasted from surround-sound speakers and made her ears pulsate. Agnes came into the center of the room and began to sing in a powdery voice aimed directly at Tyler. Emily couldn’t help but watch as Agnes started to writhe, her body transforming in Emily’s mind into a serpent that was coiling itself around and around the room, wrapping them up tight and squeezing out all the air.

Emily gave a sharp shake of her head, dipped her chin and tried to focus instead on the way in which she had earlier watched as a man blew into molten glass, turning it over and over to create a sculpted vase that looked as if it had a rainbow running through its center. She took a breath, waited for the music to do what it always did, make it possible to ignore the real world.

“Do you want to try?” Frederic sat too close, and the way he was looking at her like some kind of delicacy to be sampled made Emily shift to the side, place a cushion on the space between them.

“Non, merci,” she said, taking a sip of her drink and looking over to where Agnes was shimmying and writhing, all for Tyler’s benefit, but he seemed more interested in watching how Frederic was edging ever closer to her. It was surreal, like she had fallen down the rabbit hole and woken up in an alternate reality.

The music stopped, and the room fell still with nobody speaking, each of them waiting for something to happen. Agnes sauntered over and held the microphone out to Emily, one eyebrow raised in silent question.

“Elle a dit ‘non.’” Clementine took the microphone and offered a sympathetic smile to Emily.

Agnes yawned, then helped herself to another drink, stirring through the martini with an olive on a stick. “So you are just an illustrator, not like your grandmother?”