I couldn’t help but chuckle, breaking my eye-contact embargo to catch her smile faltering.

“Oh, goodness, what have I said this time?” she asked cheerfully.

I looked at my notes. “‘A stab at a more peaceful existence’?”

She laughed—that elegant chiming that could disarm anyone. “That’s my ghastly English for you. Well, that’s quite right anyway, I suppose. You’ve got to have a bit of violence and color in your life to appreciate the peace, no?” She smiled, with that mix of vulnerability and melancholia-tinged contentment that’s made her famous.

And that’s all it took for me to fall under her spell.

TAI

Dad once told me that in the grip of extreme shock, everything looks crystalline and sharp: like the moment could shatter, and we would break into a million little pieces with it.

She is just Lady Fleischman, from Elizabeth, New Jersey.

But I’ve lived through enough disasters to know how to lock down my muscles, to make sure the shock doesn’t show if I don’t want it to, at least not past those first microseconds I’d have to be a Mina-the-robot to control.

So when Nons starts to gasp, her mouth opening in slow motion, I whip out and squeeze the flesh of her arm so hard I know she’ll see bruises in the shape of my fingers. But it keeps each of us tucked inside ourselves, so we don’t unintentionally gift this anti-Semitic crow of a woman a single juicy kernel of our hurt.

“Elizabeth, New Jersey,” Daria continues, waving her cigarette in the air. Miraculously ignoring our shock. “Elizabeth, like the queen—Regina, she told me, as if that somehow made the boil-ridden armpit between Newark airport and Staten Island elegant. Ha. She’s Jersey trash.”

“This is the secret you’re revealing in the article,” Noni says, in this steadied rasp, while my stomach roils at the words boil-ridden armpit.

Daria bites back a laugh. “Of course not, lamb. I wouldn’t tell a soul. I am now the curator of her mystery, and that would ruin Mireille forever. And then I would feel so very cold, alone with my boring truth. But don’t fret: I’ll find something fresh and lurid to feed them, to lend you both a bit more attention on the anniversary. That’s my gift to you.” She comes to her feet, moves toward the open maw of the closet again. “Do you want to see my dress for the retrospective?”

“I thought you were agoraphobic,” Noni quips icily.

“This is different,” Daria snaps, pulling out a plastic-wrapped dress, cradling it in her arms. “Oh, it would be just like her to make her return tonight. With the biggest splash,” she adds, almost chuckling. “You know, I’m almost inclined to forgive her.”