CHAPTER 61 – January Friend

Henry Kiritani returned to NYC on Sunday, the sixth.
There were no tearful goodbyes, no floods of sentimentality, just the acknowledgement that the moment that they had shared at the Tanakas was engraved into their bones.

Eric drove Eppie back to Culver City after the dropoff, picked up everything Curon had sent Eppie from NYC, then returned her to C-401A at LAPA after an easy meal at a local diner.

He helped her unpack, for there were far too many boxes and far too much packaging, since the bulk of it came from Saks. Eppie had also taken the initiative to pilfer a dozen hangers from Sony Wardrobes while she could, so that her new wardrobe could be properly maintained.

The last time she was home, she had left an old whodunnit trap for William—a short length of sticky tape that broke easily when her door or her undies drawer was opened. She was glad to see that these remained in place, inferring that, whatever the man was up to, he wasn’t doing scheduled runs on her cheap K-Mart underwear.

The rest of the apartment remained similarly undisturbed, cool and smelling faintly of the cedar scent blocks Josefina had left here and there for moths.

After thirty minutes of packing, Eric looked at her with disbelieving eyes.

“How… how can you be so bad at this?” her Newfoundland stuttered. “I thought you were Miss Perfect at everything? What happened to the Mary-Sue we all know?”

Eppie stood in a whirlwind of old clothes and new, twenty things on the bed, cables from the table, and cardboard on the floor. “I need a break…”

What was she to tell him? That her mum had done the cleaning? That she had house cleaners and personal aides since her late twenties? That she had never packed a single thing in her tastelessly large ocean view home?

Eric growled. As a man with a meticulous garage, he could not allow his ward to live in the human equivalent of the Stray Cat Society’s blanket-strewn hovel.

In twenty minutes, her man set up her new iMac and sorted the cables. Installed the stand and spare keyboards for her MacBook, and reorganised her wardrobe for winter.

“Jesus Christ, this sweater is $600?” Eric’s eyes watered as he held up one of her merinos in cream.

“Curon picked it,” she explained, as if that was a valid reason. “Want one for Emily? There are two.”

“You think Emily can wear children’s size clothes?” Eric snickered even as he marvelled at the tags. “No, this is… too much.”

Eppie shot the man a dirty look, folded the sweater, then slipped it into the top shelf of her wardrobe.

“What are you going to do with the old laptop?” The lawyer coiled the old cables like a pile of garter snakes.

“Renée Goode,” Eppie said, before he could ask. “I’ll pass it through Simone.”

“Like, in secret?” Eric was evidently surprised by the openness of her kind gesture.

“We’ll see.” Eppie slipped her old machine into the cardboard box.

“Always scheming.” Her Newfoundland drooped his tail.

It took them ten minutes to slide the smaller boxes into the larger boxes, so that her small room finally had space to breathe.

Eppie sat coiled on her bed, her body folded like a cat’s, exhausted by Curon’s gifts. Eric stood at the door.

“Everyone’s coming back, right?” Eric asked from the doorway, coat on and arms full of compacted cardboard. “You gonna be alright?”

“I am always alright,” Eppie tilted her head adorably.

He gave her a Robert Redford nod, then locked the door behind him.

It was late, and she still had all her accounts to set up. The room was quiet, even with the window two inches open.

Eppie looked at the door and thought about her chances.

She sighed, then took her wooden chair, carried it to the door, and wedged it under the handles.

A girl living alone should not be taking any chances.

It really was unpleasant to know that, had she lacked a [System], what awaited Euphemia Fontaine would not be sweet sleep, but paranoid insomnia.

Her roommates clocked in later in the evening, but Eppie was already unplugged.

Eppie woke at precisely 6:15 AM.
Her [Persona] ran a better body clock than any alarm.

The chair was still wedged under the door handle, exactly where she’d put it. She felt immensely silly for a moment, then got up and moved it back to the desk.

Her door opened to the lovely sight of Josefina holding a tray. On the tray: a cafetière, three mugs, and a cloth-covered plate that smelled of butter and warm bread. Behind her sat Ava in full dance warm-up: leggings, crossover cardigan, hair in a bun. Behind Ava stood Halle, still in her oversized Nashville Predators sweatshirt, her auburn hair wild, holding her hugmug like a kid by a fireplace.

“Little bird,” Josefina said in Spanish, looking her over. “You’re up?”

“I am up,” she smiled back.

Breakfast was served. The girls ate. The girls talked about their holidays. Eppie told them about New York, Central Park, the galleries, and the cats.

“You look serious.” Josefina studied her face as she munched on a piece of toast. “Más seria. More serious. Something happened.”

Yep. I watched Valorie get assaulted, then stopped it by throwing a forty-five-kilogram terracotta pot across the balcony of a multi-million-dollar mansion, nearly killing the most prolific Oscar-producing Producer in all of Hollywood. And that was in the first forty-eight hours!

“Ah, nothing crazy,” she said.

“Mm-hmm?” Josefina took her empty mug for cleaning.

Ava sat cross-legged, stretching out her neck. The next few months would be crucial for her. She had her showcase, meaning it was her final chance to move to Guilliams. If she failed, she would not be attending an arts college but a regular Ivy League or nearby one, chosen by her parents. “New York? How was it?”

“Bloody freezing,” Eppie said. I would have probably frozen to death in the park were it not for my [System] payments.

Halle was far more intrusive than curious. “Did you buy a computer? I can see it from here!”

“Ya, it’s a work computer,” Eppie nodded.

“A work computer,” the Freshman said, with the undertones of someone suddenly noticing heavy machinery. “For making music?”

“That and other things,” Eppie said evasively. I really should start typing the scripts in my head down on paper. She had Pygmalion, True Grit, and Strictly Ballroom. One full-blown play, and two screenplays.

She completely understood why Shaw’s generational masterpiece might be of interest to her future theatre ambitions, but True Grit?

The revenge theme was on brand, for like Eppie, she had obsessively pursued her father’s murderer. And like herself, Mattie conducted herself among adults as an adult, rejecting her own girlhood. Then, Mattie fell into a serpent pit while chasing Tom Chaney—she got him, but a rattlesnake got her arm.

Eppie looked at her right arm, then gave her biceps a pinch.
She was rather more attached to it than Mattie.

But why not the novel? Why the screenplay?

Maybe it was because of the screenwriter, Marguerite Roberts, whose writing credits were stripped from her works by MGM as a result of the House Un-American Activities Committee’s unjust persecution. True Grit signalled Marguerite’s return in the sixties. She gave John Wayne his sole Academy Award and the repudiation of a crooked Academy.

Either way, the [System] worked in mysterious ways.

When she returned to the conversation, everyone else was laughing, and so Eppie laughed as well. The light outside her window was thin and pale, and the campus was rapidly filling up with noise.

“To the new semester,” Eppie raised her water cup.

“The new semester,” Halle raised her coffee, as did Ava.

Josefina clapped.
Their mugs touched, and Eppie took the moment for what it was—warm, unsullied, and wonderfully ordinary.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

7:45 AM.

Eppie moved past the Quest Board, navigating around the students, struggling because most of them were taller than she was, including the Freshmen. Almost everything on the board had been stripped and reset. The forms and slips had all been collected, and final notices were now up for those who couldn’t make up their minds in the final weeks of December.

At the centre of the theatre section, she saw what remained of the TITUS notice:

TITUS ANDRONICUS — LAPAGANZA
Spring Production Directing Team: Dr D. Cooper & Mrs S. Tyker

Cold Reads: Jan 15
Auditions: Jan 16–18
Rehearsals begin: Jan 23

There were half a dozen sign-ups now for the role of Lavinia.
No one had prioritised the understudy’s position as she had.

She smiled at the familiar faces who came to greet her, and then it was time for class.

English Honours began with students staring in horror at Dr Kirby’s holiday homework collection tray. At the same time, their good instructor wrote out the plans for the next five weeks in her exquisite handwriting on the whiteboard.

Eppie set hers on the tray—she had done it in between her various activities, in under thirty minutes, thanks to [Script Analysis], composed in her impeccable handwriting thanks to her [Agility].

The [System], if it was involved, was throwing her hints again. The cautionary tale in The Crucible was that Abigail Williams really was resoundingly successful, disturbingly so, in having her case heard. While Antigone and Lavinia were silenced or destroyed, Abigail had turned the corrupted systems of Salem upon itself, casting herself as the false martyr.

Eppie sat in her usual seat opposite Kirby, then greeted her friend as they entered with the air of prisoners presenting paperwork.

James Jules placed his report down with confidence, winking at her as he passed.

Cameron Atkinson had a cardstock cover sheet. He gave her a nod.

Lucy came in two steps behind Chelsea and put hers down like she was throwing away a dead rat.

Chelsea dropped hers, sat down, then shot Eppie a big smile.

Madison slipped hers in gingerly, then brushed Eppie with her eyes.

Almost everyone, bar one or two, had something to give.