For Rye Gavin Gardiner (best book club books for discussion TXT) 📖

chemical cleaners didn’t seem out of place, and these chemical scents kept that other stench at bay. She glanced at her father’s still-stained armchair, then at the bookcase.

‘Oh my, I knew that awful rain wouldn’t hold off long,’ chirped Renata, spraying air freshener in a zigzag above them. ‘No matter. At least we have an excuse to talk, just us.’

Sandie set the typewriter down on a polished walnut table by the living room window, sighing with relief. She rubbed her arms. Fragile little moth.

‘Cool,’ she said, ‘maybe we can talk about your books. I’m serious, they’d so work as films. Just imagine, Adelaide Addington on the big screen!’ She batted her eyelashes. ‘All you’d need would be the perfect actress to pull it off.’

‘Oh, there’ll be time to discuss everything, Sandie,’ said Renata. ‘Please, take a seat while I make some tea.’ She stepped into the kitchen and filled the kettle.

‘Splash some cold water in mine, would you?’ Sandie called from the living room. ‘I’m so impatient. I’ll just burn my mouth if it’s too hot.’ She glanced quizzically at Renata’s dark glasses and cane. ‘Wouldn’t you…like me to make them?’

Renata lifted the kettle before it began steaming and filled two mugs. ‘No,’ she called, ‘I can manage, thank you. Stay where you are.’

‘You can manage to clean too, by the looks of things,’ Sandie said, coughing on the stink of cleaning fluids. ‘The place is pristine. Kinda cold, though. This how you like it?’

Renata took a packet of Dexlatine from the drawer and pushed six pills into a bowl.

‘No worries,’ Sandie said, ‘I’ve worked on some freezing sets. I’m, like, inordinately professional when it comes to…’

Another three pills fell from the blister pack. Renata ground them.

‘I just think the character needs someone who, y’know, gets her. Like, what I’m thinking is…’

She dropped the powder into the mug on which a cartoon worm grinned maniacally.

‘Someone with passion for Adelaide. I mean, I just think she’s so, like, unfettered to the conventions and unchallenged tropes of modern—’

‘Tea’s ready.’

Renata set down the tray and sat next to the teenager. Sandie adjusted her glasses and glanced around at the shining wooden surfaces and impeccably fresh décor. ‘So you live here on your own?’

‘It’s my father’s house,’ said Renata, positioning the mugs and a plate of biscuits in front of them. ‘He’s taken ill and is resting upstairs. He’s asked for no visitors, but I’m sure we can make an exception for stardom.’

Sandie flicked her hair and smiled that practised smile. ‘You’re so sweet, Renata.’ She edged away from the biscuits. ‘None of those for me, though. Low-carb cleanse,’ she said. Then, peering into the mugs guiltily, ‘But…well, maybe some sugar in the tea wouldn’t kill me?’

Renata returned to the kitchen.

She couldn’t know for certain whether the Dexlatine would have the desired effect. Ideally, such a high dose would freeze the girl’s muscles as it did her father’s, but quicker. There was, of course, every chance it would simply knock her out – or kill her. She could work with all these eventualities, but she hoped for Sandie’s survival.

Drink up, little moth.

She returned with the sugar and spooned a shallow heap into the mug. The cartoon worm grinned as she took a seat. ‘How many, Sandie?’

The girl wiped her mouth. ‘Oh, sorry, Renata. I just remembered something about this model who, like, took sugar in her tea and it went straight to her thighs and…’

Renata stared at the empty, non-drugged mug.

‘…one of my fitness instructors says, well, I forget now, but…’

She placed the sugar on the coffee table and stood.

‘…I mean, he’s cool and everything, it’s just…’

She stepped to the table by the window.

‘…I’m, like, so pleased with my figure at the moment and…’

She gritted her teeth at the typewriter’s weight.

‘God, check me going on about myself again. Listen, I wanted to thank you for something…’

She approached the back of the couch and heaved the machine above Sandie’s head.

‘…for, well, being my friend. Not everyone’s as genuine to me as you are, and it’s really cool. You’re like a big sister to me. Always keeping me straight and giving me advice and inspiring me. So, y’know…thanks, Renata.’ The girl turned around.

Their eyes met.

The moment hung.

‘Renata?’

The typewriter dropped.

24

Patterned cornices lapped like waves against a ceiling that refused to fall into focus. She turned her head and saw blurred shapes rolling past, then lay back and let the carpet continue its massage of her neck. It was a fairly comfortable situation to have found herself in, except for the screaming headache. As for how she’d gotten here? Not a clue.

Then the stairs.

Each step scraped from her buttocks right up her back, thumping her head before falling away behind her. That wasn’t what she needed, not with this headache. She faintly imagined the set of stairs to be a jaggy-peaked mountain range. She giggled at the absurdity.

Light hit her, so much she wondered if she was heading outside. Of course she was, that’s where mountains live! She giggled again.

She suddenly remembered the typewriter.

The giggling stopped.

Then the smell hit her.

It pervaded every pore. The stench covered her from head to toe like an upturned swill bucket, leaping down her throat, up her nose, even stinging her eyes. She retched.

The room into which she was dragged was like a vacuum of cold, the kind of cold she imagined you’d feel walking onto the surface of the moon butt naked. Actually, it wasn’t so much the air was cold, more that there was no air, whatever left in its place cruel and hostile.

The final jagged peak passed beneath her, giving way to an exquisitely solid surface. Its icy touch shocked every inch of her exposed skin, of which there was plenty. Focus dripped