Dawn (Cutler 1)

"Philip!"

"Just kidding," he said and laughed. He released his hold on me, and I retreated to the door.

I hurried out and turned to wait for him to close the door and follow. As soon as he did, we started up the cement stairs. But just as we did so, a shadow moved over us, and we both looked up into the disapproving eyes of Grandmother Cutler.

Bloated with anger, she glared down at us and looked so much bigger and taller.

"Clara Sue thought you two would be here," she spat. "I'm returning to my office. Eugenia, I want to see you there within five minutes. Philip, Collins needs you in the dining room immediately."

She spun on her heels and walked off briskly.

My heart felt as if it would crack open my chest, and my face felt so hot and flushed, I thought my cheeks would burn. Philip turned back to me, his face filled with fear and embarrassment. What had happened to the strong, confident look he had worn so often back at school? He looked so feeble and weak. He gazed after Grandmother and then back at me.

"I . . . I'm sorry. I'd better get going," he stammered.

"Philip!" I cried, but he lunged up the remaining steps and rushed off.

I took a deep breath and continued up the stairs. A heavy-looking, bruised gray cloud slipped over the warm afternoon sun, putting a chill in my heart.

Clara Sue smiled smugly at me from the receptionist's desk as I walked through the lobby toward Grandmother Cutler's office. She was obviously still jealous and upset by the way Father and Mother had reacted to my playing the piano the other day, I thought, as well as to the crowd's applause for my singing at Grandmother Cutler's birthday party. I knocked on Grandmother's office door. I found her seated behind her desk, her back straight, her shoulders stiff, and her arms on the arms of the chair. She looked like a high court judge. I stood before her, a tight wire inside, stretched so taut I thought I might break and cry.

"Sit down," she commanded icily and nodded toward the chair before her desk. I slipped into it, clutching the arms tightly in my palms, and gazed nervously at her.

"Eugenia," she said, only moving her head slightly forward, "I'm going to ask you this just once. Just what is there between you and your brother?"

"Between us?"

"Don't force me to define every one of my words and speak unspeakable things," she snarled and then quickly relaxed again. "I know that when you were at Emerson Peabody, before Philip learned the truth of your identity, he fancied you one of his girlfriends, and you, understandably, were attracted to him. Did anything happen for which this family should feel shame?" she asked, raising her eyebrows inquisitively.

It was as if my heart stopped beating and waited for my mind to stop reeling. A gush of heat rushed up my stomach and over my breasts, circling my throat in a fiery ring that choked me. I felt feverish. At first my tongue refused to form words, but as the silence stretched and became uncomfortably thick, I vanquished my throat lumps and caught my breath.

"Absolutely nothing," I said with a voice so deep I hardly recognized it as my own. "What a horrible thing to ask!"

"It would be far more horrible if you had something to confess," she retorted. Her sharp, penetrating gaze rested on me with deep concentration.

"Philip is a healthy young man," she began, "and like all young men, he is not unlike a wild horse just finding his legs. I think you have the worldly experience to understand my point." She waited for me to acknowledge her, but I simply stared, my heart pounding, my teeth coming down on my lower lip. "And you are not without attractive feminine characteristics, the sort most men find irresistible," she added disdainfully. "Therefore," she concluded, "most of the responsibility for proper behavior will depend on you."

"We've done nothing wrong," I insisted, now unable to keep the tears that burned behind my eyelids from emerging.

"And that's the way I want to keep it," she replied, nodding. "I am forbidding you from this day forward to spend any time alone with him, do you hear? You are not to go into any hotel rooms by yourselves or invite him into your room without a third party present."

"That's not fair. We're being punished when we haven't done anything wrong."

"It's for preventative purposes," she said and in a little more reasonable tone added, "until you are both able to conduct yourselves more like a normal brother and sister. You must keep in mind how unusual the circumstances have been and are. I know what's best."

"You know what's best? Why do you know what's best for everyone else? You can't tell everyone how to live, how to act, even when to speak to each other," I stormed, my anger now rising like an awakened giant. "I won't listen to you."

"You will only make things more difficult for yourself and for Philip," she threatened.

I gazed about the room frantically and wondered where were my mother and my father? Why wasn't at least my father here to participate in this discussion?

Were they merely puppets? Did my grandmother pull their strings and run their lives, too?

"Now, then," she said, shifting herself in the seat and shifting her tone of voice as if the issue had been settled, "I have given you sufficient time to adjust yourself to your new surroundings and your new responsibilities, yet you persist in hanging on to some of your old ways."

"What old ways?"

She leaned forward and uncovered something on her desk.