“Thank you.”
I didn’t recognize my own voice.
My dress was no longer yellow, but stark white, and my hair fell in blond ringlets below my shoulders. A huge diamond graced my left ring finger, with a gold band below it.
“I’m so happy.”
The words came out of my mouth and not my mouth. The kiss I received landed softly on my cheek and not my cheek.
“No happier than I.”
I knew this man would be gentle, unlike Monsieur Brionne. He looked at me with the same kindness Dune did.
Dune.
“David.” I hold his hand as my new husband guides me across the crowded room. He takes two champagne glasses from a tray, and gives one to me.
“To my bride,” he says. “To Melina.”
“To Melina,” the crowd says in chorus.
Before I could catch my breath, the scene changed again.
Six women in prayer. A rosary in my hand. My hair in a tight bun. Feelings of peace, concern, benevolence. And sensible shoes.
The yellow fever is spreading; bodies lie in piles on the streets outside. We can’t take on any more orphans, but the infection makes new ones every day. Every hour.
Is it punishment? Justice? Crying, hungry children speak of neither.
The sound of a bouncing ball echoes down the hallway. Playtime and prayer time blend into an ache in my chest.
The ache spread out through my limbs, and my head began to spin. Three sets of sight competed, fighting for purchase.
Maman and I, leaving the ballroom as Monsieur Brionne watches.
My husband and I, laughing as we dance in the middle of the floor.
My gnarled hands and the pain in my knees, speaking of good use and great age as I kneel to pray.
“Hallie.”
Who is Hallie?
“Please, Hallie. Wake up.”
I squeezed my eyes closed, breathed deeply into my center, and pushed.
Cecile Dupart.
Melina Landrieu.
Sister Mary Christina.
Their worlds disappeared, but their memories remained. Time sealed itself shut behind them, and the ballroom fell silent.
I’d experienced more life than I could ever live on my own in the Bourbon Orleans ballroom, in the span of a few seconds. Something in me sensed the wrongness of the situation, but that didn’t mean I didn’t want it. I could go on a thousand jobs for Chronos, but I’d never dance in a pre–Civil War ballroom. I could fall in love a hundred times, but I’d never be the debutante who married an aspiring politician in the calm that came before the Vietnam War. I could live for eighty more years, but I’d never, ever be a nun.
Ever.