Roselyn stood over Shane's body, buried under a cairn of pillows. She tapped Shane with her shoe, not expecting a reaction and thus not being disappointed. "How long has she been this way?"
Girl sighed from a corner of the room, where she sucked a hookah as though it were oxygen. "Days," she exhaled.
Roselyn lifted Shane's arm and released it, watching it flop onto the pillows with no resistance. "How did this happen?"
"Good question," Girl inhaled. When she did not respond nor exhale the smoke, Roselyn prodded her. "I don't know what happened. She drank some tea and went to sleep. Won't wake up. Not usually how tea works."
Roselyn's eyes sharpened. "What was wrong with the tea?"
"Nothing. Kind of funny, in a 'we're-all-gonna-die' way. Though I guess that isn't exactly funny. Not exactly. She kept saying that I should do what I had to do, thought I was going to sprinkle something to her cup. I don't know what."
"What do you mean 'we're-all-gonna-die'?"
"Oh, there is a slight chance that all of this is happening in her head and that, if she doesn't wake up, she'll dream something new instead of us. Or stop dreaming. I really should mention these things sooner, but it's probably nothing to worry about. We won't get anywhere if we think like that. Best of all possible worlds with neat red sheep and diamonds." The way she said it, Roselyn was nearly inclined to believe.
Roselyn pricked Shane's cheek with one of the many safety pins affixed to her shirt. The blood welled to the skin, but the wound remained. Roselyn rubbed the spot, smearing her pallid skin red. The pinprick kept bleeding without unnatural cessation, without the skin closing up unmarred. "What the hell did you give her? She isn't healing."
Girl held up a hand in protest. "Nothing. Every day, ordinary tea. Whatever she is going through, it is something that isn't of my doing. This time. Wherever she is, it ain't in that body, savvy?"
Shane -- or what remained in the plush pile -- gasped air and continued to slumber serenely. "How much longer will this last?"
"As long as it has to, I suppose. Chrysaliseses. Not really my department, the comatose. I can't… I can't get in there. That head is locked shut by the previous occupant, no mail forwarding. No amount of kissing lets me in, but maybe it isn't my kiss at all. Maybe it is a not even a coma, but as long as she lays here, she is alive. Unfortunately, alive isn't always the best state to be."
"Meaning?"
"There's a whole lot more to this than dear Shaners. She has promises to go and miles to keep… you know what I mean?"
"And she can't do anything. And she thinks something happens soon."
"Right and left and all sides together. I'll keep her safe and dust her as needed, my Sleeping Beauty." Girl entangled her limb with the hookah's pipes, a housecat wrestling a squid, oblivious and indifferent to her company. "I'll keep her safe," she confided to the pipes.
"Why… I have a question, something that has been on my mind," Roselyn interrupted.
Girl did not extricate herself from the tubes, but looked up expectantly.
"Why did you… why were you and Shane involved?"
"There are a multitude of implications to that particular-"
"No games! Shane is… if not straight, than at least mostly straight. I was her roommate for months. Trust me, I would know if she was even slightly into girls." Roselyn did not attempt to hide the slight bruise to her pride. "So I know. She mooned over… still moons over Eliot and ignores just about everyone else. So why you? I guess what I'm asking is… what the hell did you do to her to make her like you?"
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