Parsifal didn't answer. He waved his hand.
"Okay," the man said, and went behind the door.
The voice of the technician came over an unseen speaker. It filled the room. "I'm going to move the table now. This is going to be very slow." When the tray moved into the tube, Sabine followed it. Parsifal wiggled his toes and she squeezed them back, and in this way they communicated.
"He's doing all right in there?" the voice asked.
"He's all right," Sabine said. Squeeze.
There is a certain feeling when the spotlight is directly in your eyes. You know the house is full, the manager has told you, but everything in front of you is wrapped in a black sea, so you stop trying. To try and see is to strain your eyes against the light. It will give you a headache. When you look out, you are blind. The only person who knows this is the one standing next to you on the stage. He is all you can see. Together you speak and smile into the blackness. He is blind and he leads you. From this close you think he is wearing too much mascara.
"You're doing just fine," the technician's voice said. "You are holding perfectly still. Just keep holding still."
There was a drumming in the room, an industrial rhythm of hammers and gears, low thuds that at times seemed so frantic that it felt like something had gone wrong. The test took half an hour. Sabine watched the clock over the tube click along like an oven timer. She wanted to tell Parsifal something, to keep him occupied, but there was nothing to say. It was all she could do to speak. "Are you doing okay?" she called, and he bent his foot by way of acknowledgment.
"You're halfway there," the voice said. "You are so still. You're perfect." The sound of bedlam, jackhammers and lead pipes on lead walls. And then later, "Three more minutes. One more set of pictures and then you're out of there." That was when Sabine felt Parsifal's toes flex and pull with happiness in her hands.
The nurse came into the room, his blue scrubs dazzling against his black skin. He pushed a switch to set Parsifal free. "Over, over, over," the nurse said. "Never have to go in there again." He slid the head cage up and flicked the chin strap loose. It came apart so much quicker than it went together. The padding was gone, the earplugs. Parsifal was free. "You're feeling okay now. Aren't you fine?"
"My head hurts so much," Parsifal said, his eyes still watering. There were wet stains beside his head.
"They'll know something soon. Come on and I'll get you back to your room so you can rest."
"Can I stay here, just for a minute? I don't want to move yet." Parsifal tried to smile at the man for his kindness. "I just need a minute to rest."
"You want to stay on the machine? Wouldn't you like it better if I moved you onto your gurney?"
"Not yet," Parsifal said. "If that's all right. Not just yet."
"Sure," the nurse said, patting his shoulder so lightly that they almost didn't touch. "We'll be right behind the window. We have a few minutes. You take your time."
Sabine thanked him and the man left. All those people she met on the most important day of her life and never saw again. Sabine took Parsifal's hand.
"I wish we were home," he said.
"We will be. We'll go home today. No matter what they tell us, we'll leave."
"Lean over," he said. "Come close to me."
Sabine bent forward. Her hair slipped from behind her ears and fell onto his forehead. His eyes were blue like the sky over Los Angeles in winter.
"Open your mouth," he said.
And as soon as he said it she felt the cold weight on her tongue and tasted metal in her saliva. She opened her mouth and he reached up to her and took the silver dollar off her tongue.
"Look at that," he said, and put it in her hand and squeezed her hand tight around the coin. "Rich girl," he said.
Sabine waited three more days before calling Dot Fetters.
"Just checking to see how the wedding plans are coming," Sabine said, but she could not make her voice sound like her voice. It shuddered and broke.
"Sabine?" Dot said.
Sabine put her forehead against the heel of her hand and nodded.
"Are you all right?"
"I'm good."
"You're coming out, aren't you? That's what you're calling to tell me."
"I was thinking…," Sabine said, but didn't finish.
"Bertie," Dot Fetters called, "it's Sabine, pick it up in the bedroom."
In the distance, Sabine could hear a scramble. Dot Fetters was no fool; two would be more persuasive than one. In the moments it took Bertie to reach the phone, Sabine saw the rooms of the house on the other end of the line. She saw the living room where Dot Fetters sat in a reclining chair unreclined, pale tan walls and practical carpet with a braided rug over that. The kind of rug that Parsifal referred to as a big doormat. The light was dim and gold and the house was as small as Sabine's was huge. The halls were hung with family photographs from generations back. The double bed that Bertie was now sitting on was covered in a white chenille spread. She didn't stop to turn on the light on the bedside table before picking up the receiver.
There was a click and then a breathless excitement on the line. "Sabine! Are you coming?" she said in the dark.
"She's thinking about it," Dot Fetters told her daughter.
"You have to come now," Bertie said. "We could use help with the wedding. You've got such good taste and I don't know what I'm doing. I need help fixing up Haas's house, too. There's so much around here that needs to be done."
"Don't make her think we want her to come just to put her to work," Mrs. Fetters said.
"She doesn't think that, do you, Sabine?" Before Sabine could answer, Bertie went on. Sabine thought of her pink hand clutching the phone, the engagement ring making a brave light. "I'm just making excuses. I'm just trying to make you think that we need you so you'll come. We just miss you, is all. You don't have to do anything once you get here."
"You fly to Denver," Dot Fetters said. "Then you take the shuttle to Scottsbluff. We'll pick you up there. Unless you're afraid of those little planes. If you're afraid, I've got no problem driving to Denver to get you."
"They plow all the roads to Denver," Bertie said.
"No problem getting to Denver," Dot Fetters said.
"Do you have warm clothes?" Bertie asked.
"She's got warm clothes. There were pictures of her and Guy in the snow."
"I wasn't sure. It was so warm in Los Angeles. Well, don't worry about it. There are plenty of clothes here. Everything's going to be too big on you but between me and Mama and Kitty there's a ton of stuff. Don't go and buy anything."
"Do you mind the cold?" Dot Fetters asked.
At first Sabine thought she was asking Bertie, but when there was silence on the line she knew it was her turn to answer. "No," Sabine said.
"It's cold here," Mrs. Fetters said. "I don't want to mislead you about that."
"I understand."
"So when are you coming?"
Sabine leaned forward in bed and looked down the hall. It went on forever. It went on so long that it simply got dark and faded into nothing. "Tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?" Dot Fetters said. "Honey, do you have a ticket?"
From the extension in the bedroom, Bertie made a squealing sound of perfect joy.
"Those tickets are an absolute fortune if you don't buy them in advance," Dot Fetters said, her voice bewildered.
"Mama, be quiet," Bertie said. "Don't scare her off. Don't make her think we don't want her to come."
Nebraska
"IT'S USUALLY NOT as bad as this," the woman said to Sabine once the plane had righted itself again. "I make this flight sometimes once a month, and most of the time it's fine."