_The Page and the Unicorn_
She studied French verbs in study hall that night, but because of her
afternoon's adventure school seemed different and she seemed different,
and even while she was dutifully memorizing a difficult subjunctive
she was thinking about the chateau and about Ariel and Paul, and when
she thought about them her heart would lift suddenly and begin to beat
rapidly inside her chest so that it seemed like one of the wild excited
birds flying in and out of the broken windows of the chateau. She sat
at her desk and said, "Please, God, let me see Paul again. Please.
Please let me see Paul again."
That night she and Gloria were already in bed, and she was lying there
thinking that the next time she could escape from the school she would
go back and look for Ariel and Paul again, when Erna and Jackie came in
from the lavatory in their pajamas and bathrobes. Gloria was staring
critically at Flip's cotton underthings folded over her chair at the
foot of her bed.
"I can't stand anything but silk next to my skin," Gloria said.
"Mummy's always dressed me in silk. She says she's going to send me
some new silk undies from Paris."
"You and Wagner," Flip said. Jackie laughed.
Erna was tapping her foot on the floor impatiently. "Hey, we just
remembered," she broke in. "You're new girls and we haven't initiated
you yet."
"Oh, Erna," Gloria groaned. "Do we have to be initiated?"
Erna pulled off her barette, pulled her hair back more tightly, and
clasped the barette again as she always did when she felt important.
"Well, you don't _have_ to be, but it just means we can't accept you if
you aren't. You want to be accepted, don't you?"
"Oh, okay," Gloria said. "I suppose we'll survive. Go ahead."
"Do _you_ want to be accepted, Pill?" Erna asked.