news van and almost fainted when she figured out who we were. Who I was.
The frenzy that followed can only be described as overwhelming. It got so crazy that Marcellus called for backup, and they helped us move inside the castle.
My apartment looked as it had the day I left. It was no longer a prison but also not a home. I would have to move somewhere else, just not that day. Marcellus, along with some of his buddies, blocked the elevator, refusing to let curious eyes or security agents enter. I hugged Horatio good-bye, thanked him for the hundredth time, and watched him disappear behind the elevator doors. I wandered back to my room, but the wall painting freaked me out, and I couldn’t bring myself to stay in there, or my brother’s room, or my father’s. I went to the sitting room and stretched out on the couch and, despite the early hour, fell asleep alone.
Barnardo: So when the smoke cleared, you just waltzed back to town. Worked out pretty well for you.
Ophelia: Yeah. It’s been a dream come true.
25
As they settle back onto the couch, Zara smiles falsely. “I am so sorry to have upset you with those photos.”
Ophelia stares hard at her. “I’m sure.”
“How did you feel about coming back to Elsinore?”
Ophelia hesitates and looks over her shoulder. A man in a suit is caught just behind the curtain giving her a thumbs-up. She grimaces and turns back to Zara. “I was relieved. I never hesitated, because I knew the people needed me back.”
I woke with a start and sat on the couch, unable to fall back asleep and unable to get up. I sat paralyzed all afternoon, unwilling to look around the apartment for fear of the memories each corner held. The noises on the street told me the news vans were still swarming, but I didn’t turn on the television, knowing I would be greeted by my own face and endless speculation and comments about my own life. The sun set. The sun rose. Still I sat.
When the opal sky had turned to cornflower, Horatio walked in and collapsed on the couch. “You sleep much?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“Me either,” he said, clenching and unclenching his hands. “Come down to my folks’ for breakfast.”
I shook my head again.
“They’re worried about you, and they’re not going to let you sit here alone.”
The thought of their kind faces actually made me cringe. I closed my eyes. “I don’t want to talk about anything, and I don’t want to be watched.”
“Yeah. I know. What are you gonna do, then?” he asked.
I shrugged.
“I wish I could just sit here with you. They keep offering to listen, to listen, to listen. But what is there to say?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Maybe by dinner,” I offered, thinking I could put them off until then and cancel at the last minute.
I thought he would get up, but he slumped down and stared out the window. Tears streamed down his face, and he clutched his arms tightly across his chest. “Why didn’t I drive him off to safety, too? I knew something bad was going to happen. I knew it.” When I reached out for his arm, he pulled away. “All of them. All of them. God! I should have stopped it. I knew something was going to happen. I knew it.”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
“It was, Ophelia. Not entirely, but I played a part.”
“So did I. So did my brother. So did Hamlet. We all did.”
He shook his head violently. “You know I could have stopped it.”
I knew that wasn’t true, but I wasn’t going to argue with him. What good would it have done either of us?
Suddenly he grabbed a pillow off the couch and threw it, knocking a picture frame off the shelf next to the stereo. “Shoot,” he muttered as he crossed to the frame and picked it up. The shattered glass tinkled to the floor. I didn’t need to see it to know it held a photo from the awards ceremony at the end of my junior year. I’m holding up my honor roll certificate and sticking out my tongue, Laertes is squishing my face, and my father is looking on, half-amused, half-uncertain as to why his children would behave in such a fashion. Hamlet had taken the picture. Now I looked away as more glass tumbled, and I tried not to throw up. Horatio put the frame on the coffee table and started