Oh my god. What a night. Most eventful museum outing ever. Well, I wasn’t there when those activists threw soup at the Mona Lisa. So let me rephrase that to MY most eventful museum outing ever.

  I need to back up and start from the beginning.

  The chauffeur came to our door and greeted me and Rosanna. He seemed caught off guard at the sight of Rosanna and stumbled over his words a bit. He asked if we had any bags but we only had purses. We stepped outside and he led the way to the limo and then it was my turn to be caught off guard.

  I had only ever been in a limousine when I was in Bucharest. That’s how the coven transported their imparateasa around. It was a sleek, black Mercedes limousine. It all looked very dignified. The interior was especially elegant. But what we walked out to tonight looked less like a stretched car and more like a long shuttle bus. At least it was black. I figured, okay, not what I expected, but I can make this work.

  But when we stepped up and inside, it was a disaster. The interior was lit up with pink and purple neon lights and the opposing rows of bench seats that snaked down the length of the vehicle had glittered silver upholstery. At the very back there was even a stripper pole before a large flatscreen displaying silhouettes of women dancing like in the opening credits of a James Bond movie. What had arrived, and had picked up our guests first, was a party bus for a night of tequila shots and lap dances, not a trip to the art museum with their empress. Ruxandra, Sonya, and Silviu sat in a row along one of the silver benches, wearing pleasant but tentative smiles. Rosanna and I sat on the bench opposite them and forced smiles of our own. It then occurred to me that if I conveyed that this was not the type of transportation I had wanted, or that it was unsuitable for the imparateasa, it would reflect badly on Rosanna, not me, for they would assume she had arranged it. And so, just as our party bus began to back out of our driveway, quite casually, as if there were nothing out of the ordinary, I turned to Rosanna, smiled happily and asked her to see what was in the bar.

  Rosanna poured champagne all around and I noticed the driver watching to see what was poured into the champagne flute given to me, and I wondered if he would say anything. But Rosanna noticed it too and smiled into his rearview mirror and he kept on driving. I told her to ask him to take a long route to the museum and Rosanna, as if on a catwalk, knowing she was being admired in the rearview mirror, strode to him, then leaned in and whispered close to his ear. From the sliver of his face I could see in his mirror, I could tell he was smiling.

  We got through the bottle of champagne in no time and I asked Rosanna to pour rum shots, which created a moment of knowing eye contact between me and Silviu. After our second round, I used a remote to wake the flatscreen which was connected to the sound system, and I flipped through a large catalog until I landed on a Nicki Minaj playlist and pressed play. As a third round of rum shots was poured I opened my purse and took out a stack of bills and asked who was gonna dance for us. There were giggles from the girls but Silviu was being too manly and just grinned. Everyone tossed back their shots and Rosanna took the remote and scrolled her way through the playlist and then went to the pole and began to dance seductively for us all to the song “Beez In The Trap.” It was apparent she had pole danced before. I immediately got loud and began throwing bills at her and soon others were cheering for Rosanna too, Ruxandra and Silviu mostly. Sonya’s participation seemed a bit perfunctory and this made me wonder if the negative feelings she had toward Rosanna hadn’t been completely erased. Ruxandra hurried to the pole to dance with Rosanna. Silviu poured another round for the remaining three spectators. Sonya’s enthusiasm increased. I doubted it was due to the extra shot of rum but that it was instead because she was now cheering for Ruxandra rather than Rosanna. They danced for a second song and then somewhere along Wilshire, they came off the pole together and Rosanna slinked over my way, while Ruxandra went to Silviu. Just as Rosanna was about to sit on my lap, she began laughing as if she were going too far and I smacked her butt and pushed her away. She fell beside me. But across the aisle, Ruxandra had climbed onto Silviu, facing him, and began to grind on his lap. Sonya, sitting beside them, spanked Ruxandra playfully. It all seemed like lighthearted drunken fun, but then I considered that every combination of the three of them had at one time had sexual relations. As Ruxandra remained on his lap, gyrating her hips, Silviu was smiling, but his smile changed just the slightest when our eyes met. It was definitely still a smile but it was as if he had been pulled out of the moment with the awareness he was being observed. Immediately I looked away and suggested another round of shots to Rosanna.

  Ruxandra slipped off Silviu’s lap to receive her shot and we all lifted our glasses and shouted “Noroc!” and drank. The revelry continued until we reached the museum and when we exited our party bus I wondered if I had just redefined myself as imparateasa. The partying aboard was pretty much the same, or actually less wild than a typical night out with Hisato. But the coven had never seen me in this light as imparateasa. And as for Rosanna, pole dancing probably wasn’t part of the repertoire expected of my lady in waiting. Maybe I hadn’t thought it through enough before embracing the party bus. But maybe I should just drop the imparateasa act I put on for them and let them see me for how I am, and how Rosanna is with me. Anyhow, I’ll have to think about that more later.

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  The driver told us the museum looked closed, but Rosanna told him we had special passes, which was kinda true. She said she’d call when we needed to be picked up. After our visitors took the requisite photos between the rows of street lamps outside the museum, Silviu and Ruxandra went invisible. I held out my right hand to Sonya and she took it. I then took Rosanna’s hand in my left. And then the three of us vanished from mortal sight.

  Sonya looked at me and said quietly, “Imparateasa, I did not know Rosanna would need your assistance as well.”

  I smiled and answered, “She’s younger than you are.”

  Sonya quieted her voice even further. “Holding one of our hands is already asking too much. If it pleases you, I will remain outside.”

  “What would please me is if we were all together.”

  And so we made our way to the museum entrance invisibly and, using my mental faculties, the double doors opened for us, tripping an alarm, which alerted security of a malfunction, and we stepped inside and began to tour the darkened halls of the museum. Silviu seemed to especially immerse himself in the “Band” installation by Richard Serra, which is hard for me to adequately describe. Entering it, you become surrounded by tall curving and falling wooden walls. You don’t exactly feel buried, but you don’t feel free either. You’re absorbed. It made me wonder if what Silviu was feeling as he explored the installation was similar to what he wanted to feel by turning into seawater.

  To get to the upper floors we had the option to take interior elevators or exterior stairs. Did we want to haunt security with the movement of empty elevator cars or more malfunctioning doors?

  As we wandered various collections, our group maintained an active discussion. (A patrolling guard began a desperate search, chasing the sounds of our echoing voices. Another guard ran away.) Regarding the art, there were humorous comments as well as serious comments. I wasn’t sure who else had picked up on it but whenever Rosanna remarked upon something, others would concur or sometimes disagree, but Sonya never said anything. Even when Rosanna replied to a comment Sonya had made, Sonya didn’t acknowledge it. This only happened once, and what Rosanna said wasn’t a question so a response wasn’t required but it still created a moment of dead air among us all.

  The third floor houses Modern Art. As we stood before a pop art painting by Roy Lichtenstein, Ruxandra remarked, “From behind, she reminds me of you, Sonya.” The painting has a stark red background and the female subject is facing away from the observer. I saw what Ruxandra meant. I think we all did. It wasn’t that they were both blonde and appeared delicate in stature—sure that helped—but it was because she had turned her back on the person engaging with her. The painting, titled “Cold Shoulder” resembled Sonya in the way she continued to snub Rosanna after reprimanding her for not fulfilling her duties to me some ten or eleven nights prior.

  As if looking away, we turned our attentions to our left—more pop art—this time a can of tomato soup (Warhol of course). I thought the painting’s renown would spark new conversation and cleanse the aftertaste of the now addressed yet unresolved divide that seemed bound to follow us throughout the remainder of the museum. But before the famous painting we were wordless and remained so fixed that each of us probably eventually noted how the height of the can makes it thin, counted its colors, distinguished its fonts, traced the roundness of its top, and read the label intentionally:

  Campbell’s

  CONDENSED

  TOMATO

  SOUP

  Had Warhol painted the back instead, we would’ve read the ingredients five times.

  “Let’s see how strong our blood is.” They all looked at me. Still holding their hands, with Rosanna on my left and Sonya on my right, I took a step back, pulling our straight line into a V. “Rosanna, take Sonya’s other hand.” There was the slightest hesitation between them, but they took each other’s free hand and we became a triangle. “Now, Rosanna, I want you to let go of my hand and see if you remain invisible.” Rosanna wasn’t sure it would work, continuing to be invisible while only connected to me through Sonya. Sonya said she wasn’t sure it would work either. No one was sure. Not even me. Because in all the times I had studied Mirela’s scribble, I couldn’t recall a time where she had held more than one hand to render invisibility, and certainly not in a daisy chain. Motion sensors, alarms, cameras, guards were all mentioned. I smiled. “I don’t know what you’re scared the consequences will be Rosanna, but if you won’t let go, I’ll let go of you both.” So Rosanna let go, and everyone remained unseen.

  Strung together in this different order, I led them to the adjacent gallery. There, before a large abstract painting by Clyfford Still, the five of us stood in a single row, the unframed canvas being so much wider than tall. With Sonya and then Rosanna to my right, Silviu took the place to my left, where Rosanna had been. He stood beside me so close that we were nearly touching, so close that I could move just my pinky to touch his, and I did.

  “I’m sorry,” Sonya said quietly.

  “I am too. It was my failure that brought this about,” Rosanna answered, just as quietly.

  “At this point it’s more that I’m staying mad than feeling mad.”

  “I understand. I’d like it if we could move past it.”

  “I want that too.”

  It was then Silviu took my hand and held it. Not because he needed me for invisibility but because I think he was proud of me. Maybe that means being proud of me as imparateasa and not as Orly, but I don’t think so because, from what I know, the Cob?lcescu don’t just go grabbing onto their imparateasa. This was personal and private.

  He let go before anyone noticed, just before we went on to the next masterpiece.

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