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returned to the table. 
    As they all tucked into their meals, the performers began the second act of the murder mystery.
    Jenny took a bite of the fluffy mashed potatoes on her place, expecting a burst of buttery goodness on her tongue, but to her surprise, the mashed potatoes tasted like strawberries to her.  She took another bite, just to confirm the odd taste.  Strawberries, fresh from the garden, met her taste buds instead of taste of mashed potatoes.
    She glanced around the table, to see if the others were having similar problems, but only Stone was looking as if his food wasn’t quite right.  She caught his eye and raised an eyebrow in question, but he just shrugged.
    What’s wrong with this food? She wanted to ask him the question, but she wasn’t certain that it wasn’t just a leftover effect of the inhaler messing with her sense of taste.
    Jenny sampled the roasted chicken, but the flavor was more like butterscotch pudding than baked meat.  The lovely green salad with Ranch dressing tasted like an unsavory tofu dish she’d once had, and the luscious-looking cheesecake slice didn’t taste anything like cheesecake.  It was more like garlic bread.
    Confused at this plethora of odd tastes, Jenny laid down her fork.  It must have been the inhaler that had thrown off her sense of taste so badly.  The others, except for Stone, were all consuming their food as if it were ambrosia.  
    Stone had lain his fork aside as well, and was now watching the actor’s performance as if it were the most engrossing thing he’d seen in three years.  His attention was so intense that it seemed a little forced.
    She took a sip of her iced water, which, she was relieved to notice, tasted like water should.  As she glanced his way again, Stone coughed.
    Jenny stared at him intently.  Stone did not have asthma.
    Stone coughed again, this time violently.
    Across the room, there was another bout of violent coughing from another patron. Then across the room, came more coughing.
    Stone turned and took a large gulp of water from his glass, and Jenny noticed that his eyes looked strange.  They seemed to be all iris and no pupil.  His pupils had gotten so small as to be almost invisible inside the deep chocolate color of his irises.
    Stone coughed again, and this time, he couldn’t seem to stop coughing.
    He staggered to his feet in an awful repeat of her earlier performance and headed for the exit. Jenny thought she could see his lips turning blue as he coughed and coughed as he passed by her.
    She leapt from her chair and followed after him, helping him through the exit much as he’d helped her earlier.  Though she had none of his strength, she tucked herself under his arm and tried to support his weight as he staggered into the tunnel.
    Jenny’s mind was racing. Stone didn’t have asthma.  In fact, Stone was as healthy as an ox.  He rarely even caught a cold!
    Jenny’s heart began to pound in terror as Stone collapsed to his knees, still coughing, just outside the exit.  His heavily muscled weight was too much for her to bear, and she went to her knees beside him.
    “Stone!” she said, desperately trying to think of something to do for him.  He was coughing so violently now that she knew he could not drink water, so she offered him none, though there was a water fountain not three feet from where he’d collapsed.
    Stone was wheezing, his pupils virtually gone from sight they’d constricted so tightly, and his lips were deeply tinged with an unhealthy blue-gray color.
    Giving one last violent cough, Stone collapsed onto his side, his hands to his chest, grasping at his own flesh much as she had done earlier. 
    As his eyes rolled back in his head, Jenny pulled the inhaler from her pocket and shook it three times, flicking the cap off in one smooth motion. She crammed it between his teeth and pushed down.
    “Breathe in, Stone. Breathe!” she yelled at him, hoping he could still hear her.
    In response, there was a