Vicki Pettersson - The Scent of Shadows

How to stop him? How to help him? How to keep him from getting killed?

“What’s wrong, Livvy?” Cher said, arms raised so Yulyia could spray beneath her pits. “You’re not talking much.”

What to say? I’d been half listening to the conversation, and so far it had lacked any meaning, direction, or obvious import. These two seemed to pluck topics from the sky and fold them like origami into something with meaning. For instance, I now knew there were eunuchs in Afghanistan who made more money than prostitutes, that Cher’s mother had decided she needed to share with her adult daughter everything she thought about sex—I had to groan with her on that one—and I’d learned that Yulyia’s motto in life was, “No cheaters, no beaters, no little peters.”

Call me crazy, but I had the sneaking suspicion that my concerns over my recently acquired superheroine status weren’t going to score very high in comparison with these eclectic topics.

Or would they?

“I was just wondering,” I started conversationally, as Yulyia tagged my left pit, “if you could be a superhero, what kind would you be?”

“You mean to have save me?”

“Not X-Man and no He-Man,” Yulyia said before I could answer. She motioned expansively with her spray gun. “I want G-Man.”

“G-Man?” We both looked at her.

“To help me find G-spot. That’s my kind of hero.”

“Good point!” Cher exclaimed.

Too much information. I grimaced and tried again. “I meant what kind of superhero would you be ?”

“A cute one, definitely!”

“With fur-trimmed cape trailing behind as I fly through the night!”

“Fox fur!” yelled Cher, getting in the spirit.

“Marten,” Yulyia purred, shuddering delightedly.

Did this spray kill brain cells?

“Okay, but other than—you know— cute , what kind of powers would you have? You know, how would you use them to fight evil and save mankind?”

They both looked at me in a moment of profound silence.

“The power to make any man fall in love with me!” Yulyia exclaimed.

“I already have that,” scoffed Cher. “How about the power to have spontaneous orgasms, and never grow old!”

Yulyia squealed and Cher giggled. I sighed and tried not to breathe in too deeply.

Fifteen minutes later we were in the day spa’s lounge area; tanned, dried, and wrapped in short terry-cloth robes. I was reclining in a vibrating massage chair, while Cher poured us fizzy water from a pitcher filled with lemons, ice, and cucumbers. About a half a dozen other women were scattered about the room, like a bunch of seals sunning on a rock. But the melodious chatter of dulcet female tones gradually melted into a sea of serenity. I hadn’t been in this environment before. I’d either shunned it in favor of a sports massage, or all chitchat had ceased when I entered any ultrafeminine domain. I was surprised to find the smell of peppermint, cucumber, and estrogen to be a heady and profoundly relaxing mix.

“Do you want to get French pedicures?” Cher asked, handing me a glass.

I sipped, and considered making up an excuse to leave, something I’d have readily done only one week earlier. I’d never had another woman look to me for companionship. I knew Cher believed I was really Olivia, but it felt good to be the recipient of her open smiles and concerned attentions. I remembered how fondly my sister spoke of Cher on the video diaries, and for that alone I would have said yes. Besides, I reasoned, what would Olivia do?

“Why not?” I said, smiling.

Cher seemed pleased to lead the conversation, and I was content to let her. She started off talking about a new pill that was supposed to shrink the waist, lift the breasts, and put color into your cheeks—being tested on mice as we spoke—then moved on to a story about a lingerie saleswoman who’d copied her phone number from her check and was making threatening phone calls about how many times Cher had sent her back for a different size chemise in magenta rolled silk. At some point, through the rhythm of Cher’s narrative, I began to understand the rhythm of my sister’s life in a way I previously hadn’t. I also began to wonder why I’d never gotten a spa pedicure before. The foot massage alone would have done wonders after a training session with Asaf.

Of course, thinking about Asaf led me to think about all the things I’d loved about my old life. My coach and his family, the training that had started as an outlet for my youthful anger and turned into a daily comfort, not unlike prayer. I thought of my home, my darkroom, and the camera that had been as much a part of me as another limb. Why couldn’t there have been, or still be, a merging of the two lives? And that thought led me back to Ben—

“…I mean, can you believe she said I was high-maintenance?”

Uh-oh. It was the first time Cher had stopped to ask me a question. Quickly, I thought, what would Olivia say? “That bitch.”

Cher drew back, looking at me blankly. Her pedicurist did the same. Mine stopped massaging the balls of my feet.

“What?”

“Did you just call my mother a bitch?”

“No! No.” Shit, I thought, and cleared my throat. “I thought you were still talking about the lingerie girl.”

“No, darlin’, my mother . But I told her that she was the one who was demanding. I mean, at least I can make my own appointments.”

I looked at her. “Do you really tell your mother everything?”

She raised a perfectly waxed brow. “You know I do.”

“It’s just I can’t imagine that,” I said, and leaned my head back in the cushioned chair. I thought about everything I’d learned of my mother lately. The truths that had been lies, the greatest lie being our lives together.

Cher placed a hand on my arm and, surprisingly, I didn’t shake it away. “Mama’s been asking about you, you know,” she said softly. “She has this idea of fixing you up with a—how did she put it?—‘a very well-to-do southern gentleman.’ She wants to know when you’re going to come by again.”

I fought off a full-body shudder and thought, Never.

“Of course you could avoid her blatant matchmaking attempts if you’d bring your own date,” she said, pausing. “That guy you were talking to looked like he might clean up well.”

“Ben? Not my type, and I’m definitely not his.”

“Olivia, honey, you are every man’s type.”

“Not Ben Traina’s. He was always into Joanna.”

To my surprise, Cher said, “Oh, that Ben! Well, I have to say, he didn’t look half as unhinged as people say. A little dangerous perhaps, but who doesn’t like a strong little chaser to wash things down. An ex-cop might fill that bill nicely.”

I glanced at her, too sharply, and looked away quickly, feigning interest in the color being applied to my toes. “What do you mean ‘ex’? He’s just taking some time off.”

Cher lifted a hand, studying her nails. “That’s not what they said on the tube, honey. And I don’t blame the department. You should’ve seen him at the funeral. He went absolutely apeshit. Attacked some poor, innocent man who was just offering him his condolences. We can’t have a guy like that patrolling our streets.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Poor? Innocent?”

Cher rolled her eyes. “Okay, so they did say the guy cheats at craps. Either way, I know what I heard. Ben Traina has been put on an indefinite leave of absence.”

“But he said—”

“But he lied. It happens with the mentally unstable.”

But he wasn’t mentally unstable. He happened to be right. And I, for one, wasn’t going to give up on him. I knew him. That boy who saw things as black and white, right or wrong, was still there. Besides, I was partly responsible for this…this transformation. Both of them, I decided. Both times.