Amanda Filipacchi - The Unfortunate Importance of Beauty

I look at the writing on the box. There’s no return name or address. Just the recipient’s name, Strad Ellison, c/o my name, and my apartment number.

“When was this dropped off?” I ask Adam.

He looks at me and knows he can’t insult me since my friends are next to me, staring at him, waiting for his answer.

“About half an hour ago,” he says. “And I’m very sorry about the misunderstanding we had on the phone when I kept telling you the package was right here, and you kept thinking I said it wasn’t. I’m glad we cleared that up, eventually.” He looks at my friends.

“Yes,” I say. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Strad staring at me. “Who delivered it?” I ask Adam.

“A woman,” he says.

“Did she give her name?”

“No.”

“Did she say anything at all?”

“She said the package was for your guest, Strad Ellison. That’s all.”

“What did she look like?”

“Asian. Early twenties. Shoulder-length hair.”

“Anything else you can remember?”

“No.”

“Thank you, Adam.”

He nods.

Strad takes the box from me. Luckily, it’s sealed tightly, so there’s no choice but to wait until we get back to my apartment to open it.

On our way up, I gaze at my friends’ faces. By dint of imagining each of them in the role of the killer, they’ve each become the killer in my eyes.

Back in my apartment, I instruct everybody to go to the couch area and stay there while I fetch the scissors from my bedroom.

Upon my return, I inform Strad that I must be the one to open the box, that I never let anyone handle my scissors.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” he tells me. “You said earlier that you didn’t want anyone to be eccentric tonight. So I’m wondering, is this your version of not being eccentric? What I mean is, are you usually even more eccentric?”

Not sure what to answer, I meekly settle for: “I’m not being that eccentric. It’s just a habit I have with scissors.”

“Why did you lie about my package?”

“It made me nervous. You didn’t know who it was from.”

Georgia says, “Plus, we were having such a good time, why interrupt the fun?”

“Okay, open it,” he tells me.

“Everyone, step away,” I caution.

I don’t want anyone to make a lunge for whatever weapon might be in the box. And if it does turn out to be a bomb, the farther away they stand, the better.

“Farther,” I say. They take another step back. “You too, Strad.”

Everyone is now standing a good six feet away from me.

As I carefully cut the tape around the box, I start getting more worried that it might actually be a bomb.

“If you think you can zero in on your target with surgical precision, you are wrong,” I say, speaking to the killer while staring at the tape I’m cutting. “Perhaps you will hit your target, but you’ll hit us as well — yourself included — and me in particular. I’ll be disfigured beyond recognition, which is okay with me, but is it okay with you? I’ll be blinded, I may even get killed. So many of us could get killed. Do you really want to harm us this way? Is it really worth it?”

“Eccentric is not the right word,” Strad says to Lily, who smiles politely through her fear.

I continue addressing the killer: “Think about it. You don’t have much time. You better decide quickly because there won’t be any turning back once the box is opened.”

I glance at my friends. They all seem extremely tense, holding their breaths.

Penelope exhales suddenly and says, “I feel faint.” She sits on the couch.

I’ve finished cutting the tape. I lift the flaps, push aside the crumpled paper, and see my face staring back at me from the bottom of the box. It’s an antique-style mirror with a handle and an ornately molded frame. I take it out of the box.

The tension leaves the room like a change in cabin pressure.

I pull the rest of the packing paper out of the box. Nothing else is in it. No bomb, no weapon.

I turn the mirror over. Beautifully engraved on the back is the name “ Strad ” and underneath it are the words, “ See Differently .”

“See differently?” Strad says. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Maybe someone wants you to see what kind of person you really are,” Georgia says.

“Or maybe someone wants you to see the people around you in another way,” Penelope says.

I puzzle over which of my friends sent this gift. It could have been any of them. It even could have been Lily, whose meaning behind the engraved words may have been: “Take a good look at yourself. Are you really so much more beautiful than I am?”

“Or maybe someone thinks you’re vain,” Jack offers.

Strad seems a bit disgruntled at these less than flattering interpretations. He finally suggests, “Or maybe someone thinks I’m a great guy and feels compelled to shower me with gifts.”

“One gift,” I mutter. “Hardly a shower.”

“Oh, it’s a shower. I call three gifts a shower. This is the third anonymous gift I’ve received.” He plunges his hand into his jeans pocket and pulls out two silver objects: a lighter and a business card holder. They are both beautifully engraved in a similar fashion. The words on the lighter, right under his name, are “ Desire Differently .” And on the card holder: “ Think Differently .”

I just stare.

“I like these gifts,” he says, putting them back in his pocket. “I just wish I knew who they were from. I haven’t told anyone I was coming here today, so whoever dropped this off must have followed me here, or been hired to follow me. Unless… they’re from one of you,” he says, his gaze lingering on Lily.

We all shake our heads no, including Lily, who blushes slightly.

I return the scissors to my bedroom. Clearly these gifts have to come from someone in our group. If KAY’s attack is only in the form of words engraved on a beautiful gift, I can handle that. The words aren’t even an insult — just a gentle suggestion. Perhaps I’ve been overly cautious. I tell myself to relax a bit. I’ve known my friends a long time and I should have a modicum of faith that none of them would commit murder. I pause, catching an error in my thinking, which I grimly correct: or at least commit murder a second time.

As I reenter the living room, I see that Georgia has stepped away from the couch area, where the others are chatting. She is casually approaching the hand mirror, which I’d placed on a little table between two windows.

My leeriness comes swirling back.

“Georgia! What are you doing?” I bark.

She seems flustered — a rare occurrence. “Nothing, I just wanted to examine the mirror.”

“Really.” My tone reeks of skepticism.

“Don’t let her!” This is Jack.

“Step away.” I march over to the mirror. “Why are you so interested in it?”

“I’m not so interested in it,” she says. “I’m just exhibiting a normal degree of curiosity.”

I pick up the mirror and examine it. We were so relieved it wasn’t a bomb, we forgot to be thorough. I turn it over, scrutinize the intricate molding.

And then I see something.

A tiny clasp that blends in with the molding. It’s located on one side of the handle, in the nook where the handle meets the mirror. I spot an identical one on the other side. Each clasp is encrusted with one tiny red stone which I had noticed but thought was just decoration. I open both clasps and pull on the handle.

With a grave metallic sound, a steel blade slides out. What a moment ago was a harmless object of vanity is now a dagger and its sheath.