Martin Seay - The Mirror Thief

Welles’s desk is finely made; its drawers open and close with no sound. Stanley figures the Wehrmacht pistol for war booty Welles never bothered to register, so that’s the gat he picks; the.45’s too big for his hand anyway. He puts his blackjack in his front pocket, lets his belt out a notch, and tucks the pistol into it where the blackjack was, at the small of his back. It’s not comfortable, but he doesn’t need it to be. He’s pretty confident the safety’s on, pretty sure he won’t shoot himself in the ass by mistake.

At the top of the stairs he pauses, listens. No noises in the house. The staircase is a dark empty tunnel with a splash of light at its bottom, fallen from the entryway window. Stanley glances at his feet for an instant as he starts his descent, fitting his steps to the stairs’ rhythm, and when he looks up again the girl is standing right there in front of him, hardly more than an arm’s-length away.

He freezes, knees bent, hand on the wall for balance. Cynthia’s shapely white fingers rest on the banister — his jacket hung a few feet behind — and her sandal-clad foot perches on the next step. Her sharp chin is tilted, her spine and shoulders beauty-pageant straight. She doesn’t look surprised to see him, or worried, either. Her caramel-cream eyes are bright, like they’re caught in a moonbeam, though no moonbeam reaches them here. She and Stanley stare at each other for a long time. Rainwater is dripping from Stanley’s jacket: a quiet tap counting the moment down.

The girl speaks. So, Betty Crocker, she half-whispers. What cooks?

Stanley opens his mouth to reply, but all that comes from his vomit-scoured throat is a mute rasp. He swallows, tries again. What, he says, the fuck goes on up here?

A wild ugliness flashes across Cynthia’s face, like she’s inhaled a wasp. Then she goes blank. It’s a blood-drained, million-watt blankness, a blankness like the downriver side of a hydroelectric dam. Stanley has seen this once or twice before: on a woman about to jump off the Williamsburg Bridge, on a guy about to shoot three people in an Alphabet City snackbar. A face turned to a burnt-out mask, no longer broadcasting, overloaded by something it can find no right expression for. Often Stanley has imagined himself to be alone in the world, but this is what alone really looks like, and it scares him. He takes an even breath, keeps his knees bent, adjusts his footing, moves his free hand a little closer to the grip of the pistol.

Have you been in my room? Cynthia says.

Stanley doesn’t answer. He could put his shoulder down and run her over — grab his pack and his jacket and scram — but now the house seems to be shrinking to trap him, or else the girl is expanding, swelling like a white balloon to fill the stairwell. Part of him wants to just shoot her. He imagines the jerk of the pistol, pictures her vanishing with a moist elastic pop.

But he’s out of danger now, or nearly so. Her eyes flit everywhere, everywhere but his face, and the color creeps back to her cheeks like schoolchildren returning after a bomb scare. She’s a little shaky; she keeps fidgeting to hide her jitters. Her tone, too, is shifty when she speaks again: apologetic at first, then accusatory. I guess you probably think, she says, and trails off. Listen, she snaps, don’t think for one hot minute you understand—

Trust me, Stanley says. I don’t.

Cynthia cops a coltish Audrey Hepburn pose on the banister, getting back her cool by acting cool. Her voice is bright and thick and unconvincing, maple syrup dripped over spun glass. They’re not my parents, you know, she says. Claudio told you, right? I’ve just been shacking here for a couple months. I met Adrian on the beach, just like you did. They’re nice people, no matter what you think. Anybody who asks, we just tell ’em I’m Synnøve’s niece. Around here, nobody asks.

She’s staring hard now at nothing; her fingers fiddle with a phantom cigarette while her eyes dice up the empty space before her. Nobody makes me do anything, she says. I don’t get what’s wrong. There’s not any harm in it. Just because somebody says. It’s just different, dig? Like you and Claudio.

You don’t know shit about me and him.

She blinks. Then her eyes sweep the stairway — mechanical and eerie, like the eyes of an old porcelain doll — and they settle on his face. She fixes him with a watery sneer. You’re a child, she says. I don’t care where you’ve been, or what you’ve done. To me you’re just a kid.

She holds his gaze for a couple of breaths, then looks away again. Almost like she’s bored. There’s plenty of space now between her and the wall, enough to push through. It’s stupid for him to stay here any longer.

So, Stanley says. What’s with upstairs? The furniture. The marks on the floor.

Her sneer gets sharper, crueler. What do you think it is? she says.

He shuffles his feet. Magic shit, he mumbles. An altar.

I bet, Cynthia says, that you would just love to see what goes on up there. Wouldn’t you? To be a little fly on the wall. I’ll bet you’d sit there on the bench, and fold your hands in your lap, and you’d never make one single peep.

For a second — just a second — Stanley’s face feels hot.

I don’t believe a word of it, she says. Just so you know. All the mumbo-jumbo’s lost on me, dad. It’s all pretty silly, I think. Juvenile. All that time and effort, trying to catch ghosts. There aren’t any ghosts . It’s weak-minded and sad, thinking like that. You read that book Atlas Shrugged ? That’s where I’m coming from, man.

Stanley leans against the wall, crosses his arms to hide the shake. Well, he says. I guess that pretty much makes you a goddamn whore, then. If you don’t believe it.

Her mouth falls open with a tiny gasp. Not shocked: surprised. Like he’s just handed her a flower that he’d kept hidden behind his back.

Then she throws her head back and laughs. It’s not a fake laugh, either. It sounds a little relieved, a little insane. Stanley’s mother laughed that way when his grandfather died, for hours and hours. It was about the last sound Stanley ever heard her make.

It’s a while before Cynthia can breathe well enough to speak. Poor Adrian! she wheezes. He thinks he conjured me. Did Claudio tell you that? No joke. It’s pathetic , dig? Wanting to see! Wanting to know! I don’t get it. I mean, it’s not like I enjoy what we do. It can be kind of a drag, honestly. But I get home-cooked chow, I get a nice place to sleep, I get some extra pocket change. I make choices, just like anybody. This is a whole lot better than where I came from, believe me.

Yeah? Stanley says. Where did you come from?

The question snuffs what’s left of her smile; a flicker of the blankness returns. Then she grins: a broad bottomless grin. She looks like a kid who’s figured out how to burn ants with a magnifying glass. Hell, she says. I came from hell.

That brings on a fresh round of sniggering. Soon she’s doubled over, wracked by hiccups, wiping her watery eyes. A whore! she says. That’s perfect , Clyde. And not just any old whore, either! Oh, no! Man, that’s really good. That’s a regular scream.

Yeah, Stanley says. Hilarious.

He draws the pistol from his belt and tips up the safety-lever and points the slim round barrel at her face. Cynthia looks at it, confused. Her wide mouth closes; her full pink lips curdle into a frown. She doesn’t seem scared. The two of them stare at each other. She hiccups again: a soft fleshy cluck in the dim quiet.

Get up here, Stanley says.

He marches her into the study, then across it, to the black door. Where are we going? she says. What are you gonna do?