Chapter 15

Outside, the chime sounds are still playing somewhere, seeming to follow me. The light from the sun stings my eyes. Had to put on Mother's black hat with the widest brim, her sunglasses with the frames big as a bug's eyes. I'm walking on the shadow side of the street. The shady side, I mean. Sometimes the words I think aren't quite the words I mean. Maybe just part of the fog I'm in this morning. When it comes to the words I mean, there might be a lag or a blank. Sometimes the blank stays blank no matter how long I wait for it to fill up with something. Like when I said goodbye to the goblin man just now. He had another name besides Goblin, I knew that, and I waited for it to come back to me so I could say goodbye in a nicer way. But when I looked at his face, the only word in my head and on my tongue was goblin. My reflection was even mouthing it beside me in one of Mother's many mirrors. I could feel myself in the glass going, Goblin, goblin, goblin. So in the end, I just said, Farewell. I said it in French, which was funny. Adieu, meaning "to god." Curtsied as I closed the door, to make it look like I meant to say it that way, to make it pretty. Pretty is a word that's always there for me in the fog. And the French for it, which is my own name, Belle. That's lucky.

Very belle, this town. I never really saw that before, or maybe I'm seeing it today in a new way. Palm trees. Curving streets. Shop fronts of glass like an endless maze of mirrors. Better hurry to work, don't dawdle. But I can't seem to stop smiling at her in all the reflected surfaces along the way. Myself, I mean. When I say her, I mean myself. In the shop glass, I'm not wearing the hat and sunglasses, funny. Don't seem to need them on the other side, I guess. I guess that makes a sort of sense. I look good, don't I? More than good. Glowing, lifted, eradicated. Eradicated is the word that comes most strongly to my mind, but it can't be the word I mean. Doesn't eradicate mean "destroy"? My face looks the opposite of destroyed. Well, but somehow it fits. Fits like the dress I'm wearing today, Mother's dress, which I'd never seen before. It was tucked deep in her closet, buried among the black and white silks like a hot little secret, like it was just waiting for my hand to find it on the rack. When I saw it, I hesitated, but then I thought, Why not put it on? She won't be wearing it anymore. And a funny thing happened then: in the closet mirror, I saw I was already putting on the dress. I was putting it on in the glass while my actual hand was still on the hanger, hesitating. I watched for a while and I thought how funny to see me getting a little ahead of myself like that. In the glass. Can that be right? Can we sometimes see ourselves just slightly ahead of ourselves? I thought of how I saw the goblin's mouth in the mirror earlier, not quite syncing up with his words. How I saw my reflection smiling and nodding before I was actually smiling and nodding, laughing before I thought to laugh. Even mouthing my thoughts. So maybe it happens sometimes, a lapse or a kind of jump ahead, a glitch in the glass. Maybe I just forgot how mirrors worked because of this morning's fog. It looked very pretty on me in the mirror, anyway. Mother's dress. In fact, when I saw my reflection slipping her arms into the armholes, I quickly slipped into them too, catching up with myself so that we smiled and zipped up at the exact same time. A red dress, which is nice. Goes with the red shoes, which we're wearing too. I do love red.

But I'm dawdling again. Got to get to work. My reflection in the shopwindows is actually jogging slightly ahead of me, I see, her heels clicking a beat faster than my heels, like she knows I'm late. Wait, I nearly say to myself. I'm coming. Which is a very funny thing to want to say to oneself. Surely I'm just not seeing things right. My phone buzzes. Heart jumps. A name and number I recognize, but not off the bat. Persephone. Goddess of the underworld. Why is she calling me?

"Hello?" I answer, a little nervous.

"Mirabelle, how are you?" Her voice sounds falsely mournful. And familiar. We seem to know each other, Persephone and I, but in what capacity?

"Been trying to get ahold of you for a while," she says. Her voice insinuates power. Like it has some sort of dominion over my soul. In the shopwindows, I see I'm still clicking just a little ahead in my red shoes. I haven't even answered the phone.

"Yes, well I've been busy. You know how it is."

"Of course," Persephone says. "I can only imagine. Well hopefully you're at least getting some sun while you're there?"

In the glass, I seem to be smiling right up into the sunlight, like it's telling me a very pretty secret. Funny because I'm actually in the shade, shivering. "Some," I say.

"Well listen, Mira, I just wanted to check in. First to see how you are, of course, and then also to confirm when you were coming back?"

"Coming back?"

"To work," she says. Her voice is starting to sound tense, frustrated. The glove of power tightening on the hand. My boss. That's why she sounds like she has a claim on me. "We're expecting you at the shop tomorrow. For the afternoon shift."

"Oh, well there must be some mistake. I'm actually coming in now."

"You are?" I can feel Persephone raising her eyebrows on the other end of the line. I've shocked her.

"I should be there in the next few minutes. So it's funny you called."

"Few minutes? Well. That's wonderful. We weren't expecting that, but that's wonderful. I didn't realize you were already back home?"

"Home." I look around me. Blue sky. Palm trees. Street that curves like a seashell, all the shop glass windows reflecting back my glowing self to infinity. I see I'm walking quite far ahead now. Quite far ahead of myself. But I can feel the smile on my mirror face. "Yes," I say. "I'm home."

As I approach the shop, I have to smile. I was worried about being late, but we're right on time, look at that. I'm right on time, I mean. Even with all the dawdling and that phone call from the underworld. I'm here at Belle of the Ball, where I work. Where I've always worked, right? Worked with Mother until she died recently. A pretty dress shop right in the heart of… the area. Can't miss it. Something's different about the shop front though. Things that used to be here, pretty things, aren't here anymore. Drawing a blank on what exactly, but I know they're gone. Where did they go? Does Mother know about this? There I am in the window. Glowing, lifted, eradicated, which may or may not be the word I mean. I'm smiling in the glass though the window display itself upsets me a little, not going to lie. Who cut off the heads of these mannequins? Why are they wearing these sad gray sacks?

In the shop, no one's on the floor. Well, maybe because my shift's starting. I walk behind the counter. Place my hands on the glass jewelry case. When did the jewelry in here become so… not pretty? The first chance I get, I'll have to do something about that. For now, though, I'd better stay here on the floor. Can't leave the register, Mother would hate that. Yet she used to leave all the time. Loves to leave while I'm forced to stay and watch her float around and disappear into the back for god knows how long. Loved to leave, I mean. Be my eyes and ears, Belle, she'd call over her shoulder. And I was. I am. Her best saleswoman, she always said. My reflection has wandered off, I see. Wandering the shop floor just like Mother does. Like Mother did, what is it with me and tenses today? I'd call myself back but that seems like too strange a thing to do. Call oneself back. And anyway, maybe it's just this glitch in the glass today. Following me from mirror to mirror like the chimes seem to be following me. They're playing here now. Right here in the shop, right around my ears. It would make me maybe a little nervous if they didn't sound so pretty. My reflection seems to be swaying a little to their music as she wanders away. Smiling, though we're not loving what we see hanging on the racks. With my eyes, I try to follow her from mirror to mirror, Mother installed so many along the shop walls. Where is she going? Where am I going, I should say. Do reflections really wander off like this?

"Hello? Are we here?" Someone's snapping their fingers in my face.

My eyes focus. A customer right in front of me. Tight, wet-looking curls that remind me of seaweed in a tide pool. A face that screams she's chosen what Marva calls the Procedural Approach. I can't tell if she's angry or frightened or extremely surprised.

"Hello." I smile at her. "How can I be of hell to you? Help to you." Funny, these word slips I'm having today.

She looks at me, a little scared maybe. Again, very hard to tell with her face. "You work here?"

I smile like what a question. I'm behind the counter, aren't I? But sometimes, in retail, one must state the obvious. "I work here, yes."

She looks at my hands gripping the counter. "I've never seen you here before." In my pocket, my phone buzzes.

"Well, maybe we missed each other. Ships in the night." I look around for my reflection. Nowhere in sight. Where did she—?

"Well maybe you can help me now." She already looks like she doubts it. Doubts me, Mother's best salesperson. I smile like sure I can, of course. My mission. My absolute pleasure to try. After all, how many doubtful shoppers just like her have I asphyxiated over the years? Assisted. She raises her hand, weighed down with the very strange, sad clothes we seem to sell here.

"I want to try these on."

"Wonderful."

My phone's still buzzing. Persephone. Why Persephone? I'm righthere, I want to tell her. Would tell her but I'm busy just now. The customer's still standing there as if waiting for something. "Well? Would you mind showing me to the fitting rooms, please?"

I smile. "I would never mind at all. Follow me."

The fitting rooms. Surely I know where those are. Surely if I walk toward the back, I'll find them there. I'm keeping an eye out for my reflection, too, of course, but it's nowhere to be seen. Where have I wandered off to now? I, she, it… what do I even call that shape I see in the glass? Never really thought about it until now. Maybe my reflection needs a name, my mirror me. Where is mirror me? Nowhere in the nearby glass. Maybe over—

"Excuse me, do we know where we're going?"

"Definitely."

Finally I see mirror me in the far corner. Glowing in a grand oval mirror. Standing there in the glass, beaming brightly, patiently, like she's waiting for me.

"Finally," mumbles an annoyed voice beside me. I turn and see that the fitting rooms are actually right beside this mirror. Three chambers, each with its own little locking door. So mirror me led me here. Not always a bad thing to let oneself go, to get ahead of oneself, I guess. Letting go is so worth it, didn't someone say that recently?

I'm about to go back to the cash register when the customer says, "You stay here. I could use another pair of eyes."

"Another pair of eyes. Of course. We can be that for you." Why not? Me and my reflection, two other pairs of eyes. She frowns at me though we're smiling at her, waving as she disappears through the door. I turn to look back at my reflection, just to admire the Glow again, when I see someone standing between me and the glass.

"Mirabelle?" she's saying. A little woman. Staring at me. Cropped blond hair. Pearls. A disregard for sunscreen that shows in her rampant lines and moles. Persephone? No, but she does look like a boss. Maybe I have two. Something about her reminds me of a small, yipping dog. It's snapped at my heels before. I know her. I'd know her crisp white shirt and pearl-wattled throat anywhere, but when I try to recall her name, all I can think is Yip Yip.

The little woman looks surprised to see me. More than surprised. Shocked, really. Like she's just seen someone dead. Like Tad did. "Mira, is that really you?"

I look in the mirror. The glass is empty, shining. I'm nowhere to be seen. I look back at the woman and smile. "Who else?"

"What happened to your…?" She brings her hands up to her own face, as if to check that it's still there. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm on my shift, of course," I say, gripping the fitting room door handle.

"Your shift? Here?"

Where else? "Yes. I work here."

"You work here?" She looks at me confused. "I'm sorry, but I don't understand."

I feel my phone buzzing again. I smile at the woman. "It's very simple."

"But… aren't you supposed to be heading back to Montreal?"

"Montreal? I'm not sure where you're getting your… information."

"I see. Well maybe you'd like to come with me in the back? And have a little chat?" She's looking at me like I'm a wild animal and behind her back is some sort of tranquilizer gun.

"That's going to be a problem," I say.

"Problem? Why a problem?"

"Well if I go back there with you, I can't be another pair of eyes. For her." And I gesture to the fitting room door. "I promised to be her eyes."

"Esther can take care of that. Can't you, Esther? She's just back from her lunch break now." I see another woman beginning to creep into my peripheral vision. She's holding a container full of some sort of soggy salad. Glasses on a chain around her neck. Bloodless face looking at me blankly. "A little late coming back today," the woman says to Esther, her voice slightly scolding.

My phone buzzes and buzzes. I shake my head. "No," I say loudly.

"No?" the little woman repeats.

"I'm staying here for now."

She looks at me for a long time. Not just confused, frustrated. And what else is in her face? Some sort of pity, why pity? Why can't I remember her name?

"I know you're in a great deal of pain right now, Mirabelle. About your mother. Is that what this is all about? Coming in here? I know grieving can be such a journey. Perhaps you're working through something."

I stare at her and she stares at me. Sylvia. That's her name. Right there in the tight lips, the parched skin, the cropped blond spikes. My phone continues to buzz loudly. Persephone again. I silence it. Smile at Sylvia.

"I'm definitely working through something, Sylvia. My shift. Now if you'll excuse me, I actually think I hear my customer calling."

"I don't hear anyone calling. Do you, Esther?"

Esther just stares at me.

"Mirabelle, listen—"

"Hello?" from behind the door. "Can you get in here, please?"

"Yes. Of course," I say, looking at Sylvia. Frowning at me now. "I'll be right in."

In the fitting room, I find her standing in the ill-fitting dress without her shoes on, staring at me. Her arms are out slightly as if the dress has arrested her.

"Well mirror, mirror," she says, locking eyes with me in the reflection. "Tell me. Is this worth the absurd amount of money you people are charging for this?"

I look into the full-length mirror. There I am, standing behind the seaweed woman just as I'm really standing behind the seaweed woman. Wearing Mother's red dress. Still glowing, lifted, eradicated. So good to be synced up with myself again finally. I feel such relief seeing myself there in the glass. Smiling as I'm smiling. Ready to be of service, another pair of eyes. Everything nicely aligned in time and space, no more weird glitch. The chimes are still playing, maybe a little more loudly, but they're pretty. I'm Mother's best saleswoman.

"So are you going to tell me or what?"

"Definitely." I smile at her in the glass. And it's the funniest thing: the seaweed woman's suddenly a bit blurry in there. Right when I go to really look in the mirror. I turn to my own glowing reflection. I'm perfectly clear. Sharp even, against the customer's blur. Huh.

"Well?"

"It's not entirely clear."

"Not entirely clear?" She lets out a guffaw. "That's a new one."

And then I see in the glass, I'm staring at her coldly. Very coldly. Am I shaking my head? How can that be when here in the actual dressing room, I'm nodding and smiling?

"What does that mean exactly?" she presses. Annoyed, but also curious. Deeply wanting the words I'm supposed to give. I always have the perfidious words to give. Perfect, I mean of course. I meet my eyes in the mirror. Eyes that are supposed to be the other pair of eyes for this suddenly blurry customer. So bright and entrancing my mirror eyes are. But are they mocking? Surely not. Not when I'm smiling and nodding like this, being so nice and polite. Nodding so hard, my neck hurts, really. And yet mirror me is doing more of a grin. A wicked grin.

"Just tell me, do I look good or not?"

I watch my reflection lean over the woman's blurry shoulder, my mirror eyes still on my eyes. A chill down my back from our cold, mocking stare. My red mirror lips hover by this woman's out-of-focus ear. Lips so very red in the glass, did I even put on lipstick today? I'm mouthing a word right into the black hole of her ear. No.

"What was that?" she whispers.

Awful, chants my mouth in the mirror. Awful, awful, awful, right into the woman's ear with my very red mirror lips. But on this side of the glass, my own lips are sealed. Literally pressed together as tight as can be. I'm shaking my head. "No," I whisper. Yes.

"No?"

"I can't say that. I won't say that," I whisper to mirror me in the glass.

"Won't say what?" the blurry woman snaps. She grabs me by the shoulders and turns me away from the glass so I'm looking right at her. "Just tell me what you see!"

I stare into the woman's face. Not blurry anymore. All too clear. The awful dress. Her awful soul. I hear an ocean roar suddenly all around us. Like crashing waves right here in the dressing room. Does the woman hear it too? No. Her mouth still seems to be saying, Tell me, tell me. So I do my best to tell through the roar. Words I can't hear in the wave sounds, though I feel my mouth making their smiling shapes. I only hope they're the perfid—perfect words. The ones I can always give. The ones she's so desperately looking for. The woman just stares at me, her dark eyes going wide. Finally the roar around us quiets. I fall silent. The mirror is empty now. Shining like nothing. Once again, my reflection seems to have slipped away.

The seaweed woman shakes her head at me like I'm monstrous.

"I can't believe," she whispers, "what you just fucking said to me."

Oh god, what words did I give?

"All right in there?" Sylvia says on the other side of the door, knocking. Her voice is smiling, but I hear the panic and rage beneath.

"Fine," the seaweed woman snaps. She slowly turns to me, her dark, wet ringlets trembling before her eyes. I think she's about to hit me. I wait for it, bracing myself. Then she sinks to her knees as if felled. I drop to my knees too, like a good reflection. She looks at me. "Is it really true?"

What did I say?"I should really let Sylvia or Esther help you now," I tell her quietly.

I'm about to rise when she reaches out and grabs my wrist. "Wait." Desperation in the press of her fingers. I look at her. Still shaking her head at me. Not with anger anymore. With a kind of wonder. A tear drips from her eye. "How did you see all that?"

Maybe I gave her the words she wanted after all.

"It's all here," I say, stroking her cheek softly. And then I recall the Treatment Room last night, the spa woman's hands on my face in the eucalyptus fog. It's all here, she said. Stroking my face just like this. Offering me the terrible mirror of her eyes. What I saw there.

"What?" the woman prompts now, bringing me back to the dressing room floor. "What should I do?" I'm on my knees with this stranger who's also on her knees. I'm crushing her cheeks between my hands, giving her a fish mouth. She's gazing hungrily, fearfully, into the mirror of me with bloodshot eyes. I see her soul, shattered like so much glass. Yet the shards are sharp and hungry, whispering feed, feed. Looking into her eyes, I feel a flicker of awful recognition. And then it's gone.

"Mirabelle!" Sylvia shrieks, pounding on the door, rattling the handle.

"Boleros," I whisper. "Or a blazer maybe."

The customer stares at me. Her pink gloss is a slash across her face. Her ringlets have gone limp. "What?"

"They really finish a look. Especially in spring."

I turn to look in the mirror. My reflection's back, locked in. Blinking when I blink. That's nice to see. But I don't appear to be in the dressing room anymore. Not even at Belle of the Ball. When I look in the glass, I see myself standing at the gates to a house on the cliff. The house on the cliff where the red roses grow. The roses are swaying gently around me in an ocean breeze. I can smell them from here. I can hear the waves and I can hear the chimes making a lovely music. I'm smiling at myself with my very red lips. I'm telling myself it's time to go.