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Chapter 16

The darkness is thick as the mist over my thoughts, but in a way that's very pretty. The red shoes lead me right to the house along the winding path, along the cliff's edge. The chimes play all around me, like a music of the spheres I'm hearing, like I'm privy to the vibration in all things. The damp, twitching grass, the shivering palms, the movement of clouds over water—a kind of hum of the world and my own clicking feet part of its pulse. Not sure what happened back there exactly. The woman on her knees in the fitting room. Sylvia rushing in, telling me to go, just go. And I did go, even though the woman kept calling after me to come back, please come back. Tell me more. Like I was some sort of awful oracle. Like we were an oracle, me and my reflection. Never had word slips like that before. Never had such a glitch. Almost like what's inside and outside are just a little bit scrambled now. I'd be troubled by it, very troubled, if it weren't for the pretty mist over my thoughts, making it already feel so faraway, farther with each step. And the promise of my reflection, being reconnected with her, hurrying me along. Funny to think of reconnecting with your own reflection. What is she doing at the house, I wonder?

When I arrive at the gates, all is dark. I can't see anything beyond the glass walls of the house. Not the great chandelier or the glittering people or the Depths. Only my glowing reflection in the glass walls looking so happy to see me, so very happy we came. I can see her smile from here. I'm smiling too, so happy to see her, so lovely she is. Of course I have questions. Why does she keep wandering away from me? Why are we having these glitches? Why did she lead me back here? I push at the gates, but they're locked. The red roses in the front garden sway behind the black bars, looking alive as ever. Apart from the flowers and my reflection beaming at me, all is still. Empty-looking. Like no one lives here. Odd, I think. Lots of people live here. The woman in red, for example. The young girl in black with the shape-shifting face. I danced with her backward around the tank, her pale eyes burning like twin flames. Those twins in the black veils, stroking my face with their gloved hands. Telling me they knew Mother and they knew me, too, Daughter of Noelle, oh yes. Mother's friends, they all are. My friends too now, right? I'm gripping the black iron bars. Trying to shake the gates, but they can't be shaken. I should be on the other side with my smiling reflection. I should be inside, not outside, shouldn't I? I watch her wave at me and then disappear into the wall of the house.

"Wait!" I call out. "Where are you going? Don't go, please." Later, when all the mirrors right themselves, when this glitch goes away, I'm going to laugh about that. How I called out to myself glowing like a moon in the dark. Told myself not to go, please. Please stay. Don't leave me here on the other side, gripping the gates. I'm going to laugh and laugh. Because it really is funny, isn't it? Right now I'm not really laughing at all, though. Right now I feel something else watching her, watching myself walk away like that. Leaving me alone here, the sound of chimes still humming all around.

"Hello?" I call in the dark. A light flashing behind me. I turn around, but there's no one there on the footpath. Just the cormorants perched along the cliff walls like bats. Just the water crashing against the rocks where Mother fell. A red glow on the waves tonight. A phosphorescence on the white foam. And then a voice. I hear it through the roar of water calling my name. Belle, Belle.

My heart thuds in my chest. Mother?

Belle, says the voice in the water.

And I'm running. Sliding down a steep dirt trail toward the roaring water in my red shoes. They wink at me from the mud while the voice calls, Belle, Belle.

I'm coming, Mother, I think. I can't believe you survived. I quicken my pace, though I'm afraid.

When I reach the shore, just sharp black rock slick with seaweed. A swelling ocean, hissing spray. The red light on the water is flashing, flashing. Mother, where are you?

In here, says the voice in the water. Closer.

Now I'm on the tip of the black rock where the shimmering red waves crash. Mother's in there somewhere. I'll have to go into the water and look. Mother will carry me in the red wave, and in the wave, we'll talk. I'll ask her, Why did you leave me? I'll tell her a lot of things seem to be leaving me, even myself. But I'm glowing, just like you did. Or at least I seem to be when I catch myself in the mirror. Now I close my eyes. Let the wave rise, taking me with it. The cold water shocks my body, freezing the air in my lungs. Her voice is all around me now. Belle, Belle, Belle. But there's nothing down here. Just dark water. Do I know how to swim? Surely Mother taught me once. A picture in my mind's eye as I thrash in the waves. A little girl and her mother on a beach long ago. The girl is on the shore and the mother is in the water, waving at her to come in, join, don't be afraid. But the little girl is afraid. Doesn't wade into her mother's arms. Doesn't trust, even though Mother's hands say, It's okay, trust. The little girl shakes her head from the shore. Don't feel like it now, she lies. And Mother drops her extended arms. Giving up. Disappointed. Oh, a coldness then. A shame, too. Drowning in it. I'm drowning now.

I see Mother on the rocky shore. "Mother!" I cry, my mouth filling with water.

She doesn't move. She's watching me drown because I never went out into the waves to meet her long ago.

And then she's gone.

I'm alone and sinking in the black. Is this where Mother went, the black? Is this where the roses are? Is this the way? My lungs fill with cold darkness.

A hand grips my arm.

Pulls me up out of the water.

I'm gasping, lying on the rocks, looking up.

A man framed by a night sky full of stars. He's got a hat on. The brim is dripping water onto my face like cold rain.

"Caught you," he says.

When I open my eyes, I'm no longer by the ocean, on the dark shore. No longer wet, though still cold. I'm dry and in a bed. A hotel room with pink walls. Is it morning or afternoon? Can't tell by the light from the half-drawn curtains. THANK YOU FOR NOT SMOKING says a little sign on the cherrywood nightstand. Someone's watching me lie here. I feel it in the prickling of my skin. The hairs on my neck are standing on end. I see a silhouette in the dark. Who are you? What am I doing here?

The silhouette turns on a soft light. The man in the hat from the beach. Sitting and watching me from the desk with his feet up, wearing a white shirt that opens to a white undershirt. Red suspenders. A silk tie around his neck in a loose noose. His hat's not on his head, it's on the desk. His hair is wet, slicked back into a dark wave.

"Good afternoon," he says. So it's afternoon, then.

"You caught me."

He smiles. "And you wet my hat," he says. "It may never dry."

"I'm sorry."

"I have other hats."

I see he's got a glass of Scotch in his hand. Looks luminous, like liquid gold. If I drank that, maybe I'd be warm again. Maybe I'd fill with light. As if he can read my mind, he walks to the edge of the bed and hands me the glass. As I sip, a fire sparks. All the way down to my toes. He stays on the bed's edge, watching me. Face half in shadow. Quite pretty, really. If pretty had a shadow side, it would be this man's sharply cut face. Telling me he can order room service if I'm hungry. I should probably eat something, he says. Fine for now, I tell him. Thank you, sir. Sir, I call him, which seems to amuse and disturb him. It amuses me, too, sort of. Because I know him, of course. I saw him at a bar once. I saw him once too through a red fish. And of course, I met him on a bridge only yesterday, though his name's slipped my mind just now. What's your name, sir? What am I doing in your bed, wearing a man's silk robe the color of midnight?

"That's mine, by the way," he says of the robe. "You were drenched."

Now I see Mother's red dress hanging over the mirror on the bureau by the open window. Oh god, did we—?

"We didn't," he says. "If that's what you're thinking."

"Didn't what?"

"I would never take advantage like that. I'm not a monster. Well, not that kind of monster, anyway. We're all some kind of monster, aren't we, Belle?"

I look at the mirror covered by Mother's red dress, the only mirror in the room. The skirt obscures my reflection, the entire glass covered in a bell of red silk. There's a vase full of red roses on the bureau. Some red jars and vials.

When I look back at the man, he's smiling at me. "That was quite the swim you took."

"I can't swim."

"If you can't swim, why go in the water, Belle?"

"I forgot that I couldn't." It's actually true, I did forget. Though how could I forget? Suddenly I want a cigarette. He gives me the one still burning in his mouth. Bringing it to my lips, I taste his rose lip balm. A whisper of a green tea essence or a cloud jelly he must wear on his face.

"Funny thing to forget," he says, watching me puff on the cigarette, a little longingly. "Seems pretty important to keep that in mind, don't you think?"

But there are roses in my mind,I want to tell him. Freshly cut in a tall black vase. A white, red-nailed hand arranging the stems to best advantage as we speak.

"Been a bit scrambled lately? Forgetting names, faces, places? Mixing past and present?"

How does he know that? "How did you know that?"

"Oh, a wild guess. But it's worth it, right? For the Glow," he whispers.

I feel myself flush now under his gaze. "Excuse me?"

"Quite the Glow," he says. He raises his glass as if to toast my face.

"Who are you?"

He feigns looking hurt. "Oh Belle, am I really so forgettable?"

"I remember you walked me to the house last night. For my free treatment."

"Wasn't that nice of me?"

"You were also at the hotel bar the other night. Then I saw you at the house. You had a black beard then." And you kissed me, didn't you kiss me?

"I did." He smiles. "And I still have the beard, by the way." He points to his desk, where I see there are a number of mannequin heads lined up, each of them sporting different configurations of wig and eyewear. I see the black beard hanging on a white face. Those strange spectacles. I look back at him and he puts a finger to his lips. "Shhh," he whispers. "It's resting."

I should be afraid, maybe. Ask him why he has all these heads. Also, why do you seem to be following me, Hud Hudson? Hud Hudson, that's his improbable name. But by catching me he did save me, remember? Can't forget that. Although maybe he saved me so he can kill me, that's possible. Still, I'm not afraid. He's very pretty, for one. Like an ad for some beguiling perfume, something with leather in it. Something with dark woods. He has a Glow himself, maybe marula oil is responsible or some sort of snail. It's nice to watch, anyway. Also, I don't seem able to speak accusing words just now. Something to do with Mother's dress over the mirror. Feels like it's muffling me in red silk. Without the mirror, I'm not quite oriented, not quite… myself, if that makes sense. The only mirror in the room is really Hud Hudson's face. How it's staring at me with such… what?

"I have to say that Glow is really something, Belle."

"Is it?"

Sitting on the bed in his suit, he really looks like he belongs in Mother's old movies, her fascist magazines. Fashion, I mean. The nefarious gentleman gloating after his nefarious night out. God knows what happened among the stylish shadows. Only Hud Hudson.

"Oh yes," he says. "There's a dewiness."

"There is?"

"A luminosity. Some might even say a Lift. An eradication of free radicals. We should talk."

"So talk," I whisper.

"You first. How long are you going to keep me waiting?"

"Waiting?"

"The treatment, Belle. I'm slavering for details here." He reaches out and I think he's going to touch my face, but he just takes the cigarette from my lips. Slips it between his. Stares at me, transfixed, waiting. Some dark shame rises up in me like a wave, why shame? I look away from him at the red dress hanging over the mirror, at the roses gleaming redly on the bureau. Shhhh, they seem to whisper. Secret.

"Nothing to tell."

He raises an eyebrow.

"Really," I say. "It's really just like… a facial basically. From a… beauty house. Like any other beauty house. The usual severings."

"Severings?"

"Did I say severings? Services, I meant of course."

Hud Hudson grins at me from his stylish shadows. "Just like a facial, huh?"

I nod. I'm getting sort of hot in the face, the way he's looking at me.

"A facial that makes you forget you can't swim?" he presses.

"I just… forgot that I can't swim. Separately."

He's still looking at my face. I feel him taking in the skin. What is he taking in? If the mirror weren't covered, I could see. He takes a deep drag of his cigarette. "Why am I getting… the very distinct impression… that you're holding out on me here, Belle?"

"Why is that mirror covered with my dress?"

"It's drying under the heating vent. Also, that mirror is hostile. Some mirrors are, as I'm sure you know."

Hostile?He hands me his cigarette again and I take a drag, tasting his roses. Feeling Hud Hudson's eyes watching me through the smoke. He's sitting very close. I'm surrounded by his leather and dark woods. Deep in the stylish shadows.

"Come on, Belle," he whispers. "Don't you want to make me weep with envy?"

I watch the dress rise and fall against the mirror glass in the window breeze. Is my reflection beneath the dress? Is she there in the glass? I can feel her looking at me through Mother's red silk. Shaking her head. Putting a finger to her very red lips. Don't. No. Secret.

"Just some steam and apocalypse in the end," I say.

He looks at me. Apocalypse?

"Eucalyptus," I correct. Funny how those words slip and slip.

"Interesting. Because I have to tell you, it really doesn't look like just a facial to me."

"It doesn't?" What does it look like?

He shakes his head. "A little more than marine algae masks going on down there in the Treatment Room, I think. Call me crazy."

"What are you, some sort of detective of beauty?"

He smiles. "Of beauty. You could say that." He's leaning in even closer now. Almost like we're fucking but we're not, obviously. I'm here and he's there, isn't he? If I had the mirror, I could know for sure.

"Why do you want to know so badly?" I ask him.

Something flashes in his eyes then. Some dark emotion. A wound exposed. It's there and then it's gone. He smiles over it. "Because I'm just like you."

"Like me?" There's a word for what I saw there in his eyes, but it's slipped my mind, filled and shining as it is with roses, slipped my tongue muffled by the red silk. "How are you like me?"

He takes my hand and places it on his cheek. Terribly smooth. Tiger grass maybe? An Orpheus flower peptide. A fermented tea elixir or some sort of moon drink. Makes me shiver. Haven't shivered in a long time at the touch of someone else's sin. Skin. Even my hand is shivering at the smoothness of Hud Hudson. Or is it shivering at something else?

"I told you," he whispers, his eyes on my eyes. "I'm a fellow freak."

He should move away from me now, he's so close. Too close. But he just stays there. I feel his whiskey breath in my face. I smell all of his skin products—he definitely uses a cloud jelly. Or is it a snow mist? With the late-afternoon light coming through the windows, I notice there's a long, jagged scar across his face.

"Why not just get a treatment yourself, then?" I ask him. "If you're a freak."

He smiles darkly now. "Because I'm not one of the anointed ones, am I, Belle?"

"Anointed ones?"

"They only seem to give them to very special people. Like you. You're very special, did you know that?"

"Me?" In the corner of the room, the red dress waves and the roses gleam. I shake my head no, but Hud Hudson is nodding yes.

"What they call perfect. A Perfect Candidate. The rest of us bottom-feeders have to pay. Too rich for my blood, sadly. I'm a poor peasant, didn't you know?"

I look at him, his clothes and his face literally glowing with money just like this hotel room. Not just money. Style, Mother would have said. Now that's style, Belle. "You don't look like a peasant to me."

"Well, looks can be deceiving, can't they?"

"They can be," I agree. "When I first saw you through the jellyfish, you had no beard, even though you did."

"Those aren't jellyfish, Belle."

Fear suddenly at the memory of those red pulsing creatures in the dark water. "What are they, then? Some sort of… squid?"

He laughs. Squid. That's good. "Let's just say you wouldn't encounter them in the ocean. Not part of the usual fauna."

"How do you know?"

"I'm a detective of beauty, remember?" He takes a long sip of the whiskey. Gestures at the red vials of cream on the dresser by the roses. "All backwash. Swill. Useless potions. They save the aqua vitae for the anointed."

"Why am I anointed?"

He glances at my forehead. "You tell me, Daughter of Noelle."

Why is he calling me that? Only my friends at Rouge call me that. "Are you saying it's because of my mother?"

"I don't know. Am I saying that?"

"I know she was a member. She died recently. An accident," I add quickly.

On the mirror, the red dress waves and waves in the breeze.

"Noelle," he says softly, like the name is a tender thing. "That's a beautiful name."

"It is. She was. Very beautiful."

"Grief's funny, isn't it?" He's not laughing at all.

"Yes." I feel an ocean of something welling up inside me, but only a single drop falls from my eye. He's brushing it away, and I'm letting this stranger do that. This stranger who looks like he walked right out of Mother's movies. Right out of her fascist magazines.

"It makes us do funny things, I know." He pauses. "I lost someone myself not too long ago."

"You did?"

"My brother. My twin, actually. Believe it or not, there were two of me once." He tries to smile, but it cracks.

"I'm sorry. What happened?"

"That's a story for another day and a lot more Scotch than we've got in this room." He takes another long sip. Looks at me. "You know, when I saw you on the bridge, you had a birthmark right there." He touches my forehead, gently grazing. "Star-shaped. Very pretty, I thought. Still there, but faded. As if the color's been leached out or something." He looks fascinated. I sense Mother's dress waving at me in the breeze, like it's calling me.

"I should go."

"But your clothes aren't even dry yet."

"So I'll wear them wet."

He reaches out for my wrist. "I'm sorry. I'm pushing too hard, aren't I? You've just nearly drowned and here I am asking you about a treatment. Us detectives—beauty detectives, I mean. We're relentless. I promise I'll shut the hell up for a while if you stay and rest. Then we can talk about this a little more, okay? You waded into some deep, dark water, Belle."

On the bureau, the mirror shimmers and the roses gleam. Come over here. I look at Hud Hudson, who's getting far too close. The stylish shadows swallowing me.

"I wonder if you can run down and get me some tea," I say.

"Tea?" He looks at me awhile. "I'll call down for some."

"I'd like it now, please. I'm still quite cold. Nothing warms you like tea."

Still looking at me. So closely. "You promise me you'll stay here?"

"Green, please. If they have it. I'd really appreciate it."

"They'll have it."

He leaves at last with a soft click and a Be right back. Don't go anywhere. Once he's gone, I run to the mirror, to my dress hanging over it. Lifting and falling so gently in the breeze. I take Mother's dress down, still damp and cold in my hands. In the glass, I watch the silk fall away, part like curtains. The mirror is like a window now. In it, I see the house on the cliff. I see the tall black gates are open. The glass walls of the house are glowing red. And there I am inside its walls, inside the house itself. My reflection standing on the stair, beside the woman in red. Glowing, lifted, eradicated. Smiling at me with the reddest lips. Waving at me to come in, come in.

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