The Mirrors of Fate (10 page)

“
I am quite shocked and appalled that my incredible, amazing, forthright, and might I add,
sexy
integrity is being challenged here.”

A smile broke. “But I already said I wasn’t thinking that at all!” she tried to recover.

“
Yeah, right. You looked as scared as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.”

Maria swallowed, rolled her head back and gave way to outrageously delighted laughter. If he wanted the win so badly, he could have it. Her eyes closed as tears welled up. By the time she slightly composed herself, she realized that Alan had left his seat in front of her and taken a position directly beside her. The hot intensity of his gaze made her laughter die down quickly.

“
I don’t want to make a joke out of it,” he said with sweet concern cradled by the deep timbre of his accent. “If my carelessness caused you to fall in any way, I’m really sorry. May I see your head?” His green gems centered on her face and he put an arm around the back of her chair to pull her close to him.

“
Yeah sure, fine,” she agreed a little nervously. She moved her hair aside so he could see her head.

“
Anywhere else?”

“
Not really. It was a big hit so the pain kinda travels.”

Maria separated her hair, tracing with her finger where the pain led. He brought his arm up to touch her head. His soft fingers brushed the tender spot lightly, sending a hot chill down her spine.

“
It should heal completely soon,” he observed. “Did you get any more?”

She gave him the liberty to keep softly investigating her scalp. Another spot caught his attention, one not caused by the ladder incident.

“
Where did you get this other bruise from?”

Remembering, Maria twisted her head away from him. “I-It’s just a little bump I got somewhere else.” Damn it, she had forgotten that where her father pulled her hair hadn’t healed completely yet. The teeth of her hairbrush daily scraping against the spot had never given it the chance. “It’s nothing. I’m just clumsy,” she added voluntarily.

But he seemed to mentally note her words as a lie.

“
God, you’ve got me really feeling bad now,” Alan said. “The only way to make this up is by taking you out somewhere.”

Maria fell silent for a moment. “Take me out somewhere? Really? I—I’m not sure about that.”

“
Why? I’d like to spend some time with you.”

“
And every other girl would like to spend time with
you
.”

“
Doesn’t matter. I’m asking the girl sitting beside me.”

“
You can just always buy me a card and leave it at that, you know.”

He flashed a charming smile. “Cards are what you give to friends. Can’t I have other intentions in mind?”

Oh yes you can!
“So then, if you don’t want to be my buddy, then what do you want to be?”

She felt a rush of blood run up her neck when he left her with no response. His eyes, still and relentlessly placed on hers, gave her the unspoken answer every girl would have accepted with outstretched arms.

“
Okay then,” she said, biting back a giddy grin. “Tomorrow, one o’ clock at the Square? Do you know where it is? It’s the hotspot of WCC on Carrigan Boulevard.”

He bowed his head with gentlemanly gratitude and stood up. “I know the place. Our plan sounds dashing,” he played around in an old-fashioned English accent. “Thank you very much Ms. Jaghai. I will see you at said time. I wish I could stay and engage you in more conversation and flirtatious chat, but I told my teacher I was going to the bathroom, and unless she believes I have a bladder problem, I think she’s realized I’ve ditched.”

She laughed again. “You better hurry then. See you on Saturday.”

Maria watched happily as her handsome date for tomorrow made his way out of the lunchroom. A happy squeal burst out of her along with an excited stamping of her feet once he was out of earshot. “Yes!” she shouted in triumph.

The lunch lady who had been eavesdropping smiled and continued with her cleaning.

* * * * *

CHAPTER FOUR

He stared into his mirror as he dressed, amazed and satisfied by the changes he saw, and yet still worried about his natural features showing through.

The small, one-bedroom apartment was stuffy, silent and dark; his bed unmade; his white sheets a heaped mess because he’d headed straight to the shower after rising. The only light he allowed inside was the small presence of the sun’s rays peeking their way through the heavy, thick, gray drapery.

The time neared one o’ clock in the afternoon. He saw no reason to rise any earlier. To do so meant more time to make the mind vulnerable through too much premeditation. To commit to a thing like this, sympathy and forgiveness must take their backseats to obligation and duty. He would not allow anything to seep into open wounds. And he had too many of them.

He had to keep his mind focused.

He credited himself for being a master at masquerading emotions. As he stared into the mirror, he regarded how easily he could change his expressions. She would never know what he was thinking or what truly lay behind his eyes, at least not until he wanted her to know it. He loved how expertly he could keep smiles on his face, to keep his entertaining thoughts completely hidden and others oblivious. Easily and clearly he remembered the ladder incident, the compelling, biting urge to drop her backward and have her skull split open on the floor. Luckily he had been a bit more creative, and the idiot didn’t suspect the truth.

But still, annoyingly, his conscience nipped at him despite his timed rising. Wake up late, simple enough. The hurry should have kept him focused on the task at hand, never allowing the piercing thought to enter, however fleeting, that his intentions for this girl were misguided and sinister. But the plan to ignore the intrusions of his conscience and simply remember his personal mission had failed. Even now as he prepared to go out, he tried to fight his guilt with a determined vengeance. He was not accustomed to playing the part of the deceiver, but had taken it on well with this young woman.

Goddamn it. Without looking too hard in the mirror, he could tell his real features were returning more quickly than he had anticipated. Much more of his hair had blackened overnight, and the deep scar on his left cheek was beginning to make its outward show.

If his master could see what a pathetic job he had done in disguising his attributes, then salted wounds, twisted muscles, and lumps would be the least of his worries later on when this was all over. He could hear it perfectly now—
Have I taught you nothing?

He went distant for a moment, affected by the upsetting thought. Would Master let him continue to train under his expertise after he returned from this unpermitted trip? He doubted he would even be able to look at his master’s granite-hewn, unyielding countenance again, let alone face the sharp glare that had reduced him into shameful nothingness many times before.

But no. Thinking of those things now made no sense. He was here for however short a time it was going to be. He could worry about disobedience and punishment later. He was only going to leave this place after he had seen her take her last breath.

When he was finished dressing, he took one last look in the mirror and smiled. Time to go back out as Alan again.

•

Maria looked at her wristwatch and frowned. If she wanted to watch idly by as chattering people had fun that she wasn’t having, then she could’ve stayed at home and watched television. The time was nearing one-thirty now and her patience was wearing thin.

How great. Make the initiative to ask her out but then turn up half an hour late? If only she had a number for him so she could find out if he planned to bail on their rendezvous or not. The chance to sneak away from home had been so perfect too. Her father was playing golf, and her mother would be at a baby shower and seeing friends for a large portion of the day. What a waste of an opportunity it would be if he didn’t show up.

Calm down
, Maria told herself and finally took a seat on a smooth stone bench. She sighed and relaxed. She had been standing in the same spot in her godforsaken heels since she arrived at the Square fifteen minutes earlier than their agreed time. She had refused to sit because her skirt—which she was surprised she even decided to wear—was so short. With her big round derriere, the fabric of the back came up and she was practically sitting bare-fleshed on the seat when she gave into the impulse to relieve her feet.

The day was relatively humid, and the Square was noisy and crowded as it always was on a Saturday. Both sides of the streets were full of shops closely lumped together that to the untrained eye one shop could’ve actually been two. The Square, really an outdoor mall, was one big melting pot of shopper’s interests. An abundance of advertisements littered the place, whether they were in the form of flyers or changing billboards that stopped people along their way as they hustled to get to the next sale. A few large overhead television monitors were always reliably advertising commercials and the occasional reports concerning the local news. If all that did not appeal to someone’s consumer spirit, flatscreens were placed side by side in the store windows for shoppers to watch.

The Square, though a big area that could easily accommodate crowds, still managed to get overcrowded on days like today. Isolated benches were placed everywhere for people to sit and were almost always accompanied by large black garbage bins displaying signs that read, “Please Care, Throw Your Trash in Here.”
A few conveniently planted trees by the benches helped keep the place cool on its hottest days.

But the activity typical of places like the Square presented a deceptive portrayal of what life was really like in White Crest City. White Crest City was a small, isolated town in the middle of nowhere. Its population was small but faithful to its location which had the resources to provide the Halimond Academy, a preparatory school that offered from pre-kindergarten through to grade eleven, and also the resources to provide a community college.

Few outside of the town or within the state visited White Crest City. Very little outside traffic flowed through. No one passed through White Crest City to get to another destination; they went around it. All activity was self-contained, and it seemed like the town was only known to those who dwelled there. Many preferred to call it a city rather than just a town, liking how important it made their small home sound. The city council liked that, so too the mayor, proud UK-born Desmond Halimond whose father created Halimond Academy to be his special blend of UK and American tradition where SATs were looked at instead of GSCEs, but students ended secondary education in grade eleven when they were usually sixteen or seventeen.

Every now and then, Mayor Halimond’s face would pop up on the large television monitors, offering his cheerful words to all his “Crestians.” A person became a Crestian once he registered at White Crest City Hall after moving there. For all these reasons, White Crest City never really seemed like a part of the United States or the state of Kentucky. It seemed to exist on its own.

As Maria sat there idly nibbling off the jellylike membrane on the inside of her mouth, she found herself observing people. Some she recognized from school, others just came out to shop as couples or as friends, and a boy joked with another and boisterously put him in a headlock. Her attention was soon taken by a skinny redheaded girl, maybe fourteen, whose frail limbs and unnaturally bright hair lent her a striking appearance.

The girl laughed uninhibitedly, the hem of her sunflower dress twirling as she eagerly took the hand of a male companion. Maria smiled at their obliviousness to the world around them as they scampered away. But she pitied them as well.

She used to envy people like that, people who because of a close-knit following of friends or a wonderful home life were lost to the problems and struggles integrally woven into normal human life. Call it sick, but she delighted in knowing they would one day face these difficulties, whatever they may be, sometime later on in their own lives. Then watch and see. Loved ones around them trying to soften the blows would make no difference. In the end, you were always alone.

She used to like watching people smile and laugh with each other, not even realizing that their precious time of joviality would be lost sooner or later. Does happiness ever really last? Once you have it, you know you have to lose it. Learning that the outcome of her life was up to the ultimate decision of her father forced her to realize that truth at fourteen.

Maria had always wondered what it would be like to have a solid home life or at least a positive group of friends. Who really had friends who truly wanted to be there for you and look out for you? Maria had friends, but not the type she wanted. Gina and Ellie barely made themselves known. They didn’t call and they had their own other group of companions they mostly stuck to. Everyone Maria knew was too absorbed with their own lives.

Therefore, the conclusion she came to quite a long time ago made more than enough sense to her—she was just one of those people in the world who was destined to be alone.

But anyway, being alone was her own fault, wasn’t it? Never did she claim to be lonely, but she never claimed to not be either. From before she even came to White Crest, she’d become quite introverted as a child. Maybe things would change if she had someone to offer a hand to her. Ha! Who was she kidding? Chances were she would have rejected that hand by all means. Lonely and being alone are two completely different things. Being lonely involves being sad; being alone means peace in coveted solitude. She liked being alone; she liked spending half of her time reflecting; she liked missing class just to write poetry. She preferred, no, she craved solitude.