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Photo courtesy of Bee Felten-Leidel |
Welcome back to Day 11 of our Sirens Samhain Celebration! Before we go further, let's announce the winner of the Zoom Yoga Session with Jayme Conner...
Jen Kolise!
Congratulations!
Today's Music Selection: Deity by Wendy Rule
submitted by River Eno
Today's Article: A Short Story, "Perfect" by River Eno
We met on Halloween, walking the streets of my town
illuminated by October’s full Hunter Moon. He was dressed as a vampire with
white makeup, fake fangs and an accent I’d never heard before. I couldn’t tell
how old he was. I was sixteen and dressed as a witch. He said I was perfect.
When I turned eighteen, he paid to have my eye color
changed. It was all the rage. He assured me it wouldn’t be painful. They numbed
me before the procedure, with a long needle in each eye. More serious pain came
days after. The clamps used to keep my eyes open left bruises. And because my
eyes were dark it took a good long while to bring them to a lighter color.
He said my brown eyes were beautiful, but green eyes set off
my red hair, making me perfect. My mother cried for weeks. Said she didn’t
recognize the person looking back at her. She said I looked cold and vacant and
alien. I stayed with him after that. I couldn’t listen to her drone on about
sweet talkers, and how he’d expect something in return for shelling out so much
money.
At twenty-one he paid for me to have breast augmentation
surgery. That’s what the doctor called it. He said he loved my slimmer more
athletic body, but the blouses he bought me looked better with cleavage. It
won’t hurt, he said. I was bedridden for a week, and the medication for the
pain made me sick.
My mother cried, lamenting the daughter she’d had, compared
the things I used to do — field hockey and track — to the new me, his
girlfriend. She overreacted about everything.
For my twenty-fifth birthday he threw a Halloween masquerade
in the polished gardens at his home outside town. He told me I was a full-grown
woman and had a white silk dress made to show off my perfect body. The guests
wore white gowns, black tuxedos, and beautifully ornate masks like at
Carnevale. Expertly painted disguises with authentic gold and silver accents.
Some adorned with jewels. Some covered their face entirely, expressionless and
airbrushed a blushing rose gold with black mesh concealing the eyes.
I was formally introduced to every guest, over one hundred
strangers. They curtsied and kissed my hand while he stood behind and a bit
above me in a tailored tuxedo. At precisely three in the morning, bathed in the
light of the full Hunter Moon he took me to the dais in the middle of the
grounds, had me bow to his guests, and killed me.
When I woke the next evening, I marveled how the strength of
my new body made it look graceful … flawless. He gave me clothes and told me I
had to say a proper goodbye to my mother before we left for his estate in
Dresden. He said I would feel guilty if I didn’t have closure, and he wanted
our life to be perfect.
Mom burst into tears when she saw me, then got hysterical
when I told her I was leaving the country. Nothing at all pleased her since dad
left.
Many moons passed —then years, then decades.
He said he was throwing a masquerade for the Hunter Moon
falling on Samhain. The first ball since my birth into the life. He said a new
dress would arrive. Only I wanted to wear a costume like I’d seen at the first
masquerade. He said the dress was already made and that was that.
I took the long way to the top of his family’s vast mountain
manse to the attic filled with centuries old furniture and paintings. I wanted
to find the costumes he’d shown me years ago from previous parties. The crate
was made of dark cedar, the box lid hinged with medieval hardware. I tilted the
lid back to get a good look at the choices and picked out a black ball gown
with green accents. I gathered the material and went to stand in front of the
Cheval mirror set by the wall. While admiring the dress I noticed a small,
ordinary cardboard box set on a Lindenwood dresser behind me. The plainness of
the box made it obvious in the sea of woods and precious metals.
It was the box my mother gave me when I left home. A
collection of memories she threw together, to tether us through time, is what
she said. I was strangely afraid to open it. I hadn’t thought of my life before
the change, except when he told me she died. He said I needed to know.
A kitsch photo album sat on top of a few other items. I
lifted it out and settled into a tall, dusty chair from the 1700’s. The first
photos were of me when I was a baby. The classic ones, on the belly and sitting
up with my big brown eyes wide.
Strange … I had forgotten my eyes were brown. I looked in
the mirror. My pale green eyes were shocking compared to the warmth of the
picture.
The next photo was of me and my mother at the beach on Labor
Day. The following was when we lost the final game at the end of my senior
year. My long, red hair hung in corkscrews. I was on the porch. I remembered my
mom snapping the picture while I was upset … but suddenly … I could see myself
through my mother’s eyes. And I was beautiful.
Pain attacked my chest and tears ran down my cheeks. A
longing for who I was and all I’d lost completely enveloped me. I dressed and
found him in the study. I set the picture on the desk in front of him.
“You said I was perfect.” I whispered.
“I knew you could be,” he smirked.
The ache in my chest grew to unbearable proportions. I hated
him.
“Wear this at the ball.” He handed me a long black gown and
left the room.
The costumes were as stunning as before. Coffins and
headstones marked the grounds for a Halloween theme. The women wore black gowns
and black eye masks. The men, black suits with white masks covering one side of
their face. They complimented me and smiled.
The longer I stood with him, staring at the scene of
revelers, the more indignation rose within me. My thoughts unraveled thinking
of what he planned. And for the first time since we met, I decided I didn’t
want it.
At precisely three am, he guided me to the fountain in the
middle of the gardens, maneuvering me around coffins and fake head stones. Two
masked men carried a sleek black coffin from the bushes and set it near the
fountain. A stillness settled and he had me bow.
“Step in, my beloved.” He smiled as the lid was opened.
“No.”
The word popped out. I looked at him, at the coffin and then
all around me. I saw two wooden staves resting on the fountain edge.
“No.”
Instinct had me move away from him, away from the crowd,
toward the fountain. He frowned, strangely, then surrendered to his anger.
“Come now…” He gripped my arm with preternatural strength.
“Do you not want this to be perfect?”
His grip hurt, and when he pulled me, my high heels wobbled
on the grass, and I stumbled against the fountain’s edge, sliding a stave with
me as he tightened his grip, pulling me upright. He sternly put me in my place.
Except … in that moment, calm and clarity rose within. One
of those perfect instants in time. When everything came together as one. My
fury. My understanding of what he had done to me and what he was going to do.
His arrogance that he’d always had, allowing him to turn his back on me.
“To continue,” he said, and clapped his hands together.
“Thank you all for com…”
Gripping the stake, I’d taken from the wall when I faltered,
I threw up my arms, and I jammed the wood into his back until it burst through
his chest. A collective gasp came from the guests as he slid off the stake and
collapsed face first into the coffin. I was shaking as the mass of menacing
onlookers approached.
A woman in a black mask with long feathers came forward. She
seemed important. She looked at him. My teeth were chattering when she looked
at me. She smiled and bent to one knee. The rest of the party goers following
suit.
“I’ve seen his show dozens of times,” she said, “But this …
this was the perfect ending … my queen.”
I looked over a sea of people genuflecting as he lay
hemorrhaging in a coffin meant for my body. And I had to agree. This was
perfect.
Edmonton
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