I slip it on—and look at that, it fits. Makes me smile a little, clears the mists. The chimes quiet, the roar of the ocean in my head goes still. I remember I’ve got work today. At my shop, of course. That’s right. I’ve got a shop, don’t I? How could I forget?
20
By the time I get to Belle of the Ball, I can see and think very clearly. Clear as a bell. Just like my name, Belle. Just like my shop, Belle of the Ball. There’s Mother in the shop glass. Mother, I’m so glad you’re here. To be honest, I thought you left me there back in my bedroom, left me for your garden world. I wouldn’t have blamed you. But it’s good to see you here in the window display, and look, you took your pretty garden with you. Wearing a dress red as its flowers, just like I am, the same red shoes to match. I chose it after Tad left me to get some fruit for a juice I don’t even need to drink. And he never came back, can you believe that? Mother can’t. Once more, she’s shaking her head just as I’m shaking mine. Or is it something else you can’t believe, Mother? Mother, why do you look so horrified?
Then I see, of course. Why she looks horrified.
There’s something else in the window display, something else with Mother in her garden. A horrible obstruction that hurts my eyes like the light. Hurts Mother’s eyes too, it looks like. A row of gray headless… are they scarecrows? Garden statues? They look like corpses. Standing all around you, Mother, oh god. Almost as if on ghoulish display. Each one backlit and wearing some sort of sack dress and… is it chunky silver jewelry? I know it sounds crazy. Because who would do something like that, right? Mother, no wonder you look so upset. What are these wretched creatures? They must be statues. And yet they look so much like corpses, I can’t help but whisper to them: When was the beheading? And why wasn’t I here, protecting you from the guillotine? Who dressed you in these fashion sacks? Who put chunky silver jewelry around your necks like chains?
Thank god I’m here now. Have to fix this immediately, right, Mother? Put the Belle back in Belle of the Ball where she should be.
“Can I help you?” says a voice. A woman poking her head out of the shop door. Grim face. Fish eyes. Red glasses hanging from a red chain around her neck. She looks a little afraid of me, like Tad did.
“Can I help you?” she repeats. Which is funny. Because we’re the ones who work here, aren’t we, Mother?
“We should really be the ones asking you that, Esther,” I say to her, and smile. She has a name tag, that’s helpful.
Esther looks around, confused. We? She must not see that I’m with you, Mother. She must not see you in the shop glass or she must think we’re one and the same. We look so much like each other today, it’s true. Esther doesn’t seem to see very well. Completely immune to the abomination in the window display.
“How can we help you, Esther?” we say in our best salesperson voice. I say it; Mother mouths it along with me in the shop glass with her very red lips. We make the delight drip.
“I work here,” Esther says.
She does? Oh god, then things are even more not pretty than I thought. Mother, did we really hire this woman? With the dead-fish eyes and the resting bitch face, who’s scared of Beauty? But we can’t let on that we forgot her.
“Of course you do.” We smile. “Sorry we’re late, Esther.”
“Late?” Esther says. “How can you be late? You don’t even work—”
“We were pursuing our Most Magnificent Selves,” I say. “But we went a little too far with the mists. You know how it is.” Probably Esther doesn’t, but it’s always good to banter with your staff like this. “First chokeberry blossoms, then Orpheus flowers… the ocean of your mind roaring along with the chimes.” I laugh and Mother smiles. “Always trauma—I mean tricky to get out the door, isn’t it? But we’re here now. We’re here to sever. Serve of course.” And we bow like we don’t own the place. “Have we been bury? Busy?”
Esther just stares at me. She’s standing in the doorway sort of blocking our way to the shop. “I’m not really supposed to let you in, Mirabelle. I’m sorry.”
I look at Mother in the shop glass. She’s horrified. Just as horrified as I feel, she looks.
“Not supposed to let us in? To our shop? Esther, that’s crazy. You need us now more than ever.” I squeeze by her, making my way inside. But Esther’s dogging my heels. She scurries past me and runs behind the counter as if to block me from it, can you believe this, Mother? I look up at Mother in the mirror behind the register. She can’t believe it either.