After Her

by Amber Kay

  I stand behind her chair to steal a better glance at her reflection. She almost smiles at the woman staring back then frowns at her own words as though she’s just now realized how true they are.

  “First, they told me it was a harmless lung infection,” she says. “I took the antibiotics and they swore I’d be okay. Then it was bronchitis. Now it’s cancer. Damn doctors can't make up their minds.”

  She stares once more at the mirror, touching the glass as if her reflection is a portrait of someone else, someone she isn’t familiar with. I imagine what she may have looked like in her formative years and why she mourns that person. The sickly, waifish creature Vivian is today is probably half of what she once was.

  “There are things you aren’t telling me,” I say. “I thought you had at least revealed the worst of what’s to know. The longer I'm around you, the more I find out about you.”

  “What has Adrian told you about me?”

  “It would’ve been nice to know that you’re bipolar,” I reply. “That is not the kind of information I like to be blindsided by.”

  She scowls. “My mental state isn’t important for you to know the status of.”

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of, Vivian.”

  “Then why do I feel like you’re judging me?”

  “Paranoia is a common side effect of bipolar disorder,” I say. “I don’t blame you for being a little agitated.”

  “Don’t do that!” She glares at me through the mirror. “Don’t patronize me like I'm some child. I don’t need to be counseled or consoled.”

  In thought, I catch a glimpse of Amelia’s bruised face. It’s enough to silence me while seeking an immediate exit as I glance at the bedroom door. Vivian notes my reaction and turns away from the mirror to face me.

  “I’m sorry,” she says with a sigh while cupping my hands in hers. “I confess that I may have a few…unsavory emotional imbalances, but I am not crazy, Cassandra. Don’t let this turn you against me.”

  I can’t look her in the eye for long. Something staring back breaks my heart. It’s like watching a toddler grapple for a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean. Anyone in this moment and in this place would sympathize. This woman is sicker than she pretends to be and not just in the lungs.

  “Vivian, I don’t think you’re crazy,” I say to placate her. She smiles then grips my hands tighter until I'm forced to pry her fingers from around mine. My reaction provokes the frown that appears on her face.

  She turns back to the mirror, proceeding to gaze at her reflection. While admiring her mirror counterpart, she slips her hands into her hair and slowly removes it from her head. I gape at the auburn wig she sheds then at her baldhead while restraining my reaction by clenching my lips tight. Vivian notices me in the mirror and smiles.

  “What’s the matter?” she teases. “Never seen a bald woman before?”

  I turn to keep from gawking at her and I fold my arms, unsure of what else to do with them.

  “Vivian, you have to stop blindsiding me,” I say without thinking until I realize what I’ve said and how selfish it sounded. I settle along the edge of her bed, gripping the bedspread in my quivering fists. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “The shock is something I’ve never gotten used to either,” she says. “Those first couple months of chemotherapy, I broke every mirror in the house and ordered Adrian to get rid of them all. It didn’t occur to me how vain I was until my hair started thinning.”

  I don’t speak. This is out of my comfort zone.

  “Are you disgusted with me now, Cassandra?”

  I shake my head.

  “Why would I be disgusted?”

  “I haven’t shown many people this side of me,” she says. “Most of them assume that I’m beautiful 24/7. Most never see what nights are like around here when Adrian is away on the business and I'm left in this big empty house alone. You must think I'm pathetic, don’t you? It’s okay for you to say it.”

  She sniffles before the actual tears arrive and I don’t think before approaching her. I place my hands atop her shoulders and look into her teary eyes, praying I don’t fall apart as she grips my wrists and sobs.

  “I don’t want to die an ugly woman,” she says. “Promise me that you’ll make sure they make my corpse look gorgeous.”

  “Vivian—”

  “If nothing else make damn sure that I'm beautiful when I die.”

  I discard every word I wanted to say because none of them feels appropriate enough. What am I supposed to say to a dying woman? How is anyone supposed to rectify this or make it better for her?

  “Okay,” I reply. “I’ll take care of everything. I promise.”

  She cracks a smile through the tears.

  “Can you help me to my closet?”

  I don’t hesitate helping her to her feet and escorting her to the closet. Inside, there are several hundred shelves of mannequin heads, each wearing a different brunette colored wig, matching her signature auburn shade of hair. Vivian struggles out of my arms and proceeds to examine each of the wigs.

  “Who should I be today?” she asks me. I linger in the doorway, arms folded as I inspect the assortment of wigs. Some are blunt bobs, one has bangs and another is wig of brunette ringlets that immediately catches my eye.

  “How about some curls,” I say. “I rarely see you in curls.”

  She climbs atop a small stepladder to retrieve the curly wig and stops to admire it.

  “Yes,” she says. “You have a great eye. It’d be a nice change of pace to go for curls.”

  I smile at her compliment, feeling like I shouldn’t react any other way. She walks ahead of me out of the closet, lingering in front of the mirror to try on the wig. After straightening it atop her head, she smiles at the result.

  “This will do,” she says while turning to me for approval. “Well?”

  “Perfect.”

  She wanders from one end of the room to the next, grabbing her makeup box, a breezy, yellow sundress with an A-line skirt and a pair of wedge heels to finish the look. She recruits me to help with her makeup despite my lack of skill and even allows me to pick the colors she’ll wear for the day.

  I'm reminded of when I was younger, playing in my mother’s makeup on early Saturday mornings. Mom would paint me in her best colors to humor me, allowing me freedom to play with every cosmetic toy she owned. I frown at the nostalgia, realizing how much I miss that quality time she and I spent together.

  “What’s wrong?” Vivian asks upon noticing my frown. I set my focus on the mirror, responding to her reflection.

  “I remember doing this same thing with my mom,” I say. “When I was nine years old, she let me play in her make up. We used to take turns giving each other makeovers and she’d style my hair in pigtails and let me wear her best stilettoes. It’s my favorite memory of her.”

  “When was the last time you two spent that kind of time together?” she asks.

  I shrug. “Um, I really don’t know. I don’t remember the last time I didn’t feel suffocated around my mother.”

  “Suffocated? I was under the impression that you two were close.”

  “We were…I mean, we are,” I say, but the words sound more foreign than I expected them to aloud. I laugh at myself for being so ambiguous. “I guess it’s more complicated than I thought it was.”

  “Complicated, how? You love her, don’t you?” Vivian asks as I coat her lashes with mascara.

  “Of course, I love my mother,” I say. “She’s just really domineering sometimes. It’s hard to appease her when it comes to my personal life or me. Mom always has to have an opinion about me. No matter how much I try to subdue her, one way or another, she is going to tell me how she feels.”

  “Hmm, that’s understandable,” says Vivian. “If you were mine, I’d keep you under lock and key too.”

  “If I were yours?” I chuckle at her response. She remains deadpan, acting as if I'm silly for questioning her terminology.
/>   “I was never given the privilege of motherhood,” she says. “If you were mine, I would be just like your mother.”

  “You talk like children are possessions. I don’t belong to my mother.”

  She glares at me briefly, offended that I’d dare to correct her. Then, she smiles to ease the newfound tension.

  “Of course not,” she replies. “I don’t mean to suggest that you’re a possession, but I can relate to your mother. If I’d been given the chance to raise a child, I’d be quite obsessive over her wellbeing too. It’s something no mother can help. I understand the urge to want control of someone’s life.”

  I stop to contemplate, wondering where she’s steering this conversation and whether I'm comfortable with it.

  Vivian selects two tubes of lipstick from the makeup box and shows them to me for approval. “Which color? Coral or Pink?”

  “Coral always looks great on you,” I say.

  She doesn’t argue with my assessment. It’s nice for once having someone accept my reply without me having to feel like I must defend my opinion. After applying two coats, she puckers her lips and smiles her reflection. I touch up her cheeks with a light dusting of blush, surprising myself with how adequate it looks.

  “Hmm, for a girl that claims to know nothing about makeup, you’re quite an artist,” Vivian says.

  “Consider it a fluke,” I say. “You will never get this kind of accuracy out of me again.”

  Vivian grips my wrist as I apply a second dusting of blush. I glance at her in the mirror, expecting an explanation.

  “Never underestimate yourself,” she says. “One of the things that initially attracted me to you is the fact that you appeared much more self-assured than most other young women your age. Confidence is the key.”

  “I’ve never been a cosmetic maven,” I say. “Sasha was more of an expert in that.”

  “If you wore a bit more, you would have some experience.”

  She swipes the applicator from my hand and turns from the mirror to face me.

  “A touch of makeup has never hurt anyone.”

  She dips the blush in the pink powder and does a few quick swishes across each of my cheeks. She stops to examine her handiwork then proceeds to select a rose-colored lipstick tube. Two coats of this completely paints my lips. She then gives me a thin line of brown eyeliner then plucks my eyebrows into two perfectly manicured arches.

  “There,” she announces afterwards. “You are no longer a pretty girl, Cassandra. You are a beautiful, sexy and irresistible woman.”

  She moves aside to let me see the mirror. I stare at myself, admiring the girl staring back. It’s nothing I’ve ever seen myself look like before. The makeup ages me at least three years. My hazel eyes offset the liner. The natural peach undertones of my complexion meshes perfectly with the pink blush.

  “It’s beautiful,” I say. “There is no way I will ever be able to emulate this look every day.”

  “That is why you’ll be taking the makeup with you,” she says while handing me a small makeup box.

  “Vivian, I don’t think—”

  “Try it for a few mornings,” she interjects. “If you don’t like it then feel free to stop.”

  The makeup does add something new to my face that I didn’t think anything could.

  “I guess it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to look a little more feminine,” I say.

  She smiles at me while combing her hands through my hair to gather it into a bun at the nape of my neck. A hungry look resides in her eyes. The look reminds me of that exact moment in the salon just after she convinced me to dye my hair. It’s the same doting look that makes me feel like her manufactured creation.

  My phone buzzes from within my pocket. Vivian frowns. I retrieve the device and glance at the screen. Karen.

  “I have to take this call,” I say.

  “Who is it?” Vivian asks and I scramble to make up some kind of lie.

  “It’s my Mom,” I say. “Speak of the devil, right?”

  With my phone in hand, I slink out of the bedroom, downstairs and out of the house, away from listening ears. After closing the door behind me and stepping onto the porch, I hold the phone to my ear.

  “Karen?” I whisper, still certain someone might overhear. “Sorry to whisper, but I'm outside Vivian’s house.”

  “I got a ding on that Jack Carrick guy you mentioned,” she replies hesitantly. “You might want to sit down for this one.”

  My hand twitches, clutching the phone. “So I was right. There is something off about him.”

  “Yeah,” she says. “Jack Carrick can’t possibly be Vivian’s physician.”

  “What are you talking about? I’ve seen him work. Of course he’s her doctor.”

  “Cassandra, according to public records, Jack Carrick died fifteen years ago.”

  My knees crumble from beneath me. I drop onto the porch. My legs feeling like goo.

  “Are you sure…you looked up the right guy?” I ask. The words slip out in spastic spurts.

  I sound asthmatic.

  “I’ve spent the last three nights researching everything I could find on this guy,” she says. “I’m not mistaken. Jack Carrick is dead. Whoever that is parading around with Vivian is definitely an imposter.”

  I shake my head as if it will somehow disprove her words. “Vivian’s Carrick isn’t a doctor?”

  “Not a doctor, but a damn good con-artist. The real Jack Carrick was a highly esteemed neurosurgeon born in East Berlin. The man has never even set foot on US soil. Your Jack Carrick doesn’t even have a valid birth certificate registered with the United States government. What we found were several different social security numbers on him connected to three other alias.

  We reviewed the surveillance cameras for the night of the gala, found him looking suspicious.”

  “There were cameras in the garden where Sasha died?” I ask. “Why haven’t you people been digging through that footage?”

  “I’m sorry we’re not investigating this case the way you want us to,” she quips. “But we did review the footage. It was five hours of nothing useful. The Coconut Lounge security detail told us that renovations were made on the building a weekend before Vivian’s gala. One of the handy men mixed up some wires, completely fucked up the cameras. Most of the footage from that night is corrupted.”

  “Then what did you get on Carrick from ‘five hours of nothing useful?’” I ask and I'm trying to bite back the urge to cut every thread of civility I have left.

  “He looked pretty awkward next to Vivian’s other party guests. He never spoke to anyone, only interacted with Vivian. It looked suspicious but it wasn’t a crime. So we ran a screenshot of his face through our database to scope him out. His real name is Randall Reed.

  46 years old, born in Seattle, Washington where he actually did acquire his medical license. Five years later, it was revoked.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  “Several malpractice cases were pending against him,” she says. “Guess the guy must have jumped ship and assumed a new identity.”

  “Oh no, I forgot about Vivian,” I say. “I have to tell her that this guy is scamming her.”

  “Don’t feel bad for Vivian just yet because I'm not done,” she says. “There’s more.”

  I brace myself as if I'm about to take flight. Sweaty palms. Furrowed brow. I swallow hard.

  “I had to pull some major strings, but I managed to obtain a subpoena for Vivian’s medical records,” she says. “Upon finding out that this Reed guy was impersonating a doctor, I knew I had to check up on all of his past and present patients’ health records. God only knows how many of these people he could have misdiagnosed.”

  “And?” I say.

  “Vivian does not nor has she ever had lung cancer,” she says. “The woman has two healthy functioning lungs. So healthy that the most she’s ever had was a common cold.”

  “But…she had symptoms,” I say, wanting to rationalize this. “She was cough
ing fucking blood! How could she have faked any of that?”

  “That’s something you’ll have to ask the ‘queen’ herself. The medical records don’t lie.

  I had them authenticated. I’ve read every word on these documents. Vivian lied to you. She’s lied to the entire community.”

  I remain where I am, on my knees in a disheveled state of utter disbelief. I’ve never fooled myself into thinking that I knew Vivian. She was always on the peripheral of logic when it came to me, just a little too beyond my reach. I never knew what hid behind those eyes or what made her tick. Even so, I felt sorry her. I just never thought she was capable of a lie like this. This is my unravelling.

  “Cassandra?” Karen calls when I don’t answer. “Cassandra did we get disconnected?”

  I try rethreading my thoughts, wondering how I’d missed it. Then it hits me, hard and fast like a blow to my chest. She and Carrick weren’t just talking that day at the hospital. They were conspiring.

  When I asked for an explanation, Vivian changed the subject. She always changed the subject. She was always so nonchalant about the topic of her “illness,” always too carefree. It should have been obvious. How did I let that woman deceive me?

  “Hello?” Karen says again.

  “I have to go, Karen.”

  “What?”

  “Vivian and I need to have a talk,” I say.

  36

  I march back into the house. Head up. Chest out.

  Up the stairs then down the main hall, I find Vivian still in her bedroom sitting in front of her mirror, adjusting her wig. She doesn’t look at me, doesn’t even notice my presence until I'm behind her, glaring at her.

  “Did you and your mother catch up?” she asks while applying a coat of lipstick.

  “Yeah, we had an interesting conversation. We discussed you.”

  She turns toward me in her chair. “You and your mother discussed me?”

  “How long have you been faking cancer?” I blurt.

  She doesn’t react. Nothing on her face exposes anything. She simply shrugs. “Is that what this is about?”

  When I hear the nonchalance in her voice, when I see how little this affects her, how little she cares—a fire stirs in me. Small, but deadly. Like a dormant disease festering in my gut. I grow angrier by the second.