Versailles

by Yannick Hill

  River rubbed his eyes with the balls of his hands, but he was awake again. He had to find his father. Find out the truth. He opened the white door and scoped the corridor with his potato gun. He looked the part. He felt the part. A newfound courage, his life was panther-shaped. He gripped the gun like it was real. It felt real. Brat. Brat-brat.

  58

  The boy at school. Levon would come to school every day wearing a different costume, complete with persona. Nothing too obvious, no lion tamers or superheroes. Levon specialized in characters you might pass on the street without looking twice, but always with some kind of modifier. Off-duty traffic cop, chilled-out garbage collector, new father butcher, murderous train operator, out-of-work dog walker . . . Whoever Levon chose it was full commitment every time, right up until he went to bed at night. It made it kind of hard to get to know him, but it was worth it to get close. Missy fell in love with Levon the afternoon of out-of-work dog walker. He turned up to school wearing these real specific clothes, again nothing fancy, just clothes an average dude that wasn’t Levon might wear, and trailing a bunch of dog leads behind him with no dogs. His character was this mix of dejected yet hopeful that started Missy on a fit of giggles so epic the teacher had to throw her out of class. Levon liked her too and they started dating, which pissed off River at first but he was okay with it.

  Missy wasn’t like other girlfriends he’d had. Missy was special. Missy was the best. Missy was awesome, like, you could talk to her about anything. And he did. They’d walk on the beach outside her house and he’d tell her all this stuff he’d never told anybody, like, ever. He told her things he’d never told himself, you know? Maybe that’s why. Maybe she thought he was too weird or something like that, maybe he scared her off with all that stupid nonsense he talked about his characters and where he got his ‘inspiration’. What a douche. But somehow it didn’t fit. Missy was different from the other girls. Missy was like, a very cool chick. So why’d she stop answering his calls? One day they were hanging out, having a great time, the next she wouldn’t answer his frankly hilarious text messages. And at school. She pretended like he didn’t exist. It hurt, man. It hurt real bad, and Levon couldn’t stop thinking about her. He was heartbroken.

  All summer long he’d thought about nothing else but this girl. Day in, day out. He couldn’t sleep. So he made her a dress. That’s right. Before they’d even kissed he’d started working on this incredible dress for Missy Baer. He made her a dress, dude. Part of Levon’s thing was making all his characters’ costumes at home on his sewing machine. He refused even to buy underwear from the store, nothing off the rack. But it was like everything that came before, all the work he’d done on his machine up until this point, had been training for Missy’s dress. And he never got a chance to give it to her. All summer long he’d thought about nothing else but this girl. He was, like, obsessed with this girl, and the damn thing was? He knew Missy would love the dress.

  So today he thought fuck it, I’m going to go over to her house. I’m going to go over to that house in disguise, dude. That’s right, I’m going to rock up to those gates as, like, the pool cleaner or some shit, and those fools are going to invite me right in, they’re gonna be like, sure, Mr Pool Cleaner, come right in, sir and, like, clean our pool, please. It wasn’t gonna work but it was totally worth a shot.

  So here he was outside the double gates to the largest private residence in the United States. Versailles. It wasn’t his first time here, but it was his first time here as a pool cleaner. He rang the buzzer and tried to look casual. Now Levon thought of himself as something of a master of disguise, but this pool cleaner thing had him second-guessing. Should he go with the whole jumpsuit, utility belt, dirty baseball cap thing, or just go all-out sexy pool boy who winds up having an affair with the lonely lady of the house? In the end he’d opted for something in between. He didn’t really have the body to go topless so he went with the neon orange vest and tropical-theme Bermuda shorts. And sunglasses. A pair of iridescent sunglasses with matte black frames and bright green arms. Okay, and a fake moustache. It was real subtle though. Thin, with a gap in the middle. He actually may grow one of these, he thought, who knows. He looked up at the camera and tried to look casual. He knew the gatekeeper, Angel. Nice guy, they’d had some good talks in the past, but right now Levon needed Angel not to recognize him.

  ‘Levon?’ said Angel.

  ‘Goddammit, Angel.’

  ‘Levon, she’s not here,’ rejoined Angel.

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ said Levon. ‘I just want to give her something.’

  ‘No gifts, cabrón. Just go home, kid, it’s not your day.’

  Levon knew better than to argue with Angel so he walked back down the drive, out of camera shot. But this wasn’t over. The truth was, he’d been planning this for weeks. Levon had a Plan B.

  Versailles. Biggest private residence in the US, and with a security system to match. But there was a way in, and it was so simple. Levon knew this because River told him one time: all you had to do was swim up to the speedboat moored on that beach and wait till nightfall. Then there was a route through the garden. A corridor of blind spots. It’s like, join the dots! River had said, You’re never on camera. I spent my whole childhood in this place, trust me, I know the angles!

  The current was stronger than he’d anticipated, but Levon had been swimming lengths these past weeks in preparation. He’d brought a waterproof backpack for the dress, and that was kind of helping with keeping him afloat. It was a long swim too, almost a mile he guessed, but he could see the boat now, Versailles’ million dollar MTI 40 series speedboat with custom bolstered seating, wraparound windshield and twin Mercury 575 horsepower engines. He’d read about it on the internet.

  He could see the tall palms now, the beginning of Versailles’ private beach. Levon swam up alongside the beautiful white and canary-yellow speedboat. There was a small silver ladder at the back. If he could just climb up that ladder and keep low, the camera wouldn’t see him. He took a peek. Versailles. Its southern edifice glowed in the bright sunshine, its darkened windows seeming to watch him. Levon ducked back behind the speedboat and expelled all the air in his lungs through pursed lips. For Missy, he said out loud. He climbed the ladder and slithered into the boat. It was a six-seater, two at the front, four at the back. Levon was in the rear footwell. Right away he wrapped himself in the rain cover he found there. This was great. A little hot, a little sweaty, but this way he could stay completely hidden until nightfall, and that’s when he would run the gauntlet to the house and throw a coin up at Missy’s window. A goofy plan, but what can you do? He was in love.

  And as Levon lay there in the back of the speedboat, wrapped up like a giant burrito, he thought of Missy, her smile, her laugh, her long blonde hair, and with these sunny images, and the gentle rocking of the boat, he fell into a deep, afternoon sleep.

  part five

  Deep Sky

  59

  What Casey did. A broken promise. Missy had been the one to find Synthea, floating face down in the swimming pool, the water only pink with her blood. She dived under the surface and brought her mother to the edge, ripped her T-shirt and tied the wrists. She looked so young at first, her wet hair and the bathing costume coming off one shoulder. This was Casey. Missy knew it in her bones. He’d broken his promise and said something. She held her mother in her arms as they waited for the ambulance. He had said something to her and now this. Her mother, her beautiful mother, she looked so young, her wet hair and the bathing costume coming off one shoulder. The water only pink with blood. All that lost time. She had lost a lot of blood but she would survive.

  And then the rest. What Casey did. He didn’t send her away but he’d kept her prisoner in Versailles. The medication came in the form of pills. Nameless pills. The packaging was white boxes. No name, no disclaimers. She took the pills and she was not their mother. She took the pills because . . . she took the pills because he told her to. This was not her mother. Mi
ssy tried talking to her but she wouldn’t talk to anybody, only stare out of the window in her office, smoking those cigarettes without the filters, staring out at the endless ocean as Missy stood behind her, asking her to come back, to come away from the window, asking, Why won’t you look at me, Mom? I never meant to hurt you. I never meant to hurt you, Mom. I get it now. You remember the candles? Do you remember us talking with the candles all around us, what you told me? You said you wished you could go away, far away from here, and I understand. It was him. You wanted to be far away from him, from this, from what’s happening to you now. His control. But it’s all my fault, Mom. I told him what you said. I told him because I thought you meant . . . because I was scared. And then you did hurt yourself, and it’s all because of me, because I thought I could trust him. I thought I could trust Casey but I know what he is now. I can see what he’s done to you, what he’s doing. Where he wants you. But it’s not too late, Mom. I’m still here, I’m still your daughter, I’m still your Missy and you can tell me anything. You can trust me. I know I messed up, but I promise, Mom. I promise it will never happen again. Please, Mom, stop staring out the window and look at me, turn around and look at me.

  She hated him. Her hate for him a perfect thing. She hated him for doing this to her mother, her talented mother, so full of love, and all her vision, all this color faded to black. She hated him so much she’d wanted to destroy him. She lay awake at night, thought about the worst thing she could do. The company. The network. Everything he had built. His reputation. She would take to the social networks and tell them everything, her friends, their friends, people she didn’t know. It would take the internet by storm. CEO of the internet’s pre-eminent social network and his wife was suicidal? Not a good look for a captain of industry. Any sign of weakness. The stock would take a massive hit, he might even be forced to sell up.

  She had sat in front of her laptop, mouse pointer poised over the ‘post’ button. Post this and it would all be over: life as they knew it. Versailles, this dream of life. A dream of life was still a dream. She clicked and nothing happened. The button on the screen wasn’t animating, like it was dead or something. Click-click-click. Then her phone, lighting up on the desk. Unknown caller. She touched the green button and held the phone to her ear. It was ringing. Her father answered, told her to come to his office, they needed to talk.

  He told her to sit, no eye contact at first, the desk between. He asked her if she ever considered what it would do to her mother if people found out. ‘Did you ever think about that, Missy? Did you?’

  ‘What, are you tracking my online activities now?’ Missy said. ‘What happened to privacy?’

  ‘I know you’re angry, Missy, but I’m your father and you need to listen to what I have to say.’ His voice was gentle but instructive. ‘We cannot afford to upset your mother at this time. I know you blame me for what happened, but telling the world our most intimate affairs is not the answer.’

  ‘You don’t care about her, all you care about is your company.’

  ‘That’s a terrible thing to say, Missy, and I want you to take it back.’

  ‘I’m nearly sixteen, Dad, it’s going to take more than that to shut me up. You can’t control me.’

  ‘Don’t do this, Missy. You’re making a mistake. I don’t know if your mother can be saved a second time. You don’t want blood on your hands.’

  ‘You didn’t save her,’ Missy screamed. ‘She’s a ghost. Oh my God. I hate you.’

  That was the last time Missy saw her father. But she did as she was told. Her mother’s silence became Missy’s silence. She didn’t want to talk about what happened to anyone, not even Levon. She wouldn’t know where to begin. It was all her fault. It was all her fault and her dreams were of falling, falling upwards into a dark, dark sky, and when she opened her eyes the light from outside would tell her it was late, too late for Saturday, for swimming or seeing friends. Her friends told her she had changed, they didn’t know about her mom, the swimming pool. She stopped updating her profile, stopped caring how people saw her. But they cared. They loved Missy. They kept calling, even when she didn’t answer, her phone set to silent.

  And then one night her dream of falling turned to a dream of flying, into the sky and out again, along a beach lined with tall palms, and the dream set her down at the entrance to a cave, and from that night forward she dreamed only of exploring that cave, of finding treasure, crystalline fragments of memory, desire, hope, anger, all different colors, all different shapes, but they were beautiful and they had weight and they felt important, more important than any-thing else. She wanted to bring them back into the waking world, assemble them into a new whole, like a new armor for herself, a new look for her waking life.

  The sword video had come at the right time. The sword video, the Level Up! email, the voice on her phone and then the boy with no name, Silas and the epic journey north. She had eaten a cheeseburger for breakfast, shoplifted a bag of Twinkies, faced down a bear in the shadow of a mountain, thrown a Molotov cocktail at a wicker effigy of her father, kissed a girl and got stupid drunk with Scout Rose.

  And now here she was, at the door to Deep Sky, sword at her side, black baseball cap pulled down low over her eyes. This was where the journey ended. It felt like two worlds, like this door was a portal between two worlds. She was far from Versailles, but this side of the door was still her world, the world of her father and her mother, of everybody telling her what to do, who to be, and how to feel. And needing her. Her trust, her friendship, her perspective. The other side was the another world, one she wasn’t born into. Unwitnessed. On the other side of this door was her world, one glittering with possibility. This is where her childhood ended, teenage-hood, whatever. Her choice to delete her profile on the social network. Her choice to take up the sword. Her choice to start the engine of her SUV and drive out the gates of Versailles, out of frame. No status update. No pictures of her to like or comment on. Her choice not to call her mom. Her choice to steal the Twinkies. Silas told her all along. There was no turning back, no going home. This is where her childhood ended. Time to grow up. Deep Sky. Deep Sky was danger. Deep Sky was the unknown. Deep Sky was the furthest from her father she could think of. Her guilt changed color. Her hate no longer hate. Why hate when she could live? Deep Sky was the furthest from the internet she could think of, somewhere she could pass unwitnessed, see what that looked like, see what that felt like. She wasn’t perfect. She was Missy. And right now she was no one’s daughter, no one’s friend, this was all her, her hands, her heart, her blood, her pulse, her choice. Entering Deep Sky was diving from the highest of three platforms for the first time, arms out straight, that one mortal moment longer in the air. A moment of sheer terror and anticipation. Deep Sky was . . . Missy didn’t know, but she wanted to. After everything she’d been through she had to know.

  She touched the door again, the wood felt warm. A dark wood, but there was a redness deep inside the varnish. She saw the button. To the left of the door, a translucent white button with a black ‘up’ arrow. This was an elevator. She held on to the hilt of her sword with her left hand. This was the unknown, her door into the darkness, but it was her darkness, her fear and the pleasure of this feeling, of feeling like herself, of having character. She guessed this is what people meant when they talked about feeling comfortable in your skin.

  Her fear, her darkness. What Casey did had cast a shadow but now it was her shadow. She was scared. Opening this door meant meeting someone. This time alone was precious, this time before she opened the door and stepped into another world. This time was precious, this time in the real world. Right now it was all she knew. Versailles. Missy was scared. She thought of her mom, brother, far, far away in Versailles, alone without her. The thought nearly made her turn around in the corridor, her mother and River still in Versailles, still trapped in that house and not know-ing where she was. The guilt nearly made her turn around in the corridor, but she didn’t. Missy pushed the white button an
d the door slid open with a ping.

  The inside of the elevator was emerald green, soft walls and no mirror but there was a piece of candy on the floor. A piece of candy in a bright pink wrapper. She picked it up and looked at it. She twisted the twisted ends and it squeaked, like a tiny creature it squeaked as she twisted. Missy felt spaced out. This was new candy. Not old candy. There was no logo but she could tell. It was new and when she untwisted the wrapper and put the candy in her mouth she could taste that it was new. The sugar made her feel better. She didn’t feel spaced out anymore, but somebody had left this candy here on purpose.

  There was one button in the elevator, so Missy pressed it. Butterflies. Like when she was a kid and her parents had people over for a dinner party. This was in the days before she and River where allowed to go to school. Sitting at the top of the stairs and waiting for the guests to arrive. Listening for the cars in the driveway, and when they came, when she heard the tires roll in and slowly crush up the gravel in the driveway, she got so excited, the sounds of different cars arriving in front of the house, the sense of excitement, of guests arriving, of new people arriving and ringing the bell to the mansion, more guests and the ringing of the bell, Missy remembered that feeling well. Sitting at the top of the stairs, the slow crush of gravel and the bell. And later, much later, when she couldn’t sleep – long after Leticia had put her to bed and sung her a lullaby – she would get up again and walk downstairs, follow the distant sound of voices, people talking, people laughing, her bare feet on the cold marble stairs. People shouting at each other but they weren’t angry, Missy watched them from the doorway and she could see. They weren’t angry with each other, they were laughing and shouting and smoking, and some of them she knew, some of them she recognized from the daytime, but they didn’t see her there, not right away. All their faces, their wet eyes and glistening white teeth, her father, her mother, her beautiful mother in the electric blue dress. Missy’s favorite dress. She wished she could see her mother one last time. Like that, in her electric blue dress, talking to another man, Casey at the other end of the table, smoking a cigarette with half-closed eyes as people talked across.