Objects in the Mirror

by Nicolò Govoni

  The bulbs hanging upon the bar look more vivid, their colors more intense, the bottles on the shelves spin around, and the words spoken by the people at the counter materialize in the air, letter by letter, floating before their faces. Some of them, the small talks, are green, some are blue, hovering around those who flirt, those who hope for a stolen kiss or a quick fuck, and the red ones crackle in the excitement of alcohol and drugs.

  Mel feels her mind open up to this dimension, grasping a newly found awareness. “What is already under control can’t be controlled,” she says to no one in particular. “Only chaos can be mastered.”

  Then Mel is in the bathroom getting screwed by Ferang. Sitting on the toilet, every penetration a punch in the belly, she eyes him from down up, staring at his face without a blink for fear of missing one of his many ever-changing faces. Ferang’s skin remixes again and again, mutating structure, his cheekbones contracting and disappearing into his cheeks, his nose getting smaller, his eyes losing the vague glimmer of treachery that they usually bear. His face disintegrates dozens of times, and every time it reforms he looks like someone new.

  His sex causes her pain, a dagger sliding in and out, but at the same time gives her pleasure. No pain no gain, they say. The sound of their bodies colliding is orange and shaped in rings that expand in the air of the cubicle, colliding with the walls, exploding in a sea of splinters.

  His pupils swell while remaining the same size, a feral, almost frightening light to them that Mel wants to touch. And she does. She reaches out and touches his contorted face, and it ripples at her touch like the water of a pond. Her fingers ply Ferang’s features. He can be molded at will. She shapes a series of faces, some of them ugly, some attractive, but none of them satisfy her, and no one is really his own.

  After an endless time, exhausted, Ferang takes it out without coming and wheezing, he buttons up his pants, his eyes on the wall, away from hers.

  “Shit,” he says. “I can’t.”

  He hesitates. He holds out his hand to her, smiles a little, if only for real, but Mel, craving to see his true face holds his gaze without moving or saying a word. Ferang’s expression changes again, his face darkens, his hand falls to his side. He gets out, leaving her abandoned on the toilet, drenched in their sweat, her dress torn.

  Mel stands, tries to tidy herself up, with her index finger traces the tear on her dress, and then she’s out of the cubicle, looking in the empty mirror, fixing the jungle of her hair, rinsing her face with lukewarm water pouring out of rusty pipes. She raises her head and her reflection in the mirror is no longer alone. Careena stands next to her, putting some bright red lipstick on, looking at her through the mirror. Mel doesn’t know where to turn her gaze. She returns her glare.

  “Your dress is lovely,” Careena says after a moment. “But you’re a slut.” And she’s out.

  Mel is back on the dance floor where the sounds have stopped dancing like flames in the air and the lights respond once again to the laws of physics. She swims through the crowd, scouring people with their eyes, looking for a sense of belonging but finding none, and so she understands—she’s looking for Ferang in spite of everything.

  He’s at the bar, a drink in his hand, his elbow leaning on the counter, his legs crossed in a James Dean-fashion, speaking with a short, skinny, insignificant, smiling design girl, looking at her close but ignoring her completely; then even his gaze drops her.

  Their eyes lock. Ferang leaves the glass and the chick at the bar, and, covering the distance between them, takes Mel

  FERANG

  in his arms. Mel reminds him of a child who has been waiting to see her father before bursting into tears. She indulges in his embrace.

  They dance. Slowly, like high schoolers. Their foreheads touching, they move to a song they alone can hear. Their eyes half-closed. His hands on her hips, hers on his neck. They say nothing. They want for nothing. When you are on a voluntary exile, your companion in misfortune is all you have left to love and hate, for both love and hate are what makes you human.

  Climbing down, in the elevator, they meet a group of fellow students whose name Ferang can’t remember and, although Mel pretends to, he knows she can’t either.

  Outside, the halo of smog around the streetlights makes it look like Christmas from back home, but in reality the night is warm and moist. The students they met in the elevator are too drunk and coked up to take a taxi. They sing the American anthem, messing up the words. They jostle amicably. They even dare venturing into the deserted street, where a light breeze seems to be blowing although not a leaf moves. Trash and sleeping beggars pile up on the sides of the street, but the guys are too drunk to notice.

  Ferang grabs Mel’s wrist. He smiles, drags her with him, with them, on this totally awesome adventure. Rich kids actually taking a walk in these streets, that is. He wants to make amends for what happened in the toilet.

  “You’re drunk,” she says.

  “My secrets keep me sober.”

  “Melodramatic.”

  The group of guys keep on singing their hearts out and punch each other like frat boys.

  “Who’s got a lighter?” goes one of them.

  “Your mother,” says Ferang, joining in the general merriment.

  Dark-faced, one of the guys turns. “Dude, this is India, you don’t say such things here.”

  Ferang smiles and waits for him to turn again. The others seem to have not heard. Slaves.

  “Aren’t you tired of feeling different?” he asks.

  Mel smiles, then sighs. “I was born here, Ferang,” she says. “Different is who I am.”

  He clears his throat. “You are not who you are,” he says, batting his eyelashes in an impression of Gabriel. “You are who you believe you are.”

  Mel chuckles. Hits him on his side.

  The dudes sing and kick crushed cans laying in the street. Ferang gets a message. He peeks at the preview on the iPhone screen. Flinching, he shoves it back inside his pocket.

  “If even Ayodhya can be silent at night,” goes Mel, looking at the black sky, “then perhaps there is hope.”

  The Fence appears before them and they realize they walked long enough to reach the vicinity of the Pit. Wrapped in filthy blankets, the shapes of dozens of homeless people. They sleep on the street, upon, under or next to their little kiosks, their only source of income in the daytime, their homes at night.

  “Make Ayodhya beautiful again,” one of the guys reads on a sign posted on the Fence, before the shacks.

  “They’re dismantling the slum,” says another. Quite the informed fellow.

  “As they should,” goes the first. Ferang eyes his face but he still can’t remember his name.

  “And what about the people?” asks the third.

  “Throw them in the street.”

  “Where?”

  The first one laughs. “Too many streets.” Rushir. His name is Rushir.

  Lit up in purple, yellow and green, a skyscraper stands towering in front of the tin roofs of the huts. Soon, it is known, a tower just like this will spurt out where there are now only slums. The Worlds United logo peeps out from one corner of the sign on the construction site.

  “Look at this,” yells one of the dudes pointing at a lady sleeping on the sidewalk. “This one has a crack face.”

  “She’s just poor,” says another with a laugh.

  “Did you watch the cricket match yesterday?”

  “Cricket?” Rushir goes. “I’m not a farmer.”

  The night sounds sweet and jolly.

  “The souls of the dead children of Ayodhya roam the night under the bridge,” goes an old Hindi song. The boys don’t realize they have started speaking in the language they so much despise.

  Two homeless people fuck on the sidewalk. Their bodies can be glimpsed under a stained blanket. They shake, their gasps clearer step after step. Ferang prays that the dudes will not notice them.

  The first to see them points his fair digit in their di
rection. Laughs hysterically. Elbows the guy next to him. No one pays attention. Then he jumps in front of the group, his face disfigured by drugs and hilarity, pointing to the two lovers. The others burst out laughing. They point at them too. One of them, the hot-blooded confirmation-needy, approaches the mass of limbs. He hesitates. Touches it with his foot. The lovers keep on doing each other, unaware. The dude touches them again, this time with insistence, but they continue to fornicate on the tar. The guy kicks them.

  The blanket falls off revealing a young man wearing a bushy mustache and a filthy undershirt. With his hands, he tries to protect the dignity of his lady lying beneath him. “Chutiya,” he hisses blindly. Then he turns, and the blood leave his face.

  Silence.

  “What the fuck did you say?” barks the guy who kicked them.

  The young man opens his mouth but says nothing, waving his hands, now forgetful of the virtue of his beloved.

  “What the fuck did you say?” echoes another dude, approaching.

  “What the fuck did you say?” repeats Rushir.

  “What the fuck did you say?” goes the last.

  They beat him to pulps. The girl, still wrapped in the filthy blanket, stares at them without saying a word. When they finished, the young man breathes in gasps. He doesn’t get up.

  In the distance you can hear dogs barking.

  Ferang fakes an icy smile, desperate to please the natives despite the growing horror. “We are observers,” he says, perhaps to himself.

  “We are witnesses,” follows Mel, next to him.

  “Audience.”

  “Perpetrators.”

  Mel calls a taxi. They travel home in silence, sitting as far away from each other as possible in the back seat.

  Old Ayodhya. At the sight of it, Ferang’s stomach writhes. The taxi stops in front of his house. Ferang lingers inside. Enjoys the air conditioning. The silence. Then he turns toward her, embarrassed, maybe even uncomfortable, or perhaps in a fit of paralyzing lucidity. “Nothing matters, and I’m afraid of people,” he says, and rushes out.

  The Old City vomits its leaden night on him.

  Ferang walks through the thick air, his head heavier with every step. Sweat glued to his armpits, to the hollows of his knees, between the collar of his shirt and the skin of his neck. The road is deserted, and then, one step after another, he’s standing in front of the door of his place.

  As soon as he enters, he will have to deal with that damn mirror, he knows that all too well. He will have to deal with that handicapped drunkard. With his own filthy mattress. In the morning, he will have to seek out a bucket of water to shower. Put on almost clean clothes. He will have to help the Doc, a perpetually gloomy, suicidal, lonely man. He’ll disinfect tools soiled with god only knows what. He will mix with the people and then go to the University, where no one gives a shit about him, except that he is the mighty Ferang—the white guy. But it won’t be truly him. It never is.

  Ferang dreads like never before the prospect of a new dawn in this shithole. He lays his hand on the wood of the ajar door. He stops. Stares. Blinks. He shakes his head, takes the iPhone out of his pocket and books an Uber, hoping that at this time in the night the taxi drivers will have the balls to drive down here. It’s booked. It’s coming. Ferang takes a step back.

  A voice echoes through the door.

  “You’ll be sorry for this,” says the Bear from inside.

  Ferang feels a chill creeping upon his slick back.

  “You have no idea what you’re doing.” He sounds calm as it gets, the Bear. “Come in. There’s something you should know.”

  Ferang is holding his breath. Trying to control his heartbeat. He lets a sigh out. “No,” he says.

  “Something bad is happening.”

  “No,” Ferang goes again.

  A beat.

  “But you know that already.” The Bear sounds surprised. “Oh, yeah, you do, but it’s easier for you to ignore the message. After all, you’re the lazy one.” The Bear waits for a response. “The sloppy one,” he adds. “The weak one.”

  Ferang backs one step further.

  “Don’t deceive yourself,” says the Bear. “If you look away and cover your ears, you’re killing him, aren’t’ you? Even if you can’t be sure of that, deep down you know you are. If I know, you know.”

  The taxi pulls over at the crossroad.

  “Read that message,” goes the Bear, the hoarse voice coming now from just behind the door.

  Ferang glances at the taxi, the iPhone in his pocket weighing tons, and yet he manages to take another step back.

  “Who are you running away from? You’re the bad guy,” says the Bear, his voice worked up. “You should thank me.” A pause. “Read the damn message.”

  In a fit of anger, Ferang fishes the iPhone from his pocket. Sender: Gabriel. Ferang reads the entire text. Puts the device back in his pocket and walks towards the taxi.

  “You can’t run away from me,” the Bear roars from behind the door.

  Ferang jumps into the taxi asking the driver to take him to the closest hotel. Then he thinks again. “Take me to the Taj,” he says and checks the reflection in each window. Nothing to be seen.

  The hotel is palatial, a six-story building right in front of the Gateway of India. In spite of the late hour, the receptionist smiles and takes a photocopy of his passport. “First time in Ayodhya?” she says, and since she’s kind, Ferang pictures himself hitting her hard in the face. Her teeth shattered. Her lips split. The sobbing, the begging. He grits his teeth till they hurt and banishes the thought from his mind.

  The room is spacious, the plaster twinkling on the walls and ceiling. The bed sheets imported from somewhere nicer. The air conditioner seems to say, “Fuck, fuck, fuck” to infinity. An antiqued mirror. Ferang covers the mirror with a towel, slinks into the bathroom. He turns on the tap. The weird noise, the smelly pipes from where he fetches water every morning a distant memory. A moment of anxious waiting. Water. A jet of water pours into the sink. Ferang places his hand under it under. The water is warm, almost hot, but in his mind, it flows directly from Everest, pure and invigorating. He closes his eyes. Lets out a groan, then a sigh. How he missed it. Fucking running water.

  Without thinking twice, he spends an indefinite amount of time in the bliss of a shower. Fuck the farmers, he thinks, fuck the slumdogs. They are all correct, the rich bastards at the University—if you don’t use it, someone else will. When he closes the tap and leaves, he feels like a new man.

  “Okay,” goes the Bear, as soon as he steps out. “I understand. We all need a vacation from ourselves every now and then.” Gunning the air conditioner, Ferang chuckles. It’s all too nice to let his presence affect his mood. The blast of cold air caresses his face like a divine blessing.

  “You take a hotel room for one night, you take a good night’s sleep on a mattress a little more comfortable. Look, I understand, you can even skip the shift with Doc tomorrow. I’m sure he’ll understand, too.”

  Ferang undresses. Places his clothes on a colonial style armchair.

  “You can do this for two or three days, even.”

  Ferang sits on the bed and turns on the TV. Thousands and thousands of channels, and he cares for none. Ferang leaves the TV on anyway.

  “But then you’ll start missing it, your work. You’ll start missing it, this hero’s story. You know it yourself, if we don’t shine, we don’t exist.”

  Ferang says nothing. He doesn’t even turn. He fingers the spotless pillowcase.

  “You know,” goes the Bear. “You are here for this reason, too. Playing god.”

  Ferang focuses on the images on the screen.

  “You’re a handsome guy, Ferang, but that’s about it.”

  An electric shock whips his nerves, slow, expanding from the core of his being until it reaches the ends. But Ferang knows he must resist his tricks. He’s toying with him, trying to get him to come around, and he tells himself that over and over, but he can’
t resist. He spins around. His teeth bared. He doesn’t know what to say, though, he realizes. He has nothing to say.

  “That’s right,” he goes, “without me you are nothing. You’re a mediocre kid, the same scared white trash you were before I dreamed up to change the world.”

  Ferang starts to speak. He must say something. But the words hang on his lips.

  “The truth, though, is that I need you, too,” says the Bear.

  This strikes Ferang like a hammer blow in the chest.

  “I need you to need me...” repeats the Bear, his voice low, joyless beyond the sheet. Like someone you could actually feel pity for.

  “I am all that is good in you,” goes the Bear, taking advantage of the silence. “But without you, I’m zero.” Silence.

  Ferang lifts his head, the fuel of a sudden realization. “You’re afraid,” he says.

  “Yes—”

  “No, not because I’m fighting you.” Ferang pulls the sheet off the mirror. “You’re scared because I might tell the truth.”

  A beat. The Bear laughs, but does so only after a moment’s hesitation, a moment Ferang didn’t miss.

  “You are a sad creature,” says the Bear, “thinking the little spell you dreamt of will cure you of me. You still need your daily dose of admiration, your own version of cocaine. You’d manipulate even the cutest of Dalmatian puppies to get it to love you more than you do.”

  “You’re wrong. It’s not love that I want.”

  “And what do you want?”

  “Understanding,” Ferang says. “Just like any other human being.”

  “And what do I want?”

  “Everything else.” Ferang clenches his fists. “And you are willing to lie, cheat, steal—kill perhaps—to get it.”

  “Well, then, you do agree,” goes the Bear. “We are the same, both of us exiled inside our own skin.”

  “No,” says Ferang, opening his arms, “the matter is far less romantic than that. I am the shadow that makes your light shine brightest, a prisoner of your apparent perfection. But I’m about to be free.”