by Jon Skovron
“The what?”
“It’s one of the newer acts,” he said. “They just put it in a couple months ago or so.”
“Oh,” I said. “I…uh…quit a little while back, so I guess that’s why I don’t know it.” Of course Ruthven had brought in a new act. He added one act every year, sometimes more if someone new showed up looking for shelter. But the idea of an act in The Show that I hadn’t watched through rehearsals, that some random human knew better than me…it hurt way more than I expected. I’d never met a mermaid. Did they breathe air or water? What did she look like? Did Ruthven bring her in to make the Siren happy? Or to punish her? There was so much I wanted to know, starting with how they did the water part onstage. But I refused to ask this human. That would have been too much.
“What was your favorite act?” he asked quietly, maybe somehow sensing that I was feeling a little homesick for The Show.
“I liked the trowe dance best.”
“Oh, that.” He nodded. “Yeah, that used to be good. Not sure what happened, though. I think they lost their lead dancer or something, and it just doesn’t have the same sizzle now.”
“She quit, too.”
“A shame. Well, hopefully she quit for a better gig.”
“Yeah. Hopefully.”
“Well, the kid checks out,” said Jeffrey as he came out from the club. He still looked a little scared, but there was also a weird awe in his eyes. “Laurellen said send him back right away.”
“I’ll walk him back,” said Vinnie.
“Thanks,” said Jeffrey, clearly relieved he didn’t have to see Laurellen again. I wondered what the big deal was. It was just Laurellen after all.
Vinnie took me into the club, which turned out to be a lot smaller than I imagined. Granted, I’d only seen clubs in movies, so my expectations were probably a little unfair. There were a bunch of guys and a few girls all jammed up together near the bar. There were a few tables, and those were also pretty packed, with other small random groups just standing around. The speakers were blasting some cheesy dance music, and everyone was shouting over top of that, so it was really loud. The whole thing felt completely claustrophobic and I had this weird impulse to just turn and leave. But when I thought about it, this was probably less crowded than a night at the Cantina, and not too long ago that had felt totally normal. It wasn’t just The Show that had changed. I had changed, too. I wasn’t sure yet whether it was for the better.
Vinnie led me into another room in the back that had a DJ spinning and a dance floor with people bouncing up and down to the beats and the bursts of neon-colored light. All the way at the back of that back room was a shiny red, round booth. And sitting at the booth, surrounded by a bunch of humans, was Laurellen. That’s when I saw what the big deal was. Laurellen was totally drenched in glamour. So much that it almost hurt to look at him. Those humans had to be completely under his spell. It made me wonder if he wasn’t cheating a little on his promise to Ruthven to not steal any more humans. Not that I would tell on him, of course. But it made me feel a little better about asking for some glamour for Liel. He looked like he had some to spare.
Vinnie presented me with a big show of hands, like a magician. “Look what the wind blew in,” he said.
Laurellen gave me a smirk, and waves of glamour rolled off him, making me feel a little stoned.
“Oh, that tricky wind…” he said. He raised his long, thin hand and gave it a regal flip. “Begone. All of you.”
It was amazing how fast they split. Totally in his thrall.
Once everyone was gone, his smile faded. “Boy,” he said. “Sit.”
“Okay.” I suddenly felt sheepish as I sat down next to him in the shiny red booth.
“Of course you realize that if your mother finds out about this she will rip my limbs off.”
“She still pissed?”
“It’s going to be a very long time before she isn’t. Possibly decades.”
I winced.
“But, more important…” He leaned back a little and his face softened. “How are you? You look in shockingly good health, I must say.”
“I get a lot more exercise. And uh…Liel is a good cook.”
“Ah, yes. Liel. So she’s with you?”
“She came looking for me. I guess.”
“Please tell me you aren’t just sleeping in some shelter.”
“No, I have an apartment and a job and everything.”
“My God. So you’re really doing it. Living like a human, and with the girl of your dreams.”
“Yeah, sort of.”
“But there’s a problem. Otherwise you wouldn’t have come looking for me.”
“Well, I mean, I miss you. And Mozart, and of course, my parents. And even Ruthven and Charon, I guess. But yeah, I kind of need your help.”
“Glamour.”
“Yeah,” I said, shame suddenly bitter in my mouth. “I’m sorry. I know it’s a shitty thing for me to ask.”
“But why do you need it? You seem to be passing with flying colors.”
“It’s not for me.”
“Oh.” He sighed. “Teenage love. Human or monster, it is the number one cause of stupidity.”
“It’s not just some stupid crush. I really love her.”
“I know,” he said. “That’s the tragedy.”
“It’s not tragedy. We just need some glamour so she can get out of the house, maybe get a job or something. So she doesn’t feel totally dependent on me.”
“I can give you some glamour, Boy. But how long do you think she’ll be able to keep that up? The kind of dosage she’ll need to pass isn’t healthy to do on a regular basis. And Ruthven will catch on that the supply is dwindling, eventually. He keeps careful track of it.”
“But what about”—I gestured to the halo of magic allure that surrounded him—“all this?”
“This is the weekly indulgence he allows to keep me from completely losing my mind. It’s budgeted in.” He looked at me then with a seriousness I’d never seen in him before. “But all of that is beside the point, Boy. Some creatures just aren’t cut out to be among humans. The trowe are one of them. You must know this.”
“That’s just some old-fashioned troll prejudice. She thinks she can do it if she can just look the part. And I believe her.”
“Which brings us back to the tragedy.”
“I understand if you don’t want to help,” I said, getting up.
“Boy, sit your ass back down.”
I sat back down.
“I was there nearly eighteen years ago when your mother and father presented you to rest of the company. You were so little back then, nothing but kid parts. And I was there during that painfully awkward phase as your mother slowly transitioned you, limb by limb, to your adult-sized parts.” He leaned in and put his long hand on my shoulder. “Boy, you’re the closest thing I have to family. Of course I’ll help you.”
Then he leaned back into his seat. “I won’t bullshit you, though. I think it’s a dreadful idea.”
I WAS A little hurt that Laurellen didn’t have faith that Liel and I could pull this off, but I wasn’t about to get all self-righteous, since he was giving us the glamour. That night, I triumphantly brought home a big batch of it in a quart-sized ziplock bag. It looked like a blend of wheat flour and glitter.
Liel put it on the very next day. I’d never used glamour or even seen someone other than Laurellen with it on. It was just one of those things adults talked about. So I was pretty curious to see it in action.
She sat on the couch and took a pinch of the powder and rubbed it into each of her eyes. She sucked in a breath, her lips curling up into a fanged snarl, and she clutched the couch with her claws. She squeezed her lids shut and pearl-white tears leaked out. Then slowly, her green skin turned to tan, her white hair turned to blonde, her ears shrank and rounded, and her fangs shrank to flat teeth. Even her facial structure changed, softening from the hard angles of the trowe into something more delicate. When she finally opened her eye
s, those diamonds that I loved so much had melted into pale blue-gray human eyes.
“Well?” She stood up and examined herself in the mirror by the front door. “What do you think?”
“Um…” It creeped me out that she looked human, but I didn’t want her to feel self-conscious. “I think you can totally pass as human.”
“Okay, that’s a start. But do I pass for a pretty human?”
“You looked pretty before.”
She clapped her hands. “Stay on topic. Do I look like a pretty human? The kind of jobs I’m going to be looking for, I have to be pretty.”
“You look like you’d fit in on some teen drama TV show.”
“So that’s a yes?”
“Uh, sure. Yeah.”
I had the night off. Since she looked human, I was hoping we could go out someplace in Manhattan where we’d never been able to go before, like Central Park, or Little Italy. But she wanted to start looking for a job right away, so I helped her throw together a résumé, and she went out that afternoon.
I remembered how shitty my first day of job hunting had been, and I knew she would probably come home empty-handed and exhausted that night. So I decided to make dinner. I wasn’t much of a cook, but I threw together some pasta thing that turned out okay. I figured the fact that I even did it would cheer her up a little.
But she didn’t come home for dinner. In fact, she didn’t come home until around two in the morning.
“Home!” she shouted as she stepped through the front doorway.
“Whoa,” I said. I had kind of forgotten that she would look human and I got creeped out all over again by her tan skin and her soft human eyes. She also seemed a little drunk.
“You are looking at the newest, and cutest, waitress at the Temple restaurant on St. Marks in the East Village!”
“You got a job already?” I asked.
“Yep, third place I tried.” She gave me a polished human grin. “I walked in and asked if they needed a waitress. The guy behind the bar looked at me for a second, then said, ‘Can you start right now?’”
“What?”
“I know, right?” She flopped onto the couch. “Some chick had just walked out on them and they were desperate. He had me work a shift tonight to see if I could handle myself, and when we were closing up, he told me he was putting me on the schedule. Three nights a week to start, more if it keeps working out. And the best part?” She pulled out a big, messy wad of crumpled bills. “It’s all under-the-table cash. Guy didn’t even blink when I told him I didn’t have any ID.”
“Unbelievable. You know it took me weeks to find a job. And I think what you have right there in your hand is about what I make in a week.”
“Humans love pretty humans.” She kicked off her high-heeled boots. “It’s like some instinctual thing with them. I bet you could get a job like this, and just as easy. All you need is some glamour.”
She picked up the bag of sparkling powder off the coffee table and held it out to me. I stared at it for a second, then I looked back at her. All of the things I’d loved about her were gone: the hard cut of her jaw, the luminescent white of her hair, the rich, deep green of her skin, and of course, those perfect diamond eyes. I imagined what I might look like if I took some glamour. Stitches gone and skin a healthy tan instead of ghastly white. Maybe I would look more refined, with a chiseled jaw and cheekbones. Like that big guy who played a werewolf on that show and always walked around without a shirt. Could I get a better job if I looked like that? Like a TV-star human? Would my life be better? Would humans like me then?
No. They wouldn’t. They’d like the glamour. Always and forever, with an almost mindless devotion. And I would always know it wasn’t real.
“Nah,” I said. “I’m fine with what I’ve got.”
“You’re kidding!” Her human eyes widened. “Think of what we could do if we were both making this much money. We could get a nice apartment somewhere. Go out to restaurants and things. Live real human lives.”
“This is a real life. This is how most humans live. You’re trying to be like a TV show.”
“Don’t you want more than this?”
“Of course. But I want to do it my way. Glamour just…I don’t know. It seems like cheating to me.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Well, some of us don’t really have any other option.”
“I know. It works for you. Just…”
“Just what?” she said. “You know what I think? You have a problem with me finally being able to get out and do my thing.”
“What? No way! I’m glad you got a job. I’m glad you’re out doing stuff. That’s why I went to Laurellen. So that you could do this!”
“Yeah, I know.” Then she just looked at me. I could usually read Liel pretty well, but the glamour threw me off. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. “Thanks.”
“I don’t need thanks. I’m just saying that I’m with you on this. It’s okay that we have different ways of doing things.”
“Of course it is.” But I felt like there was something else she wanted to say instead.
I ASSUMED THAT once she got used to her new job, we’d settle into a routine and start exploring the city again. And this time we could do it in the daytime with people around. And I thought, since we were both working in restaurants, that our schedules would match up. But she made friends with some of her human coworkers pretty quickly, and after a week or so she started going out with them to clubs after work until three or four in the morning. I fixed my schedule so we’d have the same days off, thinking we could do things then. But she’d be out so late partying on work nights that on her days off she didn’t want to do anything except sleep and watch TV.
One afternoon while I was washing the dishes, I saw her come out of the bedroom all tired and hungover looking. Her glamour had worn off and she looked sick. Her skin was more gray than green and her diamond eyes looked kind of milky. She flopped onto the couch and picked up the ziplock bag of glamour that sat on the coffee table. I noticed her hands were shaking a little as she opened it.
“Hey, maybe you should take a break from that stuff,” I said. “I don’t think even Laurellen uses it every day.”
She just grunted, grabbed a big pinch of glamour, and rubbed in into her eyes. She hissed through clenched teeth as she closed her eyes. Blood leaked out instead of tears.
“Really.” I turned off the faucet and walked over to the living room area. “Laurellen said it’s not healthy to use that much.”
She leaned back into the couch as the glamour took hold and her human shape returned. She turned to me and smiled her polished human smile.
“Thanks for the concern, Dad. I’ll be okay.” Then she pulled on her high-heeled boots, grabbed her purse, and headed for the door.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“Out. Don’t wait up.”
“I was hoping you and I could hang out.”
“Sure, we will sometime.”
“When?”
She rolled her blue human eyes. “I don’t know, Boy. Stop nagging me about it. You’re starting to make it feel like a chore.”
“Okay, sorry.”
She just shook her head and left.
That night, for the first time in a while, I logged on to my old hacker IRC channel.
surelee: he lives!
s1zzl3: who the hell is this guy?
b0y: lol, how you guys been?
surelee: parents don’t understand me, sister tortures me, same old. we seriously thought you and poxd must have died.
s1zzl3: or been arrested for letting that crazy super virus into the wild.
b0y: wait, have you seen it?
s1zzl3: just that little bit you sent me to test. that was all i needed. it took out half my rig before I got rid of it, thx a lot, you douche.
b0y: sorry. i told you to lock it down.
surelee: so you did release it?
b0y: i don’t know.
s1zzl3: how can you not know?<
br />
b0y: *shrug* I don’t really want to get into that. it was a huge, soul-crushing disappointment. so have you guys heard from poxd?
surelee: no he’s been MIA as long as you have. you mean you don’t know what happened to him, either?
b0y: we were roommates for a while, if you can believe that. but he split about two months ago with no word, no forwarding address.
s1zzl3: so i guess that Vi chick knows what she’s talking about after all.
surelee: she knew about that, anyway. I still think she’s sketch.
b0y: who’s Vi?
surelee: see? he doesn’t know her.
b0y: what are you guys talking about?
s1zzl3: some chick showed up on the channel a little while ago, fronting like you guys were super tight. she’s been filling us in on what you’ve been up to, but we thought she might be BS.
b0y: what did she say i’ve been up to?
surelee: that you were in a bad situation at home so you left, that you were crashing with poxd. that you’re working in a West Indian restaurant? something about you going to some gay club, which just cracks me up every time I think about it. last night she was talking about that girl you were always crushing on.
b0y: yeah, she moved in with me a while back.
s1zzl3: o, that’s not what she said about her.
b0y: what did she say?
s1zzl3: ummmmm………
surelee: i think her exact words were: “that vapid, traitorous bitch doesn’t deserve him. she needs to go.”
s1zzl3: congrats, @b0y. you’ve got a stalker.
11
It’s Alive
S1ZZL3 AND SURELEE told me I shouldn’t let the stalker thing freak me out. But she knew where I lived, who I lived with. She even knew random things like the night I went to Stonewall. This Vi chick had to be spying on me, which meant she lived in the city somewhere. Was she a neighbor? Maybe she was even the neighbor with the meth lab, which made her dangerous as well as creepy. The walls were thin enough that whoever lived next door could probably hear everything we said without trying real hard.
The part that scared me the most was the “she has to go” comment about Liel. Of course, if this human chick actually tried to attack Liel, she’d regret it. The bigger danger was that Liel would get in trouble for kicking the shit out of her. What would happen if the cops arrested her? Would they think she was some kind of illegal alien because she didn’t have a social or birth certificate? Then, what if they put her in jail and I couldn’t get her out before the glamour wore off? It only lasted about twenty-four hours. Less if you were really upset and your pulse was running high, and if Liel was in jail, it probably would be. And what would happen if the cops realized she wasn’t just an illegal alien but a troll? I pictured an NYPD raid on The Show, cops taking my parents away in handcuffs….