by Cyle James
“What are you?” he asked himself in a whisper as he strained his eyes to try to make out the creature’s features.
What Riley wasn’t expecting was a response.
As if the thing were standing directly behind him Riley could hear an indistinguishable whisper in his ears like something was trying to give him an answer. And it might have only been his imagination, but he could have sworn he also felt a breath on the back of his neck.
“What are you?” he asked again, loud enough that he felt uneasy drawing that much attention to himself.
And again his head was filled with a hushed voice that he couldn’t make out.
Riley straightened himself up and walked closer to the mirror with purpose, squinting his eyes in the sunlight that reflected back onto his face.
“What are you?” he asked aggressively with more baritone in his voice than he had planned.
This time however instead of the dim whisper from before, Riley got a faint growl in return followed by a loud, echoing bark of a dog.
Riley let out an inadvertent yell in shock, stepping back from the mirror and almost tripping over his feet in surprise.
“What the hell are you doing?” asked his wife from the bed, her eyes half shut and her hair draped over her face. Even from behind the bedhead it was easy to tell that she was annoyed that she had been woken up.
Riley turned to look at her and her cranky morning face.
To his aggravation when he turned back to the mirror he was greeted by the reflecting sunlight and nothing more.
“Fuck,” he said simply, which encapsulated the disappointment he felt in himself by looking away. Part of him expected that the creature would make itself scarce and yet and he allowed himself to become distracted anyway.
“I saw the fucking thing,” he put it bluntly, “The thing that you were talking about last night”.
Violet shot up from the bed like it was on fire, “No way! You’re messing with me, right? You didn’t actually see it”.
Riley shook his head and slapped his thighs awkwardly, “No, I saw it. It’s fucking real. There’s something in this mirror. And it talked to me”.
Violet’s eyes bugged out of her head, “No! What did it say?”
It was Riley’s turn to pause and contemplate as his wife had done the night before. What did it say? It didn’t really say anything.
“It, um...it whispered at me. And then barked,” he confessed without much conviction.
The irony of his wife laughing wasn’t lost on either of them as she questioned his answer, “Honey. I know I’m not an animal expert, but I’m pretty sure that the standing two-legged thing in the mirror isn’t going to be chasing the mailman down the street”.
“I’m serious,” he said, “It made animal sounds at me. Right in my ear, like I was wearing earphones or something”.
Violet stood back with a dumbfounded grin with a hand on her forehead, “I can’t believe it. I thought I was going insane last night”.
“Clearly if you’re going insane, so am I,” he stated as he continued to stare at the mirror as if the thing might step back into view.
“The question now is what are we going to do?” asked Violet.
“What do you mean?” he responded.
Violet sat back down on the edge of the bed and pointed her index finger towards the mirror, “If there is a thing in there...and that’s still a big if...then we probably shouldn’t be staying here, right? I mean, we’ve got some sort of supernatural shit going on, in the middle of the fucking woods. This is the point in the horror movie that the audience starts yelling at the screen for the dumb college kids to get out. I don’t know about you but I’ve already had my dumb college kid days”.
Riley chuckled anxiously, “So you want to run? What happened to your sense of adventure? This might not be anything to worry about. For all we know this could be some sort of trick. Like, a hidden camera show or something. We really don’t know anything about that old woman, what’s her name. This could all be for fun and games and we’re getting recorded for a television special. If nothing else, I think we may have gotten the biggest find in history. I don’t even know what it is...a living mirror...another world? Both ways we’ve got fame and fortune at our finger tips if we play our cards right”.
“If we play our cards right,” she started as she hung her head down, “maybe we’ll survive the latter of those two scenarios. We don’t know if this is something dangerous. I think that trying to exploit it is the last thing we should be doing”.
Riley bound forward with a bit more pep in his step then his wife was expecting, sitting on the bed beside her, “What do you want to do then, babe? We can leave, but where are we going to go? Are we going to sleep in the woods with the actual bears? Or are we going to stay here with something that’s very likely harmless and have that adventure that you wanted?”
Violet stopped talking and simply sat there looking at her partner.
Her husband caught her eyes glancing from the mirror and to the floor and back again. He could see the temptation in her eyes. Riley knew she was scared, but figured that she’d thank him in the end for pushing her.
She finally turned away from the mirror and looked him in the eyes, “I need your word that everything is going to be fine”.
Riley’s heart stopped for a moment. Of all of the things she could have said. Was he truly sure that it was safe? Or was his newly found desire for fame, fortune and his wife’s respect overriding his ability to evaluate the situation? It had literally been minutes since the possibility that his life might be turned upside down, he couldn’t possibly have the time to evaluate the situation fully. But he knew the wrong answer would cost him the opportunity to explore things further. And he knew that they could always leave if things got too hairy.
“It’s a mirror,” he said sternly, placing a hand on her knee, “Everything is going to be alright”.
Violet swallowed the last bit of saliva that she seemed to have left in her mouth, “Then we’ll stay”.
Riley broke out into a large smile, grabbing his wife on both sides of the head and pulling her into a kiss.
After a brief fit of romance Riley stood up and walked over to the mirror, “Now that we’ve agreed on that, let’s agree on what to do next. I mean, this has got to come down to science. So, let’s experiment. What happens if I touch it? What happens if we splash it with water or burn it with fire? What happens if we shatter the glass?”
Violet waved her hands in the air to signal her disagreement, “Let’s wait one minute there Bill Nye. How about we leave something like that to experts? If we’re going to be getting famous off this thing, I assume we’ll need to tell somebody. Why not let someone qualified do the testing? I think that we should find out more about it. Let’s track down the woman who rented us the place and ask her about it”.
He stood firmly in place as he contemplated.
Part of him wanted to start experimenting on it like a schoolboy with a magnifying glass on an ant hill, but the other part of him knew that his wife had a good point, as she often did.
“Let’s do it your way. We’ll head into town, go back to the diner and see if she’s there. If not we’ll ask around. If we can’t track her down we call in the news crews and hope that this isn’t another of Capone’s vaults. Deal?”
He put out his hand in front of him.
As cheesy as she found his arrangement, Violet stood up and went to shake his hand.
But before she could seal the deal Riley charged forward and tackled her back onto the bed in a heap of laugher.
#
It was a longer ride back down to the Red Wolf’s Choice than it was up.
On the way down they had millions of racing thoughts whizzing through their heads that seemed to make the trip that much longer. Well, what made it longer were the thoughts and the repeated Tom Waits that blasted through their speakers. One second they’d be excited about the prospect of the supernatural and the
next they’d be nervous. Neither one of them was even sure if they wanted the figure in the mirror to be real or not. What would it mean to the world if it was? What would happen to their society when there was a reveal of another realm other than their own? There were a lot of questions in play with answers that they might not have been able to grasp even if they had them.
Riley put the old beater in park in the front of the diner. The sky was a shade of light grey with clouds that seemed to drift in and out of existence. There was the slightest bit of rainfall attacking the windshield of their car, as if was the first time it was trying to patter down and didn’t want to put much effort into the assault. Through the windows of the restaurant the duo could see that the weather had amassed a small platoon inside. They rationalized that they all had to be visitors to the island as the born-and-raised folks from Vancouver surely were steadfast enough to survive a light drizzle.
Upon making their way into the diner they were met with a small chuckle from the waitress, “I see that my charming demeanour yesterday has brought you in for more?”
The smile on Helen’s face was a tad different than the previous day, almost genuine in nature. Riley supposed that she didn’t get a whole lot of people who treated her like a person instead of a smiling machine, and ironically that’s what made her smile the most.
“You say that like the food wasn’t delicious, too,” Violet jested with a slight touch on the arm that only women could get away with to one another without accusations of being creepy.
The little white haired woman craned her head to the side towards the kitchen and back to the couple, “Are you kidding me? I have seen grease traps with less oil in them than the salad here. But hey, there’s no accounting for taste. If this pleases your tongue I’m happy to serve it to you. Any place that you want to sit?”
Riley looked at his wife and cocked an eyebrow up as if to ask her the same question.
They hadn’t actually planned on eating when they got to the eatery. In fact they hadn’t bothered to find a way to eat since the night before when they last were in the diner. Food wasn’t exactly a top priority given their circumstances.
Violet answered for the both of them, “By the window would be great. I’d like to see if this pathetic water show actually gets better”.
Helen grinned again as she grabbed two menus and led the way over to another small booth almost identical to their last one.
Upon sitting down the couple got the chance to look around. Everyone seemed to be travellers as they had theorized. The patrons consisted of small families and couples, all carrying around bags and cameras. But it was quickly evident that the one person they were looking for didn’t seem to be there.
“Shit,” Riley bluntly put it as he opened the menu to the first page.
“She’s not here,” Violet stated obviously, double checking the restaurant to make sure they didn’t miss the old woman behind one of the plumper customers.
“Double shit,” Riley replied.
“What?” his wife asked.
He turned his menu around and pointed to something low on the page, “The best sounding thing on here is for kids only. I want the Little Wolf’s Brekkie”.
Violet pursed her lips and stared at her husband blankly, “You’re an idiot. You know that, right?”
He tried to stifle a smirk, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. This thing has a pancake, bacon and it’s covered in tiny marshmallows with warm peanut butter drizzled on top. This has to be the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard of”.
She made a face like she was about to throw up, most of which was amplified to make fun of her so-called man, “That’s disgusting. I can’t believe someone thought it was a good idea to combine those things”.
Finally he had to start laughing, “I don’t know why you’re hating on this. This all legitimately sounds amazing to me”.
Violet just shook her head and smiled.
Her father would have screamed at her for marrying a man who dipped chips into his ice cream let alone actively wanted to consume whatever it was you’d call that disastrous mash-up.
After a minute of Violet scanning the menu herself she finally broke the quiet, “How do you want to go about this?”
He looked up from the menu that he had been so enraptured with, “I figured we could order something off this plastic and paper thing and eat whatever comes out of the kitchen”.
Her head turned to the side, “Seriously”.
He huffed, “I’m just trying to lighten the mood. I know what you meant. If we want to find the old coot the waitress is as good a lead as any”.
Violet looked over to the woman with shifty eyes like she was a sleuth tracking a mob boss, “You ask her”.
Riley’s face was buried back in the menu, “Why me? She likes you more than she likes me. You ask her about the old woman”.
She huffed in agitation as she knew he had a point. Violet watched Helen walk around serving other customers their muck before heading back over to the couple’s table.
“So what can I get you lovely folks?” Helen asked with a smile that had diminished since its last appearance after having dealt with the other customers.
“Can I ask...?” Violet started before her husband interrupted with his order.
“Would it be possible if I got an adult version of the Little Wolf’s Brekkie?” he decided with a shitting eating beam across his face.
The waitress released a high pitched laugh that crinkled up her nose, “You’re as bad as my grandchild. If you really want to eat that stuff I can tell the cook to make two orders and throw them on the same plate”.
Riley just nodded like a kid confirming what he wanted for Christmas with Santa.
Helen turned her bright eyes back to Violet with a smile that conveyed sympathy for what she had to put up with, “And I hope you’d like something different?”
Violet pointed at something on the menu, “I’ll take this thing. And I’d like to ask you a question on the side”.
Helen wrote the order down on her little pad with a pen that seemed to have a small white ribbon dangling off the end, “Before you even have to ask I’ll tell you right now that the meat is real but it’s been sitting frozen in the cook’s fridge for like a year. So when the plate arrives and you wonder about its origins you already know the answer”.
Violet cringed as she second guessed her order of Canadian Bangers and Mash, “No. Um, I was going to ask about the woman we spoke to yesterday”.
Helen’s face lit up as she remembered, “Oh yes, you rented Poyam’s old place. I almost forgot all about that. How is the house?”
“It can definitely be described as a house. But that’s about the only good thing we can say about it. And that’s what we were looking to speak to her about,” Riley said.
“Buyers’ remorse?” the waitress asked.
He made a hand motion that suggested “so-so”.
“If I can answer your questions I will. What do you want to know?” Helen asked as she placed her pen in the crease of her ear and crossed her arms as if to brace for the hard hitting inquiry.
“Well,” Violet started, “Who actually is she? And where can we find her today?”
Riley piped up, “And is she a witch?”
Violet reached over and slapped her significant other on the arm.
Helen squinted downward at the couple trying to figure if they were taking her for a ride, “Poyam has been a mainstay on this island for decades. I vaguely recall her being here when I was a kid. But as far as I know she doesn’t actually live on this island anymore, I assume she comes over from the city. Why she still comes over, I’ve got no idea”.
Violet let out an involuntary groan, “I’m guessing that we’re not going to be finding her by chance then just loitering about down the street?”
Helen shook her head as she took the pen in her hand and started twirling it in her fingers, clinking it off her many rings, “Not unless you feel really lu
cky, she’s probably off of the island right now. Why do you ask? Is the place that uninhabitable that you can’t manage more than a day?”
Riley made another “so-so” hand signal.
“There’s...things about the house that we want to ask about. Such as its history. Who lived there previously? What happened there? Things like that,” Violet answered.
The waitress placed her pen back in her ear and started chewing on the end of her thumbnail as she thought.
“Excuse me? Can I please place an order?” screamed a man’s soft voice from the back of the diner, his accent clearly placing him somewhere in the southern states.
Helen turned with a snap and dropped her arms to her side with her hands in fists, “Can you please chill the fudge out? I’m busy. If you don’t want to wait for me then you can go and make your own damned food”.
There was a hushed silence in the Red Wolf after the old woman’s outburst.
Helen turned back to the couple with her now familiar smile, “Sorry about that”.
Riley’s eyes were popping out of his head, “It’s totally...fine”.
Helen took the pen once more out of her ear and started twirling it again, “If you want to know the history of anything on this island, you should probably make a visit to the Bowen Museum and Archive. There are a few people that work there that might be able to help you. Though I’ll warn you, the Squamish people pass down history through their oral traditions. So everything that isn’t firsthand experience is often...embellished. That doesn’t mean that it’s not true of course. But from those that I’ve spoken to, they have a way of dramatizing everything”.
“How do you mean?”
Helen continued, “I once went for dinner with a Squamish man. He was a real nice young fellow, a fisherman by family trade if I recall right. At the dinner his father spent half of the evening talking about how his wife was cooking up a fish that he had caught earlier in the day just for the occasion. It was a fish that he told took him an hour to reel into the shore, a fish that must have been five feet long and tried to bite off his hand when he went to remove the hook from its mouth. He joked that his son should have brought home a woman with more meat on her bones, ‘cause he didn’t believe I would be able to eat enough at dinner to make the effort of catching the fish worthwhile. By the time the wife cooked it up and brought it out this fish sounded like some mythical giant. It turned out that the damn fish was less than a foot long cooked. Point is, take things with a bit of caution when they tell you their tales”.