For a creative type, Liz could be organized better than anyone. In the painting room, her corner was carved out with a line of perfectly-scrubbed tile, colour-coordinated materials, and perfectly-trimmed brushes. Even the blank canvas and line of pencils on her easel were neat and every tip sharpened to the correct point. Next to her, the other artists seemed like complete slobs with globs of paint splattered on the floor and messes of brushes wallowing in murky bottles of painted water. Even Evan, the architect-turned-starving-artist, had pencil shavings around his easel and mismatched paint swatches littering his entire table.
I came in to make sure Tristan and Tyrion hadn’t left their phones in their aprons again and spotted Liz’s sketchbook open on her next piece. Normally, I managed to ignore my wife’s drawing books, but tonight as I walked by, I just caught a glimpse out of the corner of my eye. Then, I took a long, lingering look. Staring up at me with warm gray eyes was me, kinda. It was three of me, sorta. There was a central figure that had my eyes and short, curly hairstyle and that mole I hated on my chin. That one was wearing a nice plaid shirt with a t-shirt under it, like I did. To the left, sharing my left eye and adding a dash of deep blue to another eye, was a masculine figure. He had a short beard and hair that curved elegantly to the left, but was very short compared to what I had now. The mole was less prominent amidst the hair. He was wearing a suit and rainbow bow tie. Well, she’d written a note in about it being rainbow. On the right, sharing the other eye, was a woman. Her second eye was bright pink and her hair was long, pinned up, and curled under a rainbow headband. Again, the mole. She had a low-cut top, outrageous earrings, and a rainbow necklace. It was me, Danny, all of me. I wanted to hug Liz, but I wasn’t supposed to see this yet.
Groaning, I pried myself from the sketch and checked the twins’ pockets. When they were empty, other than a few shards of charcoal, I left without another look at the book. I needed to forget the drawing. As I turned the light off, a shivering outline remained behind one of the easels. I shut the door behind me and wandered down the hall, checking rooms to make sure all the lights were out. As I passed the writer’s room, I spotted the figure again; it was like electricity come to life and shifted soundlessly in the air.
When I finally reached the staircase at the end, I opened the electrical panel with my key and switched the power off to the whole floor, other than the kilns. No one had booked a night class or session, save the curing of some pots and mugs, so the lights didn’t need to be on. It wasn’t as though people didn’t just show up, but I always made a point to welcome people back if they needed an escape at odd hours; creatives were like that.
With the final task done, I turned to the boxy, concrete staircase. Seated on the fourth step with its head resting on its hands, was the electricity creature from before. Taking a deep breath, I walked right at the figure, who stood up, shivering and casting eerie lights around the stairs. I shut my eyes and walked through it, holding my breath. When I’d turned the corner, I opened my eyes and looked back. It was glaring with dark, void eyes. With a staticky shriek, it launched itself at me and I swung my keys through it. With a kind of fizzle, it disappeared and everything was calm and quiet.
Finally, I took the stairs up to the third, residential, floor, where Liz and I lived.
The whole building used to be a school that we’d converted into a kind of community haven for outcasts and creatives. The first floor was our very public area, the second was dedicated to mostly academic and creative pursuits, and the third and fourth were residences and living spaces.
On the bottom, we used what had been there when we took over. The large kitchen was in full-time use to serve meals and snacks at all times of the day, as well as hosted simple cooking classes, and facilitated prepared meal prep. At the far end, the enormous gym was utilized for subsidized sports, some larger meetings, and occasionally emergency shelter; we lived in interface wildfire country so we had been set up several times to provide temporary shelter to evacuees. There were many other meeting rooms for rent, a large bathroom and shower facility, and general living spaces that anyone could use. We had a few rooms kitted out with televisions and computers for entertainment, and even a fully-functioning drama room with a stage and seating for several hundred. Not many people used the drama room for productions, but we had hosted a couple of fundraisers. From dawn to dusk, it was constantly bustling and loud with volunteers, staff, residents, and community members utilizing everything for free or at very little cost. Plus, we had a large playground and several sports fields outside.
The second floor boasted the main entrance to the two-storey library, stocked mainly with donations from anywhere and everywhere. We had a pretty good selection and had nearly filled the entire thing. Other than having an issue with the automatic doors on the first floor, the library was fantastic; three engineers had come in stating we’d need to redo part of the structure if we wanted to fix the issue, so we just sent people up to the second floor if it was on the fritz. Every other room on that floor was dedicated to a different pursuit, with a few open to anything. Desks and computers and easels were set up where they were needed and sign-up sheets to reserve rooms were posted next to every door. On the inside of every room was a sign-in sheet so we could prove use to obtain our funding.
The residential floors had very strict rules against, well, a lot of things. For the most part, we rented to families with small children, but we were also open to marginalized groups and had a soft spot for LGBT youth. We were able to provide very cheap accommodations with childcare built-in for families, living spaces with decent entertainment, skills training, and food all under one roof. The biggest catch was that the bathrooms were shared, only a few to a floor, and they were, well, school bathrooms. We’d installed showers in every one and rooms were assigned to specific ones on the third and fourth floors; the other floors were fair game so often people would venture down to use the facilities at night. And, yes, the residential rooms had locks and separate keys.
I trudged up the steps and stood in front of our door for a few minutes before going inside. Because of the way the classrooms had been converted, most of them were one-room so there wasn’t any way to sneak in. Liz was sitting on the couch reading from an enormous book; her glasses were at the end of her nose and she was squinting.
Smiling at me when I shut the door, she asked, “Find the phones?”
I laughed forcefully and replied, “No, only charcoal.” Holding up the evidence, I wiped my hands on my pants before sighing. “They want me to go tell them, right? And I can’t, you know, call them,” I grumbled as I grabbed some water from our cooler.
“Pretty much,” she murmured, clearly having gone back to her book.
Glancing down at my watch, I leaned on the other couch and grumbled about it being too late. I took a sip of water and my head went fuzzy. It was pressure and sound swirling and the world started to turn.
When I woke up, I was lying behind the couch with a pillow under my head, the taste of metal on my tongue, and Liz was hurriedly speaking to someone on her phone. I tried to lift my head but couldn’t. Instead, I waved and she came over, tears on her cheeks. “Oh, yes, they just woke up. Danny? Danny, can you hear me?” she murmured, kneeling at my side.
Nodding, I whispered, “I’m fine. Tell them I’m fine.” My head was killing me and I could see spiders dripping from webs across the ceiling. Shutting my eyes, and groaned, “Just let me sleep.”
There was a short pause as someone spoke on the phone before Liz was gently shaking my shoulder, “Hey, Danny, they said not to let you sleep. Sorry. I just, they’re on their way. I have to get someone to open the door. Can I call you back? Okay. I’ll just use their phone. Hang on.” Again, a pause as I blinked up at the furry bodies and spindly legs. “Yeah, Danny passed out and I need you to come get my key to let the paramedics in. I can’t leave them,” she murmured into my phone. Must have been Denise down the way; she was very trustworthy and would be up this late already. Liz looked down as she put my phone back and whispered, “I’m just going to the door. Don’t pass out on me.”
I felt like forever waiting for the ambulance, and when they arrived, Liz was frantic. She talked about the first time I passed out, on a train heading out to check this place out, and every one, in order, since. If they hadn’t told her to just skip to tonight, we would have been there all night.
The paramedic, a very nice young man with a short beard and warm eyes, had me sit up after he’d assessed me a little. Once I was leaning against the couch back, I felt a little better. The nausea subsided a bit. Behind him, the door opened and a lovely, warm light burst through light the sun times a million. Seeing that I was looking over his shoulder, the man frowned a little and asked, “What are you looking at?”
Shifting my gaze back, I sighed, “The light coming in the door is lovely.” I felt a little stoned, but maybe it was just some kind of symptom hangover.
“Do you have a history of hallucinations?” he asked pointedly.
I stared for a moment before replying, “How did you know that?” Behind me, Liz was making some odd sounds; she’d forgotten to let them know about that and she was kicking herself.
Patting my arm, he stood up and went to Liz. “We’re going to take Danny to the hospital,” he announced to her quietly.
I shook my head and struggled to my feet, leaning on the couch. “No, no, we’re not going to the hospital. I already know it’s not good,” I stammered with my head spinning. When Liz helped steady me, I reiterated a chat we’d had a hundred times, “I don’t want to know what it is, babe. I just wanna keep going until, you know. You knew that.” This wasn’t the first time she’d called an ambulance, knowing I didn’t want it, because I’d passed out and couldn’t stop her.
When I woke up in the morning, sunlight was streaming on the fluffy couch in three-twenty. Groaning as I sat up, I rubbed my eyes and tried to stretch my back out. As comfortable as the couch was to sit on, it sucked as a bed. I crossed to the door and stared at a piece of cardstock that had been slipped under the door. It was a painting of our logo and the front of the school with our new sign on it. I remembered the night Liz did it.
We’d taken a walkthrough of the property and all she had to draw on was a stack of blank postcards. For an hour we’d each taken turns talking about how crazy it was to suggest we open up a community centre in the middle of three towns in this enormous compound. It had been crazy. Actually, it still was. She’d spent two minutes on the drawing and had brought her paints out as we discussed potential plans. When she was done and the paint was dry, I took the postcard and wrote out our mission statement on the back. To help. That was pretty much it. Be what people needed. And, really, we were. I turned it over to my scratchy handwriting and looked in the corner of it, where you were supposed to write the address it was going to. I’d drawn a little monster in pen. It was what I was seeing that night, in the school. I was always drawing little things like that to remind myself that the hallucinations were coming from my imagination.
The real reason Liz brought it to me was that I’d told her about the hallucinations and the headaches and everything that day. I talked about knowing there was something wrong, but that I just wanted to live my life. She’d taken a long walk and I had suspected she wouldn’t be back. Finally, she came back in and proposed both marriage and that we buy the school. That day, we decided to just live our lives.
I headed back to our room and found it empty. Not surprising. Downstairs, I could hear the community centre in full swing so I headed into the painting room. Also empty. Sighing, I went to the librarian’s office and stood in front of the red door. I took a deep breath and knocked.
For a minute, I was just standing in front of an empty room as a small gaggle of students whispered behind secondhand Shakespeare books at a table nearby. When it opened and Liz was standing in front of me, I pulled her into a tight hug.
Tears prickled my eyes as I whispered, “I’ll go to the doctor. We’re going to be at this school until we’re old and wrinkly.” She pulled back and smiled through her own tears. I took her hand and we went in to call the hospital.
It was a rainy day when Liz dropped me at the train station on the way to the hospital. She’d been gutted that she had a necessary funding-related inter-city council meeting on my first day of treatment, but I assured her there would be a lot more to come. As we stood in the downpour, I finally admitted, “Oh, I saw your sketchbook. I think you really captured me.” I just wanted to tell her that in case something happened. I knew nothing was going to happen, but the world was a crazy place.
“Guess I need a new birthday present, then,” she mused, squeezing my hand as I stepped up into the train. Smiling, she waved and shouted, “Love you!” over the PA crackling about last call out of town.
Pretty Twisted Mirrors 