Quicksilver

The mirror showed a reflection that wasn't my own. Missing hair, missing teeth, gums bleeding, chiaroscuro eyes. Red flakes of scalp peeling up from the radiation. Clothes getting grayer from the punishing washes. Soon I’d be forced to take off these clothes and put on the special robe, the one that never covered enough of me...the one that left me only shame and humiliation to stay warm by.

I reached out to that reflection and touched it with a fingertip. I’d hoped so many times that the reflection’s finger wouldn’t reach out to touch mine, but of course it always did. I wished for the hundredth time that, if it had to touch mine, the fingertip would at least be warm. But it wasn’t. Just the same cold glass, the edges of which were no sharper than what I’d face again today.

The pain never really stopped. Oh they’d promise, this is the last time, you’ll be done, you can get out of here, but of course the promises never came true.

Especially the people who invoked their god—those used to make me the angriest. They said their god planned these things and gave them a purpose. I used to tell them that I didn’t know their god, and even if I did I wouldn’t like him. Now I’m too tired even to argue that much.

The only thing that has kept me quiet through all this disaster is the knowledge that if I fought these people too hard, they could...they would...treat me worse. I couldn’t escape them, after all.

I took off my clothes. I looked down. My body wasn’t recognizable as my own anymore. This one wasn’t pink and healthy and strong. This was a bent white stick with bruises as thick as lichen, with needle marks in every visible vein in every stage of healing. I put on the robe. The cloth was shockingly cold. You’d think after this long I’d have gotten used to it, but I never had. I gathered my things to my chest as if I could protect myself with the pathetic bundle.

When I tottered out of the bathroom, the woman greeted me cheerily. “Here we are!” she said. “I’m sure you know the drill by now—you’re an old hand at this, right? Your things can go here.” She gestured to the open hole in one of the banks of lockers. She watched me stumble forward. “Do you need help? I can get you a chair.”

I shook my head and tried not to fall over as I put the bundle into the hole. I managed to get the door closed, but the little lock was beyond me. It was broken from all its previous users—the ones who’d already left, one way or the other. All the fumbling, deadened fingers… The lock fell out of my hand, bounced, and skittered across the cold tile.

She retrieved it with a smirk. “Oh these things can be just so difficult,” she said, her tone halfway between condescension and impatience. She threaded the lock neatly through the hasp and shoved it shut. She took the key and pocketed it smoothly. I wasn’t allowed even to carry that much with me anymore—not even that much agency or independence. She made it look easy.

I knew how strong her hands were. Those same hands had made me cry often enough. The needles. The instruments. The tubing. It’s impossible to feel strong with tubes running in and out of my body and needles arrayed on a tray nearby, just waiting for those strong hands to use them. On me.

She saw me looking at her. She laughed. “Why you scamp, Mr. Marsh!” she cried. “You’re too mature to be staring at a lady’s body!” Her eyes sparkled with a mean glint. She continued to laugh. “You get fresh with me, I’ll have Manuel come rough you up!”

A warmth I almost didn’t remember: anger, spreading slowly through me, like red ink in very cold water. I had never been one of those men. Not ever. I may not have recognized the face in the mirror, but I knew that. “I...need the bathroom.”

She didn’t quite roll her eyes. “Fine then, hurry up! We’ve got a schedule to keep, Mr. Marsh!”

I didn’t quite remember getting back into the bathroom or closing the door. But I remembered looking down at the knuckles of my right hand. They burned like fire. They were red. I looked up and saw that the mirror was broken, red-edged. A single piece bigger than my hand hung from its corner, still caught in the glue that held it to the wall. The piece wavered a little in midair, as if beckoning.

The woman outside was one of the god-women. I wondered if she would talk about him when I came out of the bathroom holding that shard.