"The Gorge Road" Chapter 9

 

9. Weird Sisters

The esthetician’s name was Kimberly, and she looked like she might burst into tears.

“Please,” she begged the spa receptionist. “You can’t charge her for that wax. That was, like, my worst work ever.”

“It’s okay, really,” I assured them both. I leaned in so Sarah, who was getting dressed in the next room, wouldn’t hear. “Honestly? I’m here to pacify my friend in there. I told her I’d come as her guest, so she can use her coupon and get her wax half-off.”

“Half price,” the receptionist specified. “In here, the phrase ‘half-off’ has a different meaning. And yeah, unfortunately, the computer system won’t let me use that Groupon if you don’t pay full-price for your service first.”

“Oh no, please don’t.” Kimberly hissed at the receptionist through clenched teeth. “This is exactly how we get bad reviews online and lose business. You wanna make jokes about half-off? That’s basically all I could manage before the appointment time ran out. Or before I started tearing skin off.”

 “It wasn’t your fault,” I said, trying to soothe her. “I’m sure this kind of thing happens.”

“I mean, I’ve never heard of it happening,” quipped the receptionist. I handed her my credit card to get her to shut up. 

“Please charge it for the full cost,” I instructed. “Plus a 30% tip for Kimberly.” I could afford it, with my paychecks coming in from the DiAnnons.

The receptionist snatched the card from my hand and set to work. Kimberly covered her eyes and groaned. She had truly done her best, but I’d known something was off after she’d waxed the same strip of skin four times. She had looked over at me with a pleading look in her eyes.

“I’m sorry, Ms. Ross… I don’t know what’s going on,” she’d whimpered. “The hair is coming up, but only in little clumps. If I use any more wax, or any more force, the paper strips will rip. And I’m afraid your skin will tear. And I’m sure you’re in enough pain already.”

“Not really,” I said, almost as embarrassed as she was. “Sure, it stings, but I expected that. Am I just… unusually hairy?”

“No, not at all!” She’d insisted. “It’s just really coarse. And dense.”

“That’s a nice way of saying I’m really hairy,” I’d laughed, as I propped myself up onto my elbows. “Please don’t worry about it. It’s not you. I’ve noticed that my razors get dull and clogged up really fast. Let me put my pants on, and I’ll just meet you out front to pay.”

“Oh God, no. I won’t let them charge you for this. At least, let me just grab some tweezers and take care of the ingrowns?”

“You can see those?”

“Well, this helps,” she said, holding up a headlamp apparatus that reminded me of something a dentist would wear. I shrugged and laid back down on the table.

“Again, I’m sorry if this hurts,” Kimberly said. She put on the headset, flicked on the little blue light, and set to work. I could feel the cool, sterilized steel of the tweezers against my skin, contrasting with the tiny burst of heat as a hair was yanked free, root and all – a surprisingly satisfying feeling.

“Like when you manage to pull up a weed, with all of its roots still attached,” I explained to Sarah later, once she’d successfully redeemed her Groupon and we were walking back to her car. “It feels so much more productive than when you just break it off at the stem. This way, it takes much longer to grow back.”

“I know that,” grumbled Sarah. “I just don’t see how anyone actually enjoys the feeling. I’m not paying full price for that, ever. And since when are you into gardening?”

“I’m really not, I just help MJ weed her herb garden sometimes. She’s got a little plot behind the store.”

“Is this the crazy snake-oil lady you’re always hanging out with in the back of the organic market?” 

“Her name is Marie-Jean,” I said, walking around to the passenger side of Sarah’s car. “She sells jewelry and art and bath-and-body type stuff. And maybe some herbal teas and new-age books, but she’s not a snake-oil peddler. You told me you liked that shampoo I bought for you, right? She made it.”

“It’s okay. I never said I liked it as much as my original stuff. Which you used up.” Sarah unlocked the vehicle and threw her bag in the back.

“I did my best to replace it, okay?” I sighed, and climbed into the passenger seat. “So, what do you want to do next?”

“I don’t know,” Sarah pouted as she plopped in behind the wheel. “I don’t know what there is to do in this stupid town. I go to work and then I go home and watch TV and grade papers. You’re the one who’s always out running around.”

“Well, why don’t we go to MJ’s shop so you can see it for yourself?”

“It’s, like, trinkets and art and weird books? I mean, do we have to?” she whined. “You know I’m not really into that kind of stuff.”

“Okay. How about we go to the Highlander for an Irish coffee?”

“I don’t want to go drinking with you at 4 p.m. on a Tuesday. And not at that dark, rundown hole in the wall.”

“Well, what if we went to the Goodwill store and went shopping for Halloween costumes?”

“Deon and I don’t really do Halloween. And, like, homeless people shop at the Goodwill.” She pulled a face.

“Whatever,” I replied, putting on my seatbelt. “But unless you have any better ideas, then you can just drop me off at MJ’s, and I’ll see you when I see you.”

“Ugh. Fine,” Sarah grunted, starting the engine and pulling onto Main Street. “I thought you and I were actually going to spend some time together today.”

“I’m sorry,” I drawled, not attempting to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. “But I really didn’t think that ‘Girls Day’ meant sitting in the car with our thumbs in our asses, looking at each other, going ‘What d’you wanna do?’ ‘I dunno, what do you wanna do?’ ‘Well, let’s do this’ ‘No, that’s stupid.’ But we should totally do this more often! You’re just so positive, open-minded and fun to be around.”

Sarah said nothing; simply turned the corner toward the organic store, parked, and waited for me to get out.

“I take it you’ll walk home?” she asked sullenly.

“Yes, I will, thank you,” I chirped. “I could use the exercise. And the solitude.”

I shut the car door firmly and marched into the store without a backward glance. 

So much for “making it up” to her.

I went to the spa with her like she wanted. I suggested other things to do. How else was I supposed to handle it? 

MJ was waiting on some other customers when I came through the beaded curtain. I paged through a book on Druid theology while I waited for the shop to empty out. Eventually she made her way over to me.

“What’s up, hon? You walked in here like a bat out of hell.”

“Yeah, well, my roommate will probably tell you that I am. But I had good enough reason to ditch her, as far as I’m concerned.”

“What happened? She didn’t like my shampoo, did she?”

“She does, but she won’t let it go that I used up the favorite stuff she had before. And this past weekend, she tried to throw a dinner party and I missed it because she didn’t tell me about it until the last minute. It’s all stupid, trivial stuff compared to what I’ve been dealing with lately, but it’s like everything I do puts her on edge.”

That’s exactly what Daniel said about Richard on Saturday. His voice is in your head even when you don’t realize it.

MJ reached out and put a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “But the shampoo’s working out alright for you, I hope? Nice and minty and relaxing?”

“Yes,” I gushed, grateful for the distracting thought. “It’s all I use now.”

“Well, I feel like the results are noticeable,” she said, reaching up to gently examine my hair. “But I’m biased.”

“On the subject of hair, I was wondering: Do you have any beard oil? Like, stuff that’ll really soften up coarse hair, but won’t irritate sensitive skin?”

Her eyebrows shot up over the top of her eyeglasses. “We live outside Portland, sweetheart. Of course I have beard oil. Why? Are you early-Christmas shopping for Richard DiAnnon?”

“Um, no. Personal use.”

 

****

In the dream, I was reliving a memory of rough-housing with my two-year-old brother.

I was five or six, and had been sitting on the floor, painting with watercolors. Determined to commandeer my attention, Robbie had tried to crawl up behind me, and right over everything. I’d stuck an arm out and pushed him away, back behind me. He thought this was great fun, and would spring back with a giggle, scrambling that much faster into my reappearing arm.

At first it was funny, and then I got tired of it. I wanted him to leave me alone so I could finish my picture. I told him to stop, and he just giggled more madly.

Finally, I just kept an outstretched arm latched onto his jumper continuously, to hold him away. I kept trying to paint with the other hand, pretending to ignore him. This, of course, was maddening to him. He squirmed and kicked, trying to escape my grip, which I expected.

What I didn’t expect was for him to sink his teeth into my arm.

I opened my mouth to yell, and then realized that it didn’t actually hurt me. The little teeth weren’t large or sharp enough to do anything more than make dents in my skin. It felt like getting tickled and scratching an itch at the same time.

If I yell, he’ll just think it’s funny. Boys are like that.

So there I sat, not able to paint well but determined to ignore him, while he kicked and gnawed on different parts of my arm, trying to elicit a reaction. 

This was the sight that greeted my mother as she walked into the nursery.

“Robert! Quit! Alexandra – how many times have I told you to be careful with your baby brother??”

She scooped up Robbie, plopped him in a playpen, and seized my pockmarked arm.

“Why did you let him do this to you?” she demanded.

“It doesn’t hurt,” I said simply. 

“Why were you holding onto him like that?”

“He was trying to ruin my picture.” 

“Boys will be boys, Alexandra. You need to be patient with him.”

“He was going to knock over the water and the paint and make a mess, and then you still would’ve been mad. At me.”

“If you can’t play nice with your brother and share, then go to your room.”

“But I want to finish my picture.”

“I said, go to your room!”

Defeated, I had done as she said. But the dream was different….

As I walked toward the nursery door, the room darkened, as if heavy clouds had rapidly eclipsed the sun outside. I heard an ominous thud behind me, followed by a soft rattling noise that made my innards feel like lead. I froze, afraid to turn around. I recognized the rattling. 

It’s like someone shaking a nearly-empty box of Tic Tacs.

No. It’s the sound of her opening a prescription bottle.

The rattling sound got louder, as if commanding me to turn and look. It grew louder still, until it sounded like an earthquake was rattling a warehouse full of pills in my head. I turned around, if only to make it stop.

The room had expanded into cavernous, nightmarish proportions; in the center, my mother lay dead on a mountain of empty pharmacy bottles. The neon, toxic-orange color flooded my vision. I tried to run to her, but her body sank into the pile of plastic. Then I heard her voice.

“Alexandra….. Alexandra…”

I whirled around and saw Robbie still in the playpen. He gave me a snaggle-toothed grin as my mother’s voice came out of his mouth:

“The Lord sees you, Alexandra. He sees when you make your dirty little pictures.”

Robbie held up a copy of a life drawing I’d done in college, from the first day that a male model had posed nude for my class. I’d come home for break, excited to show off my portfolio, only to have most of my work met with indifference, if not outright disdain.

“You’re wasting your time. You’ll never make any real money doing this.”

Robbie held up another piece of paper. This time, it was Daniel’s sketch of me, except I was naked, facing him, and posing provocatively: legs up and open on the garden bench, eyes burning, lips parted in a feral snarl.

“… acting like a freak…. Piece of trash…” Robbie started to cry; the words he was being forced to say upset him. 

“Wex!  Wex….” He cried out for me in his own voice, reaching out over the top of the playpen bars. I tried to move toward him, but my legs wouldn’t work. I looked down. The pile of plastic bottles had melted into an orange slime that swirled around me in a deepening cesspool, and was creeping up my shins. As it oozed past my knees and neared my groin, it turned from orange to fluorescent green.

Suddenly, tendrils of the goop shot up from the pool, and wrapped around my arms and neck.

It’s alive. Christ, the shit is alive.

“No!” I screamed. “No, you already have Mom, you’re not taking me!”

“Not same stuff. Not same… not same…” came Robbie’s eerie voice. Twisting against the evil liquid vines, I turned back toward him. The slime had oozed into his playpen.

He was eating it.

“Robbie, NO! STOP!”

“Not same… not same…” he repeated, between picking up handfuls of the stuff and putting it into his mouth. “Wanna change. Not same.”

“Robbie, stop! STOP!”

 

***

 

STOP read the new sign. CARS ENTERING FROM PRIVATE DRIVE.

I smiled, even though the sign had triggered a flashback to a nightmare from earlier in the week.

He did it. Daniel actually convinced his parents to let him have friends over.

In preparation for more visitors, the DiAnnons must have put out signage to accommodate for increased traffic near the entrance to the estate.

Let’s hope your lesson actually holds their attention.

I mentally reviewed my talking points as I turned off the Gorge road, and into the dark forest. Evening was falling faster and faster this time of year, and the shadows crept in quicker. I flicked on my ruined headlights; a couple of the bulbs still worked.

A figure darted in front of the car.

I jammed on the brake and whirled around looking for a deer, though I could’ve sworn the creature was bipedal. And very thin.

Calm down. You just can’t see worth a shit because your lights are busted. And you’re still jumpy after the run-in at the Highlander. 

Movement caught my eye again, this time on the left side of the car. To my pleasant surprise, it was just a fox crouched on the side of the road. Her tail twitched.

Dusk. Perfect time for her to be moving around.

“You’re lucky I didn’t hit you, pretty lady,” I muttered. She blinked slowly, then trotted off.

I cautiously took my foot off the brake and continued up the driveway without incident.

The house grinned down at me with gleeful, glowing eyes. Light poured out of nearly every window, beckoning the visitors who had already arrived; two cars were already parked in the circle drive. Hurried on by the idea of people waiting for me, I parked, scooped up the cardboard box that held my supplies, and made for the front door.

Before I could reach it, the door flew open on its own.

 I jumped, and dropped the box in the dirt. Several of its contents flew out, but I hardly noticed: A man in a sleek black tuxedo and a Phantom of the Opera mask had emerged out from behind the door. He came down the steps to help me, his black cape flowing behind him.

“Forgive me, ma cher mademoiselle,” he said softly, in Daniel’s voice. “I’ve startled you. Here, allow me to assist.”

“Daniel? Is that you?” I managed to choke out a laugh, while collecting a pair of scissors and a bottle of paint off the gravel. 

He squatted in front of me, handed me a stray paintbrush, and lifted the mask with the other hand.

“Bonsoir, mon ami,” he winked. “Happy Halloween. Told you you’d be impressed by me in black.”

I laughed again. “I can’t decide if you look dashing or ridiculous. Don’t tell me everyone else came in costume.”

“Come and see for yourself,” he grinned.

***

The dining/ballroom was every bit as grand as I had imagined when I first glimpsed it through the stone archway. Rich wood floors inlaid with green marble accents reflected soft and flickering golden light from yet more candelabra-like iron chandeliers. A Regency-style ballroom did not fit in with Tudor or Gothic architecture, but since when did that matter in the DiAnnon house?

 

 At least the ceiling fixtures are consistent.

 

“What keeps you from creating?” I asked the assemblage, gathered at the long mahogany dining table. “Everyone has the ability to be creative in their own way, so what’s stopping you?”

The Phantom, a Creature from the Black Lagoon, a shamanic priestess, and a mad scientist all looked back at me placidly. 

“When I was younger,” I offered.  “I used to think it was my brother, or my parents. But what about you folks?”

“I just don’t have the time,” shrugged the mad scientist, a young woman named Lisa whom I’d learned had come down from Seattle. She adjusted the steampunk goggles perched up on her forehead. “I’m just too busy with school. I’m lucky I got away to even come to this.”

“So you feel like, if you spend time and energy making the things you want to make, your schoolwork would suffer?”

“Exactly,” she said.

“That’s understandable,” I nodded. “That’s a very valid fear. Ethan, what about you?” I turned to the Creature. “I know you said you were working at the fire station in Hood River?”

“Yeah. I had to do, like, a ton of super-intense certification training to get promoted to full-time. Like, if I got back into tagging, even legally, I feel like it would look bad. I don’t wanna lose my job.”

“You were into graffiti art?”

“Dude, you didn’t tell her about that?” Ethan raised a scaly, green-painted eyebrow at Phantom-Daniel.

Daniel shook his head. “That was the past, man.”

Ethan shrugged, and turned back to me. “I got arrested when I was seventeen for vandalism. I was tagging a lot of stuff that I didn’t think people actually cared about, but I got careless about it. I always thought it’d be cool to do stuff like Banksy, the English dude? But I don’t think the fire chief would agree.”

“You never know,” spoke up the priestess. She’d shook my hand earlier, but had yet to mention her name, or take off the feathered deer-skull headpiece that partially covered her face. 

“Sometimes there are opportunities to use your creativity at work,” she continued. “That’s what I try to tell myself when I’m mixing cocktails. I just wish people would actually sit for a while and enjoy them – the different notes, the garnishes and stuff– instead of just walking off and chugging them mindlessly and while they pull levers on slot machines.”

“I used to be a cocktail waitress,” I nodded at her. “For a time, at least. I know what you mean.” I turned back to the rest of the group.

“Here’s what I’m getting at: Fear is what keeps us from creating. Fear of people’s judgement, fear of our work not being liked or accepted or appreciated. We fear that our work won’t be seen for what it really is; or for how we meant it to be. Then we wonder if we will have sacrificed our time and energy and money for nothing.”

I reached into the box and seized a collection of pop-art stencils. I handed them to Ethan, along with a case of acrylic paints and some small roller brushes. 

“Halloween is about confronting our fears, and making them fun, right?” I continued.  “So, just for tonight, think about something that scares you, or used to scare you. Can you turn your fears into inspiration for something that amuses or entertains you?”

I handed Lisa a pile of fabric scraps, some tape, and a pack of colored pencils

“I’m giving you guys permission to create this just for yourself, without worrying whether or not other people will like it. I have some suggestions to get you started, but honestly: You can completely ignore it and do whatever you want. You’re free to use any of the supplies that I brought.”

I moved further down the table and upended the box. Paint brushes, pencils, stamps, ink pads, construction paper and more all cascaded out into a treasure pile; a collection accumulated over years of study and efforts at my own creations. 

It felt good to unearth it all; to give others the chance to enjoy working with things that I had long kept squirreled away. Before getting hired by the DiAnnons, I had almost given up hope that they would ever be valued or useful. I fished out two pieces of heavy poster board, and handed them to Ethan and Lisa. Everyone was looking down the table at me as if I were a hired party clown.

“Ethan – I can’t give you spray paint to work with indoors, but these stencils will give you more control. And if you mix-and-match different objects, you can achieve something similar to that style that Banksy was really known for.”

Ethan plucked a stencil out of the pack and held it up to the light.

“Yeah, there’s a phone booth on this one. I see what you mean. Okay, what the hell.”

I turned to Lisa.  “I have a hunch you made your costume yourself. Your goggles and the trim on the lab coat – you don’t exactly see that level of detail from costume store stuff.”

She nodded, then smirked at herself. “I used to design dresses for my dolls when I was a kid – just, like, obsessively. Pages of them. Has nothing to do with my real, adult life though.”

“What if you just took tonight to sit and design whatever costumes you want?” I suggested. “Imagine you’re working for a design house, or a big theater company with an unlimited budget, and you have all those fabric rolls –” I motioned to the scraps “-- and more, at your disposal.”

 Expressing uncertainty, but also a willingness to play along, the Creature and the mad scientist went to work, shuffling through their supplies, and through the pile I’d created on the table. The priestess, however, stood with her arms crossed.

 “I feel like you’re the Wizard of Oz,” she cracked. “Pulling stuff out of your magic bag – or, in this case, magic box –”

Ethan snickered.

“ – for all of us. Except I’m the Dorothy of the group. There’s nothing in there for me, in terms of my preferred art form.”

“We’ll see about that,” I said, giving her a reassuring smile. “Daniel, would you join me in the other room for a second? For now, your project is to help me.”

Ethan looked up from the paint tubes he was sorting through, and let out a wolf-whistle. Daniel elbowed him.

“Yeah, sure,” Daniel answered me.

I picked up the now-empty box and walked toward the kitchen, by way of an old butler’s door at the end of the dining room; Daniel followed.

“Be honest with me,” I said, once we were alone in the darkened kitchen. “If everyone here is of legal age, would your parents care if we hunted up some alcohol for your spooky voodoo friend to serve? Not a lot, mind you. I’m not trying to be Cool Mom throwing a rager.”

“I’m pretty sure she’s supposed to be a Native American sachem, which is way different than voodoo –”

“You know what I mean.”

“ – and everybody here is at least twenty-one – you are not old enough to be the Mom of the group –”

I punched his good arm lightly. “Stop flattering me and just answer the question.”

“Okay, okay -- yeah. There’s, like, an unofficial liquor cabinet in the library with supplies for a dry bar. Mom and Dad don’t care if I use it, so long as I’m not an idiot about it. I can go raid that, and you can see what’s in here.”

“You’re sure? Because I’m going to make an inventory of what we use, and tell your parents about this no matter what. Just to be transparent.”

“I swear to you, they will not care,” Daniel said, walking toward the main door. “Divide and conquer, okay? I’ll meet you back here with the spoils in five.” With a flourish of his cape, he was gone.

I breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn’t noticed his sketchpad on the window seat, untouched since I had surreptitiously swapped it out for mine upon arrival.

A quick search of the kitchen pantry turned up a decent selection of things for the priestess to experiment with. After a moment, I started to catch bits of the conversation happening in the dining room in my and Daniel’s absence. I tried not to eavesdrop, but my curiosity about what they thought of my silly little craft party overruled. I walked back over to the servant’s door, and leaned an ear in close. 

“-- wish Lucas could’ve come,” I heard Ethan mutter. “Wonder if he’ll make it for Name Day.”

“You didn’t hear?” came Lisa’s hushed response. “He got the gift. It’d make him sick to be within 50 yards of this house.” 

“Which reminds me,” the priestess chimed in. “Ethan, are you sure I can’t give you a lift home after this? It’s dangerous to be running around in these woods.”

“Thanks, but I’m good. You two are being pussies. Sorry, my bad -- scaredy-cats. That’s what I meant to say.”

The priestess snorted. “Lisa has more balls than either of us. You told me you were staying the night, right Leese? At Angela’s invitation?”

“I knew it,” Ethan proclaimed. “I always knew they’d try to set you two up.”

“Then you’ve always been wrong,” murmured Lisa. “It has nothing to do with me or Daniel. My grandad and the DiAnnons go way back. They feel obligated to put me up; that’s all there is to it. And I haven’t decided if I’m going to stay or not. It’s not like I’m gonna sleep well in here anyway. I’d be better off going to my aunt and uncle’s place in Corbett.”

If most of them live around here, why would they be freaked out by the woods near the house? And if Denise has no problem sleeping here, why would anyone else?

 

In the dark behind me, someone let out a sigh. It wasn’t Daniel.