Mirage(5)

I look in the mirror every day, but it’s different when someone’s with you. I look now to see what Dom sees. It’s like meeting me for the first time. My reflection watches back. Stops me cold. I look different to myself. Slightly off. A shiver passes over my skin, raising the fine hairs on my arms. I stare hard into my own eyes. They look strange, intense, as if they are studying me—?as if this reflection has been here in this motor home all along, waiting for me to look?—?and I’m unsettled enough to close my eyes.

Dom kisses my neck, and I shut the eerie image out, concentrating on the sensation of his lips soft against my skin, my earlobe. He nips my shoulder. “Don’t close your eyes, Ry. Watch.”

His hands grasp my hips?—?a possessive move that gives me chills?—?and then slide down the outside of my thighs. He brings them up again slowly, and we watch together as he runs them over my breasts, his fingers peeling my T-shirt up to expose my stomach. I love the contrast in browns when his olive Mexican hand slides over my darker island skin.

My breath comes faster as he undoes the button of my shorts. I look down at his tapered fingers brushing along the waistband, but he gently raises my chin back to our image. He inches my zipper down and slides his hand lower. I whisper, “Yes,” because I want his hand in my pants more than anything at that moment.

I reach my arm back, seize his black hair, and tug. Dom growls softly and stares hard into my eyes in the mirror. He’s right about this game. There’s something about watching ourselves that heightens the experience. We are witnesses to our own beautiful, raging lives. I’m loving watching us until I catch my eyes again in the mirror, and a chilling thought hits me like a cold wind:

These eyes aren’t mine.





Three


MY EYES ARE dark, moist earth.

These other eyes?—?superimposed over mine?—?are the deep Arctic Ocean with ice marbling underneath. I shiver, pull Dom’s hands from my skin, and turn away from the mirror, into his chest. “We’d better get back.” I feel the foreign eyes on my spine, and the hairs rise on my neck and my stomach flutters with nerves.

“What? Noooo,” he groans, sliding his hands down my arms. “That has, like, five kinds of rejection and suck written all over it.”

I scoot out of his grasp. “My dad asked me to go up on the sunset jump,” I lie, willing myself not to look at the mirror and the ghostly otherness within it.

Dom does an exaggerated package shift; whether it’s for show or not, I don’t know and don’t care. I want to feel the sun on my back instead of phantom eyes. I leave him standing in the hall as I fling open the door and hop past the steps onto the concrete floor of the hangar. I’m outside before he’s even turned off the light.

I can tell he’s disappointed. He takes forever to lock the door. But when he turns toward me, his eyes crease with concern. “You okay?”

I slide onto his bike, trying to remember if I’ve ever been so creeped out. “I’ll be okay if you let me drive us back.”

“Woman?—”

I turn the key and gas it. “You getting on back or walking?”

“I know better than to tangle with you when you have the tiger look.”

“Hold on tight,” I warn, and then suck in my breath when he hooks his fingers inside the inseam of my shorts.

“No fair!” I yell as I gun it so fast the front tire pops off the pavement and we lurch forward.

“I never object when you do it to me,” he yells back. We both laugh into the wind.



“Dammit, I forgot to pack my chute from the last jump. I left it lying on the mat,” I tell Dom as we pull up to the skydive center.

He slides off the bike, helps me with the kickstand, and kisses my forehead. “I’ll pack it for you. I’m faster.”

“Okay.” I toss him his bike keys. “But you’d better not pack me for a hard opening like you did the other day.”

“I was mad at you for flirting with that tool in the aviator glasses.”

“I was not flirting with him!” I caress his wind-stung cheek. “You wanna go up?”

He wipes his eyes with both fists like a tired toddler. “Nah. I’d like to do one more practice session on the creepers before we try the new formation.”

I wish he would jump with me this time. The image in the mirror has me unsettled, the sensation coating my skin and sinking in, infecting my spirit. I want Dom’s hand in mine as we fly. But it’s just as well. There’s business to handle with my dad. Surely there’s a way to change his mind about the big-way, and having Dom there will only make me look like I need him?—?which I don’t.

My sneakers pound the desert sand as I jog into the hangar toward my parents’ office. Dad’s still behind his desk, talking on the phone. I fade into the wallpaper and wait until I’m acknowledged, like I’ve been trained to do. He hangs up and raises his eyebrows. “Yes?”

This is a man who appreciates directness, so I get to the point. “I care about this place as much as you do. What can I do to convince you I’m ready for the big-way?”

Dad stands up from behind his desk. I hold my breath as he walks toward me, then holds my arms. “Exhibit patience, for starters. I know you love this place and want it to do well. You don’t have to prove anything.”