Our Crooked Hearts(55)

She led me past the tinted windows of an SUV, a basketball hoop in freshly poured concrete, an Ariel doll lying facedown in grass. Then through the front door.

The house was open-plan, with a high timbered ceiling and great flanks of shining windows. In the daytime it must’ve been a hotbox of light. From the entryway I could see a sunken living space and a staircase curving to the upper floor, and a short hallway that led to an unlit kitchen. The house smelled like new appliances and floor wax and something else, a drowsy scent that nibbled at my brain and made me catch myself on the wall, fingers fumbling against the hook where a glittery unicorn backpack hung.

“Oh, right,” Marion said, and spoke close to my ear. Three syllables that set off a bracing burst behind my eyes and burned my confusion away.

“What was that?” I caught her wrist. “What did you just do?”

She shook me off with a hiss, strange eyes flaring. Just as quickly they cooled. “Be careful,” she said, conciliatory. “Don’t surprise me. Don’t just touch me like that.”

I put my hands behind my back and followed her through the house’s first floor.

The furniture was showroom plump, the painted walls had an impersonal shine. I didn’t think the house had been lived in long. A mirror hung in the hall that led to the kitchen; I could see the glint of its beveled edge. But when I walked past, it didn’t reflect me.

I stopped. Moved a hand in front of my face. Nothing. The hall was dark and so was the scene through the mirror, so it took some squinting to make out that they didn’t match. Inside the mirror, to my left, was a half-open door, and straight ahead a familiar striped shower curtain.

I was looking at my own bathroom. The mirror was as good as a window and even though I’d already suspected Marion could see me through it I wanted to smash the glass with my fists. But she was watching from the kitchen to see what I would do. I kept walking.

Pots of limp herbs lined the window over the sink beside a cobalt finger bowl inside which jewelry glittered. I pictured the person who’d last washed dishes here stripping off their rings. On the kitchen island was an open New Yorker and a pottery mug with an inch of coffee in it, its surface iridescent with oil. The room stank of unrinsed takeout containers and garbage gone bad. I guessed the mess was the only thing in this house that belonged to Marion. The sliding patio door was open all the way, letting in a breath of lilac and chlorine. An icy rectangle of swimming pool glowed against the dark.

“Why’d you leave the doors open?”

“I don’t like enclosed spaces.” She said it dryly, like a joke, and hoisted herself up on the counter.

“Whose house is this?” When she didn’t answer I picked up the New Yorker and read aloud the name printed on its mailing label. “Who is that?”

She eyed me steadily. “You want to meet him?”

My stomach twisted. “He’s home?”

Marion nodded toward another brief hallway leading off the kitchen. I could make out a few closed doors and the latticed front of a pantry. “Go say hi.”

“Is he…” Okay, I was gonna say. But what came out was, “Is he alive?”

For a protracted second, she said nothing. Then, “Yes, Ivy.” Nice and easy, no sign of irritation. “He’s alive.”

Ashamed I’d asked it, not sure I believed her, I walked toward the hall.

“First door on the left,” she said.

I turned the knob and pushed the door lightly open. There was a nightlight plugged into a socket, a tacky amber seashell that cast a glow over the man stretched across the floor in a white T-shirt and boxer shorts. He was on his back, arms gently outspread, oriented so the bottoms of his feet could be seen from the door.

I screamed. It was a half-swallowed, just-saw-a-cockroach kind of scream, because even as I opened my mouth I could see he was breathing.

“He’s alive,” she said again, from the kitchen.

“What did you do to him?” I pressed a hand to my corroded throat, remembering the feeling that hit me when I walked into the house. That knee-buckling sense of imminent blackout that Marion banished with a couple of words. Whatever the spell was, it was environmental, airborne.

Her voice floated my way, she didn’t move any closer. “He’s fine.”

I found it hard to focus on the man’s face. It seemed obscene, almost, to look at him when he couldn’t look back. I focused on his hands instead, and the clean white front of his shirt. Had she dragged him here, or is this where he’d fallen?

“Wake him up, Marion.”

“No,” she said, affronted. “I need his house.”

I stalked out to face her. “This is vile. How am I supposed to trust you after you show me this?”

She ran her tongue tip between her teeth. “If I didn’t show you these things, you shouldn’t trust me.”

“Are there other people in the house?”

“Does it matter?”

“It matters to them!”

“I’m asking if it matters to you. They’re not dead. While they’re sleeping, they won’t die, or age, or thirst. They’re as safe as it’s possible to be in this world. Their house fulfills a need, and I’ll give it back when I’m through. So. Does it matter?”

“Of course it does,” I said stubbornly. “They’re human beings.”