He put a hand to his arm and felt the flesh crackle. Another to his chest—felt it all crackly-rubber and repellent.
The skin…
…clung to him stickily. He had drawn it on, and now it felt affixed by sweat and suction, as if it were melting into him. He couldn’t writhe out of it. It must have stretched to accommodate him. It had always looked like such a small skin, but it was sufficient. It lay upon his shoulders like a mantle; the seam ran up his belly, between his nipples, and otherwise it was as seamless as Derek himself. He wondered why he didn’t feel more surprised, more horrified.
Probably, he thought, because you did it to yourself. If you did it to yourself, you can’t possibly find the thing too unattractive.
But notice, you had to be good and drunk before you really found the wherewithal to do such a thing. You had to get yourself to black out before it was really possible.
And now that you’re here… what?
What…?
The answer came slowly, but it came. He smirked at himself in the mirror, dancing sideways, twisting around to watch the mandalas spinning on his back. He was still very drunk. He pulled on his underwear, careful not to wrinkle the skin; the elastic band snapped tight on his waist, sealing the hide to him further. Then a clean shirt, crisp and slightly stiff, though he couldn’t much feel it. There was a layer between him and the rest of the world now, a comforting protective barrier. He tucked the tail of his shirt into a pair of pressed slacks he’d picked up from the cleaners only yesterday, in preparation for the grand opening.
That’s why you didn’t call the police, he said, as if it had ever been an issue. You had to get ready for the Mandala Ball. And now you’re ready. You’re dressed to the teeth. You even have your long Johns on. Although Etienne’s father surely wasn’t named John. Maybe they were long Jeans.
He was not the sort to laugh at his own jokes. It required grim determination to get his shoes on, to tie the laces. His hair was in very bad shape, but he felt convinced that no one would care. And a good thing too, because now the buzzer was buzzing. There had been just enough time to accomplish what he had. So, yes, it had been a very busy day after all, even though most of the time was occupied in lying here getting drunk enough to do what needed to be done.
The buzzer buzzed and buzzed. Imitating the sound in his throat, Derek went into the hall. He was halfway down the stairs when he thought about his door and how much time it would have taken to lock the deadbolts. It really was not possible to go back up and do all that when he was right in the middle of his grand descent.
He flew out the front gate and onto the street, and there was Etienne standing by the rear door of the limousine, holding it open for him. Inside, Nina was patting the seat beside her, so he knew just where to go. And here came Lenore Renzler, rushing up between Derek and the car, coming so fast out of nowhere that he plunged right into her and the two of them tumbled forward into the compartment, falling onto the soft red leather, their arms and legs tangled, everyone breathless and laughing.
Etienne bent to look inside the car, and Nina gazed at Lenore with fascination. They both stared at the mandala in the middle of her forehead; they seemed quite enchanted with it.
“Well!” Etienne said happily. “It looks like you belong with us!’ “How wonderful!” said Nina. “Mr. Crowe is bringing a date!’
36
Michael was relieved to see Crowe’s friend, Lilith Allure, still at the register, stuffing parcels into a bag. She glanced up as he closed the door behind him and called out, “We’re closing in five minutes, so make it snappy. Actually, could you flip that sign behind you?”
He turned the sign on the door so that open/abierto faced into the room. He wandered forward, ready to collapse. With no struggle to sustain him, he did not know which way to turn. He put his palms on a display case and leaned there, looking down upon rows of carved crystals, glass eyes, amulets etched in metal and inscribed on scraps of parchment, rolled into tiny scrolls. Aleister Crowley’s Thoth deck was fanned out across the lower shelf, the huge cards alive with grotesque, exaggerated figures in lurid colors. He stared at the Death card, the skeletal king with a reaper’s blade, and thought of the one comment every modern reader felt obliged to make when that card came up: “The Death card doesn’t mean death.” No, of course not. It signified change, the end of a cycle, transformation, making way for something new; it could refer to a relationship, a way of life, an attitude—to almost anything other than the end of a life span, the demise of a corporeal body.
But sometimes, Michael thought, Death meant death.
He wheeled around, choking on the incense that drifted through the shop—wheeled and saw posters of Kundalini serpents forming helixes inside a meditator’s body; an enormous lotus with an OM syllable at its center; John Dee’s elaborate Sigil of Aemeth; and a Tibetan mandala whose rings of concentric colors were a frightening reminder of his present situation. The Vajrayana Buddhists said the entire cosmos was a mandala, a sacred circle. Of course, they were not referring to the mandalas that had recently destroyed his life. But there was something in the night, in the oblique path he had described across the city, that reminded him the mandalas were not everything. They were circles inside of greater circles.
He could hear an old black woman talking to Lilith, just down the counter: “… and this demon, see, it bite me. Every time I move a way it don’t like, every time I think a thought I not s’posed t’have, you know, I feel it bitin’ my shoulder. It on there all the time, ridin’ me. You see it? That aura reader, she tell me she see it, but she want too much money get rid of it. So I tell her I comin’ to you. You see it, don’t you?”
“Look,” Lilith said, “I’m already late for closing.”
He imagined how his own story would sound to her, no matter how carefully he framed it. She, who listened to the litanies of the mad all day long, would treat him just like any other, sending him on his way with candles and amulets. That’s ten dollars. Blessed Be, and come again.
But then, she was Ms. A. She had spoken to the mandalas. Spoken for them. She would understand the situation.
When he caught her eye, she stiffened a little. Michael smiled.
Finally she ushered her last customer out and turned to Michael, who was waiting near the door.
“Make it fast,” she said. “I’ve got a ritual to get to.”
“Are you… is it true that you’re Ms. A?”
“Oh, Jesus Christ,” she said, moving quickly back. “Just get out, all right?”
“Please, I—I’m a friend of Derek Crowe’s.”
“I’m not Ms. A. Can’t you people get that through your heads? I don’t hang out with Derek Crowe, I didn’t know him when he wrote his book, and he sure as hell never hypnotized me.”
Michael sagged with disappointment, all his fear and fatigue welling up in him in that instant. He could feel his eyes tearing; suddenly his hopes, his optimism, seemed worthless.
“Someone said…”
“If you’re really Derek’s friend, ask him to introduce you to Ms. A. And please give her my regards.” She opened the door to him, holding her keys in the lock. He didn’t move. “What? What’s the matter?”
He found he couldn’t move. The wind again—the tugging. He grabbed onto the doorframe, knowing he must move properly to avoid it; he must strike like a jeweler’s chisel cutting into diamond, finding the one and only path that would extricate him from this moment.