American Elsewhere (16 page)

“Wait,” says the man’s voice. “Is she looking at us?”

“Can she
see
us?”

“How can she—”

Then there is a flicker of movement, lightning-fast. It takes Mona’s brain a few moments to translate what it just saw, and though she cannot believe it her brain keeps on insisting it was real.

The statue that looked like a bull waved a limb. Which statues should not be able to do, she says to herself. If it really did wave a limb, then it could not be a statue at all, but…

Suddenly Mona is falling, plummeting away from the black wasteland and into darkness. She falls until she strikes her mattress—which is odd, because she is certain she was just lying on it—and she jerks awake with a gasp and looks around.

She is lying in the corner of the master bedroom of her new house. Though she could have sworn that just now she was not alone, she looks at all the dark corners and sees no one at all. The room, though spacious, is empty.

Then the braying, shrill peal of a bell splits the silence. Mona’s whole musculature flexes in surprise, causing a stab of pain in her belly and arm. Then the bell rings again, and she realizes it’s the aquamarine phone sitting in the dusty corner of her living room.

She goes to it and watches it ring four more times. Whoever it is, he or she isn’t giving up.

Mona expects it to be the same jerk who called earlier. So she picks it up and barks, “Who the fuck is this?”

There’s an “Ah” of surprise on the other end, followed by an “Uh…”

“Yeah?” says Mona. “Go on. Talk.”

Silence.

Then: “You need to go home.”

“What?” says Mona. “What the hell do you mean?”

“You need to go home, Miss Bright.” The speaker is talking through what sounds like a sock pressed against the phone, but this cannot disguise the fact that the speaker is obviously very young.

“I am at home,” says Mona.

“No. The home you came from. You need to leave this town.”

“Okay, or—you could just mind your own fucking business.”

“They’re
watching
you,” says the voice. There is a note of genuine terror in it. “They’re talking about you.”

“Who?”

“All of them. Don’t you know what they
are
?”

“ ‘What’?” says Mona. “What do you mean, ‘what’?”

“Go as soon as you can,” says the voice. “If they’ll let you.” Then there is a click, and the line goes dead.

Mona looks at the receiver, thinking, then slowly puts it down.

She knows that voice. She’s sure of it.

She is back in bed, just on the verge of slumber, when it comes to her: didn’t she hear that voice recommend the biscuits and gravy to her once? But then she returns to sleep, and the thought is gone, and forgotten.

Mrs. Benjamin’s luncheon is held in her backyard. It is a cool seventy-two degrees outside, and her cottonwood trees have been carefully pruned so that they form a light canopy that shields the yard from the noon sun. Her gardens are nothing short of astonishing: huge clumps of flowering vines sprawl along its iron fence, and blades of sprouting bulbs droop along the pink granite borders. It looks like something out of
Southern Living
, and, unfortunately for Mona, the same goes for the rest of the attendees: everyone here is wearing a sundress with matching jewelry, heeled sandals, and sleek sunglasses. Mona, who was raised in the oil flats with nothing but an unsociable ex–Army
Ranger for company, has always felt profoundly insecure about her lack of femininity, and she feels incredibly out of place here, where she just can’t compete with this level of estrogen. It doesn’t help that she is quite short, dresses like she is planning for a hike, and is obviously Latina, unlike everyone else here.

Yet it is odd: the question of race never pokes its head above the waves. This is unusual for Mona, who has been all over Texas and worked in some of the whitest communities out there and has witnessed a vast array of reactions to her race. Since Wink is about 98 percent white, she expects at least
something
, especially from these socialites: maybe they would ask her, somewhat tentatively, where she was from, or clumsily inquire if she was bilingual (to which the answer is a sort of
no
—the only Spanish Mona knows is what she picked up on the force in Houston, which is limited to commands, threats, and thoroughly indecent questions). But these questions never come. In fact, now that she thinks about it, no one in Wink has ever said
anything
about her race: both it and her general appearance have gone mostly without comment or reaction. It feels as if the citizens of Wink have gotten used to people different from them.

Still, her insecurity intensifies as the luncheon goes along. These are a type of woman Mona has never encountered: they drink cocktails at noon and smoke cigarettes in slender little holders, and they discuss almost nothing but housekeeping and the states of their husbands and children. Perhaps they are what Carmen was fifteen years ago. They seem a cheery, bubbly lot, with their hair perfectly coiffed and their eyes bright and smiling behind their sunglasses, and they greet Mona with an enthusiasm she finds downright intimidating. None of them seem to be employed. The mortgage rate around here must be great for everyone to live so well on a single income. She manages to briefly redirect the course of conversation to her reason for being in Wink, and pop in a few questions about her mother—but of course they, like everyone else so far, know nothing: they laugh at their own ignorance, and bounce gaily to the next subject. Though Mona feels contempt for them—so privileged, so sheltered—she also cannot help but wish to be one of them.

For the most part they are all too happy to do the talking for her, but when they finally ask her a direct question it’s one Mona’s been dreading all along:

“So, Mona, any plans to settle down?” asks one, who Mona thinks is named Barbara. “I know you’re young, but don’t wait too long.”

The statement puts a bad taste in Mona’s mouth, but she still tries to smile. “I’m not that young,” she says. “I’m almost forty.”

“What!” cries Barbara. “Almost forty! You don’t look a day over twenty-seven! What
is
your secret? You
have
to tell me. I’ll bend your arm if you don’t.” The other women nod. Some even look insulted to hear her true age.

It is not a new response to Mona, who has watched friends grow gray and lined while she stays the same, more or less. She knows she’s lucky, but she’s never figured out why. Her mother and father looked well
over
their ages, but then one drank himself to sleep every night and the other was schizophrenic, so that doesn’t mean much.

“Just genes, I guess. I can’t say it’s clean living.”

“Well, it’s high time someone snatches you up,” says another, a platinum blonde who might be named Alice. “I notice there’s no ring on that finger…”

Mona tries to smile again, but it comes out as a grimace. “Well. There was, once.”

Discomfort flutters through them, the first time on this sunny afternoon. “You mean you were engaged, and it was… called off?”

“No,” says Mona. “I was married. But we divorced,” she says, before they ask if her husband died, which is probably a more pleasant alternative to them.

“Ah,” says Barbara. Some of the women grow very still. The others are exchanging glances. After a few beats of silence, the subject is forcefully changed and the flow of conversation resumes burbling cheerily along, though now far fewer questions are directed to Mona.

Yet Mrs. Benjamin does not react at all to this news. In fact, she hasn’t done much all throughout the luncheon besides pass food around and watch Mona. Mona begins to find it very unsettling, for every time she looks up, Mrs. Benjamin is watching her with a small smile.

It’s not until the luncheon’s over and everyone is leaving that Mrs. Benjamin speaks to her: “If you could please stay behind, dear, I would appreciate it. I feel like we have a little to discuss.”

Mona obliges, loitering on her porch while Mrs. Benjamin sees the other guests out. When she returns, the small, clever smile is back on her face. “Did you enjoy yourself?”

“It was certainly…” She trails off, wondering how to finish.

“Awful?” suggests Mrs. Benjamin.

Mona is not sure what to say, but Mrs. Benjamin just laughs. “Oh, don’t look so concerned, my girl. Anyone with sense can see they’re a bunch of empty-headed fools. That’s why I didn’t give them any of the
good
tea.” She winks.

“Then why did you have them over at all?” asks Mona, irritated.

“Oh, just to spite them, I suppose,” says Mrs. Benjamin vaguely. “Stir up trouble. They can’t stand one another’s company, you see. I have to get my amusement somehow.”

“And you brought me in to stir up more trouble?”

“No. I wanted to see how you’d handle them.”

Mona stops. Takes a breath. She then says, “Ma’am, I admit I do not understand the intricacies of your social spheres here, and to be honest I really do not wish to. But one thing that I really, really do not want for you to do is involve me in them for what seems to be no damn reason at all. And, believe me, you do not want that either, though you will have to trust me on that.”

“Oh, please hold on. I didn’t intend to be cruel. I just wanted to see how you’d be fitting in here.”

“Well, I will guess that I will fit in quite shittily, but that’s my problem and none of yours. Now… you got me here under the pretense of answering a few questions about the town, and my mother,” says Mona. “Can I ask you those questions?”

“Oh, certainly,” says Mrs. Benjamin, miffed. “Fire away, dear.”

They sit down on the porch and she tells Mrs. Benjamin about how she inherited the house, and her very strange trip here. When she
finishes her story Mrs. Benjamin stays quiet for a long, long time. “Hmm,” she says finally. “Well. I’ll say again that I have no memory of a Laura Alvarez living or working in Wink.”

“I’ve got photos of her living in my house,” says Mona.

“From when?” asks Mrs. Benjamin.

“I don’t know exactly… I guess sometime in the seventies.”

“Hmm,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “My memory goes back far, but… not
all
the way back. So I could be wrong. She could have lived here before I ever came.”

“I also have documents from Coburn saying she worked there,” says Mona. “Is there any remnant of their operation still in the area that I can go to? Any government agency? I just need to find
something
about her.”

“Coburn…” says Mrs. Benjamin, a little contemptuous. “That damn lab. Who knows what their papers say? I wouldn’t trust anything I heard about up there. All of their facilities were located up on the mesa, and those were gutted and abandoned when the lab was shut down.”

Mona makes a mental note of this. Because she intends to go up to that mountain, and damn soon. “What was it they did up there?” she asked. “I read they did government research, and something about… quantum states.”

Mrs. Benjamin stares off into the distance for a while. “They did nothing that was worth doing,” she says finally. “They should have put more effort into commercial prospects.
Usable
ideas. Rather than conceptual research. It did not end well.”

“Because they never came up with anything,” says Mona.

“Hm?” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Who told you that?”

“Mr. Parson. He’s the man who runs the—”

“I know Mr. Parson,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “We’re well acquainted. And Coburn, well… they only ever did one thing.” She thinks for a moment. Then she asks, “Here—would you like to see a magic trick?”

“A what?”

“A magic trick. The party bored me stiff, dear, so a trick should be entertaining. Come inside. I’ll show you.”

“I thought you said you were going to help me,” says Mona as she follows Mrs. Benjamin into her house.

“I am,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Just indulge me, please.”

She sits Mona down on the couch while she wanders off to the back. The inside of Mrs. Benjamin’s house is much less attractive than the exterior: everything is done in awful flowery wallpaper, except the living room, which has a bright red pattern depicting a foxhunt. There are also several stuffed owls, which Mona assumes were brought home from work. Somewhere there must be a room full of clocks, for she can hear a constant chorus of ticking. Everything smells of bad potpourri.

“Here we are,” trills Mrs. Benjamin as she returns. She sets a wooden case down on the coffee table in front of Mona, and stops. Her smile vanishes, and she looks up at Mona with a dark expression. She opens the case. Inside is a silver hand mirror. “An ancient swami gave me these mirrors,” she says in a theatrically hushed tone. At first Mona is confused, for she can see only one mirror, but then she looks again and sees there are actually two, stacked on top of each other. “They came from far away, in the Orient.”

“They did?” asks Mona.

Mrs. Benjamin’s solemn demeanor breaks. “Of course not, silly girl,” she says. “It’s all part of the trick.” She resumes glowering. “He gave them to me, and told me they were entrusted with ancient…” Her expression wavers. “Wait, I already said ‘ancient,’ didn’t I? Oh, forget this part… let’s get to the fun stuff.” She takes out the mirrors and hands them to Mona. “Here. Take them.”

“I have to hold them?”

“Yes, obviously,” and Mrs. Benjamin sounds genuinely impatient now. “Take them. Hurry up.”

Mona takes one mirror in each hand. They are surprisingly light, and almost paper-thin. She expected something gaudy and decadent—this is a magic trick, after all—but these mirrors have almost no ornamentation. They are silver surfaces and silver handles, and nothing more.

“The mirrors are actually halves of one,” says Mrs. Benjamin. “Like one mirror was split down the middle, shaved in two. The thing
is, when the mirror was split, it never noticed. It still thinks it’s whole, even though it’s not. But this confusion has given it some interesting consequences. Let me tell you how the mirror trick works.

“First, hold one mirror in front of you at an angle so it reflects an object nearby. Say, this ashtray.” She points to a horrible brass tchotchke on the coffee table. “Then slide the other mirror behind this one, so they touch and are whole.”