Me and My Shadow

After a long, grueling day, I was looking forward to grabbing a cocktail with some friends. It didn’t turn out that way. He was AOL as usual, and the rest were already off from the job hours ago, and they were too hammered to stay and wait for me.

Screw it. I’ll Uber Eats and raise the heat.  

My backpack, the quirky cork one from Laflore Paris, has my housekey at the ready. This brownstone FBI chose for me is a bit stark, mostly painted white, white appliances, but not sexy white with cool accessories like that my Park Slope neighbors probably have.

I grabbed the keys as I stepped up to the top brick stairs.

Turn around and check yourself, my Mom always said. So, I did. No one behind; no one in front, so I slammed the door behind me. Being a detective’s daughter, I was taught to be aware of my surroundings.

Never assume everything is as it was.

I noticed that my blinds were opened so I hurried to close them and lock the windows.

(Did I not close all of them before running off to work?)

I was pissed that I didn’t go out but passing my mirror, I noticed I grew old, or red, or pudgy. Best not to go out. I poured a bourbon neat.

No, I am just tired. But I am always tired. C’mon, I used to go out all the time! I have no responsibilities! No kids! No relationships! I should be online dating!

Damn, I was beautiful. I am not now.

Many may think I am, but I know who I was.

Beautiful, sexy and smart.

I had beautiful black hair.

I now have grey running a marathon through it.

I said yes to what I wanted, and no to what and with whom I was disgusted.

And there were a little too many.

Where did it go???

Where is my piss and vinegar?

Don’t tell me COVID messed us up this bad. My partner died, my mother and cousin.

All gone.

But why should that make me worse?

 I had to help the community.

Is it the late hours?

Is it the Baily’s in the coffee at work?

The criminality? The horrifying crap that when I look in the mirror at night I am afraid of who is looking at me?

The drinking to calm down after seeing dead bodies every week?

After seeing myself in the mirror?

My dates are not exactly dates.

My choices have been questionable.

But they still look at me when I stride across the quad to the department to express my valued opinion of criminals and such.

The police department loves when my perfume comes in before I do.

That’s when I noticed something weird.

As I was walking toward the kitchen, with its bright white monochromatic style, I thought I had an intruder. It may not have been human, but to me, a human was or is here. On the counter there was a glass of water stained with someone’s lipstick. My favorite color.

I stepped into the kitchen where this intruder was, checking if it had a friend. I felt its shadow before I saw it. I slowly lifted my head in front of the microwave and saw her face in its mirrored glass door.

Was she right behind me?

I still had my keys near me, so I clasped them the way my Dad taught me.

I turned around like a cowboy in a gunfight.

But all I had were keys.

Too bad they don’t let psychologists carry.

She had it all, everything.

There she was, a well-dressed woman with tendrils the color of blue black, like a blue black bear.

Those tendrils covered her face like seaweed, her eyes dark, eternal.

Her lithe body seemed ephemeral. I noticed her fingers were too long.

Then I immediately thought of her arms, were they muscular?

What about her legs, her belly button; only mammals have belly buttons.

Why am I thinking like this?

I began to stare at her through the looking glass, noticing things about her as if she were hypnotizing me, as if she were, me?

I was engulfed by her presence, her stance.

She is speaking to me without talking.

“Come see, come look, come close.”

I quickly turned around, “Back off, who the hell are you,” nervously clasping the jingling keys as they played her siren song.

Smiling, she moved closer to me.

I reacted by storming towards her, and I lifted my hand with the keys, my arm shaking in embarrassing nervous twitches.

I need to pull her out of my head, out of my house.

I couldn’t even pull a punch I just couldn’t touch her.

I was stuck in a buffer, stripped of my strength, with no impact. 

My brain was pushing my body to move but it didn’t work

I was dipped in amber paralyzed with dread.

This confident bitch laughed at me for not succeeding as she grabbed the keys from me, jingling them.

This demon, this spirit who is she? What is she?

Not sure how, but she disappeared.

Her presence and perfume lagged.

I went back to the living room to close the blinds further.

As I was pulling the blinds down, they fell down on top of me.

I looked like an I Love Lucy skit.

Struggling to get my sorry ass out of this predicament, I look up.

There I was on the street!

Standing in the middle of the street?

How?

I am scared of the streetlights towering over me.

Like a spotlight or a crime scene with my shadow as its outline.

Holding the evidence in my hands: twisted cords, dirty white metal blinds with the former renters’ greasy fingerprints tattooed on them.

And me, entwined with the blinds twisting me up like slimy seaweed in the middle of the ocean, or street.

How the hell did I get outside?

I had to get back inside to lock the doors and windows

I had to turn around and check myself.

Fumbling with my greasy blinds, I ran back up the stoop.

The door was locked.

Then there was a noise.

Jingling.

My spine tingled with a volt of fear and electricity.

Her keys.

My perfume.

Our shadow.

I tried to slam the door behind, but she was already in, with my keys, my perfume, myself…

You know who I am.

Don’t be scared.

We are still who we are.

Drop the baggage that stops you from being yourself, loving yourself and breathing!

It’s time. Get yourself back. Love yourself, be yourself. I will only be there when you slam yourself, hate yourself. I am tough. I am nasty.

You want to look in the mirror and see love.

Not me.

Here’s your lipstick back.