Mirror, Mirror
Alexandra Wyatt's beautiful face was familiar to anyone who ever bought an issue of Vogue, Elle, Cosmopolitan or Glamour or saw an advertisement for Allure perfume or Foxy Girl jeans. Her flawless, creamy complexion, emerald green eyes, long auburn hair and tall, slender frame made her one of the most sought-after models in the world. Alexandra began her modeling career at the age of six months when her face appeared on every jar of Tiny Tots baby food and on every box of its cereal and biscuits. As a toddler, she modeled children's clothing in Spiegel's catalog and appeared in television ads for both Fisher Price and Mattel. By the time she was in her teens, Alexandra was already a seasoned professional and took her place among the top names in the modeling world along with Cindy Crawford, Kate Moss and Tyra Banks.
Now, in her late twenties, Ms. Wyatt planned on making the move from full-page spreads and television commercials to the silver screen. She doubted if she had any real acting ability, but lack of talent never stopped anyone from becoming a success in Hollywood. Sometimes all a person needed were good looks and the right connections, and she was blessed with both.
At the conclusion of her final Foxy Girl photo shoot of the season, Alexandra left the city and drove up the winding mountain road to her weekend cabin, miles away from noise and traffic. When she parked her Land Rover on the gravel driveway, she did not notice the beat-up Firebird Trans Am parked in back of the house. Unaware of any danger, she took her keys out of her Louis Vuitton bag, unlocked the front door and went inside.
Powerful hands suddenly grabbed her from behind.
"What have we got here?" the husky voice of her captor asked.
Two young hoodlums came out from the bathroom where they had been rifling through her medicine cabinet and vanity drawers, looking for drugs.
"Find anything?" the voice behind her asked.
"Nothing but tampons and Tylenol," replied a particularly nasty-looking fellow sporting an untrimmed beard.
Then his clean-shaven partner asked Alexandra, "Where do you keep your stash, honey?"
"I don't take drugs, so you're not going to find anything you want here."
The bearded one, Les Garrison, a twenty-three-year-old unemployed automobile mechanic with a long criminal record of petty thefts and narcotics-related charges, looked lasciviously at Alexandra's charms and said, grinning wickedly, "I don't know about that. I found something I want."
Both Jake Young, Les's clean-shaven companion, and Alonzo Gianetti, the foul-smelling felon who had Alexandra in his vice-like grip, were initially hesitant to take action, but then, as usual, they went along with whatever Les said or did. Alexandra, outnumbered three to one, never had a chance. Rough hands tore at her designer clothing and ripped the delicate lace undergarments.
At first, she tried to fight them off, but her struggles proved useless. She screamed and cried, and then her mind retreated from the pain, terror and humiliation, taking refuge in a remote corner of her subconscious mind. Her green eyes remained steadily fixed on a mirror that hung on the wall. Thus, she remained oblivious to the violence inflicted upon her by the three intruders. She never even flinched when Les took the straight-edge razor from his pocket and sliced open her multimillion-dollar face.
The following day Ms. Wyatt's agent, Conrad Maddox, unable to contact his client by telephone, drove up to her mountain cabin to see if the model was all right. When he first spotted Alexandra lying on the floor, he feared the worst. The helpless model was lying motionless in a pool of drying blood, hugging a mirror to her chest, her eyes staring vacantly ahead. Paramedics responded to Conrad's frantic 911 call, and Alexandra was medevacked to a nearby hospital where the emergency room staff stitched her face back together and tended to her other physical injuries.
However, the doctors could do nothing to correct the damage done to her mind and her spirit. After being released from the hospital, the once beautiful fashion model was sent to a private psychiatric hospital where, day after day, she sat in a chair, staring at a mirror, utterly oblivious to those around her.
Conrad Maddox visited his client nearly six months after the brutal attack, hoping to see some sign, however slight, of improvement. Much to his dismay, there was none. The agent had worked for Alexandra since she was a teenager, and he had high hopes for her career in motion pictures. Although he hated to admit it, Conrad knew that her career was over. Even if she should recover from her near-catatonic state, the damage done to her face was extensive. It would take years of plastic surgery to restore her former beauty, and by that time, she would be getting older; and age was a far greater deterrent to a career in Hollywood than the absence of acting talent.
Sitting inside her room, her mind locked away in a private world, Alexandra had no idea that Conrad left the hospital or that he had ever been there in the first place. All her attention was fixed on the mirror. Her green eyes, ferocious in their intensity, continued to stare down at the glass.
* * *
Jake Young was awakened by the irritating sound of his neighbor's German shepherd barking. As he stood up, his head started pounding furiously, no doubt due to his excessive drinking the night before. Barefooted, he crossed the cold cement floor to the bathroom, swearing to himself that he would poison that damned dog once he recovered from his hangover.
As he pulled the chain of the bathroom light and the bare light bulb came to life, he thought he saw in the bathroom mirror not his own image but that of a woman with green eyes and auburn hair. Jake closed his eyes for a moment and then looked back at the mirror. This time his own bloodshot brown eyes looked back at him. Shaking his aching head, he opened the medicine cabinet, took out four aspirin and swallowed them down with a cupped handful of warm tap water.
When he closed the medicine cabinet door, he again caught a momentary glimpse of green eyes in the mirror.
Those are her eyes, he realized as his mind slowly emerged from its alcoholic stupor.
They were the same eyes that haunted his nightmares. For the past few weeks, he had dreamed of that girl several times. She was beautiful, or at least she had been until Les got hold of her. He and his two friends had only gone to that mountain cabin, believing it was uninhabited, to steal some money and maybe score a little dope.
"Why the hell did she have to show up?" he moaned.
Jake stripped off his sweat-stained clothes, the same ones he had been wearing since yesterday morning, and took a hot shower. When he was done, he lathered his face with Edge shaving cream and reached for his razor. Condensation had clouded the mirror, so he took his towel and wiped the glass. Green eyes glared at him momentarily and then vanished.
"What's the matter with me?" he said aloud to his reflection.
Hand trembling slightly, he picked up his razor and started to shave, remembering Alexandra's vacant emerald-colored eyes and the red blood running down her battered and slashed face to mix with her auburn hair.
Suddenly, the white foam on Jake's neck turned pink and then scarlet as the razor's blade sliced open his jugular vein. Jake's hands reached for his throat, but he could not stop the blood from spurting on the medicine cabinet mirror in which the reflection of a green-eyed, auburn-haired woman was smiling in triumph.
* * *
Alonzo Gianetti had not seen Les Garrison for several weeks, not since the night they broke into Alexandra Wyatt's mountain cabin. After the attack, Les thought it best that they lay low for a while. But they came away from that job with only the thirty-eight dollars and change that Alexandra had in her wallet. Alonzo could not afford to lay low any longer; he needed money. He had left several messages on Les's answering machine, yet Les had not bothered to call back.
Maybe he doesn't want to speak to me, Gianetti thought, but he can't hide from me.
Alonzo got behind the wheel of his Trans Am and headed for Les's house, determined to confront his partner in crime face-to-face. As he sped along the interstate, he came upon a Volkswagen Beetle doing fifty-five miles an hour. Intending to pass the slower-moving vehicle, the driver glanced in the Trans Am's side-view mirror, where he saw not the traffic in the lane to the left, but the reflection of the woman from the cabin. Temporarily stunned, Alonzo hit his brakes just in time to avoid crashing into the back of the Beetle. A short time later, he glanced up at the rearview mirror, and there again he saw the green-eyed, auburn-haired woman he and his two friends had raped.
"What the ...?" he muttered, but the angry face vanished.
Alonzo's hands, which were fiercely gripping the leather-wrapped steering wheel, started to shake. He needed something to calm him down, but he had nothing on him. He would have to wait until he got to Les's house.
Recklessly speeding along the highway, Alonzo kept his eyes on the road ahead and avoided looking at either of his mirrors—afraid he would see those emerald green eyes peering back at him again. As he approached the center of the city, he noticed the Trans Am's temperature gauge was in the red.
I must have blown a hose, he thought, as he made his way over to the right lane and pulled off onto the shoulder.
When he opened the door and got out of the car, he began to tremble again. Only this time it was his entire body that was shaking with fear and not just his hands. Among the row of towering skyscrapers that comprised the city skyline was the forty-six-story Fidelity Insurance Building. In the reflection of its mirrored glass exterior, Alonzo could clearly see Alexandra Wyatt's auburn hair, her slashed, bloody face and her bright emerald green eyes glaring at him with hatred.
He covered his own eyes with his hands and took several steps backward, trying to distance himself from the horrific sight. In doing so, he temporarily forgot where he was. The blare of a truck's horn quickly brought him back to reality.
Alonzo Gianetti dropped his hands from his face just as the eighteen-wheel rig bore down on him.
* * *
Les crumpled up the newspaper and threw it across the room. First Jake and now Alonzo. Where was he going to find another pair of half-witted morons for the next job? He could not very well run a help-wanted ad in the Sunday Times. Maybe he would find someone down at Pete's Tavern. After all, Pete's was often frequented by reprobates like Jake and Alonzo. The more respectable drinkers patronized establishments where the glasses were clean and the booze wasn't watered down.
When the bearded young man entered the dimly lit bar later that afternoon, he was disappointed by its small crowd. Three men were drinking at one of the tables, each of whom was old enough to be his grandfather. There were also two men standing beside the jukebox. Although they were the right age, it was clear from the way they were making eyes at one another that they were interested only in a possible sexual liaison.
Well, maybe something better will show up, Les hoped as he sat down at the bar and ordered a rum and Coke.
Several minutes later, he spied a shapely blonde in a low-cut, clinging dress, coming out of the ladies' room. Les smiled, and the blonde came over and sat beside him.
"Want a drink?" he offered.
"I'd love one," she answered. "But I don't care much for the swill they serve here. Why don't we go back to my place and I'll open a bottle of Chivas Regal?"
"I thought you'd never ask!"
Jake downed his drink in one gulp. As he tilted his head back, he saw in the dirty, poorly lit mirror behind the bar the reflection of a familiar-looking redhead with green eyes. He turned around, but there was no one there.
"Something wrong, sugar?" the buxom blonde asked.
"Nah. Let's just get the hell out of here," he said nervously, leaving a five on the bar to cover the tab.
Outside in the bright light, Les got a better look at the blonde. She was quite a bit older than the broads he usually picked up. Maybe that's why she hung out in places like Pete's, where the lights were low and the men were less choosy.
"I'm parked over here," she said, opening the door of a silver-blue Jaguar.
Neither of them spoke as she drove to an exclusive high-rise apartment building. She parked in the underground garage, and they took the elevator to the thirtieth floor.
When she opened the door, Les whistled in appreciation.
"Some place you got here," he announced, looking at the grand foyer.
"At night the view from the balcony is breathtaking," she said, as she led the way to the master bedroom. "Make yourself comfortable while I go get those drinks."
Les sat down on a waterbed under a massive wooden canopy lined with an overhead mirror. When he stretched out on the bed, he saw reflected above him the auburn-haired, green-eyed woman glaring down at him.
"No," he shouted and jumped off the bed.
Then in front of him, atop the double dresser, he saw a three-panel mirror where not one but three sets of green eyes stared malevolently at him.
"What do you want, bitch?" he whispered to the reflections, and then he went out into the hall, slamming the bedroom door behind him.
"Here's your drink, handsome," the blonde said, as she walked toward him with two glasses in her hands.
"Not in there," he said, nodding toward the bedroom.
"Okay," she agreed, somewhat apprehensively.
What is this guy's problem? she wondered.
"Let's go into the living room then," the blonde suggested.
As he walked into the living room, Les looked straight ahead toward the balcony and the incredible panorama beyond it.
"The view's not too bad during the day either, I see," he declared.
He headed for the sliding glass door, opened it and stepped outside onto the balcony. After a few minutes, the blonde impatiently tugged at his muscular arm.
"It's a little more private inside," she said, intent on leading him back toward the living room.
Les turned and then suddenly stopped short; his eyes widened in terror. The far wall of the living room was covered with mirrored tiles. In those tiles, he saw dozens of faces whose eyes flashed like emeralds and whose creamy complexions were marred by bloody gashes.
An irate Les Garrison grabbed hold of the blonde.
"Did she put you up to this?" he screamed, shaking her roughly.
"I don't know what you're talking about," the blonde cried fearfully.
The faces on the tiles were smiling, the same identical, hateful expression appearing on each one. Les took his half-empty glass and threw it against the wall, breaking several of the tiles. The reflections in the remaining ones started to chuckle and then broke out in loud peals of laughter.
Les clasped his hands to his ears, screaming, "Stop it! Stop it!"
Free of Les's grasp, the blonde ran from the balcony, locking the glass door behind her, as she went inside to call the police.
"Open the goddamned door!" he shouted.
Les picked up one of the wrought iron patio chairs and shattered the sliding glass door. As he stepped back into the living room, the faces in the mirrors continued to mock him. Furious, he grabbed a poker from the stand in front of the fireplace and began smashing the remaining tiles. Still, the laughter continued, emanating now from the hundreds of broken shards of mirror on the floor. Finally, Les ran from the room and out onto the balcony to escape his green-eyed tormentor.
"Les," a voice called.
It was Jake Young, his face white with the lather of Edge shaving cream and his throat crimson with blood.
"You shouldn't have hurt her," the young man's spirit lamented.
Les could only stand there, helplessly shaking his head, as if denying the existence of the hideous apparition.
"He's right, Les," Alonzo agreed from behind him. "We should have taken her money and left, but, no, you had to go and cut her up."
The grisly sight of Alonzo Gianetti was more than Les could bear. There was little left of Alonzo after being run over by that truck, and what was left was not a pretty sight.
"Stay away from me!" Les screamed as the mortal remains of his former associates drew closer, endlessly repeating their litany as though it were a mantra: You shouldn't have hurt her.
From inside the living room, Alexandra's laughter could be heard once again when Les, trying to escape the nightmare vision of Alonzo's mutilated corpse, went over the balcony railing and fell thirty stories to the street below. After Les Garrison hit the pavement, his body looked even more grotesque than Alonzo's had.
* * *
In her room at the private psychiatric hospital, Alexandra Wyatt looked in the mirror for the final time. She saw the auburn hair, badly in need of a shampoo and a good brushing, the pallid complexion that bore the hideous jagged scars from the razor cuts, the emerald green eyes wide open and alert and the full lips smiling with satisfaction.
She stood up, a bit unsteadily at first, crossed the room to the dresser and put the mirror in the drawer. She then went to the closet and found a shirt and a pair of jeans. No one believed she would ever wear those clothes again since the doctors had expected her to be hospitalized indefinitely. Alexandra slowly got dressed and then waited for visiting hours to end. When they did, she left her room and nonchalantly walked out the main exit with the friends and relatives of her fellow patients.
Several of the people walking beside her could not keep their eyes off her. After all, they had seen her face on TV commercials and magazine covers so often. It was amazing! She was even more beautiful in person than in the ads. They could not help admiring her emerald green eyes, her long auburn hair and her flawless, creamy complexion.
Like the fabled Dorian Gray, Alexandra Wyatt projected an image of physical perfection. Meanwhile, in a dresser drawer in her former private hospital room, a mirror held captive from human eyes the once beautiful face that had been tragically destroyed by Les Garrison.
"Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the fairest cat of all? What do you mean GARFIELD?"
Image © actioncat.com
