If Rhiannon opens the windows, she'll hear a breeze in the palms, the tinkle of a neighbor's windchimes, a bottle clanking in a streetside garbage can. But that's it. No sirens, no arguments, no car horns, no mess. Even the waves are quiet in Key West.
Lately, sleep is tricky. Two nights in a row, Rhiannon crawled out of bed at 4am and crashed on the couch with the television playing background noise. I just need the ugly noise of the world, she thought.
It always used to drown out the noise in her head. Peace via whirlwind of chaos.
What tipped the scales? Rhiannon isn't sure. It happened before running into Joseph in that bar and she knows that because he read it on her. It was already there. Dissatisfaction. God, what's wrong with her? Whatever it is, she can't get still anymore. She tosses and turns and hates the silence because there is absolutely nothing to distract her from herself. Alcohol, an old friend, daily does its job of blurring her thoughts, like colors blending together on a canvas. The closer she peers, the less obvious anything becomes, which is good. I'll make an impressionist painting out of my life.
Around friends, she puts on her old face. Chicago Rhiannon. Wisdom gained from hard-won battles, both personal and external. She wants so badly to feel the way she did at home... Happy. A culmination of events. A best-case scenario. An optimist's dream of Rhiannon Lee realized. Now it just feels...
Get up. Get up NOW. Stop thinking.
She kicks a sheet off her bare legs and wanders down the hallway of the rented cottage. In the bathroom, she washes her face and wipes a droplet off her nose. The room is orange in the glow of a nightlight plugged into the outlet. Rhiannon read somewhere once that turning on the overhead light is the kiss of death at 4am. It tricks the mind into thinking it's really time to wake up. Well fuck that. She's got designs on sleep.
"Well don't you look like hell." The voice comes from directly ahead. The reflection stares out from the mirror. Same tousled hair, upturned nose. The eyes proclaim the hour as well, but suggest a woman who hasn't been fighting sleep, but enjoying all the night has to offer.
There is a pause. Her hand reaches up to touch her cheek and then continues upward. Fingers drag through strands of hair, pushing them off of her face. "Lots on your mind, I bet."
"What the fuck?" Rhiannon takes two blind steps backward. The sharp edge of a towel rack digs into her flesh. The pain is nothing compared to the mindfuck of what she's seeing: her reflection talking, and it doesn't match her mouth. Stupidly perhaps, Rhiannon reaches up and touches the warmth of her own lips, as if reassuring herself they aren't doing what the mirror's are. That she hasn't lost control of her body.
Why that should be reassuring, considering the alternative, isn't clear. She narrows her eyes in the dimness. Starts breathing again.
"Clearly not you," and with that comes a smile, one that speaks volumes. "I can hear the television. Infomercials? Really? I thought you had better taste than that."
The mirror Rhiannon takes a step back, measured, so that she is more visible to the other. She wears a leather jacket over a Suicide Commando t-shirt. Three piercings are seen on her right ear as she angles herself slightly. She lights a cigarette and blows smoke towards the glass. Wisps curl around the edges and seep through. "You're such a disappointment, Rhiannon. You'd rather curl up with an image of Ron Popeil than your own boyfriend."
"The... guy who sells pasta makers?" It's an inane question out of a sleep-deprived woman, but when literallly talking to oneself, who's to say what's bizarre? She rubs her eyes and looks at the mirror again, wondering if she's fallen asleep on her feet, or maybe she's curled up on the bathmat and doesn't remember it. But it doesn't feel like a dream. She can feel a draft on her toes. She hears the icemaker grinding out cubes. That kind of detail doesn't make its way into sleep often.
"That's obviously the stupidest thing you could say. I'm not into the geriatric crowd." While playing it cool, Rhiannon creeps closer to the sink, still narrow-eyed. She sifts through possibilities. Is there a spell? A demonic possession of household objects? She hasn't gone to crazytown, she knows that much. She's been there before. Maybe that's why she isn't terrified... She's too convinced something's fucking with her.
"Who are you? What do you want?" Pause. "And can it wait until daylight because... I'm really not in the mood." Rhiannon feels a drop of cold water slide down the column of her throat into her t-shirt. Another reminder that she's wide awake.
"You dated Whistler for close to a year, so we both know that's not true." She takes another slip on the cigarette. The mirror feels confining now. She wants to move about. More than that, she wants a beer. An odd feeling comes over the brunette as she walks up to, then effortlessly slides from behind the glass. Arms raise up, a hand grabbing her wrist as she stretches towards the ceiling.
"And just what are you in the mood for?" she continues. "It's not Connor. We both know it. You go through the motions, but it's falling into that familiar rhythm. Patrol buddies. Sparring partners." She takes another drag from the cigarette, allowing the nicotine to rush into her bloodstream. Such a rush.
Rhiannon's mouth falls open. A reaction to not only the implication, but the way her reflection slinked out of the mirror like it was a portal. There's an ironic thought. She's back against the towel rack again, just trying not to be touched by whatever entity has found its way into her home. She has a feeling it will be cold, like death wearing her skin.
"Shut the fuck up!" Too loud... Rhiannon swallows, panicked that he might wander down the hall and hear that kind of statement in her own voice. "I don't know who you are, but you know nothing about Connor and me." She has the urge to defend her relationship, but doesn't want to give weight to anything this bitch in familiar features has said. Even if it made her arm hair stand on end. It's not exactly true, but it has featured in a couple of her paranoid daydreams. Not the lack of wanting him, but the fear that the connection between them is shifting. It's natural, Rhiannon. All relationships change. Don't freak out. So goes the mantra.
"Look, not to get cliche, but state your purpose." Her fists knot at her sides. She wonders if she can punch it, whatever it is. How would it feel to punch something disguised as herself, albeit with decidedly inappropriate clothes for the climate?
The reaction brings out another smile in her doppelganger. She's clearly touched a nerve. "What's yours?" It's such a simple question and she delivers it with weight behind it. "Since you got here, you've been floundering, Rhiannon. Sure you work on your art, go on patrol -- hell, you've even taken on the role of mentor to an enemy -- but it's not the same, is it?"
Finding the space confining, Rhiannon's twin leaves the bathroom. She knows the house like the back of her own hand. She stalks into the kitchen and takes out a bottle of beer. A simple twist pops the cap. Ash from the cigarette is flicked into the sink before she continues on to the living room. The noise from the television will help mask their conversation. Should Connor awaken, he'll assume that's where the voices are coming from.
She takes a seat before setting the now almost nub of the cigarette into an ashtray. "It's not like Chicago, is it? Or Las Vegas? It must be so hard to relax after all that... excitement."
Rhiannon has trailed the mirror-person through the house, watching in confusion as she touches things -- solid things -- like an ordinary person. Now she stands in front of the couch listening to the result of another question deflected, only now it isn't about her lover. It's about her purpose. Her feeling that Key West is a vacation she can't get out of. And it makes a hypocrite of her. She's told Connor to relax and enjoy the days of peace they're getting, but advice has always been easier to dole out than take.
"Oh." She crosses her arms. She's afraid that her hands might begin to tremble. "I get it. This is a whole fake swami routine. Interesting tactic. Distract the enemy with philosophical ramblings so she won't notice or care that there's a strange, unliving entity in her house." The television splashes color on the walls and furniture. On the walking, talking reflection gone three-dimension. It's all well and good until Rhiannon watches the other brunette's hand moving to extinguish the cigarette. She sees the insides of her wrists. The tattoos are different. No lotus flower. Something else is drawn in its place, but she can't make it out in the dark. This girl's not from Key West, either.
The reflection tucks one leg up under her frame, something the Rhiannon of this world does. "You don't get it. This isn't a prank pulled by a 4th level witch with nothing better to do on a Saturday night, and it's not a tear in the world. Though that was a laugh." She takes a sip of the beer, enjoys the feel of the condensation running down her fingers. "Okay you want an answer. What's my purpose? I'm your mirror. I'm the girl you want to be but are too afraid to admit wanting."
"Uh," Rhiannon laughs and touches her mouth. "Yeah, no offense, but you don't look like me being all that I can be. You look like--" A washed-out version of her teenage self, actually. Jeans she's worn two days running, yesterday's make-up under her eyes, and loose. Maybe sexually, maybe not, but that isn't the point. There's a way of moving, a languid quality, even though Rhiannon gets the distinct impression the posture could change at any moment and become lethal. I know this girl. Where have I seen her?
"Like shit, actually." Rhiannon's weight shifts onto her left leg and she remembers that she's only wearing a tshirt and panties. She feels too vulnerable. "What exactly is there to envy?"
"Because I'm living," her reflection replies. "Accepting my gifts for what they really are, and holy Christ is it liberating!" Her head tips back and laughter escapes again. "I fight, I fuck -- and I know what you're thinking, and I'm not a slut -- and best of all, I don't have to be responsible for everyone. I'm free to be who I'm meant to be."
She takes another sip of the cold beer before continuing. "I know why you hate it here. You feel exposed. At least where we were before, you could mask yourself in the city. They were a part of you. We belong in the dark and yet here you are, surrounded on all sides by water and tanning bodies and nothing to hit."
Twin Rhiannon stands then, and crosses to her 'reflection'. "Poor Rhiannon, can't hide from herself, yet has to put on a mask for her friends. They all depend on you. Expect you to take the lead, make the grand battle plans. Tell me you don't envy the idea of only supporting yourself."
"What would be the goddamn point of that?" Rhiannon fires back. She leans in closer and smells a scent that tickles her memory. Black licorice candy. Scorched cinnamon. It tugs on her insides but she can't name the reason. "Slayers live for other people. Slaying is what I live for. Ergo, I live for other people. And frankly, I wouldn't be alive at all if it wasn't for them, would I? If you really know me?" A half-laugh. She shakes her head. "Then you know I would've let my fingers slip from the ledge ages ago if I hadn't lived for them."
Annoyed at herself for dancing to whatever song this shadow-version of herself is playing, Rhiannon reaches out and latches onto the other brunette's arm. She turns the wrist up. There's a word scrawled across the pale, veined skin in archaic font. The letters are difficult to make out.
"But you don't live for yourself." She keeps herself still, knowing her other self could counter any offensive move made. "And that hurts, doesn't it? You keep playing the role of protector, the confidante, the lover, but it feels so wrong now. Like, everything you've been through only to be stuck here doing it all over again. Where's your reward? When do you get to let loose?"
Rhiannon shakes her head and dismisses it like it's idiotic. "No, what's wrong is living through a personal hell of your own creation, learning from it all, and then repeating it just because you're bored." That's logical and she knows it. She also knows that what her other self said is scarily similar to a terrible thought that raced through her brain one night after she finished patrol with Deanna. The gist of it was, 'Okay, D, let's play a new game. Role reversal.' It shocked her so badly, Rhiannon immediately went home, locked herself in her bedroom and began correcting her old journals with her real history, just to get a grip on reality. The next morning, she blamed it on a lack of sense of self in her new shoes. Don't forget who you are. You're a white hat. Never entertain the possibilities.
"Then explain Elfleda." She finishes the beer and puts it on the floor. "And Tristan."
The cigarettes appear again and she shakes the pack. "Tell me you never thought about what it would've been like to give in."
The name puts a foul taste in Rhiannon's mouth. She cringes. "Ugh, God, don't bring up that piece of garbage. No. I don't daydream about being Tristan's willing love slave. And that's the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I'd sooner offer up my neck to Deanna. Or Katherine. Anyone." She drops the mirror-Rhiannon's arm and backs away a step, combing fingers into her hair. She reconsiders. "Except Grace."
Her forearms come together and block the other woman from her eyes. It isn't natural to be so conversational with what she's certain is an enemy, but Rhiannon has always done it. She's always talked to them and found it easier than conversing with (or confessing to) regular people. Like it or not, they have more in common, what with killing. It is just a matter of whom.
A moment of quiet passes.
"You know, if you were any good at this, you'd ask why I didn't go through with it," she says. Her arms drop and she points at the mirrored Rhiannon's arm. "Your tattoo. It says Æðelflæd, doesn't it? Elfleda's real name. See, I had this plan." She swallows. The television flashes blindingly white for a moment, then fades to a muted pallet of blues and greens. "I was going to ask Purity to work up a protection spell and weave the name into it. If I got it inked on me, it would keep her away for good." She chews her lip for a second. "But I hesitated. You know why? Because I didn't want to tell her secret. A name is power. I protected her."
Rhiannon tries to stand casually, with hands on her hips, but the posture doesn't work. Her shoulders are drooping. She isn't sure if the tattoo on her reflection's arm is a warding spell or the occult equivalent of tattooing a cross on herself. She doesn't want to know. But just seeing it there has done a number on her, which she has a feeling was the intention. "You need to get out of my house. You're trying to show me that a Rhiannon exists between who I am and the total and complete monster I'm terrified of being... That there are shades of gray. I love gray. But let's be real. I'm not good on slippery slopes."
The other Rhiannon stands taller now, shoulders squared. A confidence exudes, even in the face of unmasking. "But all it would take is a tiny little push. You're smart enough to realize that. And somewhere in that brain of yours, a question pops up: what was it that sent me on this path?"
She glances momentarily towards the bedroom.
"And the worst part?" Mirror-Rhiannon now strides to the window in the living room. Her reflection catches and casts yet another version of herself. "The seed has already been planted in your head. By you."
As before, the woman glides into the reflective surface, turns and examines her other self one last time. "I'll be seeing you."
A full ten seconds pass before Rhiannon exhales. She feels for the armchair behind her and sits down, mostly so she can't see herself in the pane of glass. Down the hall, she feels Connor's presence as clearly as if he's attached by a string. Connor. If he hadn't fallen into this world with her, Rhiannon knows it would've been a short fall to the bottom. Ironically, he is both her savior and her punishment, because he is the nearest reminder that the shoes she's been wearing aren't identical to the ones she left in Chicago.
Sometimes she's afraid that the only way she can settle into this world is to not even try to be her old self, but reinvent Rhiannon Lee altogether.
The big question looms. Is it better to wear another woman's shoes and hope they start to fit, or cast them off entirely?