I feel my heart drop into my stomach, and my whole body is awash with chills, though I know I’m not properly registering what he’s saying.

Not. Not Carmichael.

It couldn’t. It can’t…

“She’s my partner,” he explains cheerfully, “Carmichael I mean, not Abdul.”

Stop. Stop talking please…

I hear…I can’t feel the…I can’t find the floor.

I feel like I’m falling, but I’m not going anywhere. Rooted to the ground with that same feeling like someone’s driven nails through my skin and pinned me in place.

“Abdul’s the makeup artist, but I don’t know where she is…”

I’m not even facing him as he speaks those last words, because almost in the same instant I see Carmichael. I KNOW she’s Carmichael.

You’re being irrational Alicia. This makes no sense…you shouldn’t panic. You shouldn’t.

Alicia.

Stop being so stupid. But I can’t-can’t.

She’s a very tall, very thin, almost boyish, almost dirty-looking chick- younger than me - maybe Andrew’s age - with shortish curly hair sticking out on either side of her head in a disorganized, almost afro-ish tumbleweed of a triangular bob that doesn’t even reach to her jaw.

But I know she’s his…

She’s dressed like a scarecrow, with a dingy, oversized, faded, purple tee-shirt just draping from her lanky frame that casts too long a shadow for her size.

I feel cold. From head to toe. And grip my arm until my finger leaves creases.

She looks like the poster child for hipsters, or hippies, or starving artists or ‘artsy crazies’ or all four.

And she looks like a ghost- I look like a ghost - I think I’ve seen a ghost-

A ghost of something I try with everything in me to forget, but every attempt just seems to bring the memory back with greater force-

I feel the tears at the edge of their dam.

How could...

...she possibly…?

I think I’m gonna throw up.

Because right now, even the word 'Carmichael' hits me with a recall so violent I feel like I’m being waterboarded in my own bile.

Because if, right now, I hear the word ‘Carmichael’ one more time I’m going to have a meltdown - I’m going to have a breakdown - I’m going to scream - or collapse into tears. I’m going to make a fool of myself, and I don’t even have the presence of mind to try to stop it.

Because there’s no mistaking it, though her complexion is fairer. The bewildering green eyes are still there, in grayer glory, but every bit as blindingly bright.

“There you are,” Mr. Espiritu is commenting with an expression I think he meant to make look annoyed, “Did you get stuck in line at the Salvation Army?”

“EAHHH,” she blares with an imitation of a buzzer noise that makes me flinch.

“Guess again, genius,” she sets a large styrofoam cup down on the director’s chair at the edge of the set and presses her knuckles into the palm of her hand like she’s kneading flesh, with a laugh. “I got into a fistfight at the juice bar.”

She stretches her arms out over her head and her whole body seems to lengthen as I stare up at her face dazedly with that irrational horror still writhing through my frame and morphing into a sickened fascination with this waking nightmare.

When she notices me, I watch her jaw drop as her eyebrows raise in a brilliant smile and the green eyes dazzle.

"Yikes, we've got a looker on our hands today,” she laughs. “What's your name, Angelface?" 

"Alicia." 

I whisper it so quietly I'm surprised she can hear me. But she clearly does, suddenly bending forward to what seems like half her height, and squishing my cheeks in both her hands, her vibrant face so close to my own that her nose nearly touches mine.

"Well, Miss Alicia, we are going to have a heyday working with you.” She laughs like glitter as she stands up straight again and claps her hands playfully. “I'm in love already! What are we all standing around for?! Beauty waits for no man. And it’s not even all that lenient toward other chicks either," she winks at me with a wide smile that…

Stop…

“You can call me Rudy, Hermosita. I'm Rút Maria Esperanza Carolina Carmichael, but everybody around here calls me Rudy or Tutti Frutti."

At that, she glares at Gabriel with an expression that tells me this joke must be ongoing, maybe even outside the office and I wish I could laugh, but the air gets caught in my throat, and I can’t inhale or exhale. Just feel like I’m choking on -

Poisonous deja vu. 

The room gets bigger and then smaller and then smaller again, and all the bodies are getting closer, pressing the air out of my lungs.

Please don’t touch me.

I don’t want anybody to touch me. 

I feel like screaming at each brush of fingers on my shoulders and my neck and my face as I’m hurried off to the makeup chair by the blond kid and a tallish, pretty woman in a hijab and monochromatic black who does my makeup with an unlit cigarette between her lips the whole time.

I think I disappear into a dressing room that’s even darker and more claustrophobic than the studio. I know I’m draped and drowned in a recreation of the silky, flowy, flowery dress from my painting, and I see a little, stuffy, chubby, stumpy mannequin in the corner that’s probably supposed to represent me, but reminds me of an effigy.

They put me in front of the mirror, and my reflection stares back at me like I’m the ghost and a new horror is flashing before my eyes every five seconds. I grow paler and paler, notwithstanding the fire in my cheeks they’ll confuse for roses.

“Would you look at that,” Abdul smiles, adjusting one of the flowers on the bosom of my dress with an air of pride, “Smile a little, Sweetness. You look pretty.”

I know.

I think I want to be anything else.

And I know it’s unreasonable to feel this sort of panic over working with Shannon’s sister when I know she’s a totally - almost totally, different person and there’s no way…this is nothing like working with him-

But every time someone says her name, I feel like screaming.

The shadow drowns me…

In a kind of reminiscent horror I didn’t know it was possible to feel for a face and a name-

This way.

A name other than “mother.”

A face other than my own - in the mirror-

Every time Miss…every time C…every time “Rudy” looks in my direction…

He wasn’t telling the truth though.

I get a venomous draught of aspish deja vu from those fiery eyes. It doesn’t matter if they’re prasiolite instead of emerald.

I still see h…

“You’re not afraid of water, right Princess?” she laughs at - to - with me. Would be with me if I was laughing.

“No.”

“We’re going to need you to lay under the surface so just let us know if you start to get scared at all, alright? Cool?”

Why would I have any reason to be scared?

“Man if I was a foot and 4 inches shorter, I would kill to steal your fit, girlie. We don’t find sexy trash like that just lying around at a thrift store. The style crew must have spent ages recreating that dress custom.”

I mumble something about measurements and mannequins.

“But even custom-made, it wouldn’t suit you half as well as your upcycled hot garbage,” Gabriel teases.

“Hey, Casanova,” she laughs, “I can pull off any look I want to. I’m what MAKES the garbage hot.” She adds this with a toss of her head, fluffing up her messy hair in a way that makes everyone else smile or laugh.

I try to smile too but it feels like gagging.

There’s just something wrong with me.

“Gabe, would you back up like a million feet so I can have some space, please? Your GIGANTIC head is casting a shadow.”

I’ve started stimming, rocking back and forth anxiously with my arms wrapped around me every time I get a minute to sit down by myself.

They think I’m bored.

I’m tired.

Tired of suppressing this nervous breakdown. Trying not to bite my fingers or fiddle with my hair or dig my nails into my face.

Honestly, what were the odds?

This feels like a horrible joke and the tears that have been on the surface all day continue ebbing and flowing but refuse to spill out, and that’s more exhausting but…

I guess it’s better for them…For them.

I should just be grateful that my mess isn’t messing up the shoot…somehow…

At least this time. There’s no fussing and harsh words and complaining.

I still feel like a chubby, curvy, 18-inch doll, only I’m easier to sully - ruin - make ugly - as they move me delicately and pose me - I’m still no good at trying to be pretty-

But at least this time they seem to realize that they can break me.

When they’re done copying the painting itself, there are still a dozen more photos to take with the same set or with bits and pieces of it. Flowers in my hair. ripples. Under the water. blossoms in my mouth. Real and fake flowers scrambled together with fake and almost-real-looking smiles.

I find myself sitting in the artificial puddle, scooping water and petals in both hands and every six seconds, Ms. Carmichael is asking me gently if I can raise my head. And I try, but I can’t…not enough to look anyone in the eye.

“We could go with a shy vibe. That could be kind of cute,” Mr. Espiritu suggests sympathetically, “like a timid damsel thing.”

“Being timid, is not cute,” Ms. Carmichael says abrasively, glaring at Mr. Espiritu with an unprovoked harshness that makes him flinch slightly, and suddenly she’s crouching just in front of me outside the pool with the camera hanging from her neck by its strap, too close to my face again.

“Can you try to look at me for just 40 seconds so we can get the picture, Angelface?”

Everything about her presence - her shadow pouring and dripping over mine gives me chills and gooseflesh, but I somehow nod without moving, staring at the eddying water. 

Nobody says anything at all, but I feel like I feel the little ghosts of their breaths rushing across. My skin.

Try.

At least try.

When I look up at her, I see a face, obscured by my lashes, flashing me a grin that tastes like a heart attack, but I clench my fists against the tangible chill and manage to smile something like a real smile that would almost make me proud of myself if today wasn’t today.

I don’t want to become good at lying.

But that’s all I can do.

By the time the shoot is over, I feel like I’ve been keel-hauled through all my shadows. 

By the time I get to see the pictures, I realize that my misery doesn’t show on my face.

And I’m not sure I like that.

I’m glad to shed that stupid, flowery white dress and get back into my own, ugly, normal clothes again. I don’t even take the time to dry my hair and the wet strands leave little droplets like tear stains on my tanktop.

Ms. Enam is promising that the dress will be carefully dried and given to me as a gift, along with copies of my photos and the magazine issue I’ll be appearing in after the interview. The intern with the ponytail is drying up the set inch by inch with a tatty, balding mop. Emelia’s already gone home, and I take the first chance I get to try and slip out the front door and get to my car.

At least to my car before a crash-

...Leaves me paralyzed again.

Weeping on the back seat.

At least there, I can fall to pieces in peace.

But before I can escape, I’m stopped with my hand on the front door handle by Miss Carmichael’s shadow passing over mine.

I know it’s hers before I even turn around, and I have to force myself to breathe slowly twice before I can look up at her face.

But I do.

Someone be proud of me, please.

I feel like shrinking back and disappearing, and I’m sure I must look like a deer in headlights, but she doesn’t seem to notice, or say anything about it, just asks gravely:

“Hey, do you do modeling often?”

I hope I never do it again.

Is she about to criticize me for making their jobs harder for them? 

Before I can mouth an apology she continues.

“Me and some artists I know run an art class where we get live models for our students each class, and we’d be honored to have you model for us some time if you’re interested. Think about it.”

She smacks what I think is a business card into the palm of my hand as she heads back toward the studio, but I don’t even see it, closing my hand around the small piece of paper.

She slips through the door, and there are no shadows left but the ones reaching through the windows from the last scrapings of sunset, but the nightmare doesn’t fade out as she does.