Chapter Five

[November 13th, 1968; 10:20pm]

Teresa stood over me like a disappointed nurse, arms folded, lips pressed thin. I stayed flat on the hotel bed. After today: the will, the fighting, Nathan storming out… I felt like a towel wrung dry.

She didn’t blink. “What?” I muttered into the pillow.

“At least try to be human,” she said, grabbing my ankles.

Before I could protest, she dragged me right off the mattress, my elbows scraping the carpet. I got whatever father gave me in his will along with a necklace from mother. Teresa couldn’t bear the thought of me laying in bed for most of my time so she dragged me out of bed by my legs.

“At least have some fun once in your life, girlfriend,” she spoke before searching through her closet just to try and find something for me to wear. I curled deeper into the bedsheets, hoping Teresa would lose interest. I just wanted to relax after a long day of listening to the Executor reading and passing out what was now ours.

I didn’t really care much about going outside; being the stubborn little shit that she was, she hauled me into the bathroom like luggage. The dress she picked was short and light greenish-colored, a bow stitched at the back like a pity prize. I stared at it, trying to figure out which part of me it was supposed to flatter.

Teresa didn’t care. Foundation, eyeliner, hair teased high. Her hands worked with military precision. “You look great,” she said. I looked like a doll someone left in the sun too long. But arguing only made her double down, so I swallowed it. She then put Drosselmeyer’s nutcracker back in the bag as we were going to leave in the morning and soon enough, we left the hotel room.

Thoughts were racing through my head as she gently pushed me out of the room. What if someone slipped into the room while we were gone? What if they took it?

My brain jumped through every disaster: a thief, a soldier, a mouse-king breaking through the window—don’t ask me why. My head is going in circles because now I’m imagining that nutcracker that Teresa just put away having an australian accent. It’s so weird too as well, I haven’t even taken any drugs.

It didn’t matter how much I begged of Teresa not to do this, she assured me that I’ve been spending too much time thinking about the past; especially since the hearing of the will was only a couple hours ago. The elevator swallowed us, then spit us out into the strip.

Heat, neon, cigarette smoke. The kind of air that clung to your skin. Teresa walked with purpose, dodging crowds and broken dreams. The casino she chose wasn’t one of the famous ones. This was just a glowing trap in a parking lot, lights flashing like it was calling for help.

Protesters leaned against lampposts and in the middle of the streets, waving signs.

JESUS SAVES.

HELL BURNS YOU ALIVE.

Their voices tangled with the slot machines. Teresa turned my head away from them and toward the door. “Fun,” she said, as if it were that easy. The flashing colors beckoned people to walk in and to go to a world where their money flies out of their wallet either to be returned at a higher amount or gone forever.

“Check it out Nance,” Teresa smirked while walking around the casino floor with me as my eyes zoomed everywhere. The chinging of the machines, the pattering of the dice, the multi-colored neon lighting that subdued my eyes got to me badly. The next thing I knew, my hands shaded the overstimulation a bit which thankfully allowed me to relax a bit so I wouldn’t get so overworked by the intense build-ups.

There we were in the next hot minute; my body feeling Teresa’s cold hands pushing me towards a table with what seemed to be a couple men staring right at me. My hands twitching at the wooden exteriors; the silent treatments eyeing me like I was nothing more than an outsider. Teresa soon slid next to me in one of the casino chairs before laughing. 

My eyes darted in multiple different directions; specifically to Teresa’s pocket, feeling them tremble in fear before she took out her wallet, along with drinking from a sweating bottle of Schlitz like she’d been sponsored. “I swear to Christ, Nance,” she said, exhaling the kind of smoke that smelled like she’d been chewing on the factory exhaust, “you don’t need to be nervous over a small game of Texas Hold’em.” Of course, she had to pull out her packet of cigars. I love the girl to death but sometimes, I even question why I’m in this situation to begin with.

The table was a circle of half-smiles and broken dreams. Neon from the walls painted everyone’s faces in nuclear red, like we were gathered around a fallout shelter instead of a card game. Behind the dealer, a cocktail waitress paused, watching us—all cheekbones and mascara, like she was studying the anatomy of a shark attack. The dealer—a man with sunken eyelids and hands that moved like the cards were made of glass—tapped the table.

“Blinds posted. Let’s play.”

He flicked two cards toward me. They landed with an almost polite sound. I turned them over like I was checking for mold on bread.

Queen of Hearts. Queen of Spades.

I blinked. I’d seen poker hands in movies. Two of the same card meant something, but I didn’t know what.“Oh hoooo,” Teresa whispered. “Don’t move. Don’t breathe. Just sit there like the dead fish you are.” I am not dead, I thought. I am just tired.

Across from me sat a man in a pinstripe suit. His fingers drummed on his chips, nails glossy, cufflinks glinting like bullets. To his right: a woman with hair lacquered into a helmet, chewing gum like she wanted to kill it. They glanced at me, then at Teresa, and visibly underestimated us. Which was fair. I was a wool sweater in a lion pit.

The betting started. Chips clacked like bones. Teresa shoved some of ours forward before I even exhaled.

“Call,” she said for me.

I touched my queens. They were calmer than I was. The flop came like God dropping answers on a table. Queen of Diamonds. Seven of Clubs. Nine of Hearts.

Three queens. I didn’t know the term, but I knew the feeling: my pulse started climbing my throat. No one spoke. No one blinked. The dealer’s hands hovered over the cards like a priest preparing for communion.

The businessman’s jaw tightened.

The mod girl tapped her nails, pale pink polish chipped to hell. Teresa kicked me under the table. “You’re colder than LBJ,” she whispered. “You could start a war with that face.”

“You know, I think I should turn in for the ni–” I suggested before she slammed me back down onto the seat, smiling like a mad man.

“Girl, trust me,” Teresa spoke with a smile, “you are in it TO WIN IT!”

The casino lights washed everything pink and gold—like stained glass smeared with blood. Betting moved around the circle.

Someone folded.

Someone cursed.

Teresa’s fingers trembled. It was not in fear, just the Dexedrine hitting her bloodstream like gasoline in a matchbox. She smiled like sin. The dealer burned one more card.

 The Turn? Seven of Spades. The table groaned like an injured animal. Even I knew that was good. Queens and sevens: three of one, two of the other.

A house. A cathedral. Teresa’s voice crawled up from her throat, hoarse with cigar smoke, “Sweet Mary Mother of Texas. You’re baptized now.”

The businessman lifted his whiskey. “You girls serious players?” I was about to speak before Teresa’s coarse cigar budded laughter filled the table with ash and smoke.

“We play Go Fish on the bedroom floor,” Teresa said, ashes spilling. “Tonight’s special.” In my mind, I knew that she was bluffing.. Well she wasn’t bluffing about the Go Fish part but I never decided to even play that game in my entire life. Not especially since I’m stuck in the middle of everything, just gambling my life away.

“Raise,” she added, shoving chips forward like she was throwing rocks at God. The mod girl snapped her gum and folded with contempt.

One of the boys followed, muttering about bad stars and bad luck. Only the businessman stayed, eyes like a wolf stalking wounded prey. “Seriously Terry,” I shook, “I think I should head back, I’m not supposed to–” 

The dealer burned again.

River: Seven of Diamonds.

It was obscene.

Four sevens on the felt, like someone was spelling out my doom in red neon. The businessman slapped both palms on the table. “No goddamn way.”

I stared at the board like it was a message from the will reading; my hands tremble as Teresa pulled me in with a terrifying cheshire cat grin forming on her face. It was so uneasy, I couldn’t bear to watch. The dealer’s voice split the silence. “Showdown.”

The businessman threw down two nines. It was the sort of hand men brag about in bars until closing time. I placed my queens gently, as if I was returning library books. The table erupted. Teresa launched out of her chair, beer in one hand, cigar in the other, laughing so loud I thought we’d be thrown out.

“Haha! Nance, you son of a gun!” she hollered, accent thick enough to butter bread. “She ain’t seen a deck of cards in her whole damn life and she just killed a man!” I didn’t speak. I just watched the dealer rake the chips into a mountainous tide and push them toward me. Plastic and clay, neon and smoke.

They slid over the felt like a body being delivered to its embalmer. The mountain of chips looked like another kind of funeral. I sat there, dizzy. Terrified. Victorious. Pissed off, as well. I just stood up, grabbed my winnings, cashed out and spoke, “I’m going back to the hotel room.. I need a minute..” Teresa knew that I really meant business so in a sense of urgency, she guided me back to the hotel room before the two of us got undressed for the night.

“Hey Nance,” Teresa sighed.

“Yeah?” I responded.

“I’m sorry..”

“For what?”

“For making you feel uncomfortable. I just wanted to break you out of your study factor for a bit. You know, so you don’t have to worry about your family and your studies until tomorrow?”

“I appreciate the thought,” I spoke, holding myself together, “but maybe I should try and realign myself.”

“I.. understand,” Teresa sighed before she jumped in her bed and cuddled herself close to her pillow, “Good night.”

“Good Night Teresa.” I went over to turn off the lights before my feet dragged across the floor; the cold marble got my feet locked to it’s frozen state before I just stare at the mirror. Looking at my exhausted face, I felt like something inside me just perished or died inside. The bags drooping a bit from under my eyes and my chest still tightened from the tension that was built up just because of a singular game of Texas Hold’em.

I blinked, and for a moment I wasn’t sure if I’d passed out. The sink was running again. Water dripped between my fingers, warm at first, then cooling into a thin sheet over my palms. Color bled back into my vision gray tile, chrome faucets, the pale blur of my own reflection. My face looked wrong, too washed-out, too still.

Midnight couldn’t be far.

As I straightened, the feeling hit me again. The same pressure I’d felt crossing the casino floor earlier: eyes on the back of my neck, someone trailing a step behind. I told myself it was paranoia. The stale smoke from the lobby. But there it was an unmistakable flash of red in the mirror behind me. A pinprick of light I couldn’t trace to any fixture.

My fingers clenched the porcelain, whitening at the knuckles. Kids’ laughter crackled somewhere in the room, distant at first, then threading through the walls. My heart stuttered. The sound warped into singing (soft, childish) like an old song that I’ve heard on the radio too many times.

“My lonely daydreams must be the magic.. to bring me back those happy memories…”

The lyrics jammed into my skull, every syllable tinny, breathless. I pressed my palms against my ears, but the voice only grew clearer.

“Memories have waited constant and true…”

A second voice whispered. Closer than the first. “Give him back.”

I froze. “Him?” The word barely reached my lips. The singing faltered, distorting into static. A chorus of laughter replaced it, rising like steam from a broken pipe. The red dot pulsed in the mirror; once… twice, and the reflection fractured. Not violently, not cinematic but just enough to warp my outline into something skinned and dark, as if the glass had turned into water and my body was drowning beneath the surface.

Something formed behind the blur. A rat-sized shape at first, twitching near the red light. Then larger. Taller. The silhouette stretched upward, long-legged and hunched. A voice giggled through the mirror. It was formless, maybe genderless. “I see you. I found you.” the voice faltered with what sounded like it was from a busted up radio.

The thing leaned toward the glass, and I staggered back. My legs barely obeyed me. Its outline sharpened: a black mass, one glowing eye, teeth like splintered porcelain. The claws were wrong. Too human, fingers dragging grooves into the reflective surface. “Come closer, Little Silberhaus.” it growled. I couldn’t breathe. Every muscle in my body locked. The red eye pulsed again, and the creature thinned to a shadow. “I remember you. Since the day he died.” The glass shook.

BANG.

My hand groped for the doorknob, slipping off it as if it had been dipped in grease. “That Christmas Eve… When the little toy tried to protect you.” it continued.

BANG.

The mirror shattered. Not into cinematic shards. More like it collapsed, sloughing off in heavy, jagged chunks. I shielded my face, but a sliver sliced my cheek. Cold air rushed through the empty frame. At first there was nothing. Then something hooked the front of my shirt.

A claw, like a mechanical gator’s jaw, snapped tight and jerked me forward. I braced against the tiles, nails scraping into grout, arms trembling. Through the broken glass, the red eye crept closer, illuminating a body of exposed wires and rotten fur: half robot, half carcass. Its jaw hung crooked on metal hinges. A cape… cheap fabric, torn and hung from its shoulders. A magician’s hat tilted over its skull. “Hide him if you like,” it hissed, pulling. “You can’t escape your fate.”

I screamed. My foot lashed out, slipper colliding with its face. The hat flew back. Sparks erupted from its eye as the thing recoiled. The grip on my shirt vanished. I hit the tile, cold pressing through my clothes, pain blooming through my ribs. The ceiling blurred, light smearing into streaks. My vision collapsed inward.

Black. Nothing.