It’s the light that wakes me. Morning light from a window, searing the backs of my eyelids red. What a strange, strange dream I had. Can’t remember any of it now, funny. Must be those blanks again. But the feeling of it lingers in my body—like I went deep down into the depths of myself and to wake up was to swim a long way back up to the surface, to come up gasping for air. And now? Now, my heavy lids are still closed, and I hear the sound of chimes like a strange church is nearby. A very pretty mist over my thoughts. As I wander through the mist, I see the reddest roses in vases being arranged by white hands. Their downward-pointing thorns like shining spikes.
When I open my eyes, what greets me is the nicest surprise. Other. Mother, I mean. There’s Mother right above me, smiling down at me from heaven. She’s lying in a red bed on the ceiling, what are you doing up there, Mother? She looks like she, too, awoke from a very strange dream, like she may have been wandering in some mist of the mind herself. What did you dream about, Mother? Will you tell me?
But Mother just smiles like some things are secrets.
Well, that makes sense. Everything was always a secret with you, wasn’t it? Like Beauty. You haven’t changed a bit. Must have been a good dream, whatever it was, because you look so unbelievably refreshed. Not like someone dead at all. You’re glowing, Mother, truly. It’s amazing to see you. Making me a bit emotional in the morning, I have to say. I feel a tear slipping down.
Oh look, Mother, you’re crying too. Don’t cry, we can’t both cry. Look, I’m happy again, okay? See? I’ll be happy for you.
Mother smiles again. She’s being happy just for me, too.
Oh, I see. Not Mother up there after all. Me. The ceiling is a mirror and that’s me looking up at the glass, me smiling down. Must be my bedroom. This is my bed and these are my red silk sheets. For a minute I’m very sad that it’s just me alone here. An emptiness opens up that feels bottomless. A blackness sits on my chest, pressing its knee into my throat. But I have to smile, too. Because that means that the face up there is mine, isn’t it? My face, not Mother’s, yet it looks so like Mother’s. My face defying how many natural laws. That Glow, a most heavenly Glow. I’m mesmerized. If only Mother could see.
As I rise from the bed, I notice red jars shining prettily on the insanity. The vanity. My vanity. So very shiny and red, they do catch the eye. Gleaming like sentient apples. Each one full of skin stuff that’s mine to plunder. So I’ll plunder. Make a real morning of it. In the Journey of Beauty, after all, the ridicule is key. Ritual. Though it’s going to be hard to improve upon what I’m seeing up there. If that’s me.
Of course that’s you, the jars seem to whisper. Who else would it be?
I derange—arrange the jars into exfoliants and mists, into toners and essences, into serums and emulsions, and finally moisturizers and oils, which are the somethings of the skin. Capes? Cardigans? Some sort of outerwear, anyway. The jars have no labels or instructions, which is funny, so I do it by texture or by guess. As I derange, I smile to myself. I keep thinking it’s Mother I see there in the insanity mirror, what a strange trick. Wait, not a trick. It is Mother! She’s back, oh joke! I mean, joy. Joy. Are you back to do the morning ridicule with me, Mother?
And Mother smiles with her very red lips. Definitely.
Now, we don’t need to wash our face, right? At night, one must wash off the day, and in the morning, one must wash off the night—you taught me that. But what if we wake to find the night has already been thoroughly washed away? It appears we were thoroughly washed by the very nice people at Rouge, our friends. Your friends and now my friends, Mother. Our face is so terribly clear this morning. If we washed any more, that would just be going too far. And then what would we even have left of our faces, right?
Mother’s nodding with me, yes. What would we even have left?
Let’s skip cleansing and go right to acid, my favorite. Mother’s favorite too. Acid is like cleansing but better, right, Mother? It goes deep into the ick you can’t see with your human eye, and it just melts that away like a witch. Shall we do the one that smells like it’ll numb your face or the one that smells like burning? You pick, Mother.
Mother’s smile says, Surprise me.
Now normally, if your face was on fire, you’d scream like a witch, wouldn’t you? Not me and Mother. We smile while our faces burn, we love it so. Because we know magic is happening, just like in a fairy tale. Transformational. We light a cigarette so as to add to the smoke. First one of the morning is always heaven, isn’t it, Mother? Mother actually appears to be in a kind of heaven in the glass. A garden, it looks like. Surrounded by such tall red flowers. Red and spiky with thorns. What garden is that you’re in, Mother?
But Mother doesn’t want to tell me. Mother just smiles while our faces burn and we smoke our cigarettes in tandem. Another secret she wants to keep. She loves sitting here at the insanity with me—our insanity, I should say—even though I’m on one side of the glass and she’s very much on the other side in what looks like another, more beautiful world. Will you tell me about it, Mother? Mother shakes her head no. She can’t. She’s with me here in the glass, though. She loves this morning’s ridicule that we’re doing together. It’s hers, after all. She taught it to me, didn’t you? Well not willingly, never willingly. I learned it by watching you in the mirror. How many nights and how many mornings. How many mirrors and how many years. How many ridicules. Watching just over your shoulder, you were such magic to my eyes then. And I’d say, What’s that you’re putting on your face, Mother? And you’d look at me in the glass like you’re doing right now. Smiling sadly just like that. And remember what you said to me every time? Something about never minding. Something about blood. How mine saves me, I remember that. Can’t remember what about my blood saves me. I’m having just a bit of trouble this morning with my memory. Those blanks I seem to get after I see our friends at Rouge. It’ll come back to me, I’m sure. Everything will. It’ll all come dancing back like a pair of red shoes, right?