The Possessions

by Sara Flannery Murphy

  Ana angles her face from side to side, sucking in her cheeks, then smooths down her hair. Floating next to her in the mirror, my own reflection feels extraneous. Ghostly. “By the way,” Ana says, “I was wondering if you’ve seen Thisbe around lately.”

  “Thisbe,” I repeat.

  She sighs. “Please tell me you know her.” When I don’t respond, she prompts: “Tiny thing. Blond? Your color, maybe. She joined at the start of the year.”

  “I know who she is,” I say.

  “So you’ve seen her around? She owes me some money.”

  “She left,” I say. “Not long after you did.”

  In the mirror, Ana’s gaze meets my own. She seems on the verge of speaking. Then she turns, moving away as quickly as she came.

  “Good luck with your client,” she says.

  Mr. Braddock. Welcome back.”

  I find myself watching closely as Patrick moves to sit. His movements carry an automatic assuredness, the muscle memory of better days. It makes him vulnerable and powerful at the same time. I imagine the women in his life bringing him home-baked pies in low-cut dresses, making dewy promises that they’ll do whatever they can to help him through this difficult time.

  I angle my knees away from Patrick’s. “A small piece of business, Mr. Braddock,” I say. “You left your wife’s lipstick here at the Elysian Society last week.”

  He blinks. “I left it for you,” he says. “I want you to have it.”

  “I see.” My face betrays nothing. “Do you have a special message for your wife today?”

  He runs his thumb quickly over his chin. “Not really. I want to talk to her again, same as last time.” He smiles. “Does it help you, knowing what I’ll say to my wife?”

  “This is about you and Sylvia. Don’t think about me.”

  Patrick’s smile deepens. “Hard to do when you’re sitting right there.”

  “Think of me as a means to an end.”

  “That seems a little harsh,” he says. “How many people do you work with in a day, anyhow?”

  “It depends,” I say after a second of hesitation. “Some days five or six. Other days fewer.”

  “And it doesn’t get hard on you, doing this with so many people?”

  I consider Patrick, stalling. With a few male clients, I detect flashes of a proprietary attitude in the way they stare at me. But I recall Patrick’s abashed smile in his photos and something shifts: I see in him the traces of a man who’s humbled by his own life, a man who tries conscientiously to balance the scales.

  And here I am, a woman sitting in front of him in a dress as thin as tissue paper.

  “It’s not difficult at all,” I say. “I enjoy my work. And now, Mr. Braddock, we should begin.”

  Surprise passes over his face. “Of course. I apologize.”

  After I swallow the lotus, I watch Patrick for as long as I can. As the eyelids lower, as my mind lifts away from the body, cloud light and drifting. He doesn’t move this time. He keeps to himself, maintaining a safe distance.

  I open my eyes and look directly into Patrick’s. I’m smiling. The surface of my skin is warm and sparkling, my head heavy with a blissful drowsiness.

  “I’ve missed you,” Patrick says, low. “You can’t know how much I’ve missed you.”

  but I’ve been right here

  A sharp splinter of confusion breaks through my happiness.

  I’ve been right here all along

  He leans forward. I know that he’s about to reach for me. He’s going to take my hand in his, run his thumb along my skin. Something else gives. My smile turns heavy on my face. A limb that’s fallen asleep. He becomes a client again, and I’m a body, untouchable and temporary.

  “Mr. Braddock,” I say, with an effort.

  Patrick sits back. He doesn’t hide the movement of his gaze over my mouth, my hands in my lap, my bare feet planted on the floor. I sit, barely breathing as I allow him to piece me back together.

  “Aren’t you cold?” he asks. “I’m cold looking at you. It’s freezing in here.”

  “Not at all,” I say. “I’m quite comfortable.”

  He stares at my bare arms. “I feel like I should offer you my coat.”

  “That won’t be necessary.” I catch an unexpected note in my words. Close to flirtatiousness; a bright spill against my voice.

  Patrick smiles, but he’s distracted, seriousness already moving in behind the smile. “Tell me something,” he says, near a whisper now. “Do you remember?”

  I shake my head.

  “After you take that,” he says, flicking a hand toward the lotus, “do you remember what you say? What she says,” he corrects.

  “Mr. Braddock, bodies don’t have access to these exchanges,” I say. “It’s a private process. Don’t worry.”

  “I know, but—”

  There’s a staccato series of taps on the door. Jane opens the door to Room 12 and leans in, expression bland. “Mr. Braddock,” she says, “I’d be happy to direct you toward the exit if you’ve forgotten the way.”

  “No,” he says at once, and his voice has turned formal. “Thank you. I remember.”

  As Patrick leaves Room 12, he hesitates for the briefest moment on the threshold, as if he wants to turn and look at me. But then he walks into the corridor, and the part of my brain that follows him as if magnetized, sensitive to his every move, strains after him.

  “Quite the chatterbox,” Jane says, once he’s out of earshot. “Isn’t he?”

  I straighten my shoulders. “No more than some of the others,” I say, daring myself to look at her coolly and evenly.

  “Hmm.” She gazes at my mouth. “He’s the one with the wife and the lipstick?”

  “Mr. Braddock is a good client,” I say. “He’s reliable and polite. I’ll be glad if he stays with me.”

  “Oh, he will,” Jane says, dismissive now. Patrick left the chair skewed when he left. She takes the back of the chair with both hands and straightens it in one neat, aggressive movement. “That type always stays with the same body.”

  At home, I’m edgy. I walk through my routine: dinner, washing dishes, watching TV, folding laundry. I try to focus, but I find myself staring off into space, clutching a half-folded blouse like it’s a prop that someone forced into my hand.

  Patrick’s question in Room 12 has echoed through the rest of my day. Usually, I experience my client’s loved ones as abstract and raw-edged presences. Vivid, quickly fading scraps of other lives.

  I was evasive with Patrick in Room 12 today. The truth is that Sylvia’s memories have lingered. One image in particular, clear and deep. I remember Patrick’s hand against me, at my waist. The golden hairs at his wrist, his long fingers holding the ghost of a summer tan. One or two fingernails endearingly frayed, as if he bites them when nobody is watching. I could reach right into the memory, interlace my fingers with his. Feel the light calluses of his fingertips.

  In the bathroom, I lie in the bathtub, the rush of water surrounding me. My proportions distort slightly beneath the surface. I reach my hand between my legs. Although I haven’t touched myself like this in months, my muscles begin the movement automatically.

  When everything in me turns tight and frantic with desire, I slip my upper body under the surface. The water laps warm against my lips. Against my ears, all I can hear is a pulsating and distant roar. My hips lift of their own accord, greedy for more.

  I submerge my entire head. My nose stings. I open my eyes, stare through the water at the creeping stains on the ceiling, until my lungs burn. At the moment when I think my entire body will pop like a balloon, I come up gasping.

  In the silvery surface of the faucet, my face is so warped it could belong to anybody. My wet hair, my wild eyes, my mouth a dark, open smear as I suck in breath after breath after breath.

  FIVE

  The bedroom floor. I come back to myself so quietly and easily that I don’t realize anything is unusual at first. Then the wrongness of the situation descen
ds on me.

  Through the open wedge of curtains, the sky is just lightening. I kneel on the floor. A reverential pose, like a praying child. My hands lie clenched against my thighs. I look around at the landmarks of my bedroom, anchoring myself. My bureau, right in front of me. The bed across the room. The end table, holding the Braddocks’ photos. Sylvia’s face shines out of the shadows.

  try to remember

  try

  In my own bed again, waiting for sleep, I scan my memory. I don’t know if I’ve ever sleepwalked before. What I do in my sleep, my unconscious tics and habits, how I appear to other people: these are parts of myself I can’t decode alone. I’d need a partner, an observer.

  I turn to face the wall, not letting myself start the calculation: how many years it’s been since I’ve had someone like that in my life.

  Unlike many of my clients, with their formal, vaguely funereal outfits, the client I meet on Thursday morning wears black leggings tight as snakeskin and a velour track jacket. A heart-shaped zipper pull dangles beneath the pouchy dip of her throat.

  “Welcome to the Elysian Society.” I smooth my skirt over my thighs. “This is your first time working with us, Ms. Fowler?”

  “Mrs. Fowler,” she corrects, swinging her ankle. “Candace Fowler.”

  I nod a brisk apology. “And whom do you wish to contact today, Mrs. Fowler?”

  Her voice drops into a conspiratorial hush. “First, I need to know I can trust you.”

  “We have a strict confidentiality policy at the—”

  But Mrs. Fowler holds out her hand. “Nuh-uh, nuh-uh, I know all that crap. I’m asking if I can I trust you, personally. Not the whole place, but you.”

  I’m briefly transfixed by her eyelashes. Sticky with mascara, wavering insect limbs.

  She seems to take my silence as cooperation. “I want to contact Hopeful Doe. I lied,” she adds, proud. “On the forms, I said I wanted to contact my cousin. But I’m here to bring that sweet girl’s killer to justice. Get some answers.”

  “I’m afraid you can’t contact the deceased unless you knew her personally during life.”

  She’s sucking hard on her lips. “This murder affects me personally, young lady,” she says. “It affects my family. She showed up near my home. It was my daughter who found her. My girl, forced to see something like that.” Mrs. Fowler leans toward me as if she can transmit the horror through physical proximity. “I know how these things work. The police will lose interest. Meanwhile, I’ll be going to bed every night wondering who’s out there.”

  “Mrs. Fowler,” I say, “I understand your concern. But if you’d read our policy—”

  “Oh, all right.” Her voice grows honeyed; we’re just a couple of girls exchanging gossip over coffee. “I always come prepared.” She winks, a quick snap of her eyelid, like a baby doll tilted back. “I’m not sure how much of a cut they give you, sweetie, but I’m sure it’s not enough. The pay is never enough for this work, is it? I can only imagine what it’s like for you girls.” I stiffen. “Whatever they pay you, I’ll double it. Triple it, I don’t care.”

  “You don’t seem to understand,” I say, frustration turning me blunt. “I can guarantee that you won’t find the answers you’re looking for, Mrs. Fowler. Have you brought an object that belonged to Hopeful Doe during her lifetime?” I rush ahead, knowing that she hasn’t. “Besides, victims who died violently aren’t known for being compliant. They’re confused. Their memories can be scrambled, unpredictable.”

  Mrs. Fowler cocks her head, pert as a lapdog. “Isn’t there some way around that?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  At this, Mrs. Fowler smiles as if she’s caught me in an obvious lie. “It just so happens that I did my research, young lady,” she says. “I know you can just take more of those.” She gestures at the lotus in its paper cup. “Two or three.”

  I open my mouth and then shut it, biting off my words on an inhale. There are stray pieces of information floating around. Shared by amateurs, small-time entrepreneurs, former bodies spiteful or cavalier enough to share whatever they knew. Some of the information is accurate. Most of it isn’t. Still, Mrs. Fowler shifts in my eyes, turning from housewife-gone-vigilante to somebody more thorough. A woman accustomed to getting her own way.

  “The Elysian Society simply doesn’t work that way,” I say. “If you’re interested in taking that kind of risk, I’m sure you could locate a willing participant elsewhere.”

  “Find some quack online, you mean? Show up to an abandoned building and get murdered myself in the process?” Mrs. Fowler sniffs deeply, like she’s trying to find the source of an odor. “Nah. This place might not look like much, but I’ve heard it’s the best you can get.”

  “I’m not sure that you fully understand what’s at stake,” I say. “Taking more than one lotus isn’t safe. It could hurt the body.”

  She sweeps her eyes up and down my body. “You strike me as a hearty-enough specimen.”

  The hairs at the back of my neck rise. “Surely you don’t expect me to endanger myself.”

  “You chose this line of work,” Mrs. Fowler says. “You chose to treat your body this way. Why not at least do some good?”

  I stand too quickly, helium light. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

  For a moment, it seems she won’t budge. Then Mrs. Fowler is a flurry of motion, rising and heading for the door. She keeps talking: “What you do here, people might call it freaky, but you could help people. The fact that you don’t? It’s shameful.” She looks right at me. “That baby’s blood is on your hands now.”

  When Jane comes into Room 12 a few minutes later, she stops short, looking between me and the empty chair. “She wanted to contact Hopeful Doe,” I say, weary. “I’ve sent her away.”

  Jane’s expression is blank for a moment, then takes on a grim focus. “You did the right thing, sending her away. I’ll be sure that Mrs. Renard hears about this.”

  “Thank you,” I say.

  “You’ve been following that case?” Jane asks.

  “A little,” I say. “It’s so sad.”

  “Very sad.” Jane glances at the empty chair, as if some version of Mrs. Fowler lingers there. “You did the right thing,” she repeats.

  Coming into the waiting room after Mrs. Fowler, I catch a low murmur of voices. One voice rises up from the tangle of words, followed by muffled laughter.

  Curious, I move to the farthest end of the room. They’re clustered on the floor, cross-legged. I realize that they chose this spot because they’re partially hidden by a couch; Jane won’t walk by and spot them. Ana sits against the wall, head tilted to show the long lines of her throat. A trace of a bitter scent surrounds her, overwhelming in the bland air of the waiting room.

  “Can we help you?” Ana asks.

  The other three bodies have stopped talking. They examine me with a bemused hostility, like kids on a playground approached by a younger child. When I make eye contact with the girl sitting directly in front of me, she smiles. I recognize her: Dora.

  “Jesus, sit down already,” Ana says. “It’s making me nervous just looking at you.” She pats the floor with one hand, the way she’d call a dog.

  Automatically, I sit at the edge of the group, folding my knees beneath me.

  “What were you saying?” an older woman asks Dora.

  “Oh, yeah.” Dora scratches at her neck. “The guy who lost his wife. His wife was thirty-something when she died, so I don’t understand why he’d choose me. I just turned twenty. I thought I’d be channeling granddaughters or daughters or high school friends.”

  “Twenty, thirties,” the woman says. “What’s the difference? Wait till you’re my age. You only get grannies. Half the men who walk through those doors are my age or older, but you wouldn’t think it to look at my client list.”

  “You’re talking about Womack?” Ana asks Dora. When Dora nods, she goes on: “Womack is a rite of passage around here. If you’re h
alfway pretty, you’re going to get him at some point. He watches for the new bodies. He tries them all.” She winks. “A real connoisseur.”

  “You figure his wife was a swinger?” the older woman asks. “Maybe this is what she wanted. Get a cuter body each time. Doesn’t sound so bad to me.”

  The others laugh.

  “Yeah, or maybe she didn’t want this at all,” Ana says. I can’t tell whether her sternness is mocking or sincere. Ana can be like this, disguising her emotions as exaggerated versions of themselves, like caricatured masks. “Maybe she was a good little wifey, and Womack never cheated. Now he gets to have his cake and eat it too. Feel all virtuous, visiting his dead wife. See a pretty girl in her slip at the same time.”

  Dora wraps her arms around her upper body. I remember how hard it was to grow accustomed to the thinness of the dress, a sensation like being naked in a room full of strangers. “He can just do that?” she asks.

  “Of course,” the other girl says. Tiny pockmarks dot her nose and the skin above her lips; scars left behind by piercings. “If he pays for it.”

  “I thought clients would want to work with just one body,” Dora says.

  “Most can’t,” says Ana. “We don’t have a stellar employee retention rate.”

  “If you last for a year or two, you’ll have regulars,” the older woman adds. “But until then, you’re stuck with whatever you can get.”

  “I’d like to have regulars,” Dora says.

  “Careful what you wish for.” Ana lifts her hand to her mouth. She holds a cigarette delicately between her fingers. She makes eye contact with me briefly, daring me to react. “The way I see it,” she says, once she lowers the cigarette, “the clients who don’t care are the true romantics. They can look at any random face and find the person they love. It’s sweet, if you stop and think about it.”

  “Regulars must care more,” Dora persists. “You’re not just a body to them.”

  “But you are just a body to them,” I say. “You always are. You have to be.”

  The others turn to me in a little flurry of movement, as if they’d forgotten I was here.