Viktoriya SHvab - The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

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To Patricia

For never once forgetting.

The old gods may be great, but they are neither kind nor merciful. They are fickle, unsteady as moonlight on water, or shadows in a storm. If you insist on calling them, take heed: be careful what you ask for, be willing to pay the price. And no matter how desperate or dire, never pray to the gods that answer after dark.

Estele Magritte

16421719

Villon-sur-Sarthe, France

July 29, 1714

A girl is running for her life.

The summer air burns at her back, but there are no torches, no angry mobs, only the distant lanterns of the wedding party, the reddish glow of the sun as it breaks against the horizon, cracks and spills across the hills, and the girl runs, skirts tangling in the grass as she surges toward the woods, trying to beat the dying light.

Voices carry on the wind, calling her name.

Adeline? Adeline? Adeline!

Her shadow stretches out aheadtoo long, its edges already blurringand small white flowers tumble from her hair, littering the ground like stars. A constellation left in her wake, almost like the one across her cheeks.

Seven freckles. One for every love shed have, thats what Estele had said, when the girl was still young.

One for every life shed lead.

One for every god watching over her.

Now, they mock her, those seven marks. Promises. Lies. Shes had no loves, shes lived no lives, shes met no gods, and now she is out of time.

But the girl doesnt slow, doesnt look back; she doesnt want to see the life that stands there, waiting. Static as a drawing. Solid as a tomb.

Instead, she runs.

PART ONETHE GODS THAT ANSWER AFTER DARK

Title of Piece:Revenir

Artist: Arlo Miret

Date: 172122 AD

Medium: ash wood, marble

Location: On loan from the Muse dOrsay

Description: A sculptural series of five wooden birds in various postures and stages of pre-flight, mounted on a narrow marble plinth.

Background: A diligent autobiographer, Miret kept journals that provide insight into the artists mind and process. Regarding the inspiration for Revenir, Miret attributed the idea to a figurine found on the streets of Paris in the winter of 1715. The wooden bird, found with a broken wing, is reputedly re-created as the fifth in the sequence (albeit intact), about to take flight.

Estimated Value: $175,000

New York City

March 10, 2014I

The girl wakes up in someone elses bed.

She lies there, perfectly still, tries to hold time like a breath in her chest; as if she can keep the clock from ticking forward, keep the boy beside her from waking, keep the memory of their night alive through sheer force of will.

She knows, of course, that she cant. Knows that hell forget. They always do.

It isnt his faultit is never their faults.

The boy is still asleep, and she watches the slow rise and fall of his shoulders, the place where his dark hair curls against the nape of his neck, the scar along his ribs. Details long memorized.

His name is Toby.

Last night, she told him hers was Jess. She lied, but only because she cant say her real nameone of the vicious little details tucked like nettles in the grass. Hidden barbs designed to sting. What is a person, if not the marks they leave behind? She has learned to step between the thorny weeds, but there are some cuts that cannot be avoideda memory, a photograph, a name.

In the last month, she has been Claire, Zoe, Michellebut two nights ago, when she was Elle, and they were closing down a late-night caf after one of his gigs, Toby said that he was in love with a girl named Jesshe simply hadnt met her yet.

So now, she is Jess.

Toby begins to stir, and she feels the old familiar ache in her chest as he stretches, rolls toward herbut doesnt wake, not yet. His face is now inches from her, his lips parted in sleep, black curls shadowing his eyes, dark lashes against fair cheeks.

Once, the darkness teased the girl as they strolled along the Seine, told her that she had a type, insinuating that most of the men she choseand even a few of the womenlooked an awful lot like him.

The same dark hair, the same sharp eyes, the same etched features.

But that wasnt fair.

After all, the darkness only looked the way he did because of her. Shed given him that shape, chosen what to make of him, what to see.

Dont you remember, she told him then, when you were nothing but shadow and smoke?

Darling, hed said in his soft, rich way, I was the night itself.

Now it is morning, in another city, another century, the bright sunlight cutting through the curtains, and Toby shifts again, rising up through the surface of sleep. And the girl who iswasJess holds her breath again as she tries to imagine a version of this day where he wakes, and sees her, and remembers.

Where he smiles, and strokes her cheek, and says, Good morning.

But it wont happen like that, and she doesnt want to see the familiar vacant expression, doesnt want to watch as the boy tries to fill in the gaps where memories of her should be, witness as he pulls together his composure into practiced nonchalance. The girl has seen that performance often enough, knows the motions by heart, so instead she slides from the bed and pads barefoot out into the living room.

She catches her reflection in the hall mirror and notices what everyone notices: the seven freckles, scattered like a band of stars across her nose and cheeks.

Her own private constellation.

She leans forward and fogs the glass with her breath. Draws her fingertip through the cloud as she tries to write her name. Ad

But she only gets as far as that before the letters dissolve. Its not the mediumno matter how she tries to say her name, no matter how she tries to tell her story. And she has tried, in pencil, in ink, in paint, in blood.

Adeline.

Addie.

LaRue.

It is no use.

The letters crumble, or fade. The sounds die in her throat.

Her fingers fall away from the glass and she turns, surveying the living room.

Toby is a musician, and the signs of his art are everywhere.

In the instruments that lean against the walls. In the scribbled lines and notes scattered on tablesbars of half-remembered melodies mixed in with grocery lists and weekly to-dos. But here and there, another handthe flowers hes started keeping on the kitchen sill, though he cant remember when the habit started. The book on Rilke he doesnt remember buying. The things that last, even when memories dont.