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“When I look at you, I am only reminded of how I would risk everything to lay beside you so you may never go cold. And I know, you would do the same. Whisper to your little heart, my dear Valerie, to shed its sorrow and those parts that keep you away from me.”
Mircalla touched her arm and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Valerie met her gaze and she saw not just a promise, but a reflection of something deeper—hunger awaiting her, hunger searching for her, hunger she already gratified. The doubts, the fears, they receded, replaced by a fierce determination. Taking a deep breath, Valerie reached out, and took her face in her hands.
Despite the complete stillness of her body, her mind was unquiet. But it did not change the fact that Mircalla saw her, who she really wanted to be, and in her heart of hearts, Valerie knew she would be held together by the gravity of this happenstance.
If, she thought, this woman found her in the desert and begged for a drop of rain, she would cut herself in half and let her blood run like a river. If she needed a voice to sing, she would cut her tongue and make herself speechless. She would make herself a god and an abomination to hold this feeling a little longer. This sweet obsession, the tantalizing promise of recognition was enough to rekindle Valerie’s faith. If her perseverance was the result of someone’s privation, then so be it, she thought.
“I’ve never been to this part of the town before!”
Mircalla was leading the way ten steps ahead, her limbs waving like a flag, the thin air of midnight meandering gently around the outline of her body, and they ducked into a small alley where a few women laughed like hyenas and coughed like drunkards next to a stack of wooden boards, shutters of bedrooms half open like dim eyes. She plowed her way through the deep snow, the raw dirt and smell of urine clinging to her clothes, while Mircalla sauntered on, slowly, the back of her neck tucked neatly in her collar. The place was a maze. She would have got lost if it weren’t for Mircalla’s head bobbing around. Valerie wondered how many times she had been here before, stepping in and out of the narrow streets, outstretching her arms, inhaling the sharp smell of liquor and grease.
“Where are we going?” Valerie asked.
“I thought we might stop for a drink before we head to the last stop on our route.”
She winked and pulled Valerie into a small pub. Men were swarming to its vicinity, slurring their speech and crying tears of laughter, while women rubbed their backs on the walls, their braids caught in the chilling air. A warm light spilled from the pub’s windows, a cacophony of voices singing over the appalling tune. They walked past the crowd, pretending to be gentlemen, inattentive to the teary eyes and inquiring whispers. The clink of beer mugs infested the room; men gathered in corners discussing nothing in particular made Valerie increase the pressure on Mircalla’s arm. The floor was sticky with spilled beer and gin, long trails along the polished woods. Clamorous, overexcited voices rose from every table, people treading the place with an unseen energy, their tittle-tattle louder than the music. One man caught Valerie’s attention as he banged his fist on the table while the other two belched in his face with their toothless smiles. It was the first time Valerie saw them, not in the background of her life, but in bursts on her peripheral vision; neither droopy nor exhausted from the day’s work, not a crack of exertion on their wet mouths, not pinched or wretched. Their eyes were not narrowed with spite, and the tongues did not curl in disgust with her name. When she was absent from their lives, they were normal people with reddish streaks running through their drunk faces, lips eaten in guilt, drinking beer at midnight.
Valerie shook off the snow from the folds of her cloak after Mircalla gestured to the bar. “I’ll get us two beers,” she yelled and disappeared into the crowd. She kept her head low, rapping her fingers on the table and humming to the tune. Nobody seemed to notice them, the chatter went on, beers got lukewarm, the dancing feet grew tired but kept on dancing. Mircalla sat across from her and pushed a heavy mug of beer. She fingered the thin rim of the glass slowly while Mircalla was looking at her intently, the sparks in her eyes reflecting the pub’s yellow light but Valerie knew something darker was lurking beneath.
“Have you ever wanted to choose another name? To be someone else, untethered from all that came before you, and entirely bound to yourself alone? To outrun yourself?”
Valerie took a sip of her cold beer and licked her lips. The warmth spread from her throat to her stomach, the bitter taste sliding down her tongue like an ice cube, the sweat on the glass cooling her hot fingers as her vision doubled. “I’ve been taught to embrace it like a ghost who only loves the house it haunts. It is interesting, you know, what a name does to your body.”
“What does it do?”
Valerie chuckled. “It decays mine, I’m afraid. Yet, I’ve never seen someone whose body grows luxuriantly when their name passes the lips.”
“Is it a curse, you think?”
Her snort of laughter came to a halt. Mircalla had found a half-eaten raw potato and rolled it across the loose boards. A shade of scarlet flashed across her face. Valerie rubbed her eyes. “What do you know about the curse?” she asked, suddenly alert and somber.
Mircalla looked weary and old. Hunching her shoulders against the men, the music, the quarrels. Her eyes dimmed, slanted with a darkness so persistent that bred hopelessness. Valerie swallowed hard.
“I can’t quite remember it except for a few fragments here and there,” she shrugged, “but maybe this is better.” She gulped the rest of her beer. “What I know is, however, that it rattles you. And the worst of all, in one blink, it will ruin you. I feel it when you quicken your pace, when you bury your cheek to your cloak, when you walk past the long halls of your home. Vertigo Peaks is not fit to protect you.” She drew in a sharp breath. “It will all fall down but not before I will burn their hearts first.”
“How do you know all of this? Who told you?”
“Let’s not shift our attention from one secret to another, dear.” Mircalla reached over the table and pressed her hand with a bewildered look; her eyes darted up and down, her gaze piercing past her neck. “But this itch… I had it once.” She got up and fastened her cloak. The cloud of fury passed from her face; her countenance expressed forbearing. “Come. We have a place to be.”
As they wandered the dark streets, everything appeared in a state of disentanglement from the mind’s tenacious hold, far out of reach, and bathed in the friendly charm of snow, bordering. Valerie felt her heart lighten, taking a new shape under the layers of clothing, her feet did not flounder as it used to do and Mircalla was by her side. She pulled Valerie to a corner and pushed her against the wall. Her hand scraped the cold stone. They were breathing heavily into each other’s faces, sending clouds of vapor into thin air, and Mircalla’s pupils were so large that Valerie saw herself in them. There was a pause, a silent agreement, signed in the eyes and carried by the lips. Mircalla pressed a hand to the nape of Valerie’s neck and pulled her closer. The distance seemed insurmountable, yet there she was, reminded of her heart.
When her lips moved, Valerie moved as well, impatient. “I want to taste you,” Mircalla said. Valerie’s mouth was dry; she grew weary of words. Instead, she nodded. Mircalla got rid of the hat and stroked her tousled hair, let the dark curls sway in the wind, then fixed her stare, as if drinking the moment. Knowing her, Valerie hoped it would be quick but when Mircalla’s hand slipped through her shirt, pressing the nail of her thumb against her chin, she could not help but let out a trembling sigh. Her pulse edged in the back of her thighs.
“Open your mouth,” Mircalla grinned, leaning closer.
No hunger was ever this satisfied; Valerie wanted to hold her and invite her deeper, inside, where every fiber of her existence exploded with one name. She shifted a little to run her fingers through Mircalla’s long silver-dusted hair but she pinned Valerie’s hands above her head, still with that wicked grin. The cold stones were hard against her back while Mircalla was all soft like a daydream, rocking her back and forth.
Valerie was not taught to think that the touch of lips could end the world, but as she stood breast to breast with Mircalla, she knew the desire would consume her and scrape her flesh off the bone. The bare longing right between her legs where Mircalla cradled herself was enough to hurl herself into a half-forgotten life, she moaned and threw her head back, as if she was nothing but a soft clump of bones.
“Please,” she gasped for air. But Mircalla was a cruel lover. She kissed her eyes first, then the tip of her nose, and only then followed her lips the path of her cold hands, sliding down the neck. Valerie wriggled, restless and wanting, until Mircalla came back to her lips. She tasted like cheap beer and Valerie had never wanted to laugh more. However, Mircalla silenced her as her tongue made its way in her mouth; a promise of sin and salvation.
She dared to think of her husband once, but the image vanished quickly as Mircalla bit her lower lip, teeth sunk deep into that rose shape, and Valerie felt the warmth of her own blood fill her mouth. She moaned when Mircalla pulled back, then saw her mouth smeared with her blood, as if she had just eaten wild berries, and watched it trickle down to her chin.
A sound of footfalls came first, then the vulgar tongues rose. Valerie craned her neck and got a glimpse of a small group of drunkards, gathering like a pack of wolves at the end of the street.
“Oi, you ratbags! What you’re doing here, coddling each other?”
Valerie could not believe she was not dreaming a frightful nightmare; she was wakeful and staring at the men, yet Mircalla, still gazing dreamily at her lips, ignored their renewed titter and snort.
