The Mirrorverse
Chapter 18

Maya

Ka wandered off in the direction of the bedroom, and Maya heard the bed move under his weight. She left him to have some private time as she curled up on the sofa. She blinked back tears trying not to break. She felt that she had done enough crying over those past few days to last a lifetime, she didn’t want to start again for fear she might never stop.

Fixing her eyes on a spot on the table, she braced against the overwhelming sense of hopelessness that was threatening to engulf her. The tears started leaking from her eyes but she never wavered, still staring at that grain of wood.

Maya’s thoughts wandered back to the psychiatric hospital, in that other place that was as real as the reality she was seated in. And somehow more believable. Her life had been just perfect, she had everything she had ever wanted, a great life. This only compounded the idea that it was fictitious. But he wasn’t. And if he was real, then it was all real. So what if it is all real?

Maya returned to the train of thought she had kept to herself in the hospital. She knew the shiny things had something to do with it. She knew she had passed through them, into and out of the other world. Her theory seemed even more ludicrous by the light of day.

Her heart fluttered again at the reminder that nothing was where it should be, that the world had ceased to make sense. But then, right then at that moment, she knew that both worlds were real. That somehow there were two realities she was a part of. Either that or she was barking mad.

Maya loaded a pea onto her fork and took aim. Rob, cook extraordinaire had come to feed them while Les regaled them with stories of London, some of which, she suspected, had been somewhat fabricated in order to entertain a slightly morose Ka. Les and Rob had stayed on in LA to make sure Maya and Ka were okay.

When Les got to the goose crapping on the lead actor’s head, their suspicions were confirmed. A great story teller Les might be, but could he withstand bombardment by pea? Maya launched the green projectile which did a belly flop into the horseradish sauce, nowhere near Les’s head. Her fork resting innocently in her hand, she stared at the ceiling, apparently ignorant of the floating vegetable.

Les was sat diagonally opposite, the furthest of the small group from Maya, and therefore perhaps not the most sensible target. Only, Rob, sat to Maya’s right, had noticed her small act of defiance at life’s severity over the past week, and responded with multiple projectiles meeting successfully with their target, Maya’s unsuspecting cheek. Gasping, she launched a sprig of broccoli which he ducked, wiggling his finger to show her she was naughty.

“Now now children, we, the grown-ups, are supposed to eat the food, not play with it,” faux-scolded Les, waving his fork at each of them in turn.

“He started it!” cried Maya, pointing at Rob who was feigning shock at this absurd, juvenile statement.

“Did not it was her, she put the pea in the horseradish!” Rob stuck his bottom lip out as he pointed to the small legume doing the backstroke in the cream coloured sauce. They were doing remarkable impressions of children, and it really was a welcome relief from the oppressive atmosphere that had lingered since Maya’s return from hospital the previous day. She went to open her mouth but Les interrupted.

“I don’t care who started it, I’m finish...” he began, before a sloppy chunk of wet cabbage came flying from his right, resting on his cheek and closed eye. The perpetrator had a sparkle in his dark eyes that Maya was glad to see returned. “Why you little...” Les threatened Ka as he pulled the slimy mass from his cheek and out of his eye. He was interrupted by a squeal of joy from Maya as her broccoli, dressed in horseradish sauce, landed square on Ka’s nose. Before long, Les’s rather flamboyant shirt began to resemble a restaurant’s waste bin while Rob’s plain black shirt looked like it would never return to black again.

Suddenly there was a rather large amount of cabbage in Maya’s hair, apparently from her right, though it was hard to tell with the food flying everywhere. Everything that was wrong in the world was forgotten for those precious moments that the four friends screamed like children, running around the house inserting food into each other’s ears.

Out of breath, they sat on the floor laughing, leaning against the walls at least an arms-length from each other for fear of a reprisal.

Maya felt truly blessed to have a bunch of people in her life who didn’t feel the need to act their ages. Les had over thirty years on her, Rob slightly his junior.

Whatever other men in their fifties get up to can’t be this much fun, thought Les. Besides, we are all the same mental age, that’s all that matters.

Maya’s eyes met with Ka’s, who had red bean stuff smeared all over his short sleeved black t-shirt and on the sleeves of the long sleeved blue one beneath it. His hair was a mosaic of vegetable extract and he appeared to have something in his eyebrow. Despite, or perhaps because of all this, to Maya he’d never looked sexier. Suddenly she wanted Les and Rob to make a sharp exit and have him all to herself.

“What on earth,” wondered Les, extracting a large orange bogey from his left nostril. It appeared to have been a carrot in a former life, and its fate caused another round of raucous laughter.

Having decided to leave the clearing up until the following day, Ka and Maya headed to the bedroom, after letting Les and Rob out and thanking them profusely for a well needed and most entertaining evening. Les did admit to making up most of the stories on the way out but was assured they were great anyway.

In spite of Maya wearing almost an entire boat of horseradish sauce as a hat and Ka looking like he’d lost a paintball fight, they fell into bed, locked in a fierce passion borne out of separation and pain.

Maya didn’t sleep, that last night in the world she had grown up in. She tossed and turned, occasionally seeing a glimmer if she concentrated on it enough. She didn’t want to wake up in that place, but needed to take control of her life. Take control of whatever was happening to her.

She was staring at the ceiling when Ka stirred from the first real sleep he’d had in a week. Maya hadn’t got up, to let him rest undisturbed for as long as possible. She snuggled up to the sleepy man, pulling herself closer with her arm and leg that she had just draped across him. A smile spread slowly across his face, the last time he would look relaxed for a long time. His eyes flickered open and he returned the embrace, until it was hard to tell which limb belonged to whom. Maya wanted to stay there forever, warm and happy in the arms of the man she loved. But she knew what she needed to do, the question was, how?

“I believe both worlds are real, that somehow I’m passing between them using these glimmery things,” Maya insisted again, concentrating on creating one in front of her. Ka wasn’t looking as one appeared for a fleeting moment. He was perched on the edge of the sofa, his head in his hands, despairing at the craziness his love was spurting at him. Maya’s heart broke to see what she was doing to him, but it had to be done, he had to see. Only it wasn’t working, she couldn’t get a glimmery shape to stay for long enough.

“I know baby, I know, it’s okay, we’re going to make it okay,” he assured her, looking up through his hands.

“I know, it’ll be just fine,” she reassured, making one appear slightly to Ka’s right for a brief moment. No, that wasn’t where it was supposed to be. She didn’t want him waking up from a coma somewhere. She didn’t feel reassured. In fact, she felt slightly crazed, her heart beating like there was no tomorrow. Part of her wanted there to be no tomorrow. She didn’t want to go back there, but she couldn’t stay not knowing what was real and what wasn’t. She needed to do this.

“Look,” said Maya urgently, pointing at a levitating glimmery mass that disappeared as soon as he looked up. He sighed and put his head back down. “You’re never going to see it if you don’t look,” she snapped.

Maya knew how nuts she sounded. She knew what she was doing to him. But she was convinced that she could do it. And then there it was. As she truly believed, it appeared and stayed, a beautiful silvery oval shape, floating in the middle of the room. Maya put her hand on Ka’s face and pushed it upwards towards the alien mass in their house. He froze, eyes wide as its majesty danced, reflecting in his eyes. Maya took her hand off his face and walked towards it, at which point he became frantic.

“Where’d it go?” he panicked, looking all around him, “Where is it?”

“It’s still there,” she replied, confused. He got up and took her hand, immediately returning his gaze to the beautiful thing in front of him. He then let go of her hand, before retaking it.

“I can only see it when I hold your hand,” he murmured, frowning as he looked from Maya to it. “Why can I only see it when I touch you? What is it?”

“I don’t know,” she replied to this unexpected turn of events. Admittedly nothing lately could be considered expected, but she did wonder how much weirder things could get. Shortly after, she was to regret wondering.

Maya took a deep breath, looked at Ka and moved over to the shimmery mass before walking straight through it, pulling Ka through after her.