Our Contract of Distrust

-- 7 --

I didn't sleep well last night.

I slept in the main bedroom to appease him. He didn't say anything.

I pretended to be asleep when he entered the room, but he probably knew I was lying.

But I didn't care anymore. He'd never believed I was the type to be honest. What did it matter if it was now true?

It didn't.

It only mattered that every night I had to sleep beside a stranger.

Every night my bed became a silent, awkward prison.

So I woke early, feeling as if I'd merely rested my eyes for five minutes.

I wash my face with cold water to try to remedy the situation.

It doesn't.

I realise I'm lost in thought, staring into his mirror.

The mirror in his bathroom is clearer than what I'm used to. And I hate it.

Mirrors aren't comforting objects. No matter how much you might attempt to tweak your appearance, there are some things that never change.

Perhaps I should get my hair cut. I can't remember the last time it was trimmed. The ends are all split. It's a drab, raggedy mess of straw.

Maybe I should try cutting it myself. It's a waste to spend money on a hairdresser. I don't even know how much hairdressers cost these days. It's probably expensive. I probably can't even afford it if I wanted to.

Yeah, I should cut my hair.

Maybe a style that could lessen the prominence of my forehead. But that was probably too complicated.

The mirror exposes numerous imperfections I don't usually notice. Like the faint freckles on my nose and across my cheeks under my eyes. Even though I don't spend much time in the sun, they've reared their ugly genetic head regardless.

But supposedly makeup could easily conceal that.

My worst feature was perhaps the hardest to alter.

My eyes were far too bright, far too striking. A terribly cold, pale green. It wasn't a common colour, even amongst naturals. Brown was the safest. Brown was the most widely distributed.

The only fashionable pale colours were purple and silver. And even then, silver wasn't always viewed favourably. The gangs had seen to that. And the aides. Even some high-end propositioners had contributed to the current popular opinion.

But Trin had predominantly silver eyes, and she didn't fit into any of those categories.

Scissors. I need scissors.

I quickly scan under the basin for scissors. None.

Perhaps the stationery draw?

I find them there. They probably aren't the sharpest but they seem to be in working condition.

I return to the mirror. How much should I cut off? An inch? More?

I gather a section of hair by the side of my face and began to cut, just shy of an inch off. The simple action is strangely enjoyable.

I watch the strands of hair scatter softly to the ground. I should've cut my hair a long time ago.

I repeat the process on the other side of my face.

What should I do for the back?

In the end I decide to split it all evenly into two sides and continue cutting. It'll work out somehow.

When I finish cutting I comb my fingers through my hair, removing rogue strands that had refused to fall.

Despite the fact that my weight surely wouldn't have changed from the handful of hair I removed, I feel lighter somehow. Maybe it's psychological.

I tug at the strands that curve in onto my cheeks. I hope they won't be annoying.

I had decided to cut the parts by my face shorter than the rest of my hair. I think it looked okay, more or less. As okay as the one-length style before had at least.

The longer strands of my hair now reached just below my shoulders. It was a relatively normal hair length. It shouldn't stand out much.

A flash of movement catches my eye.

My pulse spikes and I reach for the scissors.

Feodor is leaning against the bathroom doorway, his expression unreadable.

I lock eyes with him in the mirror.

"You cut your hair?"

I don't know whether it's supposed to be a rhetorical question, since the answer is obvious.

I nod once to satisfy him.

"Clean up. I'll make breakfast." He says.

I watch in the mirror as he turns and leaves.

I don't realise I'm holding my breath until it catapults from my mouth.

____________________________

"Hey," Peggy says to me in the afternoon, "I was wondering, you don't have to take those absences anymore?"

"Absences?"

"Yeah, you know how you used to miss a day once a week or so?"

"I never took sick leave."

"No, not that. It was still work, I think, but well, you never told me what you did. You- you don't remember it?"

"No..."

"Oh. I guess it was a little while ago now. It's no big deal, I was just curious is all. Maybe it was just boring surveys or something?"

"Yeah. It must've been something like that."

I say this more for my own sake than for Peggy's. Since when did I ever miss work? And why can't I remember it?

It would be best if it really were nothing. Just something insignificant like being randomly selected for answering government surveys.

Randomly selected. That part at least rings true. Because what could anyone possibly want with someone like me?