The Secret World of Maya Alexander

Chapter 35

After creeping softly up the stairs, Maya was relieved to shut herself away in what had become her safe haven within the guest room of her home. Shutting herself away just before her husband's usual punctual return at 17.45 had almost come to mark the end of her day's work and the onset of a secret evening ritual. It had begun the day she had returned from holiday to discover the return of the hall mirror and her husband. Stephen had prepared a meal and flowers but Maya had excused herself due to exhaustion from travel. He had hoped that the regular messages from Jackie during the vacation had been a sign of hope for a future reconciliation. Those hopes were eventually dashed by Maya, who told Stephen that she did not think she wanted to be around him. He had seemed to accept her point of view. But then insisted that he had nowhere else to go and that they would have to try and work through things, at least for a while.

'Perhaps in time you will feel differently?' It had been like a final plea, which tried to reach up the stairs and tap his wife on her shoulder, willing her to turn around. But she did not turn around. Instead she had taken herself and her luggage into the guest room, where she had rested, hunched up in the corner of the floor. Body still. Eyes closed.

That was when the first whisper came from the mirror. 'Not now, not ever'. It had taken Maya back to another evening she had caged away in her mind.

As she opened her eyes, she had seen a sparrow in the corner of the mirror. Its mouth opened as the whisper came, but it was as though the voice did not belong to the sparrow at all.

That first evening, she had followed the bird as it had flown away into the corner of her mirror. It had taken her back to a familiar land. A gentle forest still full with summer promise. Rich jades and emeralds and olives had become her rooftop. Adorned on a canvas of sky blue. Or with the hemp of starlight to paint the scene. The first few nights, she would simply lay and listen to the crickets tapping out the passing of time as she watched the ever-changing mural above her and drifted off to sleep.

She would always awake in the morning to find herself in the guest bed, covered by a soft white duvet. She assumed she must have made her own way to bed. She never questioned where reality ended and dreaming began, or if the two were exclusive of each other. She just knew at the end of each day she would find comfort in the forest.

Maya was exhausted after Jess's departure that evening. It had been a long time since she had had to feel so much. She crawled into her pyjamas before assuming her position in front of the mirror and waiting to be summoned by birdsong. She was soon greeted by the vision of a falcon and its rapid bursts of brief shrieks.  It came with a sense of urgency. Reaching out to touch its thin fawny wings, the traveller was granted the power of the falcon's acuity of sight and speed of its flight.

As sudden as the passing of her sharp intakes of breath, Maya found herself soaring over mountains and oceans. Visions presented with such vibrant precision, that it was as though she had never truly seen such a thing as a mountain or ocean before.  As the flight came to an abrupt end. Maya found herself in a forest once more. Though just like the mountains and seas, it was as though it was revealing itself to her with an intimacy she had never experienced before.

With her renewed power of sight, she felt compelled to move beyond her usual resting spot at the foot of a fallen tree, where she had spent many nights leaning into its comfort as her eyes drifted off into the decorated skies of night and day. It was still daylight in the forest. She knew from experience that this could change suddenly or seem to linger endlessly. A light penetrated through the baldachin of luxurious greens as Maya lifted her eyes and followed the tallest trees as they reached up into the sky. As she soaked in the vision, a warmth radiated through her body. The forest spoke. A message which she seemed to understand despite the absence of words.