The Mirror and the Mask Read Free

saw him. That was twelve years ago.”
    Jane did the math. Annie was thirty-two. “You think he’s living in the Twin Cities?”
    â€œA friend of mine who was passing through town on a business trip a couple of weeks ago said she was positive she saw him in a bar.”
    Jane ate her soup while they talked. “No luck?”
    â€œNot yet. And money is getting tight. I took a leave of absence from my job back in Steamboat Springs. Like I said, I’m a bartender at a ski resort.”
    â€œI suppose you do a lot of skiing. I used to ski all the time when I was in college.”
    â€œNot anymore?”
    â€œIt always seems like I’m too busy.”
    â€œYou should make the time. I can’t imagine my life without riding those hills.” For the first time, she smiled. She had a small space between her two front teeth, and a couple of her bottom teeth were crooked. It probably meant that Annie’s family hadn’t had the money for orthodontia when she was a child—and that in adult life, Annie hadn’t either. Not that the teeth detracted from her looks. If anything, the flaw seemed the exception that proved the rule.
    â€œLook,” said Jane, finishing her soup. “You’ve actually come at a good time. I have a job, but it’s not pretty.” She explained about the flooded dry-storage room. “I’m headed down there myself. I could use an extra pair of hands.”
    â€œSure,” said Annie.
    â€œThere’ll be some heavy lifting.”
    â€œNot a problem.”
    â€œI’ll pay you what I pay the other two guys who agreed to help. Twelve seventy-five an hour. It might take the rest of the day.”
    â€œCount me in.” She hopped off the stool, ready to get to work.
    Â 
    Terrance and George paired off, as did Annie and Jane. Henry acted as straw boss, moving the tall racks, as they were emptied, out into the hallway and helping the flooring crew pull up the old vinyl flooring.
    As they worked, Jane and Annie talked. Jane learned that Annie had received a degree in folklore and mythology from the University of Colorado, Boulder.
    â€œMy major interest was in Greek and Roman mythology,” said Annie, hoisting a sack of rice over her shoulder. “I did my senior thesis on the mirror and the mask as they’re used in the myth of Medusa.”
    â€œThe woman with the snakes in her hair.”
    â€œIt’s a fascinating story with lots of variations. She was a beauty. Either she was raped by Poseidon in Athena’s temple or she had consensual sex with him. Either way, Athena saw it as sacrilege and punished her by turning her golden hair into serpents.”
    â€œWhy didn’t she punish Poseidon?”
    â€œHe was immortal. Medusa wasn’t.”
    â€œFigures.” Jane hefted a fifty-pound sack of flour out into the hall.
    Annie followed with the rice. “Athena also turned Medusa’s face into something so horrible, so ugly, that when men looked at it, it turned them to stone. Apparently, Athena didn’t want any handsome young men to sleep with her.”
    â€œSex as rape, or sex as sin.”
    â€œYes, but it’s more than just a story about sex. It’s about the destruction of innocence.”
    â€œA theme that interests you?”
    â€œVery much.”
    Jane wondered why, but it seemed too intrusive to ask for details. Instead she said, “What about the mirror and the mask?”
    â€œYou really want to hear this? Most people change the subject after the ‘destruction of innocence’ part.”
    Jane laughed as she walked back into the storage room. “No, I’m interested.”
    â€œOkay. Stop me when your eyes start to glaze over. It’s all about paradox and duality. The hero as victim and the victim as hero. A mirror is something that reveals; a mask is something that conceals. But when you think about it, mirrors and masks are dualities as well