Reflection

“I had a curious dream yesterday,” said Nick.

“Oh?” said Janette politely, and arranged herself more comfortably into the corner of the sofa in her apartment above the Raven.  He was visiting her on a day off work; and LaCroix was, for once, not hanging over the pair of them uttering words of wisdom.  Still, she was not that interested in parsing the diurnal reflections of Nicolas’s subconscious.  Even less so when she heard his next words.

“I was mortal.”

“But chéri!  That has been your dream for centuries.”  She laughed a little, dismissively.

“And so were you.  We were married; we had a baby.”

For a long irritated moment, Janette held her tongue.  Deliberately, she instead lifted her long cigarette-holder, feigning to take a deep drag.  It was, of course, a ploy for time.  She loathed the taste of tobacco:  vampires have a keen sense of smell.  But it would do no good to snap at Nicolas when he was in this sort of mood.

Finally, she said simply, “I don’t think I ever thanked you for returning the portrait.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Am I?  That is good to hear.  For so many years you have kept it, my portrait that I commissioned.  And I did want it back, you know.”

“And now you have it,” said Nick.  “Are you changing the subject?  I said I dreamt we were married, that we had a child.”

“I heard you.”

“But things were different in the dream.  You were different.”

Obviously! was what she wanted to retort.  Still, her annoyance must have appeared on her face, for she could see his harden.  There was no getting out of it, then:  he would tell her of this “dream” of his, will she nil she.

“You did not love me any more, I think,” he went on, “or, at any rate, we were in the middle of yet another fight.  You were an angry slattern—”  (At this, Janette sat up indignant.)  “—hair a mess, screaming at me.  And I was having an affaire.  With Natalie.”  He looked wistful.  “She was the police captain, in the dream; and I went to her apartment and she was all dressed up, in a fancy evening gown with long earrings dangling….”  He lifted his hand, gesturing down from his own ear nearly to his shoulder.

“If you were having an affaire,” Janette said drily, “I do not doubt that I was angry.  As for Natalie….”  Her face altered suddenly, her interest piqued.  “Nicolas, mon cher, did you not, many years ago, spend time talking nonsense with that Doctor Freud?  Weren’t you trying to control your hunger?  And he took it to be a different sort of lust altogether—but then he always did have only one thing on his mind.  And, as there was so little you dared to tell him, it’s no wonder he did you no good.”

“I don’t know what you’re getting at.”

“Now, that I believe! Still, chéri, consider,” and she smiled, “In your dream we were married but you went off with Natalie.  And you returned my portrait.  So.”

He still looked puzzled.  Well, for all his maunderings, he’d never been one for true introspection.

So, the next day, Janette decided to take matters into her own hands.  Thus it was that Natalie, having worked overtime and slept all afternoon, came belatedly out of her bedroom in a floral-printed flannelette nightie under a terrycloth robe only to hear a buzz from the lobby succeeded, far too quickly, by a knock on the door.  She opened it expecting to see Nick, but instead found Janette.

“I’ve decided to take you shopping,” was the greeting, followed—after a look up and down Natalie’s attire—with the words, “for clothes.  Nice clothes.”

“I have nice clothes,” said Natalie thinly.

It did no good for her to hold the door, though.  With a mere fraction of a vampire’s strength, Janette pushed it gently against the wall, said “Show me,” and walked imperiously past her into the hall.

Natalie pressed her lips closed against the retort she was dying to say (but did not actually want to die for saying), gestured towards the bedroom, and stood fuming while Janette swiftly ran through the hangers in the closet, pausing only briefly, with raised brow and the occasional shake of the head.

“If these are ‘nice’ clothes, then you need some ‘good’ clothes, Dr. Lambert.  You need some clothes for … for best.  Something suitable to wear when you go out on a-a-a…”  She hunted the word.  “…a ‘date’.  To the theatre, perhaps.  The opera or the ballet.”  Janette turned to Natalie, with a clear level eye.  “Nicolas enjoys the ballet.  Has he taken you?”

“Not yet.”

Janette nodded.  “He shall,” she declared.  “And you shall be suitably dressed to accompany him.  An evening gown, certainly.  And,” she added, “earrings.”

Natalie grimaced.  “I don’t think you quite realize,” she said carefully, “what sort of money I make.  I’m pretty sure I can’t afford to buy the sort of clothes that you think ’suitable’.”

“Never mind,” said Janette, with private resolve.  “That will not matter.”