Smoke in Mirrors

so that she could dial 911 instantly if necessary, and made her way through the shadow-drenched living room to the door.
    She flipped on the porch light and peered through the peephole. Relief swept through her when she saw Thomas on the doorstep.
    Then she saw the dark stains on his shirt.

    “Oh, my God.” She wrenched open the door. “ Thomas. Is that blood on your shirt?”
    He looked down, face twisting with irritation. “Bastard. Cut my lip. This was a new shirt.”
    “What happened? Are you all right?” Stupid question. He was very clearly not all right.
    “Accident on the footbridge.” He took his finger off the bell button. “Can I come in and clean up?”
    “An accident?” She stepped back hurriedly. “Yes, of course. Come in. Maybe I should take you to the emergency room.”
    “Just left the E.R. I’m okay.”
    “You were at the hospital? Thomas, for heaven’s sake, what happened?”
    “Long story. But don’t worry. Nothing’s broken.”
    He came through the doorway, moving stiffly, and stopped in the hall. She finally got a good look at him in the overhead light. There was a bad scrape high on his left cheek, his knuckles were raw and his hair was badly mussed. His jacket, trousers and shirt were stained with mud and blood; his shirttails hung loose.
    She closed the door very carefully, locked it and turned around.
    “Thomas, what happened to you?”
    “Ran into a jogger.” He caught sight of himself in the hall mirror and winced. “Damn. Coming here was a mistake. Didn’t realize I looked this bad. I should have had Ed drop me at my place.”
    “Tell me about this accident.”
    “On the footbridge.”
    “You said you went to the emergency room but you certainly don’t look like you’ve seen a doctor.”
    “They were busy with the other guy. I didn’t let them clean me up. Figured I could do that here.”

    “You’re not making any sense, Thomas.”
    “Like I said, it’s a long story.”
    “You can tell it to me while we get you patched up.”
    He did not argue.
    She stepped around him, leading the way back through the living room and down the short hall.
    She sat him down on the edge of the white tub and then she turned on the water in the sink. She saw him watching her in the mirrored door of the medicine cabinet. His eyes were colder than the waters of the cove.
    “Are you sure you don’t need a doctor?” she asked.
    “I’m sure.”
    She opened the cabinet and took down some alcohol, cotton swabs and a tube of antibiotic ointment.
    “You always travel with a fully equipped medicine cabinet?” he asked.
    “As a matter of fact, I do. I keep the basics handy, at any rate. My grandmother taught me that. She believes in being prepared. Take off your jacket and shirt.” She faced him. “I need to see the full extent of the damage.”
    “It’s not that bad.” He started to shrug out of his jacket, halted briefly to draw a slow breath and then peeled it off with a stony, stoic expression.
    “You’re in a lot of pain, aren’t you?” She took the jacket from him and hung it on the hook behind the door. Something clanked against the wood panel, distracting her. “What is that?”
    “The wrench I brought with me to fix your leaky faucet.” Methodically, he undid the buttons of his shirt.
    When he got it off she was relieved to see that things did not look too bad. “Can you take a deep breath?”
    He tried it cautiously, feeling his ribs with his fingers. “Yeah. No sharp pain. Relax, Leonora, I’m okay. Just a little bruised.”

    She moistened a ball of cotton with alcohol and went to work on his scraped cheek.
    “All right,” she said, “let’s have it. What exactly happened out there?”
    “Some kid high on dope tried to brain me with a golf club and throw me into the cove. He missed. That’s the end of the story, as far as Ed Stovall is concerned.”
    For an instant she didn’t think she had heard him correctly. She lifted the cotton ball away from his cheek.
    “What?” She had a hard time getting the word out. Her tongue felt thick. “The kid tried to kill you?”
    “They think he was on that S and M stuff we’ve been hearing about. He’s still seeing monsters in the E.R. Apparently he thought I was one.”
    The floor of the bathroom fell away beneath her feet, leaving her hanging, weightless, in midair in some other universe. The world on the other side of the mirror, she thought.
    “You’re serious, aren’t you?” she