There was no answer. I pushed the door open softly and ventured in. This room was very much like my own, but richer. I knew that I should leave, but curiosity got the better of me. I crossed to the wide white dressing table, spread with scarves and bottles, and opened the top drawer.
Gloves, in every possible color and material: soft and rough, gleaming and dull. I worried my hands into the mess of fabric. Some of the gloves were leather or kidskin and felt like live fingers brushing my own; some were mere cloth; and some were lace, which raised small red hives on my skin. So many of them, like faceless, tentacled deep-sea creatures. My Hair floated tentatively towards them, as if it, too, wanted to touch. I found them oddly fascinating. Each pair seemed to hold the ghosts of Milady’s hands.
I pulled out a pair—nothing special; cream, soft leather, with a small bow at each wrist—and snaked them on, one finger at a time, feeling the second pair of hands enclosing mine. I spread my fingers and looked at myself in the mirror. My hands did not seem to belong to me anymore.
As I watched, they lifted themselves to my Hair, smoothed it back. They encircled my neck as if to strangle me. I put one finger into my mouth, to taste it—I did not know why. The glove had a musty, rubbery mouthfeel. The quiet suddenly seemed oppressive and the gloves oddly sinister.
I pulled the finger, now slightly damp and darkened at the tip, away from my mouth and tried to remove the gloves, but they seemed fused to my skin. Fighting rising panic, I struggled with them, but they would not budge. They were a slick second skin, elegant and malicious, making my hands look like they didn’t belong to me.
“What are you doing?”
I turned. Milady was there in the doorway, a tall column of cream and gold.
No use lying. “I was looking through your drawers.”
“I can see that.”
Silence. I bit my lip, but said nothing, feeling dread out of all proportion to my crime. Milady moved across the room like an elegant ghost.
“I hope you didn’t disarrange anything.” She was smiling, but there was something dangerous about it. I bit my lip and held out my hands, showing her the gloves.
“Ah.” She walked over and peeled them off for me, finger by finger. For her, they relinquished their hold. Beneath, my hands were red and swollen. “These are very … specialized gloves, Netta. Only to be worn on very particular occasions. I hope you have learned your lesson.”
I nodded. My hands stung and tingled. She paused at the fingertip that I had mouthed, perhaps feeling it still damp.
“Sorry,” I said, sounding—I knew—decidedly un-sorry.
“Here.” Milady pulled out a pair—pink lace, with ribbons at the wrist. “These ones. These are much more suitable.”
I was loath to touch them.
“Keep them,” she said. “You will need them.”
“What?”
“Don’t say what, say pardon.”
“Pardon, Milady?”
“Keep them. They’re yours.”
I took them reluctantly, wondering if they would slither themselves on and fuse to my skin again, but they lay limp in my palm. Milady had turned back to her dressing table. I stood, uncertain.
“Go on.”
I turned to leave.
“And Netta?”
“Yes?”
Milady’s face had seemed to lengthen, grow pointed. Her eyes raked up and down my body, somehow managing to convey disapproval without changing her expression one whit.
“Why were you wandering the house alone?”
“I just … wanted to get to know it. The place where my mother lived,” I added quickly.
“Hmm. Wash yourself”—she raked me with her gaze, dusty hem to disheveled Hair—“and I will send for you shortly.”
