“One of the gods transformed your father into gold dust. It was not the first time he had pulled such a trick. He floated in the air around me and I had daughter after daughter. Each one, in turn, given back to the gods.”
Her mother nodded along with herself as she spoke. She did not make eye contact with Laura but rather stared down at her own legs, crossed at the knee, where she balanced her teacup in both hands.
“It could only be a girl,” her mother said. “The gods only exchanged fortune and luck for girls. Boys were the ticket to conquest and warfare, but your father had little use for that.”
Laura's limbs felt heavy, like anchors. She didn’t want to cry in front of her mother, who looked so pathetic before her; an old, trapped woman in an inescapable labyrinth. Laura did not want that for herself. She did not want to live or die in this stupid, gigantic house with its countless enveloping doors. She could not wish that fate on the dolls, either.
“What about me,” Laura said.
“I begged him,” her mother said. Silver tears trailed down her wrinkled cheeks. Shining rivers spun with silk and water. Her tears danced as they fell under the warm, orange light of a nearby lamp. “I told him no more. I wanted a family. I wanted to rest. And he agreed, on one condition.”
“What?” Laura asked. She grabbed a napkin from the table and crumpled it in her fist. As her mother opened her mouth to speak, Laura smoothed the napkin until it was flat again and then she tore it into jagged strips of fabric, transparent and thin.
“He wanted to find a different way to trap souls.” Her mother brought a hand to her mouth.
The cup in her lap tipped over and a river of tea splashed out, soaking into her skirt and dripping down to the floor. Neither moved to clean it up. Laura arranged the pieces of napkin on the table into a neat and precise row. While her mother began to sob in earnest, Laura picked
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