Free Humanity by J.D. Knutson

represented the carnival.
    “Do you see it?”
    “See what?”
    “The beauty, Candace.”
    “Not really.”
    He took me by the arm, hauling me away
from the glass.
    “Where are you dragging me to now?” I
demanded.
    He stopped me in front of a speckled,
cracked mirror, hung on a tall, metal wall. “What do you see?”
    “A mirror.”
    “No.” He stood behind me, gently pushing
my hair forward, then tucking a few strands behind my ear. He lifted my chin,
meeting my eyes in the mirror. “What do you see?”
    “Myself?”
    “Yes.”
I looked closely. “I look washed out. There are shadows under my eyes.”
    He dropped my chin, taking a step back
and shaking his head. “I might just have to shoot you for that,” he informed
me, wrinkling his forehead.
    I turned to face him. “What next?” I
asked.
    He looked around at the wall we faced, at
the building it was attached to, then met my eyes. His glinted with mischief.
“Follow me,” he said. Then he turned and walked into the building.
    I followed, but, when I entered, my eyes
were met with more mirrors. Some of them were cracked. Others were whole. A few
were completely shattered, their pieces littering the ground.
    It was a maze. A maze of mirrors.
    “Gideon?”
    I heard a chuckle somewhere ahead. My
heart was in my throat. Was this a ploy? Was he trying to escape? He couldn’t
have ran before; with his injury, he wouldn’t have managed to outrun me. But a
house of mirrors was the perfect way to confuse me long enough to slip away.
    I sprinted forward, looking for which way
I was supposed to turn. I chose one turn, then another. Over and over again I
was met with my face. Me. Candace. I looked even paler than I had in the first
mirror. What would I do if he left me?
    My breath was shallow. Sweat beaded under
my eyes. And, still, turn after turn of the maze. Dead end after dead end.
    “Gideon!” I gasped, panicked. I had no
idea where I was or how to get out. The mirrors felt as if they were closing in
on me. I stumbled, then sank to my knees.
    I needed to breathe. I needed to focus. I
wouldn’t manage to get out if I couldn’t even see straight.
    I closed my eyes, slowing my breath. I
listened for anything I could possibly hear.
    “Candace?”
    I blinked my eyes open. Gideon’s face was
right in front of mine, his eyebrows knit in concern. I could see each freckle
across his cheeks and nose. His deep brown eyes stared into mine.
    “Gideon!” I breathed in relief; my hand
snapped out to grab his arm.
    He patted my hand. “I didn’t know you’d
panic like that. Sorry.”
    “I thought you’d left me.”
    He stood, pulling me to my feet. “Well, I
didn’t. I just thought it’d be fun. And, at the other end. . .” He pulled me by
the hand, through the maze of mirrors, to the other side. There stood the
Ferris wheel. “I thought that if you couldn’t see the beauty in anything else
around us, then you’d at least be able to see it here. After all, you got so
excited before, when you could see it from the road.”
    The bulbs lining the limbs of the Ferris
wheel weren’t lit, but they weren’t broken, either. The structure stood, tall
and unbroken, glinting in the sunlight, the earth claiming it with green
climbers.
    I stared at it, then looked over at
Gideon. “Yeah. I like this.” I looked at it again. “If you look at it and
nothing else, you can almost pretend civilization hasn’t ended.”
    He was silent for a moment, letting me
look.
    “I had one other idea,” he all but
whispered.
    I turned to him, open to any suggestions
he had. “Yes?”
    “I want you to close your eyes again.”
    I did. He took my hands and pulled me
forward, leading me along. After several steps, we stopped.
    “Keep your eyes closed,” he murmured,
then placed my left hand up against his shoulder. His newly freed hand went to
my waist. He led me in a slow, careful circle, that my mind began to interpret
as a dance. After a minute, he started whistling a