A Silent Witness

Chapter VII: A Silent Witness

Andy ate more out of habit than hunger. The meal was absurd, a chef’s fever dream, perfectly seared steak and scalloped potatoes lined up like dominoes, art-directed asparagus, a dollop of orange roe on the cupcake like a dare. He ate it anyway. He drank the whiskey. It all tasted… fine. The whole thing felt like a parody of comfort—every flavor a little too sharp, too self-satisfied, like it was mocking the idea that eating could ever make him feel better. But perhaps the problem wasn’t in the food. Perhaps it was in him.

The suite was so large and well-appointed it felt designed by a committee that had never met a human being. Andy sat at the massive glass dining table, which might have seated twelve, but tonight had a guest list of one. Behind him, the fireplace glowed with warm oranges and yellows, flickering against the red velvet couch and the ocean-dark windows. He looked like someone in a hotel ad, but with none of the joy.

Andy poured a second whiskey and wondered how long it would take before he stopped feeling anything. He kept staring at the “Master: Permit Visitor Access” button, half expecting it to light up. It didn’t. He was completely alone, except for the painting over the fireplace.

That was the real company. He caught himself glancing at it again, and had to **** his eyes away. But then, inevitably, he looked back. The woman in the painting was… impossible. More nude than a nude, legs splayed, breasts cartoonishly outsized even by the standards of **** porn, yet the details were so lovingly rendered that Andy felt a strange, proprietary embarrassment each time he met her eyes. She seemed to smirk at him from her field of wildflowers, as if amused that he had to eat alone while she was immortalized in perpetuity.

He finished his steak, then stood up to grab a cupcake. “Well, Katherine, care to join me?” He said it with a laugh, the kind you use to pretend you’re not talking to yourself. “I’d offer you a seat, but you seem not to need one.” He hesitated, then actually gestured at the chair across from him. “Seriously, though. Not much of a talker, are you?”

He sat, cupcake balanced on the edge of his plate. He looked at her again, expecting the same sly, unchanging stare. Instead, her expression had changed.

She blinked. Once. Deliberate.

Andy froze, the room a million miles wide and perfectly silent except for the sound of his pulse in his ears. He watched as her lips curled into an unmistakable grin. Not a static, painted smile, but the sort of grin that deepened with mischief, that hinted she could laugh if she had lungs.

He stared, waiting for the logical explanation—maybe he was more drunk than he thought, maybe there was a projector somewhere, maybe Arabella was fucking with him. But no, it was worse than that. Because now the woman in the painting, Katherine, shifted her weight, folded her arms under her massive breasts, and tilted her head to the side in a show of exaggerated patience.

Andy stood up so fast his chair crashed to the floor. The cupcake went spinning, leaving a comet’s tail of frosting on the glass. He staggered back, one hand on the table for balance. For a wild moment he thought he’d hallucinated the whole thing, but she was still there, still moving—her hair, black as a starless night, falling over one shoulder, the highlights in her eyes following him wherever he moved.

He stared at her. She stared back, and then, in a gesture that was somehow both subtle and tragic, she nodded. Just once, a careful, queenly dip of the chin. She knew exactly what she was.

Andy’s breath left him in a ragged exhale. “You’re real,” he said, and the words sounded stupid. “You’re actually… you can see me?”

Katherine gave him a slow blink, another nod, then lifted her chin, the painted line of her throat pale and proud. She tried to say something, but of course there was no sound. Her lips parted, then closed again, a soft sigh of defeat.

He shook his head, put both hands over his face, then lowered them again. “Okay. Fine. You’re a painting. I’m a guy talking to the painting of a naked woman. This is… fine.”

Katherine looked at him like she’d seen a thousand men lose their composure before him, and she’d outlast every single one. She rolled her shoulders, which caused her breasts to bounce absurdly, then folded her hands in her lap, away from her groin, her pose suddenly demure in a way that only accentuated her nudity.

Andy laughed, hollow and high. “This is some kind of test, isn’t it?” he asked the ceiling. “Arabella’s probably watching. You’re a computer screen, and maybe there’s a hidden camera in the cupcake.”

The painting just watched him, tilting her head with an expression that screamed, Are you really that dumb?

He walked over to the fireplace, daring himself to get closer. The painting was even more detailed up close. He could see the brushstrokes in the curves of her stomach, the shimmer of paint in her irises, the tiny hairs on her forearms. She looked… alive. Not just in the eyes, but in the micro-expressions, the tension in her jaw, the way she waited for him to make the next move.

He reached out, then stopped himself, hand hovering above the frame. “Is it okay if I…?”

She shrugged, a slow, painted ripple, then offered him her left hand, palm up, fingers curling slightly as if to say: What could it possibly matter now?

He touched the surface of the painting. It was cool and smooth and perfectly dry. And all of a sudden, she grinned and gave him a high-five, breasts bouncing. He didn’t feel anything, but he backed away out of surprise, tripped over the chair again, and sat down hard on the carpet.

The painting laughed silently. She cupped her hands around her mouth, as if to stifle it, then leaned forward, hands on her knees, breasts hanging, the posture oddly conspiratorial. She pointed at him, then made a gesture: rotating her index finger against her temple, the universal sign for “crazy.”

Andy covered his face and groaned. “Yeah. That’s about right.”

He sat there for a long moment, listening to the blood in his ears and the faint, synthetic sound of the gas fire. When he finally looked up, Katherine was still watching him, but this time her gaze was softer—almost gentle. She tilted her head again, then pressed both hands to her chest, as if to say: Sorry. This isn’t your fault.

He stood, legs shaky. He righted his chair and sat, then poured another whiskey. He set a second glass on the table, in front of the painting.

She saw the gesture and gave him a look that was pure gratitude, pure loneliness. Then, for the first time, she leaned forward in the frame, as if to better see the drink, and nodded again.

For a long time, they just sat, Andy and Katherine. He with his whiskey, she with her impossible patience. Her glass, and the cupcake, sat untouched. He found himself unable to eat that cupcake with her eyes on him, which was insane, because her eyes were pigment and canvas. Unless they weren’t.

Eventually, Andy managed to ask, “Can you… understand me?” He felt stupid, but he needed to know.

Katherine’s answer was a slow, deliberate nod. She rolled her eyes with a look that screamed, How do you think I’ve been responding thus far?

“Okay.” Andy let out a breath, steadying himself. “Do you… want anything? I mean, besides the obvious.”

She rolled her eyes so hard it bordered on physical comedy, then lifted both hands, palms up, and shrugged. She seemed to be saying, What would be the point?

Andy tried again. “Are you… trapped? Or is this, I don’t know, voluntary?”

This time she arched an eyebrow—one of the few things she could do without it seeming staged—then pressed both hands flat against the “glass” of her world, splaying her fingers as if there might be a way through.

“Trapped,” Andy translated. “Got it.”

He tried to think of the next question, but it felt like standing at the edge of a black hole, not knowing whether your voice would ever come back. “Were you always… like this? Or did you… become this way?”

She blinked, then jabbed a finger downward, at herself. She made a slow, circling gesture with her hand, then pointed at the painted body again. It took Andy a second, but then he got it: “You became this. This is new. Well, not new, but… not original-issue you.”

A nod, sharp and definite.

Andy hesitated. “Do you… know how long?”

She held up both hands—ten fingers—then flashed four more. Fourteen.

“Fourteen years,” Andy said, low. “You’ve been here… fourteen years?”

Katherine exhaled with enough drama that even the painted grass behind her seemed to bend. She made a gesture with her right hand—a loop, then a flick off her wrist, like tossing something away. Andy realized she was saying, Give or take.

He reached for her whiskey, paused, then poured a second shot for himself, leaving her glass before her. It clearly was a stupid gesture, since obviously she couldn’t drink it. He expected her to mock him. But she watched him do this, and the lines at the corners of her eyes creasing with what could only be called affection.

“So,” Andy tried, “what do you do all day? Can you… see the room? Hear things?”

She nodded, then made a grand, sweeping gesture to indicate the whole suite. She mimed walking, then stopping dead at the edge of her frame, palms out like a mime hitting glass.

“You can see and hear, but you can’t leave the painting.”

Nod.

He stepped closer, staring at the frame. “What about the rest of the painting?” he asked, gesturing at the wildflowers, the distant mountains, the slice of sky rendered in impossibly blue pigment. “Can you, I don’t know, wander around in there?”

Katherine’s face twisted in what could only be described as disdain. She pointed at her own feet, splayed apart, then at her knees, then at her breasts. She shook her head, lips pressed tight, as if to say: This is it. This is all I get.

He looked again—really looked. The painting had no other figures, no background animals or insects, not even a hint of movement in the clouds. Katherine was the entire foreground, and she couldn’t even cross her own legs or turn her back. He realized, with a flush of sympathy so raw it hurt, that she was forever stuck facing outward, unable to hide or even modestly avert her eyes.

“You can’t even… move away from the front, can you?”

A sharp shake of the head.

“And you can’t, like… cover up?” He regretted it the moment he said it, but her look was pure relief—someone who’d wanted to be asked, even if she had no good answer. She tried to fold her arms over her chest, but they bounced apart again, the exaggerated size of her breasts making it comically impossible. She tried to tuck her knees in, but the painting’s rules **** them open again, splayed like a **** model’s. She mimed the effort, then shrugged, face soft with apology.

Andy snorted, the laugh more pain than humor. “I’m sorry,” he said, and meant it.

She tilted her head, then gestured, What about you? A single finger, pointed at his chest, then up to his head, then a slow roll of her eyes to mimic his earlier spiral.

He laughed, but this time it came out almost real. “I guess I’m not much better off. I have a bed the size of a yacht, and eight women who are here because of me, and I don’t even have the excuse of being painted on a wall.”

Katherine pantomimed a violin, then stopped, smiled, and extended both arms toward him, as if to offer a hug. It was so ridiculous, so earnest, that Andy actually felt himself tearing up.

He let the moment sit. He poured another drink, then pulled the cupcake toward her end of the table. “I don’t know if you can see it,” he said, “but it’s carrot cake. You seem like someone who’d appreciate carrot cake.” He cut it in half, set one piece in front of his own chair, and one directly beneath her. Then he sat, and for a while, they just existed together. The cake, like the whiskey, sat untouched. He felt foolish, but her eyes glimmered with gratefulness for the thought.

He asked her more questions, and she answered as best she could: with nods and gestures and, sometimes, the resignation of someone who’d been asked every question a thousand times. He learned that she couldn’t sleep, or age, or get sick. She apparently couldn’t even go mad. He learned that she remembered every moment since the day she’d been trapped, and every season of the Harem Hotel on this island, since then. He learned that she’d spent most of the first ten years hanging in this very suite, watching a parade of men come and go, none of whom had ever noticed her as anything other than décor. He learned that the last four years had been storage, which, she implied, was about as exciting as being trapped in a tomb, except dustier.

He tried to invent a language with her, something to make communication easier. He tried charades, then Morse code, then simple yes/no blinks. But every time he got creative, she seemed to get sadder, and eventually she just shook her head and traced a finger over her lips: No voice. No words. Only this.

“So it’s a prison, then,” Andy said, quietly.

She nodded, but then made a face: not just a prison, but a punchline.

He wanted to break the tension, so he started gathering the plates and leftovers. He rinsed the dishes, thinking about what the others were doing—if any of them would actually visit him, or if they’d spend the night plotting escape. He glanced back at the painting, saw Katherine watching him with a fond, almost motherly expression. He realized she was the only person who hadn’t expected anything from him all day, except maybe basic decency.

He wiped his hands on a towel, walked back over, and stood in front of the fireplace. “It’s weird,” he said, “but I think you might be the sanest person in this entire hotel.”

She smiled at him, then blinked and, curiously, pointed at the friendship bracelet still tied to his wrist. The one Laura had made him, all those years ago.

He followed her gaze, and felt something crumble inside his chest. “This?” he asked.

Katherine nodded. This time, the gesture was slow and reverent. She mimed drawing something, then pointed at her own heart. Then she pressed both hands to her chest, over her painted breasts, and bowed her head.

Andy’s throat tightened. “It was… a gift. When I was a kid. From… From Laura.” he raised the bracelet so she could see the letters on it. “She was my best friend. I think she was the only person who ever… who ever actually liked me. I loved her, although I was too young to understand it. But she loved me. Not just what I could do, or what I had, but…” He trailed off, then started again. “She died. I think that’s when everything went off the rails for me.”

Katherine reached out, palm pressed flat against the invisible membrane of her world. She looked at him, eyes so green and vivid they seemed to glow, her face somber, and waited.

Andy hesitated, then pressed his palm to hers, matching her gesture. He couldn’t feel her, not really. The glass was cold and thick. But for a second, it felt like touching another human being.

He let himself cry, for the first time since he’d gotten here. He tried to hold it in, but the dam had broken. He pressed his forehead to the frame, shoulders shaking, while Katherine watched—eyes luminous, gaze soft—not judging, just… there.

When the storm finally passed, Andy wiped his eyes and tried to compose himself. He looked at her, embarrassed, but she just smiled. A real smile, not the painted kind, but the kind that made him believe she was more than paint and pigment.

He took a breath. “I wish I could help you,” he said. “I wish I could do something, anything, to make this less awful.”

She shook her head, then, with careful, deliberate precision, extended both arms again, miming the hug she couldn’t give. Andy smiled, in spite of himself. They sat together for a while, the silence between them no longer hollow, but filled with something that might one day resemble hope.

After a while, he looked at her, then at the glass of whiskey, and said, “I wish I could bring you out. You don’t deserve this.” He let the words hang. Then, because there was no one else to say it to, he started telling her about the day. The girls. Their transformations.

“There’s a girl downstairs,” he said, “who can’t stop wanting to help me. Even if she’s exhausted. There’s one who has… breasts the size of volleyballs and was remade to look like what my sick fantasies might imagine her to look. Another has to be hugged by me or she goes nuts. There’s a woman who can’t come unless I watch her. And someone who has six arms now, and they won’t even let her stop touching herself for two seconds.” He tried to laugh. “And I thought I had it bad.”

Katherine made a face—surprise, then empathy, then a kind of resignation. She pointed at herself, then at the frame, then at him. It was hard to read, but Andy thought she meant: It can always get worse.

He nodded, then frowned. “Do you know who does this? The woman, Arabella—she runs everything. I think she gets off on watching us suffer. It’s all a show to her. I can’t stand her.” The words came out sharper than he’d intended, and the anger in them surprised him.

Katherine’s face changed. For a second, she looked genuinely worried. She lifted her hands, made a slow down gesture, then mimed weighing two things in her hands, side to side.

Andy blinked. “You think I should… what? Trust her? Give her a chance?”

She nodded, urgent now. She pointed at her own eyes, then at his heart, then made a tiny okay sign with her fingers, like a kid promising not to break a toy.

Andy shook his head, half-frustrated, half-impressed. “You’re defending her? Didn’t she do this to you?”

Katherine sighed, then pointed at the door, mimed “walking,” then “bringing something back.” She brought her hands together, fingers lacing, then pressed her palms to her chest and looked at Andy, pleading.

He got it, finally. “She brought you back,” he said. “You were in storage, and Arabella… hung you here. So you could… watch. Be part of it.”

Katherine nodded, then raised both hands, palms up, and shrugged. She looked tired. Her hands fell into her lap, limp, and she slumped a little, as if the weight of the years had finally settled in.

Andy stared at her. “Fine, I get it, you are grateful to her. But is there something I’m missing? Why are you on her side?”

She tried to answer, but the limits of the painting were too strict. She made a face, frustration mounting, then she pressed her fingers to her lips and looked away, ashamed.

Andy softened. “It’s okay,” he said. “I get it. You want me to keep an open mind. Maybe you know something I don’t.” He stood, walked over, and pressed his hand to the frame. “That’s something I can do for you, isn’t it? For what it’s worth, I promise to try. I’ll… I’ll try not to hate her.”

Katherine looked at him, her eyes so clear and so sad that Andy felt his resolve falter. She nodded, once, a small but deeply sincere gesture.

He stepped back, exhausted. “I think I need sleep,” he said, voice raw. “Thank you for listening, Katherine. I’m glad you’re here.”