Lumière (The Illumination Paradox) by Jacqueline E. Garlick

why.”
    That’s the second time he’s done that strange little movement—once outside at the carriage and now again. I’m not sure if it’s his way of emphasizing his point, or just a nervous habit, but before I’ve had the chance to figure it out, his back is turned, and he’s heavy into his tea preparations again. Plucking the tea service off the shelf, he slams it down onto the countertop: first the pots, then the creamers, followed by the sugars and both lids.
    I wince, trying not to look disturbed by his behavior; though, truth be known, I am. But no more than I am by staying in a house with blackened windows.
    “You are never to climb the stairs to my father’s third-floor laboratory,” he continues, before I can utter a single word. “No matter what sounds you hear.”
    Sounds? What does that mean? What kinds of sounds does one emit from a laboratory? Dread curdles in my belly. What kind of laboratory is this?
    “We live here alone, my father and I, except for Iris, who prepares our meals and does light housekeeping. They’re her clothes you’re wearing”—he eyes me warily—“but you needn’t thank her. She prefers to be left alone—”
    Alone?
    “She has her own apartment on the second floor, below my father’s laboratory”—he hesitates, pouring the water from the stove into pots—“which you are never to enter . Do you understand?”
    I look up, drinking in his ominous expression. Dread seeps from my gut to my bones. Why all the secrecy? Why such dire instructions? I nod, silently, wondering what’s really going on.
    Then, as if there’s been a shift of the wind in the kitchen, his mood lifts. “Sugar?” He sort of smiles, as much of a smile as I’ve seen pass his lips in the two short hours that I’ve known him. What on earth is wrong with him?
    I nod and he clatters toward the table, still dark and broody about the edges, tea service rattling loudly in his hands. He places things down, a little confused about their order, changing things twice before settling, offering me endless lumps of sugar and loads of cream.
    “Care for a humbug?” He flips his coattails out behind him, joining me for tea.
    “A hum- what?”
    “A candy?” His brows rise. He shakes the candy bowl in my direction.
    Forget the mood barometer. I may need a full psychoanalyst kit to decipher the rapid mood swings of this man.
    Reluctantly, I accept the sweet, examining it before popping it in my mouth. It taste of butter and cocoa and fiery peppermint, mixed with something bitterly unexplainable. I spit it out and examine it again, peering through its clear coating for a bug. God only knows what one might serve in a home with blackened windows.
    Urlick laughs. Then clears his throat to cover it up. His eyes fall to the pendant at my neck. “Tell me about that necklace,” he blurts.
    “There’s nothing to tell,” I snap.
    “Surely, there’s a story behind something so unusual—”
    “A connoisseur of women’s jewelry, are we?” I tip my head.
    “I wouldn’t say that,” he answers slowly.
    “Then how would you know?”
    “Know what? ”
    “If it’s unusual.”
    “I guess I wouldn’t.”
    “Well, there we have it.” I cross my hands and look away.
    Urlick clears his throat again, and for a long time we sip our tea in steeped silence—me pondering why he’s asked me such a thing. What interest could he have in my jewelry?
    It takes a while, but finally—heads fixed forward, hands warming round our cups—snatches of actual conversation begin to pass again between us, rising through wisps of Earl Grey steam.
    “Is that a bruise?” I pause. “On your face, I mean?”
    Urlick looks up from his cup. “A birthmark. What were you running from?”
    “Trouble. Has it always been that color?”
    “Worse. What kind of trouble?”
    “The worst kind. How did it happen, exactly?”
    “I got stuck. What do you mean by, ‘the worst kind?’” He grimaces. “Is there any other?”
    “No. What