I feel so lucky to have people in my life who support my writing habit. This next on-the-spot piece is inspired by an impromptu prompt doled out in a burger joint by my coworker Kristina. The iPhone note, quickly written, states the following:
You go to a magician and it turns out the magic is real…He makes somebody disappear, and they’re really gone.
The piece…
The Disappeared Woman’s Lament
When they say never talk to strangers, what they mean—or what they should mean—is never talk to magicians. You see, I’m not here. Well, not in your version of here; the kind of here with conversational awkwardness between two beings, or food of any kind (I considerably miss pizza and garlic bread sticks), or some sort of facility a person usually refers to as a restroom. No, this here is a blank-ish sort of place, a white background that when you stare too long, may appear a cream color; and then after longer consideration, possibly taupe. There are rabbits here, white; golden rings; what looks like the bottom half of a very attractively-legged woman. On the other side of the room there is something that appears much like a door, but may be made of the silk lining of the inside of a driver’s cap or top hat. I do not know where this door leads, nor have I been able to reach it (it seems to move away from me as I step toward it). I am in the not-here, the no-where, the ex-istence. I can’t even recall the journey—I want to say it was moderately painful, but a girl in the not-here can’t concern herself with such not-things. I feel that this is supposed to be true.
And when enough of the not-quite-time has passed, in lengths that seem day-like in their tangibility, I continue to scope the rapidly appearing and disappearing objects. I have a thought: Perhaps we are the remnants of failed magic; of tricks gone awry. I feel that this is also supposed to be true. The legs of the half-woman kick in heeled agreement.
But I feel it, both unexpectedly and planned, a hand reaching out from the red silk door, fumbling in the sort-of-white with urgency. I touch it, this hand, and it snatches around my fist, pulling like the furious closing of a portal. And then I am here. Your here. Staring into the stunned faces, jaws agape with astonishment or terror, and I can see the beads of sweat drop from the magician’s face like rivulets from the edges of a waterfall. He looks at me and forces a grin. Too close, I think I hear him say.
“Bow,” he whispers.