Of the moment

A story about a timely matter.

30 May 2023

Stacy Brown —

Fairy Dust

I never leave the house without makeup. Now my face stares back at me from the stainless steel of a notice board, naked and smudged. There are no windows here, only posters and notice boards to break up the pale lilac walls. The rustle of paper gowns and softly closing doors break the silence of the hallway. I want to be outside. This place is for sick people. I’m not sick.                                                                 

‘Miss Smith?’ A thin woman in a white tunic stands in the doorway and scans the sea of identical faces. The air feels dry in my throat as I stand and gather my things, wary of the walls, and of my weak leg threatening to tip me into them.

‘Are you wearing any jewellery?’ she asks, as I follow her into the corridor. ‘Anything metal?’   

A moment of panic. Am I?  ‘No,’ I answer.                                                              

There’s a red locker beside an empty chair and she waits patiently for me to fold up my jacket and place it inside. I’m led to a room opposite where she holds the door open, and gestures for me to go through, her arm poised to steady me. My fingers cling to the hem of my shirt as I step over the threshold, my legs tiring already. There’s a narrow bed at the centre of the room, its headboard a cylindrical machine with little yellow lights that illuminate the space inside.                                                                                                          

‘You might have to shuffle down a bit,’ the nurse says kindly. ‘And mind your shoulders.’ I notice the heavy lacquer of black eyeliner sweeping above her lashes and I’m conscious of the way I look, of my colourless face and the dark circles under my eyes. She’s young and fresh faced and it’s unfair. If the patients can’t wear makeup in here, why can the nurses? 

I perch on the bed, carefully sliding my legs up as I notice a plastic mould for my head where a pillow should be. I stretch out on the mattress, my forgetful feet grateful for the chance to lie down. A plastic frame rests lightly against my shoulders as the nurse presses earplugs into my ears, securing them in place with a heavy set of headphones, the weight of them pulling my head back. My legs are lifted, a pillow placed under my knees before a white plastic grate is drawn across my face and I’m caged in, weighted down. Tubes from the headphones lie heavy across my chest.                                                                                      

‘If you feel you need to get out,’ the nurse says, ‘just give this a squeeze.’ She hands me an air pump that fits in the palm of my hand like a plum. Another tube to stretch across my chest. I grip it tentatively.                                                                                               

I close my eyes against the brightness of the room and think of the world outside, blocking out the feeling of tubes that press me against the bed. I take slow, steadying breaths between the gaps of the plastic bars across my face. I lie perfectly still, thinking of fresh air and sunshine as the machine swallows me whole.                                                

 ‘You okay in there?’ a voice crackles through the speaker, barely legible over the noise of the machine. I wonder if the loud thrumming will shake me apart, loosening my elbows and knees and shuddering my memories to dust like an upturned Etch-A-Sketch. Maybe that’s what the cage was for. To keep all my pieces together.

‘Yes,’ I reply, but I’m not sure if they hear me, because I’m miles away. Away with the fairies. I’m on the beach, a broken radio loud with static disturbing the air around me, frightening the gulls away. I’m walking through an open field, the air cool against my cheek. A pylon buzzing with electricity. Loud hammering emanates from its metal legs and I frown, my fingers flexing around the air pump.                                                      

I take a deep breath.                                                                                                   

Trees surround me, darkening my view into branches and bark and an overcast sky. I push my way through the bracken that buffer me against the noise, twigs clawing at my hair as I brush past. There’s a hum of thunder rumbling in the distance as I stumble into a small clearing. There’s a circle of mushrooms, their red speckled tops open flat like tiny umbrellas. The sun peeks through the clouds, making the grass glitter white in a pattern of shimmering footprints on the ground. The woods have grown silent, the sun brightening into a golden glow above me as I’m pulled down into the circle of mushrooms at my feet.                     

I blink as the bars are lifted away and the headphones removed. The nurse smiles and helps me sit up, my arms aching from being pressed against my sides.                                

‘There we are,’ she says, taking the earplugs from me. ‘You did really well.’

*

‘Would you like to see the scan?’ I’m back in the hospital, weeks later, sitting in a small white room with an examination table and a desk. Rain patters against the window, blurring the world outside. The doctor’s wide, expressionless face looks at me from behind his computer, a small desk fan quietly rotating the warm air. ‘Miss Smith?’                              

My hands fidget. I think of how surreal it would be to see my insides displayed on a screen. Maybe I could take a copy home. Hang it on a wall in the living room. I nod at the doctor and he clicks the mouse, angling the screen toward me.                                                         

But my body’s not there, and my stomach drops.                                                     

The doctor’s talking, his voice a low murmur of background noise that I can barely hear as he gestures to the screen with a pen, pointing out the different shades of grey between the wrinkled edges of my brain. The fan stirs the hairs on the back of my neck as he zooms in with the mouse, and patches of white appear among the grey, like fairy dust.

Stacy Brown is a writer of short fiction residing in Hampshire. she has a masters degree in creative writing from the University of Chichester, a short story published with potato soup journal, and a snake plant called Trevor.

KJ Hannah Greenberg tilts at social ills and encourages personal evolutions via poetry, prose, and visual art. Her images have appeared as interior art in many places, including Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, Kissing Dynamite, Les Femmes Folles, Mused, Piker Press, The Academy of the Heart and Mind, The Front Porch Review, and Yellow Mama and as cover art in many places, including Angime, Black Petals, Door is A Jar Literary Magazine [sic], Impspired [sic], Pithead Chapel, Red Flag Poetry, Right Hand Pointing, Smoky Blue Literary and Arts Magazine, The Broken City, Torah Tidbits and Yellow Mama. Additionally, some of her digital paintings are featured alongside of her poetry in One-Handed Pianist (Hekate Publishing, 2021).

Photo by Susan Cohen.

Susan Cohen started out life in New Jersey, lived places other than New Jersey, and wound up in upstate New York. She likes winter, don't judge. She has always kept an eye out for photos of things that move her, and not just pretty things. Susan's photography focuses on the juxtaposition of light and dark, unconventional angles, and things hidden in plain sight. Her work conveys a mood. Life's too short to photograph the mundane. Susan's work has been included in shows around the Albany, Troy, and Saratoga regions. She can be contacted at susanmcohen1@gmail.com.