Jason and I have been friends since before we can remember. We were born on the same day and our fathers bonded in the waiting room. We frequently spent time at the other's home, so that one pair of parents could babysit, while the other pair went out for the evening. Even when Jason's dad got promoted and had to move away, they visited often and spend a week together in neighbouring chalets at a holiday park in the summer. At the holiday park we spent most of our time together at 'Kid's Klub', which allowed our parents the freedom to do what they wanted.

This year we were both sixteen and officially too old for the organised activities; the previous year we had done archery and fencing and Jason had been surprised that I was at least as good as him. We did not get to test who was actually the best because the supervisors did not allow the boys and girls to compete directly. We spent the first day on the rides, but were wondering what we could do to stave off boredom for the rest of the week, when we saw the couple that had run the 'Kid's Klub' for the last decade.

"Hey, Steve!" I called. He and Hayley stopped to allow us to catch up.

"Hi, Jason, Macey. It's good to see you." he answered.

"We were wondering if you might know of anything we could do, so we don't get bored. We've ridden every ride twice already."

"Well, you could come and help us out; we know that you're both kind and responsible people. Unfortunately, we wouldn't be able to pay you, unless you have some of the right qualifications. If that does not appeal, maybe you could think about putting something together for the talent show on Friday. And then there's the local excursions, but I'm guessing that poking your noses around the local castle ruins or the basket-weavers is not going to be your thing."

Hayley chimed in that if we wanted more details about the talent show, we could get them from main reception and reiterated that we would be welcome to come and help with the younger kids.

We wandered off to main reception and got given the rules and an entry form, as well a schedule for the off-site excursions.

Later, after another round of the thrill rides that were already losing their thrill, we sat a table in one of the cafés. While Jason chewed on a bite of burger, I commented, "These excursions look a bit more at mum and dad's speed. How do you feel about helping out Steve and Hayley for some of the week,at least we might get to see if we're as good at the archery as we were last year. Or we could try to work something out for this talent show thing; there's a £100 prize for the winners and £50 for the runners-up. I don't know what we could do though, because I can't sing a note and you can't dance a step and between us we don't enough properly funny jokes to fill a minute."

"I think you're right about the trips and I don't have any desire to help shepherding the younger kids, but maybe I've got an idea for the talent thing."

He waited for me to finished chewing the bite of burger I had taken. "What kind of idea is that?" I asked eventually.

"I thought we could do a magic act. You'd make a great assistant and I know a couple of magic tricks."

"But don't we need lots of equipment for that kind of thing, especially if we are meant to be entertaining the whole audience, so the card tricks you've shown me won't be enough."

"Well, I know how between us we can make it look as if your head has fallen off. And I know a few other bigger tricks, but I can get them to work with a minimum of rehearsal; it'll just be a case of finding some things to adapt for what I need; unless there's a magic shop in the town."

"Would I need to wear anything in particular? I didn't bring any leotards or fancy gowns."

Jason considered for a moment. "I think you'd be alright in your bikini, although I'd have to find a jacket or an overcoat to get the head off thing to work. Come to think of it, your mum's red jacket would be ideal. Why don't you go back to your chalet and ask her if we could borrow it for the show and starting filling in the form, while I have a look around to see what I can find and make a plan for what else we could do."

I went off to asked my mum if we could borrow her red jacket, so that we could enter the talent contest at the end of the week. She seemed happy that we had something more than just 'hanging around' to occupy us for the rest of the week and lending us her jacket was a small price to 'keep us out from under her feet'.

When I caught up with Jason, he said that he had visited the town and got the only thing that he could not borrow from the park. He had a plan, but I did not get to hear all of it, because he told me that everything would work better if I didn't know until the time and that rehearsing the head-drop illusion would take up a lot of our time. I handed over the jacket so that he could do whatever needed to be done with it.

The next day he showed me how the head-drop thing worked, which was I would bend down while the jacket stayed up right, supported by a frame Jason had made by bending wire coat-hangers. I asked if I was doing it right and he assured me that a little bit more practice and it would look good enough to fool most people, especially as they would not be expecting something like that and I'd be back up before they can get a really good look. "Although, now I see you doing it, I think something to wrap round your neck, like a scarf, and something to hide your legs a bit, would make things look even better. Perhaps if you wore a skirt or a sarong or something like that it would look better."

The next day I had borrowed a Sarong from mum and Jason showed me how to tie it so that the move required to get my head down to belly level and catch it there went unnoticed by the audience. When rehearsed some patter to make the head drop seem to have a reason, rather than a mere demonstration of a trick, then we practised a routine with a length of rope which got cut and where the cut was seemed to move about. My part in this was easy; I had to hold the end of the rope and looked puzzled by the things Jason did to the rope; no acting required, because I hadn't a clue how Jason was doing the things he was doing to the rope and he was not telling me.

“So have you found the trick for the climax of the act, Jace?”

“Yes, Macey, I have, and it's going to blow everyone's socks off. I got a look round the venue, including backstage and found the perfect thing. I asked if I could borrow it and had to do quite a bit of persuasion to get them to say yes. So, I checked it out and it definitely works. So, we've got a good chance of winning this thing, unless Elvis turns up.”

“So? What is this trick? And when are we going to rehearse it?”

“That's the beauty of it we won't need to rehearse it; it's a self working one, not one that needs an assistant with three months of constant practice. All you need to do is act and react naturally and follow a few simple instructions and you'll be perfectly fine. It can't go wrong and is impressive as all hell.”

Most of the rest of the week was spent in rehearsals of the pieces of the act that I knew about and bugging Jason about the part I didn't; with no success, as he insisted that it was safe, would play big and did not need me to know what it was in advance.

----------

The evening of the show I was veering between being confident and a nervous wreck thinking about the unknown final illusion. I had more time than I expected to ride the emotional roller-coaster, because we were scheduled to be last; Jason had mentioned trying to persuade the organisers that was the best place to put us.

The acts before us passed unremarkably, like a cross between a karaoke night and a bad night at a comedy club. I thought the best of the bunch was a mime act who made the suitcase that decided it didn't want to move; it looked remarkably real. Then it was our turn.

We walked on to the stage. Jason had borrowed a black jacket and trousers from somewhere, but the initial impression was undercut by white running shoes and a green t-shirt under the jacket. I was dressed in a white t-shirt under the red jacket and had the sarong wrapped in the special way that Jason had shown me.

“But, Jason, what are we going to do for a finale, if we can't use the guillotine illusion?” I asked.

“I don't know yet, Macey, but I'll come up with something; I feel sure of it. But we can't use that guillotine after the little accident we had with it.”

“I don't remember there being an accident,” I said trying to appear puzzled and mask my tensing for the performance of the head drop effect.

He patted me on the shoulder, saying, “Don't worry about it, the little problem is fixed; I think.”

On that cue I performed the manoeuvre that I had been practising for the past few days. To the audience it looked like my head had dropped off of my shoulders and conveniently tumbled into my hands that were held at about waist height.

Jason pretended to be oblivious of my sudden decapitation, until the audience made a sound in reaction. He then helped me return my head to its proper position, an act, not of kindness, but to ensure that as I rose to my normal posture, the clothes did not get pushed too far out of line and give away the trick.

“I think you are going to need to apply another coat of glue, while I set up for the trick we do have planned.” He pulled a length of rope from his pocket.

I went backstage and quickly removed the rigged clothes and the t-shirt. Then I put a red ribbon with Velcro on the ends around my neck to give the continuing impression that my head may have been detached at some point. A check that my bikini was still on straight and not indecent from the head drop or the removal of clothes, then I returned to the stage.

On stage Jason had tied the end of the rope to a microphone stand and was hunting for something that tied the other end to. When I arrived he stood me about six feet from the microphone stand and then handed me the loose end of the rope. “Here, hold this!”

I watched as awed as the audience while Jason cut the rope in the middle, showed cut ends before knotting them together and sliding the knot close to my hand and unknotting them. I stood there with about six inches of rope dangling from my hand, while the rest of the rope dropped onto the stage. He looked at the two parts of the rope as if he was disappoint that it was not in one piece, which drew some laughter from the part of the crowd that were not cheering the feat of converting two three-ish foot long pieces of rope into a six inch piece and a six foot piece.

Jason picked up the end that lay on the floor and retied it to the short length I was holding. The knot he made was then slid most of the way to the other end, where it was untied again. This left me with the tail of a six foot length of rope that had less than a minute before been a six inch length. More cheers, laughter and mock disappointment.

The final stage was to retie the knot and slide it back to the middle, then ask me to drop my end, after which he slid the knot of the end of the fully restored rope, then tossed the knot in the air and caught it in his pocket.

He made moves that suggested he was considering doing it again, in the hope of a different outcome. I asked, “Have we got a finale yet?”

“Yes, I've found the perfect thing.” He put his fingers to his mouth and gave a shrill whistle that I had not been expecting. I response came a rumbling noise. Something six feet in each direction with something that jutted up above the six foot tall frame. I could not tell what it was, because it was covered by a tarpaulin, so that its outline was clear, but the only detail I could see was the large casters on which it moved at the corners.

One of the two men that pushed it on stage went round and locked the casters, while the other connected a large yellow plug the trailed from under the frame, into a socket on the end of the thick cable he had been carrying draped over his shoulder. Both men left.

I did not have to act stunned and a little overwhelmed. “What the heck is that?” I asked with a tone that suggested that I was afraid that I would not like the answer.

“It's a classic illusion.” Jason stood beside it, grabbed hold of the tarpaulin and pulled. To everyone's surprise, especially Jason's, the tarp did not want to budge from the jutting part at the top.

Jason took a moment to assess the problem, then went behind the huge thing and dragged the tarpaulin from the back.

The device revealed was made of heavy lumber with the smoothness and polish it probably did not possess when it was built, but had acquired over years of use. The outer frame was mostly empty, except for two items that froze my blood; a platform at the back and most terrifying a five foot diameter saw blade held up by a spindle attached to a large motor housing.

While the audience was shocked at the revelation, I asked the question that I needed answering. “What are you planning to do with that?”

“I'm planning to cut you in half,” he replied as if that was a normal sentence that a normal person might utter several times a day.

“You never said anything about this and we sure as hell never rehearsed anything of the sort.” My voice was squeaky with terror at the prospect. I had seen this kind of thing on TV, but had never imagined that I might be asked to be involved in such a thing. Of course, I was curious about how the illusion was done, but the prospect of having it demonstrated on me in front of an audience that included my parents appalled.

“It's ok; there's nothing to it. All you need to do is lie on the table and stay still while I wind this handle which will move the table part under the saw blade, which will be rotating at three thousand RPM, driven by the fourteen horsepower motor up the top there.”

If my feet had not been rooted to the spot by the overwhelming spectacle of the machine, I would have run. Instead, I bent down until my eyes were level with the table. There was a slot in the table, about three inches deep and a quarter inch wide; this slot lined up with the saw blade so that the lowest part of the blade would pass through the groove in the table about two inches below the surface.

I did not get to ask the next question, because Jason pulled a lever which resulted in a short shower of sparks and the blade beginning to rotate. He leaned forward and picked up a sturdy wooden rod, After waving it about, he touched it to the edge of the still accelerating blade. The end disappeared on some unknown trajectory, cut off and thrown by the power of the blade. He tossed the remains of the stick away and took my hand. He gave my hand what I think was meant to be a reassuring squeeze, but I did not feel any better about the idea of being run through with a large buzzsaw.

Numbly I followed him behind the equipment; it did not look any better from this angle, except for the minor comfort that from here if I stumbled, I would bump into the moving platform instead of the whirling blade.

He moved my hand to over his shoulder put and arm behind my back while sweeping the other behind my knees. I was in his arms before I could wonder what he was doing. Against intuition I felt safe in his arms, despite being lifted towards the moveable platform close to the saw blade. He spread his arms so that I had to straighten my body to avoid falling through growing gap between. When I was mostly straight he stepped forward and rested by butt on the edge of the table.

“Now, roll over so that your belly is on the table and line yourself up with the markings on the surface.” This would put me in the middle of the platform and still about a foot from the blade. I followed the first part and the look down to find the markings Jason was taking about. I found the markings were mother of pearl inlaid into the age-darkened surface. The outline for placing legs seemed a little short until I realised that the rounded ends of the creamy markings each went round a small dark green velvet pad and would make a good place to rest my knees. The shuffling I had to do get my knees and legs positioned pulled on my bikini bottom; I checked that the red bikini briefs still covered everything they were meant to; they did.

The marking for the legs ended at the groove in the table and I was confused by the markings on this side. There were a pair of narrow half ellipses with velvet pads in the rounded ends and another narrow full ellipse containing more velvet padding. It took more time than it should have to work out they were two arm positions; arms laid on the padding of the full ellipse would be perfect for resting my head on, while if I rested elbows on the pads at the ends of the half ellipses they would support my upper body and give me more chance to see what was happening. I chose the elbows-propped position.

While I was getting myself into what I hoped was the best position, the audience were murmurring; my guess is that they thought I was closer to the blade than I really was; not that it made much difference on the longer run, if Jason's stated plan happened.

Jason started to move towards the handle he had indicated earlier would move the table towards and under the blade. “Don't you need to tied me in place, or something?” I asked urgently.

“I don't need to shackle you or anything like that; firstly because even being up there you're a lot braver than me and, secondly, because I am told that it feels quite nice once it gets started.”

“And who would tell you that? I thought you said you found this contraption in storage somewhere backstage.”

“I did, but I also found the nameplate of the magician who had owned. So I did the research and found he had died in the seventies, but I managed to locate his assistant who was sawn through three times a week back in the sixties, and she told me how to operate it and that after the first scratch from the blade you will enjoy it. Oh yes! I nearly forget put your hair up a bit, because Helga said that it hurts like hell if you get even a small clump of your hair caught in the blade.” He handed me a blue scrunchie to rein in my long blond hair.

While I tucked my ponytail up to be a lot shorter, Jason announced, “I shall now pass my lovely assistant, Macey, under this whirling steel blade. And I would like to assured those in the middle of the audience that should the worst happen, the bottom of the blade is travelling away from you so that blood splatter in your direction should be minimal.”

As soon as my hair was better controlled, I felt the platform I lay on move and quickly resumed the position I had originally taken. It took me a moment to notice that the movement had been away from the blade, but the motion quickly switched directions. Before I thought about not being secured in this position and that I could roll off the table, it was too late; the space between me and the blade had shrunk enough that there was some risk of being cut if I moved. It came down to a decision between 'did I take the chance that I might be able to escape without touching the blade?' or 'Did I trust Jason enough to let whatever he had planned happen and hope it turned out right?'.

By the time I had formulated the question it was too late. I felt a searing streak of pain across the back of my waist on the side towards the blade, about an inch above my bikini. I yelped an incoherent scream of pain that silenced the muttering in the auditorium. I saw a momentary slip of the determined smile on Jason's face, knocked askew by worry that things had gone wrong. Then I felt a warmth in my back that soothed the pain away in a couple of seconds. A quick glance upstage confirmed that my blood was not being flung towards the plain backdrop; this calmed me enough to check my back, where the blade was buried an inch or so into my flesh and getting deeper as Jason continued to turn the handle.

The inevitable had already happened and against all intuition I was calm and, more importantly, neither in pain nor dying. The soothing warmth that spread from the blade, that should have been ripping out my intestines and slinging them at the back wall, was pleasant. If I had been asked to do it again, might have said something like, 'Ok, but cut out the tension building, it made me worry that you didn't know what you were doing.'

I guess I had not been concentrating, because I became suddenly aware that the platform had stopped moving and Jason had abandoned his position at the handle. A small thump noise had brought me back from the calm reverie. Jason was stood at a corner of the frame unlocking the wheels. I checked behind me to see how he had left me relative the saw blade that whispered breathily from somewhere too close. I soon discovered that 'too close' was entirely through my middle; the teeth raced into the groove in the table on one side of my body and returned to view the same distance on the other side. The little of my body that I could see ended in a large metal disk rotating through the small of my back.

Before I could ask the question, Jason was announcing the answer to the audience. “I feel sure that some of you don't believe that Macey is currently divided by a running buzzsaw and think that she is somehow hiding behind the blade somehow. To prove those few wrong, I shall turn the whole apparatus to show that she isn't hiding back there and it isn't some clever wedge-shaped table that allows her hide below the blades reach.” As I watched the scene began to change, soon I could see the audience, dimly; I gave them an apologetic wave, as if I was afraid that I was imposing on their time, but was intended to show I was still alive, even if I didn't believe it either.

Halfway round the view was almost a mirror version of how it had started, Jason paused before continuing to where the rotation had started. “Well, I can't leave the blade running through Macey all night (I don't want the bill for the electricity that the motor must be going through).” He locked the wheel and returned to the handle; A quick wiggle to remind himself which direction he needed to turn the handle and I was moving toward the audience once more. I had expected that the pleasant feeling of the blade rubbing inside me would diminish, but it did not; even after I was clear of the blade and the platform section extended beyond the front of the origin six foot cubic frame of timber held up by whatever sliding mechanism it had used to move me forward. Another splash of sparks and the saw blade began to decelerate.

“Now, some of you believe that, despite what you have just witnessed, Macey has not been cut in half. This is understandable, because most of you will have seen the version where the assistant gets on the table behind the saw and is transported through the saw, with much histrionics and drama, and then, in the defiance of logic, hops off the table as if nothing has happened. I will acknowledge that magic defies logic, but there should be limits.” Jason leaned down and tugged on the side of the table. He extracted a large sheet of metal from the section under my legs. After a bit of waving it about to show that it was heavy and solid, Jason fitted it into the groove that had accommodated the lower edge of the saw blade, mercifully stopped now, and slid it until it touched me. A second blade quickly followed, pulled from below where my elbows were resting and slid into the slot next to the first.

He took up a position mostly the far side of the metal from me and placed a hand on my hip and the other on the audience end of the sheets stood in the central slot of the table. He whispered to me, “When I count to three I need you to lean forward a little; ok?” I nodded my understanding and he started counting.

On 'Three' I leaned forward and felt him pull back on my hip for a brief moment, then I felt a coolness pass through me which became a delicious sensation, when combined with the warmth that still remained within me from the sawing. It took a few seconds for many of the audience and me to realise that the metal sheets had been slid right through me. I knew for sure that I was in two parts, as were those in the audience that believed their eyes. I caught a glimpse of an upraised foot and twitched it experimentally and it moved exactly as expected.

“Some of you die-hard sceptics will be saying to yourselves, 'she avoided the metal sheets the same way that she avoided the saw blade in the first place.' And you'd absolutely right.” There was a bit a hubbub in the audience; even I gave Jason a questioning look. “The point is Macey avoided neither the metal sheets or the saw blade and to prove it, let's separate her.”

To my horror there was a click as Jason touched something on the edge of the table near the central slot and then walked to the end of the table where I was facing and pulled on the edge. I felt movement, which initially did not make sense until I caught out of the corner of my eye my feet moving away at the same speed that my upper part was moving forward. When my upper and lower parts were about two feet apart, Jason stopped. This coincided with a clunk from under the platform I lay on.

Jason leaned in and said, “Sorry; I know Helga warned me about it, but I forgot in the excitement of the movement. The thing is, the tabletop has hit the stops and locked there. Handy if you want to present a buffet in the middle of a beautiful woman, but a disaster if you want get off stage before the bar closes.”

“So what do we do?” I asked.

“I don't know! Helga said that the few times it happened to her, they improvised a way of getting the stumps to touch while trying to avoid giving away it's real magic.”

“Anything more specific than that?” My question containing an undertone of panic.

“I wish!”

“That would be good if it worked, but as it hasn't I guess it won't!”

“Don't get snippy now, we need to think of a way out of this mess, rather than think of who to blame.”

Fortunately, probably due to the mixing of the cut warmth and the dividers cool, I could not remain mad a Jason for long and an idea occurred. “Get two large cloths and lay one over each half. I'll think of the rest of the instructions as I think of them.” The voice of reason, sent him scurrying to fulfil my request. I turned to address the audience.

“As you may have noticed, this piece of magic was somewhat under-rehearsed, by which I mean unrehearsed. Jason had a good idea of what he was doing and then he got cocky and stuffed it up at the last moment. It falls to me as the assistant to pull the magician's iron from the fire barehanded. You know how it is girls! The boys have some neat ideas, but sometimes it goes wrong and we have to tidy up the mess.” Fortunately, I did not have to continue this rant, because Jason returned with a couple of large cloths. “Right! There you are! Go inside the frame, so you don't get in the way of everyone seeing what happens next. And don't scrape yourself on the saw blade; I don't want to make you clean it if you get blood on it. No, the other side, next to my legs. They may need some guidance or a helping hand, but don't get any other ideas.”

He gave me the 'spoilsport' look, but nodded that he was here to help get my plan to work.

“First, draped one of the clothes over the metal divider and my legs, but leave my feet showing.” To help in that task I straightened my knees so that my legs flat on the table. “Good. Now hand me the other cloth , but keep a hold of that end so I don't accidentally pull it over the blade and uncover what I am doing.” I took the cloth and draped it over my shoulders. “Grip the nearer foot and try to slide it towards the divider. It's lucky that this table is smooth with age.” He took hold of my foot and I felt his temptation to tickle it, so I said, “Uh-uh! We haven't the time right now.”

While Jason held my foot I kept the other foot out stretched and hoped nobody would notice the upstage foot, because it was less visible and covered by the cloth. I tried press against the pressure Jason was supplying and bend knee and hip to raise my straight leg and my stump against the blade; I hoped that to the audience it looked like I was levitating myself. Jason quickly got what I was going for and used his other hand to support my hip without appearing to do anything to help and putting on a look of surprise and puzzlement. When my knee reached the divider I did my best to keep my cloth covered stump rising until I felt it was above the height of the divider. To the audience it looked like my lower half was levitating and once it cleared the barrier moved forward. This resulted in my lower half kneeling against the blade with my stump projecting part of the way over the gap to my upper half, with one leg stretch back to give the impression that it was still as flat as it had been when it was covered by the cloth.

This had been strenuous and I knew that I would need help raising my upper half too. I instructed Jason to come round 'to adjust the cloth over my upper part'. With some, possibly overcautious help from him I managed to rise onto my hands with my upper body still held horizontal. Two hand-steps back and I could feel my lower body, but the cloths were in the way. I told him that the cloths needed rearranging and he knew what to do. Once he was at the front again he moved the cloths from where they were not needed, while leaving me covered by cloth from neck to ankle. The sense of relief when my stumps touched and bonded was almost euphoric. I had to calm quickly for the last stage, to make this look, at least a little, planned. I told Jason to whip the cloths away and be ready to catch me when I rolled off the ends of the divider blades.

With a flourish Jason did as asked and I rolled towards the audience. I had expected to end up in his arms, but as he caught me, about table level, he span round once and deposited me on my feet.

They say the applause of the crowd can be addictive and I felt on cloud nine from the standing ovation.

Sadly, we were told by the judges that we had been on stage longer than the rules allowed for, even if it seemed to be a technical problem rather than intent, so we were down-graded to second place and the guy with the stubborn suitcase won.