Melody – One

The telephone was ringing. Melody sighed and rolled over, gracefully standing up off the couch in one motion, the kind of thing that only seems to work when you’re not thinking about it. School had just ended three weeks ago. This was her last summer before college. Why was everything so dead?
Scooping up the receiver she sighed again before saying “Hello.” She didn’t know why she was so depressed. Everything seemed fake and used, daytime TV style, and nothing could distract her from the bored haze that seemed to devour every hope of a smile.
“Hey, you free tonight?” It was Miranda. She’d known Miranda since sophomore year. Miranda was nice, and they were pretty close, which was more because neither of them really had any sort of “best friend.”
“Yea, I think so.”
“Great. I was going to this show, but my date bailed on me. He has uh… Something. Anyway, you up for this?”
“What kind of show?”
“Don’t pretend you have something to do.”
“Well, there’s SNL.”
“C’mon. You’ll love it. I promise.”
“What kind of show?”
“Magic.”
“Pass.”
“C’mon. I know how boring most of them are – some annoyingly foreign guy in a polyester suit and barely clad assistants pretending to be sawn in half – this guy is different. He does the magic on audience members. And he doesn’t use props.”
“Okay. You’re getting warmer.”
“And I know this place we can go afterwards for drinks.”
“Drinks?”
“Yea.”
“Okay, when are you coming?”
The show was at the Blue, which was defiantly a plus. Instead of just another theatre, the Blue was an atmosphere unto itself – tasteful art on the walls, decent lighting, and a very local atmosphere, with minimal seating in couches and armchairs. In spite of its small club appearance, the Blue managed to book some of the leading acts in their town, a wide selection of talents and shows, ranging from Chris Rock to Jets to Brazil to Moby to Sarah Jones. The magician was simply titled “Steve West” without any cheesy name or flashy lettering. They recognized Charlie and Elaine, a couple from their school, sitting on an antique blue sofa under a huge photograph of a mountain in Antarctica.
“Hey, what’s up?” began Miranda.
“Oh. Hi,” said Charlie.
“Hi.”
“Hi.” Miranda and Elaine pretended to hug. Charlie pretended to smile.
“I heard great stuff about this guy,” grinned Charlie. His attempted enthusiasm was sickening, and Melody thought she remembered dating him for a week. Maybe it was Ryan though, who was his best friend.
“Really?”
“Yea. I mean, you haven’t?”
“No, Miranda just called me up tonight. She was going to go with uh… Samir, I think.”
“So what do you think?”
“Beats television.”
“Yea. I guess so.” His awkward tone was satisfying in a sick way.
The lights dimmed a little, which really didn’t make much of a difference as to visibility, and Miranda grabbed her hand and dragged her to an empty couch.
The stage illuminated, Timmy, who graduated three years ago, jumped up on stage. Timmy had some kind of job here, though it had never been clear exactly what.
“Jesus, he’s hot,” smiled Miranda. Melody agreed, but said nothing.
“Sup, y’all,” began Timmy, “It’s great to see all of you here tonight, and we’re really happy to present the first magic act we’ve ever had here. Now, as you should already know, this isn’t going to be another Vegas-ized performance with fireworks or some stupid dancing maneuvers, this is just uh… well, I’ll just shut up and start the show. Ladies and gentlemen, Steve West!”
Everyone clapped, and a twentysomething with black hair and blue eyes walked out onto the stage. He was plainly dressed in baggy jeans and a black T-shirt that fit well.
“Hey, first of all, I’d like to thank everyone here for coming. This is my first act outside of New York, and really, it’s great to see so many people. Anyway, I’ve promised all of you something ‘different’ so here it is: I won’t be using any props tonight.”
A few people laughed.
“I mean really. No props. Well. Just one.” He reached into his pocket and a worried look appeared on his face.
“Um… yea. One moment.” He reached into his other pocket, and turned around, with a mock look of panic. More people started laughing.
“Okay, does anyone have, say, a scarf? Or, Timmy, you got a tablecloth?”
Timmy, from offstage, replied, “I’ve got a bandana.”
“Great. Bring it up here.” Timmy brought him the bandana.
“Okay, as you can see, this proves that I talked to Timmy before the show.” More laughter.
“As for my next gimmick, I won’t be using any assistants. All tricks will be performed on you – the audience. Also, you’re all going to need to participate here – there’s only about 25 of you here tonight, but honestly, that’s pretty decent right? I heard Timmy tell me this place only holds 150.”
“125” corrected Timmy.
“Alright. Well I may as well get started. Can I get my first volunteer?” Hands went up.
“You there. In the red skirt.” A half-Korean girl in a black tank top, black army boots, and a red plaid skirt stood up and vaulted with one hand onto the stage.
“What’s your name?”
“Suzie.”
“Okay, Suzie, you’ve never met me before have you?”
“Nope.”
“Yea, that’s not gonna help you though. You ever seen magic on TV Suzie?”
“Sometimes?”
In an aside tone, he said, “So, you um… have any ideas for tricks?”
She shook her head.
“Great. Well I was sort of hoping you would see, because I don’t either.”
Suzie laughed.
“Alright. Well, I’ve got one idea. Okay, this is called the disappearing girl. And, as the title implies, it makes a girl disappear. Now, using only one prop, supplied by Timmy, I am going to, before your very eyes, disappear Suzie completely. I think I can bring her back too.”
Taking the bandana by the tip, Steve shook it out, and made a quick whipping motion. The bandana seemed to unfold into a 3x3 black silk cloth. Everyone started clapping.
“I don’t see what the big deal is, this is only part of the act.”
Steve performed the same motion again, and the cloth turned into what looked like a bedsheet, still black.
“Okay, Suzie, ready?”
“Sure.”
“Great.” He took the sheet and draped it over her, as if covering a statue. Suzie’s giggle escaped from underneath, just before Steve took hold of the sheet from the top and ripped it away, reveling Suzie to have, in fact, vanished completely. The crowd applauded loudly.
“Wow” said Miranda. Melody had to give it to him – it was better than she’d expected. Even his cheesy one-liners weren’t as bad as she’d anticipated.
“Okay! IT WORKED!” Yelled Steve. “Now, we’ve got to bring her back somehow. Hang on.”
Steve began balling up the cloth into his left hand, and, somehow it all seemed to fit. Melody thought of it as the same slight-of-hand that appeared on TV, only backwards. When he was finished, Steve opened his hand to reveal a black rubber ball, which he bounced once on the floor. The crowd applauded again.
Steve took to ball, held it between two fingers and grinned a little, then threw it across the stage, where, upon hitting the ground, there was a bright flash, and Suzie appeared from nowhere, looking dazed, and very surprised. The club went nuts. Even Melody smiled.
“Okay, now, my prop seems to have vanished. So, Suzie if you could just hold still for one minute, I’ll figure out where it went. With that, Suzie opened her mouth to speak, and out fell the black rubber ball, bouncing twice before she gained enough wits to catch it.
“Very good. You’re though now. Beat it,” Smirked Steve. Suzie, laughing, but still looking confused, took her seat.
For his next volunteer, Steve selected a short blond, whose name turned out to be Emily.
“Okay, so Emily, you know any magic tricks?”
“Well, there’s Sawing a Lady in half.”
“Great idea. I don’t have a saw, but that’s only a minor setback right?”
“Uh… sure.”
“Okay, Emily, you up to be halved?”
“Why not?”
“Well, personally, I can think of lots of reasons why not, but those only apply to me. Anyway, lets go ahead and get started.”
“Alright.”
“I’m going to need two other volunteers as well.”
Miranda raised her hand, and grabbed Melody’s and hoisted it up as well.
“You two – over there.” He pointed, at them.
Miranda didn’t say anything, just smiled innocently, while Melody, tried not to laugh, pretending that she really was pissed off.
They made their way onto the stage, and after telling Steve their names, he turned again to the audience.
“So, what I’m going to do is, cut this lovely young girl into two pieces. Are any of you going to stop me?”
Everyone laughed.
“Great. It’s easier that way. Now, Miranda and Melody, I need one of you to take hold of her feet, and the other of her shoulders. Good. Now, raise her up, don’t worry, she’s not as heavy as you’d think.”
The girls did so, and pulled Emily up off the ground, and tilted her so she was horizontal. Steve was right – it was as if she was perfectly weightless. Emily laughed, and said, “This feels weird.”
Steve tucked the ball back into his hand, and opened it to expose that it was again the 3x3 piece of cloth. With only some kind of look on his face that could only be described as “Devious” he walked to the middle of Emily, and wrapped the cloth around her waist.
“Ready?”
“Yea.”
“One. Two. And Three.” Steve pulled the cloth up, and all the way through Emily, as effortlessly as passing it through water. For a moment nobody said anything, refusing to believe what they were seeing. Following this came a thundering applause, for Emily was in fact, two pieces. Miranda, at Emily’s shoulders took the signal from Steve to pull her back a few feet so that the separation became clearer. Emily’s two halves continued to float, and instead of blood, each end was lined with skin, just as if there never had been a cut in the first place.
Melody was so stunned by all of this, that she dropped hold of Emily’s ankles, which didn’t seem to matter, as her severed legs continued to hover above the stage without any means of support at all. Steve took a quick bow, and turned again to Emily, who, like everyone else there, couldn’t quite believe what was going on.
“So, how do you feel?”
“It’s really… Strange. It’s a lot to take in.”
“Yea, that’s what they tell me.”
“You mean you’ve never tried this?”
“For some reason that’s never been fully explained to me, this magic only works on girls.”
“Oh.”
“Yea, so sorry to disappoint any guys out there, but Title 9 is invalid. Hope that’s okay.”
A few sighs of what must have been relief were heard.
“So you think you’d like to be restored?”
“Do I have to?”
“Well, no, I can always do that later.”
“Like after the show?”
“If you want. You’re the paying customers after all.”
“Okay.”
Steve took hold of Emily’s halve and walked them, still floating, over to where she’d been sitting. He then took each and set them beside each other, on a large recliner. Emily touched her legs, and squirmed with delight.
Returning to the stage, Steve said to Miranda and Melody, “So, as long as you’re up here, would you like to do a trick?”
“Of course!” Shrieked Miranda before Melody could stop her.
“Great. And I’ve got the perfect idea for one too. Timmy can I get a couple chairs up here?”
Timmy grabbed two simple aluminum chairs from somewhere and handed them up to Steve, who set them down, back to back.
“If you would sit down, please?”
Miranda and Melody each chose a chair. Their heads where barely touching. Melody fidgeted a little – he hadn’t yet told what he would be doing.
“Now. This will only take a second.” Steve dropped the black cloth over their heads. She head him count.
“One.”
She took in a breath, wondering if I could be her last.”
“Two.”
She closed her eyes.
“…”
Something wasn’t right. There was no three. There was no buzz of the stage lights, no murmur of the audience, no sound of Miranda’s excited breathing. It was all silent, all black, and she couldn’t even feel the cloth on her face, only noticing the sweat on her palms, as her fists clenched with anticipation. This perfect bliss continued for a second, and she couldn’t hear anything. But she could feel the applause ushering out from the crowd, the roar of amazement, at… whatever it was.
Her curiosity overtook her fears, and tentatively, Melody reached up to find if it was true. It was. Her head was missing. Her neck simply ended, in the same sort of skin that Emily’s two halves had, and touching it sent chills down her spine, it was so alien.
She stood up, and had she a head, it would have smiled the biggest grin of her life. She knew that she should be feeling panicked, but she didn’t. She didn’t care. Losing control was beautiful. The silence, the tranquility was exactly what she’d been hungering for her entire life. For once, she knew true darkness, true quiet, and true peace.
She touched her neck once again, and felt a gentle hand guiding her back to her chair. Once again, she felt the black cloth over this time only her next. She counted. One. Two. Three. As the cloth was whisked away, the impact of the sound hit her like a brick wall. More applause. More amazement. She could only smile. Depression had lost its grip on her mood, and the euphoria was unbelievable. Steve said something, which she wasn’t really paying attention to, and Miranda grabber her hand and pulled her back to their seat.
Miranda said, “That was SO strange.”
Melody grinned and squealed, “That was the coolest thing I’ve ever felt in my life.”
“And I guess that answers the question of if it’s real of not.”
“I’ve got to learn how to do that.”
“What?”
“That. I wanna learn how to make my head dissapear.”
“Melody, that was scary. Have you gone nuts?”
“No, I really mean it. I love it.”
“Weirdo.”
“Freak.” They both laughed.
“Hey, isn’t that my… oh god.”
“What?”
Miranda just started into space, looking like she’d seen a ghost.
“Miranda? You’re shaking.” Melody picked up her hand, which was cold to the touch. It was then that she noticed a ring on Miranda’s hand, a ring that looked exactly like one that Miranda had given to her for her birthday, a ring that she could’ve sworn that she’d put on before they left. Not quite panicked yet, she reached into her jeans – no it was a skirt, and pulled out a set of keys. Miranda’s keys.
Miranda forced herself to calm down, and while Steve launched into his next act, Melody couldn’t help but laugh hysterically.

To be continued.