Breadcrumb #611
DARIA LAVELLE
The storefront is tiny, just the width of its slender green door.
You’ll have to shuffle sideways through the cramped corridor, like in one of those old railroad apartments, but nothing like that at all. Your back will snag against the unfinished wall and the rest of you will suck in, trying to avoid the baubles, the tinctures, the bell-jars and hourglasses and apothecary canisters and beakers and flasks all glittering down from every inch of the floor-to-ceiling shelves, which will go as far as your eyes can see and then some.
When you make it through the hall, when you let out the breath you’ll have been holding, you’ll be in a little back room that, every five minutes, will spin wildly about on its chicken legs.
Each time it stops, a lone window will reveal a new wonder. Sometimes you’ll overlook a great pyramid in Giza. Sometimes, you’ll be on the bank of the Danube in the dark. Sometimes you’ll be staring at a Banksy on a brick wall. Sometimes you’ll be this close to the surface of the moon, craters galore. You could waste time opening the window in front of you and breathing in desert sand or river rocks or Nuts4Nuts or moonbeams, but you’ll only have ten minutes in the place, and you’ll already have spent one shuffling down the long corridor, so tick tock.
Inside the room will be three wise girls, each seated at the foot of a massage chair. The first chair will be copper, the second silver, and the third gold. Each girl’s hair will match the chair she serves, long down to her waist, worn in serpentine braids. They’ll have bangles, too, hundreds of them, up and down the sinew of their arms, the same color as their hair and their chair and the rest of it. And the clothes they’ll wear, red or grey or mustardseed, will glimmer, though the fabrics will be dull and coarse and the back room will have scarcely enough light to make them shine.
You’ll pick a chair and sit down, though sometimes a girl and her chair will pick you.
“They’ll have bangles, too, hundreds of them, up and down the sinew of their arms, the same color as their hair and their chair and the rest of it.”
Each girl has her specialty. Copper for the heart. Silver, the mind. Gold, the soul.
The girls will offer you a massage, even though they stink at massages and their chairs are just for show. You’ll say you’ll skip the massage, but that you’ll take the Happy Ending Special.
“Payment up front,” your girl will demand, one hand on her hip, her fingernails tapping.
You’ll nod and fork over several years of your life.
She’ll tuck them inside the wide sleeve of her red or grey or mustardseed tunic, and nod, and hold out her hands, into which you’ll place your story.
You’ll watch her eyes swing left to right, reading your words, consuming your pages. She’ll read very, very fast; she has infinite practice and she’ll not want to waste any time. You’ll notice the corners of her mouth twitch, and you’ll wonder whether that’s a smile or a frown. You’ll bite your tongue so hard you’ll taste blood.
“Yes,” she’ll say at very, very long last, “I think we can fit you in.”
And she’ll beckon you through a door that won’t have been there a moment ago, was perhaps never there and will never be there again, its beaded curtain jangling as it tongues you inside.
This next room will be darker, smaller, lit by the light of a thousand candles and still too dim to see your own two hands. Your wise girl’s hair will glisten, copper or silver or gold, and that’s how you’ll be able to follow her through this room, into a crumbling passageway, and beyond to a dense forest. You’ll hold your arms out in front of you, grasping at shadows and shoving away brush, as you try not to trip over roots and brambles.
“I’m Ariadne, by the way,” she’ll say in the dark, her voice pealing like a bell.
You’ll tell her your name, and she’ll sound unimpressed when she repeats it back to you.
“Where are we going?” you’ll ask in a spell.
“I’m taking a shortcut,” she’ll reply.
You’ll walk for what feels like decades. You’ll wonder how much time has passed and remember the hourglasses you saw in the entry, the ones that didn’t seem to move by any gravity you could follow, the sand flowing up instead of down and winding itself into question marks. You’ll be ready to scream right about then, but just as you open your mouth to shout, Ariadne will turn around and press something into your palm.
“It’s ready for you,” she’ll whisper, her words making sparks in the dark, phosphorescent as fireflies.
“How does it end?” you’ll ask, breathless with equal parts exhaustion and anxiety.
“Oh,” she’ll laugh, “I can’t ruin the surprise!”
“Surprise?” you’ll panic, “It’s not that kind of story.”
She’ll say your name softly then, and put her small, hot hand on your shoulder.
“Does a thread really care what the tapestry looks like?” She’ll ask this as though it is some sort of answer.
And you, not wanting to sound stupid in front of so wise a girl, will mutter something noncommittal like, “I guess not.”
And then a great gong will sound, and Ariadne will vanish into a ball of light, and the dark forest with its thick brush will lift around you like so much smoke.
You’ll be right back out on the street again but in your hand will be the vial, inside of which will be a curled slip of paper, upon which your perfect ending will be written, the thread distinct from the tapestry, because that’s what you just chose without knowing you were choosing it.
The green door will never be in the same place twice.
The only way to find it is to follow the white rabbit out from a magician’s dream. You’ll know him by his pocket watch – the casing made of copper, the chain silver, the hands gold – and the sound it makes as it counts down, each tick and tock the beat of a tale-telling heart. He’ll be checking this watch constantly; he’s forever running late. And Destiny hates to be kept waiting.