by aubrey minnick
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Note: To truly appreciate (and understand) this story, you should read
"Masque of the Red Death" by Edgar Allan Poe, "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson,
and "Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.
To read the stories my English teacher assigned me had always been one of the foremost things in my life, until it became my life. You see, once upon a time when such things could happen they did, and now I believe they always can. To put it simply, I was inside some of those stories. Oh, you may say that's impossible and all such fiddle-faddle as that, but I saw it with my own eyes! It happened fourteen days ago, one night after I was fresh from reading a quite remarkable short story.
I pondered over the story in my mind that night, savoring it as one would the last chocolate in a candy box. It had been the last one, the last one. Oh, what mourning that called for! But it had been good. I'd figure I'd watch the movie next, but that wasn't what I wanted. It was not for me to decide, however. The thought crossed my mind that perhaps I'd become a writer myself, someday.
I relished the silence of the night, silence I could think in. There was so much territory in those stories left unexplored! Just then, an inspiration found me. If the professionals wouldn't, then I would. I grabbed up pencil and paper and began to write.
That started a long series of writing and indulging myself in new adventures in the pre-existing universes created by such literary greats as Poe, Steinbeck, Faulkner and Welty. I never showed them to anyone, but one day a friend asked to see them, so I gathered them up in a sort of portfolio and set out to his house. On the way, I was sidetracked by a rainstorm, and I guess I got hit by lightning because when I woke up (I don't remember falling asleep, that's why) my clothes were charred on the ends of the sleeves and pant legs, and my hair appeared frizzy and blackened. What I saw, though, is what amazed me. I rubbed my eyes and looked again, hoping the bizarre scene would disappear from before me.
"I've never read anything about being struck by lightning causing hallucinations," I wondered softly to myself, "but I suppose that might account for it."
Before me, dozens of royalty masqueraded as ghosts, spirits or phantasms, dancing rigidly about to the music one hears in dreams, which proceeded from a small, well-trained orchestra at the center of the rainbowed apartments. A dark chime erupted from behind me as I recognized where I might be, and, turning to see the eerie black grandfather clock behind me, I was convinced.
As the clock struck midnight, I targeted my objective, the one in authority, Prince Prospero. I trekked from the black apartment to the purple, from the purple to the white, and then through the green, orange and violet until I stood before his Majesty. I only then noticed that everyone had hushed and that all eyes were upon me.
"Who dares?" challenged Prospero, and I was surprised to discover that he was speaking to me. I lifted my hands in confusion, and it was then that I noticed that my clothes had changed from my customary blue and green to a robe of scarlet and that a masque covered my face. Before I could speak, Prospero was on the floor, dead, and I, turning helplessly, fell into a tornado of sorts, which blew me into another story.
I would have liked to enter the realm of A Worn Path and chatted with old Phoenix, but time travel is a morbid invention, and it whisked me off to Shirley Jackson's The Lottery. I crept into the gathered crowd unnoticed, and wondered what I was doing there. It wasn't long before names were called, and men strode up to the box that held their fate haphazardly to hide their nervousness. Disgusted at what was about to take place, I began to quietly slip out of the crowd and away until I heard my name called.
I froze, then turned slowly until the man who held the list of names came into view, his eyes staring directly at me. "Miss DeWhit, it's your turn. Take your chance like the rest of us."
Pushed by the crowd, I found myself with my hand in the box, grabbing the first thing that my hand came into contact with. I quickly retreated and hid myself in the crowd to listen to the hundred names yet to be read. "Who's got it?" The moment came too soon. I unfolded my paper discreetly, trying to hide what I hoped wasn't there.
It was.
"Miss DeWhit's got it!" trilled an unwelcome voice, and soon the crowd took up the chant.
"She's got only herself," stated the man with the list of names, and continued, "You know what you have to do. Let's get this over with."
I tried to run, but they surrounded me. Suddenly, their rocks became hailstones and I was caught in yet another spate of bad weather.
I trekked through the blizzard that had blown up, hoping through the chattering of teeth for some shelter from the hailstones. Then, as quickly as it came, the blizzard left, and I was at the doorstep of a house, knocking for all I was worth, which wasn't much since I was half-frozen.
A woman came to the door and helped me inside, wrapping me in warm, welcoming blankets and calling, "Doctor!" This time I did not recognize where I was, but I didn't care so much as that I was finally somewhere warm, and also incredibly tired. I guess I must have fainted then because I woke up later as a patient. I sat up, but this motion was interrupted by the Doctor doing his overly-cautious thing. "I'm fine," I told him, and I was, now that I was thawed. I didn't feel like I'd just been struck by lightning, caught up in a tornado, stoned and become a human popsicle all in one day. I came to the conclusion that time was very violent.
"Can you explain why you were half-frozen in sixty degree weather?"
"Um . . ." I started, then finally decided. "No."
"Do you know where you are?"
"No clue, but I'm sure it's somewhere I've read about. And don't ask me why." There. That should make him just curious enough to involve me in whatever adventure would come up next, and that's what I wanted. More adventure.
The Doctor got this weird expression on his face; it's hard to describe, somewhere halfway between confusion and surprise, between not wanting to believe and having to believe. He shook his head and walked off for awhile, so I got up. I felt the top of my head to see what the lightning had done to my hair, and discovered it hadn't taken but an inch off the end. I noticed a pen and paper on a desk nearby and snatched them to write about my somewhat eventful day, sitting in a very comfortable, Indian style position.
The Doctor, having gotten whatever hilarity in him calmed, returned to the room, I suppose, to talk to me. Being in the middle of a paragraph, I paid no attention.
"Excuse me," interrupted the Doctor.
"Just a moment," I said. "I'm in the middle of a paragraph."
The paper was grabbed from my hands. "I'm afraid I can't let you do this."
Offended, I began to ask why when the realization hit me of where I was. "You're from that Yellow Wallpaper story," I stated.
"Uh . . . The upstairs bedroom has yellow wallpaper, but other than that, I don't know what you're talking about."
"Aha. I thought so."
"Do you want to explain who you are?"
"Oh, sure. I'm Azara DeWhit, time traveler, at your service."
"Time traveler?"
I nodded.
"I see . . ."
Later he told me that I'd be moving to the upstairs, yellow-wallpapered bedroom to keep his wife company. For me, like her, he prescribed total bedrest, I suppose to cure me of my time traveler fantasies.
That wallpaper was annoying, I must tell you, and since I wasn't allowed to talk to the woman on the other side of the room (or so I was told), it slowly began to get to me. The Doctor's wife, who was already kinda nuts, would babble on to herself about the woman trapped in the yellow wallpaper, all the while staring at me. It was quite disconcerting. I noticed that, like myself, she was a writer, and oftentimes I was tempted to ask what she wrote. After she started clawing at the wallpaper, though, I lost my initiative. All the while, the time travel/bad weather phenomenon was conspicuously absent.
Deep into planning my escape, I heard a rumble as if from an earthquake coming from the other side of the room. The Doctor's wife was screaming, "You're free!" and, discovering that the wall had split and given me an opening, I dashed for it. Soon, I was home free and back to reality, except for the fact that I really had been hit by lightning and the EMS had to be called and all that. In the hospital I got to talk to a psychologist who gave me a lecture about near death experiences and hallucinations. I, however, still firmly believe that the above events did, indeed, occur, and will vouch for the truthfulness of my adventure.
I'm still writing, but never about yellow wallpaper or stonings or masquerades. I've finally cured myself of those plotlines. Also, I now believe that stories should end, like this one is going to right . . .