“Your future audience ain’t gonna hear you with a little church-mouse whisper like that. You’re not gonna sell out theaters or find your name on posters. You better find your voice, girl, and find it quick. It don’t take the world long to decide you’re unexceptional. You love magic?”
It was a ridiculous question, like asking a person if they loved breathing or swallowing. The feelings I’d grown for magic in the past fourteen months went beyond something as fragile as love. My mistake had been confiding that to Sir, who’d thought magic was dumb until he realized he could use it for his challenges.
“Of course.”
He nodded and squatted in front of me, voice low. “You keep your eye on the prize and you’re gonna be somebody someday. I can feel it.” His hand twitched as if to highlight the point. “The world’s never seen the likes of you, sweets.” He returned to full height, stretched his back, then settled into a kitchen chair.
“Sir?” Jack called from the stairs as soon as he’d gotten comfortable. “Can you come up here?”
“Whatever it is, ask your mother,” he said without moving.
“Her door’s locked.”
“Come down here, then.”
“I can’t.” She hesitated. “I was trying that jump-rope trick you taught me. I think I twisted my ankle.” When Sir didn’t say anything, she added, “It really hurts.”
He heaved himself out of the chair and grabbed the watch. “Fifteen to go.” He sauntered out of the kitchen, climbed the stairs, and began scolding my sister.
I resisted the urge to relax. The platter was steady. All I had to do was keep it exactly where it was for fifteen more minutes. I could do anything for that long, couldn’t I?
The task ahead of me was easy compared to Houdini’s work. For the Upside Down Trick, he locked his feet in stocks, then had himself lowered upside down into a tank filled with water. He stayed in there for two minutes until he escaped. He performed the trick hundreds of times.
In the Underwater Box Escape, he was handcuffed and put in leg-irons before climbing into a wooden crate. The crate was weighed down with two hundred pounds of lead, nailed and chained shut, then hoisted off the side of a barge into New York’s East River, like Alan said. It sank immediately. Fifty-seven seconds later, Houdini resurfaced, free of the restraints. When the crate was brought ashore, it was intact, shackles still inside.
These were the lengths I’d have to go to in order to make it as a performer. Sir was right: I had to be head and shoulders above everyone else. I pretended that I barely felt the rope chafing my wrists, the platter weighing down my skull.
Still, I considered shifting ten steps to my left so that I’d be in the living room and positioned over the couch to give the platter somewhere soft to land, just in case. Sir warned against just-in-case thinking all the time. Only losers thought that way, and in doing so, they predetermined their failure. But he’d never said I had to complete the sixty minutes standing in this exact spot.
I decided to stay where I was. No sense disturbing the peace.
Then: I felt it. Sometimes they built slowly, giving you time to press your tongue to the roof of your mouth or say “pickles.” Other times, like this one, they came out of nowhere.
I had to sneeze.
I hurried toward the carpet at the same time my nose and mouth erupted. All of a sudden my head was horribly light. In slow motion I watched the platter falling, falling, falling. With three quick flicks of the wrist, I freed my hands from the trick rope and caught the platter right before it crashed to the floor.
I stood there for a minute, doubled over and gasping. When my breathing returned to normal, I noticed how quiet the second floor had become.
Sir’s sermon had stopped.
A wave of something stronger than nausea rushed through me. I would’ve heard him coming down the stairs, wouldn’t I? I stopped breathing but could still feel my heartbeat in my hands. My knees went weak. I saw myself locked in the coat closet, a dog cage, a casket, in the pitch black, in white light, in seeping red. I was too frightened to cry or whine. I tightened my sweaty grip on the platter. I forced myself to peek at the staircase behind me.
He wasn’t there. He was still upstairs.
I exhaled heavily, then tiptoed back to my spot on the tile and rebalanced the platter on my head. Once I was positive it was steady, I refastened the ropes around my wrists.
Thanks, Houdini.
I listened for my father’s footsteps. Half a minute later he marched down the stairs, grumbling.
“That sister of yours is destined for the stage.” He pulled the stopwatch from his pocket and tossed it on the table. “Nothing wrong with that ankle.”
Several minutes later the watch beeped and vibrated. Sir glanced at the screen, then my head. He pressed the stop button.
“I’ll be damned, sweets. See what happens when you put your mind to something?”
I smiled. He took his time making his way over to me. When he lifted the platter, my head felt light enough to float away. I held my breath as he removed the rope from my wrists. If I hadn’t tied it exactly as he’d left it, he didn’t notice.
“Bet that feels good.” He set the rope on the dining table.
I rubbed the reddened skin on my wrists.
“We’ll go to the magic shop after school tomorrow.” He picked up the platter and began spinning it again. “What do you want from there, anyway?”
“Handcuffs.” I kept my eyes on the dish.
He nodded. The platter slowed, wobbling on his finger. My father sighed once like he was bored and, without warning, dropped his arm. Mother’s platter crashed to the floor before I even thought to move.
It shattered into a hundred pieces.
My knees buckled; my chin slumped to my chest. I picked up a few shards as though they might glue themselves back together. I thought of my mother alone upstairs. She must have heard the crash, must be crying her eyes out now, asking God why she hadn’t been given a better family, a stronger daughter. I dug my fingernails into my palms to stop the tears. I couldn’t bear to lose four points right now. I closed my eyes, willed myself to escape like Houdini had.
When I was positive I wouldn’t cry, I peered up from the floor at my father. He was watching me with curiosity, like I was a science experiment.
“Why?” was all I could manage. Did he know I’d cheated?
“Don’t you worry, sweetheart. A deal’s a deal. We’ll still hit the shop tomorrow.”
I nodded, confused, and began to gather the fragments in a pile.
“Leave it. You got your fifteen points. Go on to bed.”
“But . . .” I gestured at the surrounding mess.
He winked. “She’ll clean it up in the morning.”
7
Natalie
JANUARY 8, 2020
WE STAND IN silence, waiting, but hear nothing else from the forest on the other side of the wall. Gordon and Sanderson exchange a glance.
“What the heck was that?” Cheryl clutches her suitcase.
Chloe peers backward, like she’s thinking of making a run for it.