Different. Better. Please.

JUDI







DIFFERENT. BETTER. PLEASE



It was Liz’s favorite day of her favorite season, but this Halloween, she felt nothing at all. Just the night before, her fiance Mike had called off the wedding. After he’d left, Liz had spent most of the night sobbing until finally passing out around five a.m.

Now she stared at the ceiling until her eyes drifted over to the bedroom door. On it hung the costume that she’d been so excited to wear just 24 hours earlier. It was one of those ubiquitous sexy costumes, a pirate wench dress straight off the rack, but Liz loved that it was stunningly gorgeous in its color and detail. Hanging in Mike’s closet in his apartment was a man’s pirate outfit. It had been the first “couples” costume Liz had ever planned with someone, and looking at it now brought back a fresh slew of tears, and a brand new searing of pain.

As her body shuddered with sobs and her heart felt like it could literally be shattering despite all scientific evidence to the contrary, Liz tried desperately to make any sense of it all until her brain hurt too much to think anymore. She sat up and hugged her knees to her chest, and as she screwed her eyes shut, wishing all of this to be different, wishing for anything but this grief, her wishes came out in words, surprising herself, but filling her with a bizarre and blessedly relieving warmth.

“Different. Better. Please. Different. Better. Please…”

Over and over, Liz repeated the words, feeling like a crazy person, grateful there was no one around to see her like this, but even more grateful for the calm. The calm soon grew into an urgency, taking on a life of its own, and the room seemed to rock back and forth as if it were on a boat. Suddenly, Liz had remembered a time in her past that she’d long forgotten about. A time when she’d chanted some other seeming nonsense, and watched as her words seemed to float out of her and onto the walls around her, first fluttering, then dancing together like kaleidoscopes.

She had thought that was a dream, or simply a wild imagining of a kid. But now her words seemed to swirl once again. She unclenched her body, and sat up straight, with newfound strength, repeating the words, but now with authority. And her words, just as they had in that forgotten time years before, found their way onto the walls, where they seemed to dance, but this time there were no kaleidoscopes. This time, the words kept fluttering about as if looking for something. Liz felt some unease, but couldn’t let herself stop it. She had to see what would happen. And she didn’t want to return to the pain. So she kept repeating, softer now. What were they looking for?

And just as that question passed through Liz’s mind, the colors on the wall stopped swirling. They formed strong, purposeful lines and shot straight over to the door, surrounding the pirate costume, spinning around it in triumph. As the colors sped up, they banded together to form an almost blinding white glow, and Liz didn’t know what to do now. Shit had gotten seriously scary, and though she was scared to stop, she was more scared to keep going. She ceased her chanting, and held her breath. Waiting.

The light remained, but grew slower, and duller. Its strength seemed to wane, and Liz let out her breath. As she did, the light suddenly grew even brighter than before, and appeared to collapse into the costume, then disappear. As Liz shook with relief and shock, from within the costume, the light reappeared. This time, it shone out through every bit of color in the pirate costume, and the dress seemed to come to life for one split second, until the light disappeared for good.

Along with the costume.







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