The Eliza Parable

I drummed my fingers against the table, a duet with the rain. Despite the heavy drops that hurled themselves at the thin windows the sun still managed to sieve through some of the melancholy clouds, peppering the room with light like sugar on a cake.

There should be a rainbow, I thought numbly, the voice in my head slow.

I looked over to find my friend, Eliza, wanting to speak. But the silence between us was like a towering stack of duvets: soft but heavy, crushing us under its warm, thick embrace.

The rain was a comfort.

There was an insistent buzzing and then a bottle-blue insect landed on the table. It crawled around on the surface, jumping here and there at any slight movement, frantic. It reminded me of her. Maybe it was the way it crawled under the table, like it was playing a miserable game of hide and seek.

Or perhaps it was something more than that…

Eliza looked simultaneously fearful and drained. I imagined her trapped in a suit, a mask taped to her head; uncomfortable wearing someone else’s face and clothes and skin – only displaying what her family and friends wanted to see.

I looked outside. I could finally see the rainbow.

Finally, she spoke, but it felt distant, muffled, like she was hiding in a fortress of pillows – not unlike what we used to do when we were younger, brighter. “What do I do?”

I looked into her eyes, seeing past the mask into her beautiful bottle-blue irises. The lump in my throat filtered out all the “it’ll be okay”s and the “they’ll understand”s until only the truth remained:

“I don’t know.”

She sighed, deeply, as if she was breathing out a storm that had been brewing inside her for decades. I imagined her hanging on a clothes hanger, making her shoulders too straight and too wide under the suit, the tension ironing out the creases of her spine.

I thought I could see the rainbow reflected in her dark pupils.

I grabbed one of her delicate hands in two of my own, careful not to chip the porcelain of her skin. I stroked the back with my thumb tenderly, imagining it was a pretty, white bunny in need of protection from the cold outer world. I built a shell around it, a shield.

I would be her shield.

And I told her honestly: “I want you to be happy but I want you to be you.”

The words tasted alien, like they had come from another – much worse, universe. I thought they should be one and the same, being happy and being yourself. But, as much as I wanted it to be true, it was a lie – chocolate-covered and tied with a bow so everyone accepted it. Sweet enough that everyone believed it was true.

The rainbow bounced off the glass table we sat at, making our intertwined hands glow with colour.

Suddenly, she leaned in. She smelled like bed bugs and grass and I desperately wanted to taste her – despite what everyone would say. 

Then, her soft lips touched mine, a little furry around the edges. I feared what would happen if her parents entered, the two of us lock-lipped, drinking the other in, savouring the sweetness of the all-too-short moment shared between us. But I felt brave: a shadowy, secret part of me wanted more.

But Eliza stood. “You’re right. I have to make a decision.”

Fear and sorrow hugged my heart: I didn’t want to hear what her decision was. I wanted her to have both – happiness and truth. The world was cruel to deny her.

She announced: “I want to be myself.”

With that I watched as she dug her hands into her scalp until it cracked open like an old eggshell. She continued to tear herself down the middle, her skin suit ripping away, the lie crumbling at my feet under the glass table we had moments ago kissed at. The bottle-blue eyes I had fallen in love with popped out, revealing the six black, shiny pupils glaring coldly back. Then, one after another, two giant translucent wings erupted from their humanoid cocoon, mucus hanging from each tip. 

Eliza tipped her head in my direction, no longer owning the power of language in her true form.

And, as she beat her wings, breaking through the thin glass of the window, I imagined a glint from the rainbow radiating from her furry, black body.