"See, Dr. Rosenbaum, I know
you think I’m crazy. I’m not even going to try to
convince you otherwise. I don’t care anymore."
"Melanie, I don’t think you’re crazy."
The chubby, bespectacled girl in the chair glanced up at the
psychiatrist, a little smile on her cherubic face, and pushed a
blonde curl out of her way. "Oh, you will. But back to you,
what were you about to say?"
The man in his gray suit, sitting in his gray chair, in his gray
office, with that gray day peering in through the tall windows,
only looked back at her neutrally. "I was about to ask you
to tell me about yourself. Tell me about what’s going on
with you right now."
"Oh, that’s pretty simple. Where do I start?"
"Well, how about at the beginning of your current
problems?"
She sighed and sank down in her chair. "Alright. That would
have to be eight months ago…When Jareth came. See, when it
first happened, I really was scared. I mean I screamed and
screamed like the world was ending. Really, what prepares you to
see a Goblin King?
"We talked about the movie already; you know who I’m
referring to. And you know, if he hadn’t looked like David
Bowie, I would have been okay. But I’m telling you, the man
*was* David Bowie. He had the one freaky eye and
everything."
"But Melanie," the doctor interrupted, "Why did he
appear to you?"
She shrugged.
"I guess I was in real trouble. My parents were divorcing. I
was still with Brian, that lout. Dieting obsessively, mostly
because of him. And let’s not forget Amanda Sommers, my old
arch enemy since grade school. You’d think by the time
you’re a senior in high school, the teen queen would have
moved on to more important things than torturing you. Some people
just don’t mature as fast, though."
"So," Rosenbaum went on. "What happened that night
six months ago?"
Melanie smiled.
*****
I was crying while I was checking
my email. I was really upset about the whole divorce thing, and
everything else and I was a mess. But oh yeah, I was checking my
email. D’Arque_Auynjil@Hotmail.com. I belong to this mailing
list about Labyrinth—I already told you that part—and I
check my mail almost every hour on the hour at *least*. We talk
and write stories and share things about ourselves…it’s
really wonderful. So there I was, crying on my keyboard and
sorting spam and stories on the fic list, and suddenly, out of
just nowhere, someone taps me on the shoulder.
Your mind can make so many jumps in the space of a second. I knew
I was the only person who was supposed to be in the house right
then, and that if someone else was, it meant they probably were
unauthorized personnel. More frightening, however, was when I got
back to the idea of me being alone in the house.
I was screaming before I even got my chair all the way around.
And then…well, what I saw was enough to make anyone else
lose their mind.
Generally, when one is screaming, one has ceased most rational
thought anyway, but everything came to a halt when I saw Jareth.
He’s sort of impressive, if you want to know the truth. All
that hair and glitter. It was just too weird. I stood up and
gaped at him.
He was wearing black. All black—black tights, boots, vest,
with a white shirt with these sleeves…you know, the big lacy
edges…nevermind.
He said, "Hello, Melanie."
I screamed again, and started to run. My bedroom door
wouldn’t open. Jareth was talking behind me.
"Oh, come now, Melanie. How many visitations have you
written? How many times have you fantasized about this moment?
And here you are yowling as if you’ve seen a ghost."
"You’re not real!" I shouted back, the only thing
I could think to say.
"If you believed that, I wouldn’t be here," he
answered.
Now that stopped me. I got to thinking. There no way this could
be happening, so I had to be dreaming. Except everything was
making sense. There was only one thing I could do.
I played along.
"Okay. Okay, you’re Jareth? The Jareth?’
He smiled, and bowed a little, elegant and composed. "Indeed
I am."
"Okay," I said again. It didn’t quite sound like a
real word anymore. "So what are you doing here…in my
room…with me?"
"You’re a Listian. I always help my Listians."
"Yeah? So where were you when all the other girls were
having the worst times of their lives? Calliope and Kitty
and—"
He waved a hand at me. "I was there. I’m always there.
Just as I am here."
I glared at him. "Yeah right. They never told us that."
He sighed. "A visitation is typically something completely
unlike what you write. It’s a whisper in your ear. It’s
a sudden thought of me. Intangible."
"But I can see you?"
"You need to."
"The others needed to."
"It’s not the same. Melanie, you aren’t just a
Listian."
I grinned. "Let me guess. I’m part Fae?"
"You, my dear, read too much fanfiction. No, you are not.
You are a regular human girl, albeit one who is inches from a
descent into disbelief."
"Disbelief? But I’m seeing you here, when all the
others couldn’t."
"You stand at the edge of the abyss, Melanie."
"That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard in my
entire life."
"Do you know what you’ll become someday if I leave you
alone?"
"Sane, well-adjusted and normal?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
"So what’s wrong with that?" I demanded.
"Just what in the world could be wrong with that?"
He paced circles as he spoke. God, he really was beautiful.
I’d get used to seeing him, but then, at the beginning of
all this, I was so impressed. "Melanie. You must understand
that the Listians are special."
"I knew that," I interrupted, but he went on.
"They are a group of those strange and wonderful
individuals, the eternal children. Only these, rather than be
crushed under the boot of cynicism and robbed of their innocence,
have banded together. They have formed a concrete alliance. And
breathed life into their dreams."
I weighed this and found I couldn’t grasp it. "What are
you talking about?"
"Clara formed me as a cursed spirit. I have stood with
Death’s wings around me under Rachel’s pen. I made
myself a cat at Dreamin’s direction. Anakerie gave me a
father, Calliean a brother—and by Helen I now have a ward. I
live near a rose-born creation of Alexa’s mind. I played as
Hoggle in Maed’s imagination. I put needles to Sarah’s
flesh, as a sadistic villain…while in another dream, I loved
her with all I was. I have loved a hundred others. I have thrown
a dozen parties at least. I have been nothing but a joke. I have
been an evil antagonist. I have been a romantic hero. I am all
these things at once, I live all these lives…because you
have given them to me."
He saw I understood, and he stopped, and smiled.
"And because you have all done this for me, I am your
protector."
I groaned. "You sure are one lousy dream."
Jareth frowned deeply. "You will eventually believe in this
moment. I’ll see to it that you do."
"Whatever," I answered casually. "Whatever."
I waved a hand at him.
He disappeared.
No poof of glitter, no spark. Just he was there and then he
wasn’t, like I’d blinked and he’d stepped out of
my vision. Except I hadn’t blinked. And I was alone.