Gwendy's Magic Feather

37

GWENDY CAN’T REMEMBER THE last time she went on two runs in the same day. If she had to guess, she’d say it was the summer when she was twelve years old, the same summer Frankie Stone started calling her Goodyear and she finally decided to do something about her weight. She ran pretty much everywhere that summer—to the corner store to pick up eggs and bread for her mother, to Olive’s house to listen to records and tear through the latest issue of Teen magazine, and of course, every morning (even on Sundays) she ran the Suicide Stairs up to Castle View Park. By the time school started in September, Gwendy had lost almost fifteen pounds of baby fat and the button box was hidden away in the bottom of her bedroom closet. After that, life would never be the same for her.

Tonight, she jogs at a fast clip along the centerline of Route 117, enjoying the feel of her heart pounding in her chest. The snow stopped falling several hours earlier, right around dinnertime, and the plows are busy clearing side streets at this late hour. The main roadways are eerily empty and hushed. At the bottom of the hill, she passes a group of men wearing hardhats and orange vests with CRPW stenciled on them: Castle Rock Public Works. One of them drops the shovel he’s working and gives her an enthusiastic round of applause. She flashes the man a smile and a thumbs-up, and keeps on trucking.

The tiny piece of chocolate the button box dispensed was in the shape of an owl, and Gwendy stared in rapt fascination at the amazing details—the staggered lines of each feather, the pointy tip of its beak, the pools of dark shadow that made up its eyes—before popping it into her mouth and allowing it to dissolve on her tongue.

There was a moment of complete satisfaction—at what, she didn’t know, maybe everything—and then a rush of startling clarity and energy spread throughout her body. All of a sudden, she not only no longer felt like crying, her entire body felt lighter, her vision seemed clearer, and the colors in the condo appeared brighter and more vibrant. Was this what it was like when she was younger? She couldn’t exactly remember. All she knew was that it suddenly felt like she’d sprouted wings and could fly up into the sky and touch the moon. She immediately changed into workout clothes and running shoes, and headed outside.

No, not immediately, she reminds herself, as she cruises past the Sunoco station toward Main Street and the center of town.

Something else happened first.

In the midst of all those good feelings, those wonderful feelings, she suddenly found herself fixating on the red button at the left side of the box, and then slowly reaching out with a finger and touching it, caressing its glassy surface, and the thought of actually pressing it and erasing President Richard Hamlin from the face of the earth wormed inside the basement of her brain like the wisp of a forgotten dream just before waking.

Whoa, girl, a little voice whispered inside her head. Be careful what you daydream because that box can hear you thinking Don’t you doubt it, not even for a second.

Then, and only then, did she carefully withdraw her finger and go upstairs to change into running gear.