Community of Magic Pens

by Community of Magic Pens (epub)

  The famed White City was burning, a direct parallel to the Great Fire. That which had risen from those ashes now returned to ash.

  Now those people who had wondered about her prescience had more reason to suspect. She was invited to show her artwork from the Expo, along with her newest pieces of the burned-out ruins, at the police precinct. They asked her whereabouts at the time the fire started, even as they marveled over the emotion infused into her drawings, smoke clinging to the lines and making their eyes water as though they bore witness to the flames. The police reviewed her portfolio and knew she was not to blame, only exceptionally talented.

  Or, in her mind, exceptionally cursed.

  1903.

  She had become the artist the papers called when something burned.

  This time it was the newly opened Iroquois Theatre. The fire was out before she arrived, but the building still smoldered in the frigid winter air. So too did the bodies stacked around the building—too many to transport away on icy roads with limited vehicles.

  She stood away from the building, telling herself it was perspective, as she tried to sketch its original lines. But her gaze returned time and again to the bodies.

  She was tired. Fifty-six years old, no family, still teaching for a pittance. In another life, she could have been among the dead—seated in an expensive orchestra level seat, just in front of the stage where the conflagration had started.

  She wiped away a tear, smudging charcoal across her face, and looked at what she had drawn. It was the scene inside the theatre, as she had imagined it. Worse than she had imagined, even.

  She tucked the sheet into her sketchbook and began a new drawing.

  1910.

  The city was burning again.

  That was how it always felt, when the calls came in.

  This time, she could not bring herself to get out of bed. The years of smoke had taken their toll, and she breathed with a rasp even on good days.

  Her days as the fire artist were at an end.

  1958.

  She’d been dead more than forty years, but the city had called her back. Though she was insubstantial, she had her tools.

  A school fire this time. And being a ghost, she witnessed it from the beginning.

  There was nothing for her to do except draw.

  When she finished, she drifted until she found her old art box, filled with stacks of her drawings, tucked beneath her great-nephew’s bed. His father had carried it from her apartment when she died, and her great-nephew had kept it with him since. Though her sisters may not have known what to make of her art, at least her extended family saw some value in keeping it.

  She lifted the lid and placed her newest sketches atop the others, dating back almost a century.

  1971.

  “Package, sir,” the clerk said.

  The smudged and tattered wrapping paper covering the package was spattered with chunks of melted snow and salt. But the box beneath was solid wood, untouched by the elements.

  The curator coughed as smoke tickled at his sinuses and throat—not like cigarettes, but something thicker and older, like the world afire.

  The handwriting sprawled across the top sheet. “These belonged to my father, though he was not the artist. We hope you can find a home for them at the Art Institute.” No signature followed.

  The curator shuffled through the pages beneath. Charcoals of a burning building. As he examined them, he identified the name of the building worked into the stone façade—Our Lady of the Angels School. He recalled that fire—it had been all over the news as a great tragedy.

  He dug deeper into the pile. Most of the drawings depicted fire or its aftereffects. An old theatre. The White City. The Great Fire, even. The drawings spanned an incredible amount of time. He rubbed his eyes, the smoke permeating the paper making his eyes water.

  He lingered over one drawing, blinking to clear his eyes. The World Congress Auxiliary, the building in which he now sat, rendered in precise detail, though evoking loss and destruction.

  He peered at the drawing’s lower corner, bearing a smudged “T. L.”, as though it had been rubbed many times over the years.

  He called out to the mail clerk. “Do we know where this came from?”

  “Couldn’t quite read the return address, sir, though I know it came from within the city.”

  The curator’s mind was already awhirl with thoughts of the exhibit this trove would unlock. He’d have to check all the dates and try to identify “T. L.” But the title in his mind would be better than finding the name associated with the artist. Charcoals from an Unidentified Chicago Artist.

  Dawn Vogel’s academic background is in history, so it’s not surprising that much of her fiction is set in earlier times. By day, she edits reports for historians and archaeologists. In her alleged spare time, she runs a craft business, co-runs a small press, and tries to find time for writing. Her steampunk adventure series, Brass and Glass, is available from DefCon One Publishing. She is a member of Broad Universe, SFWA, and Codex Writers. She lives in Seattle with her husband, author Jeremy Zimmerman, and their herd of cats. Visit her at historythatneverwas.com.

  Pointy Chances

  Robert Kingett

  Just before the bell rang, I dropped my pen. Immediately panicking, I dove under my desk to hunt for the rainbow-colored treasure I had found last year. I was hoping that it would whimper or cry out or something to let me know where it had landed, but the pen seemed to have a mind of its own when expressing any sentient behavior. Even though my blurry vision couldn’t distinguish the object near me, I grabbed it and held it up to my face to see if it was, in fact, the special pen. It was. It swirled with the rainbow of colors I loved so much. Sighing with relief, I went to stand up and banged my head on the underside of the desk, causing it to tip over along with my chair. A few other students in the class winced, stopping their clinking braille writers to turn towards my monumental accident.

  “Whoa,” Jesse said. “Are you always that hard-headed, there, Nick?”

  “You are such a riot,” I playfully fired back, rubbing my throbbing head. Jesse unfolded his cane and came over to help me up. I could see the deep black of his skin in front of the bright fluorescent lights as his blurry form came into focus. I took his outstretched hand as he pulled me to my feet. Still holding his hand, I caught a glimpse of a flashy grin before he patted me and went back to his seat.

  In my shirt pocket, I suddenly heard my special pen groan amidst the whispers of other students.

  Oh yeah, I thought, now you have something to express. How funny. Shaking my head, still rubbing it, I looked for the familiar blurry outline of my best friend Amanda, who was still sitting in the front of the room, furiously typing on her electronic braille notetaker next to other students unzipping their backpacks. As I walked towards her, and her form became clearer, I noticed that she had changed her hair color yet again. This time, it matched her icy blue eyes.

  “How strange,” I said, dodging a few tapping canes as some classmates left early.

  “What’s that, your face?” The pen chuckled in my pocket after her reply. Upon hearing the high-pitched chortle, Amanda giggled, leaned towards my shirt pocket, and started talking to the pen as if it, instead of I, were her best friend.

  “It’s good to see you didn’t lose your sense of humor, Pointy.”

  “You know I don’t like that nickname,” I snapped. “And, no, I was referring to your extremely bright blue hair.”

  “I was very tired of having green hair. Anyway, why didn’t you ask Jesse to sit with us at lunch today? You had the perfect opportunity, you know?”

  “He wouldn’t want to be asked out on a date while in the midst of saving me from a disaster.”

  “I didn’t say ‘date.’ I said, ‘lunch.’” The pen sighed in my pocket. Amanda suddenly sat bolt upright, turned towards me, and stared towards my voice.

  “Oh my gosh. You’re still afraid of telling him how you feel, aren’t you?”<
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  “Quiet!” I hissed as the bell rang and various students around me snapped their canes open, put their large-print or braille books away, and began shuffling out of the classroom, creating a rhythm with their canes.

  “Why should I be quiet?” Amanda said, to the backdrop of cell phone screen readers around us. “No one’s gonna pay attention to me, anyway. They think I’m weird.” I glanced at the black T-shirt she had on. Enlarged white letters spelled out, in print and braille, I totally see you.

  “Gotcha,” I said, nodding absently.

  At that moment, a cane briefly thwacked me on the leg. I turned and saw Jesse making his way out of the room. He looked very strong and confident, and extremely cute, with his buzzed hair and eye-catching smile and his huge, warm hands, holding onto his cane with very firm muscles on his arms.

  “Oh, goodness, I’m so sorry,” he said, smiling.

  “Your cane looks nice,” I blurted. I could immediately feel my heart beginning to pound and my face growing so hot that the Earth’s temperature rose a few degrees.

  After giggling, Jesse said, “Well, I’m sure yours looks really nice too, Nick.” He smiled again and started to head out but stopped and turned back to us.

  “Oh, hey, Amanda. Sorry about that. I’m just in a rush because the school library has some new audiobooks by black authors I want to check out. I didn’t want you to think I was ignoring you.” The pen sighed in my pocket. Jesse laughed, probably thinking the pen was Amanda.

  “Oh, no worries, dear. I was admiring my non-perfect cane.”

  As Jesse laughed, turning towards the doorway leading to the hallway, I took a deep breath and cleared my throat. “Bye,” I called. Despite my throat clearing, my voice cracked.

  As soon as he was gone and we were left alone in the classroom, Amanda walloped me, hard, with her cane pouch after I sat the pen on the table before us.

  “You seriously are afraid of him, like he’s a mad scientist or something. Why?”

  “I’m not afraid of him. I’m afraid of my own feelings . . . like, what if he’s not gay?”

  “That’s why,” she said with an emphasized thump of her cane pouch against my arm, “you use Pointy to express how you feel. Let them do the writing.”

  I sighed and put the pen back in my pocket, where it cooed happily. I distinctly heard canes thwacking against walls and lockers slamming shut.

  “You could charm Jesse with your personality,” Amanda said. “You really could. I mean, it’s not like he can see your brown hair and green eyes, after all.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I replied, leaning on an empty chair. The trouble was, I didn’t feel great, or smart, or inspirational, or witty. I felt ordinary. I didn’t understand what the pen saw in me that made me worthy of Jesse. The pen had told me before that we both were very caring people. That time Jesse had signed his name in my yearbook last year, our junior year, the pen had been able to glimpse his true character. But what if it was wrong about me? I was sure the pen wasn’t wrong about Jesse, because in my eyes, Jesse had a heart of gold. He’d often give hungry kids lunch money because the school district didn’t believe in free lunches. Jesse, like me, believed that was a huge issue in the system, but still, he wanted to ease their pain. He never asked for anything back.

  “Look,” Amanda said, “Pointy said before, they would be willing to help. And, they are a pretty good pen, it seems, I mean, morally speaking, so, why not use Pointy? Pointy wants to help, so let Pointy help.”

  “But Jesse doesn’t want me,” I said. The pen began to whimper in my pocket, but I plowed on.

  “I’m serious.”

  “I don’t think so. I think you’re wrong.” Amanda said. “Catch him at the library before you go to the dorm today. Talk to him. Ask him to eat lunch with you on Mystery Meat Friday, during lunch period,” she giggled. The pen giggled too. I sighed and stood up. I walked over to my now-upright desk, retrieved my cane, and popped it open. Feeling dread, I made my way to our school library.

  My heart continued to pound as I entered the library and began making my way to the braille books. Jesse was a bit old-school in the sense that, even though he loved downloading braille books online and reading them on his refreshable braille display, he said it was still epic to hold a book in his hands.

  The longer I searched for his blurry familiar form, the louder my heart seemed to pound. I mean, what would I do if I actually ran into him, what would I say if I actually— Suddenly, I yelped and leaped back. I realized that I had just crashed into Jesse.

  Whipping around, he caught me as I tripped on a chair while backing away from him. Holding onto his vice-like grip, I gasped for air as he looked at me worriedly. Seeing the concerned look on his face made my stomach do a somersault. Oh, wow was he handsome . . . and caring, and he was holding me . . .

  “Nick?”

  “I was thinking about you and wasn’t looking where I was going,” I babbled. The pen chuckled in my pocket. Jesse was still close enough for me to see a grin dance across his lips and light up his eyes.

  “What a coincidence; I never look where I’m going,” he said with that broad grin still touching his eyes. “But, um, you said you were thinking about me?”

  “Well,” I murmured. “I mean, I was thinking about recommending you a book. You know, because, well, you read books . . . and I read books, too, but anyway, there’s a black book—I mean a black writer you should definitely check out because he writes LGBT literature featuring . . . ” I trailed off, staring at his face. I began to hear my breathing increase in volume. My heart was pounding even harder, and my breathing soon became very rapid.

  “LGBT?” he asked, curiously.

  “Yeah,” I choked. His forehead furrowed, but then he gave me a small smile before hugging me.

  “Whoa Nick, your heart is beating so fast. Are you okay? Here, let’s sit.” He took my now-sweaty palm and sat down at a back table still near the braille section. He still held onto my hand as we sat down. He then took my hand in his huge, warm hands and gripped it tightly.

  “Let’s take a minute and breathe. Okay? Let’s calm down.” He calmly inhaled then exhaled a few times before I realized I was supposed to copy him.

  When I calmed down, he went back to the shelf and retrieved the braille book he was looking at before.

  “This book is an LGBT fantasy by a black writer. I think you’d like it. Mind if I read to you? Actually, wait, I have an idea.” He took out his braille display and went to go get some print paper for me. When he returned, he smiled after setting the paper down before me.

  “Let’s have some fun,” he said, eagerness in his voice. “Let’s make a TBR list for each other. We both like to read, so wouldn’t it be great if we could get to know one another through our book lists?” He paused before continuing, “Oh, and don’t worry about the print. I’ll have someone read it to me.” The pen squeaked excitedly in my pocket. Jesse smiled and then suddenly chuckled.

  “I always knew you were cute.”

  “Cute?” I repeated, like I didn’t understand words. He smiled and began typing on his braille notetaker. His looked to be a newer model than Amanda’s, so I wondered if he wasn’t secretly looking me up online or something. I took the pen out of my pocket and set it on the print paper. I first made my book list, which transformed into braille. Beneath the book list, I placed the pen on a free spot. Before writing, though, I bent down and whispered to it, “Help me.”

  The pen gave an excited sigh and began composing. I watched my arm move across the page with a flourish. I, unfortunately, couldn’t tell what the pen was creating because the words were turning into braille faster than I could read.

  After a few minutes, Jesse got up and went to a wireless printer nearby. He handed me a large-print typed sheet.

  “I hope the font size is good enough,” he said. “I just coded a conversion program into this thing, so I hope my coding skills are good.”

  “I’m amazed,” I gasped, feeling extremely
impressed and touched. I set his book list aside and looked at my book list I was giving to Jesse, filled with perfectly spaced tactile dots. I cleared my throat, adjusted myself in my chair, and picked up the paper, handing it to Jesse.

  Upon taking the paper and feeling the braille dots, Jesse’s eyes bulged. “Wow! This is a really pleasant . . . ” he trailed off, his fingers carefully going over every contraction, every letter. He didn’t move. He sat there, still as a statue, but with a look of pure shock on his face. When he was done, I looked over to see a tear rolling down his cheek.

  He read the paper again, this time letting the tears flow more freely. When he was all done, he gaped at me.

  “You . . . you . . . are so sweet. I love your book list, and I love your note. I really do.”

  I took the paper back from him. The dots were transforming into bold, print, block letters again. Before I read it, though, I turned to Jesse.

  “Look. I have something I want to confess. I’ve had a crush on you for a while now. I’ve liked you ever since we did that English project together back in freshman year. The one where we had to argue for banning problematic classic literature in schools? You were so poised and so ready. I felt like you were better than me in every way. I thought, also, that you were extremely nice and someone that was worth getting to know. I guess what I’m trying to say is, you make me want to be who I know I am. You’re an inspiration to me, but that’s because I feel so average and ordinary, that I just looked up to you a lot. But I’ve realized that I do have a lot to offer someone. I’ve got a few quirks about me, but I’m a pretty okay person. And, I feel extremely comfortable being myself around you. You’re the first person I ever wanted to improve alongside. You know?”

  He didn’t say anything for a while. He just sat there, staring at where my voice was coming from. Finally, he said, “I’ve always thought you were really smart. I also always thought you were really cute. And, again, I love your book list. I’m glad you opened up to me. I really am. It would definitely be an honor to be your friend . . . ” He gave a small laugh as he added, “and possibly more. We can share book lists together, even if we break up.”