Member-only story
A Cinderella With Nowhere to Go
Your fairy tale is my nightmare.
Every night, right before I go to bed, I check the closet once more — just to see if the glass slippers are still there. Sometimes moonlight reflects off of them, and I think I can almost see a sinister smile there in the cloudless sheen. But then I blink, the vision departing, and shut the door.
My husband snores away in the bed, and I linger by the window and watch midnight’s swath over the courtyard. The guards are out there, invisible, for all the times someone tried to break into our complex.
Once, someone even got as far as our youngest daughter’s room. The man’s plaintive plea was that he wanted just a piece of the famed Cinderella’s magic from a cut lock of hair. That was one of the worst moments, seeing the confiscated scissors — the weapon that could have been under a different type of crazed behavior.
I haven’t seen my fairy godmother in thirteen years, but no one seems to care. To them, I am “charmed” — blessed by the magic that comes so fleetingly to this world. Maybe that is why I still check on the glass slippers each night, so afraid that what remains of the magic will leave me at any moment.
And, as I age, the gleam in my husband’s eyes grows dimmer and dimmer. I see the way his gaze lingers after the maids on staff…
