Words that Vanish

The mahogany desk was cluttered by letters—some open, some half-written, and one stubbornly denying a single word to be inked.

I pressed the pen into the opaque page and prepared my gracious entry.

“ Dear Princess Rebecca, ”

No, wait, what?

“ Princess Rebecca, ”

Where did Dear go?

The greeting was fading and I blinked again to verify.

“ Rebecca, ”

Great, now the Princess is missing.

I tried to write the word Dear back to the beginning.

“ Dear Rebecca, ”

Yet, the vanishing continued, now reading, “ Dear becca, ”

What! How!

I was shocked at my ink being—being deleted. I shook the pen hoping a sudden stir of the ink would clear reality, setting things back to normal, but becca was gone now. The letter simply read, Dear the word fading, becoming translucent, it struggled to exist for another moment.

The letter was empty now.

Perhaps Julian, my assistant, played a prank on me? Had she replaced the ink in the pen? That must be it.

A different pen, I’ll try a different pen.

My desk drawer opened on its own as if in response.

No. No. No. Drawers don’t open on their own. This won’t be okay—but no, I have to write her this letter. Yes, I have to write Rebecca this letter.

Red pen, blue pen, onyx pen with a silver dragon, and another pink pen leftover from Julian borrowing the desk.

Red pen, please be the blood that beats this letter to life.

“ Dear ”

The word vanished faster than before…

My choice failed me.

Blue pen. Be the sky that is inscribed above this blank page.

“ Princess ”

I was prepared to test words on the page, was it Dear that vanished quicker than Princess?

The word stuck around for several seconds, but then it made its escape.

I released a heavy sigh. Frustration eclipsed my mood, fueling heat that made me adjust uncomfortably.

Okay—no red pen, no blue pen, and no sandy brown pen from before. Julian wouldn’t have been this thorough, to replace all the ink with vanishing ink?

I grabbed the pink pen, Julian’s pen, perhaps it would undo the trick, this curse, a poor prank, a trip past hell.

“ Dear Princess Rebecca,

I can’t wait to tell you about these incredible cookies. ”

I wrote fast this time, urgently, to challenge the phantom's speed.

Two awful seconds passed…

And the letter simply read, “ incredible cookies ” briefly, until it read empty and incomplete all over.

Damn you, I cursed the phantom. I really wanted to let the princess know about those cookies too. A small tear formed inside my soul, I loved those cookies. I wanted to share those cookies so badly.

Time for the big guns!

The onyx pen limned by the silver dragon was summoned to my hand. Quickly I wrote,

“ Dear Princess Rebecca,

Help! I’m trapped writing this letter to you! Endlessly the ink vanishes! Not a single word preserved, all of them delightful cookies ready for you to consume! ”

I huffed. What could Princess Rebecca possibly do for me?

Part of me knew the pen wouldn’t work. It must be the page. I concluded it must be the page, as the entirety of the message vanished, except Help! It held on a few more moments. Just to haunt me further into insanity.

“ Dear Princess Rebecca,

I have a mouthful of words ready for you—I’ve missed you! And I've brought you cages of cookies! They are a wonderful network of cookie blessed apparatuses, each enchanted by a unique exchange of flavors. I swear the chocolate battled past a dragon of coconut and almond just to successfully woo my mouth into leaking out drool! ”

The words began vanishing… The flavor from the page was being sucked back into an empty hell.

Just another broken page. Ha ha ha. Just another broken page.

I quickly tried a different piece of paper and decided to glance out the window above my desk. Good. The sun was still shifting through the morning. I’d have time to write the letter.

It had been a week…

It wasn’t the page that was broken. It wasn’t the pen. It wasn’t the paint brushes I tried either. It wasn’t the coffee I used or the blood I finally used as the endless desire to write captured me. As that demon finally captured me.

No word could be written by me and last.

I tried zipping out lines about dragons dressed in souffle dresses, and wolves with their fur removed roaming around a forest. Words drizzled out like lingering lies involving a self declared monarch, some chased after spirits aimed to enchant stars. I had given up on trying to write a letter to Princess Rebecca. No writing lived.

There was a knock on the front door.

I was slumped down under the desk. Afraid of the empty page that seemed to suffuse the world above me.

There was another knock on the front door.

I struggled to get up, dizzy from losing nearly a pint of blood in an attempt to write a broken, and barely balanced ballad. But I made it to the front door.

Julian was there to greet me.

She simply handed me a pen and said, “ Sorry, I intentionally kept this. ”

It broke me. There would be no sending cookies to the Princess, Rebecca.