In memoriam of my glasses
I lost my glasses to a pit of lava in the Four Former Forges. Collateral damage, I suppose, and luckily I don’t need them to see, but it still hurts - it’s hard to remember a time before I had them.
When I was a child, I used to pick up my dad’s glasses and try to wear them around the house. I didn’t understand why he would wear these odd things on his face that made reading books impossible, but I would do it anyway so I could look just like him. I remember him plucking them off my face and saying, “you’re lucky you’ll never need these, dear; they become such a burden when you’re sprinting away from a Yeti or trying to escape the grapple of an Awakened Tree.”
I’ll always remember the day I got these glasses. Every year at the end of harvest season, we’d celebrate with a holiday of trickery called “Knave’s Night.” As legend goes, when the first cool winds of winter start to blow through the village, the arrival of The Custodian is imminent. He makes his way from town to town, swinging his lantern and signaling the end of the harvest season. The townsfolk called upon The Lanky Knave’s deceitful ways and attempt to disguise the town, thereby tricking The Custodian into passing over the village and giving us two more tendays of warmth. It was tradition for each home to paint their front door with a new color and delightful designs, and (my favorite part) each person puts on a disguise or dresses up as someone else. At the end of the night, if we had successfully confused The Custodian, he moves on to the next town and we get to enjoy the warmth for a little longer! My father and I didn’t revere the gods in the same way as the other village folk, but it was my favorite holiday because I got to dress up as someone else and pretend to be a normal kid for a day.
One year, I was walking around the village taking in all of the beautiful new door designs in the golden light of the setting sun, when I spotted a group of costumed village children who were laughing and poking fun at each other. I started to shyly follow them around, hoping for a chance to say hello and join them. As the night darkened, I kept following a few houses behind them, listening to their cheerful conversation turn sour over an extinguished lantern.
Here’s my chance, I thought to myself. I can help them relight their lantern and they’ll let me join them for the rest of the night! I slowly walked towards them, pulling my hood a little lower, patting my face paint to ensure it was still in place. “I can help you relight it!” I called out to them. They turned towards me, their expressions brightening. One of the girls held their lantern out me, opening the door to the candle inside. Having limited interaction with the other kids in town, my heart started beating frantically with excitement. Could this be the beginning of having real friends? I held my little candle out to light their wick, and in my excitement I must have siphoned my own fire magic. When my flame touched theirs, it flashed outward, exploding the wick with a pop, and the heat immediately turned the candle wax to hot lava, running out of the sides of the lantern and down the girl’s hands, dripping down her arms and to the ground. She let out a startled scream and started howling in shock. The other children, stunned by what they just witnessed, started screaming too. I’ll never forget their look of fear as they tore away from me.
“People fear what they do not know.” I heard my father’s words echo in my head as I ran home in tears.
I burst through our freshly painted mint green door, startling our injured tressym off my father’s lap. He had stayed at home for the past few years while I went out, pouring over old books and enjoying a hot cup of pumpkin tea. Through tears, I told him about what happened, and that I’d never fit in with anyone. I cried and said I wished I could just be normal. I wished I didn’t have magic. I wished I wasn’t me anymore.
I remember him looking at me sadly, then giving me his tea to sip on while he went to the kitchen to fetch me a handkerchief. When he came back, it wasn’t a handkerchief in his hand, but an old pair of his metal rimmed glasses with the lenses popped out. I looked up, and saw my dad with the goofiest expression on his face and our red mop on his head. “I’ll tell you what, dear. We can still celebrate right here and trick the Custodian together.” He pointed to the mop. “You don’t have to be Fahima tonight - I’ll be you, and you can be old me.” He bent down, eyes wrinkling with a big smile, and placed his glasses on my face. They were comically big on me, but I refused to take them off for the rest of the night. I refused to take them off the day after that too, and all the days following.
I’ll miss those glasses - they were one of the last pieces of my dad I still had.
