The Talisman
- Discovery
Sarah had been fat and in need of glasses for as long as she could remember. She wasn’t particularly attractive without glasses: thankfully they’d stopped getting stronger at the minus 6 mark. That small piece of good fortune failed to prevent her from being mercilessly bullied and tormented at school by a girl called Jenny: thin, unbespectacled and quite pretty, but possessed of cruel wit and, finding Sarah an easy target, sank her claws in at every opportunity.
Years passed by: her situation now being a woman of around 25, still just as fat, ungainly in appearance and gait, and still wearing glasses. Her current eyewear was rather nondescript rounded-off square frames, with the lenses required to correct her myopia being about 5mm thick: still weak enough to escape the necessity of all that messing around with plano fronts. She was glad of that small mercy of fate, at least.
Every day she went to work at the local garden centre, being obliged to pass by a small antiques shop on the way: more like a junk shop, it could be said. She usually stopped to look in the window, just out of curiosity; one morning she did so, and saw a small object in the corner that hadn’t been there the day before. It was a ring of light brown stone, about 50cm wide with a hole about 15mm wide in it. Someone had screwed a small metal ring into the side and looped an old piece of string through it, thus making it into a pendant. On the upper face of the ring there were some faint marks, as if someone had engraved it long ago, then the pattern had been all but erased by time: she fancied that it resembled an eye. It was on offer for £12, nothing at all really. She was fascinated, so went in to buy it. The shopkeeper told her someone had found it their attic, goodness knows how it had come into their possession, but it seemed it could be ancient Egyptian Talisman, or more likely just an old bit of stone. He let her have it for £10. She took it to work, whereupon she quickly forgot about it, then rediscovered it in her bag two days later and left it at home.
- Wishing
The weekend came: Sarah happened to be at home in the evening, busy tiding up her small flat. As she was in the kitchen waiting for her washing machine to finish its wash cycle, she picked up the small paper bag containing the Talisman she’d bought earlier in the week, and instantly remembered what it was. She pulled it out and stared at it for a moment, wondering why on earth she’d parted with money for it. Then she pulled the string out and hung the thing around her neck. Well, she could wear it, and she could look through it: there were many pendants you could do that with, she mused. Idly she raised it to her face and held it a short distance from her right lens, allowing her right eye to peek through it at the washing machine.
At that, the washing machine started spin-drying rather noisily. Rather irritably she thought to herself, whilst peeking though the Talisman “I wish the damn thing would be quieter!” Instantly there was a flash of light, and at that the washing machine’s usual noisy rattling softened to a quiet, barely audible hum. She dropped the stone ring in surprise, where it dangled around her neck. She listened hard, but it was true: the machine had quieted down a lot, and she knew she hadn’t gone deaf because the wall clock ticking was now audible again, as if the machine wasn’t running. She held the Talisman gingerly in her hands, not sure if she believed what had just transpired. Then, with grim determination, she decided to find out. She looked around her kitchen for something to wish for: something simple, she thought. But when a magic wish-fulfilling device is involved, deciding what is simple isn’t as easy as it sounds. With a little trepidation, she decided it was a matter of trial and error.
Looking around her, she quickly found something to try it on: a pot plant that was doing particularly badly. She brought the Talisman to her eye, looked at the plant, and solemnly said to it ‘I wish you would hurry up and grow.’ As before, there was a brief flash of light, rather like a flashbulb on a camera; her weedy, feeble pot plant was now a vibrant, healthy thing, shining with health and sporting three attractive yellow flowers. She smiled: it was good to see such a result. She stared at the Talisman in wonder and delight, endless possibilities dancing in her mind.
Just then she heard a banging and shouting from next door: it was her neighbours having a row again. At that time of night! She glanced up at the clock, and thought just for a moment that it looked a little odd, but she couldn’t place why or how. Then the noise level grew abruptly, so she sighed, and with an inspiration looked though the Talisman again in the general direction of the noise and said ‘I wish you’d shut up!’ There was the same flash of light, but nothing happened. Nothing at all. She tried again, and still nothing happened except a tantalising and ineffective light flash. What was going wrong? Had she worn it out already? She looked at her electric kettle, wished for a new one, and instantly got one, just as desired. She quickly realised what had happened with her still-rowing neighbours: the thing worked by line-of-sight only. It wasn’t a huge problem, so she shrugged.
She then looked at the washing machine, and that odd feeling of something-not-right came back to her, but still she couldn’t place it. Idly she pulled the washing out of the machine and hung it, and then looked up once more at the clock to see what time it was. It looked suddenly very odd: she seemed to see two images for a moment, then one, then two. And even odder - one was slightly blurry. It came and went like a phantom in her gaze. Then she realised what was going on: just as the last time she needed new glasses, everything was clearer in one eye than the other. Quickly she covered one eye and lens with her hand: her left eye definitely seemed OK. Her right eye saw slightly fuzzily, but only in the distance. She’d realised that she’d become shortsighted, which was OK, but within the space of 15 minutes seemed rather quick to say the least. She realised that the reason for this change was hanging around her neck on a piece of string: this wishing-device was grabbing bits of vision from her, from the eye she’d held it to. Every time she wished for something, it had made her a little bit more myopic in exchange. Quickly she took it off and put it away in a drawer, trying to forget about it.
Unfortunately she could not forget about it: it was too big a temptation. She resolved to use it only on really important things, not fixing the washing machine and growing pot plants. Big stuff that concerned her whole life. And the biggest thing she could think of was herself: her weight, the way she looked, the glasses, and all the rest of it. Could the Talisman help with that? And not demand too much in return? There was only one way to find out, and that was to try. She did her best to avoid thinking about her situation and what the Talisman seemed to offer her all during the rest of that week.
During the Saturday immediately following her purchase, she found that she couldn’t resist temptation any longer: she stood before her full-length mirror, holding the Talisman before her left eye. Softly she said ‘I wish I could be a dress size smaller.’ As before something flashed; she dropped the Talisman in surprise, because as before it had done as requested. Sarah saw a noticeably thinner reflection of herself standing looking back at her in the mirror. Unfortunately, her clothes were still the comfortable, rather tent-like garments she’d worn before. And now her distance vision in both eyes was slightly fuzzy. The other problem was that she had several more dress sizes to drop before she could consider herself thin. How much vision would the Talisman take to get her there? Her current size was good, but it could be better.
Half an hour later a woman looking vaguely like the old Sarah stood before the mirror. She’d lost something like 10 stone in weight and over a dozen dress sizes. Another wish had given her some smaller-waisted jeans and a smaller top, hugging her new trim figure more accurately than her previous attire. Gone were her chubby cheeks; in their place an elegant sleekness rather than obvious corpulence, and her nose had been made smaller and cuter, all great stuff, in her estimation. But now, she needed to look quite closely at herself to see clearly: her vision was pretty fuzzy, even with her glasses. Her right eye was better than her left one, so she tried something. She wished, ‘give me my old vision back!’ The flash of light only brought more myopia and no magic cure. Evidently the Talisman didn’t work like that. Instead, she needed new glasses and quickly. She didn’t want to try asking for new glasses in case it cost her more myopia. So, as soon as she could she went along to her optician: he was suitably impressed by her new trim figure, but rather astonished at how poor her vision had become. He mused aloud that it might be something to do with her weight loss, but didn’t dwell on that. Sarah didn’t dare tell him about the Talisman: he barely believed the visual change, she could only imagine his astonishment at being told about the cause. She’d gone up around 2.5 dioptres in her left eye and about 3 in her right eye. About an hour later, as promised in the adverts, she was sporting new glasses, rounded ones with the now obligatory plano front lenses that she thought she’d never need. As she walked home these flashed intriguingly at any passer-by who chanced to look at this attractive young woman.
- Nemesis
Everyone at work was most impressed by her dramatic weight loss, being quite curious about both that and her noticeably thicker glasses. She was forced to use the Talisman to stop the awkward questions, being as she couldn’t think of a plausible explanation for the changes. Despite this, it felt very pleasant being thin and shapely after years of being overweight, and in her opinion well worth the extra myopia. Over the next few months she succumbed to temptation repeatedly: conjuring up money, new clothes, a new car, all sorts of things. Thus again she was obliged to return to the optician, after what appeared to him the strangely brief period of only six months. She let him tell her that he thought it was “adult onset myopia”, all the time knowing the real cause. All these little wishes had cost her another 3 dioptres in each eye, bringing her up to minus 12 or so in each eye. The glasses she needed now were scarily thick, almost half an inch at the edges; thus she vowed to stop using the Talisman.
A week later a new recruit arrived at the garden centre where Sarah worked. Sometime during the morning Sarah spotted her for the first time, her face falling into an aghast and slightly angry look as she did so. The reason for this was that the new recruit was the awful Jenny! Sarah wondered unhappily how she’d wound up there; she’d hoped never to see her again. She immediately wanted to rush home to fetch the Talisman in order to zap her on the spot, regardless of the cost. But then she realised that Jenny didn’t recognise her, thanks to her new look. But Jenny hadn’t changed at all: at first she was all charm and banter, but when she started on someone, she knew exactly how to upset them with icy barbs and cruel remarks.
One day Jenny remarked casually about how she’d once known a fat girl called Sarah at school, and how she’d enjoyed teasing and making fun of her: Sarah had to stop herself shaking with anger and dismay at that. Jenny laughed about it and related how she’d once sent her home with broken glasses… Sarah knew then that Jenny was responsible for that! Then Jenny had the gall to say something about Sarah’s present glasses, and it wasn’t kindly either: something along the lines of “those things make you look weird”. Sarah wasn’t listening: she’d had enough of this nasty young woman.
Sarah went home at lunchtime, retrieved the Talisman from the drawer she’d hidden it in, then walked back to work trying to think of all the awful things she could do to Jenny. Her decision was obvious: make her like she herself had been, but maybe a little worse. When she’d returned to work, she skulked around in the warehouse, waiting for her prey to come. And come she did, all unsuspecting. Sarah watched her walk within a few yards, peeking from behind some bags of compost, and through the hole in the Talisman. She whispered, her voice a little shaky, ‘make her fat, ugly, spotty and smelly with really strong glasses. You can take some vision from both eyes, I don’t mind.’ Instantly her own vision became quite blurred, but despite this the change in her target’s appearance was obvious: instead of the thin, reasonably attractive girl Jenny had always been, there stood the ugliest girl she’d seen in a long time, including herself in a mirror. She was now very unpleasant to look at: just like the woman within. Rolls of fat wobbled as she stopped moving and realised what had happened, if not how. Dimly she saw someone rushing away out of the warehouse, but thanks to her now high myopia and the glasses she needed to correct it, she could not tell who it was. Sarah got out before the smell hit her.
Well it caused quite a to-do at work. This ugly fat woman called Jenny tried to explain that she really was Jenny, but was quickly shunted off the premises: the smell and look of her was enough to make her very unwelcome. She went home and had her first look at herself in the mirror: it was quite appalling, really. Everything that could have been wrong was wrong, indeed worse than wrong. Flabby skin, with spots and blackheads. Hairy warts under her chin and next to her nose. Crooked teeth. And then there were the glasses! They were appallingly thick, making her eyes vanish behind them. And her body, well, the stomach she now had looked utterly ghastly. Everything was just…. ugh! She washed and washed herself, but her smell wouldn’t go away. It clung to her, but that wasn’t what her boyfriend did upon seeing her: he took one look and walked right out, a fitting end for someone who had been so cruel to the overweight and bespectacled Sarah.
As for Sarah, she soon found herself the object of male attention, finding to her delight that the glasses didn’t make any difference whatsoever. After some time dating, she donated the Talisman to charity.