Sleighted

No magic.

Now we can move on to talk about that tiny little mistake. A slipup so inconsequential, of course no one noticed.

But I have to tell you about that chain of silly little messes, that confluence of circumstance that led to all my hard work being unraveled. About me, curled up into incoherence by an infection boring its way through my inner ear canal and down my neck, waiting for antibiotics to kick in. About the new event organizer I hired this time around, eager to please and even more eager for a fatter income than she was already getting. About Dani, preoccupied with some investment that took a bad turn.

That’s all.

I knew nothing, of course. I wonder now if there would have been a way to mitigate the damage, had I seen the ads the next day. The next week, even.

Probably not, methinks.

As it was, I got my first inkling of what had happened when an unfamiliar clamor stole into my dressing room on the third floor. I put my compact down on the table and went to peer over the windowsill.