The latest edition arrived with a bang.
A Bang Behind the Curtain
The bang came just as Emi dipped her pen into the ink.
A paper figure of a bird dropped from above the stage. The audience gasped. Behind a curtain, the top of the painted tower vanished from view.
“Did it fall?” someone asked.
“I think it did,” said someone else.
Emi stood at the back of the hall with a notebook in her hand. She was reporting the performance for the evening edition. She had seen the bird fall, but not what happened behind the curtain.
Onstage, Nao lowered her paper rifle and bowed. The applause grew louder.
Emi wrote: A loud bang. A falling bird. The tower?
She underlined the question mark.
What Fell?
When the audience began to leave, Emi went towards the stage. A stagehand named Jun was gathering paper scraps beside the curtain.
“Did the tower fall?” Emi asked.
“No,” Jun said. “Would you like to see?”
He drew the curtain aside. The tower stood behind it, its folded walls straight. The little bird lay on the floor at its base, attached to a length of red thread.
“We meant the bird to come down,” Jun explained. “It was part of the final scene.”
Nao joined them and picked it up. One of its wings had opened slightly, and she pressed the fold back into place.
“I heard people ask about the tower,” she said.
“The curtain moved across it,” Emi replied. “From the back, I couldn’t see what happened.”
Nao held the bird out for her to inspect. “Did it look as though it fell by accident?”
“I wasn’t sure. That’s why I came to ask.”
Emi noted the bird, thread, and standing tower, then opened her programme. It described a bird descending at the end, but said nothing about the curtain covering the tower.
A Closer Account
Near the front row, a visitor was putting on her coat. Emi asked what she had seen.
“The bird came down,” the visitor said. “I could see the tower behind the curtain. It didn’t move, though I nearly did when I heard that bang.”
“Did you know the bird was meant to fall?”
“I’d read the programme. I still jumped.”
Emi thanked her and returned to her notebook. She crossed out the question about the tower and wrote that it had remained standing. She also described the audience’s surprise; that part had been easy to hear from the back.
At her desk, Emi began a headline mentioning the bang, bird, tower, curtain, and audience.
Nao came over to return the programme Emi had left onstage.
“Will all of that fit?” she asked.
“Perhaps on two lines.”
“It may need a stage of its own.”
Emi shortened the headline and wrote what she had observed and heard.
The Evening Edition
The edition was ready before the last visitors left. Emi placed copies on a small table near the door, and Nao picked one up.
She read about the bang, the paper bird, and the tower that had stayed upright.
“The sound was bigger than our stage,” Nao said.
Jun arrived carrying the bird. “It certainly surprised me.”
“You knew it was coming,” Nao said.
“I did. I was surprised by how many people turned to look at me.”
A visitor took a copy and glanced at the headline. “Will tomorrow’s edition be just as exciting?”
Emi gathered her notebook and pen.
“That depends on what happens tomorrow,” she said.
The visitor smiled and carried the paper outside. Onstage, Jun hung the bird by its red thread while Nao held the curtain back, leaving the tower in full view.
Livora Gracely ♥
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