Fractured Fairy Tales by Catherine Stovall Page B

the busy little man sits down at his desk and begins to punch a series of holes into the card. Occasionally, he stops and peers at the rose, then at me, before continuing. What results is a little brown card made more of holes than substance, with a complex pattern running through its centre, which almost looks like the tooth of a savage beast.
    “Well that’s that,” the old man says suddenly.
    Mr. Metero stands, flapping the card to and fro in the faint summer breeze as I watch it sway. He stills it then and turns, feeding it into the shining little engine on his desk, which waits patiently to receive its instructions. Though I have seen many a clerk feeding the machines downstairs, in this moment I feel that I am witnessing a spectacle like no other. The weatherman himself has created a forecast, and I’m about to see it come to life.
    The card clicks into the feeder, disappearing through the slot. A few seconds pass as I stand, tensely awaiting the rumble from one of the brass pipes. It comes from a particularly thick one to our left, which rattles visibly under the strain of what must be building inside it. A tightness forms in the very pit of my stomach as I watch, grasping out to steady myself with the back of Mr. Metero’s chair. My fingers grip the solid wooden rim, digging in with fear as the pipe shakes itself into a frenzy, before suddenly letting rip with a force that makes me leap half out of my skin.
    The lightning shoots into the sky, but some of it snakes a path into the room itself. It shudders all around me, bright as dawn after dark, blinding every sense as it illuminates the room so intensely that one would think the office had disappeared altogether. The pain of the light is too much, and I cover my ears against its buzzing, dropping to the ground in a ball to cower from its awesome presence. It is only when I feel a withered old hand on my shoulder that I dare to open my eyes again. I can see the huge office on the edges of my vision, but the centre of my sight is still blinded by a shadow of the light.
    “There now,” Mr. Metero croons. “The first of your lessons is taught.”
    My skin tingles as I rise, and the old man helps me into his chair. I look down at my hands, relieved to find them undamaged by the fierce lightning blast, and then seek out the reflection of my face in the dome of the rose. As I take in my fine features, unblemished as always, I realise that something is different on the other side of the glass. The rose is renewed. Where the withered old stem once stood, a verdant green stalk stands proudly, thorns and all. The petals are pink and rosy once again.
    “You replaced it,” I breathe, looking to Mr. Metero for guidance.
    He shakes his head, resting a hand on the glass.
    “My engines do not simply control the heavens,” he explains. “All nature is programmable, if one knows the correct codes.”
    I try to process what he’s telling me, finding it hard to keep all my thoughts in a sensible order as I gape at the beautiful rose once more.
    “You said something about a lesson,” I say as recollection dawns.
    “Yes,” Mr. Metero answers. “Lesson the first: nature has a fine balance to its energy. In order to renew the rose, energy had to be extracted from somewhere else.”
    I furrow my brow.
    “But from where?” I ask.
    The old man taps his hooked nose, still grinning.
    “That’s your second lesson, and it isn’t for me to tell you,” he replies.
    Before I can fathom all that I’ve seen and heard, Mr. Metero plucks a valise from under his desk and adjusts his hat. He begins to stride briskly from the desk, back towards the aubergine corridor where the elevator is waiting. I rise from the chair to find my legs are shaking, crashing back down into its creaking curves as I grasp at the very air before me.
    “Wait!” I cry. “You’re not going already, are you? What am I supposed to do?”
    The old man doesn’t so much as look back, he just waves me off