Michelle Reale
Manipulation
In the city square, a sad faced puppet is being manipulated by a handsome puppeteer. Carnivalesque music accompanies the puppet’s antics as he plays with the crowd. He smells the shoe of an old woman, grabs the crotch of a young man then runs after a woman with somewhere to go , her high heels clicking on the paved square , who then turns around and slaps the puppet, to the uproarious laughter of everyone gathered.
Into the crowd, a man pushes a stroller with a girl who is far too big for it. His wife lags, unsteady, behind. Her arms are folded and she is looking down. She begins to shuffle her large feet to the strange sound. The puppet is singing a song that everyone seems to know. Young and old clap their hands. The puppet is now a jolly guide to the sing-a-long, orchestrating the high and low voices, his little arms in the patchwork velvet of his tiny suit shimmer in the sun. The woman gets caught up in the tune, now remembering the words, from years ago when she was just a girl. Her face is red with the effort of concentration, and she claps and stomps her feet out of time. The puppet stops and places his wooden mitts on his tiny hips and affects anger. In motions hilarious, he pleads with the crowd: who is she? What is she doing?
Her husband calls to her impatiently while pushing the stroller back and forth with one hand. The tips of the child’s shoes scrape on the patterned brick as she sits nearly motionless. The man smokes a cigarette with the fervor of someone damned. The child reaches for it. He puts it near her mouth then pulls it away, smiles for what seems like a mere second. He scowls, looking into the crowd.
The woman is straining now, singing with effort, but not making a sound. Her face is crimson and the cords of her neck look as though they might snap. The puppet waves his mitt in front of his face and pretends to faint from alcohol fumes. The crowd is egging her on. She begins to spin, slowly, with her arms extended outward, like a wayward plane, looking for a place to land.
Her husband breaks through the crowd with the stroller and yanks her by the arm. The crowd gasps though a bit of laughter can still be heard. The puppet motions to the couples’ retreating figures: come back, come back. He holds his hands together, as if he is praying, pleading. He rallies the crowd to call to the woman, but their interest has faded. The sun is hot and everyone begins to move on.
The woman’s arms hang by her side and she looks down at her daughter while brushing her bangs to the side. She sees the purplish bruising and smoothes the hair back into place. The little girl looks up at her and a soft tendril of smoke escapes through her small, pouted lips. The husband lights another cigarette and winces at the sun.
The woman turns back and sees the puppet standing in the center of the square with his small wooden mitt extended to her, his head tipped slightly to the side. The music is slow, dark and agonizing. She reaches her hand out to him. He withdraws and throws his head back in a gesture of great hilarity, turns and does a jig back to his little black case. Her husband offers her a puff of his cigarette which she takes greedily and in turn, offers it to her young daughter. They begin the slow walk home to where it all started in the first place.