“I realize now that I wanted to disappear. To get so lost that nobody ever found me. 
To go so far away that I'd never be able to make my way home again. 
But I have no idea why.” 
(Jessica Warman, Between)

 The Disappearing Man

By Bill Harder

Harold woke up on this particular morning feeling a bit strange. Climbing out of bed he stretched as he looked at himself in the mirror. Oddly, he noticed that his reflection was beginning to fade. Absently he rubbed his sleepy eyes and peered again at the misty image before him. No mistaking it – he was getting fainter by the minute. He thought it peculiar, but dismissed it as he pulled on his clothes and headed down the stairs for the breakfast that his impatience demanded be ready.

As he sat at the table waiting for his wife to bring a cup of coffee he thought he might make mention of his new condition.

“Susan – do I seem a little... transparent to you? Am I fading a bit?”

She didn’t seem to hear him as she puttered about the stove, flipping pancakes and filling coffee cups. He repeated the statement, this time a little louder, but was interrupted mid-sentence. “Harold!” she called out, interrupting his query of concern. “Harold – breakfast is ready!”

Startled, he responded, “Susan you dingbat – I’m right here. Now bring my coffee and something to eat so I won’t be late. You know I hate to be late... Did you hear what I asked you? Am I fading out?”

Susan turned to the table, and looking right through him pinched her brows together in consternation as she again called out the invitation to their morning repast. Pausing only a moment to wait for a response she shrugged her shoulders and sat herself down to dine on two fluffy pancakes. She reached around to set the frying pan back on the stove without so much as a glance over at Harold, who sat in his chair with his mouth hanging agape.

“Well!” he spat out, snapping his jaws shut. “That’s a fine way to treat your husband first thing in the morning. I’ll be off then, without my breakfast and probably late to boot! If I’m fired it will certainly be your fault!” And with that he stormed out of the house, grabbing his overcoat and briefcase as he went.

He walked to the bus stop, as he usually did, stomping down the sidewalk, clouded in frustration. He didn’t have time for the busker playing guitar at the corner; nor did he appreciate the fact that the doorman at his office didn’t take time to open the door for him – Harold withheld any cheery hellos or Merry Christmases in light of the man’s rudeness. In fact, he wondered if the doorman even noticed he was there. On the 10th floor the receptionist didn’t bother to greet him and his own secretary entirely looked right through him when he brought his growing frustration into the front office.

Throughout the day Harold had the mounting sensation that he was completely invisible – un-seeable in any fashion by sight, sound or touch. It absolutely infuriated him. No one gave him a moment’s notice; nobody offered help, extended sympathy, even seemed to miss him. He began to feel very much alone. The more energy he put into being noticed the less anyone around him seemed to care. By mid-afternoon he was desperate to the point of jumping up on the boardroom table in the middle of a high-level meeting, scattering agendas and notices, and shouting at the top of his lungs, “I’m here! I’m here for God’s sake – somebody notice me! Please, somebody say something to me...”

A brief glimmer of hope died out when the board chair looked directly at him and to know one in particular asked, “would someone close the window – a draft seems to be blowing the papers about.”

That was all he could take. Like a scolded puppy he climbed off of the oval table and slumped out of the room. No one saw him leave, no one missed that he was not there. Trudging down the hall he passed a decorative mirror – stopping to gaze, nobody looked back at him. He had completely vanished. “Well...” he thought, “that’s the end of me. No one ever did love me – it’s fitting that I just fade away. The whole miserable lot of ‘em can fade away too for all I care...” And with that Harold the disappearing man drifted out of the building and on to the street.

That might have been the end of him then – he may have simply paled from existence as though he had never been. It just might have been, but for a rather peculiar incident, a few hours later, on 49th and Main. Leaning against a light standard, feeling dreadfully sorry for himself, he noticed a young woman, a girl really, standing at the corner waiting for the light to change. She was shivering, and rightly so for she had no coat and only a wisp of a shirt, and this a cold day. Her arms were wrapped tightly around herself, faint protection from the biting chill. What was strange was not the presence of this poorly-dressed teen, for they were plentiful in the city. The unusual thing was his observation of her – that he noticed her at all. It in fact surprised even him.

“Odd,” he thought, “I pass by here everyday and don’t remember seeing so many people so poorly dressed for the weather.” On an impulse, and before he had a chance to rethink it, he had slipped his overcoat off and wrapped it around the shivering teen; it materialized around her gaunt frame from nowhere, becoming solid as soon as he removed it. She turned to see who had helped her. She almost, but not quite caught a glimpse of someone standing behind her, sad eyes moist, coat-less in the wind. He didn’t care about the cold – he was done-for anyway. What was a little cold to add to his despair?

He walked on from there, his hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, his shoulders caving-in to his despair. Hungry, he stepped into the mall and meandered his way to the food court. He stopped in front of a vender – Asian food. A cacophony of smells made his stomach growl. Reaching to his back pocket for his wallet he addressed the woman behind the counter. “I’d like a plate of...” he began, and then stopped mid-sentence. She did not see him, she had no idea he was there – though she did turn toward him as though a faint noise had caught her attention. Tears again filled his eyes. So this was how it would be – alone and slowly starving to death!

He sat down at a table in the common area. Once again his misery was interrupted by a rather unusual interaction. A scrubby, elderly man sat down at the table directly across from him. The fellow omitted a foul odor, his clothes worn and dirty, his face scarred and deeply creased. The man’s hands were shaking and his eyes darted nervously about the room. Harold’s initial reaction of disgust mutated into compassion as he realized he was not much better off himself. He stared with newfound concern at the man, wondering how he could have gotten into such straits. Without a doubt he needed a hot meal – and a bath!

Opening the wallet that had not yet migrated back to it’s pocket, Harold pulled out $45 bucks, cash, and dropped it on the table in front of the old fellow. It was all he had on him. The vagrant had been looking over his shoulder longingly at a burger joint and did not see the money appear before him out of thin air. Nor did he say thank you to the faintly visible outline of a man whose shoulders hung low as he wandered out of the food court.

Feeling despondent in his loneliness, Harold fled to the streets. The December light was low in the sky and what little warmth the day had promised was giving heed to the dusk. He wrapped his arms around himself, not so unlike the girl an hour earlier. Heading down Main he stepped into an alleyway to get out of the wind and catch his breath. Slipping on some ice he fell hard, scrapping his face and tearing his pants. As he looked up from where he fallen he saw a cat, shivering in the cold, staring vaguely through him. Poor cat, thought Harold – I suppose she can smell me, even if I cannot be seen. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out a wrapped chocolate that he’d forgotten he’d picked up earlier. He unwrapped it and laid it on the snow. The kitty meowed piteously and gingerly sniffed the offering. Looking straight at him the cat suddenly grabbed the chocolate and fled down the alley.

Feeling insubstantial to all but the wind Harold decided to make his way home. He ghosted down the darkening streets, cold, as much from dread as from wind-chill. Waif-like, his thoughts drifted with him. He had spent his life, his marriage, all his energy hungry to be loved and here he was fading from the world, and no one cared. The misery of his thoughts was interrupted, however, by a small child in the front yard of a darkened house; a house in fact, that had no Christmas lights, no tree in the front window. The little boy was sitting on the dim front porch, sobbing softly into his sleeve. Forgetting for the moment the immaterial nature of his being Harold walked up to the step and squatted down in front of the child.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, a very real concern etched on his face. The boy looked up, sniffing and wiping his nose with the back of a ragged mitt. He looked directly into Harold’s eyes, and for one heart-stopping moment Harold remembered that he had disappeared. And then, as though the veil between life and death had been pulled aside, the child replied, “Mister, – how come you’re sort of see-through?” Too shocked to make sense of the boy’s question, Harold pressed on. “You’re sad – what’s the matter? Where’s your mom?”

The boy shrugged his small shoulders, “I don’t know,” he said, eyes to the ground, “she’s out somewhere – said she’d be home later.” Harold glanced at the front window – “you don’t have a Christmas tree!” The child’s eyes misted over again and a big tear slid down his cheek as he shook his head “no”. “There’s no Christmas at my house”, he said as he stood and turned to the door. Harold stood with the boy and turned to leave, but just before the door closed he called back to the lad – “maybe it will come – don’t loose hope, maybe...”

His thoughts fired in rapid succession. Without consideration for the misery and seeming failure of the day, let alone of his whole life, Harold ran across the street to a pay phone and called a cab. Minutes later he was again surprised when the cabby stopped right where he was standing. He hopped into the back seat and asked the driver to go to the Department store on 12th. Without a glance back the driver commented absent-mindedly, “it’s cold out fella – you otta be wear’n a jacket...”

“Wait for me,” Harold instructed the cabby as he closed the car door. Catching his reflection in the window he was startled to observe that he was almost substantial – only a glimmer of the street light behind shone eerily through his head like a warning beacon. The cabby nodded non-committedly as Harold ran to the store. Twenty minutes later he returned with a three-foot, pre-decorated, fiber-optic Christmas tree in a box. The cabby popped the trunk and Harold slipped the tree in, closed the trunk and slid into the backseat of the cab. “Take me to that big grocery store near the highway!” The driver gave a nod and pulled away as snow began to fall in earnest.

By the time the taxi drove up to the little boy’s house a blizzard was settling in, obscuring the road and the cheerless house of the child. Harold gave the driver his credit card and waited impatiently as the cabby processed the bill. For the first time, his driving-weary eyes eager for his own home, the taxi-driver looked directly at Harold,. “Here ya go mister – merry Christmas!” Harold returned the glance and for the first time really saw the cabby – a tired, hard-working man longing to finish his shift. “Merry Christmas” He replied, “and thanks for tonight – I really appreciate it.”

It felt a bit weird coming from his mouth – “thank you” – and to a stranger to boot; Harold never said thank you... but then, it had been, by all accounts an exceptionally strange day. Retrieving the tree and an armload of packages from the trunk Harold made his way through the wiping wind to the front porch. Rapping on the door he shivered against the cold. There was no answer at first, but then Harold heard the soft footsteps of the boy inside. The door eased open a crack and the little boy looked out, squinting into the blowing snow at the stranger standing on the stoop. “I have something for you” Harold explained uncomfortably. “Is your mom home yet?” The child shook his head “no”, staring with growing wonder at the pile of packages in Harold’s arms. “What’s your name?” Harold asked. “Charlie,” was the brief reply.

“May I come in Charlie, I have something for you, and your mom?” Nodding “yes” Charlie stepped back to let the stranger in, his eyes getting large as he saw the box with the tree. In but a moment Harold had the tree set up, several wrapped gifts spread enticingly beneath the glittering branches. A small turkey was left in the fridge along with a carton of eggnog and a can of cranberry sauce.

He returned to the front door and bent down to pull on his shoes. “Mister...” Charlie said quietly. “Are you God?” Harold looked at the boy, the child’s face glowing with joy at the amazing events of the evening. “No, son,” he said tiredly as his voice choked with tears. “No, I’m barely even real...”

Impetuously the child ran over and gave him a hug, holding on tightly for a moment before stepping back. “You’re not see-through any more.” He said with innocence.

“No... no I’m not.” A pause and then, “and you’re not either.” There was a moment of quiet, the front hall lit by the twinkling of the Christmas tree lights. Then Charlie said softly, like a benediction, “You sure are real to me!” And with that Harold the visible man stepped into the night and disappeared into the blowing snow.