Mr. Vertigo by Paul Auster

“it’s like this. Christmas is coming up next week, and what with Mrs. Witherspoon in the house and all, I’ve heard talk about a celebration on the twenty-fifth. Turkey and pudding, presents, maybe even a fir tree with baubles and popcorn on it. If this shindig comes off like I think it will, I don’t want to be caught with my pants down. You know how it is. It ain’t no fun to receive a present ifyou can’t give one in return. So that’s what I’ve been up to in my room all these days. I’m working on a present, concocting the biggest and best surprise my poor little brain can think of. I’ll be unveiling it to you in just a few days, big brother, and I hope to hell you aren’t disappointed.”
    Everything I said about the Christmas party was true. I’d overheard the master and his lady talking about it one night through the walls, but until then it hadn’t occurred to me to give anyone a present. Now that I’d planted the idea in my head, I saw it as a golden opportunity, the chance I’d been waiting for all along. If there was a Christmas dinner (and that same night the master announced there would be), I would use the occasion to show off my new talent. That would be my present to them. I would stand up and levitate before their eyes, and at last my secret would be known to the world.
    I spent the next week and a half in a cold sweat. It was one thing to perform my stunts in private, but how could I be sure I wouldn’t fall on my face when I walked out in front of them? If I didn’t come through, I’d be turned into a laughingstock, the butt of every joke for the next twenty-seven years. So began the longest, most tormented day of my life. From whatever angle you chose to look at it, the Yuletide bash was a triumph, a veritable banquet of laughter and gaiety, but I didn’t enjoy myself one bit. I could barely chew the turkey for fear of choking on it, and the mashed turnips tasted like a mixture of library paste and mud. By the time we moved into the parlor to sing songs and exchange presents, I was ready to pass out. Mrs. Witherspoon started off by giving me a blue sweater with red reindeer stitched across the front. Mother Sioux followed with a pair of hand-knit argyle socks, and then the master gave me a spanking new white baseball. Finally, Aesop gave me the portrait of Sir Walter Raleigh, which he’d cut out of the book and mounted in a sleek ebonyframe. They were all generous gifts, but each time I unwrapped one, I could do no more than mumble a grim, inaudible thanks. Each present meant that I was drawing closer to the moment of truth, and each one sapped a little more of the spirit out of me. I sank down in my chair, and by the time I’d opened the last package, I had all but resolved to cancel the demonstration. I wasn’t prepared, I told myself, I still needed more practice, and once I started in with those arguments, I had no trouble talking myself out of it. Then, just when I’d managed to glue my ass to the chair forever, Aesop piped in with his two cents and the ceiling fell on top of me.
    “Now it’s Walt’s turn,” he said in all innocence, thinking I was a man of my word. “He’s got something up his sleeve, and I can’t wait for him to spring it on us.”
    “That’s right,” the master said, turning to me with one of his piercing, all-knowing looks. “Young Mr. Rawley has yet to be heard from.”
    I was on the spot. I didn’t have another present, and if I stalled any longer, they’d see me for the selfish ingrate I really was. So I stood up from my chair, my knee-bones knocking together, and said in a feeble little church-mouse voice: “Here goes, ladies and gentlemen. If it don’t work, you can’t say it’s from want of trying.”
    The four of them were looking at me with such curiosity, such a raptness of puzzlement and attention, that I shut my eyes to block them out. I took a long slow breath and exhaled, spread my arms in the loose, slack-jointed way I’d