Older: A Slightly Different Version of Missing Pieces

It was a clear, bright day at the height of Summer. In the middle of a large, sprawling park, where tall, lush green trees grew among expanses of well-tended grass and along winding, lazy sidewalks, people sat on picnic blankets conversing, or chased dogs and children through the grass and around trees, laughter floating upon a slight breeze.

            I walked, hands in pockets, sometimes along a pathway, sometimes on the grass; mostly alone with my thoughts, but sometimes watching the people talking, playing or running as I passed them by.

           

            Ahead of me, I noticed another pedestrian walking along the sidewalk, an older man, wearing suspenders and neatly pressed trousers. He wasn’t remarkable in any way save one; above his shoulders, where you would expect his head to be, there was nothing but air.

            Startled, I stopped walking.

            “Ahem, Miss?,” The word was obviously coming from the emptiness where his head was, in a middling depth, slightly gravelly voice, “Excuse me miss, but I seem to have misplaced my body, have you seen it hereabouts?” He said it in a sort of singsong lilt, the words going higher and lower like water above a rocky streambed.

            Yes, he was speaking to me; that was apparent. Though he had no head; therefore no face or eyes (the usual indicators of address), he had undeniably stopped directly in front of me, and his body was arranged in my direction, shoulders straight, feet pointed towards me.

            “Um,” I sputtered, unsure how to handle this strange situation, “You have a body, it looks to me like it’s your head that’s missing.” Well, that sounded a bit rude, I thought, and internally winced.

            “Oh. Hmm. That’s getting somewhere, at least.” Apparently that hadn’t sounded rude to him, good. “Do you have any idea what dimension you’re in, or rather, which dimension my body seems to be in?”

            I laughed nervously.

            “Welll, we call the world we move about in, with shadows and light and depth of perception the ‘Third Dimension’…”

            “Aha! But of course, that isn’t quite the name I know it by; you call it the third dimension, and this is still the planet called Gaia, or Monos, or maybe you know it by the name of Earth, is that right?”

            “Mhm, Earth. That’s it.”

            “Okay, so that would make it, by my reckoning… the 59th dimension!”

            With that exclamation, a fizzing noise grew louder, and with a violent pop, the man suddenly sprouted a head above his shoulders. Wild pepper-and-salt hair waved in all directions save one; the top of his head was shiny-bald. His hair didn’t match his orderly clothing or neat manners, much to my surprise. He also wore thick glasses with heavy frames. The formerly headless man’s glasses made his watery gray eyes appear significantly larger than they actually were. He peered earnestly into my face, his gaze a little unnerving.

            “There we go,” He said, a mouth finally accompanying his words.

            He looked down at his feet. I followed his gaze, a little stunned by the sudden appearance of what should have been at the top of his body all along, and noticed that he was wearing sandals over white, baggy socks. Hm, I thought, maybe his hair isn’t so incongruous after all… Still, there was nothing terribly peculiar about that, however; his socks lay flat and empty just where his toes should have been.

            “Well, I’m off to find the ends of my feet,” He grinned at me, eyes sparkling, all good humor and no bewilderment at his missing toes. I suppose that made sense though, considering how his head had made an appearance. He took his glasses off and polished them with a handkerchief from his pocket; his eyes actually were that big, making him look like some sort of a very large insect. “Thanks for you help!” he exclaimed after he’d replaced his glasses.

            With a quick wave and a short leap into the air, he was gone. Disappeared, though he left behind one thing that shortly vanished with him as well; a delighted and exhilarated laugh that lingered upon the Summer breeze for half a minute, before breaking up and skipping about, like the laugh that was said to have created fairies.

            “Well.” I said out loud. “You’re welcome.” A little late, but I had a feeling that he had heard me anyway. And I had the strangest notion that I had met him once before, in another time, long ago… 

(That was fun :) I think I definitely like him better as an old guy, more personality. I still want to try a young boy, though. It's funny how this is almost becoming a character study project...)