Member-only story
SHORT STORY / FANTASY
A Hidden Agenda
What my little visitor did not tell
“You are not really here, are you?”
“Well,” he said, pulling at his long beard with a gnarled little hand, small booted feet barely reaching the edge of the seat and showing dark leather soles scratched and patterned by years and miles, “that depends on who’s looking.”
He didn’t exist, of course.
“That would be me, looking,” I told the little mirage.
“Then I’m here,” he said.
No, could not be. Still, as if to humor my hallucination, I said, “Do you mind if I touch you? Just to verify.”
He hesitated, but after a heartbeat or two answered as if he had not, “Of course.”
So, surprised and not a little fascinated that this illusion insisted on being real, on being touchable, I walked across to where he sat in my reading chair. What was it we called the gnomes back home in Sweden? Tomte. Yeah, that’s right. Tomte. This one looked exactly like one. And so lifelike.
I’ve had them before, these gnome hallucinations, but not for a while, and never this vividly.
And now to make this little guy vanish.
