When You Leave I Disappear: A Novella

She closed all but her browser window which was waiting for a new search. She typed quickly.

My writing prompts

The screen filled instantly with thousands of hits, most of which said “does not include ‘my’” – with a prompt to search only for the exact phrase. She clicked the only link. That web page was titled (ironically) “My Writing prompts.”

She waited as the site loaded. There was the usual warning about collecting cookies, which she accepted. The screen flickered, and a simple form appeared in the center of a black screen.

LOGIN – or CREATE ACCOUNT?

She clicked create account and a new screen appeared. She frowned. There were none of the usual suspects among the fields she was presented. No username. No password.

First question: Are you a talented writer?

There was a button for YES. There were no other choices. She hesitated over the YES. A blue circle appeared across the black background. The blue began to disappear at the top, spinning clockwise around the circle and leaving only the black. She wanted to press the button on her mouse and move to the next screen, but she was paralyzed. Was she a talented writer? What did she have to show that would prove it? The Teresa Vincent novels? The short stories in literary magazines she’d written in college that made her cringe every time she re-read them? The bits and pieces of things she’d collected and recorded in journals that had never gotten past the point of ideas? She blinked and realized the blue had completely disappeared. She was about to hit the back key and return to the main screen, thinking it had simply timed out, when the screen shifted again.

“ENTER SAMPLE” was at the top of the screen. Beneath that in smaller type, “Write something that is real. Write what you want to say to the world.”

Then there was a large blank text box. Andrea stared at it. She’d come to the site to get prompts, not provide them. She felt unprepared and oddly vulnerable. Her fingers found the keys, and she began typing the first thing that came to mind. “Alexis Jones was a tall, thin woman with jet black hair and an icy smile.”

The words disappeared from the screen. Another circle, larger than the first one, appeared to the right of the text box. This one was white, but began slowly turning red, moving steadily around from the top like the first. Andrea closed her eyes, flashed back to the first question, then to the review of Imagine Us in Heaven, and began to write.

* * *

Every face you see is a mask and every face you present to the world is also a mask. Some people are experts at shifting from one to the next. The face they show you won’t be the same as the one  your husband or wife sees. They navigate rooms, features flickering from one countenance to another so quickly it’s seamless and impossible to track.

Most people are not so adept. Their masks will linger and give away secrets. Features slip into place that present them to the world in ways that don’t feel real, that are paper-thin and fragile enough to blow away in a gust of wind. Those are the masks you cherish, patching them and molding them until they solidify. Who you believe you are or want the world to buy into. Masks can protect you, but they crack. If you wear them too long, you can forget what’s important. Masks aren’t protection, they’re a prison, and every face is a mask.

There are more dangerous masks. There are more inescapable prisons. These are created for you by others, molded around your features and your words, creating something you have no control over. The more who see and accept that face, the harder it becomes to remove. You wear it in public. No matter how hard you try, it seeps into your private life, shows itself to friends and colleagues, replacing your features and stealing your identity. Imposter syndrome is a very simple disorder when you consider how many imposters you might actually be.

If you want to change the world, you have to break them all. The most terrifying face you can present to the world is the one that hurts the most, the one that burns in the sun and faces the world unprotected. These are the faces of artists, writers, creators. They are the faces that will be remembered far beyond death. They are the faces that lead to madness, or greatness, or both.

The mask I wear is killing me. I have to break it. I have to destroy it, but I am afraid. It’s a face the world loves. What if, after it’s broken, what’s left isn’t enough? What if I’m not enough?

* * *

Andrea lifted her fingers from the keys and stared at the screen. What she’d written had come from somewhere deep inside. Her frustration with her career, her hatred of the work she was doing, combined with her absolute fear of disappointing her fans, her editor, or lost touch with the world she’d created. What would result if they suspected how she felt, or even worse, how she regarded their adoration. If she was an imposter, and what she wrote was crap, what did it say about the millions of readers who snapped up every title as soon as it hit the shelf? Or the book clubs full of wine tastings, blog tours, and book reviewers who raved and promoted her?