Another Plain Jane

Our story concerns a girl of very plain features: another plain Jane, in fact. This Jane had a pale face and a small, delicate body, and she always dressed up in the same old, dark green, velvet dress and nifty ankle boots. She had the remarkable talent of going unnoticed, and this suited her remarkably well. While spending her Saturday afternoon going up and down in an elevator (as was her favourite weekend pass time), someone would walk in, and having failed to notice her shadowy figure in the corner, he would begin ranting away to himself. He would stop and compose himself the minute someone else came into the elevator, and Jane would stay there, quietly observing and amusing herself with all sorts of presumptions she made about these people. Jane’s remarkable talent also extended to the fact that she managed to avoid having anyone accidentally stumbling onto her. It seems that she would manage to become part of her very surroundings, and the most embarrassing situation only consisted of someone leaning quite roughly against her, mistaking her for a sign post at the bus stop.

So you see, this remarkably plain Jane was quite remarkable indeed. And being so quiet and observant (alas, what else could she do), she was almost naturally disposed to come across all the littler interesting things in life. In her very small home, she had managed to accumulate the most interesting books, pictures, boxes, tins, lamp shades, jugs, and all sorts of other things. She also had a very peculiar cat called Moustache who had the uncanny ability to appear suddenly in the most awkward places and get into the most impossible spots. She would often find him crammed quite cosily in her favourite cup, or peering out of her letter box with his light gray eyes. She had a plant with black, silky stems that spiraled around and stayed suspended around the room ever so delicately, with tiny silvery thorns that shone fluorescently in the night. Whenever she could, Jane would drift invisibly through endless jumble sales and charity shops, collecting items she couldn’t think why anyone would want to part with. Just as she would superimpose an entire personality and lifestyle on the elevator visitors, she also had the habit of grabbing, say, a book that she picked up at a second-hand store, close her eyes, and muse about who had owned it, how he had acquired it, where he had put it, to whom he might have lent it, and where he might have forgotten it. She had done the same with Moustache, who had appeared quite suddenly on her door step one breezy summer night. Sitting on her favourite chair, she would take him into her lap and mentally go through all the crevices he had eased his way into throughout his life time.

Now, Jane, as unordinary as she may be, still had to earn a living in an ordinary way, so she worked in the public library in the town. Unlike most people, however, she enjoyed her work. For one thing, there were thousands of books to muse about and guess at their past, and there were quite a few visitors whom she could speculate about. She enjoyed the fact that for the most part of her day, and her week, she was dealing with books with different binding, texture, titles, smells, stains, and colours. She would often slip unnoticed into a dark corner, and huddle up comfortably, reading some book she had come across and taken an interest in. However, as with most things in this world, Jane’s remarkable talent and, perhaps, makeshift sanctuary, had a very grave danger lurking behind it. Her ability to become one with her surroundings also made it possible for her to forget herself being there, till it was too late for her to become detached and whole again. In an elevator, where there is so much light and flurry of people weaving in and out on their various errands, it was not dangerous at all. But Jane had to keep track of time when she went for her secret breaks in some dusty and cob-webbed corner of the library, kept cool and dim and distant by the looming piles of books. If she lost track of time, the cobwebs would start to spread over her, and the dust would take its place in the folds of her dress and in the crevices of her face, and the darkness would seep through her hair, until she would become the very wall and ground. But Jane always kept at least half an eye open for the nearest creeping shadow that was making itself too familiar.

Jane would go back home at five o’clock by bus in the winter time, because her frail body would have been swept up like a feather had she tried to brave the terrible wind that haunted the park through which she would otherwise have had to pass. As spring had finally come and made it safe for people under 45 kilograms of weight to get by on foot, Jane had once again taken to walking back home after work. On her first time walking back home that Spring, while eating the cherry tomatoes she had purchased from the green grocer just outside the park, and thinking of all the wonderful and pungent smells of the different coloured pages she had come across that day, she noticed something. Now, most people wouldn’t have really seen any difference, but our Jane here, as we know, was very sharp in this matter. She was walking in the path closest to the park wall that enclosed it, and all along this wall, were a series of bushes, one of which seemed a good amount bigger than the rest. Jane knew that the park was quite abandoned and that no one really took care of it, so these bushes spilled and stumbled over one another, till they all formed one big knotty mess. But this one bush was bulging forward quite majestically. Jane wondered if she had been accurate enough in her observations the previous autumn, before the winter interrupted her walks.

The next day, she made it a point to see the bush with an objective eye, and still, the bush seemed fuller and healthier than the rest. So acute was the difference, that the rough clumps of endless knots appeared to shrivel away from the intricate green plaits, emerging from the breathing insides of this splendid bush. Unnecessarily, Jane looked about her to see if she were alone and then softly crept up the rubble-like soil, to the almost pulsing bush. It looked so endlessly full and deep from all angles, that she felt that she had to make sure that there was actually a wall behind it, and proper ground supporting it. For it seemed, at the time, that this bush was too extraordinary to simply erupt out of the earth and mould its way around the park wall and the other bushes, just like any other plant. I just didn’t seem to be predictable by ordinary standards. She decided to leave her bag and the brown paper bag of cherry tomatoes close to the rest of the withered thicket, and with a furtive and surprisingly agile motion, she shot straight through the mysterious bush, leaving only a small disturbance in the tangling green.

Jane could not contain her awe when she hit the ground. All evidence of daylight was gone, but the lavish green of the living thing illuminated the interior. She looked downwards and realised that the ground she stood on was unlike the soil in the rest of the park, fatigued to its last breath. It was a soft, rich brown that smelled of freshness. All that Jane could see around her was an astonishing display of detail that rivalled anything she had seen of the sort before. The bush was absolutely all around her, almost covering her, but at the same time, she could move around freely, as if swimming in a deep green chaos of beauty. The velvety leaves brushed softly against her, and the swaying twigs were as dainty as her very fingers. Only when these finger-like twigs started prodding her further towards the insides of the bush did she begin to feel as if she might be in danger. But the plant was so enthralling and persuasive that Jane could not resist. She had no sense of orientation, and as far as she knew, there was no earth or wall, but just a swarm of rustling arms, finger tips, and feather-like hair, that pushed her forever inwards. Finally, the gentle earth-sprung beast, (for she felt that the word ‘plant’ could not possibly account for the strong and willful life abundant in whatever was pushing her onwards), thrust her into a clearing. Whatever it was, it moved to accommodate Jane in a comfortable sitting position, so that she could see right in front of her and her arms could move about freely, while still being sheltered by the veil of leaves.

If only her eyes could get any bigger and her chin drop even lower could she have been able to express her astonishment. In the near distance, surrounded and sheltered by the same plant-like creature, was a very small wooden house. In the midst of all this underground darkness, a warm golden light had still penetrated by way of the house (just like a Halloween pumpkin, thought Jane.) Its source, Jane could see through the open door, was a set of dispersed candles whose light oozed out of the window and door and bathed everything in an enchanting glow. Jane perceived a flickering shadow breezing through the house, and to her ever growing surprise, a tiny man appeared, and sat at a desk. She could see his profile quite clearly through the door, sitting on a chair, and realized that though he looked very small, he must still be of human proportions. She sat very still, completely absorbed in watching this little man. He was as white as snow and wore brown pants and a dark green shirt that looked as if they were made from the very plant that surrounded his house. He also had on a vest that seemed hard, wooden, and carved, with many slit-like pockets, bulging with things completely unknown to her. He had a magnificent pocket watch, whose mechanical ticking she fancied she could hear, and a big, golden magnifying glass through which he was peering, both attached to one of his pockets by long golden chains. His dainty hands seemed as if they were carved out of very pale wood, and they were making a series of swift maneuvers that looked vaguely like knitting or weaving. She set her gaze on his face, which appeared to be made of the same material as his hands, though it had more softness to it. He seemed calm and keen on his work, and when he gave a quick look outside his door, she could detect a certain amount of pride, as if he were responsible for the dark green life around him. Jane looked closer and closer at his eyes and realized that the pride she detected was of a paternal kind, and that it was heavily tinted with affection as well as pain. A stem twisted itself playfully around her leg. All she could hear was the soft rustle of the moving leaves, whispering secrets to each other and the swish of the man’s swift fingers doing their dance. She heard the soft clicks of the burning candles, and his persistent clock, and it was at that moment that she became painfully aware of the absence of the beating of her very heart. She followed the man’s beautiful fingers, forever fluttering so purposefully in the air, and his beautifully carved face and bony body bent lovingly over his work. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a twig dip into her hair and twist its way around a strand.

Then, she finally realized. The soft candlelight was not the only thing spilling out of the window and door. A fragile but perceptible stem was creepily crawling out, in time with the flurry of hands which she now realized were weaving these seductive vines. With a soft gasp, she took in her last breath, as more vines, leaves, and twigs encompassed her, till she could feel her very limbs dig deep to root themselves, or stretch and spiral mysteriously out of reach, sprouting leaves themselves. Looking down at her velvet dress, she realized it had blossomed into life and was shifting around, bursting into rustling leaves which furtively whispered the same secrets passed onto them by the other leaves. The strands of her hair slid down her neck and shoulders and grew thicker into twigs. She fixed her eyes on the man hard at work, deciding to set her last look on something she would enjoy contemplating forever. And just before her heart stretched out into a knotty root, and before her head was fixed into a thick bark of a tree, the carved man looked directly at her, and smiled a smile that glowed like the candlelight.

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