by Jesse Raub

“Oh, it’s on. Come quick.”

I turn away from the mirror in the bathroom, toothbrush hanging out of my foamy lips.  My wife is gesturing to the TV with her hand, still in her pajama pants and old raggedy t-shirt.

“Sefioufsly?”

All morning, the show had been promising a death-defying highwire act—between two buildings, no net, this guy was supposed to walk across this street and then bicycle back across the wire again.  I had sat glued to the TV, through the weather report, the morning news wrap up, the doomed predictions for the stock market, the election forecast, just waiting with my cup of coffee in hand for the fluff.  The puff piece.  The tale of strength and confidence in the face of adversity.  This is how I start my mornings.  But it is already 7:45am, and I am close to running late.

The day before they had this kid on who’s arm was bitten off by an alligator in a Florida swamp.  Some prosthetic manufacturer donated this crazy expensive arm to him, and then gifted him with a life-like hand on air, which the kid likened to “Halloween or something.”  These are the moments that fuel my day.

I sink back into the stiff cushions of our flimsy sofa, next to my wife, and watch intently as the suited news crew stands around laughing and patting each other’s shoulders.  The camera pans upwards, and you could see almost like a fleck poking up from the roof of a building, just a dark little speck against the blue sky, the tightrope walker.  Cut to the crane shot from the other building, and you can see this guy, jazz shoes and pants, purple sequined shirt.  Freshly shaven face.

“This is too good,” my wife says to me.

“I know, can you get a load of that outfit?”

“I can’t believe they still wear that,” she responds.

“Like, I can’t wait for the Criss Angel of tightrope walking—the rock ‘n roll tightrope walker who dresses in like, wide open dress shirts with chains around his neck and feathered back hair and ripped jeans—I love that crap.  Just this idea that that’s how cool, masculine guys dress,” I sy, straightening and flattening my tie.

In my third year of my life as administrative assistant at the University, all glory and hope for advancement had gone out the window.  Just one more year until my wife has her doctorate.  If her dissertation goes over well, that is.  One more oppressing year of waiting on that bastard Dean of the business school.  That’s why I needthese puff pieces.  These glimpses into some life I know I don’t have or ever will.  The crowd panning shots of people outside cheering by the set, visiting New York instead of going to work.  The on-location travel segments to the Forbidden City.  The interviews with the guy who drifted out to sea for seventy-two days and survived with no food or water, even though he was blind.  And let’s not forget ol’ alligator arm.

“There he goes.”

On the screen, the tightrope walker takes his first step, his pole balanced between his body.  But then something happens.  The wire sinks under his foot, and the guy goes tumbling down onto the wire, dropping his pole and grasping for any ledge.  Then the screen goes dark.

“Holy shit,” my wife says gasping.

Cut to street level camera.  The newsman grabbs the microphone from the stunned newslady who is staring up at the building, mouth agape.

“Folks,” he says staring straight into the camera, “there’s nothing to worry about here.  The, uh, Great, uh (shit whatshisname), Highwire Artist has gained his footing.  I know this is a “no net” stunt, but there are safety precautions in place and everything is going to be fine.”

My wife sighs an audible sigh of relief.

And then, in the background, behind the newsman, something purple and flashy and heavy bounces and lands powerfully in a heap on the sidewalk so fast that you don’t even see it drop.  The camera cut out to black again.

“Don’t worry, hon,” I say to my wife, standing up already late at 8:01am, “You heard the man.  Everything is going to be fine.”

“The Highwire” by Jesse Raub is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.