Second Edition
by Jen Nafziger
One day you'll find an eyelash in a small library book, a slight, black curve that's tucked into the margins like some long-forgotten tribute to the intoxicating text. You tap the hair against your finger, pull it close to view. The static of the world glues the intact follicle to the subtle ridges of your skin, your distinctive human fingertips. The lash belongs to someone who loved this book, like you, whose passion for the page deserved a human sacrifice. If only you could meet the woman who loved the story, too.
Then, you'll slide the eyelash into a test-tube, take it to the lab, and make yourself a clone (it isn't so expensive anymore). Clones, they grow like dandelions, and soon you'll have a friend, a cheery, egg-yolk yellow bud you can rub upon your cheeks. You discuss great novels while sharing Found Greens salad in the Hipster coffee place that's just out of your budget. You both have the same taste, you and the clone. Neither have much money, hence the libraries and food sharing.
You'll begin to wonder if she's human, or if she's even real. She's a copy. A second edition, pressed again by popular demand. Her pages stuffed with words others read already, but you don't even care. Each new chapter is singular to you. You, with the literature-loving, bitter-salad eating, eyelash-shedding clone.
And then one day, you disagree. She finally reads your shared and sacred book. You have a better job now, so you purchased it in hardback from the independent bookstore that's blissfully disorganized. She's furious. "This book is crap," she shouts, a severe, soul-wrenching slog. She cried the whole way through. She stands, red-faced, rubbing puffy eyes. You take the little book, pages damp with clone tears, and you see a brand-new eyelash there, stuck inside the binding. Does she always use the pages like a tissue?
The clone will pack her bags and call a cab. You'll wonder as she leaves, was it like this before? Is that how the eyelash first appeared? Lonely now, you look down at the open book, the fine, dark silk curl, waiting like an unfinished parenthesis. You'll trap it in another sterile test tube.
This time, it will be different.
The End
This story was first published on Monday, August 9th, 2021
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