Ariel’s Broken Jukebox Pt.6 - Gaslighting and the Fingerless Prince
What is it like to lose a voice?
A lot of people wondered when they heard I had been gaslit for three years.
Well, it's both simple and complex, like an equation not everyone can solve. It was like death, yet it felt alive. Gaslit people go to work, have fun, work out, meet family and friends.
But to do so, they must do without a voice box. They might use an AI program to speak for them. Or they could use their abusers, who know how to talk to them well. In that case they speak but not their minds, they laugh but not at the jokes ty find funny, they attend parties and gatherings, they buy clothes, cut their hair, shave their legs, but they are still not them, even eating their favorite ice-cream bowl or lying lazily by the sea.
Sounds complex? Well...let me tell you a story about a prince who was everything everybody wanted him to be, but not himself when he agreed to lose his voice.
Part V
"It was as if the piano held the secret to his artistic reverence, the thing that destroyed everything in his life, except his true feelings. How he felt while playing was something he found hard to explain to anybody. Yes he liked food, talking to people, laughing, and riding the merry-go-round. Yes he liked kissing and touching people he found attractive. Yes he loved climbing mountains. But playing the piano, it was like all the keys on a puzzle piece clicked. It was like this game where you have to place all the wiring in the right place and you finally get it, panting happily like a dog. The piano was his refuge from a world that didn't really get him, although he wasn't that challenging. But the piano kept its secrets. And his secret was that he hated having to be somebody else to survive. Otherwise, he'd be shunned by the world, shut off from all experiences and daily interactions.
But the piano wasn't abandoned. Someone was there. A little girl. She sat tentatively at the piano, rolling around on the round chair. Every time she faced the piano she'd hit a note. Yes, most of them were off-key but she laughed as she did it. And he laughed with her. The prince did something he hadn't done in months. He released his face from the cloth shield mask, untied the finger straps of the cloak sleeve, and tore away the cloak. Although it felt scaling, like he peeled away some skin with it, he was energized. The sun beams came through the cracks in the trees and the leaves looked more vibrant. He had a short moment of being alive and present, and he cherished it. He had forgotten how normal interaction with people was, but he was ready to try. Unlike his true nature, he acted casually and bravely, approaching the girl, offering to teach her. The girl replied shyly that she didn't have any pennies to offer him. He was relieved that she didn't know who he was, but he smiled and said he didn't want her money. She just had to come here every other day to practice.
That day, the prince regained some of his old tricks. His notes were solid and poetic, his melodies structured, and his improvisations pointed and non-confusing. The girl showed promising talent and he said he would be here the other day if she was. The prince rode his horse home that day - after carefully enclosing himself in the cloak - and something had changed in him. He was well-versed in his powers. He was Spartan and cautious. But he was different, similar but different, more like himself than he had ever been. Dare he say he was better than in his days before the contract? When he was wildly lashing at the piano, without any understanding of who he was, and why he was the only one in the kingdom who wanted to do this?
That night he slept peacefully. And woke up with a heavy heart. As he walked to the main square of the kingdom he found out why. There she was, the girl. The little girl he had just taught to play the piano. She was hung from the gallows, her hands tied behind her back, and her face blue, her eyes bulging and swollen. All the prince's restrained anger unleashed, his faux reserve failed. He climbed the gallows, untied the noose the girl hung from and grabbed her. The poor townspeople gathered around him as he held her corpse and screamed chaotically. He sounded gibberish and muffled, as if he had forgotten how to talk. He demanded to know the reason why the girl was executed. It took 10 of his father's men to disentangle him from her and drag him back to the castle.
In the castle, the prince discovered that for the first time in months he had taken off his cloak. He had forgotten to put it back on this time as he left his room. The king, his brothers, and the ministers, the nobles, and the clergy were all disappointed in him, disgusted with his behavior. Outside, the streets roared with rebels. The whole town raged against the king and the royal court. They demanded justice for the murdered little girl. The king yelled in the prince's face that he had brought shame and disgrace to the family. A commoner is a commoner and this girl was involved in a secret ploy to assassinate him: the prince himself. She was used as a pawn to lure in the prince, the easiest target of them all. "The only fool in this family."
Words hit the prince's chest like daggers. He slumped on the ground, blurring all the figures, muting all the sounds. Except when the king told him that the sorcerer was the one who uncovered the plot. And if it weren't for him, the prince would be dead the next time he went to play his damned piano. Rebels and anti-monarchy anarchists would be waiting for him, and they would take their time with him, and when he has reached the ultimate levels of pain, they would kill him in vengeance to upset his father. The prince bent on himself, growling in pain, his face a mess of tears and a trickle of blood dripping from the corner of his mouth after his brush with the guards. He was drenched in remorse. He disappointed his father. He disappointed his brothers. His act of mindless bravado resulted in a bloodbath. But more importantly, he let down the sorcerer. And to his horror he discovered that the sorcerer was the one he cared about the most, feared the most, and whose opinion - in his eyes - mattered the most. He loved and feared the sorcerer but more importantly he respected him more than he respected himself. The sorcerer was flawless, unlike the prince, and all those months of hard work culminated in nothing. A blank space of non-existence. The prince had to be wrapped and buried in a coffin. And his room could be his graveyard of passion."