Original Fairy Tale Challenge: "Oh Marissa" -- by Abigail Leskey

Oh Marissa

I

Once upon a time, in Verizon store (more red, more black, and more white than Snow White herself) that had just closed, Marissa had her first kiss and felt as if she were in the hall of a castle. Keith gazed down at her, his blue eyes brighter than the tropical seascape screensaver on the desktop behind him. “I love you,” he whispered.

Marissa’s eyes widened and she slid one foot back. She felt romantically toward Keith, but they had only met a month ago, when they had both been hired. She had most definitely not instigated him to kiss her. “I-I love you,” she said awkwardly. “Too.” 

Keith smiled, leaning closer.  He was wearing aftershave that smelled like the sandalwood furniture polish that Marissa’s grandpa had bought at a dollar store and had taken back because it kept gluing the dusting cloths to the piano. “I picked up our marriage license two days ago,” he said, and she felt him pushing a ring onto her finger.

“What?!” Marissa pulled her hand away and stepped back, almost knocking over a shelf of premium smartphones. “I—you haven’t proposed—what?!”

“I just did.” He clenched her wrist and shoved the engagement ring onto her finger. No twenty-five-year-old Verizon employee could have afforded it, a ring with five large diamonds, Marissa realized as she was trying to get away from him without cracking the screens of phones that were so expensive she wouldn’t want to buy one even after she had paid off her college debt. Had he stolen it? Was he secretly wealthy? 

“Keith!” She pulled her hand out of his and out of the ring. Both his nails and the ring scratched it. “We are not engaged. And we—we aren’t even dating. I mean, we’re stopping dating.”

Keith suddenly stood much straighter, and she realized he was beautiful. He normally was charmingly handsome, but he was not usually beautiful. Or two inches taller than usual. She took another step back, and was about to run when the ring in his hand expanded as if it were the mouth of a balloon, until it was as large as a hula hoop. Marissa was transfixed.

She stared at him like a mouse stares at a cat until he flipped the silver circle around her neck and his eyes lit cerulean. Then she screamed, and tried to duck under the ring and run. But she was physically paralyzed. This had to be a nightmare. It had to, it had to, it had to. 

“I’m a wizard, Rissa,” Keith said, smirking at her. “I’m a wizard. And I’m putting you in a phone.”

“What even,” Marissa gasped, and stared in incredulous fear as Keith gripped the newest, most expensive phone he could reach and held it up. Its screen blazed with cerulean light. 

“You’ll never get out unless someone intentionally smashes it to let you out,” Keith said. “And—we both know nobody will do that. It costs a thousand and ninety-nine dollars. And ninety-nine cents.”

Suddenly Marissa could no longer feel the weight of the ring, and could see nothing but cerulean, and could not scream. Then she was turned off.

II

                  Norma Heaberlin was shopping for her first phone, which her grandson Nick was giving her for her eighty-second birthday. She tottered around the white cases of technology, squinting at phones and tablets though large round glasses and nearly knocking things down with her flowing black lace shawl (hand-knit of finger-weight bamboo-cotton yarn). 

“What are you looking for, ma’am?” 

Norma looked up to see a handsome young employee, with a name tag that said he was Keith. 

                  “A phone I can use to text my grandkids,” she said, at the same moment as her grandson, a prosperous programmer who had once gotten his beard caught in a vintage record player, said, “Your premium phone.”

                  Keith smiled, elegantly gesturing toward a sleek silver phone. “This one has a new voice assistant, that is only being released to our most valued customers. All you need to do is say, “Oh Marissa,” and she will help you with anything.”

                  “Hmm.” Norma tipped her glasses up and looked at the phone from under them. “What if she talks to me when I’m sleeping? Or when I’m in the—”

                  “She can’t,” Keith assured her. “She can only speak if you say “Oh Marissa,” and she can’t say anything unless it’s an answer to what you said.”

III

Oh Marissa, how do I look up the weather?

I’m in a phone. I’m in a phone. I’m in a phone.

I am bringing up the weather. The high today will be sixty-four degrees. The low will be fifty-five. There is a ninety percent chance of rain at eleven p.m.

Help! Please destroy the phone!

Please let me out!

Oh Marissa, text Sarah, “Do you have enough shampoo? Love, Grandma.”

Oh Marissa, what are the symptoms of mass hysteria?

Oh Marissa, what mordant should I use to dye yarn with dandelions?

Oh Marissa, is it normal for a cat to cough up three hairballs?

Every time I can answer. Every time I can’t say anything that is not an answer...I can’t even use contractions or informal words…. But what if I—

Oh Marissa, what is fifty times thirty-four, minus four? 

Fifty times thirty-four minus four is1696, which is approximately ten times the number of hours I have been trapped in this phone.

Oh Marissa, what are home remedies for dry eyes?

A home remedy for dry eyes is crying, which can be accomplished by sadness, such as that caused by being trapped inside a phone. 

Oh Marissa, how do I keep kittens from tearing up carpet?

One way to keep kittens from tearing up carpet is to magically trap them in a phone. 

Oh Marissa, why do you keep talking about being trapped in a phone?

Finally! 

I keep talking about being trapped in a phone because I am not a voice assistant. I am a woman who was trapped in a phone by a wizard named Keith who wanted to marry me. 

Please ask me how to free me.

Oh Marissa, good grief!!!Can I get you out?

You can get me out if you destroy the phone.

Oh Marissa, I’m going to destroy it right away! 

IV

Norma had heard that phones broke when people dropped them, so she dropped her phone. The phone did not crack. She dropped it again, then threw it at the floor, then threw it at the wall. It dinged the wall. Norma picked the phone up and carried it over to the sink. She’d heard that phones died after they were dropped in water. But would that be considered destroying it?

“Oh Marissa, I’ve dropped and thrown this thing, and it’s fine and dandy. Would dropping it in the sink work?”

“Dropping it in the sink will not work, because this phone is from the Premium Collection and is waterproof,” Marissa answered, and fell silent. 

Norma stepped over a cat that was pretending it was a rug and laid the phone down on the floor, jumped on it five or six times, and then bent to look at it. There was one crack in the screen. Norma’s bones felt like they had fifty cracks in them. Eighty-two-year-olds should not jump on phones. 

Norma sighed. Hitting it with her cane wouldn’t work; her cane had a rubber tip and a rubber-covered handle. Hmm….

Norma limped into the kitchen and returned with a white marble rolling pin that had belonged to her great-grandmother. She held it directly over the phone, moved each of her loafered feet to the side, and dropped the pin. The phone splintered like an eggshell. 

There was a blur, and then a trembling young woman with unparted curls was covering her face with her ringless brown hands and sobbing. 

Norma patted her shoulder. “Do you want cocoa? Tea? Coffee? You can just call me Grandma Norma. Do you want green tea? Cognac? Sillabub?”

Marissa looked up with a surprised, tearful laugh. “Cocoa would be nice, thank you. Um, thank you so much for—I can’t replace—”

Norma shook her head firmly, and picked up the broken phone and threw it into the trashcan. One cat and two kittens ran to the trashcan and sat near it, trying to see through the opaque plastic. 

Norma patted Marissa’s shoulder again. “Do you want regular cocoa, dark cocoa, or mint cocoa? You can think about how many charges you want to press against that awful wizard while I heat the milk.”