rapunzel

once there was a princess who was locked away at the top of a very tall tower. she languished there alone and lonely, her only friend the endless blanket of her perfectly golden blonde hair. she brushed it and looked at it, and marvelled at it underneath the changing light of day- the way it looked simple and happy in the morning, then denser and more complicated as the day went on, until it finally looked so sad and pallid that willed herself to sleep in order to avoid it. sometimes she would untie the laces binding her inside of her dress, slip out of it, let her stiff white petticoats drop to her ankles and feel her hair against the pure untouched meadow of her skin. the only person she ever saw was a woman who her father had hired to keep her bathed and fed-- once she was beginning to show the signs of womanhood (her eyes grew corners, her body grew curves), he banished her there so that he would never be faced with that ultimate and unspoken rivalry. she used to peer from the tiny porthole, gasping at the sight of colors, motion, depth, anxiously awaiting her turn at it all. she hadnt looked out in years.
soon however, word got out that a beautiful virginal creature lay waiting suitors, if only they could reach her. she learned of this news from the woman who took care of her, and her only advice was, dont let down your hair.
men lined up to catch a glimpse of her, to prove that they were the strongest, the most worthy. she was excited by the prospect of her life changing, and she so desparately wanted to get out, if only to fail and falter, that she went against her maids wishes and let her hair down to the first man who pleaded
rapunzel, rapunzel, let down your golden hair.
the sound of his voice made her sink into herself, too scared and too thrilled to do anything. he asked again.
rapunzel, rapunzel, let down your golden hair.
and so, timidly, for no one had ever touched her hair before, and hardly anyone had ever seen it, she unravelled her best friend, herself, through the porthole for the man's consumption. she peeked her eyes out of the window to watch his reaction, but when she looked down she saw many many men, some of them laughing, some of them with knives and bags.
oh rapunzel, the first man said after he had quieted the others, how i love you! your hair is as beautiful as the sun, i do not know how i have lived before you.
but before he began to climb up it she was already reeling it back in, desparately, hysterically, ashamed and silenced by her grave mistake. he didnt want to show her the world, he didnt want to let her fail and falter. he wanted to take a slice of her back to his home and show it off. he wanted to own her.
men kept coming and she refused to even go to the window. she wiped her tears with her hair and she alternated between imagining strangling herself with it and just letting it down anyway, letting herself be used by them. she wasnt sure which was a worse thought.
but one night, as she lay in a nest of her hair unable to feel tired at all, she heard a whisper. it said
im trapped too.
she thought at first she was beginning the decline into insanity, into insanity due to nothingness, but then she heard it again, crisp and masculine and as haunting as it was relieving.
im trapped too.
she allowed half an eye to peek out the porthole. underneath the moonlight was an empty handed man. for no good reason at all, but for the first time in her life, she felt the strange and dangerous pang of trusting someone.
do you want my hair? she asked him.
your hair? why, what would i do with your hair?
well, im not sure. it just seems to be what i have to offer.
no, he said. i want your tale. i want to hear how it feels up there, and if you ever get so lonely that theres only one color, one voice, one memory, one fear.
yes, she whispered. yes.
i want to know if you are at all angry, if you are ashamed, if you are happy up there, content and embedded in habit. i want to know if you desire to escape, or if you are scared of what awaits you.
she fit her shoulder and her arm out of the porthole and reached for him, and as he extended his arm in an equally ineffectual movement, he said,
we will escape.
and they did.