The Shimmery Translucent Steps

The foot traffic in the mall was heavy with the holidays right around the corner. Santa’s Coming to Town could be heard through the mall speakers. Store windows were frosted with snowflakes to highlight suitable presents for under trees. Sara assuredly strolled past the clothing, jewelry, and shoe stores while swinging her purchases with each step. The remainder of this shopping trip was all about books now. And the store she wanted was on the lower level.

Sara ticked off gift ideas in her head while she strolled along the concourse. Occasionally, a passerby would catch her eye, and Sara would wish them happy holidays as her face beamed with delight. She only had a few items to buy, and her seasonal shopping would be finished. Sara’s gait came to a distinct halt at the top of the staircase. She could not force herself to take that first step.

She gazed down at the first step below her feet. Her stomach clenched in on itself and her toes curled inside her shoes. Before her eyes, the steps shimmered and elongated into a never-ending translucent staircase, then quickly widened invitingly, and narrowed before lengthening again. Sara closed her eyes to shut out the steps and repeated the dance of elongation and widening. A rushing wind in her head drowned out the Christmas carols. Sara’s jaw tightly closed around a scream that was welling up from the bottom of her throat as the fiery staircase of her nightmares flashed through her thoughts. Once again, Sara was frozen in fear. Meanwhile, Sara reluctantly backed away from the stairs as her thoughts returned to her childhood.

The round-faced little girl was excited by a squirrel with a bushy tail that had come up to the front door. Glancing around for her mother, she dashed to the nut bowl on the table and then raced across the room to the front door. Cautiously, she opened the door quietly not wanting to scare the squirrel away. She bent over, extending her hand with the nut out to the squirrel. She paid little attention to the cold air that whirled her. All her focus was on the squirrel, the nut and not giggling.

The gray squirrel looked up from the seed it had been munching on. Standing on his hind legs, the squirrel looked at the young girl in blue gingham pants with a white shirt. His tail quivered and his nose twitched as he decided what to do. Finally, he turned and dashed down the front steps. He stopped before the big oak tree and looked around to watch the little girl

Disappointed that the squirrel had not taken the nut, little Sara walked across the icy porch to the top of the stairs. She heard her mother calling for her. When she turned to go back inside, she slipped and crashed down the steps, the nut still in her grasp. She picked herself up and looked for the squirrel, but it had vanished into the branches of the trees. Shivering from the cold, Sara made her way back into the house.

Sara’s mother was in the dining room when Sara entered the house. She scolded the young girl for going outside. Extending her hand out, Sara told her mom about the squirrel and the nut. Her mother explained that it was not a good idea to feed squirrels by hand, that they could bite her and make her sick. Sara promised that she would not try again.

Momentarily, Sara recovered from her reverie. She looked around the concourse for another way down to the lower level. She saw an escalator off to the left and a glass elevator off to the right. Sara wondered which would be the better descent for her to choose. She puzzled over the options for her descent to the lower level. Quickly deciding, she headed towards the escalator as her thoughts once again turned to that fateful day of the fall.

Later that day, Sara’s mother was doing laundry in the basement. She told Sara to go into the basement after she put her toys away. Sara finished putting her toys away and then went to the basement doorway. She started down the steps. But two steps down, her left leg would not move. Sara lost her balance and tumbled down the remaining steps to the landing.

Hearing her daughter fall, Sara’s mother rushed to the landing and picked up the little girl. She carried Sara to the living room, placing Sara on the sofa. Sara lay on the sofa and watched television for the rest of the afternoon. At dinnertime, a TV tray was set before Sara with her dinner. When bedtime arrived, Sara limped to her room, changed into her nightgown, and climbed into bed. During the night a noise woke up Sara, she tried to climb out of bed but could not move her legs. She cried out loudly.

After examining the young girl, the doctor talked with Sara's mother in the living room. “The paralysis is temporary. Sara probably sprained her hip when she fell. The swelling from the sprain is putting pressure on the nerves controlling the girl's legs. She will recover, but she needs a lot of rest.”

Upon seeing the teeth on each moving step and the length of the journey downward, Sara felt faint and knew she could not manage the escalator. She headed towards the glass elevator, she reassured herself that she only needed to close her eyes once she was inside. She watched as the elevator moved up and down while she approached. Indecisiveness about the trip shot through her as she pushed the button to go down.

However, for this normally active four-year-old girl, being confined to a toy wagon so she could move around the house was boring. She could not play on the sun porch with her dog and toys or in her closet with her dolls and stuffed animals. When she needed to use the bathroom, someone had to help her. She even needed help getting in and out of bed. Recovery took six weeks, but to young Sara, it seemed like a lifetime.

Before the elevator doors opened, Sara decided to go to her car and drive to the other side of the mall, where the bookstore was. She would completely avoid the man-made descents to the lower level. Thereby, she solved her dilemma, silencing the thoughts of her accident. Sara knew she suffered from acrophobia and would have to face it someday. But this shopping trip was not that day.