“How did you get this?” She enquired (not) looking at my invisibility cloak with her coveted and infatuated eyes. I sat speechless, surprised at her choice – How did I get it? I don’t know. I don’t remember.
“How did you get it?” She asked again, more curious now.

The greed and admiration in her eyes caused an unexplained agony in my heart.

“You seem utterly fascinated by it? You want it?”

“Want it?” She exclaimed. “Hell yeah! I want it!” And then she went on to how she would use it; How she would blend right in and no one would ever know, how she would run freely, oblivious of the eyes and voices around, how she would observe and never be observed, how she would be anyone she wants in her own little world. It would be amazing, she said. It would be the greatest thing, she said.

Her naivety stabbed jealousy in my heart and her ignorance made me chuckle. How did I get the invisibility cloak though? Oh! I remember! I did not get the invisibility cloak. I made it. I casted a spell weaved out of colloquial speech and vernacular thoughts. I dyed my cloak with the rainbow colors of society. I washed it in the buckets full of dreams and fairy-tale fantasies and squeezed them right through it. I dried it under the sunlight of approvals and normalcy. I sewed it with the delicate soft threads of comfort and advantages. I ironed out the wrinkles and creases with the heat of conformity as well as frequent genocide of idiosyncrasies.

“You like it? You can take it.” I said.

“Really? You sure?”

Am I sure? Of course, I am sure. I don’t want it. In fact, I loathe it. I am tired of wearing this depressing thing! And your admiration! Jeez! It doesn’t make even a bit of sense to me! How can you be so fascinated by this? What’s wrong with being seen after all? When there is nothing to hide why do you need this cloak? Once you start wearing this, you can never take it off! Why do you want to spend your whole life peeking through this deception? This cowardice? This great doleful irony?

“Yes, you can take it. It is yours now.”

And anyway, I have already started making myself a new one.