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THE JESTER’S WAGER

(from “Clickity Clack” – stand-alone adaptation)

The lights rise like bruises.
I’m in a cabaret where the jester jangles coins in a silver bowl and shouts,
“Place your bets, my darlings! Place your bets!”
Baby dragons balance on either platter of a tarnished scale—
souls up for auction, wings twitching.

I don’t remember how I got here,
only that I keep losing everything I try to hold:
bottles, lovers, the thread of thought itself.
She sits across the bar, sequined and unsmiling.
When the jester winks, she unclasps her bra like it’s a curtain call.
The audience roars; my pulse forgets its lines.

“Takes two to tango,” she whispers,
and I nod because movement feels safer than silence.
We spin beneath colored bulbs until the floor tilts,
and I see—briefly—that the jester’s mask is my own reflection.

The music stops. The bets are settled.
She fades into the wings, leaving her perfume
and the echo of laughter that might be mine.

I sit there,
clutching an empty ticket,
certain that somewhere, backstage,
someone is still taking wagers on whether I’ll wake up.