BARBARA WALTERS. PERIOD

BArbara Walters. Period.

Roni Endres

I awoke facing the wall, trying to grasp my bearings as I journeyed from dreamland to reality. My room was pitch black, minus the sliver of light peeking out from under the door, and dead silent, minus the heavy mouth breathing I suddenly realized was not in dreamland but as real as the puddle of drool adorning my pillow case.

I turned to the direction of the rhythmic breaths. What I had assumed was light coming from under the door was actually the glow of the figure in front of me.

“Barbara?” I rasped. I wasn’t scared, but confused.

“Come,” she said. Except, what came out wasn’t words. It was a series of clicks and squeals, a pattern of noise that resembled echolocation. Yet, I understood her. Not only did I understand her, but it made sense.

“Barbara,” I said, “you look different.” She looked younger, but her eyes still held ninety-two years of wisdom. She wore a green flannel robe, the collar of which settled just below the tattoo reading “NO REGRETS” across her neck. She hugged a copy of Joan Didion’s Slouching Towards Bethlehem to her breast and watched me as I took in her presence.

“Come,” she clicked again.

“Where?”

She simply held the book out to me so that the title was mere inches away from my face. I looked into her eyes and we exchanged a silent message. Then, she turned around and I hopped onto her back. I clung to her as she soared out of my dorm and across the North Lawn of her former college campus.

“How have you been?” I asked, attempting to fill the silence. She shushed me, and through her squeals and clicks told me to embrace the silence. She then told me that she also had that tattooed.

I obeyed, but before I could attempt to fully appreciate the tranquility, we landed in front of the Barbara Walters Campus Center. We stood side by side on the grass, staring up at the big letters that read her name. She squeaked and pointed.

“Yes,” I responded. “That’s you.” I shivered. I had forgotten a jacket. Suddenly, I felt a warm and heavy fabric being draped over my shoulders. I looked down and saw the green plaid, and then looked up at Barbara. I didn’t realize it until now, but she was well over six feet tall. Still hugging the Joan Didion best seller to her body, which was now covered in another green plaid robe, she stared at me, into me, rather, and

I swore I saw the tiniest upturn of the corners of her mouth before her fist met my jaw in a swift uppercut and my world went black.

I woke up in front of the fireplace in the living room of the campus center. My jaw felt like I had been punched by the hand of God, and I quickly remembered that I had been. Rubbing my bruised face, I blinked a few times and came face to face with another ghost-like figure sitting cross-legged in the fireplace.

“Barbara?” I asked. “Barbara, why did you punch me?”

She put her finger to her lips. “No hables, niña,” she whispered. I comprehended that her Spanish tongue had said, “Don’t speak, child,” but I yearned for answers.

“Barbara,” I pleaded, “I don’t understand.”

“Sí, tú puedes,” she countered. But I didn’t. I didn’t understand her.

I realized that this was not the Barbara I had once known, the Barbara who had possibly broken my jaw. This new Barbara was dressed in a long white gown, with sleeves that draped down to her knees while her hands were raised in a meditative position. Although she was sitting, I could tell that this Barbara was significantly shorter than the previous. She had buttons for eyes, like the characters from Coraline, and seated in her lap was a daytime Emmy award.

Barbara 2.0 maneuvered herself into a backbend and crawled out of the fireplace and over to me. I sat up, feeling an unexplainable obligation to express the utmost respect for Neil Gaiman’s Barbara Walters. Her buttons met my pupils and irises, and we exchanged a brief, but what felt like long, analysis of each other’s eyes. Finally, she uttered, “Vámanos,” and I obeyed, following her out of the room and to the staircase in the middle of the campus center.

As she climbed the stairs upside down, her head hit each step she passed, like a metronome that mimicked my heartbeat. Or was it the other way around? Did my pulse follow her metronome?

“Barbara, doesn’t that hurt?” She didn’t answer, but increased her speed so that she was now racing up the stairs like a gazelle running from a lion. I ran faster, and soon realized that we were traveling up an endless hill of stairs.

“Barbara, ¿te duele?” I asked again, this time in Barbara 2.0’s native tongue. She remained silent, the only sound coming from her being the thump of her head hitting the linoleum stairs.

I was running out of breath. I cursed myself for not grabbing my inhaler before leaving, but in my defense, I didn’t expect such a physically demanding journey. The air stung my jaw as I ran. Barbara 2.0 accelerated again, and I tried

to keep up, but it was humanly impossible for my two measly legs to match her speed, which confirmed my suspicions: Barbara Walters was not human.

My vision blurred, so my only gauge of her speed was the sound of her head banging against the steps, which now sounded like a playing card on a bicycle tire in the Tour de France.

Suddenly, the thumps came to a halt, but the staircase didn’t end. I kept running. There was a magnetic pull between me and whatever, or whoever, was at the end of this staircase. My vision and my breath were leaving me and just when I felt like I was about to collapse, I did. Except, I collapsed not by fainting, but by tripping over the last step, which I didn’t see coming, and landed on my swollen jaw. Lifting my head, I felt a warm liquid sliding down my bruised face. I reached up to touch my injury and instinctively brought my hand in front of my face to examine the substance on my fingers. I blinked and raised my eyebrows a few times, attempting to force my sight back to life. Once I saw the red trickling down my fingers, I breathed an air of relief, and then one of fear as I processed the open wound on my face.

All of a sudden, I noticed a hand in front of me and looked up. Standing tall above me was a white stallion, mane blowing in a nonexistent

wind, and seated atop its blinding coat was none other than Barbara, but with human eyes, no tattoos, and sporting a bright yellow blazer and matching skirt set. I looked back down at her hand, and saw that her gentle grasp was cradling an unwrapped pad. I looked up at her, and she nodded with a warm smile. I took the pad from her hand and she gestured to my face. I complied, and pressed the sanitary napkin to the source of the blood. She beckoned me to the horse, and I stood and wobbled over, my legs not fully recovered from my marathon up the staircase. She extended her arm to me, and with the hand that wasn’t holding the pad to my face, I let her pull me up onto the horse with such a strength as if I were an eyebrow hair being plucked from a linoleum-tiled face.

I placed my hands around her waist as we rode, and she stopped in front of the bathroom. She was waiting for something. For what, I wasn’t sure, until the door slightly creaked open and I saw a familiar green plaid pattern through the crack. The plaid disappeared into the dark bathroom and the door opened all the way, revealing Barbara and Barbara 2.0 standing side by side, watching us. Barbara, levitating and cradling Slouching Towards Bethlehem to her breast, and Barbara 2.0, on all fours and bent over in a bridge, exchanged glances and stepped away from each other, creating a path for me and Barbara 3.0. I attempted to get

off the horse, assuming that the large animal would not fit in the small room, but Barbara 3.0 stopped me. Right before my eyes, the entrance to the restroom expanded, stretching until it was big enough to fit me, Barbara 3.0, and the horse. We trotted in, and I realized that not only had the door grown, but the bathroom had, as well. It was much bigger, at least three times its original size. Upon entering, the door slowly came to a close, an action it performed by itself. Barbara 3.0 smiled and gestured for me to leave the horse. I slid off, protected from the cool floor only by my thin socks, and faced the three Barbaras. I noticed blood trickling down my wrist, and realized that the pad I was using to cover my wound was soaked through. Barbara 2.0 crawled over to me and opened her mouth, revealing another pad to replace the dirty one. I took the menstrual product out of her mouth and replaced the old pad with the new one.

“Gracias,” I said.

“De nada,” she replied, and crawled back to her spot next to Barbara No. 1. Before I could decide how to dispose of the former, Barbara 3.0 trotted over and the horse opened its mouth. She gestured to its open jaws, and I disposed of the makeshift band aid and watched the domesticated bronco chew it like a clump of hay.

The first Barbara spoke up, voicing a pattern of clicks and moans that translated to, “You

have reached your final destination.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

Barbara 2.0 interjected, her Spanish serenading me with the explanation that it was time to complete the mission.

“What mission?” I begged Barbara 3.0, assuming she would speak next. She didn’t, but merely reached into her shirt and pulled out a small grenade.

“I don’t understand.” This time I really didn’t understand. Was this how I was going to die? Had nineteen years of my life and one and a half semesters of college led up to this moment? Was I destined to die amongst three vastly different and slightly unsettling Barbaras?

Barbara 3.0 held the grenade out to me. I was hesitant. I had never been in the presence of a military-grade weapon before, let alone held one. Eventually, I took the weapon from her gentle grasp. Both of my hands were now occupied with objects that held a power no human could comprehend: a grenade, and a menstrual product.

“Barbara,” I addressed all three of them now, “why?”

They simply looked at me and nodded. All of a sudden, the answers flooded me like it was that time of the month. I realized that it wasn’t the end for me, but for them. I looked into each of their eyes one final time, having

to lower my gaze for Barbara 2.0 as her head was almost touching the ground, and silently thanked them. Releasing my hand from the pad and allowing the dried blood to glue it to my wounded jaw, I swiftly pulled the pin from the grenade, dropped it, and ran out of the bathroom, slamming the door behind me. I dropped to the floor in a fetal position and covered my ears and squeezed my eyes shut, anticipating the blast. Seconds passed, but nothing. Slowly, I opened my eyes, uncovered my ears, and rose slightly. As I was about to stand, a loud boom resounded in the Barbara Walters Campus Center and I dropped to the floor. I remained conscious, but my heart was pounding in such a way that I should not have. Again, I scolded myself for leaving my inhaler behind. But that wasn’t important, not now.

I rushed over to the bathroom, the entrance of which had returned to its normal size, and placed my hand on the doorknob. I took a deep breath, turned the handle, and pushed slightly. What I saw through the crack in the door was a glow, but not a literal glow this time. It was the glow of fulfilled hope, the glow of an unknown future no more. I opened the door all the way, and stepped into the restroom that was no longer filled with the three Barbaras, but their gift from the afterlife. Littered across the floor was menstrual products galore. Pads, tampons, diva cups, super, regular; you name

it, the Barbaras had transformed into it. As I admired the period products, I noticed that on the counter there was a duffel bag, and next to it a wicker basket labeled, “Free Period Products.” Instantly, I scooped up an armful and released them into the basket. I stuffed the rest into the duffle bag and dashed out the door.

In each bathroom in the Barbara Walters Campus Center and every other bathroom at Sarah Lawrence College sat the same wicker basket with the same label, and I dispersed the gifted menstrual products into each basket. After I emptied the last of the supplies into the last bathroom, I was suddenly transported back to my bed. My room was brighter than when I had left, and upon looking out the window I realized it was the morning of the next day. I felt like I had just woken up, like maybe I had been dreaming. Hesitantly, I felt the side of my face for the pad, and once my fingers came into contact with that blessed bequest from Barbara, I released a breath I didn’t realize I had been holding and smiled. I looked out my window again, and saw a rainbow decorating the bright blue sky, along with an array of fluffy white clouds that each took the shape of a B and a W.