First Night, Last Letter

Joe Kavalier’s first night in New York was not quite night at all, but a gray, shivering hour before dawn, when the city’s noises quieted and time itself seemed stretched. He sat at a battered drawing table in Sammy’s tiny bedroom, elbows resting between a bottle of ink, a cup of cold coffee, and a sheaf of clean Bristol board. Sammy had thrown open the window, hoping the chill might keep them awake—might keep Joe from vanishing beneath the weight of all he had carried from Prague. The room smelled of turpentine, sweat, and American coffee. Joe’s eyes, sharp and haunted, lingered on the envelope that lay on the bed. It bore a Prague postmark, weeks late. The letter’s corners were worn thin; the handwriting, his brother Thomas’s, was trembling but legible. It had arrived so late that it could almost have been a ghost. Sammy hovered, trying not to look worried. He fidgeted with his suspenders, glanced at the clock, and then at the penciled outlines of their Escapist comic page, barely begun. “Joe, you want me to read it to you?” he asked, voice gentle. Joe shook his head, silent. He drew a line, then another. The Escapist, breaking out of chains. His lines were sharp, almost angry. He hadn’t told Sammy that he could barely read the letter—he was too afraid of what it might say. The city’s noise pressed in, distant horns and the rattle of an elevated train. Joe’s hands shook. Sammy tried again. “Publisher’ll be here in two hours.” He laid a steadying hand on Joe’s shoulder. “We turn this in, they give us the next issue. We don’t—” Joe glanced at him, lost. “You write, I draw. We escape. Yes?” The silence stretched. Joe’s mind wandered to the rooftops he had seen on his way to Brooklyn, the way the city seemed to float above its own worries. He thought, fleetingly and foolishly, of flying. He remembered his magic tricks, the ones that never truly let him vanish. He thought of Thomas, trapped in Prague, and of the letter—too late, always too late. Sammy tried to fill the quiet. He sketched dialogue in blunt pencil, muttering. “The Escapist slips his bonds,” he said, as if it were an incantation. “He finds a way.” Joe’s hands moved faster. The Escapist’s jaw was his own, thin and determined. Behind the mask, a prayer for rescue. He drew the city skyline, but let it blur at the edges, as if it might dissolve. Outside, the sky began to pale. A sudden wind plucked the letter from the bed. Joe lunged, caught it before it escaped through the window. For a moment, he held it in both hands, heart pounding. He did not open it yet. He stared at the envelope, then at the unfinished comic page, and finally at the open window. He rose abruptly, letter in hand. Sammy watched him cross to the fire escape. “Joe—what are you doing?” But Joe was already halfway out the window, coat thrown over his shoulders, hair wild. Sammy followed, heart in his mouth. They climbed to the roof, the city below yawning wide. In the dawn wind, Joe spread his arms, the letter clutched tight, as if he could take flight. His eyes were wet, but his mouth set. “If I jump,” he said, voice hoarse, “do you think I would make it home?” Sammy, shivering in his shirtsleeves, put a hand on Joe’s elbow. “You can’t go back,” he said softly. “But you can draw him out. You can draw all of us out.” Joe looked at the horizon. He folded the letter, placed it in his pocket. With a shaky laugh, he turned, pulling Sammy with him. Together, they descended to the drawing table, and as the city woke, the Escapist broke his chains once more—on paper, if nowhere else. And in that fragile, ink-stained morning, they made their deadline. They chose to stay.

Comic