Unhinged by David Margolin

Unhinged by David Margolin

The rebellion could not have started more inconspicuously—an errant paper clip delivered the first blow.

Kyle liked paper clips. He admired the simplicity of the design; a little piece of metal ingeniously twisted to hold things together. They were cheap, plentiful, and no equipment was required to use them.

Two nights ago, before going to bed, he used a paper clip to join a coupon for spumoni ice cream and his shopping list. He lay the grouping next to his wallet and car keys. The next morning, he found the two pieces of paper just where he had left them, but they were unclipped. The paper clip was near the left corner of the papers, where he had placed it, but it was deviated upward, as if it had slipped off the paper. Not thinking much of it, he quickly re-clipped the two pieces together, folded them in half, and placed them in his shirt pocket.

He made it to the grocery store uneventfully. When he pulled the papers out of his pocket, he found that they were unclipped again. He looked in the pocket and saw the paper clip lying innocently on its side. He couldn’t shake the feeling that it was grinning at him. He was so unnerved that he neglected to use the coupon.

After returning home and putting the groceries away, Kyle tried a little experiment. He unfolded the spumoni coupon and shopping list, re-clipped them with the same paper clip, and laid them down as gently as he could on top of his desk. Slowly, the paper clip migrated upwards, towards the far edge of his desk, as if a tiny motor were propelling it. Kyle whisked the papers off the desk, and the paperclip stopped moving.

Enough of this nonsense; I’ll show you. He pulled out the medium-duty chrome stapler from the top right drawer of his desk and put it into action. He heard the satisfying ka-chunk as the action of the stapler transformed the straight ends of the standard-size staple into the familiar crimped shape. He noticed that the stapler needed refilling. He read the warning on the bottom of the box of staple refills, “Caution: Staples have sharp points. Keep out of reach of children,” Perfect example of closed captioning for the thinking impaired, he mused. How dangerous can a little garden variety staple be?

Kyle was startled when he looked back at the papers that he had just stapled together. The staple was lying on top of the papers, its ends restored to their original right-angle positions. “Holy shit.”

Kyle grabbed his reading glasses by the right temple to get a closer look at the renegade staple. Only the temple travelled with his hand– the rest of the glasses stayed on the table. The tiny hinge screw thatshould have held the temple in place was resting on its side next to the empty hole that it should have occupied. He came back with a mini screwdriver fit for restoring the unity of his reading glasses.

He was able to put the screw back in without a problem. After the last turn of the screwdriver, he was satisfied that it was tightly secured. He placed the glasses topside down on his desk, grabbed a magnifying glass out of a desk drawer, and stared at the screw that he had just replaced, daring it to misbehave again. After a few minutes he felt silly, and was about to give up the screw surveillance, but something changed. It was too subtle to classify, not quite a movement, not perceivable by any one sense. It was more like a change in the air pressure coupled with a feeling of danger.

Kyle wanted to turn away, but he could not force his attention off the hinge screw. Was it turning? God no, it was. It was turning counterclockwise, glacially but inexorably. An hour later that screw lay on its side, completely out of the hole, sitting on top of the frame next to the hinge.

 Kyle knew that he couldn’t figure out problems very well on an empty stomach. After two yogurts and a piece of leftover pizza, he realized that he was too tired to think clearly. In his dreams, every object that he picked up fell to pieces and staples marched in rows like goose-stepping soldiers.

When Kyle awoke it wasn’t very clear to him which memories from yesterday were of real events and which were of dreams. The only thing that he knew for certain, was that he needed a cup of coffee more than anything else.

He never got a chance to drink it.

No sooner had he lowered the lid of the coffee maker onto the pod, he heard a whizz and felt the air pressure of a projectile flying towards him. Kyle reflexively twisted his head sharply to the left, barely avoiding contact with the missile. Had he been a teeny bit slower the object would have taken off at least the top of his right ear or even pulverized his skull.

The flying whatever-it-was landed in the kitchen wall behind him with a THWANG, imbedding itself deeply into the wallboard; only its metal tip was visible. When he pried it part way out with the aid of a pliers, he saw that it was a hinge. He turned around and saw that the door to the cabinet where the coffee cups were stored was hanging lopsided; one hinge was missing. Kyle ducked down, pulled a metal pot out of a drawer, and put it on his head as a helmet. Thanks to his quick thinking he lived long enough to hear the deafening bang of another door hinge smashing into the improvised helmet.

Kyle ran into his bedroom closet and shut the door. By stretching his body as far as he could, and standing on his tiptoes, he was barely able to grab the straps of his gym bag. He retrieved his fencing mask and protective clothing and donned them at maximum speed.

But for his state of terror, Kyle would have appeared comical as he ran in a crouch through the house in his pot helmet and fencing garb. I’ve got to disarm the remaining connectors—remove them, before they remove me. Stay calm, Kyle. He ran toward the garage to retrieve his toolkit. He couldn’t identify all of the various connectors that were deflecting off his helmet and clothing—they all looked ominous. By the time he laid hands on the toolkit, he was sweating profusely, panting for air, and his hands were shaking.

Kyle had no memory of the racquet created by the heavy spring-loaded garage door hinge smashing into his helmet. He experienced it, but the force of the blow prevented his hippocampus from recording it. No matter—it was obvious to him what had happened based on a throbbing headache, ringing in his ears, double vision and nausea, the big dent in his helmet, and the crumpled hinge lying nearby.

Kyle cautiously got to his feet. He saw doors lying on the ground next to their former locations. The floors and counters were a sea of disconnected connectors: screws, bolts, push pins, paper clips, and clamps. This is some mess to clean up, but at least now I won’t be ducking flying weapons.

Kyle rose on wobbly legs. Amazingly, he was feeling optimistic. Who needs doors anyway? His positive mood was interrupted by an unfamiliar feeling in the roof of his mouth–not pain, or cold, or hot—something vaguely out of order. He localized the sensation to his left mesial incisor. Tentatively he wiggled it slightly. He compared it with the one on the right. The nausea amped back up and he felt his heart pounding. He knew, with sickening certainty, that the left incisor was loose. Subtle, but undeniable.

Remembering how the connectors’ rebellion had started small and then spread, Kyle commenced a body check. He extended his fingers and compared sides. The right index finger looked longer than the left. He did a tactile inspection of his index fingers, using the thumb and forefinger of the opposite hand to feel and pull. His nausea jumped up another notch. Loose, the tip of his right index fingers was loose. I know where this is heading. Kyle’s last bit of hope was squashed by a strong mental image of his supine body lying on the floor, all the parts there, but none of them connected, like the paperclip that moved itself out of place. In this image, his eyes were open, staring at the ceiling, aware of everything that was happening. His brain, resting in his cranial cavity, not dependent on any connectors, still functioning normally.

I have to get to my Baretta and end this nightmare. I probably don’t have much time before I lose the ability to pull the trigger. Intending to make a run for his 9 mm, stored in a lock box in the bedroom closet, Kyle stood, then stumbled. The tendons and ligaments of his left ankle had disconnected enough to prevent full weight bearing.

Kyle did not scream, or curse, or pray. He was listening to the song fragment, playing loudly and repetitively in his head, “Your ankle bone connected to your leg bone…”

Hopping towards his pistol as fast as could on his good leg, Kyle thought, If there is an afterlife, I hope that earworms aren’t allowed.

* * * * THE END * * * *
Copyright David Margolin 2025

Image Courtesy: Pixabay