Passages
Reluctantly, Ray accepted that Jasmin wasn't able to discuss what she'd experienced. They walked back to concert auditorium's parking lot in silence, her arm slung across his shoulders, his arm curled around her waist. The lot was nearly empty when they got back. Aside from making it easier for them to find their car, they were both grateful for the solitude.
Ray held the door for her. Jasmin tossed her purse inside, then turned to take her place.
"You're beautiful," Ray told her over the window frame of the door.
Their eyes met. She seemed tired as she smiled her appreciation. She lowered herself to sit.
"You are . . . so beautiful."
Their eyes held onto one another as Jasmin began to transfer her weight. The passenger side of the car sank as they both expected, considering that she weighed nearly tree-hundred pounds, but then the car just kept on sinking. By the time Jasmin was seated with her feet resting on the pavement outside the car, their shared look of love had changed one of stunned surprise. Neither of them said a word. After a moment, Jasmin shifted her weight back to her feet. The car rose with her until her rump cleared the seat. She paused for a moment, then sat back down again. Again the car sank as it had before. By this time, their eyes were, again, pleading for answers.
"Ray?" Jasmin asked him in a small, frightened voice.
Ray's mouth worked nervously, but nothing came out. Finally, "It looks like you've . . . gotten heavier."
Her eyes searched him for something more.
"I've gotten heavier," she echoed slowly.
Once the notion worked its way into her mind, however, Jasmin suddenly sprang to her feet, and strode away from the open doorway. As the car finished bouncing from being relieved of her peculiarly heavy weight, she began pacing aimlessly in the vast open space of the near-deserted parking lot.
"Oh . . . this - is . . . getting to be - too much," she sighed elaborately into the night time sky. Lowering her sites, she stopped, tried folding he arms over her chest, found that she couldn't, growled, "Shit!", then rested her open hands on her iliacs and resumed pacing.
Ray took a few steps toward her.
"Impy," was all that he could think offer her at the moment.
"How Ray?" Jasmin demanded, glowering in his direction as she continued pacing. "How did I get heavier?"
His mind working feverishly, Ray searched for an answer. As if everything up 'til then hadn't been enough, now they had yet another new phenomenon to deal with.
"Well . . . ," he said, latching onto the first thing he could come up with, "you've gotten bigger."
Jasmin stopped, and faced him.
"No," she announced. "I've had two moderate meals since we read my weight at just over two-ninety, and yet I'm breaking the damned car."
She resumed pacing, and thinking.
"And it wasn't like this when we got here, what - three, four hours ago?" she went on. "No. Something else is going on."
She stopped again, and took to bouncing herself lightly on the balls of her feet.
"I don't feel any heavier," she observed. "In fact . . . I feel lighter."
"That's because you've gotten stronger with your added weight," Ray offered in explanation as he watched her.
"No," she said thoughtfully, bouncing herself a few more times, "I hear you, but that can't be all of it."
She turned, and faced him once again, dropping her hands so that her arms hung naturally away from her sides.
"How do I look?" she wanted to know.
"Uhv . . . ," Ray stammered, too stupefied by her beauty to make a more intelligible utterance at the moment. His hesitation frayed Jasmin's patience.
"How much does it look like I weigh," she quickly rephrased herself.
He looked her over, groped a moment, then, "You . . . really don't look any bigger than you were before."
Her eyes became unfocused from introspection. "And yet . . . ," she intoned vaguely as she resumed pacing again.
"Okay, how does your leotard feel?" Ray ventured to ask.
She stopped to take a mental survey of how her leotard felt on her body, then reported as she resumed pacing, "It doesn't feel any tighter, if that's what you mean."
"Then there's really only one other possibility."
At this, Jasmin stopped, and looked at him expectantly.
"Density," he said simply.
Her look became perplexed. "Density?"
"You're getting heavier, because your body's getting denser," he went on to explain. "So, you may not look bigger, or different, but you've become heavier than you look."
"Okay," she intoned in a way of prompting him to go further.
"Alright," Ray went on to elaborate, "it's atoms, and space, right?"
"As a description of matter, yeah," Jasmin agreed.
"Molecules, and the atoms they're made of, are mostly empty space, right?"
"Right."
"No. Wrong," he told her. "You're different."
Jasmin frowned, and cocked her head slightly to one side.
"Your atoms are getting more numerous, but they're also getting tighter, and closer together. So, even though it may not look like you're getting bigger, your whole body is getting denser, and so, heavier."
"No," Jasmin stated.
"Why not?" Ray challenged her.
"No," she said again, shaking her head. "By tighter you're talking smaller, right?"
"Right."
"So you're talking about changing the orbital radius of the protons, and electrons of a given atom, right?"
"Right."
"You do that," she explained, "you change the nature of the atom itself, even though the subatomic components may be the same, you change the orbital pattern, you change its nature, because you're going to change the way it behaves, and the way it interacts with other atoms."
Ray stood there looking at her, nodding his head as he assimilated what she'd said. He then continued her thought, "And even if we agreed that your atoms were merely getting closer together, that would still involve altering orbital patterns."
"And besides," she further wanted to know, "where are all these extra atoms that are making me so much heavier coming from, anyway?"
Ray held her gaze for a long time. He sincerely longed for a way to answer her, but the more he struggled, the more he realized that there wasn't an answer for her. Not one. She stood before him in, not merely active, but effective, defiance of almost every law of science he'd come to know, and trust. It wasn't just a combination of elements that'd caused her to change so much. There was something else, maybe lots of things else, but they were things which only God could know about. It occurred to him that, like glory, perhaps knowledge, too, is fleeting. The quest to understand as unyielding as it is unending.
Somewhere beyond these thoughts, he heard a woman softly crying. Ray focused his eyes again to see his Jasmin crying. They were still in the parking lot. She stood before him, just as she had been, a few feet off, massive, and strong, and powerful beyond comprehension, crying. He could tell that she had seen him. Seen him all too well. She had seen the futility of his reflections, and his 'answer' had left her feeling every bit as empty as he felt himself to be.
"Impy, I'm sorry . . . "
"I'm not me anymore, Ray," Jasmin stated, focusing her misty eyes on what she could see of him. "I'm . . . ," and then she turned away. Even from him, she had to turn away. "I don't know what I am anymore."
"You're still the same person," he asserted, hastening to her side.
Jasmin turned her back to him, unable to believe what he was saying.
"You're really no different than you were before," Ray persisted. "Yer just having to react to different circumstances."
"But the circumstances are me," she insisted. "It's not something outside. It's me. Inside me, and I don't know what it is."
Ray's fingers traced their way around her slender, modeled waist. Jasmin could feel him at her back. He held her close, just the way she needed.
"It is you," he told her with that one, and only confidence of his. "Nothing else, no one else, but you."
Jasmin heard him, and listened to him.
"You remember those three people you helped this afternoon?" he asked. "That was you too." He held her closer. "Nothing else, no one else, but you."
Jasmin had ceased her crying, her thoughts revolving around what he'd said. It made sense, in a comforting sort of way. What did it matter if it was true, or not? When it gets down to survival, you don't worry about philosophy. Truth becomes whatever advocates us best. Her hands found his, and she held him, tighter, tighter, now enough.
"What's going to happen?" she asked.
Ray took in a breath, and let out a sigh. "I don't know," he told her honestly. "We'll find out."
Jasmin's tummy pushed out a laugh that she'd intended to be mirthless, but, somehow, wasn't.
"Like it 'r not," she said.
Ray smiled as he looked at what he could see of her beautiful Asian features. He'd never noticed that particular curve to her cheek before. He kissed her hair, and inhaled its wonderful fragrance.
"Hey!" came the sound of a masculine voice from somewhere in the distance. Alerted of another's presence, the couple separated to regard each other curiously.
"Hey!"
The voice was closer. They turned to the direction they thought the voice had come from to see a large, overweight security guard striding purposefully toward them. He raised an arm, and pointed an authoritative finger at Ray.
"You!" he sternly ordered. "Get away from her! Now!"
"Where'd he come from?" Ray asked Jasmin.
"Beats me," said Jasmin. She eased herself away from him, and quickly wiped away the residue of her tears. "We'd better cooperate," she cautioned, "he could give us trouble."
"Back off from the lady, mister," the guard admonished Ray.
Taking the initiative, Jasmin stepped toward the guard, her hands raised in a gesture of appeasement.
"It's alright, officer," she explained. "He's with me. We're together."
His first real look at Jasmin stopped the guard dead in his tracks.
"Whoa, mama," he couldn't keep from saying, but then he was quick to correct himself. "Oh, excuse me ma'am. I saw him grabbin' you from behind, an' I thought you might need some help."
"It was a Hymlick maneuver," Ray interjected as he approached, placing himself by Jasmin's side. "She was choking."
"Yeah, I was choking," Jasmin echoed a little too quickly. She caught herself, and slowed down, "Somewhat. But I'm okay now. My husband came to my rescue."
"Your - ?" Ray began.
"Just," Jasmin quickly interjected, firmly placing the heel of her shoe on Ray's foot to shut him up. "like he always does," she continued as she took his arm, and leaned her head toward him. Ray smiled as best he could in spite of the pressure on his foot.
The guard looked them over briefly.
"Well," he said cautiously, "alright. That is if yer sure yer okay, ma'am."
"Yes," Jasmin assured him, "I'm alright now." She tightened her hold on Ray's arm. "We're both alright now."
"Fine," Ray almost chirped.
Assured that there was no 'situation' that required his intervention, the guard relaxed.
"Well, anyway," he offered Jasmin easily, "you look like you could take care of yerself," he chuckled once, then added, "and then some."
Jasmin lowered her eyes, and smiled shyly, offering a gracious, "Thank you," in return for what was obviously intended to be a compliment.
"You look pretty big," the guard opined.
Jasmin looked up at him, and smiled a little broader.
"Well, you are . . . really big."
Jasmin continued smiling, but her face was starting to hurt.
"Well," Ray intervened, "we have to be going."
He turned to shepherd Jasmin toward the car.
"Y'know," said the guard, ambling after them, "I gotta brother who lifts weights - "
"Isn't that nice," Ray threw out desperately.
" - but 'e doesn't look anything like you."
Jasmin froze for a split second, then turned back to the guard, beaming through her clenched teeth.
"Oh, really," she seethed melodically.
Ray caught her arm before she could do anything more.
"Honey," he prompted nervously. Their eyes met, and he told her with all the significance he could muster, "let's go."
Jasmin relaxed, and turned back to the car as Ray placed himself at the door for her.
"Hoh, get me outta here before I rip 'is balls off," she implored him in soto voce, but then she hesitated. She remembered how she'd made the car sink before, and she knew the guard would notice if she got in again.
"Get into the car," Ray hissed at her through his teeth.
"Not with him here," she hissed back.
"He is not going away," Ray pointed out.
They exchanged a look of helpless resignation, then Jasmin turned, and lowered herself onto the seat. The car sank, just as it had before.
"Holy shit, lady," the guard observed, "you must weigh a - "
"Shocks," Ray said in the nick of ton - or rather time. "The shocks have gotten really soft."
Unseen by the guard, Ray frantically motioned for Jasmin to get her legs inside so he could close her door. She did, and then he did, and then he began making his way around to the driver's side.
"I should have them replaced," he said, "but you know how it is."
"Yeah, I know," the guard said, having been there. "But you shouldn't put somethin' like that off. It can really screw up yer alignment."
"Yeah, well . . . thanks a lot," Ray offered as he opened his door. "Well, uh, good night."
By the time the guard had finished saying "Good night," in reply, Ray was behind the wheel with his door closed. He hurriedly found the ignition key on his ring.
"Here we go."
"At last," sighed a much relieved Jasmin.
He inserted the key, turned it and the engine cranked. And cranked, and cranked, and cranked. He turned the key off for a moment, then tried again. Again, the engine cranked, and cranked . . .
"Ray . . . ," Jasmin pleaded as she massaged her forehead.
"Damned generator," he muttered as he kept trying.
At length there was a dull knocking sound outside on the passenger window. The couple froze for a moment, then hesitantly looked over to Jasmin's side of the cab to see the guard looking in. He motioned for the window to be rolled down.
"Oh God," Jasmin sighed just before she opened the window to greet the guard with her brightest smile. "Hi."
The guard bent low to peer thought he open window.
"Wha'zit?" he asked Ray. "Starter problem?"
"No, it just takes a little time sometimes," Ray fumbled in reply as he tried again.
"'cause I got a buddy whose a mechanic. He's a pretty good one too, which is kinda rare these days, y'know."
"Yeah. A good mechanic is hard to come by," Ray agreed. At the moment, however, all he wanted was to rip out the car's engine, and brain the guy with it.
"I can give you his number, uh, if I can find it," the guard said as he straightened, and began digging into a shirt pocket that contained enough scraps of paper to qualify as a recycling center. "I know I got it here somewhere."
Once the guard was out of view, Jasmin shooed Ray away from the steering column. After he'd complied, she took hold of the key herself, and turned it. Her entire hand flashed. There was the sound of a huge electrical surge as the engine not only turned over, but roared to life.
"What was that?" the guard asked, leaning down to peer through the window.
With both her hands looking quite normal in her lap, Jasmin was the picture of innocence.
"Oh, nothing," she answered sweetly.
"I saw a flash," the guard insisted.
"Light," said Ray, holding up a small flashlight, which he'd miraculously produced. "Flashlight," he said agreeably, holding it up for the guard to see. "Just a . . . flashlight."
The guard took a moment to visually scrutinize the flashlight Ray held.
"Boy, that little thing sure puts out a hell of a beam," he said, then he added quickly to Jasmin, "oh, excuse me, ma'am."
Jasmin merely smiled for his benefit, all the while running a list of words through her head that 'excuse me' wouldn't even begin to cover.
"Yeah," Ray agreed agreeable to the guard, referring to the flashlight, "it . . . sure does."
"Man," the guard enthused, "I could see it all the way out here."
"Yeah . . . ," Ray agreeably agreed agreeably.
"Yeah, an' I wasn't even payin' attention."
Spontaneously, Jasmin snorted at this, then immediately raised a hand to her mouth to hide her grin. She feigned a brief coughing fit to conceal her outburst of laughter. The guard reached in, and solicitously patted her back to help. Well meaning though his gesture was, he couldn't avoid noticing the thick mounds of muscle that his hand encountered.
"You okay, hon?" Ray asked her for the guard's benefit.
Jasmin waved her hand dismissively.
"Mmm, just . . . swallowed the wrong way," she lied. "That's all."
"Boy, you are beefy, ma'am," the guard remarked, meaning it as a compliment. "If you don't mind my sayin' so, that is."
"Oh no!" Jasmin nearly wailed with a heavenward glance. She patted her upper chest, and cleared her throat some more.
"Well, like I was sayin' - "
Jasmin loudly cleared her throat.
"Uh, like I was sayin'," the guard went on, undaunted, "I don't think I've ever seen a small one that bright before."
"Yeah, it's powerful alright," Ray said.
He turned the light on, hoping to God that it would appease this nice guy from hell enough to where he'd let them go. The flashlight's bulb, however, failed to illuminate when the switch was fully engaged. This absence of light, brought to light, for all concerned, the realization that the flashlight, with its powerful light, wasn't working. With her elbow perched on the door-sill, a diplomatic battle weary Jasmin had to rest her head in her hand as Ray thumped the flashlight in his palm a couple of times in an effort to get it working.
"Aw, looks like you got a dead battery," their friend observed.
"Well, uh, it's a powerful light, so it . . . takes a lot of power," Ray said helplessly, still fiddling with the newest, and latest, addition to their plight.
Jasmin sighed, then looked to Ray, and held out her hand.
"Let me try," she offered sweetly, then she added, "dear," with a bit of a snarl.
She gave him a knowing look, and held up her other hand so he alone could see the glow in her palm. Ray noted her hand, and her look, then gave the flashlight over to her.
"Be nice," he whispered in admonishment.
As the flashlight changed hands, the corners of Jasmin's mouth went up, then, just a quickly, lowered again. She thumped the flashlight twice against her palm, then began fiddling with it.
"Oh," she whined helplessly, "I can't figure out how to turn it on." She looked up at the guard all pouty, and doe-eyed as she asked him, "Could you help me, please?"
Ray had to cover his mouth in an attempt to stifle his own laughter. He was all too familiar with Jasmin's 'helpless little woman' act, and couldn't believe how effective it was at times. Jasmin had just enough time to give him a quick jab with her elbow before the guard's head appeared in the window again.
"Oh yeah," he said, taking note of the flashlight's style, "I've seen this kind before." He took the flashlight from Jasmin's offering hand, and looked it over. "These flashlights can be kinda moody. Kinda like a woman, y'know," he said with a laugh, then, "Oh, uh . . . no offense to the missus, y'know."
With the guard preoccupied with the flashlight, Jasmin turned to Ray, and ran her hands firmly down her thighs. Her leotard fought the battle of its life to contain her expanding musculature.
"Be nice," she emitted in a malevolent purr. She grimaced, and bared her teeth to indicate that she was about to be anything, but 'nice'.
"This kind doesn't have an 'off-on' switch per-sae," the guard informed the 'little lady' as he smiled at Jasmin. "At least not like you'd be used to, y'know."
"It doesn't?" Jasmin gushed in mock amazement, playing as dumb as she could.
"No," he told her, falling under the spell of his own charm. He took care to demonstrate. "You have to twist it in the middle, like this."
"Really?"
The guard looked the flashlight over with it 'on'.
"And it does look like the battery is dead."
He then twisted it 'off'. Jasmin took hold of the end of the flashlight.
"Try it again," she urged with a trace of mystery to her tone.
Ray wasn't sure what she had in mind, but he put a hand on her knee anyway, just as a hopeful reminder for her to 'be nice'.
"Lady," the guard said, attempting to instruct her as he would a child, "a dead battery is a dead battery."
"Oh, pleeease?" she oozed with a pair of lips so pouty they looked like she'd been kissing a nest full of bees. "Maybe it's just stuck," she innocently suggested, " . . . y'know."
The guard was doubtful. "Well . . . "
"Oh, I just know you can get it working," she enthused, ratcheting her I.Q. down a few more points.
The guard knew what he knew . . . or at least he thought he did, but he wanted to . . . satisfy - the little lady.
"Eh, sure. Why not."
With Jasmin still holding the flashlight pointing towards him, the guard took hold of it, and twisted it to its 'on' position.
Nothing.
"Oohhh!" Jasmin sighed in disappointment as she took the flashlight back, and looked it over.
"There, you see?" the guard told her.
"Are you sure it's on?" she asked.
"Yes lady," he replied patiently, "it's on."
She twisted the flashlight off, and on repeatedly.
"Is this how you do it?" she asked.
"Yeah, that's the switch, if you can call it a switch that is, but even so, a dead battery is a dead battery."
The moment the guard had finished his sentence, Jasmin twisted the flashlight on, and the bulb illuminated. She had discovered an ability, and was sending a stream of energy through her fingers, and directing it into the flashlight's power cells to make it look like it worked.
"Oh look!" she exclaimed excitedly. She showed the light to the guard, and added with just the right amount of melodic coyness, "It worked for me."
At once, the guard became deadly serious.
"Le' me see that thing," he said, reaching for the flashlight. Jasmin surrendered it to him, but retained her grip on its end. "Maybe that battery's not so dead after all."
He looked the flashlight over as Jasmin kept the bulb lit. It wasn't very bright, but she could see the beam play over the highlights of the guard's overly-plump features as he continued to scrutinize the flashlight. Eyeing him closely, Jasmin made sure to turn her fingers off as the guard twisted the flashlight to the 'off' position so that the bulb went out. The guard frowned in concentration, puzzling over the mystery of how she could get the flashlight working, and he couldn't. Jasmin watched the guard intently. His full attention was focused on the flashlight. She saw his brow relax. Maintaining her grip, her heart skipped a beat when she saw his eyebrows rise. She glanced at his hands on the flashlight. His fingers gripped, then started to move. As the guard twisted the flashlight to its 'on' position, Jasmin sent a surge of power into it that produced a blinding flash aimed directly into his face.
"Ah, Jeez!" the guard cried out, stumbling back from the car with his eyes clamped shut.
Jasmin looked at Ray, pointed a finger ahead and told him, "Go."
Ray slammed the idling car in gear, and punched the accelerator. With no loss of traction, the car lunged forward, taking them away, and leaving the guard behind.
"Hoh man!" the guard exclaimed, blinking to recover his eyesight. "That little thing is bright!"
By the time he could see again, however, Ray had gotten them out of the lot, and they were gone.
"Hey, where'd you go?"
Finally on their way, both Ray, and Jasmin, were able to relax. Ray backed off on the gas pedal, and steered the car toward the freeway entrance they needed.
"Man, I didn't think we'd ever get outta there," he said, breathing a sigh of relief.
"Neither did I," Jasmin wearily agreed as she rolled her window up to where she wanted it.
"Could you believe that guy?" Ray wondered.
"I think we're going to need a new flashlight," Jasmin noted, holding the flashlight up for him to see. Not only was the bulb blown, but the entire forward end of the flashlight was melted.
"Oh . . . look what you did," Ray droned melodically.
"Yeah, well," she sighed, dropping the flashlight into the tray between them. After a few moments, she wondered, "You okay?"
"Yeah," he answered, then, "You?"
"Yeah," she told him. "I don't think I'm bottoming out the springs, but don't aim for any bumps in the road."
Ray got them onto the freeway. Traffic was pleasantly light. He eased the car into a comfortable lane, settled at a comfortable speed, and then the two of them settled down for a comfortable ride home. They traveled in silence for a time. Almost at once then, they slowly looked over at each other. The moment their eyes met, they both broke into laughter, and they laughed all the rest of the way home.
"I still think you should go see the doctor, Frank," the man's wife tried to tell her husband tactfully as they prepared for bed.
"Betty, I told you," Frank insisted, "I just blacked out for a few seconds. The medics checked me out when they got there, and I'm okay."
The couple shared a look. Frank could tell that his wife remained unconvinced.
"I'm fine," he tried to assure her, and then he turned to deposit his wallet, and change on the counter of the mirrored dresser. "If anything," he added, "I'm upset about that muscle-dyke who messed up the truck." He shook his head slowly. "It's gonna cost a bundle to replace those door mounts."
Betty slipped her long nightgown over her head, and arranged it over her thickening, middleaged body. She was more concerned about her man than about his truck.
"You know what the doctor told you about your heart."
Frank closed his eyes, and sighed. He knew she meant well, but he really wished she would get off worrying this particular bone. He watched her in the mirror as she turned down the bed.
"Betty, I feel fine," he assured her once again, and then his wristwatch joined his pocket items on the dresser.
Watching her busy herself with the bed as he pulled his T-shirt from his pants, Frank thought to himself, Yeah, she's getting plumper, but, damn!, she still looks nice. A smile teased his lips as he shucked the T, and then he turned around, and snapped her bottom with an end of it.
Betty had only time enough to yelp, and stand erect before Frank was on her, groping, and mauling her lustfully. She protested just enough to egg him on while quietly thrilling at the attention he was giving her. When he'd finished with his 'brazen attack', her arms were clutched around his swollen middle, and they both were feeling happy, and light.
"I told you feel fine," he said, and then he pulled her closer, "and now I'm gonna prove it!"
She laughed, then nuzzled wonderfully against him. She'd been holding back a lot, because of what the doctor had said. She sighed a bit, and tried to extinguish the warm little fire kindling in her belly.
"C'mon," she told him with an affectionate pat to his rear. "It's getting late, and you want to finish that job tomorrow."
Frank looked into his woman's eyes. They were eyes that loved, and cared, and concerned themselves too much with worry. He smiled at her.
"Don't expect to go to sleep right away."
She smiled up at him wistfully as she breathed another sigh, and then some of the wistfulness went away.
"Promise?" she asked him quietly.
His smile broadened. He gathered her close again.
"You know I always deliver," he announced to Betty's warming laughter.
They separated. Immediately, Betty noticed, "What's that?"
"What?" Frank wondered.
Frowning with curious concentration, Betty reached up, and lightly touched the center of Frank's chest.
"That," she said, tactilely exploring a different colored area of skin. "It looks like a mark."
Frank tucked in his chin to observe the spot. He couldn't see it very clearly, but could see it well enough to seriously wonder.
"Hm . . . what is that?"
His own curiosity peaked, Frank went to face the mirror over the dresser to get a better look at the spot. What he saw surprised him. There was an area of his skin at the lower center region of his chest that appeared distinctly different from the aged, and weathered skin surrounding it. It was pinkish white in color, pure of hue, and completely void of any single age defining factor. Frank looked at the area. He knew it hadn't been there when he'd dressed that morning, and he knew that it had never been there before.
"Frank," Betty now implored him, "please go see the doctor."
Tentatively, Frank ran his fingertips over the spot. It felt unusually smooth, and soft to his touch.
"What the hell is that?" he wondered almost silently as he continued studying the mark on his chest.
Most surprisingly of all, the entire area of soft, pinkish skin was bordered by the unmistakable outline of a flattened, human hand.
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