My fingernails don’t end. Even though I pull them off. I take hold with my thumb and forefinger. I pull a nail off my finger and it just keeps coming like a magician’s handkerchief from his breast pocket or a clown’s handkerchief from his throat. These rods of nail are seemingly infinite. They’re like bendy calcium arrows. I can pull entire canes of nail out of my fingertips. I can’t even feel it any more.
The first time I did it, I cried. I didn’t cry from the pain – even though it hurt — but I cried because I was so scared. I cried and I cried. At night, I would look out the window at the forest behind my house and cry like a wolf. I’d hold the pillow to my face and pretend it was a sponge.
My boss told me that I could leave work for a few weeks if I needed time. I was crying so much that he had thought one of my parents died. I didn’t want to tell him what was happening, so I went with it. Nobody could understand. It took a while for me to come to terms with it. I didn’t feel human for a while, then I realized it’s pretty overrated to feel human. I grew accustomed to what I now refer to as “the infinity nail.”
Things have started changing. I now smell peanut butter when I pull them out. Peanut butter and street-beaten car tires. It’s not as bad or weird a smell as it sounds. Actually, I really like it. It reminds me of nothing in particular and it’s charming in that way.
I’ve also figured out good ways to use this curse to the advantage of mankind. The other day, a man had broken his leg doing a backflip off of a staircase in front of the mall. His knee went backwards. I saw the whole thing and it hurt to look at.
It was even hard to see up close, to touch, but I ran up to him and asked if I could help. He nodded, biting his lip, and I pulled the calf and thigh apart and then smushed it back into place with a crunch. He was a tough guy. There were tears falling out of his eyes, but I think that was more like the kinds of tears you get from yawning or having a nose-hair yanked out.
After it was set, I pulled out a leg-length nail rod from my thumb (the smaller fingers are good for speed-nails, the kind you can whip or cut with – the wider nails are really good for building or stabilization). Then I pulled out another leg-length thumb nail and a middle finger nail about the same length.
I placed one thumb nail on each side of his leg and wrapped the middle finger nail around his knee, bending it like a twisty-tie. I’d seen the same principle applied to legs or trees before – it’s how you keep a sapling from slouching.
A splint, if you would.