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David Blaine has my nose. He
sits across from me in his London hospital room, withered
from his heroic, forty-four day stay in a plexiglass box suspended
over the Thames during which he survived on nothing but an
intravenous supply of water, my nose clenched firmly between
the index and middle fingers on his right hand.
"It all just got me thinking, you know? About life and
what the human body can endure," he says, and lightly
tugs at the tube still attached to his nose with his left
hand. My attention immediately shift back to his other hand,
which still clutches my nose.
"The human body is like, you know, the most incredible
machine God ever made. And what do machines need to run? Fuel.
And what's the fuel that covers the earth? Water. So I thought
that I could, you know, like reduce everything to machine
and fuel, and just live like that. You know?" His eyes
meet mine; they've often been described as bedroom eyes, penetrating,
truth-seeking. But I think they're more like a drunken night
crashing on your friend's fold-out couch in the living room,
the metal support bar disallowing any attempts at comfort
and protracted rest. I break their pull and watch as he takes
my nose and pushes it halfway through a quarter, his gaze
never leaving me.
"It was just me and the box, you know? And all those
people watching me, but I was alone, doing my thing, testing
myself and being alone high above a crowd," he says,
absently conjuring a deck of playing cards from somewhere
in his hospital gown. "There was nothing but love, man,
you know? All those people watching me be alone, and I felt
nothing but love radiating up toward me." He fans the
cards across the tray in front of him, and I reflexively pick
one and turn it over. It's my nose on the one-eyed jack. I
just nod and return the card with my nose to the deck. I notice
somehow my nose has jumped back into his right hand.
"And forty-four days, man. I calculated that's how long
I could do this for. I'd be dead at forty-five, you know?
And you know what else?" I shake my head. A nurse enters
the room and changes the bag for his IV drip. He points a
finger at her. She unbuttons her blouse. I barely notice her
lacey bra, as there's my nose, etched onto her ivory stomach
in charcoal. She buttons up her blouse, straightens a few
items at his bedside, and stands by the window. "People
don't know this, but Jesus was actually out in the desert
for forty-four days before the Devil tempted him. The translation
everyone reads is wrong, man, you know? That guy with the
cheeseburger in the little helicopter? That was the Devil
on a bun, man, the devil hanging out on a little whirligig,
tempting me. And I said no, I have to do my time. Just me
and the box, you know?"
I nod. I realize that I'm breathing a bit heavier than normal,
more deeply and with a slight wheeze, because it's all through
my mouth. I look to his right hand for the nose. It's not
there. He nods knowingly and weakly gestures to the nurse.
Sec draws back the curtain. A nose is painted onto the side
of the building across from us.
It's not mine.
I tell him so. He looks sad, just for an instant, disappointment
flickering across his face like the shadow of a telephone
pole inside a fast-moving car. He coughs. Then coughs again.
And again, the rattling in his chest getting louder, wetter.
I signal for the nurse, but she doesn't move. His coughing
fit continues to intensify. I expect his tray to be covered
in blood, his test of the boundaries of human endurance to
end tragically a few feet from my astonished eyes, my noseless
face.
There is one final cough. There is no blood. Something lands
with a wet plop on the tray. He picks it up.
"Is this your nose?" he asks.
It is, I tell him.
"It's a beautiful thing, man, the human body, you know?"
I can only nod, knowing with every fiber of my being how beautiful
as I push my nose back onto my face.
How beautiful indeed.
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Above:
Blaine excited about being alive
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