Hidden Within The Words

“Are you familiar with subliminal messages?” she asked calmly.
“What? You mean if you flash the words “drink more soda” during a show I’ll have an insatiable thirst for some soda?” he replied, grinning.
“What if I told you it wasn’t only limited to things like television and movies? What if your thoughts could be controlled by what you read?”
“I’m listening.”
“So, OK, subliminal messages supposedly works by activating the brain regions associated with whatever words are displayed. So simple words like danger or threat brain region associated with fear,” she continued, sliding her glasses up the arch of her nose. “So what happens when you associate certain products with certain words?”
“I’m not sure where you’re going with this.”
“Let’s play a game of word association, I say the word and you tell me the first product that comes to mind. The first word is Luxury.”
“Sedan.”
“Big.”
“Sell, but I see what you’re doing. Listen Melissa, this isn’t some kind of psychological warfare on controlling the psyche of the consumer of goods. This is good marketing and advertising, the choice is with the consumer who purchases the goods. Obviously, this type of messaging would have no effect on lower income brackets.”
“Right, but that’s not true. Everyone reads Greg, everyone. This includes even the people who can’t read.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s not the text or the individual characters. It’s deeper.”
“You’re insane.”
“Check this out,” Melissa hopped up from her light oak wood desk and grabbed a rolled newspaper off a series of vertical black trays. She removed its faded green rubber band and unfurled the paper on the desk. “What do you see?”
“The metro paper, so what?”
“Look at it! What do you see?”
“Oh, um, some local boy does good article?”
“Keep looking,” Melissa responded, nodding intently, her eyes wide, a wild smile on her face.
“OK, OK.” Greg grimaced. His eyes darted left and right, line by line. “So what gives? I’ve read the whole article, and I’m really happy he saved that dog and her puppies. It’s fantastic, it really is.”
“Uh-huh.”
“So this is what you dragged me over here for? I have soccer practice tonight and I have to study for a test tomorrow, and you’re over here showing me outdated news about a guy who saved a dog from a house fire.”
“Autostereograms.”
“Auto – what?”
“Autostereograms are three dimensional images that are hidden inside a pattern.” Melissa’s wild smile opened even wider. “So stare at the text, the words. Cross your eyes.”
“Oh. No. You don’t mean. No, no way. Are you serious?” Greg’s curiosity was piqued. His enthusiasm quickly waned though. “I don’t see anything.”
“Of course you don’t, anyone reading the paper or a book will cross their eyes – even if they’re not looking for hidden imagery.”
“So?”
“So look at the paragraphs and how they’re structured. I want you to pay special attention to the spaces between words and the spacing between the individual lines.”
“Oh, I think I see something.”
Melissa appeared as if she was about to pop with excitement, “Really? You see it too?”
“Yeah it says, “Melissa… is… crazy!”
“Shut up. Look closer, there is an image in the first paragraph. Do you see it?”
“No.”
“You don’t see the fire?” said Melissa disappointedly. She grabbed a pen from a small purple cup-holder and drew lines between the words and through the spaces in the article. It was odd to Greg, because it really did look like a fire. Greg began to wonder, was the fire imagery only a coincidence or was it really the words from the article making him see fire hidden within the words?
“I see it now, but who’s to say you couldn’t do that to any article? I mean here, let me try it here, on movie reviews. Here’s a sweet movie, right up your alley. Now, what would they try to hide in a romantic comedy review?” Greg’s voice faded as he began to mumble his way through the review. “Boom, I got it!”
Melissa raised her left eyebrow, “What do you see?”
“It’s a heart, see?” Just like Melissa before him, he grabbed a pencil from the same purple cup-holder and began to trace out a heart between the words. “Isn’t that sweet? Looks like subliminal love at its finest to me. I have to say, this is amazing Melissa, but do you really believe writers and editors are actively planting imagery in their writing? And if so, why would they do this? What do they have to gain?”
“I haven’t got that far. And no, I don’t think they’re doing it intentionally. See, that is where it gets weird. It’s almost as if the writer is embedding the imagery subconsciously, almost as if all their words somehow can channel the image.”
“Is it always images?”
Melissa appeared to hold her breath for a moment. Looking down, she let out a quick sigh. “No, no it is not always images.”
“Well, what else have you seen?”
“Words are the most common. In a magazine I actually was able to trace out prestige in a mobile phone advertisement, and then sometimes there are names, but none that I am familiar with. And then once there was a face … But it’s not always just one image per page. Sometimes there are multiple images and names and then, there was also something else.” Her voice trailed off, sadly.
“What was it?” Before Melissa could look up even open her mouth to reply, Greg’s watch began to chirp a digital melody. “Oh, crap. I’m late to practice. This when I’m supposed to be out the door and on my way! Melissa, this, this is incredible. You’ve discovered something that could change the way the world looks at… words! I’m still a little surprised why you’re sharing it with me though, I mean we’ve been neighbors for six years now but we’ve never really talked at school. I want to keep looking at this stuff with you, it’s incredible. I’ll come over tonight after practice, OK?” And with those words, Greg threw his navy blue backpack over his red and white checkered shirt and dashed out of the library.
“Dates,” she whispered softly. Melissa pulled her phone out of her light pink jacket, her ruby red painted thumb resting over Greg in the contacts section of her phone. Should I call him and let him know what I read in the obituary? No, then he will really think I’m crazy. Before Melissa could make up her mind, her phone lit up and almost jumped out of her hand. “Hello?”
“Hey! It’s Greg, I got to my car and found out soccer practice was cancelled. Are you still at the library because I was thinking that I could come back?”
Melissa was not sure if it was her stomach or her heart that began to flutter. “I, um, yes – I’m still here. But listen Greg, there’s something you need to know.”
“What is it? Oh, let me guess. You have another dog story lined up for me,” he chuckled.
“No, stop it. Be serious. I read your name, in the obituaries.”
“Wait, what?”
“And…” Melissa’s voice got quiet. “There was a date.”
“No, no. Melissa. No.”
“It was today, Greg.” Melissa began to choke back tears.
“That doesn’t mean anything, listen, I’m maybe 12 steps from the door? I’m already walking – nothing’s going to—” The phone hitting the hard pavement was the last thing Melissa heard before the tires began to screech outside. She began to sob and buried her face into her folded arms. She should have told him sooner. Would he have believed her?