Fine Print

“Having trouble finding your eye glasses, Doctor?”

Henry squinted up on top of the wardrobe in his room, where a very smug Hyde sat smiling down at him. Henry grimaced at him. “I’m doing sums. You know full well I can’t read all those tiny characters without my spectacles.” He rummaged around on his under used bedside table, hoping he might find the silver rimmed object there – even though he fell asleep in his office much more frequently than in his own bed.

“Hmm,” Hyde purred, slithering down from his perch in a lilting stream of smoke. “Then perhaps I could help you look for them...”

Henry sighed. “I’m sensing a catch. What’s the catch.”

“Oh, no catch! Why ever would you think there was a catch? I’m just interested in helping us see...eye to eye.”

Henry glared at his smug counterpart. “You know where they are, don’t you?”

Hyde’s smile flared. “Maybe.”

Henry’s mouth pulled up to the side with a small feeling of triumph. “Then, if I try hard enough, I could know where they are without your help, couldn’t I?”

Hyde tipped his head from side to side in a weighing gesture. “You coooould. But at what cost? How much time will it take to wrestle the answer from me?” He leered. “Assuming I even know to begin with.”

He had a point. “Fine,” Henry said. “What do you want for your help?”

“Just a little autograph,” Hyde said, gesturing to a slip of paper Henry hadn’t noticed before on the table. “Some of my associates don’t think I could actually be associated with someone of your class, so you’ll only be helping me prove a point.”

Henry raised a skeptical eyebrow. “That sounds decidedly easy. Almost too easy...”

Hyde scoffed and waved Henry’s words away with a hand through the air. “A small favor for a small favor.”

Henry maintained his skeptical glare for a moment, then reached for the paper. Sure enormity that’s, the large print was in his hand, certifying that he knew Hyde personally. There was a smaller smudge at the bottom, but without his glasses, Henry couldn’t make it out. It didn’t look like much text, though. Perhaps it truly was a smudge. Whatever it was, Henry needed his spectacles. He produced a pen from his jacket and signed the paper.

Hyde grinned. “Thank you, Doctor. Now, I think you might find what you’re looking for under the socks in the top most drawer of your dresser.”

Henry sniffed, straightened his vest, and went to the dresser. Sure enough, his glasses were there. “Next time you want something so trivial, just ask without hiding my spectacles.”

Hyde hummed a laugh. “Trivial? Oh, Henry. You should read the fine print on the paper you just signed. You know, now that you have your eyeglasses back.”

Hyde cackled and faded away as Henry snatched up the paper and read “I, Henry Jekyll, also swear to let Edward Hyde ravage me at least twice a week.” Henry flushed and immediately tore up the paper. He turned on his heel and went back to his office. He settled into his chair and looked down at the numbers on the page — crystal clear through his glasses now. But it was useless. He would never be able to focus on his sums now.

“Right,” he said, standing from his desk and undoing the first knot of his necktie. “Get back here, you. We have something to negotiate.”