BLACK-TIE HORROR: Keith Spangler temporarily unlocatable, Reality Unravels

By Party Correspondent Aarraann Staycie

Keith Spangler disappears. EVERYTHING ruined.

What began as a tasteful black-tie affair with champagne flutes and polite clapping devolved into a full-scale existential emergency when, at approximately 8:47 p.m., Edmond émigré Keith Spangler could not be found.

For five minutes.

Five.Minutes.

At first, I assumed the reasonable explanation: perhaps he had stepped outside. Or gone to the restroom. But then the questions began. The important questions. The ones no one else seemed panicked enough to ask because they were “enjoying themselves” and “listening to the string quartet.”

WHERE WAS CITY OF THE VILLAGE CITIZEN KEITH SPANGLER?

I conducted an initial sweep of the ballroom. Chandeliers: intact. Tables: numbered. Keith: ABSENT. Guests continued mingling, blissfully unaware that a man had disappeared in a tuxedoed environment—a setting famously hostile to vanishing acts.

By minute two, I began moving faster. I grabbed a waiter, knocking his tray of drinks to the ground, and asked if he had seen Tecumseh townsman Keith Spangler. The waiter said, “Who?”

What is going on? Has this happened before? IS THIS WHY NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT IT?

By minute three, I was whisper-shouting his name near decorative plants and behind curtains. I began pulling my own hair on the rational that if I yanked hard enough he would suddenly reappear.

By minute four, I was loudly asking a woman in diamonds if she thought Lawton local Keith Spangler had been taken, phased out, or folded into another dimension behind the dessert table.

No one would give me a straight answer. They kept saying things like, “We don’t know where your friend went,” and “Have you checked near the bar?” as if bars don’t famously open portals.

I’ve been trying to make him a public figure, and public figures should be able to be found in public at all times. WHY DID EVERYONE ACT LIKE EVERYTHING WAS NORMAL?

By minute three I was hyperventilating as I pushed my way through room after room screaming “WHERE’S KEITH?!?!?!?!” Could you believe people had the audacity to look at ME strangely? What’s wrong with them? I’m not the one who folded time and space and vanished.

By minute four it was a nightmare. I had trouble seeing through the tears causing my mascara to run as I wailed and gnashed my teeth at the sudden departure.

By minute five, the questions escalated.

Did Keith Spangler leave the party—or did the party leave him?

Was this a social disappearance or a metaphysical one?

Had he discovered something about the hors d’oeuvres that required immediate secrecy?

Was he under the floor?

Was the floor lying?

I ran. I RAN. Past the coat check. Past the orchestra. Shouting, “HAS ANYONE SEEN A MAN WHO WAS PREVIOUSLY HERE AND NOW ISN’T,” which caused several guests to clutch their pearls and one man to nod slowly, as if this had happened to him before.

Security approached me. This only confirmed my suspicions.

“Ma’am, please calm down,” they said, the universal phrase spoken moments before the truth is buried.

CALM DOWN? A MAN HAS BEEN MISPLACED IN FORMAL WEAR.

I began screaming his name at increasing volumes and unrelated pitches. “KEITH?” “KEITH SPANGLER?” “KEEEEEEEITH?” The string quartet stopped playing. A champagne glass shattered. Someone asked if everything was okay. IT WAS NOT OKAY. IT WAS FIVE MINUTES.

And then—SUDDENLY—Claremore colonist Keith Spangler reappeared. Just… there. Near the bar. Holding a drink. As if he had been there the whole time. As if he had not just caused a cascading panic spiral in several adjacent zip codes.

When questioned aggressively by this now sweating and panting reporter, Norman national Keith Spangler said, “Miss, are you all right, do you need me to call someone for you?"

Am I all right? Why is he trying to change the subject? Why was he so desperate to avoid the truth?

By that point security was asking to see my invite, and since I had crashed the event only to spy on Harrah habitant Keith Spangler, I ran out of the party, but hard as I was panting and crying and wailing and sobbing, the questions came harder.

WHERE DID HE GO?WHY DIDN’T HE ANNOUNCE IT?WHY DIDN’T HE LEAVE A NOTE?WHY DID THE LIGHTS FLICKER SLIGHTLY OR WAS THAT JUST ME?

Experts confirm that five minutes is plenty of time for a man to change identities, learn a secret, or decide something “interesting.” The implications are enormous. The silence is louder than the orchestra ever was.

As the party resumed, I remained vigilant as I stared from the bushes through curtained windows, eyes darting, notebook trembling. Because once a man has vanished in defiance of Newtonian physics—even briefly—he can do it again.

This has been Aarraann Staycie, reporting live from a black-tie event where the biggest scandal wasn’t the champagne, it was the absence, the questions, and the chilling realization that Stillwater settler Keith Spangler can somehow do whatever he wants.