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They found me face down on the concrete, in front of the tiger exhibit. The doctor said it was heatstroke. They said my body temperature was like one-thousand degrees or someshit, and my organs had been fixing to melt. They said if the EMTs hadn’t found me when they did, I would’ve been dead. Mom was crying and shit, being all dramatic like she does. “It’s a miracle,” is what they were all saying. But little Shani, she was saying something else.

She was saying, “You is tanuki blessed.”

Then I must’ve passed out, again.

When I came to, Shani was sitting on the long couch near the window, lotus-style, wrapped in a blanket, surrounded by white, plastic-looking walls, with a single ray of sunshine peeking through those sad, medicinal-blue curtains. The sunlight made her wildass afro look like a damn jack-o’-lantern. I could hear kicks flying, punches being thrown, and people shouting because she was playing Tekken on my PSP, probably screwing up my win-loss ratios because she didn’t even know the most basic combos. She was a goddamn button-masher, through and through.

Sitting up with a damn IV jammed in my arm, I weakly said, “Man, why you playing my game? Play Little Big Planet or Shrek or something.”

“Bored of those,” Shani replied, not looking up from the little screen, an intense, hyperfocused look on her face.

“You know what they say,” I said, coughing, “about getting bored?”

“Nuh-uh, what they say?”

“If you’re bored, you’re boring,” I said, laughing to myself, because despite almost dying and being in that depressingass hospital room, I was in pretty good spirits for some reason.

“That not nice,” she replied, looking up at me. “I gonna tell Momma you said that.”

I just gave her a little shrug, then looked at the chair near the bed. Mom was gone. I guess I’d been out longer than I’d thought.

“Where she go?” I said, rubbing my eyes.

“Get food.” Shani replied, mashing buttons.

“From where?”

“I dunno.”

I felt around the side of the bed, found the button, and pressed it. The headrest slowly lifted with a grinding whir. When it was done, I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. I started recalling what happened at the zoo the day before. It all seemed like some kinda weird fever dream. I mean, for a second there, at the zoo, it was almost like I was in goddamn Japan. That ain’t possible. That’s absurd. And Sinclair had been talking to me like he was a damn fox. Ridiculous. Maybe I’d passed out right there at the tiger exhibit, from heat exhaustion or whatever, just dreamt the rest up. That checks out. But for some reason, I wasn’t sure. Actually, I didn’t have a goddamn clue.

So I said, “Yo, Shani.”

“What?”

“What happened,” I coughed, “with the tanuki?”

There was a long quiet, just the heart monitor going boop boop boop and the sounds of Tekken going off. Eventually, the fighting noises stopped, like Shani had paused the game, but she kept staring down at the screen, not pressing a single button. Her face had gone blank, and for some reason, she looked real sad.

After like thirty heartbeats, I said again, “Well, what happened?”

That’s when she put the PSP down and looked up at me with those big brown eyes of hers, wearing this fakeass smile. I knew it was fake because she wasn’t showing those big buckteeth like she normally does.

“Well, while you and Mr. Fox was talking, I sneaked off to find the tanuki. It took me a long time, like forever! But I asked this pretty woman at one of the shops, and she was wearing this long dress with colorful flowers all over it, and she told me how to get there, so I walked and walked and walked, and then I found it, up a big big hill. And it was really cool! It was like this big farm with lots of fields all around it, and there were all these old houses and big apple trees and dirty statues, and the sky was real pretty! Anyway, the girl told me that the tanuki liked to stay in this old house nobody lived at anymore, so I went to the oldest house I could find, the one with all the holes all in it. Then I went up to the door, and it was like one of those doors in those TV shows you watch, and I slid the door open and started doing my song, ‘Tanuki, Tanuki, Tanuki, ’Nuki, ’Nuki,’ and after a while, guess what? They actually showed up! Can you believe it? And they looked just like raccoons! They had these furry, thin heads and dark eyes and round ears, and they were all big and fluffy and fat and had stubby tails! They actually looked a little like foxes up close, actually. They was so cute. I tried to pet one, but they didn’t come close. So I kept singing my song, ‘Tanuki, Tanuki, Tanuki, ’Nuki, ’Nuki,’ and it felt like a whole hour I was doing that, until they came up to me, and then I actually got to touch one! Can you believe it? I got to touch one!”

I was thinking to myself, big farm, lots of fields, old houses, dirty statues, apple trees. That’s exactly what I’d seen. Maybe it was real after all. Maybe not. Maybe it didn't matter.

So I said, “Yeah, Shani, I believe it.”

Then she kept going, but her tone shifted. She was still trying to sound all happy, but there was something off about it, like she was forcing it or someshit, I could tell.

“So, so after I petted one, I pulled out the lucky bead. You remember? The lucky bead? The one Mr. Yamada gave us?”

“Yeah, Shani, I remember.”

“OK, so, so I pulled it outta my pocket and held it out, and the bigger tanuki sniffed it, and then made these cute little noises, and then turned his butt to me like he thought it was bad food or something. He said, gross! This stinks! But, but then the smaller one snatched it right outta my hand and ate it right there in front of me! Can you believe that? Can you? And then, guess what?”

Something told me she was making this shit up as she went along. Maybe it was all the stuttering she was doing. But I decided to play along anyway, so I said, “What?”

“There was this, like, this big flash of light, and then, then there was smoke, and, and, and fireworks too! And then, and then, when the smoke went away, there was a man standing right in front of me! And, and he was tall, and handsome, and, and he was wearing a black tuxedo, and, and a mask! And he was holding a, a rose! And, and then he gave it to me, and then he said, then he said, ‘Thank you very much, Miss Shani. You and your family, you is now tanuki blessed.’ And then, right after that, that’s when I saw you guys, near the big tree, and that’s when I guess you got hurt and fell over, so I ran up to you, and then Sinclair picked up you, and he was really strong! He picked you up and carried you back! The whole way! That really happened! It actually did! And yeah, yeah, that’s what happened. Can you believe that? Can you? Can you?”

That’s when I knew for sure she was lying, because when I’d gotten to that farmhouse, there wasn’t no damn man in a suit. Plus, she was basically just describing Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon, to a goddamn tee. There ain’t no tanuki turning into Tuxedo Mask, that shit’s ridiculous. What likely happened was, she found the farmhouse, saw the tanuki, tried to give them the bead, and then absolutely nothing happened. Those goofyass raccoons sniffed that thing, thought, “What the hell is this? This ain’t food,” then peaced the hell out. That’s why Shani was so sad, those tanuki shattered her wildass dreams right then and there, forced her to grow up a little, become more like me. Sixteen, on the cusp of being a man. Those tanuki were just mundane animals, like the rest of us. No tricks, no magic. That’s the only story that made sense, the only thing that really mapped to my reality.

But for some reason, in that moment, none of that really mattered. I could see in Shani’s eyes that this was her story, this was what she wanted to believe. I wasn’t gonna be the one to shatter her illusions, break her little heart, at least not anymore. It was real to her, so why couldn’t it be real to me? Ain’t everything just a damn figment anyway? I mean, shit, this whole hospital scene could’ve been a goddamn dream. How would I really know? Why break a little girl’s heart over some story when I couldn’t even say for sure if the damn bed I was in was real or not? My eyes could be deceiving me. Hell, my mind could be deceiving me. How could I ever know? When we get right down to it, ain’t the truth just a buncha bullshit anyway? And if a little girl wants to believe some bullshit, if that’s what makes her happy, then who am I to tell her no? It’d take some kinda psycho to break a kid’s heart like that.

That’s why, when Shani asked me if I believed her, I just smiled softly and said, “Yeah, Shani, yeah, I believe it.”

And she smiled back, real wide, buckteeth and all, then she said, “But don’t tell Momma, aight? She’ll think we crazy!” And she was doing that twirly-finger thing by her ear while she said it.

“I won’t,” I said. “I won’t tell her.”

Then she said something that warmed my heart. She said, “You the best Big Bro in the whole world.”

That had me blushing, it really did, but I played it off like it was nothing. “Naw, I ain’t that good. Besides, would the best Big Bro in the whole world do this?”

I grabbed one of the pillows and chucked it as hard as I could in her direction, but I guess I was still pretty weak, because it landed just a few inches away from the bed. That’s when we both started laughing our asses off. We laughed and laughed for like five whole goddamn minutes. I could barely breathe by the time Mom walked in carrying two bags of Chick-fil-A, looking at us like we were crazy.

“What you two laughing about?” she said, placing the bags on the small table near the couch.

Shani instantly went silent, her cheeks real big, like she was holding her breath or someshit.

“Nothing,” I said. “Shani just being ridiculous, like always.”

“Well,” Mom said, taking stuff outta the bag, boxes of waffle fries, chicken nuggets, sandwiches. “Y’all need to eat something.”

I took one look at the box of nuggets and something turned in my stomach. Miss me with that shit, was what I was thinking. But I wasn’t gonna make a big deal outta it, so I just said, “I’ll have some fries.”

Shani, looking blue in the face, exhaled, then said, “Yeah, me too, just fries.”

“Just fries?” Mom said, looking annoyed. “What’s wrong with y’all? Y’all gonna make me waste all this food?”

“I ain’t that hungry,” I added.

“I ain’t that hungry, too,” Shani repeated, trying to sound just like me.

Mom sighed. “I guess I’ll see if the nurses want some.”

Then she made the rounds, handing each of us a big box of fries. We ate without talking for a while, just listening to the EKG, until eventually Mom got up from her chair, walked over to the small CRT high up in the corner of the room, and switched it on.

It was playing the news.

“More protests are underway following the shooting death of twelve-year-old Tamir Rice by a police officer in Cleveland, Ohio. The shooting has sparked renewed national outcry over police use of force, as demonstrations continue across the country following the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.”

“Same old shit,” I said under my breath, with a mouthful of fries.

I guess Mom heard me, because she turned with this stern look and said, “Watch your mouth, and don’t be disrespectful. That could’ve been you!”

I sucked my teeth, feeling the need to argue with her, but instead just grabbed another fry and took a bite. Footage of the protests was playing as I ate, and the newswoman kept talking about all the shootings, how horrible they were, how that Tamir kid didn’t have a real gun, just an airsoft gun, how the police were killing people left and right with no consequence and shit. It was kinda making me sick, to tell you the truth, like all they were trying to do was frighten me. The world as told by mainstream media, that wasn’t the kinda world I wanted to live in. I’d much rather live in Shani’s world, the world of myth and mystery, the world of transforming tanuki.

So I said, “Yo, Mom, change it to Cartoon Network or someshit. Shani don’t wanna see this.”

“Watch your mouth, young man,” she said, giving me a look. Then, just as she was getting up to change the channel, the coverage shifted to something else, footage of Zoo Atlanta.

The newswoman was saying, “In other news, breaking story from Atlanta, an exotic animal has gone missing from the local zoo…”

My curiosity shot through the goddamn roof. I narrowed my eyes at the little screen up there and said to Mom, “Hold up, I wanna see this.”

“...are searching for Loki, one of the park’s two tanuki, after the animal was discovered missing from its habitat early this morning. Officials say there is currently no indication that the animal poses a danger to the public, but visitors are being asked to avoid the area while the search continues. Zoo officials have not said how the tanuki escaped, and they are urging anyone who may have seen the animal to contact zoo security immediately.”

At that, Mom gave me a curious look. “Wasn’t you and Shani going to see the tanukis?”

I gave a half-shrug and looked over at Shani, who was staring up at the TV, munching fries, totally rapt, like she wasn’t even listening to us. Then I looked back at Mom, put my poker face on, and said, “What you trying to say?”

“Nothing,” she replied. “Just a weird coincidence, is all.”

The broadcast continued. They were saying, “Investigative reporter Lauren Williams, our news correspondent down in Atlanta, Georgia, went to Zoo Atlanta to find the truth for herself. Here’s what she found.”

The scene then switched to shaky camera footage of a young woman walking around Zoo Atlanta. She was oohing and aahing at all the different animals, asking random guests a buncha stupidass questions. “Do you work for the zoo? Have you heard about the tanuki? Did you see it? When’d it happen? How’d it happen?” She went on like that for a few minutes, getting nothing from nobody, until eventually she came across the Panda Shop. That’s when she approached a tall man in a safari outfit standing right outside the entrance to Trader’s Alley, which was all taped off with yellow tape that read DO NOT ENTER. The man’s back was turned as the reporter tapped him on the shoulder and said, “Sir, are you with the zoo?”

When the man on screen turned to face the camera, I nearly choked to death and spit out a buncha damn fry chunks.

A wide smile spread across the man’s paleass, alien-looking face. Then he said, “Yes, Special Investigator Madison Sinclair, Dangerous Creatures Division, at your service.”

The reporter froze for a second, like her brain had just blue-screened or someshit. I couldn’t tell if she was stunned by his weirdass beauty, confused by his scary-sounding title, or maybe both. Then she held out the microphone and said, “Ahem, OK then, well, what can you tell me about the tanuki that went missing this morning?”

Sinclair stood there rubbing his pointy chin thoughtfully. After a few seconds, he said in that hypnotic voice of his, “They will come back, or maybe not.”

The reporter seemed genuinely confused by his answer. “Could you expand on that? What do you mean?” she said, occasionally glancing back at the camera with this clueless look on her face.

Sinclair cleared his throat. “Well, they are clever little things. I think they will find their way.”

“Okayyyy…” the reporter said, drawing out the syllables just like that. “When you say they’ll find their way, what do you mean? Where is that, exactly?”

A playful grin formed on Sinclair’s face. Then he shifted his gaze right at the camera and stared hard, like he was hypnotizing the whole goddamn world or someshit, before saying, “Where? Well, wherever they need to be, of course. It is not such a big deal. You should really just stop worrying about it.”

The reporter had been staring right into Sinclair’s eyes, and when he finished talking, she turned back to the camera, her confused expression now replaced by one of almost-stupid joy. Then she said, “OK then! You heard it here first, ladies and gentlemen, the tanuki will show up wherever it needs to be! It’s all good! No need to worry!” Then she waved goodbye and added, “I’m gonna grab me a hot dog from Go Dogs Food Truck! Maybe I’ll even see a tanuki on the way! This has been Lauren Williams, signing out!”

The broadcast then flashed back to the newsroom, where the newswoman sat beside a digital square displaying a picture of Loki right by her head. “Thank you, Lauren. I’m glad everything’s good down at Zoo Atlanta. Nothing to worry about! And those tanuki are just so darned cute, aren’t they? I just wanna grab one and give it a big hug! Anyway, we’ll be right back after these messages.”

Unfuckingbelievable, was all I could think as I watched that crazyass broadcast. One of the tanuki had actually escaped? Was Shani really telling the truth? Nah, no damn way some tanuki had turned into Tuxedo Mask. That shit’s ridiculous. How would they even know who Tuxedo Mask is? I bet tanuki don’t even watch TV. It was probably just a coincidence that Loki escaped the day after we went there. But it was a pretty weird coincidence, that’s for damn sure. A coincidence like that was almost just as unlikely as Shani’s story. But still, animals don’t transform, so it had to be a coincidence. Right? No other explanation. And Sinclair? He was talking all hypnotic and weird on the TV, like he was trying to make the whole damn country forget that a tanuki had gone missing. That was suspicious as hell. But it didn’t mean he was no damn fox or whatever. That guy was always acting weird as hell, so who knew what he was really up to.

But it did get me thinking. Maybe my debate with Sinclair really did happen. Maybe it wasn’t no damn dream after all. Maybe I’d really changed his mind out there. Or maybe it was all some kinda subconscious-fever-dream shit playing out in my mind while I was passed out, like two sides of myself duking it out or someshit, like you see in the movies. Maybe it didn’t matter. Because, to be honest, whoever he was, he kinda changed my mind, too. When I was passing out under that apple tree, dream or not, I remember thinking, maybe zoos ain’t so bad, as long as people who actually care about animals are working there, people like Madison Sinclair.

After letting those thoughts settle for a minute, I popped another waffle fry into my mouth, then looked over at Shani, who was being awfully quiet for some reason.

When our eyes met, she slowly raised one finger to her lips, made a little “shhh” noise, then gave me one of those bigass Mr. Yamada winks.

I just sucked my teeth, shook my head, and leaned back in that hospital bed, accepting the fact that maybe I’d never have all the answers.

I mean, who the hell does, anyway?

***

Nothing happened for a longass time. I kept going to school. Mom kept working her call center job. Shani kept staying obsessed with Sailor Moon and SpongeBob and shit. We kept going on those Thursday “shopping trips,” except Swap USA was gone, so Shani and I just sat in the damn LA Nails the whole time, playing Tekken and eating expensive-ass lollipops. The apartment kept being the same ghettoass place, with the same busted-up walls and moldyass ceilings. I even had to put a few buckets down in the kitchen when the damn pipes started leaking. I kept studying, doing my schoolwork the best I could, got all A’s. I kept mowing lawns, making dinner sometimes, doing what needed to be done to help Mom keep the whole damn house in order. Life just kept going on, like nothing crazy had ever happened. After a while, I’d almost forgotten all about the tanuki thing. Eventually, school let out, summer break started, and I started sleeping in and staying up real damn late, just going with the flow of things.

Until one night, something happened.

Mom came home from work after a long shift. Shani was dead asleep in the room. I was lying on the couch, headphones on, listening to “Chillaxation” by Bop Alloy on my PSP. It had the most dopeass saxophone sample I’d ever heard in my life. Just a little chillaxation. Just a little chillaxation. I was real into that shit, hadn’t even heard Mom come in. Next thing I knew, she was standing right over me, holding an envelope between two fingers.

“This one’s got you and Shani’s name on it,” she said, tossing the letter onto my chest and then walking off to her bedroom.

The envelope was covered in Japanese stamps, some depicting rising suns, others twisted dragons, cherry blossoms, snowy mountains, kimono women, big-balled tanuki, and dudes wearing pilot goggles giving salutes. Mine and Shani’s names were written right there, near the address in the corner, in the worst damn handwriting I’d ever seen in my life. A flood of memories came back to me, precious things I’d almost forgotten, suddenly remembered.

I tore the envelope open and found two things inside.

The first thing was a Polaroid. It was a close-up shot of two men. One was Mr. Yamada. The other was some dude I’d never seen before, but he could’ve been Mr. Yamada’s twin or someshit. They were both standing at the bow of a small boat, wearing huge, goofyass smiles on their faces. Behind them, off in the distant waters, was an island. It was the most beautiful island I’d ever seen, all lush green, with rolling hills and forests as far as the eye could see. And in the white space below the photo, in messy black ink, right beside a crude drawing of a tanuki, it said,

“Thank you. Please visit Shoukichi sometime. Tell him we understand.”

The second thing was the waiver for the Super Mega Blowout Smash Bash. Except now I realized it wasn’t no waiver at all. It was actually some kinda legal document, something from the Tamasaburo estate, and it had my signature right there on the dotted line.

That’s when my eyes went wide, and I suddenly remembered what Shani had said that day at the hospital.

“You is tanuki blessed.”

It wasn’t often we drove through the Downtown Atlanta Connector, but when we did, it was always for something real special.

The dash of the old station wagon read 10:30 AM, and Mom had it tuned to her favorite station, 103.3 FM, ATL’s Number One for Hip-Hop and R&B. They were playing some oldies, “My Boo” by Ghost Town DJs. That 808 cowbell and kick were going off as I watched skyscrapers go by through the tinted window. The Bank of America building seemed way bigger than it did from the projects, but I could still crush it with just two fingers, so how big could it really be? And those medieval-looking Basilica towers loomed nearby, out of place in that concrete purgatory, not nearly as tall as the Bank of America building, but all the same shit, all pretend debt and phony salvation. To a CEO, seven figures in the bank probably seemed like some kinda deliverance, but they’d only be fooling themselves, because no amount of money can open those pearly gates, that kinda shit comes from within, at least that’s what the Buddhists say. 1065 Williams Street NW zoomed by faster than a speeding bullet, still enough time for the faces of Master Shake, Space Ghost, and Spike Spiegel to bounce around in my brain. I didn’t wanna work for no man when I grew up, but I guess I wouldn’t mind working for that one. How damn cool would that be? Shani was playing my PSP in the back, which I normally never let her do, but ever since that last Thursday afternoon, I’d been feeling pretty generous. Plus, I didn’t wanna miss this shit, I loved watching the city go by. It was like a whole ’nother world out there, hard to believe people even built that shit. I’d read that some of those buildings cost hundreds of millions of dollars, seemed like a damn waste to me, especially since people were sleeping in boxes just below those very same goddamn buildings. Trey always said it was the white man trying to keep us down, his favorite TV show The Boondocks, but, hell, I’d seen black dudes do some real evilass shit just to get their hands on a couple hundred-dollar bills, so it seemed to me like race had nothing to do with it, maybe money was the real problem here, defiling everything it touched, like some kinda equal-opportunity corrupter, ain’t nobody immune. And I could see the corruption everywhere, in everything, in the buildings, the billboards, especially the faces of people zooming by in their fancyass cars. Everyone looked serious as hell, driving as fast as possible, like they were all late for work or someshit, like they gotta make those big bucks before they kick the bucket or whatever. I wanted to tell them, no matter how fast you drive, you can’t outrun the damn Grim Reaper, and you certainly ain’t taking your wallet with you after that scythe comes down. But of course that didn’t stop people from driving like they’d lost their goddamn minds, merging without signaling, weaving through traffic, honking and riding our ass, all while Mom was sitting there gripping the wheel real tight, shouting words that should never be repeated. She always had a real bad temper, taking her rage out not only on the road, but also on me. Sometimes I thought Jesus was the wrong man for her, what her ass really needed was the Buddha, because she needed to calm the hell down, find that inner peace.

When we arrived at Zoo Atlanta, the parking wasn’t nearly as bad as I was expecting for a Saturday morning. Mom found a spot close to the park, so we only had to walk a few blocks to get to the front gate. About a minute in, Shani started complaining that her legs hurt or someshit. Mom and I told her to suck it up, we knew she was just being lazy, but she kept going on and on about it like she always does. So I picked her small ass up, put her on my shoulders, and carried her the whole damn way, right through the front gate, which looked like a jungle hut or someshit, with columns made from logs, flimsy-looking thatched roofs, and a bigass ZOO ATLANTA sign with forest green text and gorilla pictures all around it. It was hanging just above the ticket line. As we passed under it, Shani slapped it with her hand and shouted, “TANUKI TIME!” in decibel levels that could make your damn head explode.

Under normal circumstances, surrounded by all those damn people, Shani’s antics would’ve embarrassed me, but not that day. Because that day, I just wanted Shani to be happy. I wanted her to remember that day for the rest of her life. Lord knows I still do.

But, to be honest, despite her small size, she was straight-up breaking my back. Maybe it was that damn afro of hers. It’d grown wild over the last few months, and that metal comb sticking out probably added a pound or two. More likely, though, it was just because I never worked out and was thin as hell, and my big hoodie wasn’t doing much to keep that November chill from cutting right through me. Either way, I couldn’t keep carrying her ass, so I had to put her down once we got in line.

We waited in the ticket line for maybe ten minutes. Shani was restless the whole time, talking Mom’s ear off about tanuki shit. I was looking around, examining people, taking in the surroundings, noting the exits, all that shit. There was a sign nearby that said ZOO RULES, and it had like a hundred bullet points on it. The first one was “NO PETS ALLOWED,” which had me laughing, considering this was a goddamn zoo, full of fucking pets. They could lock up elephants, make them stand on balls and shit, but dogs and cats were unhinged, uncontrollable, outta the question. Go figure. That’s zoo logic for your ass.

When we stepped up to the booth, both Shani and Mom were looking at me with these expectant looks on their faces, like I was suddenly the sole provider for the household or someshit. So I whipped out my cheap TJ Maxx wallet, asked the lady how much, and ended up paying about seventy bucks total, since there was a buy-two-get-one-free promo going on. Then the lady had the audacity to ask me if I wanted to buy a damn Flash Pass.

“Hell naw,” I said immediately. Why would I wanna pay extra to see animals suffer faster? They ain’t going nowhere, plus they’re all suffering at the same goddamn rate regardless. Any amount of money for this shit was too much to begin with. Zoos were goddamn criminal, as far as I was concerned. Besides, I was planning to get the hell outta there as fast as possible anyway. There were only two reasons I was at this evilass place to begin with. The first was to fulfill Mr. Yamada’s last request, and the second was to make Shani’s wildass dreams come true. That was it. Miss me with the atrocity exhibition bullshit.

The inside of the park was busier than the cars outside would’ve led you to believe. The waves of people contained by turnstiles and concrete and fences and gates and shit. I was thinking for a minute that this was a damn people zoo, not an animal zoo, but then I realized we could leave whenever we wanted, and the other animals didn’t have that luxury, so maybe it wasn’t a people zoo after all, maybe it was just another shithole. The first non-human animals I saw were the pink flamingos. Their pen was just to the left of the entrance. They were all standing there, one leg up, looking like lawn decorations. Opposite that was a food stall called Go Dogs Food Truck. “All Beef Hot Dogs!” was what the sign said. It unsettled me, to tell you the truth, the fact they were selling beef at a zoo. That’s one step away from just killing the zoo animals and feeding them to the guests, was what I was thinking. I guess they’re OK with chopping up cows, serving them up in fancyass sesame seed buns, but they’re not OK with killing elephants and lions and shit. Why not go all the way, why not just kill them all? I found myself wondering, what criteria decided which animals were food and which were entertainment? And which fate was actually worse? Both seemed pretty damn awful to me. I wasn’t no damn vegan when I went into that place, but it was fixing to turn me into one, that’s for damn sure.

We’d all eaten Pop-Tarts and cereal and shit for breakfast, so none of us were all that hungry, especially me, with my head still swirling with all those darkass vegan thoughts. But when Shani saw the nearby souvenir stall, packed with animal-shaped lollipops, she lost control and went wild like she always does. You know how she is about her damn lollipops. “I want one! I want one!” she shouted before bolting off into that ocean of people. And as she bobbed and weaved between legs, I lost sight of her. Mom started freaking out. “Where’d she go?! Where’d she go?!” But I was cool and collected, saying, “Calm down, she’s just right over there.” Then I followed in Shani’s wildass wake, rubbing shoulders and bumping into people as I slid my way to the stall. But when I got there, Shani was gone, like she’d passed through a damn portal or someshit. She’d just up and vanished like goddamn Swap USA.

Mom caught up with me, panting, and said, “Where is she? Where’s my baby girl?”

I was scanning all over the place, up and down, sideways too, thinking to myself, aw shit, here we go again. Shani was always getting herself lost whenever we went places, and sometimes it’d take hours for us to find her ass because she never stayed in one damn place for long. It was that ADHD brain of hers all the teachers kept saying she had. That’s why she was in all those special classes. I wasn’t worried, though, because it wasn’t like anyone was gonna kidnap Shani. That’d be insane. She was too much of a damn handful. I mean, even if someone did abduct her, they’d probably return her ass within five damn minutes.

“I’m going to the front desk,” Mom said, looking around with the crazy eyes, fear written all over her face. “Security. They’ll know what to do.” She was breathing heavy, and I could hear the panic creeping into her voice, even though this happened literally every damn time we went anywhere in public.

So, of course, I thought she was overreacting. I also didn’t think no wannabe police officers were gonna help the situation, but I said, “Aight,” anyway, just because. Then I lowered my hoodie to help with my peripherals and said, “I’ll look around, see if I can find her. Meet you back in thirty,” still all calm and collected because I wasn’t worried, plus I was looking forward to some alone time, some relative peace and quiet.

Mom nodded with this terrified look on her face, then bolted off toward the entrance, shouting, “Keep your phone on!” as she dodged oncoming human traffic.

I had a good idea where Shani had run off to. Trader’s Alley, where Thor and Loki lived. If I was her, that’s where I’d be. So I slid my headphones over my ears, hit shuffle on my PSP, and found myself one of those bigass directories. A relaxed drumbeat was going off, watery synths, uplifting horns, all downtempo and chill. It was “Waterfalls” by TLC, one of Mom’s oldies that had somehow found its way onto my device. It didn’t really fit the situation, but it felt right, so I didn’t bother skipping it. Plus, I’d already pocketed my PSP and was too busy tracing a path with one finger across the huge map in front of me. Trader’s Alley was just north of where I was at, past the Rhino Habitat and the Clouded Leopard Den. Then I’d have to take a left by the Panda Shop into Trader’s Alley, passing tigers, sun bears, Komodo dragons, and naked mole rats along the way. Looked like I was about to go on a goddamn safari.

So that’s what I did. I went on a goddamn safari. The chorus was playing, “I know that you’re gonna have it your way or nothing at all, but I think you’re moving too fast,” but I wasn’t moving fast at all. I was walking along at a brisk pace, bobbing my head to the breakbeat, getting lost in those wobbly waterfalls, those airy horns, those soft jazzy tones, watching those sad animals go by, and not just zoo animals, human animals too. Stressed moms, pissed-off dads, crazyass kids on leashes, teenagers acting the fool, rhinos just standing around eating grass, looking depressed as hell, leopards pacing back and forth in the corner of their exhibit, people leaning over the railings, laughing, cheering. It struck me that not a single one of those people had stopped to analyze what they were actually doing, getting pleasure from the suffering of animals. It made me kinda sick. And the Panda Shop was just as you’d expect, a shop full of panda shit, flanked by huge ceramic pandas, with kids climbing all over them. There was even a photo booth, with a person in a full-body panda suit inside. Kids were going into that booth, getting their picture taken with this panda person, and I’m sure each photo cost like fifty bucks, because charging people to watch animals suffer wasn’t evil enough, they had to exploit the goddamn kids too.

Right before I entered Trader’s Alley, past the sun bears and the Komodos, I came upon the tigers, all huddled together in the corner of their fakeass habitat. There were trees planted here and there, out-of-place rocks scattered around, and some marshy shit that was supposed to make the place look wild, but instead, it just looked like somebody had Googled “tiger habitat” and built whatever dumb shit came up first. There was a slab of meat sitting in the middle of the pen, but the tigers didn’t seem one bit interested. They were just bunched together in the corner, looking small despite how damn big they were. It was like they knew this wasn’t where they were supposed to be, but they had nowhere else to go, nothing else to do, trapped in a Walmart imitation of a world they’d never actually experience themselves. And I remember thinking, what kinda life is that? Eating when somebody decides to feed you, sleeping all day because there’s not a damn thing that interests you, spending your whole damn life behind metal fences while dumb kids made faces at you and took pictures. These animals weren’t wild anymore. Corporate America had turned them into pretenders. House cats, is what they were, and it was a damn shame.

I guess you could say I wasn’t being very constructive at the zoo that day, being negative about every little goddamn thing, but back then, well, what can I say? I just really fucking hated zoos. Walking through that atrocity exhibition, I could’ve let it ruin my whole mood, but TLC was going, “Believe in yourself, the rest is up to me and you,” so I told myself I was gonna try to be positive from then on out, then I pressed on, determined to find my wildass sister and fulfill an old goofyass Japanese man’s final request.

As I passed into Trader’s Alley, it was like passing into some kinda weird fever dream. I suddenly found myself surrounded by huge, gnarled-looking trees, on a walkway canopied by swaying leaves, shadows like living blobs of ink, a chill wind whistling through every little thing. The path was like some kinda ancient nature trail you’d see in an anime or someshit. There were paper lanterns, kinda like the ones back at Swap USA, dangling from trees, blanketing everything in dim orangish hues, and some of the trunks had bigass scrolls nailed into them. The entire place had an almost mystical vibe to it, like there was some kinda old magic in the air, not that I believed in any of that shit. I was sixteen, on the cusp of being a man, I didn’t have no time for that fantastical nonsense.

There was a certain calm in that place, but at the same time, it kinda freaked me the hell out, made me feel like I wasn’t supposed to be there. But I pressed on anyway, and as I did, the woods got darker and the mood got stranger. A gray fog blanketed everything. There were dead leaves all over the pathway, so each step was an eerie-ass crunch. It was almost like I was slowly walking through a portal or someshit, because the farther I went, the fewer people there were, and the few people I did see were wearing oldschool Japanese outfits, like kimonos and straw hats and shit, stuff you’d see in an old Kurosawa film or whatever. I figured it was all part of the whole Oriental theme they had going on, like it was cosplay or whatever, so I didn’t really pay it no mind, at first.

Eventually, though, the people vanished, and I was left all by myself. I barely noticed TLC had faded out, and for some reason, the next song never played, so I just kept walking, listening only to the crunch of leaves, the birds chirping, all the weird animal noises going off in the distance, animals that had no business being in downtown Atlanta, if that was even where I was anymore. The thought that I might’ve been somewhere else started to spook me, though, got me thinking irrationally and shit, like maybe I’d actually been transported somewhere. It was stupid, but sometimes you can’t control that shit. That’s when the urge to call Mom hit me, partly to tell her where I was at, but mostly just to hear her voice, tether me back to reality. But when I pulled up my phone, there were no bars. The signal was dead.

I was starting to get afraid, to tell you the truth, but I pressed on, determined to find Shani. After some time, a hazy outline appeared in the fog, a person, the only person I’d seen in the last who-knows-how-long. It was a little girl, walking down the foggy path, and she looked a helluva lot like Shani. I shouted her name, but she didn’t look back, and I couldn’t seem to catch up with her, even after I broke into a sprint. Eventually, she vanished into the haze like some kinda ghost, but I just kept running.

Minutes later, I saw her again. She was standing by an old Japanese-looking hut, talking to somebody, a man. I lowered my headphones, because there was nothing playing anyway, then squinted my eyes to get a better look. And sure enough, it was Shani, but I couldn’t make out who the man was because his back was facing me and it was foggy as hell. But I could tell that the man was tall and thin, wearing one of those dumbass safari outfits. And that’s when my stomach dropped, because I suddenly had a good idea who it was, and I didn’t like it, not one damn bit. It looked to me like Special Investigator Madison Sinclair. I couldn’t believe it. Had he been telling the truth? I’d thought he was just some crazyass psycho, making shit up. But did he really work at the zoo? No goddamn way.

So I positioned myself behind one of those bigass trees to get a sneaky look at what was going on, and sure as hell, it was him, the psycho himself, looking like he’d just jumped right outta one of those goddamn LA Nails posters. I could tell he and Shani were in the middle of something, but what that something was, I had no clue. All I could see was Shani smiling real wide, waving her arms around, all animated and shit, while Sinclair just stood there with a hand on his chin, nodding along. My brotherly instincts were kicking in, so I suddenly felt the urge to rush in, jump that freak, protect Shani. But what I actually ended up doing was just walking up to them, real casually, acting like the great pretender, pretending like I wasn’t scared outta my goddamn mind.

I put a hand on Shani’s afro and said, “Shani, how many times we gotta tell you, you can’t just run off like that.” And I did all this while pretending like Sinclair wasn’t there. In fact, I had my back turned to him, like he wasn’t even worth my consideration.

Shani seemed startled at first, but when she realized it was me, she started jumping up and down like she does. “I sorry. I just really wanted to see the tanuki!” she was saying. She had a big tanuki-shaped lollipop in her hand, and she was waving it all around like a blur. “Tanuki! Tanuki! Tanuki! ‘Nuki! ‘Nuki!”

Noticing the lollipop, I said, “You pay for that?” Then I just sucked my teeth, because what was I thinking? Shani didn’t have no money, she was a damn seven-year-old. She’d stolen that shit. But it didn’t matter. I just wanted to get outta there as quick as humanly possible, so I pulled out my phone again, to text Mom that I’d found Shani, but the signal was still dead. That’s when Sinclair said something that caught my attention.

He said, “Ah, young man,” in that hypnotic, psycho voice of his. “We meet again.”

I thought to myself, we meet again? This fool talks like he’s in a goddamn film noir. I turned a little to give him a quick glance, then feigned stupid and said, “Sorry, who’re you?”

“Special Investigator Madison Sinclair, Dangerous Creatures Division. We met at the store, what was it called...” He placed a hand on his pointy chin and made one of those hmmm noises. “Ah, that’s right, Swap USA.”

“Yeah, don’t remember, sorry,” I said in a short, rudeass tone. I dunno why I was lying. Being the great pretender just made me feel more secure and shit, like I was distancing myself from this man’s crazy ass.

“Well, that’s OK.” Sinclair smiled his big fakeass smile. “Your sister here was just telling me all about Mr. Yamada,” he said, pausing for a moment, then looking me up and down before adding, “...and the tanuki.”

That shifted something in my stomach, unsettled me. I narrowed my eyes at Sinclair, then glanced down at Shani and said, in a low, whispery tone, “What the hell you tell him?”

Shani flashed her pearly buckteeth and said, “I just told him about how Mr. Yamada is a tanuki and how he gave us that lucky bead and how he wants us to free his brothers, that’s all.”

That’s all? Shani told this crazyass man we were basically planning to commit crimes? That’s it? The hell’s wrong with this girl? That’s the problem with little kids, all pure and innocent and shit, don’t know when to keep their damn mouths shut.

Sinclair spoke again, this time with a grin. “She also thinks I am a fox, isn’t that funny?”

I thought to myself, a fox? Where’d she come up with that crazy shit? Then, in the span of like a split second, a whirlwind of memories came back to me. I remembered that time Sinclair had changed his damn clothes so fast, and that Zoo Atlanta infomercial, how they said foxes could shapeshift and shit, and how Mr. Yamada, when I’d asked him about Sinclair, he said, “Oh, fox?” And Ryutaro, “very tricky fox.” Then I looked at Sinclair, at his pointy, pale face, his thin, angled eyes, his bizarre bone structure, like he was some goddamn model from another planet or someshit. And that’s when it clicked. Obviously, to Shani, this man was a damn fox, or a kitsune, or whatever they’re called in Japan. I didn’t believe it myself, not really, but when I tried to put myself in Shani’s shoes, with her overactive ADHD brain, full of fantasy and foolishness, it made perfect damn sense.

And right when it was starting to click, something in me suddenly screamed, DANGER! That fight-or-flight shit kicked in, and I of course chose flight. So I grabbed Shani’s wrist, tugged her a little, and said, “C’mon, we gotta go!”

But before I could bolt the hell outta there, Sinclair looked me in the eye, which kinda froze me in place. Then he said something that made me think.

He said, “Do you believe it?”

“Believe what?” I said, wearing those attack eyebrows.

“Her story, of course.”

I started saying, “That girl has a wildass imagination,” but then I looked at Shani, who was staring at me with those big brown eyes of hers. Those eyes which, in that moment, I thought must be protected at all costs. Protected not only from physical pain, but also mental pain, that hurt and sorrow and suffering and shit. I didn’t believe her story, not really, but it made sense. And with those big wobbly eyes staring right at me, I just couldn’t say no to her. I couldn’t let her down.

So, turning my gaze back to Sinclair, I said, “Yeah, damn right I believe it.”

“See! See! Even my big bro thinks so!” Shani shouted, wrestling free of my grip and bouncing up and down like she does. “So won’t you help us? Won’t you help us free the tanuki, Mr. Fox?!”

Sinclair’s cheshire smile turned into a flat line. Then he raised one dark eyebrow and said, “Where, then, is this so-called lucky bead?”

Shani instantly whipped out the bead and held it up to Sinclair. “Right here, see!”

Towering over her, Sinclair leaned forward, examining the thing, narrowing his already narrow eyes until they were basically closed shut. Then he scrunched his nose, pulled back, and let out a high-pitched “Ho ho ho!” before getting all stoic and saying, “That, my dear, is just marble.”

“It’s not just a marble! It’s a lucky bead! Tamasaburo gave it to Mr. Yamada at Tama Hills!”

Feeling less frozen-in-place, but still feeling that sense of danger, I nervously said, “C’mon, Shani, let’s go. Momma’s looking for us. We can…”

But Sinclair cut me off, like I wasn’t even there. He was looking Shani right in the eye when he said, “Hand me the marble, young lady. I will examine it for you.”

“OK!” Shani said with a clueless smile, then she went to hand Sinclair the lucky bead.

That innocence and purity was making her act stupid as hell again, defenseless against Sinclair’s crazyass charisma, so I stepped between them and said, “Naw, we good.”

Sinclair furrowed his brow, looked me straight in the eye, and said, “She must give me the marble.”

And when he looked at me, that strange feeling came over me again, that psycho-killer shit. But I knew better. I’d worked all this out. All I needed to do was exert my own will. So I shook my head hard and repeated myself, “Naw, we good.”

Annoyance flashed across Sinclair’s face, then he feigned a stoic expression and said, “If what you say is true, then you are intending to commit a crime. Do you realize that, young man?” Then he rubbed his pointy chin and added in a menacing tone, “Releasing animals from the zoo, without permission, hmm, what is that, a felony?”

I gulped, because maybe he was right, but I didn’t give a damn, so I said, “We ain’t doing shit, we just standing here, minding our own business, ain’t nothing to do with you. We gonna see the tanuki, then we going home. That’s it.”

Sinclair grinned. “Then surely you wouldn’t mind if I accompanied you?”

Damn, this freak was calling my bluff, and his will was strong. I was focusing so hard that sweat was forming on my brow, and I was starting to feel a little faint, to tell you the truth, but I tried to play it all cool regardless. “I don’t want no security guard following me around, cramps my style, you know?”

“Ah, but I am no security guard,” he said, glaring at me. “And besides, you will never find your way around this place. It is not, well, how should I put this...” He paused. “This place is not all that it appears to be.”

Getting all hot and bothered, I snapped. “Man, what’s your damn game? Why you doing this?”

“What in the world do you mean?” he said, talking all innocently like he was in a goddamn Disney movie or someshit, still staring hard at me, not blinking even once. Then he added, “I simply want to make sure you do not get lost in here.”

“Naw, you up to something. You don’t want us to see the damn tanuki, I know it,” I said, staring right back at him, refusing to blink, exerting my will so hard I could feel sweat beading up and dripping down my face in real time. “You ain’t fooling me.”

At that, Sinclair didn’t say a word, he was just glaring at me, hard. And in that moment, staring into that fox’s slanty eyes, I adopted Shani’s story, made it my own. Like I’d been saying, I didn’t believe it, not really, but somehow, in that moment, I tricked myself. I don’t know how or why it happened. Maybe I thought it was the only way to change Sinclair’s mind, get him off my damn back. Whatever the reason, for a brief moment there, I was thinking like a kid again, and it felt good, damn good.

So I sucked my teeth and said, “You scared, think the tanuki gonna get revenge or someshit.”

Scrunching his nose, he replied, “That is ridiculous. Why would they want revenge? They are simple creatures.”

“Because you got them caged,” I said, wiping sweat from my brow. “They don’t wanna be an exhibit, they wanna be free.”

“Look around you, young man,” Sinclair said with an air of righteousness. “Do you see it?”

“Do I see what?”

“Japan,” he said. “All around us. This place was created specifically for them, to make them feel comfortable, at home. Why would they want to be free? They have everything they need right here.”

“This ain’t Japan,” I said. “This is damn Zoo Atlanta.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure, and even if you made it exactly like Japan, it still wouldn’t be enough.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because it ain’t real!” I shouted. “It’s pretend!”

“Pretend or not, the tanuki like it here. They have never once attempted to escape,” he said with a strange expression on his face, like he knew what he was saying was bullshit.

“That ain’t true,” I countered, sucking my teeth again. “Mr. Yamada escaped.”

“That is not even his name,” he said quickly. Then his expression softened, became pensive, almost sad. After a moment of nothing but the wind whistling, he added, “‘Taro Yamada,’ that is the Japanese equivalent of what you might call ‘John Doe.’ It is a made-up name. We called him Tyr, for courage and duty, as he was very headstrong, but that too is a made-up name. The truth is, no one knows his name, except for those two tanuki, and they cannot talk, they have forgotten how, as they are merely simple creatures.”

“Simple creatures?” I said, keeping my eyes locked on this trickyass fox, exerting so much willpower that I was starting to feel a little light-headed. But I collected myself and added, “Ain’t we all simple creatures? Basic wants, needs, desires, all that bullshit.”

“Some are simpler than others.”

“That seems like a damn matter of perspective to me,” I said, having flashbacks to my short stint with the debate club at school. “And besides, ain’t you a damn fox? Ain’t that what you supposed to be?”

Sinclair squirmed, like I’d made him uncomfortable, then he said, “I do not see the relevance.”

“You don’t see the relevance?” I said, sucking my teeth. “OK, then let me ask you something.”

“Go on.”

Staring him right in those slanty eyes of his, I said, “What makes you so damn special?”

At that, Sinclair broke eye contact, and the moment he did, it felt like I was released from some sorta spell. I stumbled backward, caught myself, then put a hand on my forehead because suddenly I had a real bad headache, and I was sweating something fierce. Sinclair was watching me with this curious, surprised look on his face, like he’d never been asked a question like that before. Then he said, in a quivering tone, “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” I said, breathing heavily, “exactly what I said. What makes you so damn special? You an animal, just like a tanuki, and y’all both transform or whatever, supposedly. Hell, according to your own damn infomercial, y’all practically related. So if it’s OK for a tanuki to be penned up, turned into some kinda spectacle, then why shouldn’t you be thrown in a damn exhibit yourself?”

He started squirming even more. I could tell he was trying to find the words, but nothing was coming out. It was like I had caught him off guard or someshit.

So I added, “How do you decide what animals get locked up and what animals don’t? And what makes you so damn special that you think you can even decide that shit to begin with?”

Sinclair started stammering. “F-foxes, foxes are more clever, we, they, they’re able to adapt, assimilate...”

“Ain’t humans more clever than foxes?” I said. “Tell me, then, why shouldn’t I just put you in a damn cage?”

“I...” Sinclair trailed off, staring at his own feet. It was obvious to me that he’d never thought about this shit before. Foxes may be clever, I thought, but they ain’t very mindful, that’s for damn sure.

I was feeling like I was about to pass out, but I was also feeling like I was on a damn roll, real worked the hell up, so I kept going. “And when does it stop? If goddamn aliens came down, smarter than us, what’s stopping them from just putting us all in a damn zoo? And then, when new aliens come down, smarter than the old ones, what’s stopping them from putting those other aliens in zoos, and so on? I’ll tell you what’s stopping them, according to your logic, fucking nothing, that’s what.” I paused to catch my breath, then kept going. “When we start ranking animals like a goddamn Smash Bros tier list, we all become zoo animals. That shit ain’t sustainable. And it ain’t how I wanna look at life, it ain’t the values I wanna pass down to Shani or anyone else. It’s a cycle of suffering, Sinclair, stupidass suffering.”

When he looked back up at me, he seemed like an entirely different animal. That mischievous grin was gone, replaced by the look of somebody who’d just had the goddamn existential rug pulled out from under him, like he’d been forced to confront someshit he’d spent his whole life trying to avoid. But in one last-ditch attempt to justify what I viewed as his own damn hypocrisy, he started monologuing like a villain in a goddamn Japanese role-playing game.

“Tanuki cannot survive out there. Their homes, our homes, have been destroyed. Our families have been killed. Back in Japan, they have nowhere left to go. The age of tanuki is long over. They could not assimilate. Some of them tried, all of them failed. They end up in alleyways, eating out of garbage cans, drinking water from gutters, run over by cars, poisoned by antifreeze, trapped in storm drains, caught in fences, crushed under construction equipment. Foxes are smarter than that. That is why foxes are everywhere and tanuki are nowhere. The human world is too demanding for them. Humans take themselves too seriously. Tanuki are incapable of taking themselves seriously. Tanuki are simpleminded, carefree. They live and breathe in the moment, play games and fool around all day. They have no sense of responsibility. In fact, they shun responsibility. They do not have the first clue how to survive in the human world. They do not know how to work, how to make money, how to commute. They cannot even learn to ride a bike or drive a car, and believe me, we have tried to teach them. They are hopeless. They may have the power, but they do not have a clue how to properly use it.”

He paused and cast his thin eyes back down at the ground. For a moment there, he even looked like he was about to cry, then he continued.

“But I do not look down upon them. No. I care deeply for them. We are more similar than different, after all. That is why this place exists, for them, to make them comfortable in their final days. This is not a punishment or a cruelty, it is a mercy. That is why I take my job seriously, young man. I protect these animals. And what you propose to do will only hurt them, get them killed. It is irresponsible, dangerous. It is a risk I am not willing to take.”

When he was done, I realized he wasn’t no damn villain after all. He was just a misguided fool, a misguided fool with a good heart, probably like me in some ways. But I still didn’t agree with him, and I intended to make that damn clear.

So I said, “But shouldn’t they be allowed to make their own decision? What gives you the right? You ain’t God.”

“What gives me the right?” he repeated. Then he put a hand on his chin and looked up into the canopy, closing his eyes.

For a long moment there, neither of us said shit. The wind whistled, birds chirped somewhere overhead, and off in the distance I could hear tigers and bears and all kinda other foreign animals just talking amongst themselves.

Until, eventually, Sinclair opened his eyes and said, almost to himself, “I do not know.”

I thought maybe I was finally getting through to him. This whole debate had me feeling for the guy, it really did. I guess tricking myself into believing Shani’s crazyass story helped with that, because otherwise, I would’ve just thought this dude was out of his damn mind, pretending to be a goddamn fox. But naw, somewhere along the way, I’d stopped seeing him as some crazyass psycho and started seeing him as a real person, with thoughts and feelings and all that shit. I started seeing him as somebody who might actually be telling the truth, or at least somebody who believed he was. And once I started looking at him that way, I didn’t know what the hell I believed anymore, either. Maybe that was the whole point. What’s real? What’s fiction? Who the hell even knows? Ain’t everything just a damn story when we get right down to it?

So I said, almost playfully, “Aight, Mr. Fox, you gonna help us find these damn tanuki or what?”

At that, Sinclair lowered his gaze and smiled the first genuine smile I’d ever seen him smile, then he said, “Yes. We will let them decide.”

Then, suddenly, a look of concern flashed across his face, and he said, “Where is the young lady?”

Shit. I’d forgotten all about Shani. Why was I always doing that? I turned around real quick, hoping she was just hiding behind me or someshit, but there was nothing but dead leaves and fog. Shani had run off again, like she was always doing. I couldn’t blame her, though. Kids ain’t got time for no intellectual debate-type bullshit.

Realizing Shani was really gone, Sinclair lifted his nose to the air, sniffed, twitched, then shouted, “Come, quick, follow me!” before bolting off down the pathway, into the fog.

I followed, but I was feeling faint, sweaty as hell, so I was having trouble keeping up. Sinclair was running so fast, making all these wildass twists and turns, ducking down all sorts of hidden paths, passing cherry blossom trees, Japanese-style huts, teahouses, bathhouses, koi ponds, all blanketed in orangish hues and leafy shade. People flashed by like ghosts, some wearing kimonos, others with blades at their hips. It was like running through Sengoku-era Japan, a scene straight outta Samurai Champloo or someshit. But I just couldn’t keep up. When we turned onto a beaten pathway between a break in the trees, a pathway leading up a steep green hill, I used the last of my strength to shout, “Yo, Sinclair! Wait up!” Then everything went dark and I fell facefirst into the damn grass.

The next thing I knew, my arm was around Sinclair’s bonyass shoulders, and he was helping me up this massive hill dotted with a blurry rainbow of flowers. He was saying, “Do not worry, young man, not much longer now, we are almost there,” while I was seeing double, feeling like I was basically dying, and kinda panicking internally. So I pulled my phone outta my pocket while we were moving, trying to text Mom again, but I could barely make out what was on the damn screen, just a flurry of pixels and the word ROAMING where the signal bars should’ve been. Then I nearly tripped over a damn pebble and dropped my phone. I considered stopping to pick it up, but thought to myself, “To hell with it, doesn’t matter,” and just kept on going, up the hill, through the fog, propped up by this man who may or may not have actually been a goddamn fox.

After about a minute of walking, the path leveled out, revealing what looked like an endless stretch of farmland. There wasn’t a damn cloud in sight, just an infinite white expanse, and the sun was high up there, looking like a big red circle peering down on all things. I could see blurry people far off in the distance, wearing coned hats, whacking the ground with tools and shit, and I was thinking to myself, “Damn, I must still be passed the hell out, because this ain’t real, this is a goddamn fever dream.”

I let Sinclair lead me down a dirt path until we came to what looked like a shaded grove of apple trees, that’s when he stopped, pointed toward a building in the middle, and said, “There.”

At first, I couldn’t make out what he was pointing at. My vision was all hazy and red, but I squinted real hard and finally realized it was some kinda farmhouse, made of old wooden planks, with a thatched roof sagging over the whole thing, bigass holes torn through it. There were statues all over the place, thin Buddhas and bald pilgrims carrying staves. The doors were old wooden sliders, and the windows were nothing more than thin strips of wood. The place was ramshackle as hell and probably couldn’t hold up to a small gust of wind, much less someone just sneezing in its general direction.

Totally outta strength, I removed my arm from Sinclair’s shoulder, sat myself down lotus-style in the shade of a bigass apple tree, and said, “Aight, what the hell is this?”

“This is Tama Hills, home of Thor and Loki.” Then he pointed toward the farmhouse again and added, “And your sister.”

My sister? I squinted real hard, and, sure enough, there she was, little Shani, right by one of those sliding doors. I guess she’d found her way all by herself. I knew she would. That kid was tougher than she looked. She was kneeling down, holding her hand out toward the door’s opening, and something in her palm was shimmering in the Japanese sunlight.

The last thing I remember were two fat, goofyass-looking furrballs peeking through the door. I smiled real wide, fell backward into the cool grass, and thought to myself, “Maybe this place ain’t half bad,” then I passed the hell out.

The next day, I woke up in the damn hospital.

It’s crazy how you never know that shit in the moment. Maybe if I’d known, I’d’ve been a little nicer to him that night. Maybe I wouldn’t’ve had such a crankyass attitude. Maybe my last words would’ve been someshit other than, “You crazy, Mr. Yamada.” Maybe I would’ve told him how much I enjoyed getting to know him, or how much I liked being his accomplice, or how much fun I’d had during the Super Mega Blowout Smash Bash, or how much his store meant to me, how it’d changed my life, introduced me to all sorts of dopeass Japanese shit I never would’ve known about otherwise, like Dragon Ball GT and Pocky and Rocky and all that tanuki shit. Maybe I would’ve even given him a hug or a handshake or some cornyass shit like that. Who knows.

How could I have known? I couldn’t’ve. It’s impossible. How can we ever know? Friends, family, pets, archenemies, at some point, we never see them again, and we ain’t privy to the what, the when, the where, or sometimes even the why. It just happens, without notice. One day, poof, they’re gone, just like that. It really gets you thinking about life and shit.

And it happens all sorts of ways. Sometimes it’s a car crash or a heart attack. Sometimes they fall down the stairs, trip on a rock, crack their heads open. Sometimes they overdose, get shot, get arrested. Sometimes they just up and leave, start a new life, decide they don’t wanna deal with this shit no more, abandon their wife and kids, go gallivanting off somewhere, end up dead in some gutter or, if they’re lucky, in some homeless shelter downtown. And sometimes, well, they just vanish without a trace, leave you standing there, thinking, “What the fuck? Where the hell’d you go?”

And that’s exactly what I was thinking that next Thursday afternoon. Because, just like my damn phone the week before, Swap USA had just up and vanished. Poof. Gone. Just like that. Mr. Yamada along with it. And that freak Sinclair, I hadn’t seen him in a good bit either. Whatever damn portal they’d been spit out of, well, it just sucked them right back up, I guess.

Because that Thursday, I found myself standing in front of a barren storefront, no paper lanterns, no tanuki statues, no lucky cats, no video game posters, no nothing. It was just a tan brick wall, with visible water damage, like it hadn’t been pressure washed in hundreds of years. The door was closed tight, and it had one of those keypad locks on the handle. There was a sign on the window that read, “LOOKING TO OPEN YOUR OWN STORE? CALL ART @ L.D. COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE. THE L STANDS LOW, THE D STANDS FOR DOWNPAYMENT.” The words “LOW” and “DOWNPAYMENT” were crossed out in red spray paint, replaced by “LIMP” and “DICK,” which would’ve had me laughing if I hadn’t been so wrapped up in my own damn head.

Because I just couldn’t believe it. At some point, in just a week’s time, Swap USA had given up the ghost, dropped out of reality. Poof, bye-bye, peace out, outie 5000, just like that. Shit was crazy and depressing.

Feeling both dumbfounded and down, I said out loud to myself, “What the fuck… where the hell’d Swap USA go?”

Shani popped that ridiculous lollipop outta her mouth and said, “That’s a no-no word. Momma get mad at you for using that word.”

I gave her a sly look and said, “Momma ain’t here now, is she?”

“The tanuki ain’t here either,” she said, hanging her head real low and sounding all sad and shit.

After about a minute of us just standing there, paying our respects, looking at that depressing, dirtyass wall, Shani said in a low-energy tone, “Can we go to the furniture store? I wanna jump on the beds…”

I looked at her like she was outta her damn mind. “I ain’t getting no cops called on us again.”

“Please? Please? Please?” she kept repeating, but her tone was still low. “Please?”

Shit, I thought, she’s about to throw another goddamn tantrum. So, trying to derail her crazy brain, I said, “What about the nail place? Get your nails done up like Momma.”

But she didn’t reply. She was just staring at the empty storefront, not saying a word. Then, outta nowhere, she started crying. At first, it was just these little sniffles, silent tears, then it turned into straight-up bawling. I didn’t know what to do. Was this some kinda new manipulation tactic? Normally, she just kept repeating herself over and over. She’d never cried like this to get what she wanted before. So I knelt beside her, put a hand on her afro, and said, “Hey, what you crying for?”

“The tanuki,” she said, heaving. “He gone…”

“What, you mean the statues?”

“No,” she said, crying even louder now. “Mr. Yamada…”

That girl had a wildass imagination, but I empathized. With Mr. Yamada gone, it felt like there was some kinda hole in the fabric of the universe or someshit. I felt Shani’s sadness rubbing off on me, I really did, and in that moment, with my hand on her afro and all, I felt like I’d caught the damn crying contagion, because I was about to cry too. But I closed my eyes real tight to fight it back. I mean, what’s the use in crying? What’s it gonna change? Is it gonna magically materialize Swap USA back into existence? Bring Mr. Yamada back? Dad used to say, “Man up, boy, you gotta move on. Shit’s rough, no use dwelling.” So, in that moment, I was trying to speedrun moving on, but then Shani wrapped her arms around my stomach, buried her little afro-head into my hoodie, and started crying even harder, her whole body heaving like crazy. So, in that moment, I couldn’t speedrun shit. I couldn’t help it.

I’m sorry, Dad. I just couldn’t help it. And besides, you never answered my call, so why the hell should I care what you think? I had to work out all that Sinclair shit on my own. After you left, Mr. Yamada was the only man in my life, like a role model to me, and now he was gone too. Maybe that’s the real reason I was crying. I didn’t have a role model no more. Maybe I needed one. Maybe I needed someone to keep me on the straight and narrow, endow me with that crazyass wisdom. I don’t know.

I also don’t know how long we were crying, but it felt like a longass time. Maybe that’s just how crying feels, though, like it lasts forever, until it doesn’t. I wouldn’t really know. This was the first time I’d cried since I was like ten years old, back when Mom and Dad got into that big fight, screaming and hitting each other. That was when Dad slammed the door and never came back. Back then, all three of us were crying, but now it was only Shani and me. I sat there holding her, letting her cry into my hoodie, until something caught my attention.

It was a cat. I saw it outta the corner of my eye. It sauntered around the corner and sorta pranced up to us, stopping in front of the old Swap USA door. It was one of those Siamese cats, white with a dark face that looked kinda like a mask, and its blue eyes were crossed up as hell, so it looked kinda stupid. I wouldn’t have thought much of it, but this was no normalass cat. It had a red bow tied around its head, like it was Kiki from that one movie, and there was a big piece of paper dangling from its mouth. It sat there, tall and upright, looking all regal and fancy and stupid and cute and shit, just staring at us for what must’ve been a full minute. Then, I guess it got annoyed, because it let out a single, high-pitched meow, obviously directed at us, like it was on a tight schedule and we were wasting its precious time or someshit.

I sorta eased Shani off me, nudged her toward the cat, and said, “Look.”

Rubbing her eyes, she calmed down a little bit, blinked at the cat, and said, “Aww, pretty kitty, where you come from?”

The cat narrowed its crossy eyes and let out a disinterested meow, then dropped the paper onto the walkway and pushed it toward us with one dainty paw.

I cocked my head, looking all dumbfounded, thinking to myself, what is this, the Feline Express? I reached over, picked up the paper, and that’s when I realized it was an envelope. I turned the thing over in my hand. It had two little punctures in it from the cat’s teeth. There was a signature on the front, “Taro Yamada,” along with one of those goofyass creatures drawn on it, which I now realized was a tanuki, the same one from Mr. Yamada’s old placard. Underneath the signature were the words, “EVERYTHING IN STORE,” written in barely legible scribbles. I probably should’ve been freaked the hell out, because cats delivering letters was some seriously Ghibli-ass shit that I never would’ve expected to happen to me in my whole damn life, but for some reason, all I could do was smile.

I know it sounds corny as hell, but looking at that letter, I felt Mr. Yamada’s presence there on that walkway, like he was watching over us or whatever. Sometimes I’m too sentimental for my own good. It’s always getting me into trouble and shit.

Before I could open the letter, Shani crawled closer to the cat and started saying, “Here, kitty, kitty, c’mere, boy,” making those little clicky noises with her mouth. The cat looked seriously unamused. It turned its head like it was too good to associate with us, then let out a prissy meow.

“Oh, I sorry,” Shani said. “I didn’t know.”

The cat meowed again, then again, and again, each time at a different volume.

Shani turned to me and said, “She’s not a boy, she’s a girl, and her name’s Maeve.”

I was sitting on the walkway, legs crossed, watching all this shit unfold, just shaking my head. That’s all I could do. I was thinking to myself, Shani had a wildass imagination, but at least she wasn’t crying no more, so I just went along with it, let her have her pretend conversation with this snobbyass cat.

“Where you live, Maeve?” Shani asked.

Maeve narrowed her piercing blue eyes, then meowed four times, each time in a different pitch.

Shani turned back to me and said, “She lives at the dry cleaner’s over there. Says she got a tuna bowl waiting, but she don’t want it to go dry, so she’s gonna go now.” And she sounded a little sad saying that last part.

I didn’t want her to start crying again or whatever, so, playing along, I held up the letter and said, “Ask Maeve how she got this damn letter.”

So Shani asked, “How you get this damn letter?” mocking my tone as she said it.

Maeve was in the middle of prancing down the walkway but stopped at Shani’s voice. She let out one meow, then two mows, then pranced off with her tail sticking straight up and her butt showing, before vanishing around the corner.

Shani turned to me and said, “She said she got it from some ugly raccoon a couple days ago.”

I looked down at that letter and started thinking real hard, like I was having a serious stream of consciousness, a real run-on paragraph of philosophical thoughts and feelings and shit. I thought to myself, an ugly raccoon, huh? Shani must’ve concocted some elaborate story in her head about this whole thing. But what if? What if Mr. Yamada really was a tanuki? He had all that tanuki shit in his store. He knew all the tanuki tales. He’d even been playing tanuki games like Pocky and Rocky and Animal Crossing. And he’d seemed legit sad when he told us that story about Tama Hills the other night, like he’d lived through it or someshit. The man was definitely obsessed with tanuki. But that didn’t mean he was one, right? That’s gotta be some bullshit. I’d been on this planet for sixteen years, and not once had I ever seen a damn ghost, or angel, or fairy, or elf, or goblin, no damn leprechauns or genies, no big-headed aliens, no demons, no talking animals, none of that shit. You’d figure, if that shit was real, I’d’ve gotten at least some kinda whiff of it at some point, but in sixteen whole years, not even a single sniff. I mean, there were people online posting pictures of spookyass shit, but those pictures were always blurry as hell, like they’d been taken with potato phones. How come, with all these high-powered cameras in everyone’s pockets, not one damn person could snap a single clear photo of an alien, or a demon, or a Bigfoot, or whatever the hell? That shit was not real. The material world is all there is. Ain’t nothing beyond it. Space, time, matter, that’s all we got, that’s all we need. Everything else is extra. Superfluous, that’s the word smart people would use, I think. Tanuki ain’t supernatural, they’re just Japanese raccoons, closer to foxes and dogs and shit. They got blood, flesh, muscle, bone, just like the rest of us. They don’t have no damn magical powers. Centuries’ worth of scientific study would have to be thrown out the goddamn window for there to be transforming animals. I’m pretty sure that shit violates the First Law of Thermodynamics or whatever. That shit is just not real. Mr. Yamada was simply a man obsessed with tanuki, that’s it. Who knows, maybe he's one of those super autistic types who get real into shit, maybe he tricked himself into believing he was a tanuki. There were a buncha kids just like that at my school, coming to class fully decked out in fursuits, believing themselves to be dogs or cats or whatever the hell. But belief don’t change reality, now does it? Not that I really cared. I could get along with anybody. Kids like that were always getting harassed, but I was never the one doing the harassing. I didn’t give a damn. I always figured, even if I didn’t agree with somebody, might as well let them do what they wanna do, as long as they ain’t hurting nobody. Strange Japanese man wanna pretend he’s a tanuki? Fine. Let him. No skin off my back. Hell, if anything, that just made him more interesting. I was always drawn to people like that. It was always getting me into trouble and shit. But the fact remains, interesting or not, Mr. Yamada wasn’t no damn tanuki. That, I was sure of. That shit ain’t real. That shit’s absurd.

As if she had been reading my mind, Shani suddenly said, “Do you think Maeve saw Mr. Yamada in tanuki form? That’s how she got the letter?”

I sucked my teeth and said, “There ain’t no transforming raccoons, Shani, that’s absurd.”

“How you know?” she said, her tone both bratty and hurt.

“Cuz I just do, that kinda thing would be all over the damn news.”

“Not if they’re hiding real good.”

I wasn’t gonna get into no argument about transforming animals with a damn seven-year-old. There’s no getting through to kids. They gotta grow up and figure that shit out on their own. So instead of responding, I just started turning that letter over in my hand, hyping myself up about what might be inside. I was so excited to open it that I was also kinda nervous, too. I guess excitement and nervousness are kinda the same thing, really just a matter of perspective when you start thinking about it.

Shani poked her little afro-head over my lap and, looking at the letter, said, “You gonna open it? I wanna see! I wanna see!”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “Just give me one damn minute, please.”

During that one damn minute, I put my headphones on, whipped out my PSP, and hit that shuffle button, to shift my perspective, get myself hyped up. Kanye West started playing. Something from The College Dropout. It went, “Oh yeah, I got the perfect song for the kids to sing.” That’s when I started ripping at the corner of the envelope, but I paused, still kinda worried about what might be inside, didn’t wanna tear whatever it was. So I gave the envelope a little shake, squeezed it, pinched it, trying to figure out its secrets. It felt like a buncha papers had been stuffed inside there. What could it be? I ran through a whole laundry list of shit. A farewell note? The tournament bracket? Some of those weirdass scrolls he had hanging around? Was it just a buncha damn Pokemon cards? I was praying it wasn’t just a buncha damn Pokemon cards. That’s baby shit. A chorus of kids started singing, “Drug dealing just to get by, stack the money ‘till it gets sky high.” And that’s when I thought, maybe it’s money? Maybe money’s in there. The moment I thought that, well, my face lit up and my mood instantly improved. Mr. Yamada did say we won everything in the store. Maybe he wasn’t joking. This had me thinking those greedyass thoughts. And while Kanye was singing, “We never had nothing handed, took nothing for granted,” I was thinking about the $250 I’d saved up cutting grass, how it meant I only needed about $150 more to get myself a PlayStation 4, maybe a little extra if I wanted another controller and some games. I started seriously hyping myself up, thinking maybe Mr. Yamada had just emptied out his entire cash register and stuffed it all into this damn envelope. I started thinking, if we’d really won everything in the store, that had to’ve added up to some bigass number, which meant I was about to hit payday in this here ghettoass strip mall. Kanye was rapping, “ain’t no tuition for having no ambition, ain’t no loans for sittin’ your ass at home,” and there I was thinking myself about to be tanuki blessed.

But I mean, for the record, I didn’t care all that much about money, to tell you the truth. Like I’d been saying earlier, I was trying to be a monk, not some drug dealer. I’d acclimated, learned to get by with nothing but my wits and pocket lint and all that shit. But I wasn’t gonna turn down no free money. I ain’t no damn fool. I imagined even a monk would take money if it was just handed to him, if it was gonna improve his life somewhat. Right? And that PlayStation 4 was definitely gonna improve my damn life somewhat. Absolutely. How else was I gonna play that new NBA 2K14 and that new Need for Speed with those updated, dopeass graphics? And I was sure there’d be a new Tekken game coming out soon. Had to get that too, otherwise Trey would beat my ass every Friday, and I couldn’t have that, didn’t wanna end up looking like no damn fool in the fighting ring.

So, considering all that shit, I eagerly tore that envelope open.

But then all the color drained from my face, and my eyes sank, and my mouth hung slackjaw like I was some kinda idiot, because guess what... there was only twenty-four damn dollars in there. Oh, and some loose fucking change. That’s it.

Kanye was rapping some shit but I didn’t care no more. I lowered my headphones and just sat there dead-eyed, staring down at those meager bills, coins slipping between my fingers, rolling into the gutter just like all my damn hopes and dreams. I started thinking to myself, shit, what the hell was I thinking? Of course there’d only be twenty-four damn dollars in there. This was Mr. Yamada, after all. I felt like such a moron, getting myself so hyped up over nothing. I started thinking maybe I was wrong, maybe I am a damn fool.

That’s when a chill November wind blew in from outta nowhere and sent the envelope flying outta my hand, scattering some papers from inside that I hadn’t even noticed before, because I’d been too wrapped up in my own greedyass thoughts and despairs. Thankfully, I’d already pocketed the money, otherwise that shit would’ve blown all over the place, too.

Shani grabbed one of the papers and held it in front of her face, turning it every which way, then she said, “What’s it say?”

I was sucking my teeth because I was now in a foulass mood. “You still can’t read? How old are you?” is what I said, because I wasn’t thinking about how Shani was dyslexic as hell, how the teachers couldn’t do nothing for her, how I should’ve been understanding and all that shit, because, well, in that moment, I was still too wrapped up in those greedyass thoughts and despairs. That’s also why I said “Gimme that shit!” and snatched that paper outta her little hand like a supervillain.

“That’s a no-no word, you can’t say that!” she shouted. But I ignored her and started reading the paper instead.

It was some kinda formal expense report, printed off from a computer. Apparently, Mr. Yamada paid $1,450 a month to rent that space, around $230 a month for electricity, $45 for water, plus a $30 monthly garbage fee, on top of taxes and other bullshit. There was a full list of games and DVDs and CDs and consoles and figurines, prices and dates listed. He’d sold all that shit off. It also listed all of Mr. Yamada’s debts, which, when I added everything up, came out to something like $46,000. There were figures in red and figures in green, pluses and minuses, additions and subtractions. I couldn’t make sense of the whole thing, but from what I could make sense of, Mr. Yamada owed a lot of money to the property company, and pretty much every dollar he made went toward paying off that debt, leaving him with only $524.87 after everything had been sold off, which meant that, after selling everything in Swap USA, he pocketed $500, stuffed the remaining $24.87 into an envelope, and had a damn cat deliver it to me somefuckinghow, like I was living in a Ghibli movie or someshit.

After reading that report, my mind started spiraling into one of those streams of consciousness or whatever they’re called. I started thinking, is that what owning a business is really like? Being a slave to the man, just with extra steps? Ridiculous. I slid my headphones back on, trying to focus my twisting-and-turning thoughts. Kanye was going, “Mama says she want to move south, scratchin’ lottery tickets, eyes on a new house,” and I just sat there in the lotus position, thinking real hard. What was crazy was that not a single soul ever walked by. It was just Shani and me out there on that walkway, crying and thinking and shit the whole time. I’d always thought people became their own boss so they wouldn’t have to answer to nobody. I’d always thought being your own boss meant being your own boss, not being somebody else’s boss. That didn’t make no damn sense to me. Was it just bosses all the way down? And if so, who was the final boss? Banks, landlords, bills, debt, or maybe it was just money in general? Was everything really about money? Was that really how the whole damn world worked? Everybody scraping by, doing shit they don’t wanna do, just to hand their hard-earned cash over to somebody else? That was some bleakass shit. But maybe I was wrong. I don’t know. Maybe I didn’t have a fucking clue. The chorus of kids was going off again, “We wasn’t supposed to make it past twenty-five, joke’s on you, we still alive,” and I found myself thinking maybe I was missing something. I was only sixteen, after all, on the cusp of becoming a man. I still had a buncha lessons left to learn. But that expense report had confirmed something I’d already suspected, something I’d been trying hard not to believe, that money was God in this world, and everybody prayed to it whether they wanted to or not. Hell, just a minute earlier, I’d been doing the same shit, mourning over money, pining over PlayStations, despairing over dollar bills. I’d been telling myself I was a damn monk, that I’d acclimated, but when I started really looking at that shit, I realized I’d just been fooling myself. I cared a whole helluva lot about money. I had just been pretending not to. But why? What the hell was I trying to prove? Was money gonna make me happy? I’d read about richass men murdering their whole families, American Psycho shit, so obviously money ain’t buying that much happiness, is it? Did I think money was gonna make me cool or someshit? Like, the more money I had, the more bragging rights I’d have with the kids at school? “Guess what, I got me a damn PlayStation 4. What you think about that, Trey?” Ain’t there more to life than money? There’s gotta be. But if so, why do we chase it so bad? Just for survival? Is money just Darwinism in action or someshit? Does man just naturally have a greedyass mind, or does money create man’s greedyass mind? Are we all just out here chasing money without realizing it’s the source of all our damn problems? Have the banks, landlords, and debt collectors just tricked us all into thinking the poison is the cure or someshit? Or was this all just a big cope on my part? Me just trying to make myself feel better for being broke as hell? The kids were singing, “Throw your hands up in the sky and say, we don’t care what people say.” So I started repeating that in my head. We don’t care what people say. We don’t care what people say. Then I thought, yeah, why the hell should I give a damn? Why should I care? And that’s when it happened. Something shifted. Something clicked into place. I couldn’t explain it, not then anyway. I just knew I wasn’t thinking the same way no more. And it wasn’t no damn cope.

That’s when I heard Shani crying again, so I didn’t have time to analyze my epiphany or whatever, yet it didn’t matter because you don’t analyze that shit, there’s no need. I just crumpled the expense report, tossed it aside, slid my headphones off, and calmly walked over to Shani. She was sitting there lotus style, holding another paper in her hands, another paper I’d missed because I’d been so damn lost in those damn greedyass thoughts and despairs. I could see the paper clearly from above. The ink was smeared with Shani’s tears, but it was obvious what it was. It was a printed article from Zoo Atlanta’s website, and at the top was a big picture, a big picture of two tanuki. The article was titled, “Wintertime with Loki and Thor.” And near the bottom of the page, scrawled in thick black ink, in the worst handwriting I’d ever seen in my life, were four words,

THE TIME IS RIGHT

Little Shani looked up at me with big tears in her eyes and said, “We gotta help them.”

“What you mean?” I replied, all calm and serene because I already knew what I had to do, plus there was just something in the November air that afternoon, something weird and chilly and profound.

Shani didn’t respond at first. Instead, she dug into her pocket and pulled out that damn marble, that lucky bead or whatever the hell it was. She’d been carrying it around ever since Mr. Yamada had given it to her the other week. She held the marble up so it glimmered in the sunlight, and then she said, “Thor and Loki, we gotta give it to them.”

I knew she had a wildass imagination. I knew she had this whole fantasy built out in her little afro-head about transforming tanuki and Mr. Yamada and all that shit. I knew that. And I also knew it was bullshit. I was convinced of that. I wasn’t no damn fool. I was sixteen, on the cusp of being a man. I lived in the real world, not some kiddy fantasy world. So I knew for a fact this was all stupid. But, at the same time, I also knew it was important to Shani. And I knew she believed it, because behind all the tears, she had this fierce, unstoppable look in her eyes, something I’d never seen before in a person, much less a damn seven-year-old. I also knew she wasn’t gonna shut the hell up about this until she got her damn way, because, well, you know how she is.

And I also knew what I had to do. Like I’d been saying, I didn’t believe in all that tanuki nonsense, and I hated zoos, miss me with that shit, but I wanted to support Shani and, well, it felt sorta symbolic, like a last farewell to Mr. Yamada or whatever. If he wanted us to give some marble to some tanuki at the zoo, if he thought that was meaningful in some way, well, it was the least I could do for him, considering all he’d done for me. I was his accomplice, after all. And like I’d been saying earlier, I’ve always had a stupid-strong sense of responsibility, it was always getting me into trouble and shit.

But before I agreed to do anything, I wanted to make sure Shani was dead serious, because I wasn’t just gonna abandon all my principles and go to some evilass zoo, and I certainly didn’t wanna give them any of my damn money. I mean, I didn’t really care about the PlayStation no more, but that money could still be used for food and water and all that Darwin shit. So I said to Shani, “Mom says we don’t got no money.”

And Shani said exactly what I knew she was gonna say. She said, “You got money.”

So I said, “Yeah, I do.”

Then she just stared at me with those big brown eyes of hers.

And that’s why, two days later, we were at the damn zoo.

The streetlights around our place were all broke, so it was real dark out there, nothing but headlights washing over broken asphalt, busted billboards flashing the giant faces of crookedass lawyers, and the occasional lighter sparking off above the sidewalk where some group of kids were huddled together passing brown paper bags back and forth. I was thinking to myself, if I’d made slightly different choices growing up, I might’ve been one of those kids, but I grew up with a drug addict, so I knew all about them cautionary tales.

Shani was rapping from the backseat. “I’m gonna see a tanuki, tanuki, tanuki, ’nuki, ’nuki! And when I see a tanuki, I’m gonna give him a cookie, cookie, cookie, ’ookie, ’ookie!” She was shaping up to be a natural MC.

But I could barely hear her on account of my bigass headphones. I was listening to Gorillaz, “Tomorrow Comes Today,” bobbing my head to the down-tempo beat, watching graffiti go by, getting all lost in the darkness of that spookyass harmonica or whatever it was, trying to make meaning outta the words, “The verdict doesn’t love our soul, the digital won’t let me go,” even though I didn’t have a clue what the hell he was singing about. That’s what I was always trying to do, though, make my own meaning outta the music.

As we were pulling out onto the main road leading to the strip mall, Mom stopped the car suddenly. There was a mangled old man crossing the street real slow, his arms like a dinosaur, his walk like a zombie. I felt kinda sorry for him but still pressed the button, made sure all the doors were locked, just in case. Then I felt bad because, well, living in the projects, you start thinking everyone is a villain, even though deep down you know that shit just ain’t true.

But you still think it. That’s why, when the man abruptly turned and started walking toward our car, I told Mom to back the hell up, but she wouldn’t listen. She actually rolled her damn window down and let the man get real close. He had crumbs and shit in his beard, and his eyes were all yellow and mucusy. I’m not gonna lie, my heart was pounding, and I was holding my breath, praying to some god I didn’t believe in. Shani, on the other hand, was waving and singing, just as happy and oblivious as could be.

“Everything OK, sir? Do you need any help?” Mom said.

The man smiled real wide, showing his little baked-bean teeth, then he said, “It’s a nice night out. Not too cold, not too hot, feels just right. God bless you, folks.” Then he just walked off into the night.

I exhaled and looked at Mom with this what-the-hell-you-thinking look. But she just shook her head and said, “Where’d you learn to be so distrustful? Certainly not from me.” Then she started driving. I didn’t know what she was getting at. Considering all the shit I’d seen, how could I not be suspicious of some randomass homeless dude walking across the street in the middle of the night? It’s basic survival skills, was what I was telling myself. I was sixteen, not a kid no more. I couldn't afford to play around. Who else was going to look out for the family, especially since Dad left? Maybe that old dude was Special Investigator Sinclair in disguise or someshit, who knows? I wouldn’t put it past that freak.

The moment I thought that, my stomach turned, because I hadn’t been thinking about Sinclair in a bit. Somehow I’d put him outta my mind until just then. And in that moment, thinking about it, I thought, what if he was still at Swap USA, waiting for me? This freaked me the hell out. I melted into the car seat just as that spookyass harmonica was going off in my ear again, which didn’t help, so I pulled my headphones down and tightened my hoodie up real tight so that my face was barely visible, and then, all nervous and shifty-eyed, I said, “You know what, I don’t think I need my phone no more. Maybe we should just go home. It’s late, you know, past Shani’s bedtime.”

Mom side-eyed me and said, “You want me to turn around? Now? After all this fuss? We’re almost there…”

Shani poked her head out from the backseat, no seatbelt as usual. “No turn around! I wanna see tanuki! I wanna see tanuki!”

Man, I thought, what the hell was I getting myself into? Why’d I even think this was a good idea? I could’ve smacked myself in the head right then and there. I was so damn stupid sometimes.

Moments later, Mom turned into the strip mall, slowed the car to a crawl, and said, “Where’s the store? I’ll park by the curb.”

I looked at her like she was stupid or someshit. “What you mean, where’s the store? We come here every damn week.”

“Don’t you talk to me like that, boy!” she snapped. “I don’t know what your problem is tonight, but you ought to drop the attitude, or else you ain’t going to Trey’s tomorrow, or anywhere, ever.”

I shivered at her tone and started to make some excuse, but then Shani leaned into the front, pointed out the store, and said, “It’s right there! See, see! You see the tanuki?”

“Ah, I see it now,” she said, blinking, then she pulled the car parallel to Swap USA, right by the curb. She then turned to me with a stern look on her face and said, “Be quick.”

I didn’t say nothing. I just poked my head up a little bit by the window to get a good look at the surroundings, hopefully without being noticed by anyone outside the car, then I checked the rearview, scanned the store and the walkway and everything nearby, nervous as hell. There were a buncha cats out front, like they were guarding the place. But I wasn’t looking for cats, I was looking for Sinclair. He was nowhere in sight, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t lurking in the shadows or someshit. Then I heard a loud snapping sound. I jumped in my seat, looked all around like a crackhead who had just heard a police siren go off. But it was only Shani, messing with the door handle in the back.

“Shani, stay in the car,” Mom said. “Your brother will be just a second.”

But as she was saying that, Shani somehow got the door unlocked and then bolted outta the backseat, onto the walkway, where she ran up to one of those tanuki statues and started jumping around, doing her little tanuki rap. I swear that girl had infinite energy sometimes.

Mom rolled the window down, stuck her head out, and shouted, “Shani! Get back in here, NOW!” Then she started taking off her seatbelt.

I considered just letting Mom handle it, because I was dreading getting outta that car, but then I thought, well, this was my fault, I’m the one who suggested this. And I’m sixteen now, on the cusp of being a man, so I knew what I had to do, what Dad would’ve done. I’ve always had a stupid-strong sense of responsibility, it was always getting me into trouble and shit. So I gulped, put a hand on Mom’s knee, and said, “I got this,” then I gulped and got outta the car.

The only light under the walkway was from the paper lanterns, like the whole place was lit only by orange candlelight or someshit, so the tanuki shadows were vibrating and shaking and flickering all over the place, like they had minds of their own, almost. It was kinda calming. There were also hella cats, black cats, calico cats, Maine Coons or whatever the hell they’re called, and a shit-ton of bowls out there, full of food and water. I guess Mr. Yamada had put those out there. I stood there just taking it all in, cats rubbing up against my leg, wanting attention, so I bent down, gave some ear rubs and shit, which had them purring like mad until Mom honked the horn, then those cats bolted faster than I’d ever seen cats bolt in my whole damn life. I’m talking like, in a flash, ghosts. So I turned my head toward the car with this what-the-hell expression on my face, but all Mom did was poke her head out and shout, “Hurry up!” So I took Shani by the hand and said, “C’mon, back in the car,” but she jerked away then bolted toward the door, busting through, the bell going off in her wildass wake.

The first thing I noticed walking into the store was that it was darker than usual, and not just because it was night, it was like the lanterns had been turned down to the softest possible glow, casting weirdass shadows and shit all over the place. It was all warm and calm and mysterious in there. The moving shadows gave the video game posters this mystical aura, made the anime figurines look like little totems or someshit, made Tanuki Mario over there in the corner look less like a mascot and more like some kinda ancient god come to life, and the scrolls taped up all over the place were like the supernatural cherry on top. It was almost unreal. The second thing I noticed was the music, it didn’t really fit the mood. It was some kinda jazzy tune, playing at low volume. A girl with an accent was singing, “It is night, it is death, it’s a trap, it’s a gun.”

Mr. Yamada was in his usual spot behind the counter, his face glowing from the TV. He hadn’t even bothered to check the front door when we came in, like he just knew it was us or someshit. He wasn’t wearing his shades or beanie anymore, and he looked more awake than usual, kinda red in the face but at the same time peaceful, like he was in his zone, like some kinda creature of the night. He seemed to be part of the store, like it was an extension of himself or someshit, but there was something sad about it too, like he was all alone in there, no co-workers, no family, no nothing.

The music kept going as I was taking everything in, almost like the singer was talking to me personally. “A sliver of glass, a life, the sun, a night, a death, the end of the run.” And just as I was trying to make meaning outta the music, that’s when Shani bolted to the counter, pulled herself up so that she was halfway on top of it, and started shouting real loud for some goddamn reason.

“I SEE TANUKI, TANUKI, TANUKI, ’NUKI, ’NUKI!”

This obviously spooked Mr. Yamada. His whole body shook real quick, then he went motionless and fell outta his chair sideways, cartoonishly in slow motion, landing on the tatami behind the counter, and I swear there was a little puff of smoke that went up when it happened. But I couldn’t see him back there, so I hurried to the counter to check on him, see if he was OK, but by the time I got there, he had pulled himself up and was brushing at his jeans. I expected him to be pissed, but he just had that goofy smile on his face.

Looking at Shani, he said, “Ah, Queen of Smash, been waiting for you.”

I thought to myself, what the hell he mean by that? I swear, Mr. Yamada just said things to sound mysterious sometimes, like he had to maintain that air of goofyass wisdom or someshit. It was annoying but I also kinda liked that about him.

So I said, “Yo, Mr. Yamada. You OK?”

“All good, just little scare.”

“Looked like you was playing dead there for a minute.”

He put his hands on his big belly and let out a hearty laugh.

“No sounds of nature tonight?”

“This Akiko,” he said with a solemn look on his face. “Remind me of home.”

The singer’s accent clicked when he said that, obviously Japanese, then I said, “Well, you got good taste, Mr. Yamada.”

“You want CD?”

“Naw,” I replied. “I’m good, don’t got no CD player anyway.”

A little grin formed on his lips. “No money?”

Sucking my teeth, I said, “Why you always saying that?”

Another hearty laugh.

I was still kinda nervous, occasionally glancing over my shoulder to see if anybody was looking through the windows or someshit. But it was dead as night, no one in sight. Just to be sure, I said, “Yo, by the way, you seen a man around? Tall, spooky as hell?”

Mr. Yamada placed a hand on his pudgy chin and thought about this for a moment, then he let out a little hiccup and said, “Fox?”

“What you mean, fox?” I said, contorting my face into one of those what-you-talking-about looks. Then I repeated myself. “I said ‘a man,’ you seen a man? Wearing some kinda whackass outfit.”

Rubbing his chin, Mr. Yamada said, in a sort of clueless way, “Foxes scared of cats.”

More crazy Mr. Yamada shit, I thought, so I just shook my head and said, “Anyway, I ain’t got much time, you got my…”

But Shani interrupted me, pointing to the TV, shouting, “TANUKI!”

I made a “huh” noise, then bent my head a little bit to see the TV behind the counter. It was playing that Zoo Atlanta public-access shit. What a weirdass coincidence, I thought. I guess it was on repeat. It was on the part about the folklore. We watched without saying a word, totally mesmerized. I guess it felt appropriate in a weird way, considering all the tanuki shit around.

By the time it was over, Mr. Yamada’s expression had gone from goofyass to deadass. I had never seen him looking so solemn and strange. I was so taken aback by this that I said, “You OK, Mr. Yamada?”

With some kind of sadness in his voice, he said, “They wrong, come from Japan, not Italy. And names not Thor and Loki.”

His change in tone weirded me, made me curious, but I was on a timer, so, trying to change the subject, I said, “I gotcha… by the way, you got my phone?”

But it was like he hadn’t even heard me. He just stared off into the distance with this glazed look in his eyes and said, “Many tanuki captured by humans after Great War.”

Per usual, I had no idea what the hell he was talking about. Was he talking about World War Two? Was he even old enough to be alive back then? I knew I needed to get the hell outta there real quick, because Mom was waiting, but also my curiosity was piqued, I just had to know. So, against my better judgement, I asked, “What, World War Two?”

“No, no. Great Tanuki War, many years ago.”

My eyebrow raised like it normally does when I hear some crazyass shit. That’s when I got a whiff of my old man, alcohol. I hadn’t noticed it before, but there was one of those clay jugs with big kanji on it by the computer monitor, the cork popped out and dangling by a rope tied around the mouth. I couldn’t believe it, Taro Yamada, night drinker. Who would’ve thought? He still seemed harmless, though, so I wasn’t afraid or nothing, but I did need to get outta there as fast as humanly possible, otherwise Mom was gonna go wild on my ass. So I started to ask about my phone again, but before I could, Mr. Yamada just kept right on going, like it was story time at the library or someshit.

“It happened in Tama Hills. My grandfather, Tamasaburo, saw all go down. Humans cut down trees, pave over shrines, build amusement parks, subdivisions, slowly at first, so tanuki no care, no worries, continue with lazy antics. But soon humans close in on tanuki lands, that when tanuki fight back, play many tricks, hurt many humans, but no matter, humans undeterred, destroy many tanuki homes. Tanuki spend too much time playing games, wait too long to fight back, many die as result of inaction.”

Mr. Yamada paused, grabbed his jug, and took a swig. At some point during his story, the music had stopped, replaced by the sounds of nature, rain falling softly on leaves and owls hooting and shit. I had no idea where he was playing all this stuff from. I figured he had a sound system in the back or someshit. Shani was sitting on top of the display counter with her legs crossed, listening closely. I hadn’t even seen her get up there. And me, well, I just wanted my damn cell phone, and I didn’t wanna get chewed out by Mom, so I didn’t have time for no drunkards making no wise remarks about raccoons or whatever the hell, which is why I started to say, “OK, yo, so you got my…”

But he just kept going.

“Tanuki believe all hope lost. Some flee to cities, eat garbage out of cans, drink water out of gutters, raise pups in alleyways. But most stay back, cling to old lands, refuse to budge. That when kitsune come. Very tricky fox, Ryutaro, try convince leader of Tama Hills that only way to survive is transform, live with humans, abandon lands they born and raised in, move on, put tanuki life behind them. Ryutaro say he can get tanuki jobs, good pay, set for life, but leader of Tama Hills refuse, say she rather die, all tanuki on her side. But then Ryutaro, disguised as tanuki, spread rumors, sow doubt, start rebellion within tanuki ranks. Tanuki fight each other, much bloodshed, many perish. Leader of Tama Hills fall in battle. Faithful tanuki stay behind, cling to lands, but most leave, transform into humans, work for kitsune, who take advantage. Many tanuki play human so long they forget true nature, live in apartments, drive cars, sell tempura, never questioning. Big sorrow, much sadness.”

Mr. Yamada paused, took another swig, so I jumped in and said, “That’s cool and all, Mr. Yamada, but I really need my…”

But then Shani jumped in. “What happened next? Tell me! Tell me!”

My eyes rolled into the back of my skull. My sigh was louder than thunder. And, of course, Mr. Yamada kept going.

“One family stay behind, in dying forest, very hungry, but they scrape by for many moons, until humans start laying traps, metal cages, death machines, meat inside, tempt tanuki. One day, father tanuki, very hungry, take chance, snatch meat from metal teeth, but teeth clamp down. Loud yelp echo throughout forest, scatter hearts and birds in all directions, then eerie silence. Sons search for father, find him hours later, mouth clamped to meat, body cold, bloody, no life in eyes. Mom die many moons ago, so now three sons orphans, lost, left to fend for themselves. One day, cold, starving, cocky, having learned nothing from father’s death, tanuki brothers think they can outsmart traps. Come across cage with meat inside, they go inside, eat meat, trap close, lock them in. Many moons pass, three brothers dying in cage, until one day human come along, take tanuki, bring to human world.”

Shani was rapt this whole time, and when Mr. Yamada went to take another swig, she said, in a whispery tone of wonder, “What happened next? Did they escape?”

I, on the other hand, was thinking about my damn phone, and the beating I was about to receive from Mom, so I started to say, “Uh, Mr. Yamada, my phone?” But before the words could come out, he started up yet again.

“Patience, Queen of Smash,” he said solemnly. “Tanuki brothers spend many moons in cages, inside human building, separated, too weak to transform. Humans feed tanuki, nurse them to health, but still tanuki no escape, unable to transform, somehow magic sealed. Humans give tanuki new names, send tanuki to Italy on big plane, for study, then to Atlanta, to live in zoo, entertain humans. Zoo covered in scrolls, banish all magic, so tanuki cannot transform, cannot escape. But one tanuki brother have something others do not, lucky bead, relic from grandfather Tamasaburo. This tanuki hide lucky bead in pouch for long, long time, wait for perfect moment. One day, in backrooms at zoo, moment presents itself, so tanuki eat lucky bead and magic return, more powerful than ever. He transform into security guard, tell brothers he will return one day, to free them. But many moons pass and brother no return. Over time, lucky bead power wane, no longer can Tanuki go to zoo, scrolls too strong, you see?”

Did I see? Did I see what? All I saw was a crazy old goofyass-looking drunk man rambling on about some storybook shit. I needed my damn phone or else Mom was gonna beat my ass, so I said, “Mr. Yamada, I need my…”

But then Shani jumped in yet afuckingain. She said, “Wow! Is that a true story? Did the tanuki brother ever return? What happened to the bead?”

Mr. Yamada leaned in real close to Shani, reached behind her ear, and snapped his fingers. When he pulled his hand back, he was holding something between two fingers. It looked like one of those cat’s-eye marbles.

“Bead right here,” he said with a hiccup. “You can have, and one day, you can use, when time is right.” He then dropped the marble into Shani’s little hand.

Shani’s eyes were the biggest supermoons I’d ever seen. She was totally amazed, staring down at that yellow-and-blue marble in her tiny hand. Then she looked at Mr. Yamada and said, in that same tone of wonder, “Are you… Are you the tanuki?”

I was rolling my eyes like crazy at this point. Shani had a wild imagination, would believe anything anyone told her. Maybe that’s one of the trade-offs for being young and pure of heart, you’re gullible as hell. I remember when I used to be like that, people tricking me all the damn time. Not anymore, I thought, I’m sixteen now, on the cusp of being a man, ain't nobody gonna trick my ass.

But Mr. Yamada wasn’t trying to trick nobody, or at least I didn’t think he was, because after Shani had asked her question, all he did was let out a hearty laugh, much louder than usual, probably on account of all the alcohol, then he said, “No, no, just folktale, that’s all, for kids. No such thing as transforming tanuki. Just fun and games.” But there was something real sad in his voice when he said that. Then he did one of his big laughs again, only this time it sounded kinda fake. He added, “Besides, even if true, tanuki no tell, big secret, humans can never know, big no no, bad luck.” Then he let out a little hiccup, grabbed his jug, took a swig, and started up again.

He was saying, “In ancient Japan…”

But then I thought, hell naw, I ain’t gonna let this goofyass man ramble no more, otherwise I ain’t never gonna get outta Swap USA, so I cut him the hell off.

“Mr. Yamada, I need my damn phone.”

“Ah, yes, phone,” he said, blinking his eyes at me like he had never been interrupted before in his life, then he turned and rummaged behind the counter. Moments later, he pulled out my damn phone and went to hand it to me, so I went to grab it, but at the very last second, he pulled it back and said, “One more thing.”

I could’ve screamed, I really could’ve, but instead I just took a deep breath and said, “What, what is it, Mr. Yamada?” And I should’ve won an award for that, an award for god-like restraint, I really should’ve.

“I forgot tell you one thing,” he said, looking kinda dizzy. “About tanuki island.”

Aw, shit, here we go again, I thought. I was about to be like, “Naw, I’m good, Mr. Yamada, miss me with that tanuki shit,” but of course he didn’t give me the chance.

“Sea of Japan, Oki Archipelago. They say there an island, Chiburijima, where tanuki roam wild and free. Tanuki paradise. I learn about this just other day, on Nature Channel. Never heard of before.”

“Aight,” I said with a question mark, then I added, “What you trying to say, Mr. Yamada?”

He burped, then, looking kinda confused and disheveled, said, “How much ticket to Japan cost?”

I sucked my teeth and looked at him like he was crazy. “How the hell should I know? Look it up online.”

He just shook his head and said, “No internet.”

No internet? How’d he have no internet? I’d seen him on his damn computer doing stuff before. Was he just putting on a show all this time? Crazy Mr. Yamada, I thought to myself, then I shook my head and said, “Mr. Yamada, I really gotta bounce. Mom’s waiting.”

He finally seemed to understand, because that’s when he started doing those apologetic bows, then he handed me my damn Obama phone and said, “Sorry, sorry, got carried away. ‘My bad,’ as you say.”

Trying not to sound annoyed as hell, I said, “You good,” then I pocketed my phone and added, “Thanks, Mr. Yamada. Maybe lay off the juice.”

He let out a big laugh at that, then did another one of those little bows, then he sat down in his chair and started changing channels on the TV, different voices and music and shit going off in quick succession.

I took Shani by the hand and started to go, but before we left, I remembered something, something I’d forgotten to ask. I thought about not asking him at all, because I didn’t want him going off on one of his damn tanuki tangents again, but my curiosity got the better of me.

“How’d you get my phone, anyway?” I asked.

Without looking up from the TV, he said, “Find it on table.”

“Naw, no way. I remember pocketing it.”

At that, he didn’t even say a word. I remember his goofyass face all aglow with TV light, colors flashing all over him as he just sat there, still as one of those tanuki statues. Then, real slow, he turned his head toward me and gave me the biggest wink I’d ever seen in my life, then he burped real loud.

I sucked my teeth like I was always doing and shook my head. “You crazy, Mr. Yamada,” is all I said, then I took Shani by the hand and we left the store, bell dinging behind us.

I didn’t know it then, but that was the last time I’d ever see Mr. Yamada.

Back then, I didn’t believe in no magic or nothing like that, no gods, no demons, neither Bodhisattvas nor Brahmas, no angels, no saints, no witches snipping at strings. I believed we forged our own destinies, walked our own paths. I told myself there ain’t no story written up there in the stars. No heaven, no hell, no Easter Bunny type shit, no Santa Claus keeping no lists. Souls, chakras, karmic debt, oneness, miss me with all that cosmic hippie bullshit. I was an ATLien, born and raised. I’d seen some shit and knew what’s up. I’d seen homies walk outta Sunday Mass then ten minutes later they’d be smoking rocks behind the QuikTrip. I’d seen moms drop their kids at daycare then run tricks in the parking lot. I’d seen twelve-year-olds with Smith & Wessons and wads of hundred-dollar bills. Drugs, sex, guns, money, these were the real gods behind all the bullshit. I thought it was all one big joke, thought I had it all figured out, thought I’d seen everything.

But I ain’t never seen nothing quite like Special Investigator Madison Sinclair. That motherfucker spooked the shit outta me, not gonna lie.

That’s why, when I got home, I should’ve been doing homework, but come eight o’clock, I was sitting on my bed, staring out the window, watching the Atlanta skyline, feeling those nighttime project blues, thinking those deep thoughts, the kind that make you wanna listen to Miles Davis and shit. But I didn’t have no Miles on my PSP, so I was listening to Marcus D instead, Melancholy Hopeful, and he was going, “Understanding is the key to longevity,” and I was starting to crash, feeling like maybe I didn’t understand a goddamn thing.

Was Sinclair some kinda demon or what? Why’d I tell that freak all those things? Why’d he even wanna know? It felt like my mind had been violated or someshit. How’d he even do that? I’d heard about psychopathic murderers, some so charismatic they could hypnotize their victims, lead them straight into their torture chambers, no questions asked. Maybe that’s what was going on, some crazy-charisma type shit. Yeah, that had to’ve been it. But what about the clothes? How’d he change clothes so quick? Maybe it was some Penn and Teller shit, some high-tier sleight of hand nonsense, that had to’ve been it. There ain’t no magic in this world, no ghosts, no demons, nothing like that. Everything’s explainable, at least that’s what I kept telling myself, staring out at that Atlanta skyline.

The song hit the chorus, “Wherever you wanna go, my flow is taking you, to distant worlds where the melancholy is breaking through,” and in that moment, the skyline did look like some kinda distant world, nothing like the projects I was trapped in. That’s why I was serious about school. I was gonna get there, to that distant world. Breaking through, that’s all that mattered. Beyond my reflection, past the old billboard that said BEEN IN AN ACCIDENT?, I could see the Bank of America building way off in the distance, glowing like a guiding star in the serious moonlight, red lights blinking all around it. Dad used to say those lights were aircraft warnings, put there after some planes had crashed or someshit. And I was feeling like maybe my plane was crashing, maybe that’s why I was focusing on the lights so hard.

Then I started wondering, what would my old man’ve done? How would he have reacted to Mr. Special Investigator Madison Sinclair? He probably would’ve punched him straight in the mouth, either that or asked if he had any weed on him. Sometimes I’d talk to my dad about shit like that, shit that was going down in my life, shit like this. He was real smart when he wasn’t shit-faced or high outta his mind, always knew what’s up. But he was gone, so I didn't have nobody to talk to, nobody who understood what I was going through. Mom was too into her Jesus bullshit, and Shani, well, she was only into SpongeBob and Sailor Moon, so I couldn’t talk to her about nothing.

They say if you speak of the devil, she will come, and that’s exactly what happened, because right when I started thinking about her, Shani bust into the room and said, “Come look! Come look!” And, if I’m being honest, I was kinda grateful, because I was getting too wrapped up in my own head. So I got up off the bed, navigated through the maze of blocks and toys and shit, and went into the living room. The TV was on. Mom was leaning back on our ratty old couch with the Bible in her face, and our old black cat, Kiki, was asleep on her stomach. Shani was sitting on the floor real close to the TV, surrounded by Sailor Moons, some already missing legs and arms and shit because those fancy toys ain’t actually for kids. There was some kinda public-access show on, flashing all sorts of animals across the screen. I wasn’t interested.

“What am I looking at?” I said, gloomy and unamused.

“It’s the Zoo!” Shani shouted, holding up a Sailor Moon and waving it around. “It’s the Zoo! It’s the Zoo!” Then she turned to me and said, “I wanna go to the Zoo! I wanna go to the Zoo! Please? Please? Please?” Then she started coughing real loud, probably because of all the damn mold.

“What you asking me for?” I said with an annoyed look on my face. “Ask Mom.”

Mom immediately chimed in. “We can’t afford that right now, baby.”

“But Momma!” Shani jumped to her feet and started hopping in place like she does when she gets all excited. “I wanna see the elephants! Please? Please? Please?”

I thought to myself, I ain’t dealing with this shit. Plus, I hated zoos. Keeping all those animals in pens and shit, it’s messed up. They don’t belong there, they belong out in the wild, where they came from. Me going to a zoo would be like paying to watch my ancestors pick cotton. Not that my ancestors were animals or nothing like that, but they were slaves, shackled and caged, both literally and metaphorically, just like those animals at the zoo. That shit’s sick, evil as hell. So naw, I wasn’t going to no zoo. That’s why I started making my way back to the bedroom, but just as I got to the hallway, something on TV grabbed me, sucked me in, demanded my full attention.

Come on down to Trader Alley and meet Thor and Loki! The only two tanuki in the United States! These charming creatures are often mistaken for raccoons, but tanuki are actually members of the canid family, closer to dogs and foxes! With their round bellies, masked faces, and oversized tails, these curious creatures have fascinated people for centuries! In Japanese folklore, tanuki are playful tricksters said to possess the ability to transform into anything they desire, from ordinary household objects to spooky monsters and even humans! Whether causing a little mischief or bringing some good luck, these legendary shape-shifters have remained beloved figures in Japanese mythology for thousands of years!

I was right there, standing next to Shani, listening to every word, tanuki propaganda beaming into my eyeballs. Tanuki statues, tanuki artwork, real tanuki, Thor and Loki. I was thinking to myself, what a weirdass coincidence, since I had only learned what a tanuki was that same day, and from Mr. Yamada no less, who had those big-balled raccoon lookalikes all over his damn store. Maybe he thought they brought him good luck or someshit like that, who knows. I got so absorbed in the programming that I sat down on the floor beside Shani, and we both just stared up into the glow.

Now it’s time for some fun facts! In Japanese folklore, only three animals are believed to possess the power of transformation, tanuki, some cats, and foxes, which are called “kitsune” in Japan. But unlike kitsune, who are said to use their magic for trickery and deception, tanuki are known for playful, harmless pranks and rewarding kindhearted people with good fortune! Legend has it that tanuki can use enchanted leaves, and even their own scrotums, to magically create and transform all sorts of objects, from swords for battle to market stalls for shopping! Their playful tricks and mischievous antics have made them beloved figures in Japanese folklore. But sadly, due to ongoing deforestation in Japan, many tanuki have been displaced from their natural habitats, forcing them to live closer to towns and cities. This is why it’s said that many tanuki now live among humans, disguised as ordinary people, so there could be one sitting next to you right now! Wouldn’t that be something?! There’s a popular joke in Japan that the recent rise in popularity of fast-acting energy drinks is due to the needs of transforming tanuki and foxes, because transformation requires so much energy! Isn’t that funny? So be careful, if one of your friends drinks a lot of energy drinks, who knows, maybe they’re actually a tanuki or a fox in disguise!

As the program flashed footage of tanuki and foxes wandering around the woods and shit, Shani and I were looking at each other with these playful, freaked-out expressions on our faces, giving each other goofy looks, sticking our tongues out and bugging our eyes out, like we were tanuki or someshit. And for a second there, I had forgotten all about those nighttime project blues.

If you’d like to meet a couple of tanuki that definitely aren’t disguised as humans, bring your family and friends down to Zoo Atlanta to visit Thor and Loki! They came all the way from Italy to be with us! And they love company! All-day passes are now buy two, get one free, but only for a limited time! Don’t miss out on the tanuki fun, only at Zoo Atlanta!

When the program ended, Shani jumped up and started marching all around the room, pumping two Sailor Moons above her head with both hands, going, “Tanuki! Tanuki! Tanuki! Tanuki!” Then she abruptly tossed the Sailor Moons and ran to the couch, dive-bombing Mom and shouting, “I wanna see the tanuki! I wanna see the tanuki!” And, at the same time, Kiki bolted the hell outta there, skid down the hallway like cats do sometimes.

Mom embraced Shani and rolled over with her on the couch, rustling Shani’s little afro and saying, “Careful, careful, not so rough.” Then she sat up, took Shani by the hands, and said, “We’ll see, OK, baby? Momma gets paid next week. If we got enough, we’ll go.”

“Really?” Shani said, calming down. “You mean it?” Then she started coughing again.

I knew Mom was bullshitting, because we ain’t never had enough after bills. Maybe if we cut back on the McDonald’s, or maybe if she took a break on the manicures, but she’d never do that. Despite all the Jesus shit, my mom was kinda vain, if I’m being honest. But it was whatever. I’d gotten used to having no money. It’s crazy how you acclimate, how you figure out how to get by with nothing but your wits and some pocket lint. The way I seen it, poverty forces you to become either a monk or a drug dealer, and I wasn’t gonna become no drug dealer. I shopped at Goodwill, rode a rustyass bike, and ate ramen every night. I didn’t need no fancy clothes, no expensive cars, no gourmet meals, no gold chains, nothing like that. I’d put all that shit outta my mind, well, except maybe the PlayStation 4, but even that was just a hope and a prayer, something I knew deep down was never gonna happen, just another stupid dream, just another day in the life. Besides, I wasn’t going to no zoo. Miss me with that evil shit.

Still feeling those blues, I decided to go to bed early, so I went back to Shani and I’s shared bedroom, stripped down to nothing but my boxers, turned off the lights, then plopped down on my bed, determined to get my winks in. I was restless, though. My eyes wouldn’t stay closed. The curtains were wide open, so I could see the billboard and that glowing skyline out there. I started thinking about Sinclair again, then about my old man again, then I started thinking, what if I called him? Told him what happened? He’d know what to say. He’d put all this shit into perspective. Back when he left, I got so mad I’d deleted his number, but I knew it by heart, so why the hell not?

So I sat up and checked the bedside for my cell. It wasn’t there. Shit, I thought, so I got up, turned on the lights, started searching all over, first my bed sheets, then the drawers, then Shani’s toy box, then all over the floor, pushing blocks and dolls and shit all outta the way, then I checked Shani’s bed, the Doc McStuffins sheets, even underneath the damn bed. But my cell was nowhere to be found. It had just up and vanished. It was gone. I could’ve sworn I’d put it in my pocket before I’d left Swap USA earlier. Did I leave it in the living room? Maybe Mom’s car? Maybe in the fridge? I was always leaving my damn phone in the weirdest of places.

Sighing, I put my cargos back on, threw on my old Space Ghost shirt and hoodie, then went back into the living room. It was all dark in there. Shani and Mom were on the couch. Cartoon Network was playing at low volume. Adventure Time was on, the old blue dude was saying, “Lot of emotional, powerful stuff in here” or someshit like that. Shani’s head was on Mom’s lap, and she was doing those slow blinks she does when she’s about to pass out. Mom of course had that damn Bible in her face.

“Y’all seen my phone?” I said loudly, checking the counters and tables and nooks and crannies and shit, still not finding it. Then I checked the little kitchen area in the corner, dug through all the cabinets with the off-brand cereal, the ramen, the nastyass canned vegetables, and all that other shit Mom bought with her SNAP benefits. Then I checked the fridge, because sometimes I was known to put my phone in the weirdest of places. But I still couldn’t find it, so I went to the light switch and said, “Mind if I turn the light on?”

“Shhh,” Mom replied. “Shani’s almost asleep.”

“Well,” I said, kinda annoyed. “I can’t find my phone.” I started checking around the couch, lifting the pillows and digging into the crevices, trying not to be too loud.

“You check the car?”

“What you think?” I replied with an irritated look. “You seen me leave the house?”

Mom didn’t answer. She just had that damn Bible in her face.

“What, you think I crawled out the window, scaled the building, got into the car, without the keys, mind you, then climbed back in through the window?” I said all this kinda under my breath, trying not to wake Shani up, but I had a real bad tone. “That what you think?”

The moment I said that, I knew I shouldn’t have. I didn’t know what I was thinking, getting so disrespectful with Mom. Normally she’d smack me in the mouth for talking like that. But turns out she wasn’t even paying attention, still too busy reading her holy book or whatever. Tanuki’s luck, I guess.

But no such luck with my cell phone. I searched around for another minute, but it was still nowhere to be found, like it had fallen into a portal or someshit. So I paused, took a deep breath, ran my hands over my buzzed head, and that’s when I got an idea.

“Yo, Mom. Can I use yours?”

She didn’t respond.

“Mom!” I shouted. “Can I use your phone?”

Shani snapped up and looked around all bug-eyed like she’d just seen a ghost or someshit, then she shouted, “Don’t worry, Sailor Moon! I found the magic wand!” Then she laid her head right back down like she hadn’t said nothing at all.

Mom was glaring at me over her Bible. She had that you-done-fucked-up look on her face.

“Sorry, sorry, my bad, just looking for my phone, is all.” I said, proactively pleading, begging for my life, because Mom could get real scary sometimes. “Can I just borrow yours, for a second?”

“Fine,” Mom said, pulling her phone out from under a pillow and handing it to me. “Don’t use up all my minutes.”

I flipped the phone open, thumbed my number into the keypad, then let it ring. I listened real close to everything around me, trying to hear if my cell was going off somewhere, but nothing was happening. So I turned off the TV to hear better, still nothing. Then I walked into the bedroom, closed the door, and listened even harder, squinting my eyes and looking around real hard, like that was somehow gonna help me hear better or some stupid shit. Still nothing. All I could hear was the calling tone coming from Mom’s phone. And after a few seconds, even that stopped, leaving nothing but the sound of a police siren going off somewhere in the distance.

I sighed and went to snap the phone shut, but that’s when I heard something, somebody’s voice, soft and muffled. I looked down at the little screen and noticed the call had connected. But it couldn’t have been my voicemail because I ain’t have no voicemail, didn’t have time for that shit.

“Hello… Hello… Who there… This…”

I was a little freaked out, not gonna lie, also kinda angry, because clearly someone had stolen my damn phone. But why? An iPhone I could understand, but a thirty-dollar Obama phone? Why? Why the hell would anyone wanna steal that? And when did it happen? I could’ve sworn I’d pocketed it before I left Swap USA. I guess it could’ve happened when I was coming home earlier. I did pass a few sketchy individuals going up the stairs, but, if that was the case, they must’ve been a master thief or someshit because I hadn’t felt a damn thing.

The voice kept going. “Hello… Someone there… Acc…”

I tensed up, put the phone to my ear, then, in a rudeass tone, said, “Why the hell you got my phone?”

“Oh, found phone,” the man said in a weird accent before I cut him the hell off.

“Who this? Where you at?”

“This Taro Yamada, Swap USA.”

As soon as he said that, all the tension in my body melted away, leaving only some kinda profound confusion. How the hell’d he get my phone? I’d pocketed it. I distinctly remember pocketing it. I blinked for a few seconds, staring at the wall in front of me, which was covered in smiley faces and moons and stars and shit, Shani’s handiwork.

Mr. Yamada went on, “Still there? Hello? This Taro Yamada. Swap USA. You hang up?”

Coming back to my senses, I felt a little embarrassed, having snapped at him, so I said, “Oh, damn, my bad.”

“You not bad, you good, found phone.”

I had no idea what to say to that.

“You come get? Store still open. I wait. No big deal.”

I looked over at the alarm clock on my bedside, it was almost ten. Swap USA was open this late? No way Mom was gonna take me out at this hour, so I said, “Can I drop by in the morning?”

“No no, go bye bye tomorrow.”

Go bye bye tomorrow? What the hell he mean by that? Crazy Mr. Yamada shit, I figured. So I just shook my head and said, “What if I give you my address? You can drop it off.”

“No no, can’t drive.”

He can’t drive? For real? How does this guy survive? Probably a good thing, though, because Mr. Yamada wouldn't survive in this neighborhood very long. Thinking to myself, I ran my hand across my face and let out a big sigh. “Well, damn, OK then, hold on, let me ask.”

“No big deal, I wait.”

I left the phone open but put it in my pocket, then I went out into the living room, where Mom was still reading her Bible, and Shani was dead asleep with her head on Mom’s lap. I was dreading asking, because I knew what Mom was gonna say and I had already pissed her off earlier, but I asked anyway.

“Uh, you think you can drive me to Swap USA real quick?”

Mom peered up from her page. She had this look on her face like, “What are you, stupid?”

I started squirming, mumbling, “Left my phone there.”

Mom was still glaring.

“Mr. Yamada has it, and he’s going somewhere tomorrow, so I gotta get it now, and he can’t drive, but he said he’d wait.”

“You want me to drive you to Swap USA,” Mom said, looking at her watch, “at ten o’clock at night?”

“Yeah, need my phone. How else am I gonna call you tomorrow?”

Mom looked confused, like she didn’t get my point.

“I’m staying at Trey’s after school, you remember?”

This wasn’t a lie. I was going to Trey’s the next day. He was like my only friend at school. We chilled every Friday at his place, played some Tekken, smoked some weed.

Mom sighed, shook her head, then looked down at her Bible. “Shouldn’t have lost your phone then,” she said, like that was the end of it.

I raised my voice, pleading. “But Mom, c’mon, Swap USA is only like five minutes away!”

I guess I was being too loud because, when I said that, Shani’s head snapped up. She did a double take between me and Mom, then rubbed her eyes and said all groggy, “Swap USA?”

Mom was looking hella pissed now. I could tell she was about to go wild on me, but then Shani started repeating, “I wanna see the tanuki! I wanna see the tanuki! Tanuki! Tanuki! Tanuki!”

“Calm down,” Mom said, then looked all confused. “Tanuki?”

“The statues! I wanna see the statues!”

“No, baby,” she said. “It’s too late.”

“But I wanna see the tanuki!”

“I said, NO!” Mom was getting real serious.

But you know Shani, once she gets something in her head, she just will not quit, so she kept repeating, “I wanna see the tanuki! I wanna see the tanuki! I wanna see the tanuki RIGHT NOW!”

That’s why, five minutes later, we were in the car, driving to Swap USA, at ten o’clock at night.

I swear, that girl gets whatever she wants sometimes. Spoilt as hell.

Nothing crazy happened for a couple weeks, so I put the whole thing behind me, rationalizing “Special Investigator Madison Sinclair” as just the ravings of a madman and Mr. Yamada’s behavior as, well, just Mr. Yamada being Mr. Yamada. Plus, I was too busy focusing on school. I wasn’t gonna end up like my mom or my deadbeat dad. I wasn’t gonna spend my whole damn life in some call center or halfway house or wherever the hell he was at. I was gonna be different. I was gonna go to college, become a music journalist. That’s why I was always working on my words and grammars and shit. That was my dream, well, that and getting a PlayStation 4, which was starting to feel more like a pipe dream every damn day because, well, between Shani’s Thursday lollipops and Mom always bumming money off me, I’d only saved up about $100 cutting grass, and that was just not gonna cut it. My ambitions were high, and my hopes were even higher, so I kept up the grind, meaning I didn’t have time for no weirdass bullshit.

But, as it turned out, weirdass bullshit had time for me because one Thursday in November, the weirdass bullshit caught up with me. And, as you might’ve guessed, it happened during one of those weekly “shopping” trips.

I was listening to Daft Punk’s Discovery when we walked into Swap USA that afternoon. The song kept repeating, “Something’s in the air. Something’s in the air. Something’s in the air.” Shani’s cheeks were puffed out like a big crescent moon because she had that whole damn lollipop shoved into her mouth. The place was packed with kids, which was weird because it was never that busy. It was usually low-key and chill. But something was going on. There were a bunch of brats huddled in the back, and there was so much chatter and laughter and shouting that I could barely hear my music, even with the PSP at full blast. So I slid my headphones down and started making my way toward the counter to figure out what the hell was going on, but then Shani tugged at my cargos.

Pulling the lollipop outta her mouth with a loud pop, she shouted, “Too loud!”

So I detached the cord and handed my headphones to her. “Don’t break ’em,” I said, glaring because she had broke a pair before, and they were hella expensive.

She grinned her big, toothy grin, nodded, then put the headphones on. They smushed her little afro and looked humongous on her. Then she ventured off to the Sailor Moons alone because all the other kids were too interested in whatever was happening at the back of the store. And so was I, so I walked up to the counter to ask Mr. Yamada.

Mr. Yamada was sitting in his usual spot behind the counter, holding a GameCube controller. I recognized the game he was playing, it was Animal Crossing. I played that a lot when I was younger. But there was something weird going on, though, because Mr. Yamada didn’t look his normal self. He was wearing dark circular glasses and a black beanie, like he was in incognito mode or someshit. There were also all these long slips of paper taped to the counter, with strange symbols and kanji drawn all over them, kinda like scrolls you’d see in Naruto or someshit. They were actually all over the store. So I went to examine one, but before I could even get close, Mr. Yamada’s head snapped toward me.

“No touchie!” he shouted, wearing a warped version of his typical goofyass smile.

“Whoa,” I said, withdrawing my hand. “My bad.”

“Not bad, you good, just no touchie decorations,” he said, turning back to his game.

“Gotcha, no touchie decorations,” I repeated, rubbing my buzzed head, feeling embarrassed. Then I said, “Didn’t know you was into Animal Crossing,” to ease the tension a little bit.

Mr. Yamada nodded as he navigated his little guy on screen. “Good game, remind me of home.”

Home? Did he mean Japan? Animal Crossing wasn’t set in Japan, as far as I knew. I shrugged this off and asked, “Who’s your favorite villager?” to further ease the tension I was feeling.

“Tom Nook my favorite.”

“Oh, the raccoon? Not really a villager, but…”

“Not raccoon,” Mr. Yamada interrupted. “Tanuki!”

“Tanuki?” I repeated. “Ain’t that the same thing?”

“Not same thing!” Mr. Yamada snapped at me again. “Totally different!” He sounded like one of those intense samurai guys you’d see in a Kurosawa film, before they land the killing blow on some poor fool.

“Whoa,” I said. “My bad.” Then I thought to myself, tanuki different from raccoons? How did I not know this, considering all the Japanese media I’d consumed? I guessed this was my American education catching up with me or someshit. It was also in that moment I realized all the raccoon statues around the store weren’t actually raccoons at all, they were tanuki. Mr. Yamada must’ve really liked tanuki.

Growing impatient with me, Mr. Yamada quickly added, “What you want? Sign up for tournament?”

“That’s what’s going down?”

“Yes, yes.” He lowered his shades to scan me up and down, then his expression changed. “Oh, it you, accomplice!” he said, dropping the impatient tone and talking like he had just run into a close friend he ain’t seen in years, which I thought was strange.

“Yeah, yo, you ain’t recognize me?”

“Hard to see,” he said, pointing to his big shades.

I noticed his eyes looked way darker and sunken than usual, so I was tempted to ask about that, but I didn’t want to get snapped at again, so instead I just said, “So, what’s this tournament?”

He jumped up from his seat, lifted his hands, and shouted, “SUPER MEGA BLOWOUT SMASH BASH!” like some sort of cartoon character.

I blinked, both at the ridiculousness of the name and because I ain’t never seen him act like this before. “What is it? Smash Bros? Which one?”

“GameCube,” he said as he casually sat back down in his chair, acting like he hadn’t just done some seriously goofyass shit. Then he quickly added, “Sign up twenty dollar.”

Twenty dollars? The universe was conspiring to take all my PlayStation 4 cash. But I wasn’t gonna let it, so I said, “I’m good. Sounds tight, though. I’ll just watch.”

At that, Mr. Yamada turned his head toward me in slow motion, like he was a movie villain or something. Then he stared at me for a whole five seconds before asking, in an almost grave tone, “You just watch?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Why? No money?”

“Well,” I said, rubbing my head again, embarrassed. “It’s not that, I just ain’t…”

“You play free,” he said, interrupting me.

“Free?” I blinked. “You sure?”

Mr. Yamada held one finger over his lips, which were curled into a grin, then went, “Shhhhhh.”

I shrugged. “OK then, what the hell, sign me up.”

Mr. Yamada pushed a sheet of paper across the glass countertop, then handed me a pen. It looked like some kinda crazyass legal document, with lines and lines of small text. Did he have a lawyer draft up some kinda sign-up agreement or someshit? Ridiculous. Either way, I wasn’t reading all that, so I just scribbled my name real quick and slid the paper back to him. Then I turned to join the crowd of kids. But just as I was about to walk off, it hit me, I hadn’t asked the most important question.

“What’s the prize?”

“Prize?” There was a dramatic pause and another goofy grin. “Prize everything in store.”

I laughed at this obvious joke, but I played along. “OK then, Mr. Yamada. Sounds good. If I win, I get everything in the store.”

He gave me a little nod, then went back to playing his Animal Crossing. His little guy was throwing leaves on the floor, which turned into furniture. His room in the game looked just like how you’d expect Mr. Yamada’s room to look in real life, dim orange lights, chill nature vibes, log furniture, like he was living in the woods or someshit. I wasn’t surprised at all.

When I got to the table in the back, the one with the CRTs and all the kids, I noticed a tournament bracket drawn on a sheet of paper. It was lying right there on the table. So I picked it up, and somehow my name was already on there. Did someone overhear my conversation with Mr. Yamada or something? I looked around at the other kids and didn’t recognize a single one, so there was no way they could’ve done it. Maybe Mr. Yamada had just assumed I was gonna be part of the tournament, so he wrote my name down earlier? This didn’t seem too crazy, since I was there every Thursday. Then I thought, who holds a tournament on a school day anyway? Mr. Yamada worked in mysterious ways, I told myself.

The bracket said I was up against some kid named Justin, but I didn’t know who that was, so I walked around, sliding between kids, tapping shoulders, introducing myself until I found my opponent.

Justin must’ve been like twelve years old. He was wearing a bright green Minecraft shirt and was lugging around a Megatron book bag. He looked like a straight-up nerd. He had that extreme baby face kids around his age have, and he wore these big square glasses and colorful braces. I felt kinda sorry for him because he was definitely getting bullied at school, no doubt about it, and I knew some shit about getting bullied. So, after he told me his name, I said, “Don’t go easy on me, aight?” trying to play it cool and start us off on the right foot and all that. I even went to shake his hand, and at first it looked like he was gonna give me a handshake, but then, at the very last second, he pulled back and said, “Psych!” Then he stuck his tongue out and shouted, “I’m gonna beat your ass!” So my empathy for that little shit dried up right then and there.

A few kids were ahead of us in the bracket, so Justin and I didn’t get to play at first. I took the time to check on Shani, see what she was up to. She was still in her own little zone. She had taken the Sailor Moons outta the boxes and was playing with them on the tatami. I towered over her with a stern look on my face, shaking my head.

“Shani,” I said.

She didn’t respond. She still had my humongous headphones on. She also had that ridiculous lollipop in her mouth.

“Shani!”

She snapped her head up with a surprised look, then popped the lollipop outta her mouth and lowered the headphones.

“You can’t take those out, you gotta buy ’em.”

“But they sad.”

I stared at her with this deadpan look on my face, then said, “Shani, c’mon, you gonna get us in trouble.”

“How would you feel, in a box?”

“They toys, Shani.”

When I said that, she hung her head real low and let out a big sigh. “They not toys. They friends. They got feelings.” She was doing the baby-talk shit again.

And I knew she was about to blow up, so I knelt down beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Look, there’s a tournament goin’ on. If I win, I get everything in the store.”

Her face lit up and her eyes went wide. “Everything?”

“Everything.” I didn’t really believe what I was saying, but hey, whatever works.

“I can have all the Sailor Moons?” she said, staring at me with her big brown eyes. “Can I? Can I? Can I?”

“Sure, yeah,” I said, standing up. “But you gotta put ’em back.”

“OK!” she said cheerfully, then she quickly boxed up all the Sailor Moons and jumped to her feet. “Can I watch?”

“Sure, if you give me my ’phones.” I was always better at video games if I had my music.

“OK! Here you go!”

I plugged the cord back into my headphones, then whipped out my PSP to queue up some music, but just as I was doing that, I heard Justin say something behind me.

“Ready to get your ass beat, Sid?”

This kid was calling me Sid, too? Shit. I had light skin, on account of my mom being white and all that, but I definitely had more melanin than that pale-ass psycho. Shrugging it off, I just shook my head and said, “Your mom know you talk like that?”

“My mom’s a professional wrestler and she’ll beat your ass.”

Jesus, this kid. An obvious lie, but still. I told myself I wasn’t gonna engage with this toddlerass fool any longer. I figured whooping his ass in Smash would set him straight, so I just rolled my eyes and started making my way toward the CRT table, but that’s when Shani jumped in.

“My big bro can take you, easy!” she shouted, stomping her foot. Then she added, “Braceface!” as a sort of follow-up punch.

Justin’s face warped with rage and disgust. He looked Shani up and down and said, “At least I’m not black.”

This pissed me the hell off, so I turned to the kid and was about to say some real stupid shit, but before I could, Shani stepped up and handled the situation with grace.

What she did was, she took that big wet lollipop outta her mouth and stuck it right in the kid’s hair, then she said, “Oops,” and walked off, just like that.

Justin started flailing, pulling at the lollipop, going, “Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow,” with each tug. I shook my head, did one of those “pshh” noises, then followed my sister.

All I could think to say to her was, “Nice,” and I meant it.

“That kid’s a big meanie!”

“You got that right,” I said, then I thought to myself, damn, didn't know Shani could hold her own like that, she’s growing up too damn fast.

The time of reckoning was drawing near, so I pulled up a chair in front of the big gray Magnavox and took one of those super-deformed GameCube controllers off the table. A group of like five brats surrounded us. Shani took a seat on the tatami next to me, her arms wrapped around her knees as she peered up into the glow of the TV, which was repeating the Smash Bros. intro, the one where the Mario toy comes to life and is challenged by Link from Zelda before flashing all the characters one by one until finally landing on the title screen with that absurd announcer shouting, “SUPER SMASH BROS. MELEEEEEEE!” just like that.

I pressed the Start button and navigated to Character Select, then picked my homie Young Link, who never done me wrong. I wasn’t a pro at the game or nothing, I just played it here and there at my friend Trey’s house, so I knew my way around a controller and usually won matches. I always had a knack for fighting games. My favorite genre, in fact. But, if we’re being technical, Smash ain’t no true fighting game, basically just a party game for kids, so I didn’t take it too seriously.

Justin’s arrival was signaled by some crazy laughter. Kids were pointing at him, saying, “Yo, man, what happened to your hair?” because a chunk of his bangs was missing. He kept shouting, “Shut up, shut up, shut up!” as he aggressively pulled a chair up, snatched a controller off the table, and sat down. Then he looked at me and said, “I’m gonna teach you and your dumbass sister a lesson!” Then he picked Marth, a swordfighter who happened to be a top-tier character, but there was no way this kid was a top-tier player, no way in hell.

Instead of honoring the kid with a proper response, I just slipped my headphones on, whipped out my PSP, and put on a good fight song, “Bombs over Baghdad” by OutKast. The trippy intro went off, then Andre 3000 came in, “One, two, three, yeah!” And that’s when the match started. Three stock, no items, Final Destination. It could be no other way. It was like we became our characters. I opened with a fire arrow from across the screen. Justin spot-dodged it and rushed in with a neutral slash. I dodge-rolled that, got behind him, smashed him with a quick flick of the C-stick. Andre 3000 was singing, “Who want some? Don’t come unprepared. I'll be there, but when I leave there, better be a household name.” I followed the smash attack with a boomerang toss, but I angled it upward, expecting Justin to jump, and he did, so he got hit. I took the opportunity to jump in and do a whirlwind slash with Up+B, which caught him by surprise, whipped him around, launched him off the side of the battlefield. Andre was rapping, “In a silk suit tryin’ not to sweat, hit somersaults without the net,” and I was feeling fresh, real fresh, and clean, too. My execution was flawless. Kids around us were oohing and aahing. I was thinking, this gonna be easy. Justin recovered with a ledge grab, got to his feet, and said, “I was just feeling you out, now you’re gonna die,” which I barely heard on account of the music and didn’t bother to respond outta pure spite, instead just pulling out a bomb and tossing it his way. But that’s when he started doing the fancy shit. He started crouching and sliding around the battlefield real fast. He was doing what they call “wave dashing,” a high-level trick used by pros, something I could never figure out how to do myself.

That’s when the match took a bad turn. Justin was moving around so fast, doing these little sword pokes all over the place. I couldn’t get a read on him. Andre 3000 was on the chorus, “Don’t even bang unless you plan to hit something. Bombs over Baghdad!” And, at that moment, it dawned on me, Justin was right, I was gonna get my ass beat. My stomach kinda dropped. He was better than me at Smash. Shit, I thought to myself, how is this even possible, some twelve-year-old clown, this good at a game that’s almost older than he is? I put in my best effort, but this kid was on a whole ’nother level. About a minute passed and suddenly I was on my last life. I lowered my headphones. “Bombs over Baghdad” had become my anthem of defeat, so I didn’t wanna listen to it no more. Justin and I were just standing on the battlefield, our characters staring at each other, bouncing up and down in their idle animations, when he said, “Told you I was gonna beat your ass. I give you five seconds to give up.”

Shani had been watching this whole thing unfold, her head darting back and forth from the screen to my controller, like she was memorizing my inputs or something. She had that focused look on her face she got when she got real interested in something. And when Justin told me to quit, Shani, who was about the size of the chair I was sitting in, stood up with her hands on her hips and said, “I wanna play!”

Flustered, I waved at her to hush. But, as you know, once she gets something in her head, she just won’t stop, so she kept on going. “I wanna play, I wanna play, I wanna play RIGHT NOW!”

Overwhelmed by embarrassment and shame and pure rage, I snapped at her, “Shut up! You don’t even know how to play!” Then I immediately felt bad because I was clearly taking my frustration out on the wrong person.

“Do too know how to play!”

Justin laughed his little prepubescent laugh and said, “You wanna let your little sis’ fight for you? Fine. Probably do better than you.”

I was pretending not to be bothered by this, but I couldn’t help rolling my eyes, clenching my teeth, and wanting to kill him. But then I thought, whatever, it’s just a dumbass party game, who gives a shit, so I handed Shani the controller and said, “Go nuts,” totally expecting her to get her ass beat.

Shani was overjoyed, bouncing up and down. “Let me sit, let me sit!” She kept saying that, so I got up and let her take my seat, at which point she took the controller in both hands and started making Young Link duck up and down repeatedly. She clearly had no idea what she was doing. Justin took advantage of this, wave-dashing Marth toward Young Link and trying to take a swipe, but somehow Shani managed to get Young Link to do a dodge roll, then she started ducking him up and down again for no apparent reason. She was getting lucky, I thought. But then it happened again, another dodge roll, then more ducking. Justin was getting visibly pissed. I guess he thought the ducking thing was like some kinda taunt. Young Link looked like he was spazzing out, like how you’d expect him to look if a seven-year-old was playing him, but there was something weird about the whole thing, some kinda controlled chaos in the movements. Justin just couldn’t get a hit in.

At one point, when Shani had Young Link at the edge of the battlefield, Marth went for a jump slash but got dodged again, sending him tumbling off the ledge to his death. Justin was fuming, his face scrunched up with rage as he did a double take at Shani, who was just bouncing up and down in her seat with this huge smile on her face. Justin got Marth in there again with a different approach, but somehow, all without making a single attack, Shani had spastically maneuvered Young Link in such a way that Marth fell off the side again. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It was like one of those scenes from a kung fu movie where the seasoned pro squares off against the drunken master whose moves are impossible to predict because of how random they are. She was like Mugen from that anime Samurai Champloo or someshit. I ain’t never seen nothing like it. Shani, without attacking even once, had somehow managed to make Justin kill himself twice, and now they both had just one life left.

It was a classic showdown scenario, up there with some of the best scenes in Bruce Lee films. An eerie silence took over the whole store. Only the nature sounds were playing. All the kids were real close to the Magnavox, watching with bated breath, occasionally gasping and muttering things like, “What the hell, how’s she doing that, no way, unreal,” and so on. Justin was playing it safe, keeping Marth a good distance away from Young Link, so Shani started with the arrows, but she never charged the arrows enough to reach Marth, instead just shooting them at seemingly random distances. She then had Young Link pull out a bomb and toss it directly up, then started with the arrows again. I had no idea what she was doing.

Justin took this chance to maneuver Marth into the air, appearing over Young Link, but just as Marth went to do a down-air smash, the bomb came down, hit him, blew up, and sent him flying off the edge of the battlefield. Shani then ran Young Link to the edge and waited there for Marth to recover, ducking up and down the whole time. And just as Marth was about to grab the ledge, Shani had Young Link fall off the battlefield, grab the ledge, and then just hang.

My jaw dropped. This was some advanced tech. Had she been watching YouTube tutorials or someshit? I couldn’t wrap my head around what the hell was happening here. Because as Marth went to grab the ledge, Young Link, who was already hanging from the ledge, prevented Marth from grabbing it, because only one player can be holding the ledge at a time, which resulted in Marth falling to his death and the announcer shouting, “GAME!”

“I win,” Shani said calmly, big smile on her face, teeth showing.

Justin immediately chucked his controller at the tatami, stood up, and started pacing around. “Not fair!” he shouted. “She got lucky!” he shouted some more. “Actually, she probably cheated!” he shouted a few more times. Then it looked like a lightbulb went off over his head because he got real calm and said, “That girl’s not even part of the tournament. She shouldn’t even be playing, so this doesn’t count.”

I didn’t really care either way because it’s not like there was a real prize or nothing. To me, the real prize was seeing this kid get his ass beat. Plus, I learned something new about my sister, she was some sort of video game savant or someshit. I was pleased with this. But the other kids in the store seemed to take this all very seriously because there was a collective gasp at what Justin had said. After all, he was right, this was an illegal match, it broke tournament rules. Justin should’ve been the winner.

But then Shani stood up with the bracket in her hand. “No, my name right here,” she said, holding the paper out proudly.

Justin’s face twisted with rage. “What!” he shouted. “Give me that!” He snatched the paper from Shani’s hand, read it, and that’s when he went all bug-eyed. “What…”

I figured Shani was just joking around, but Justin’s reaction seemed to indicate otherwise, so I walked up to the kid, took the paper, and read it myself. Sure enough, Shani’s name was right there, written in real bad handwriting. Her name was actually where my name should’ve been. My name was just gone somehow. So, like Justin, I also found myself bug-eyed, going, “What…”

Justin shook his head and said, “She must have wrote it on there!”

Some random kid said, “She was sitting there the whole time, I seen her!”

Justin then accused Mr. Yamada. “It’s that guy! He did it!” He turned to point at Mr. Yamada, who was just sitting there playing Animal Crossing.

Another random kid said, “No way! Unless he’s like magic or something. He ain’t moved!”

Justin had run outta accusations. He just stood there, shaking violently, then, after a few seconds, he snatched up his backpack and bolted outta the store faster than I’d ever seen anyone bolt in my life, shouting some rudeass shit as he ran. All the kids bust out laughing, and so did I.

But Shani wasn’t laughing. She just sat back down with controller in hand and said, “OK! Who’s next?”

I couldn’t tell you exactly how she done it, but twenty minutes later, she had won the Super Mega Blowout Smash Bash. Her opponents didn’t even get mad. They were all kinda awestruck, actually. The kids gathered around her, praising her and asking her for tips, some even asked for her autograph. They pulled out their cow-print notebooks, and Shani scribbled her name inside each one, putting little moons and hearts and shit all over the place. At some point, some kid called her the Queen of Smash, so everyone started chanting, “Queen of Smash! Queen of Smash! Queen of Smash!” And she was loving it, lapping it up, lifting her hands, twirling around, jumping up and down, happier than I’d ever seen her before.

And, to tell you the truth, I was pretty happy too, and damn proud of her. Who knew she was so good at video games? My sister Shani, Queen of Smash. I figured I’d give her her five minutes of fame, so I sat down on the tatami, slipped on my headphones, and hit shuffle. “Starfish and Coffee” started playing. Prince was singing, “All of us were ordinary compared to Cynthia Rose. She always stood at the back of the line, a smile beneath her nose.” And it was then that I realized, damn, my PSP must be magical or someshit because shuffle kept playing the most relevant songs. Or maybe I was just looking for the relevance in everything back then.

I wanted to remember this moment forever, so I figured I’d take the tournament bracket home with me, put it on the refrigerator or someshit, but when I went to grab it off the table, it wasn’t there, there was just a big green leaf in its place. Maybe that leaf had always been there. Some kid must’ve grabbed the bracket, so I thought whatever, and pulled out my flip phone instead, snapped a picture of Shani surrounded by all those kids. The picture was low-res and pixelated as hell, but other than that, it came out great. Shani was smiling real bright, and one boy even had his hand on her little afro, smushing it, like he was crowning her the actual Queen of Smash.

Then my phone started buzzing. It was a text from Mom. “all done. hungry? :)” And yeah, when I thought about it, I was hungry, so hungry, in fact, I could’ve eaten the actual McDonald’s coupons Mom had been holding onto, so I texted her back, “yea brt,” then pocketed my phone.

Shani didn’t want to leave, but the other kids were leaving, and plus I bribed her. I figured, since she won the tournament and was supposed to get everything in the store or whatever, Mr. Yamada would at least let her have one or two Sailor Moons. So we both walked up to the counter to claim our prize.

“Yo, Mr. Yamada,” I said.

Shani copied me. “Yo, Mr. Yamada!”

Mr. Yamada was chopping down a tree in his game, looking all oblivious. All he said was, “Who win Smash Bash?”

I was about to answer, but then Shani jumped in, repeating, “I did! I did! I did!”

“What we get, Mr. Yamada?” I said, crossing my arms. “You said everything in the store.”

He didn’t laugh or nothing. He just swiveled in his chair and, still wearing those circle shades and that baggy beanie, nodded solemnly at us like he was some kinda ridiculous anime sensei or someshit. Then he said, “Store yours, just not now.”

This was all part of the joke, I thought. So I said, “At least let her pick out a few things.”

“No problem, no problem. Go. Go pick,” he said.

“You heard him, Shani. Don’t go too crazy.”

Shani went running off, cheering.

She was gone for a couple minutes. So I was standing there, looking at the posters and the Yu-Gi-Oh! cards and the ancient Neo Geo Pocket boxes no one ever bought that were behind the counter. Then I remembered the weirdass shit with the bracket.

“Yo, Mr. Yamada,” I said, pausing to wait for him to give me his attention. “When I went to write my name on the bracket, it was already there.”

“Oh?” was all he said, and he said it in this kinda sly way.

“Yeah, and it was real strange, ’cause when Shani started playing, her name was there, too.”

“Very interesting,” he said, with these long, drawn-out syllables. “What you think happen?”

“What you mean, what I think happen?” I said, raising one eyebrow. “You write our names on there or what?”

Mr. Yamada leaned back in his chair and let out a little “hmm” noise. It was at that moment I noticed his belly. It looked huge under his flannel shirt, like one of those fat Buddhas you see in Chinese restaurants. Was Mr. Yamada going into hibernation or someshit? Because back in September, he was thin as a rail. I thought to myself, damn, he must’ve been eating Big Macs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every damn day to put on that kind of weight. I just chalked it up to yet another classic Mr. Yamada mystery and said, “You did, didn’t you? You had to’ve.”

He rocked forward in his chair, put his elbows on the glass display counter, looked straight at me, lowered his shades just a little so I could see his baggy eyes, and then, with a blank face and a grave tone, said, “I never tell,” then he winked.

I made one of those “pshh” noises, then said, “Mr. Yamada, you crazy man.”

There was a big, hearty laugh, then he just went back to playing Animal Crossing, then Shani returned with an armful of boxes. There was Sailor Moon, Sailor Mars, Sailor Jupiter, Tuxedo Mask, Sailor Uranus, Sailor Pluto, even Sailor Chibi Moon. And she was looking up at me with this kinda “Is this OK?” look on her face.

I gave her this playful glare and said, “You get something for your big bro?”

“Yeah, yeah I did!” She shuffled some of the boxes around in her arms. Turns out there was a Super Saiyan 3 Goku in there. My favorite.

“Girl, you know me too well,” I said, smirking. Then I turned to Mr. Yamada and said, “Alright, we outta here. See you next week.”

It was strange, though, because when we started walking away, Mr. Yamada looked kinda sad, so I stopped and said, “You OK, Mr. Yamada? We take too much?”

Adjusting his shades, he shook his head, made a goofy smile, then rapped, “All good in the hood baby baby,” with the most ridiculous accent I had ever heard in my life. Shani and I bust out laughing. We couldn’t believe he was quoting Notorious B.I.G. lyrics. Living in America must’ve corrupted his brain or someshit.

“Mr. Yamada, you crazy man,” I repeated, then we walked outta the store, the bell dinging behind us.

But it wasn’t even two steps down the walkway when I heard that smooth, hypnotic voice casting a spell. It said, “How’s Mr. Yamada?” and ran a wicked chill down my spine. I tensed up, turned toward the dark magic, and there he was, Special Investigator Madison Sinclair, still in that ridiculous outfit, sitting on a bench with his legs crossed in front of one of those hella eighties LA Nails posters, you know the one with the woman as white as snow, wearing heavy makeup with her hair all crazy, staring at you all seductively. If it wasn’t for the safari getup, you might’ve thought Investigator Sinclair had jumped right outta the damn poster. That’s how mesmerizing this freak was, especially since he was holding that gyroscope thing in one hand, and it was spinning around like crazy.

“Hello, Mr. Sinclair!” Shani shouted cheerfully. “Guess what I did today!”

I signaled her to hush, then stepped in front of her, gave Sinclair an icy look, and said, in my toughest tone, “What the hell you want?”

“I believe we may have gotten off on the wrong foot,” he said, his eyes almost supernaturally slanted and his mouth curved into this weird, almost creepy smile, like he was trying to look friendly but couldn’t look anything other than mischievous as hell.

“Is it the clothes?” Sinclair added, tilting his head somewhat like a confused animal might do.

“Damn right it’s the clothes,” I said instantly. It was also his face and freakyass way of talking, too, but I wasn’t gonna totally destroy this poor fool.

“I wear these clothes for a very special reason,” he said, his unsettling expression unchanged.

“Deadass? And what’s that, a clown convention?”

Shani didn’t approve of my tone, I guess, because she kicked me in the leg and said, “Be nice!” But I just brushed her off.

Sinclair didn’t seem to mind, though. He actually put his thin hand up to his mouth and let out a chuckle that sounded like a high-pitched “Ho ho ho!” Then, after containing himself, he said, “You wouldn’t understand.”

“Yeah? Try me.”

His face turned serious in an instant, and then he said, “What if I told you these clothes protected me from powerful magic?”

Trying to sound tough, I said, “I’d say you crazy, like I knew you was.”

Another “Ho ho ho!” Then he said, “Would you prefer a different outfit?”

I wasn’t gonna entertain this fool any longer, so I said, “Aight, we outta here.” Then I took Shani by the wrist and turned away.

But then he said, “Just one thing, please. I mean you no harm.”

So, against my better judgment, I turned around to face this fool, and that’s when my jaw dropped to the floor, because this guy was now wearing a full-on tuxedo, with a tie and all, and his pitch-black hair was styled immaculately, almost like he really did just jump outta one of those LA Nails posters. I did a double take, thinking, how the hell he do that? Was he some kinda street performer or someshit?

Shani, though, wasn’t freaked out at all. She actually bust out laughing, started clapping, and went, “Do it again! Do it again! Do it again!”

Sinclair’s mouth curled into a grin. “This is the only other outfit I have, young lady.”

Freaked the fuck out but also curious as hell, I said, “Man, how you do that?”

“Secrets of the trade, my friend,” he said, placing a thin finger on his lower lip, which was bright red, almost like he was wearing lipstick or someshit. “But I’ll tell you, if you do one thing for me.”

“What, pay you?” I said cynically.

“No, no, nothing like that,” he replied, staring right at me.

I had been avoiding eye contact with this fool until that very moment, when our eyes locked, and that’s when some weird shit happened. My whole body shivered, and it was like my mind went blank or someshit. I suddenly really, really wanted to know how he did his little outfit-swap trick, and it was almost like I would do anything to find out.

Sinclair continued. “I would like to know about Mr. Yamada.”

“Oh,” I blinked. “That all?”

“Tell me everything.”

So I told him everything, every little detail and nuance. I told him about the boy and the dad and the Charizard. The “No speak English.” I told him about Pocky and Rocky. The beanie, the sunglasses, the 5-Hour Energy drinks. I told him about Animal Crossing and the Super Mega Blowout Smash Bash, and how the names on the tournament bracket kept switching around. The wink. How it seemed like only kids could come into the place. I gave the man times and dates. I told him how Mr. Yamada gained weight. I even told him all the little details, like that one leaf on the table.

As I was recounting all this, Investigator Sinclair pulled out a notebook and started scribbling, nodding to himself, muttering things like, “Ah, play tricks, uses happa, interesting, matter manipulation, very curious, possible scrotal transformation, but that doesn’t explain, hmm, seasonal torpor, it must be, no doubt about it, but why can’t I get in…”

When I was done, he scrunched his nose up like an animal might do and looked confused, then he said, “There must be something else.”

I shook my head and said, “Naw, that’s it.”

“Think harder!” he shouted, his face suddenly warping into some terrible, beast-like form, but only for a split second, which might’ve been just my mind playing tricks.

Feeling strangely compelled, I started to do what he asked. I closed my eyes and thought harder. Then I thought, oh yeah, there was one more thing, the scrolls. But now, with my eyes closed, I started feeling like my normal old self again, and then it hit me that this whole interaction was weird as shit. It spooked me, honestly. So I opened my eyes and looked at Shani, who was looking up at me with a kinda concerned look on her face. That’s when I grabbed her by the wrist and said, “C’mon, we gotta go,” in a very freaked-the-fuck-out tone, because that’s exactly what I was, freaked the fuck out. I cannot overstate this enough. That’s why I started pulling Shani away as fast as humanly possible.

“But but but he not tell us how he do it yet!” Shani protested in baby talk, flailing her one free hand around like crazy.

“Cut that shit out!” I shouted, then immediately started feeling kinda bad because I was trying not to curse around her. But it didn’t seem to matter much in that moment because my fight-or-flight response was kicking in, and my wings were flapping like a motherfucker.

So I tugged Shani across the parking lot, shoved her into the back of Mom’s car, and shouted, “McDonald’s, and step on it!” Sure as hell not looking back.

But Shani wanted Burger King, and as you know, once she gets something in her head, she just won’t stop, so of course we went to Burger King, where I got myself some Chicken Fires and a large Coke.

But I gave them to the Shani, because I just wasn’t feeling hungry no more.

I'm writing this because Taro Yamada changed my life, and I gotta tell somebody about it, even though I doubt anybody’ll ever believe me. To this day, over ten years later, I still don't even know if I believe me. That’s how crazy this shit is. It’s so crazy that sometimes I think I might’ve imagined the whole thing, because the more time passes, the more it all starts to feel like some kinda weird fever dream. Maybe that's just what time does, turns all things into dreams.

I’ll start from the top, when all the weirdass shit started going down, back in September 2013.

Every Thursday, my mom would pick me up from school and take me “shopping,” which was her word for getting a manicure at LA Nails while I was stuck at the strip mall babysitting my little sister, Shani, who was seven years old and annoyed the shit outta me. Every time we got outta the car, she would say, “Can I get a lollipop? Can I? Can I? Can I?” and she wouldn’t stop until she got one. All because, one time, I made the mistake of taking her to this little store on the corner to get myself a Dew, and there she saw this huge rainbow lollipop. It was bigger than her face and cost like eight dollars for some bullshit reason. At first I said no, of course the hell not, but she just wouldn’t shut up about it, so I gave in and used some of my lawn-mowing money to buy her this ridiculous lollipop, even though I was trying to save up for a PlayStation 4, which was coming out in a few months and cost like four hundred bucks. I remember telling her, “Don’t ever say your big bro ain’t done nothing for you,” but she didn’t care. She was too busy enjoying her lollipop. I probably never should’ve bought her the damn thing to begin with, but what else could I do? Once she got something in her head, she just would not stop. That’s when I learned, with kids, it only takes one motherfuckin’ time.

Eight dollars may not seem like a big deal to you, but it adds up. Back then, after Dad left, we didn't really have no money. Mom worked at a call center for basically nothing, and I mowed grass for chump change. We lived in the slums, in this dingy two-bedroom apartment that smelled like mildew, and I think the ceilings were covered with black mold because Shani was always coughing all the time. Mom would buzz my hair every few months just so she didn’t have to pay to get it cut. Kids at school used to say I looked like a race-swapped Sid from Toy Story, then they’d push me into a locker and laugh at me for living in the projects. We still had flip phones and used prepaid cards for minutes. We didn’t even have a home computer. To get on the internet, we had to go to the local library downtown, which was always full of homeless people begging for money, which we never had. The little money we did have went to rent, food, and, evidently, Mom's Thursday manicures.

But those Thursday manicures weren't all bad. The strip mall we went to, which was in a bad part of Mechanicsville, just south of downtown Atlanta, a couple of miles from our apartment, had this one store I always liked to hang in. It was a Japanese import store that done shown up outta nowhere just a few months earlier. We called it “Swap USA,” but the sign above the place said “SAWP USA,” so who knows what the hell it was really supposed to be called. The tagline underneath said, “MANGA, DVDS, TRAYDING CARDS, MODULS, COMPUTA GAMES,” just like that. It was a few doors down from LA Nails, wedged between a sketchy dry cleaners and an equally sketchy used-furniture store. And while the outside of every store was basically the same, with tan brick that hadn't been pressure washed in hundreds of years, Swap USA somehow looked totally outta place, like it had been dropped in from another dimension or something.

Swap USA had a strange, almost mystical vibe about it. It was like a little slice of the East in the West, but it went way beyond that. It's hard to explain, especially nowadays since it all feels like a dream. The first thing that comes to mind was the paper lanterns that hung from the walkway. Then there were the statues, two golden, waist-high lucky cats on either side of the door, bobbing hands like magic, and a bunch of fat, knee-high raccoons, some wearing straw hats, some holding little jugs of alcohol, all with huge, exposed balls between their legs. I remember people, when they be walking by, would stumble over the statues and then look all confused, like they hadn’t seen them there or someshit. The big windows were plastered with posters of Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! and video games I ain't never seen before in my life, all surrounded by crazy kanji lettering. And the inside of the store was no different. It was like a whole 'nother world in there. First off, the inside seemed bigger than the outside somehow, and there was a single speaker in one corner, always playing chill nature sounds. Paper lanterns just like the ones outside hung from the popcorn ceiling, glowing with faint orangish hues. There were ancient capsule vending machines, you know the ones filled with cheap plastic ninjas and little aliens throwing peace signs and shit. One corner was like a little shrine, it had a toddler-sized Mario dressed as a raccoon with a little offering bowl at its feet, and it was surrounded by smaller raccoons with their balls all exposed, which was a little uncomfortable at first but you got used to it. The floors were tatami and made crunchy noises as you walked over them. Video game posters and wall scrolls depicting old Japanese art were all over the walls. There were portable wire racks all over the place, with rows of manga, anime figurines, Japanese DVDs, and CDs for bands I ain't never heard before in my life. Every wall was lined with games, most of them released before the year 2005. PlayStation, GameCube, Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, and so on. Many of these games were Japanese and couldn't be played on North American consoles, but Swap USA also sold these little adapters that could be used to trick your console, with springs to hold the lids open. There was a small section in the other corner dedicated to handheld games, that was usually where I spent most of my time because I only had a PlayStation Portable back then. And in the very back there was a long folding table draped in some sort of fabric embroidered with flowing dragons, and on the table were three big CRT TVs hooked up to different consoles, with controllers scattered all over the place. The checkout area was on the right-hand side from the front door, flanked by these long, see-through glass displays where Pokemon cards were propped up in cases tagged with prices marked in yen instead of dollars for some reason. The displays doubled as the checkout counter, and lined across the top were rows of those small decorated boxes full of Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! booster packs, and there was an old gray computer monitor beside an ancient-looking cash register, all surrounded by those little 5-Hour Energy drinks. There was also a black CRT TV there, too, facing the single chair behind the counter, which was only ever occupied by one person, Taro Yamada, who was the owner. I had learnt his name on my first visit because there was a small sign near the computer monitor that said, “Hello, my name Taro Yamada, human being and owner, from Japan, plz enjoy,” written in barely legible handwriting and signed with a crude drawing of some strange creature wearing a goofyass smile.

I called him Mr. Yamada. We got along pretty good. He was an outsider, from Japan, a man far from home, living in a weird, foreign world. I guess I kinda related to him, feeling like an outsider myself. I never got along with nobody, never had too many friends. Back then, I thought it was because I was mixed, not black, not white, something else, something in between. At school, I was called a “mongrel,” a “half-breed,” and a “race-swapped Sid,” by both white and black kids. I didn’t fit into either side, so I just couldn't win. It was all bullshit. I’ve always thought the whole “race” thing was bullshit, too, to be honest, because all it seems to do is cause harm, but clearly not everyone shares my view, judging by how many lockers I’ve been pushed into. So I’ve been forced to work within their bullshit paradigm my whole damn life. And I like to think that Mr. Yamada was kinda like that, too. He was totally outta place, a strange creature, not part of this world. I had no idea how he got there, or why, and I didn’t ask, because that was the unspoken rule, we didn’t talk about it. But he was making it work somehow, what with his weirdass video game store, like he had carved out his own world, and he called that world “SAWP USA.” Maybe that was his way of fighting back against the bullshit paradigm. Who knows.

Another strange thing about Swap USA was that almost everyone who came in there was a kid. That includes me, because I was 16, right there on the cusp. It attracted us like young moths to an ancient flame. When adults did show up, it was always with their kids, never alone, almost like they couldn't even see the place without some kid pointing it out to them, like there was some sort of sci-fi perception filter hiding it from adult senses, or maybe it was on one of those child-only frequencies or someshit. And the kids who did show up only ever bought Pokemon cards, never no video games or manga or nothing else, so I wondered how the store even stayed in business. I mean, think about it, how does a store like this survive on Pokemon alone? Maybe I just didn’t understand how business worked. After all, back then, I was only 16. What did I know?

Speaking of Pokemon cards, that's what was going down that Thursday afternoon, when Shani and I walked into Swap USA, taking refuge from the crazy Atlanta heat. She was licking her huge lollipop, and I was wearing these huge black headphones, listening to Modal Soul by Nujabes on my PSP, snug in the pocket of my baggy cargos. There was a chubby young boy and his dad, who had ratty hair and was dressed like some kinda druggie, both standing in front of the counter. The boy was ripping open booster packs one after another. I went over to the handheld corner to check out the PSP games, while Shani wandered over to one of the figurine racks to look at Sailor Moons. I was watching the father and son outta the corner of my eye. They must've purchased like 20 packs, because the boy kept ripping them open, leafing through the cards, then tearing open the next one, always with a kinda disappointed look on his face. I couldn't hear what was going on very well because “The Sign” was playing in my ears, the singer was going, “Some of us do not see the signs because we are too busy shopping.” But I wasn't too busy shopping because I didn’t have no money, so I could make out the dad saying, “Did you get anything good?! Anything worth a damn?!” because he was talking real loud for whatever reason. The boy kept shaking his head, though, until, on what must've been the seventh or eighth pack, he shouted, “Look, Dad! Look!” and held up a card that shimmered in the orangish hue of the lanterns.

“What'd you get?” the dad said impatiently, bending over to get a good look.

“It's Black Charizard, holographic!” the boy was saying, happy as could be.

It was all muffled by the music, but my curiosity was piqued, so I got a bit closer to the counter, still pretending to browse the PSP games. I watched the dad snatch the card from the boy's hand. He held it up in front of his face, examining both the front and the back. “Looks expensive, good on you for pointing this place out to me, boy,” he said. The boy was looking up at his father with a kinda sour expression on his face. The dad then shouted at the man behind the counter, “Hey! Old man, what's this worth?”

The “old man” behind the counter was, of course, Taro Yamada. It was always Taro Yamada. There were no other employees. Like I was saying, he was very obviously not from around here. He was Japanese. He had a round face that was both smooth and wrinkly at the same time, and his eyes, always shadowed by huge dark bags, were like little slits, almost like he was asleep all the time. He was a short, thin man who mostly wore oversized flannel shirts, always with checkered patterns, and baggy jeans. He clearly did not care about his looks. It was like he had just gone to the men's section at TJ Maxx and picked out the first thing he had seen on the rack. He must've been in his late 50s or something, but it was hard to tell. There was something about him, something that seemed to transcend time and space, so I could never pin down his true age. He could've been 60, or he could've been like 25, it was impossible to tell. His hair, always short and messy, didn't help with the age thing, because it was both black and white at the same time. The sides were all black, but the middle was gray and fluffy, which made it look like he had a wild tuft of silver shrubbery growing out the top of his head. He looked goofy as hell, if I'm being honest.

As the dad was shouting at him, Mr. Yamada was facing the TV behind the counter, controller in hand, tapping away at the buttons, lost in whatever he was playing, or purposely ignoring the dad's shouts, or both, it was hard to tell.

So the dad raised his voice. “Hey! Old man, you deaf or something?”

Still no response.

The dad stood motionless for a second, but then, in a sudden burst of anger, smacked his free hand on the counter as hard as possible.

This got Mr. Yamada’s attention. He slowly turned to the dad with a friendly smile on his goofy face, but still said nothing.

“How much this worth? I wanna sell.”

The boy nearby suddenly had a big frown on his face. “But Dad, I wanna keep it.”

The dad almost lurched at the boy and said, “I don't wanna hear it. You got like a hundred cards. Dad gets to keep one and sell it. That's how it always been.”

The boy let out a long sigh, then hung his head, like he was accepting his fate or someshit.

Then the dad turned back to Mr. Yamada. “Well?” he said, holding the card out.

Mr. Yamada picked up a pair of black reading glasses near the computer, placed them on his button-like nose, then took the card from the dad's hand and examined it closely, or maybe he was pretending to examine it, it was hard to tell. Then he turned to his computer, tapped away on the keyboard, pushed his face real close to the monitor, reading something or maybe pretending to read something, it was hard to tell. Then he turned back to the dad, who was standing there tapping his foot impatiently. Mr. Yamada looked at the boy for a moment, then back to the dad, and then, in what sounded like an exaggerated, hopeless-foreigner voice, said, “Sorry, no speak English.”

I almost bust out laughing because I knew for a fact that Mr. Yamada spoke English, but my slack-jawed expression stopped me from doing anything other than stare at this crazy shit.

“What?! You don’t speak English?!” The dad’s face was all red, and I swear there was steam coming outta his ears.

Mr. Yamada, wearing that same friendly smile from before, made a little “huh” noise, then said, “English? No. No speak.” And he mispronounced all the typical syllables you’d expect a Japanese man to mispronounce, which made the whole thing even more hilarious.

“What the fuck you mean, you don't speak English? Why you looking at your computer then?” The dad was fuming. “And if you don't speak English, how the fuck you run a store here in the States, then?” The dad snatched the card back from Mr. Yamada without looking at it and pocketed it. Mr. Yamada seemed unfazed, though, because he just smiled, picked up his controller, and started playing his game again, like nothing had happened.

Then, outta nowhere, the dad turned his attention toward me, so I quickly looked away and shoved a PSP game in my face, pretending like I was busy shopping or something. Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep. Not my kinda game, toddler shit, to be honest, but it would have to do for now. But the dad saw through my ruse and shouted, “Hey, kid!”

I tried to ignore him, acting like I didn't know he was talking to me, but the guy repeated himself.

“Hey, you!”

I pulled down my headphones and looked at him like, “Huh?”

“You shop here?”

“Do I shop here?” I said, blinking.

“Did I stutter?” He was real heated.

“Well, yeah, I guess, only a few times, though.” I didn't want to get involved with all this dumbshit. The guy was making me feel weird, especially since his son was just standing there, squirming and looking all embarrassed.

“So does the old man speak English or what?!”

“Does he speak English?” I repeated, trying to sound like I had no idea what he was talking about.

“That's what I said, does he speak it?”

“Uh,” I said, mumbling, trying to figure out a way to get outta this, but I couldn't think of anything, so I started saying, “Uh, I think he does,” but then, outta the corner of my eye, I noticed Mr. Yamada sort of cock his head from behind the TV, then I felt his weird eyes on me. So I corrected myself, “...not speak English, I think, no, no he don’t.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” said the dad, throwing up his hands. Then he turned to his son and said, “C'mon, we'll take this Chari-whatever to the store near our place,” and then he grabbed his son's wrist and started tugging him toward the front door, Pokemon cards in tow.

But then something strange happened, because as they got to the front door, outta nowhere, one of the lucky cats fell over. So when the dad went to push the door, it wouldn't open all the way. It was blocked. Mr. Yamada casually stood up from his chair, looked over at the door with this kinda mischievous expression on his face, then came out from behind the counter with a big stick.

“Sorry, sorry,” he said, doing one of those little courtesy bows. “Happen all time.”

The dad's eyes burned like a firestorm. I swear I thought he was gonna explode. He kept muttering, “Jesus fucking Christ, Jesus fucking Christ,” under his breath, still gripping his son's wrist. If my mom were there, she would’ve ripped this guy a new one for using Jesus’s name in vain like that, but me, I didn’t care about all that bullshit. We’re born on some weirdass ball, then we grow up and die. There ain't nothing more to it than that, no gods, no magic, no cosmic hippie shit, no nothing, that’s what I believed.

After a few seconds of muttering to himself, the dad suddenly turned his focus on me again, calling out, “Can you believe this shit, kid?” And while he was looking at me, I noticed Mr. Yamada brushing up against the young boy, sliding something into his pocket. Then he bent over and whispered something in the boy’s ear, and the boy’s face lit up. It all happened so quick, but I swear I saw Mr. Yamada slip a Black Charizard into that boy’s pocket. Was it the same one? A different one? How? Why? I had no idea what was going on. Then Mr. Yamada took his long stick, stuck it through the crack in the door, and pushed the lucky cat aside. He then bowed respectfully to the dad and said, “Pesky cat go bye bye. Please come again!”

The dad didn't say a word, he just shook his head and tugged his son out the door. I watched him through the big window as he crossed the walkway, where he nearly tripped over one of the raccoon statues, followed by a long string of words that would make your momma cry.

The whole scene left me stupid. I couldn’t process it. All I could think to do was slide my headphones on and zone out. It was on shuffle. MF DOOM was rapping, “The game is not only dangerous, but it’s most strange.” I picked up another PSP game. Ape Escape: On the Loose. I read the back. “The monkeys are on the loose and they must be stopped!” I thought to myself, why do they need to be stopped? Why not just let them be free? Thinking about animals in cages made me feel sick, probably because we done always had a bunch of cats back home. Cats should not be caged, in fact, I’m pretty sure they can’t be caged, they’re too wily and cunning and shit, plus they can bend their bodies in impossible ways. I’ve always had a fondness for cats, actually, all animals, because no animal ever pushed me into a locker, other than the human animal.

Snapping outta my rambling thoughts, I realized I hadn't checked on Shani in like 20 minutes, so I put the game back on the shelf and went over to the figurine section, where I found her surrounded by like ten different Sailor Moons, still in their boxes. She was holding her wet lollipop out to each one, saying, “Here you go, Ms. Moon, have a lick, and you too, Ms. Venus, and you also, Ms. Neptune.” Clearly, she was alright, so I left her alone to do her crazy-kid shit, thinking I'd go check out the DVD section, but I just could not get the whole incident with the dad outta my head, so instead I lowered my headphones and went up to the front counter to talk to Mr. Yamada.

“Yo, Mr. Yamada.”

He was just sitting there playing his game, blips and bloops firing outta the CRT's mono speaker. I caught a glimpse of what he was playing. It was kinda like one of those spaceship shoot 'em ups, but it was a raccoon instead of a spaceship, and the raccoon was shooting leaves instead of bullets. I wanted to ask him about the dad and the Pokemon cards and shit, but I didn’t know how to approach the subject, so I opened with something else.

“What you playin’?”

“This Pocky and Rocky, for Super Famicom,” he said in a cheerful tone, without looking away from the screen.

“Oh, tight,” I said, kinda fidgeting.

“You buy something?”

“Naw, naw. I just, hey, I was wondering...”

The blips and bloops continued for a few seconds before going silent, leaving only the sounds of nature from the store’s corner speaker. Mr. Yamada swiveled around to face me and then, in a goofyass tone, said, “You never buy, no money?”

I faked a laugh and shook my head. It occurred to me in that moment that the bags under Mr. Yamada’s eyes looked more like a mask than part of his real face. Actually, his whole face didn’t look real.

“Then what you need?” he said, grabbing a 5-Hour Energy and downing it like it was nothing. The bags under his eyes seemed a little less baggy after that.

“I seen that whole thing with the guy.”

“Yes, yes, you my accomplice now.” He said this with an impish grin on his face.

I wasn't sure what he meant, but I laughed regardless, then I said, “Yeah, well, I seen you, you know, give that kid the Charizard.”

Mr. Yamada's expression slowly morphed into an intense glare, and then, in a weird, almost scary tone, he said, “You saw nothing.”

I blinked, somewhat shook by this.

But then suddenly Mr. Yamada let out a hearty laugh, waved his hand, and said, “No big deal, all fun and games!”

“You not worried the dad'll find it?”

“Won't find card,” Mr. Yamada said with the utmost confidence.

“How you know?”

“Told boy, plus card special.”

Told boy? Special? I wasn't sure what he meant by any of this shit, but this was Mr. Yamada, nobody ever knew what the hell he meant by anything. So I just said, “Yeah, OK, well, I just wanna say, that was real nice of you.”

“No big deal, fun and games.”

There was a moment of silence before Mr. Yamada started to turn back to his weirdass raccoon game again. But I had one more question for him.

“Why?”

Mr. Yamada rotated to face me. He looked confused by the question.

“Why you do it?” I clarified.

His fuzzy brow wrinkled as he thought about this, then, in this wise-man kinda tone, he said, “Man want more more more, take everything if let him, greed like poison.”

I blinked. Greed like poison? I started thinking, doesn't Mr. Yamada own a business? Doesn't he sell booster packs with random odds to kids in what basically amounts to child gambling? Isn't that kinda greedy? I must’ve had a dumb look on my face because Mr. Yamada waved his hand at me and added, “Boy just want card, man want something else. Cannot give what man want, so give card to boy. Easy peasy.”

The look on my face must have become even dumber than before, because Mr. Yamada dismissively waved his hand again and said, “Plus, Charizard expensive, can't pay that,” and then he let out another one of his hearty laughs.

Blinking, I nodded and said, “Aight...”

I was now even more confused than I had been when I first asked the damn question. Typical Mr. Yamada. At this point, I figured I wasn't going to get a straight answer outta him. I never got a straight answer outta him. So I just slid my headphones over my ears, sat down at the table in the back, booted up Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection on my PSP, and started playing Arcade Mode as Kuma. I was playing pretty sloppy, though, because I was kinda distracted, thinking about everything Mr. Yamada had said. And after maybe 30 minutes of getting my ass handed to me by the computer, my phone started buzzing in my pocket. Mom was calling me.

“All done here. How's Shani? Ya’ll hungry?”

Shani? Oh shit. I was so lost in thought I had forgotten all about Shani. Some brother I was. I looked up, noticed she wasn't in her usual spot, or anywhere, and then my hands got all sweaty and my mind went into panic mode.

“Uh, yeah Mom, she fine. Uh, see you in a bit. Gotta go. Peace.”

I snapped my phone shut, jumped outta my seat, stuffed my PSP into my cargos, and then ran to the counter, breathing all heavy.

“Mr. Yamada,” I said, panting. “You seen Shani?”

He was still sitting there just casually playing his raccoon game. Blip bloop blip bloop bloop bloop. He didn't even look up when he said, “Oh, little miss Shani? Talking to man outside.”

“Talking to man outside?!” I shouted, kinda copying Mr. Yamada’s accent on accident. “You ain’t tell me?!”

“Thought he was dad.”

“Thought he was dad?!” I repeated, then I just shook my head and bolted to the front door.

Shani was out there, under the cover of the walkway. And sure enough, Mr. Yamada was right, she was talking to some random dude, definitely not my dad. I pushed the door open hard, heard the bell go off with a loud ding, then grabbed my sister by the wrist and said, “Shani, you can’t just leave! Scared the hell outta me!”

Shani looked up at me with those big brown eyes of hers. Her mouth and cheeks were rainbow-colored from the lollipop. She nodded. “I sorry, I forgot.” She always did baby talk when she was in trouble.

Whatever, I thought. Then I turned to the man and said, in a protective, rude-ass tone, “And who are you?!”

The man didn't respond at first. He just looked me up and down, like he was scanning me for intel or someshit. So I did the same, and that’s when I noticed how crazy he looked. He had a thin, clean-shaven face, sharp features, high cheekbones, a thin nose, pointy ears, and a faint claw-shaped scar between his slanted eyes, which were always squinted into this curious glare, and he was grinning, always grinning. He possessed a sort of supernatural beauty, like he was a bishonen in an anime or something, and his age and ethnicity were impossible to gauge. And that wasn’t even the craziest thing about him. The craziest thing about him was that he was decked out in khaki-colored safari gear, complete with matching sun hat, which had some sort of reflective material wrapped around the brim. I squinted and realized the material was aluminum foil, which raised immediate alarm bells and red flags in my mind. He was also holding something in his hand, some kinda crazy device with curved strips of metal formed into a globe surrounding what looked like a red crystal. The metal was spinning around the crystal like some out-of-control gyroscope. I ain’t never seen anything like it.

Needless to say, the moment I put all this crazy shit together, I started to think I was dealing with some sort of dangerous homeless man. I started to think, god damn, this guy was planning to abduct Shani, and I stopped him at the last minute! This thought sparked something in me, so I tugged Shani down the walkway, but that's when the man finally answered my question.

“My name is Special Investigator Sinclair,” he said in a smooth, almost hypnotic voice. “I was just asking this nice young lady here some questions. Is she your sister?”

Special Investigator? What was he, police? Was Mr. Yamada in trouble or someshit? I looked the man up and down again, paying special attention to the safari getup, and figured, no way, this guy ain’t no police, not in that weirdass outfit. But, against my better judgment, I didn’t immediately run for the hills, because my curiosity was piqued. I’ve always had a bad habit of sticking my nose into places where it don’t belong, could never resist a good mystery, it was always getting me in trouble.

“You cops?” I asked with a raised eyebrow, already knowing the answer.

The investigator's thin lips curled ever so slightly. “No, no. Nothing like that.”

“Then why you talking to my sis?” I said, positioning myself in front of Shani, who was right behind my leg, looking back and forth between the strange man and me.

“I was asking her about this lot,” he said with a half smile.

“This lot? You mean this store?”

“Ah,” he said, looking at the big windows, as if something was coming into view for him. “Right, yes, this store.”

I blinked, wondering if I should tell this crazy mofo off or just exit the situation. I settled on “exit the situation,” so I turned to Shani and said, “C'mon, let's go see Mom.” But before we could get the hell outta there, the man spoke again.

“What's the name of this store?” he said, looking at the building instead of me.

For some reason, I was compelled to answer him. “What you mean?” I said, then, dumbfounded, I added, “Can't you read the damn sign?”

His thin eyes scanned the store, then, in a totally serious tone, he said, “No, no, I cannot.”

“You can't read?” I was all wide-eyed and stupefied by this. This guy was definitely an insane homeless dude, no doubt in my mind, probably had drug problems, too. There were a lot of people just like him around these parts of Mechanicsville.

I pointed at the sign and said, “See? Swap USA.”

The man's face warped into a weird, almost sinister grin, then he turned to me and said, “Ah, thank you, young man. I can see it now. What’s your name?”

There was no way in hell I was telling this psycho my name, so, thinking out loud, I said, “Alright, we gettin' the hell outta here.” And, with Shani's wrist in hand, I started down the walkway. But I was going the wrong way, so I had to turn around, which meant that, unfortunately, I had to pass by this so-called “Investigator” again.

As I was passing, he stepped in front of me, blocked my path. He towered over Shani and me, which kinda frightened me, so I froze up. He then put a hand into his safari pants, and that’s when I started trembling, backing up, thinking, oh shit, oh shit, this guy gonna kill us, we gonna die, this is how it ends, I’m too young.

But instead of killing me, he just pulled out his business card and said, “This is my card. My number's on there. If you see anything strange, please call me immediately.” And he said this in such an official tone, as if he were an actual cop or something, that it just further reinforced my opinion that he was batshit crazy. But at least he wasn’t pulling a gun on me or nothing, so I relaxed a little bit, then I quickly snatched the card, shoved it into my pocket, and hurried away as fast as humanly possible.

As Shani and I were walking out into the parking lot, I couldn't stop thinking about what he had said. “If you see anything strange.” What the hell did he mean by that? He was the strangest thing I had seen all day.

I couldn't help but look back over my shoulder to see what he was up to. I saw him bent down near one of those raccoon statues, holding that weird device in his hand again. And through the Swap USA window, I also caught a glimpse of Mr. Yamada behind the counter, casually dropping what looked to be a cooked lizard straight into his wide-open mouth. Was that the sort of “strange thing” this dude was talking about?

No way, I thought. That ain’t strange. That was just Mr. Yamada. He was a foreigner and just did weirdass shit like that. He ain’t strange at all, just from a different world. They probably eat weird shit like that over there in Japan all the damn time. No big deal. That’s what I thought.

But I was so wrapped up in this train of thought that I hadn't been paying attention to where I was going, so I walked straight into a parked van, smashing my nose so hard it started to bleed. I shouted “FUCK” then felt ashamed since I was trying to stop cursing around my little sister, who was now shaking with uncontrollable laughter. I didn't get mad at her, though. How could I? It was my fault and, plus, little kids love their slapstick. They can't help it.

Minutes later, we were in my mom’s car. She wanted to take us to McDonald's for dinner, said she had some coupons or something, but Shani wanted Wendy’s and wouldn't shut up about it. And, as you know, once she got something in her head, she just would not quit, so we went to Wendy’s.

While we were waiting in the drive-thru line, Shani, with her head poking out from the back, told Mom everything that had happened, even the stuff about the dad and his son, which surprised me because I thought she had been too absorbed in her Sailor Moon tea party or whatever to realize what had gone down. I guess she was more aware than I had gave her credit for. Kids’ll surprise you, they really will. Mom just nodded along with the story and did the whole “Ah hmm, OK, I see honey” thing the whole time as she was admiring her nails. I didn't add much to Shani's retelling of events because I was too wrapped up in my own head about the whole thing, but at some point Shani shouted, “And then the weird man gave us a card! Show her the card! Show her the card!”

Oh yeah. The card. How could I forget?

I dug into my pocket and pulled it out.

MADISON SINCLAIR, SPECIAL INVESTIGATOR

ZOO ATLANTA, DANGEROUS CREATURES DIVISION

M.SINCLAIR@ZOOATL.ORG

770-876-9858

I thought I was going crazy for a minute. Dangerous Creatures Division? What the hell? I read it again, just to make sure, then again, and again, and again.

“Well? Show me the card,” Mom said, growing impatient.

I handed her the card.

She quickly read it, shook her head, then passed it back to me. “Nutjobs all over the place nowadays.” Then she let out a long sigh and said, “We really need to find a new place to live.”

I didn’t disagree.

Thad, where are you now?

I met you once or twice when I was younger. The last time was in the late 2000s. You were visiting my mom, staying in her spare bedroom. I lived in the guest house off the driveway. I remember you were wearing a blue, flower-print bandana, and your wild hair was poking out all over the place, and your shoes were wrapped in duct tape for some reason. You wore holey cargo pants and a shirt that was way too big. You looked like some sort of grungy 21st-century shaman. There was an aura of dangerous wisdom surrounding you. I never knew what you were going to do or what you were going to say. And you never seemed to be all there, like your body had trouble containing your soul or something, like your soul was just drifting around in some far-off place. When we hung out that time, you were chain-smoking cigarettes with these trendy detachable filters. You swore by these filters. “These things take out all the bad stuff. I’ve been using them for only a week and I already feel like a teenager again. They get rid of all the cancer. Try one.” You handed me one, and I slipped my Marlboro Light into it, and then we sat there on the guest house porch, smoking. You talked a lot about tennis. I got the impression you were like some sort of tennis savant. “I live for tennis, it’s the only thing that gives me joy.” You knew all about the different tactics, the different grips, the different serves, the topspin, slice, lobs, and volleys. “It’s like war out there on the courts, with sweatbands instead of Kevlar helmets, rackets instead of semi-automatic rifles, and balls instead of bullets,” is something you said to me. You had a way with words. You seemed really smart. We also talked about what we were reading at the time. You had been reading something by Stephen King. I had been reading The Sandman graphic novel, so I quoted something from it, trying to sound smart myself. “Sleep, the little brother of death.” And I remember, after hearing that, you stood there all pensive for a moment, then you said something I’ve never forgotten, something I can still hear you saying today, in my head, clear as crystal.

You said, “I like that. That’s a really good quote.”

Sometimes I wonder, when it happened, did you think about that quote?

I know your whole story, or at least the mythologized version, the one passed down from your sisters, specifically my mom when she had been drinking a little bit, which was the only time she would ever open up about anything.

“Thad was the jewel of the family. I think Dad loved him most of all. He was always sarcastic and rebellious, things Dad normally hated in me, but he found these things endearing in Thad, celebrated them even. Thad wasn’t the best at school, but he was a star tennis player, on all the big school teams. He could have been a professional player, if not for the accident. One day, when Thad was in his early 20s, he and his friends were driving a big truck in an abandoned parking lot. Thad thought it would be fun to stand on the tailgate while the truck was going like 50 mph. He fell off, hit his head. He was in the hospital, in a coma, for 3 days. We all thought he was going to die until, randomly, he just woke up. Dad said it was a miracle. But the person who woke up was not Thad. He was still my brother, but it was like he was a completely different person. His mind didn’t work right. He was crazy, erratic, angry all the time, couldn’t think straight, said things that made no sense. He couldn’t take care of himself, couldn’t hold a job, couldn’t be bothered to bathe himself. The doctors said he exhibited signs of schizophrenia or dissociative personality disorder or something like that. He thought people were out to get him and would spend days in his room, alone, talking to himself. It destroyed my Dad, he didn’t understand it. He loved Thad, took care of him, paid for all his expenses, his apartment, food, clothing, all of it. But Dad was never the same after that. His jewel had cracked, lost its shine, or something. But your grandma, Susu, she didn’t seem to care about any of that, she was just grateful that Thad had survived, doted on him and treated him like a king, like she always did. They even played tennis together sometimes, because, despite everything that had happened, Thad still loved to play tennis. It was his only joy in life.”

When we smoked together on the porch that night, you didn’t seem crazy to me. I mean, you seemed a little eccentric, but you didn’t seem crazy. What is crazy, even? A social construct? Whatever doesn’t fit into the cultural norm? Of course, I didn’t know you before the accident, so I have nothing to compare you to, but you weren’t rambling mad or screaming at me, which is what I think of when I think of “crazy.” To me, you were just the cool uncle, someone who broke the family mold, someone who didn’t seem to care about the rat race that so preoccupied my family’s attention. You were an outsider, someone I could have a conversation with about books and philosophy and the weirdness of the world. In a way, I kind of looked up to you, as I fancied myself a little crazy, too. And you were supposed to be the authority on the subject, you lived with the crazy, you knew what it was really like, and me, well, I just pretended, like you so often called out. I remember, one time after looking at my ripped-up jeans and band T-shirt, you told me, “You like to pretend you’re not from a wealthy family, don’t you? You think being wealthy delegitimizes you as an artist or something, cheapens your mystique, makes you a faker, so you try to hide it, you fake that you’re not wealthy, but either way you still end up being a faker, which is kind of crazy, isn’t it? You should just be yourself, man.” You would say stuff like this totally unprompted, as if you had no awareness of social niceties. But you were never wrong. Maybe the quote-unquote “crazy” people are more sane than we like to think? But the truth is, I had no idea what you were going through. I didn’t even think about it back then, as I was too obsessed with myself to even care. It wasn’t until later that I learned the extent of your condition. My mom told me, when she was drunk one night.

“Thad was on all sorts of anti-psychotics, to make him functional, and even then, he was barely functional. He one time left the bathtub running in his apartment for three days straight. He just turned the water on, walked away, and forgot about it. It racked up a thousand-dollar water bill, and even more in damages. This was what he was like. He would cut his own hair, sometimes leaving huge bald spots. His whole place was full of broken junk, old food, boxes, bike parts that would never get used, tennis stuff. You would trip over tennis balls just walking through his living room. And he loved spray paint for some reason. He would spray-paint crazy pictures all over the apartment walls. One time, when he was visiting Susu, he spray-painted the letter ‘T’ on a big oak in the backyard, and when asked why, he said, ‘So you will never forget me.’ The ‘T’ is still there. And then, without even asking, he spray-painted Susu’s bike black, without a finish, so it was all sticky and gross. She had to buy a new bike. And he loved duct tape, too. He would wrap his shoes in duct tape, for example, and if any of his clothes got a hole in them, he’d just duct-tape the hole. And when he was in his 30s, his ex-wife, who was just as crazy as he was, shot him in the stomach 3 times. Thad fought back somehow, wrestled the gun out of her hands, called the police. He was in surgery for 7 hours. The doctors said he lost so much blood that he should have died right there on the spot, but somehow, due to his athletic physique, which was due to all the tennis, he survived. It was another miracle, my dad said. He was like a cat or something, with his 9 lives.”

To be honest, Thad, I hadn’t thought about you in a very long time. It wasn’t until a few weeks ago, when a teacher friend of mine texted me a story about one of his students, that I was reminded of you. My friend told me that one of his students, who was a bright, promising young man, one day drove his motorcycle down the road at 100 mph, crashed into a tree, and nearly died. This young man was in a coma or something, just like you had been, and when he woke up, he was seemingly a different person. My friend said that he hadn’t seen this young man until high school graduation, when the young man showed up out of the blue to watch the ceremony. My friend described this young man as blank, void-like, a shell of who he once was. The kid didn’t even recognize him. This reminded me of you, Thad, so I told my friend about you, and we had a lengthy discussion about this unsettling phenomenon, this whole “you can get knocked on the head and become like a different person” thing. We talked about the story of Phineas Gage, a railroad foreman who had a rod blasted through his skull, tearing apart half of his brain. Gage didn’t die, but those who knew him said he was almost like a completely different person after the event. Impulsive, angry, hard to get along with. I said to my friend, “I don’t think Gage, or your student, or even Thad truly changed. I think their bodies may have changed, but their souls remained the same. Maybe the body is just a receptacle for the soul, and when the body gets severely damaged, the soul can no longer be expressed like it normally would. So, even though the person seems different, they're actually the same, just unable to express themselves properly.” I don’t know if I believe that, but it’s a nice thing to think about.

What do you think, Thad? Do you think the body is just a shell, some sort of biological husk designed to contain our true selves, our souls? Do you think our brains interpret our souls and then use the rest of our bodies to express them? Do you think this could explain why, when some people get hurt, they seem to change? Do you think that, because their bodies are broken, they can no longer express their souls properly? Do you think that maybe, when a baby is born with a severe handicap, there was some sort of fuck-up at the soul factory? That maybe their soul was placed into a defective body, by accident? And if so, do you think that when we die, our souls are released from these faulty containers, finally free to fully express themselves? And if so, where do our souls go? Do they just drift around in the void of space, communicating with other souls? And when you're like this, in soul form, can you drop in on people who are still alive, watch them from some disembodied, bird’s-eye view, flip through their lives as if flipping through TV channels? Or are we sent back to the soul factory, recycled in some way? Or do we go to heaven, hell, some sort of Valhalla? Or maybe it's just a really long sleep? What do you think? Where are you now?

I wish I could ask you these questions for real, Thad. I really do.

My mom told me what happened. She said, shortly after that visit when we smoked together on the porch, you had an accident, you broke your ankle pretty bad. The doctors said you could never play tennis again. So you took all your anti-psychotic pills at once, released your soul from its faulty biological container.

You left a note, and my mom told me what it said.

It said, “Tennis was my only joy.”

There we were, my roommate and I, in the little dining corner of our mostly barren living room, sitting at the only table in the whole condo, playing Pokemon cards, the entire place smelling like cigarette smoke and purple kush.

“That’s cheap as fuck,” Kyle said, taking a drag off his cigarette.

I had just played another Eevee and evolved it into a Flareon. “When you play this card, search your deck for an Eevee evolution and attach it to this card.” That made three fully evolved Eevees on the field. It was cheap as fuck indeed, and in hindsight, it was an illegal deck, as it had like six Eevees in it when the official rules only allowed four of the same card. I didn’t know that at the time, of course, but even if I had, I probably wouldn’t have cared. I didn't care about much back then.

The year was 2009. I was fresh out of high school. I lived in a rented condo with two other people, Kyle and Megan. Kyle was my good friend from high school. Megan was my ex-girlfriend. She and I didn’t get along very well. She said I didn't care about her, that I spent all my time playing video games instead of paying attention to her. I told her, “If you love me, you should accept me for who I am, flaws and all.” This didn't fly too well. We would get into such heated arguments that, one time, after I had locked myself in the spare bedroom, she kicked the door down. We never did get it repaired. Instead, I hung a sheet up. That sheet ended up being my bedroom door because she cheated on me a few days later, and we broke up, meaning I was kicked out of the master bedroom. Out of all the lessons I could have learned from this, the one I learned was, never room with someone you’ve only dated for a few months, otherwise you're in for a world of hurt.

The condo itself was paid for by my mom, who lived about 300 miles away. “I’ll pay for the place until you find a job, then you’re on your own,” is what she told me, without any sort of real deadline, so, in my view, I wasn’t really incentivized to find a job at all. That meant I spent most days playing video games, drinking Mountain Dew, getting high, watching YouTube, and chain-smoking Marlboro Lights in my bedroom, all while my mother thought I was out there putting in applications. Like I would ever let some fat cat exploit my labor. “The job market around here is really terrible,” I would tell her over the phone.

This was also the year that my sister’s boyfriend died. He was a drug addict and a liar, but he was one of those very charismatic drug addict liars, someone you just couldn't help being drawn to for some reason. He had a sort of devilish charm going on. One time, my savings of $400, which I kept in a desk in my bedroom, went missing, and I knew it was him because, like an idiot, I had shown him where it was, and the money went missing only a day after I had shown him. But I couldn’t prove it, so I didn’t even bother calling him out on it. He was always such a nice guy, so it seemed almost cruel to accuse him of something like that, especially since he would act deeply offended by any sort of accusation. “Who, me? You really think I would do something like that? Who got you a Mountain Dew from the gas station the other day? Who fed your cats while you were out of town?” Another time, he took a bunch of Xanax, went out driving, and crashed into a school bus, injuring like four kids. Somehow, he got off with the minimum amount of community service possible. It was like he was immune to serious consequences or something. That was his superpower, I guess, dodging big trouble. But this superpower couldn’t save him from the biggest trouble of all. He died in his parents’ bathroom, surrounded by vomit and syringes. His name was Brandon. He was 26 years old.

As you can imagine, my sister didn’t take it well. Actually, she went sort of crazy. First, it was the spirit stuff. She would pay some self-proclaimed “spirit medium” hundreds of dollars a week to quote-unquote “channel” Brandon’s spirit so that she could commune with him or whatever. The first time she told me about this, I laughed in her face. I told her all that shit was bogus, that death is the end and there’s nothing afterward, only darkness. I also told her that her sadness was being exploited and that she was falling for it hook, line, and sinker. But she didn’t care. She truly believed she was communicating with Brandon. I didn’t respect it at all. Then she got into crystals. She thought certain crystals could channel Brandon’s spirit, make him “flow through” her. I laughed at this too, told her there was no scientific evidence for any of that shit. “The only way to get over Brandon’s death is to face reality and move on. He’s not coming back,” is what I told her. And she would reply with, “There’s more to life than just science. There’s something else. There has to be. Otherwise, what’s the point? You should open your mind a little.” And I would tell her, “I do have an open mind. If I saw convincing evidence that spirits were real or that crystals could open portals to the underworld, I’d believe it. Problem is, there’s no fucking evidence.” And then she’d say, “Well, I’ve seen it happen, that’s my evidence. So why do you care? It’s helping me.” And then I’d think to myself, “Yeah, whatever, we’ll see how long that lasts.”

And I guess it didn’t last very long because, shortly after her stint with the paranormal, she took an abrupt turn and started going to church every Sunday. But this wasn’t any old normal church, this was The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She became very involved with the Mormon religion. She started carrying around a copy of The Book of Mormon. Sometimes she’d even quote from it. “Fools mock, but they shall mourn,” is something she told me once, after I laughed in her face about her sudden religious epiphany. I remember telling her, “That’s ironic, considering the only reason you’re a Mormon now is because you’re in mourning. I’m going to start calling you the Mourning Mormon.” After I said that, she kicked me out of her apartment and wouldn’t talk to me for like a week. But she eventually got over it. We had a mutual understanding. She knew what I was like, and I knew what she was like, and we accepted each other.

Or, at least, I thought we did.

The next time I saw her, Kyle and I were sitting at the only table in our barren condo, smoking cigarettes, taking big fat weed hits, and playing Pokemon cards.

“MORMONS ARE HERE,” Megan yelled from down the hall before vanishing into her bedroom. Her bedroom, which was my old bedroom, was right off the entrance, so she always heard the door before anyone else.

This was the second time Mormons had come to our place within the last few weeks. I was starting to suspect that my sister had tipped them off, like she had called the Mormon police on me or something. “I know a seriously lost soul who needs saving,” is what I imagined she told them. The Mormons that showed up the first time were both in their early 20s, Brother Rigby and Brother Graf. They were both really tan, probably because they spent 11 hours a day walking from door to door, proselytizing. They wore tucked-in white collared shirts, ties, and small messenger bags at their hips, and they were always clutching a Book of Mormon by their side. Rigby was the taller of the two, and he wore a crew cut. Graf, who was shorter, also wore a crew cut. They both looked eerily similar, as if they had been grown in a lab or something. The first time they came over, they started cleaning our kitchen without even asking, which irked me for some reason. I thought they were trying to subtly manipulate me with fake kindness, hoping it would convert me or something, so I kindly asked them to stop, at which point they started asking Kyle and me about our “faiths.” Kyle told them that he used to be a Christian, and so they had a lengthy discussion about some Biblical stories and their meanings, which is one way to lead on a Mormon, I guess. But I preferred to just fuck with them. I got a kick out of it. That’s why I made it a point to smoke in front of them. What were they going to do about it? Damn me to Hell? And I told them I was an atheist, that I didn’t believe in fairy tales, at which point they started with all the sermonizing. The first time they tried quoting from the Book of Mormon, I stopped them short and said, “If you’re going to convert me, you’ll need more than some flowery words from a book.”

Brother Graf just smiled at me and said, “We’re not here to convert you, we just want to get to know you.” And, trying to sound all smart, I said, “Who can ever truly know someone else?” Brother Graf then opened his Book of Mormon and leafed through the golden pages. He paused, placed his finger on a passage, then said, “Yea, and he looketh down upon all the children of men; and he knows all the thoughts and intents of the heart; for by his hand were they all created from the beginning.” So I said, “So, you’re saying God knows all things?” And Brother Graf said, “Well, that’s how it is written, yes.” So I said, “And you believe that?” And he said, “I do.” So I said, “What about free will, then, is that just an illusion or something?” At that, Brother Graf paused, then leafed through his book once more, stopping on another passage. “Cheer up your hearts, and remember that ye are free to act for yourselves, to choose the way of everlasting death or the way of everlasting life.” Brother Graf was obviously new to this whole proselytizing thing, otherwise he probably wouldn’t have had to look up so many passages. So, to make him feel uncomfortable, I said to Graf, “Can you talk to me like a normal human being, instead of just reading things at me?” At which point Graf’s smile sort of shook with a sigh, which pleased me greatly. I then added, “Look, even if a God did exist, how do I know which one it is? How would I know it’s the Christian God and not, like, Thor?” And that’s when Brother Rigby stepped in and responded with a story about Joseph Smith, the founder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and how Smith had translated some Golden Plates through quote-unquote “divine inspiration,” to which I said something like, “Cool story bro.”

But then Brother Graf said, “There were 11 witnesses, and it was reported on in the press,” and I said, “So?” And then Brother Graf handed me a copy of the press clipping, which he had in his messenger bag for some reason, and said, “Can any other religion claim such concrete eyewitness testimony?” And I said, “I guess not, but that doesn’t prove anything. They could have all been in cahoots, how should I know?” At which point Brother Rigby said, “I understand your doubt, Nathan. Tell me, what do you believe?” And I said, “Nothing.” And he said, “Nothing? Surely there is something.” And he said this while looking around, as if illustrating that there was indeed something in our general vicinity. So I said, “Well, I mean, I guess there’s something, but I don’t believe in it, I don’t have to, it’s science. It’s the observable universe. It’s just true. No belief necessary, that’s the beauty of it.” And then Brother Rigby said, “How do you know it to be true?” And I said, “Because it’s observable and testable and, c’mon, is this a trick question?” And then he paused for a moment before saying, “You place a lot of faith in science.” And that's when I figured out that Brother Rigby was a lot smarter than he appeared to be, and that annoyed me to no end.

Which is why, after that first visit, I did some homework on Mormonism. I wasn’t going to let Brother Rigby play games with me anymore. My research basically consisted of getting high, then watching a bunch of YouTube videos and reading Wikipedia articles. I read all about Joseph Smith, how he was considered a prophet called by God, how he had multiple wives, some of whom were teenagers, how he had been accused of financial fraud by multiple people, and how he ran for president in 1844 but, while campaigning, had been arrested and then murdered by a lynch mob because he pissed off so many people. I also read all about the Golden Plates, and about how Smith had put some sort of crystal ball in his hat, stuck his face in the hat, and then, using this magical hat trick, translated the hieroglyphics on the plates, which ended up making up the majority of the text in The Book of Mormon. I also learned how the whole thing had happened in 1827, and how several of the supposed witnesses later became estranged from Joseph Smith for one reason or another, mostly because he was always doing shady shit with money. I also learned that these plates were supposedly returned to the angel Moroni after being translated, meaning there was no physical evidence that the plates had even existed. I also knew that Mormons believed God was a physical being who looked like a human, hence “made in his image,” and that, according to Mormons, God lived on a planet called Kolob, where one day was equivalent to 1,000 years of Earth time, which the Mormons called “Lord’s Time.” I also learned how Mormons preferred to be called “members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” because the word “Mormon” had negative connotations or something, which of course meant that I would keep calling them Mormons, to get on their nerves. And, according to one YouTube video I watched, Mormons also wore magical underwear, never taking it off, as a physical reminder of their commitments to God or something, which was knowledge that I immediately put into my repertoire of anti-Mormon talking points because it was just too fucking funny not to.

I thought their whole religion was a farce, an absurd fairy tale, which wasn’t so different from how I viewed all religions back then. To me, Mormonism was no more ridiculous than any other Christian sect. It was all unscientific, unverifiable nonsense. But Mormons annoyed me more than other Christians because Mormons were just so damn nice. I found it offensive. I thought they were putting on airs. I thought they were trying to trick people with faux niceness and then, once they had lured them into that niceness trap and converted them to Mormonism, I suspected they would drop the facade, bear the fangs, so to speak, and bite down with the condescension and judgement. So, not only did I want to win arguments with them and make them look foolish, I also wanted to piss them off. I wanted to break down their facade. I wanted to reveal them to be the angry, judgmental, condescending people I believed them to be under their masks. I wanted to force them to reveal their true colors. I wanted to turn their constant smiles into persistent frowns. And, after my high-as-a-kite research sessions, I felt like I had the knowledge to do just that, to destroy the Mormons, piss them off. Especially that self-righteous prick, Brother Rigby, who wouldn't stop smiling and thought he was just so damn smart with all his “faith” shit.

“Shouldn’t we get the door?” Kyle said, reviewing the cards in his hand.

“They can wait a few minutes, fuck ’em,” I laughed, playing another Eevee, immediately evolving it into a Jolteon.

“Jesus dude, not again,” he said, sighing and smoking.

“YOUR SISTER’S HERE TOO,” Megan shouted before retreating into her bedroom again.

“My sister? Well, shit, I guess I should get the door then,” I said, putting my cards face down on the table, right next to a bowl packed with slightly charred greens. “This will probably be more fun than getting your ass beat by Eevees, though, right?”

“Whatever,” was all Kyle said, blowing smoke clouds.

When I got to the door, I looked through the peephole to catch a glimpse. It was Brother Rigby and Brother Graf, just as I had suspected. They still looked like they were grown in some sort of lab somewhere, maybe one on Kolob or whatever. My sister was standing behind them, looking kind of nervous, scratching her nose with a tattooed hand. She had a whole colorful sleeve, which was a big no-no for Mormons. Body is a temple and all that. But I suppose, her being new to the faith and all, they were willing to look the other way, for now.

Even from behind the door, the two Mormons had these big, toothy white smiles. It kind of pissed me off, to be honest, which only made me more eager to break down their fake-friendly personas and reveal them as the intolerant religious nuts I believed them to be. That’s why I thought it would be funny to offer them both a cigarette, to see what they’d do. I knew they couldn't drink coffee or tea or alcohol, and I knew they certainly couldn't smoke. So, of course, like Satan, I’d tempt them. This would be my first facade-shattering act.

So I dug a hand into my pocket and pulled out my pack, then I slid out three smokes, popped one into my mouth, and opened the door. “Brother Rigby, Brother Graf, nice to see you again,” I said, forcing a fake smile. “You boys want a cigarette?” I was holding the smokes out between my fingers.

Brother Rigby immediately responded with a big smile. “No thank you, Nathan.” Brother Graf was just standing there, smiling, but his eyes were kind of narrowed and shifty, like he was thinking real hard about something.

“Tee,” I said, holding a cigarette out to my sister, “how about you? You still smoke?”

Both brothers shifted their gaze toward Tee, still smiling but also watching her closely, which I took to mean they were judging her harshly, like a sort of “what you do next could decide the fate of your very soul” kind of thing.

But that’s when Tee stepped forward and said, “Nathan, I have to tell you something.”

“Wait, don’t tell me,” I said in an incredulous tone, “you’re converting to Mormonism?”

She didn’t laugh. She only looked down at the doormat that Megan had put there weeks ago, which was woven with the words, “ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE.”

Brother Rigby spoke up, “Don’t worry, Tee. It will be OK. Tell him.”

I was starting to get a little weirded out, so I said, “Tell me what?”

That’s when Tee looked up with tears in her eyes and said, “You know, when Brandon died…”

“How could I forget?” I said, blinking at her.

“You never called.”

“I was supposed to call?”

“And you never said sorry.”

“What do I have to be sorry for? It wasn’t my fault.”

She paused, looked down again, big frown on her face. The Brothers Mormon were watching her, smiling. Then she said, “And you never said anything nice, you never said anything like, ‘It’s OK, Tee, everything’s going to be alright. Things will get better.’ Not even once.”

“How am I supposed to know things will get better? How could I possibly know that?” I didn’t know what she was trying to get at.

“When I told you about the spirit mediums, you laughed at me.”

“Well, no offense, but it was stupid. I didn't want you to waste your money.” As I said this, I stepped out onto the mat and closed the door behind me. I lit my cigarette, took a long drag, and blew smoke.

“Do you mind?” Brother Graf said, eyeing the cigarette but still smiling.

“What?” I said, grinning and trying to act cool. “You want one?”

“No.” He paused, then he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, exhaled, and said, “No, thank you.”

Tee continued, “And when I told you about the crystals, you laughed then, too.”

I sighed and blew more smoke. “Look, you know what I think about all that new-age stuff. I don’t know why you even tell me that crap.”

“That’s not the point,” she said, looking me straight in the eye.

“What’s the point then, Tee?” I said, starting to get a little annoyed. “Bring Mormons over here to lecture me? Tell me about the Plates again?”

“You called me the Mourning Mormon,” she added with a teary glare. Both brothers sort of squirmed when she said this.

“OK, maybe that was a little harsh, but c’mon, it was kind of funny, wasn’t it?”

“It was not funny, Nathan,” she said sternly, followed by a tense silence.

After a few seconds, she seemed to gather her courage because she went off. “Someone I loved died, and you laughed at me. You told me to get over it. You made me feel like shit. It’s not funny at all. You’ve never shown me any compassion, not even once. You never show compassion for anyone. You act like you're better than everyone else, like you know everything, but you just sit in your room all day playing Mario or whatever, mooching off Mom. You’re a negative influence, Nathan. You’re critical, you’re mean, you have no empathy, no perspective, and, frankly, I don’t want you in my life anymore.”

I narrowed my eyes, tapped some ash onto the cement below, and, trying to sound unfazed, said, “What is this, some kind of guilt trip? An intervention? Did the magical-underwear guys put you up to this?”

Brother Graf, no longer smiling, stepped forward, but Brother Rigby put his hand out, stopping him. Tee then shook her head and said, “No, I asked them to come, because I couldn’t do this by myself.”

“Then what, you just came here to tell me that you’re done with me? Isn't that a little dramatic? You're just cutting me out of your life, what, forever?”

“Yes,” she said, “unless you can apologize, and mean it.”

There was another tense silence. She was standing there, glaring at me, teary-eyed. I was standing there, an incredulous look on my face, occasionally taking drags off my cigarette. She was waiting for me to say something. And I knew what I had to say, but the contrarian spirit within me prevented me from saying it, so even if I had said it, it wouldn't have been genuine, at least not at that moment. And the Mormons were looking at me, too. Brother Rigby was still smiling, but Brother Graf had this stern expression on his face, like he had something to say, and his eyes were like little dark slits. I was starting to feel some serious pressure.

So, acting all cool, I took another drag and, without looking at my sister, I said, “Look, sorry for calling you the Mourning Mormon, that was out of line. You’re right. That other stuff, though, not sorry. Spirits aren’t real, crystals don’t do anything. I’m not going to apologize for just stating the facts.”

Tee shook her head. “You just don't get it,” she said softly. Then she turned and walked away. Brother Rigby followed her. Brother Graf, however, stayed behind. He was staring at me with those narrow eyes of his. His smile was gone. I blinked at him a few times, then opened the door and walked right through it without saying a word.

But just as I was about to close the door, Brother Graf raised his voice. He said, “You know what, Nathan? You’re a fucking asshole.”

This stopped me in my tracks, stunned me like a deer in holy headlights.

His grimace then softened into a smile. He watched me for a moment then said, “May God bless your soul.” Then he took his Book of Mormon out of his bag, placed it on the welcome mat, and walked away.

I stood there for a few seconds, staring at the Book of Mormon. Then I shook my head, closed the door, and thought to myself, “I did it. I got him to reveal his true nature. The facade has been shattered.”

But even though this was exactly what I had set out to do, there was no satisfaction. Something was wrong. This was not how I had wanted it to happen.

When I went back into the living room, Kyle said to me, “What took you so long? Where’re the Mormons?”

“The Mormons aren't coming in,” I said. “They broke the facade.”

“What do you mean?”

I thought about this for a moment, then I said, “I don’t know.”

We never did finish our game of cards. Instead, I retreated into my room for the rest of the afternoon. I lay on my bed. I stared up at the popcorn ceiling. I paced around. I was restless. My stomach was churning. I kept seeing that dumb Book of Mormon in my mind, lying out there on the welcome mat. ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE. And after what felt like a few hours, I knew what I had to do. I picked up the phone and called my sister.

But I can’t remember if she ever picked up.

With this entry, I’m going to reveal one of the internet’s biggest, most well-guarded secrets, one that may even get me killed or, if I’m being serious, forever banned from the community to which this secret belongs.

But first, some background.

It all started around ‘06 or ‘07. I know this because every night my bedroom wall was a kaleidoscopic mishmash of color from Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim, alternating between anime and adult-oriented cartoons. It was the era of Futurama, Cowboy Bebop, The Boondocks, FLCL, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force. “Number one in the hood, G.” I must have been a freshman in high school. The curriculum was English Lit, Algebra, Social Studies, Spanish, and Science, or something along those lines. I remember the science teacher was a big Christian who refused to teach evolution, and of course, I was the smartass kid always asking her stuff like, “Do you think God could create a rock so heavy that he can’t lift it?” in a faux-genuine tone, as if I truly wanted to know the answer when really I was just fucking with her. Back then, I thought I knew everything, so of course I watched a lot of Amazing Atheist and Thunderf00t on the nascent YouTube. I regurgitated their talking points like they were my own. I filtered the world through an anti-spiritual, pure-science lens, which appealed to my latent nihilism. Nothing was known unless it could be observed, validated, and tested, and even those things were meaningless to me because there was nothing beyond the known universe, only entropy and suffering. Obviously, I was a very chipper kid.

I remember the Spanish teacher was into The Smiths. She had a printout of Morrissey and Marr on the wall behind her desk. What The Smiths had to do with Spanish, I had no idea, but The Smiths were one of my favorite bands, so this teacher and I bonded over this picture a little bit. But she was also the flirtatious type who would look me up and down in this “What are you doing tonight?” sort of way. Somehow, even at my young age, I knew she was dangerous. And my suspicions were confirmed when, one day, she got fired for marrying one of the students. She tried to keep it on the down-low, but everyone found out. The rumor was that it was a green card marriage. All the other teachers pretended as if they had no idea what was going on. And the day it was found out, the administration held a big emergency meeting in the gym. “We’ve gathered here today to discuss Ms. Baez’s departure. There have been many rumors floating around, so we would like to set the record straight. First, she was not fired, she has voluntarily left of her own accord.” And so on. Damage control. The idea that a teacher at a private Catholic school could do such a thing was so blasphemous, so scandalous, that it had to be covered up. But we all knew what happened.

All the students were there in the gym. I was sitting next to this kid named Aaron, who was my only friend that year. Somehow we got along, even though he was opposite from me in many ways. He was big into sci-fi television and would often read books on quantum mechanics at lunch. He wore a pocket protector and big rounded spectacles and was quite chubby and had a round face colored by rosacea. Pretty much all the stereotypical things you would expect from a classic nerd in a television show, he had them. But he and I bonded over SimCity one day, so we clicked. And I guess I was one of the only kids who would even talk to him. Maybe we gravitated toward each other because we were both sort of outsiders, on the fringes of the soccer-obsessed, church-going student body. He too believed there was nothing beyond the realm of science, only entropy and suffering. Most of the time, Aaron was no-nonsense, very serious about his schoolwork, but when Computer Lab came around on Wednesdays, he seemed to change, show more of his true personality. Instead of doing the assignments, he'd browse Star Trek message boards and get into furious post wars with other users about the show’s physics or which alien race was the most advanced or whether Kirk was a better captain than Picard or whatever. I always told him Sisko was the better captain. This both annoyed and intrigued him because, “Wait, you watch Star Trek? Really?” I guess that was another reason we got along so well.

And yeah, I watched Star Trek, mostly because my grandma was into it, also MacGyver and Stargate SG-1. However, back then, my multimedia diet primarily consisted of computer games, ’80s music, and Adult Swim.

Adult Swim used to do these things called “bumps,” where before returning from commercial break they’d display a black screen with a humorous joke, saying, or anecdote in small white font, usually accompanied by a jazzy, urban beat. The bumps were typically ironic, poking fun at current events or certain fringe groups and ideologies. And one night, when I was watching Cowboy Bebop, right after the commercial break, I remember seeing this one bump where they quoted someone from theflatearthsociety.com. (Trying to find the bump now, in 2026, seems impossible, but I swear it existed.) It was some quote from a user saying something about how, under the Flat Earth model, moonlight is caused not by the sun’s light reflecting off the surface of the moon but by bioluminescent creatures called “moon shrimp.” The bump presented the quote with no additional comment. No snarky remark, no accompanying image, nothing. I guess the Adult Swim staff figured the absurdity of the quote was hilarious enough on its own.

Needless to say, this bump immediately grabbed my attention. The next day at school, I told Aaron all about it and, when Computer Lab came around, we both navigated to theflatearthsociety.com, created accounts, and basically started textually attacking everyone on the forum, making numerous posts about how stupid they were and whatnot. We started with low-hanging fruit, like, “Don’t you guys know that we’ve been to space and also have satellite images of Earth clearly showing it’s round?” to which we were met with conspiratorial counterarguments like, “All those pictures are computer-generated. We’ve never been to space. Here’s a link detailing the moon landing hoax.” When we tried to counter those conspiracies, we were called sheeple and laughed at by the majority of the userbase. So we switched to more advanced arguments, like, “If the Earth is flat, how do you account for gravity?” and Aaron was really good at coming up with scientific examples and math formulas to quote-unquote “prove” gravity did indeed actually exist. He was way smarter than I was.

But the Flat Earthers had a counter for this stuff, too. Aaron and I quickly found out that they had created their own incredibly detailed cosmological model, called the “Neo-Classical Model,” with its own governing principles, its own underlying assumptions, and even its own mathematical framework to support each and every little nuance. The roots of this “Neo-Classical” Flat Earth model date back to the mid-1800s, where it was outlined in a book titled Zetetic Astronomy: Earth Not a Globe, written by Samuel Rowbotham, who was basically a kook writer-slash-inventor with no credible educational background whatsoever. Despite that, to the modern-day Flat Earther, Rowbotham's model fully explains the phenomenon we call gravity and literally any other potential hole in Flat Earth theory. In this model, the Earth is a disc that moves upward at 9.80665 m/s2, which they call “Universal Acceleration,” the same measurement used for gravitational acceleration. The sun and moon are also discs, hovering 3,000 miles above the Earth, both rotating clockwise in a circular path opposite each other, which accounts for night and day. The North Pole is the center of the Earth, while the South Pole is the circumference around it, which Flat Earthers have lovingly taken to calling “the ice wall" (some even joke that it's guarded by armed penguins). Considering all this, one might assume that if the Earth is indeed moving upward at a constant rate, then it would accelerate past the speed of light and kill us all, but Flat Earthers have a counter for this too, outlined in excruciating detail on their wiki, using Einstein’s theory of special relativity to demonstrate that it’s actually impossible for an object to accelerate past the speed of light.

What I’m trying to illustrate here is that Flat Earthers created their own scientific worldview, backed it with already established science and advanced mathematics that went way over the head of the average layperson, especially teenage me, and have been using this model to bludgeon people they call “Round Earthers” (or RE’ers) over the head with ever since.

As far as I can tell, the origins of the original “Flat Earth Society” date back to the mid-1950s, when a guy named Samuel Shenton founded it. This original society existed with a small membership until Shenton died, at which point Charles K. Johnson created the International Flat Earth Society of America after inheriting part of Shenton's library, and he was able to convince about 3,000 people to join. They created newsletters and flyers and seemed like a relatively serious group of true-blue “Flat Earth Scientists,” but their numbers eventually dwindled to nothing. Then the society was later revived by one Daniel Shenton when, in 2004, he registered the domain name theflatearthsociety.com and launched the forums and, later on, the wiki. As far as I can tell, “Daniel Shenton” was not related to Samuel Shenton in any way, and it likely wasn’t even his real name, as there’s no record of him ever having been alive, so, to this day, Daniel Shenton remains just another anonymous person on the internet, which should give you some idea of what we’re dealing with, some hint about the secret soon to be revealed here.

Anyway, like I was saying, Aaron and I joined up around 2006 or so, after seeing an Adult Swim bump. We spent many days in the computer lab arguing with Flat Earthers, and even took the hobby home, browsing the forums deep into the night. I didn’t have the patience or mental capacity to properly argue the Round Earth perspective, often defaulting to name-calling and cat memes, which, early on, got my account banned, so I would make a new one, only to get banned again, only to make yet another account, only to get banned again, and so on, until eventually I started being a little nicer and started making friends within the moderator team. But Aaron, on the other hand, had the patience of a Zen monk and the mental capacity of an adolescent Einstein, and he was dead serious about proving Flat Earthers wrong. He would write essay-length posts outlining all his arguments, packed with scientific jargon and math formulas, and while most users responded with ridicule like, “Have you been to space yourself?” or “Are you just parroting mainstream science like a good little sheep?”, there was one user who always engaged him seriously, a guy named Tom Bishop. Tom would take each and every point in Aaron’s posts and dismantle them one by one using hardcore science and advanced mathematics and detailed diagrams, which fueled months-long debate wars between the two of them. This eventually became so frustrating for Aaron that, one day, he just stopped logging into the site altogether. He was done.

Being far more cynical by nature than Aaron, I started to suspect something was up with the Flat Earth forums pretty early on, way before he even quit. It really hit me when, one time, Aaron was arguing back and forth with some established Flat Earther, and I noticed that, when Aaron employed the argument that lunar eclipses disprove the Neo-Classical model (because how could an eclipse happen if the sun and moon discs are rotating opposite each other at all times?), the Flat Earther made up some ridiculous counterargument on the spot. That counterargument was basically, “Well, there’s actually a third celestial disc that’s invisible to the naked eye called the ‘shadow object’ that hovers just below the sun and moon discs and sometimes intersects with them, which explains why eclipses happen,” and then, as if suddenly realizing someone had exposed a vulnerability in their model, the moderation team added a wiki article covering this mysterious “shadow object” (sometimes referred to as “the antimoon”) on the same exact day Aaron made the original argument. This struck me as very strange because most scientifically minded people don’t operate this way. In fact, most people don’t operate this way. People don’t usually just make things up on the fly and then immediately argue as if they those things are true. The scientific method, which most Flat Earthers claim to respect and practice, usually calls for a hypothesis (e.g. “the shadow object”) to be tested through experimentation and then refined based on the results, not, “Oh, let me just make up some bullshit real quick to explain this obvious problem in my model and then pretend as if it’s 100% factual.” This practice of making things up on the fly became so commonplace among Flat Earthers that, by around 2007, a year after I had joined, I was convinced the whole website was some sort of elaborate hoax, an “epic troll,” as we used to say back then.

I became so convinced of this that I flipped sides and started arguing for the Flat Earth model myself. That’s right, I was a Teenage Flat Earth Scientist. I wanted in on the fun, to be part of the joke, to participate in “the lulz,” as we would call it back then. This transformative process is what I’ll now dub the “Round Earth to Flat Earth Pipeline,” and I suspect it’s how a lot of quote-unquote “Flat Earth Scientists” got started.

I made a brand-new account that was dedicated solely to slinging Flat Earth propaganda. I employed many methods, like liberally quoting the Flat Earth Wiki and making things up on the fly, but my main method was simple, I would sow the seeds of doubt in modern science. I would argue that, instead of blindly following the mainstream scientific narrative, you should instead do the research yourself and experience the science firsthand, only then could you know the true shape of the Earth. I would argue that you can’t trust the government, so you can’t trust pictures of Earth from space. And I would also argue that there was a huge conspiracy to hide the shape of the Earth, backing it up with ridiculous theories like “it’s all big oil, the oil companies are making a killing off the airline industry under the Round Earth model, because they can artificially extend flight times and therefore sell more oil.” But my main go-to doubt-sower was “dark matter.” I would say, “The entire Round Earth model of physics is dependent on this made-up substance called ‘dark matter,’ which supposedly makes up 27% of the universe but has never actually been observed or tested, and despite this, you’re expecting me to believe the Earth is round? Are you fucking kidding me right now?” And I would stick to this argument like glue, because it was grounded in a real scientific problem that cosmologists still haven’t been able to fully resolve. What the fuck is dark matter? Where does it come from? Why hasn’t it been observed? Why can’t it be tested? To me, that signaled serious problems with our understanding of the universe, and if there were serious problems with our understanding of the universe then why the hell should I believe any of it?

This line of argumentation was a hit, and one that many Round Earthers couldn’t contend with. It was a great sower of doubt. They would say, “Well, we know dark matter exists because otherwise galaxies wouldn’t behave the way they do, their rotation curves wouldn’t match the observed gravitational effects, so something invisible has to be there even if we haven’t directly detected it yet.” And I would say, “OK, but how the fuck is that any different than me saying the shadow object causes lunar eclipses?” At which point they would either error out and start repeating themselves or simply concede, saying something like, “OK, maybe we don’t fully understand how our universe works yet, maybe our model is incomplete, but I think our model makes more sense than yours.” And that was exactly where I wanted them, because it was the perfect position, it placed Round Earthers and Flat Earthers almost on the same playing field of uncertainty. It promoted “critical thinking.”

As I was doing all this, I would tell myself that I was trying to save these poor lost souls, encourage them to do their own research, help them actually use their brains, use some critical thinking for a change, but really I was just laughing my ass off the whole time. Sometimes I would even log in to my old account, the one I had used to argue for Round Earth, and post intentionally bad Round Earth arguments directed at my new account, essentially arguing with myself in order to build up my persona’s credibility as a legitimate “Flat Earth Scientist.” And considering the admins could see the IP addresses of every account, and considering the IP addresses across my two accounts matched, the admin team surely knew I was doing this, but they never said a word about it, which is just yet another hint about the secret soon to be revealed here.

It was around 2008 when theflatearthsociety.com had a little civil war. I’m not sure exactly what caused it, but at some point Tom Bishop, who was still just as active as ever, suggested that the forums were going off the rails, that “it was becoming too much of a joke,” and that a new forum should be created with real “Flat Earth Scientists” as the moderation team. Tom Bishop, however, refused to be part of this new moderation team, for some reason. But this idea took off and so a splinter group was formed. Shortly after, a new website popped up, theflatearthsociety.org, which was hosted by a whole new person and run by a whole new moderation team. I was quite active as a Flat Earther when this was going on, and while I was never made part of this new moderation team, I was respected as a “true” Flat Earther and accepted into the inner circle. From that point onward, I was actively posting on both versions of The Flat Earth Society, using the same persona on each forum, until a few years later when .com shut down, leaving .org as the only official Flat Earth Society online community. During all this time, I became such close friends with the webmaster that I was added to his personal IRC chatroom, where I would spend many nights just shooting the shit with the moderation team, who were pretty much just like me. We would stay up late talking about music and video games and Adult Swim, sometimes we'd even play Team Fortress 2 together. 2fort, one of the best first-person-shooter maps ever made. Notice, however, how I didn’t say we would talk about Flat Earth Theory, because in group chats none of us talked about Flat Earth Theory. And that’s because, well, none of us really believed in Flat Earth Theory. I mean, c’mon, there's so much evidence that the Earth is round, you would pretty much have to be an idiot to believe otherwise. Ships disappear hull-first over the horizon. Different stars are visible depending on your hemisphere. The higher you climb, the farther the horizon extends. Time zones exist because different parts of Earth receive sunlight at different times. Shadow angles change depending on latitude. You can easily calculate the Earth’s circumference in your backyard using sticks and sunlight. Circumnavigation. Satellites and astronauts and even private citizens have photographed the Earth from space thousands of times. Gravity pulls matter into spherical shapes, and this can be reproduced in lab environments. Constellations rotate differently in the northern and southern hemispheres. Airplane routes only make sense on a globe. People at higher elevations can see sunsets longer. Weather balloons capture the curvature of the horizon. GPS systems function using a mathematically modeled spherical Earth, so if the Earth were not actually round, GPS would be all fucked up. This is all well-known stuff. The entire Flat Earth moderation team was aware of this stuff. We may have made counters up on the fly to explain away these obvious scientific truths, but we did so knowing exactly what we were doing. It was all a big joke, and we were all in on the joke. In fact, we were so in on the joke that, in group chats like the IRC channel I had been added to, we wouldn’t even suggest it was a joke, because doing so would have broken the unspoken code.

But in private chats, one on one, the code simply didn’t apply. The admin, the moderators, even some of the most serious-seeming Flat Earthers on the site were all in on it. We’d send each other links to certain posts, laughing at how gullible the RE’ers were, celebrating how deftly we had tricked them. We’d strategize ways to shore up the Flat Earth model, how to make it ironclad against Round Earth science so that we would continue to be taken seriously by newcomers. We didn’t want to be seen as some huge joke because, of course, that would undermine the effectiveness of the joke. We’d talk about this stuff all the time. For those in the know, this was an open secret.

So, that’s the reveal. The Flat Earth Society, in its current incarnation as theflatearthsociety.org, is an elaborate hoax, an epic troll, satire basically. The hundreds of wiki articles, the detailed diagrams, the complicated mathematical frameworks explaining Universal Acceleration, it’s all one big joke. The whole society is just a small group of people with multiple sock accounts pretending to be idiots for lulz.

But who’s really the idiot here?

Now, don’t get me wrong, we all had our reasons, many of which we pretended were noble and justified. We’d tell ourselves that we were encouraging people to challenge their own deeply held beliefs, that we were promoting a certain level of critical thinking that we felt was lacking in the modern collective psyche. But the real reason we did it was because it was just funny as hell. We did it for the lulz. It provided an endless stream of entertainment. “Come look at the dumb Flat Earther, doesn’t he know that ships disappear behind the horizon? What an idiot!” But in our minds, we weren’t the idiots, the people arguing for Round Earth were, because they didn’t realize it was all a big joke. They were gullible conformists who couldn’t think for themselves. There was also an element of contrarianism at play here. The only reason I got along so well with all the so-called “Flat Earth Scientists” was because we were all so similar in a contrarian, outsider sort of way. We all ranged from about 16 to 25 years old, we were all deeply cynical and distrustful of authority, we all had nihilistic outlooks on life, we all had barely any real-world friends, we all spent way too much time playing retro computer games and arguing on the internet, and we all listened to music made long before we were even born. One guy around my age was obsessed with Pink Floyd and Frank Zappa and had thousands of dollars’ worth of rare recordings. You could say, perhaps, that we were born in the wrong era, but really we just had massive chips on our shoulders and wanted to be different from everyone else. We saw everyone who wasn’t in on the joke as conformists, and we desperately didn’t want to be like them. The Flat Earth Society epitomized this dynamic, because what’s more non-conformist than claiming you believe the Earth is flat? Nothing. In the twenty-first century, that's probably the most contrary claim one can make. So, of course, The Flat Earth Society attracted people who were, at their core, contrarians.

There was one anomaly, however, one person we couldn’t quite figure out. This person wasn’t in the IRC channel. He didn’t speak privately to any members of the moderation team. He refused to be part of the inner circle. He seemed to operate totally independently. This person was Tom Bishop.

Tom Bishop is what I would call an elder Flat Earther. As far as I can tell, he has been around since the forum’s creation in 2004. He seems to know the Flat Earth Wiki by heart and can instantly regurgitate its talking points from memory. When waves of newbies would show up repeating the same Round Earth arguments, he would often just reply, “Read the wiki,” followed by a link to whichever article supposedly debunked the claim. His avatar was a picture of a nondescript, well-shaven, elderly Caucasian man with neatly combed silver hair, and, considering these were the days before generative AI, and considering I reverse-searched the image and found nothing, the photo seemed unique and genuine, as if it could actually be a real photo of him. More importantly, Tom himself seemed entirely genuine in his interactions. Sometimes he was a little caustic, but unlike everyone else on the forum, he never once hinted that he was joking, trolling, or playing a character. In fact, out of everyone I interacted with on the forums, Tom Bishop is the only one I would comfortably say might have been the real deal, especially considering that, here in the year 2026, he’s still posting, still arguing for Flat Earth with the same unwavering seriousness. As of right now, his profile has 18,032 posts to its name, and his latest post, on April 27th, 2026, reads, “There are far more interesting and pertinent phenomena to discuss, much of it right around you. Round Earthers who have looked into this should know that there are FE explanations for the Midnight Sun. You have been tricked and hoodwinked into focusing your attention on Round Earth gaslighting, which is obvious by the phrasing of the ‘Final Experiment.’ In contrast, Round Earthers won't even acknowledge the wild astronomical phenomena that is being pointed out, and opt to pretend that everything is perfectly normal.” Tom Bishop is a legend, and he has been doing this for a very long time without ever once breaking character, which tells me either A) he is neurotically dedicated to trolling people on a relatively obscure internet forum, or B) he is not playing a character at all, meaning he genuinely believes the claims he’s making.

I point this out to highlight the fact that, while the majority of theflatearthsociety.org is satirical, there may, in fact, be a few people who actually believe the crazy shit they are espousing. But herein lies the problem. Because of the satirical nature of the site, it’s almost impossible to know who’s genuine and who’s faking it. Who’s an idiot, and who’s pretending to be an idiot? (I’m using the term “idiot” here flippantly, but you know what I mean.) The waters here have been so muddied that, who could possible know?

There’s this famous internet quote, often used on message boards, that goes something like,

“Any community that gets its laughs by pretending to be idiots will eventually be flooded by actual idiots who mistakenly believe they're in good company.”

I would take this a step further and ask, if you spend all your time pretending to be an idiot, are you not just a full-blown idiot yourself at that point? What’s the difference? Does it even matter if you’re pretending? To put it more succinctly, if the satire is indistinguishable from the thing it's satirizing, is it still satire, or is it just the thing itself at that point?

So now I’m starting to think that maybe I was the idiot all along.

Over the last month, I’ve developed a sort of fascination with John Lennon. I've always been drawn to dark, contradictory figures. It all started when I took the time to really digest his first true solo album, Plastic Ono Band, and found myself stunned by how raw, introspective, and sincere it all was. The ending of the first song, “Mother,” had me immediately captivated. John repeatedly screams, “MAMA DON’T GO DADDY COME HOME,” until it gets so intense that there are no words left, only crackling, guttural screams, like an animal yowling in pain. When I first heard it, I thought to myself, “Damn, this is the same guy who wrote ‘Please Please Me,' what the fuck?”

But then I remembered that he also wrote “Help!” and that’s when it all started to make sense, that's when it all started to come together, as they say, right now, over me.

From that moment, I started digging into every song that John Lennon ever wrote for The Beatles, and I found that, out of all the band’s music, John’s stuff was by far the darkest and most introspective on the records. While Paul McCartney was writing stuff like, “Ain't got nothin' but love, babe, eight days a week!” and “Baby, you can drive my car, and maybe I'll love you!” and “Good day sunshine!”, John was singing, “Well, you know that I'm a wicked guy, and I was born with a jealous mind” and “I used to be cruel to my woman, I beat her and kept her apart from the things that she loved” and “I’m a loser, and I’m not what I appear to be,” all of which just intensified my fascination with him, especially since, in the public’s collective eye, John Lennon is seen as this sort of guru of peace, love, and understanding. I mean, he wrote “Imagine” and “Give Peace a Chance,” after all. This contradiction between Lennon’s private and public persona, this disharmony between ego and ideals, soul and intellectualism, is what really captured my attention. How could such a seemingly enlightened dude be so cruel? Was it all some sort of artistic act?

I quickly found out that, no, it was not some artistic act for John Lennon. He was just a very sincere, self-aware, deeply conflicted person, full of insane contradictions. He was a very complex person, as we all are, but he also did a lot of bad shit. He’s on record, in many interviews, admitting to beating his first wife, sometimes brutally and sometimes in public, with eyewitnesses. He also virtually ignored his first son, Julian, and, according to the biography I’m reading, John Lennon: The Life by Philip Norman, he was emotionally abusive to practically everyone around him. What makes Lennon especially unsettling is that he seemed fully aware of his own shortcomings and hangups, yet rarely did much to correct them. From an early age, he was cruel to people he deemed beneath him intellectually or artistically, often getting into fights at school and developing a reputation as a heinous bully. He was stubbornly contrary toward almost everything and had no respect for anyone, frequently shoplifting, even from mom-and-pop stores, including ones where he knew the owners personally. He rejected authority at every turn, nearly flunked out of school, and only made it into art college because a sympathetic headmaster recognized something exceptional in him. And exceptional he was: artistically gifted, witty, intellectually curious, and as sharp as a legendary samurai sword. Despite his disdain for school, he spent much of his adolescence reading, drawing, and writing poems and short stories. He was far more well-read and artistically accomplished than any of his peers. Yet all reports indicate that he was still a major asshole. He was the type of person who, depending on his mood, was capable of either beating your ass or having a deep, intelligent conversation with you, meaning hanging out with John was like nursing a ticking timebomb with a very well-hidden fuse. Yet people seemed to like him. He was very good at impressing people. His sharp wit, intellect, and adaptability got him far. When rock music exploded in the 1950s through Elvis Presley, Lennon very quickly taught himself how to play guitar and formed The Quarrymen, the band that would eventually become the Beatles. He quickly got shows lined up at various local establishments, and his early band was generally well-liked by those who listened. One would think this might satisfy John, make him a little more pleasant to be around, but this was not so. He would frequently drink and get into fights with people in the audience, and sometimes even with his own bandmates. And during his time in the Beatles, things didn’t really improve. He once nearly killed a DJ for suggesting that he and Paul McCartney were gay together, for example. And out of all the Beatles members, he only seemed to respect Paul, often dismissing Ringo Starr and George Harrison as mere musical instruments to be used and abused. Yet even with Paul, in the 12 years they worked together, John only complimented him one time. One gets the impression that John was an envious person who resented anyone he perceived as his equal or as more accomplished than himself. There seemed to be a venomous rage always bubbling beneath his surface, and this rage seemed to drive all his behavior. This is readily apparent in any recorded interview he ever did. In almost all of them, he’s intense and comes off as kind of dangerous, like he could get up and punch you in the face at any moment. This is especially apparent if he’s being interviewed with other members of the Beatles, who are all generally pleasant people. The contrast is stark. John often just stared at the interviewer as if to intimidate them, and sometimes he would switch from big smiles to death glares seemingly at random, and he would tell off-color jokes with a straight face so it was impossible to know if he was actually joking, and he often answered questions with short, evasive language, then treated the interviewer like they were stupid when asked to elaborate. Yet herein lies another contradiction, because despite his frequent hostility, he seemed desperate to be loved and admired. He aspired to be a pop star, after all. “I want to be the toppermost of the poppermost.” He cultivated this persona of someone who didn’t give a shit about what anyone thought of him while, in reality, he craved approval and validation from almost everyone. Yet he went about attaining this approval in weird, counterproductive ways, because his motivation to impress people was inspired more by wanting to prove he was better than everyone else, and he didn't really hide this fact.

Some will argue that John Lennon had undiagnosed autism or ADHD, and that that somehow absolves him of all his bullshit. First, it’s well documented that John suffered from dyslexia, but beyond that, nothing is confirmed. We have a tendency to reach retroactively, to try to fit our observations to our already existing biases. Meaning, yes, I think some people desperately want John Lennon to have ADHD or some form of autism, because that would more easily explain his behavior and, in some cases, make him “just like me!” And secondly, even if he did have autism or ADHD, this wouldn’t absolve him. As someone who was medically diagnosed with ADHD at a very young age and shares many characteristics with John Lennon, such as his latent contrarianism and bubbling rage, I refuse to believe that I have no control over my behavior. Yes, controlling myself might be a little harder for me than for someone without these traits, but I’m not sitting here beating my wife and ignoring my kids and being a major asshole to everyone I meet. People can adapt in spite of their neurological conditions. People can find ways to work within the unfortunate framework handed down to them by God or genetics or whatever you happen to believe. We can change our shapes. This is what I choose to believe. And again, we don’t actually know what John suffered from, besides the plague of existence. The truth is, we will never really know the contents of John’s soul. After all, how could anyone truly know what’s going on inside another person? All we have to go on is John’s artistic output and his behavior, which reveal maybe about 1% of what we might be able to know about him. Unfortunately, that 1% isn’t very pretty.

This is what gets me about John. His music suggests a level of self-awareness that one might assume would lead to self-improvement, but all reports seem to agree that, despite writing songs like “Give Peace a Chance” and “Imagine,” he was still the same ol’ angry, jealous guy at the time of writing those songs.

But perhaps, later in life, he was trying to change, who knows? In a 1980 Playboy interview, right before his death, he said, “I fought men and I hit women. That is why I am always on about peace, you see. It is the most violent people who go for love and peace.”

When I read that, I thought to myself, wow, what a great quote. It seems intuitively true, especially for someone as self-aware as John Lennon, to gravitate toward concepts that contradict their own negative traits. This is the entire basis of the self-help industry, after all. I mean, if I’m being honest, the primary reason I study Buddhism is because I believe it to be the solution to my own feelings of envy, anger, and despair. Buddhism’s focus on peace and empathy has helped me cope with my own bullshit. But did it truly help John cope with his? If he did not practice what he preached, so to speak, does that not mean he was just a huge hypocrite?

And that’s what I really wanted to dissect here today, hypocrisy.

First, what is hypocrisy? Merriam-Webster defines it as:

hypocrisy noun

hy·poc·ri·sy \ hi-ˈpä-krə-sē \

1: a feigning to be what one is not or to believe what one does not : behavior that contradicts what one claims to believe or feel

It follows that if John Lennon were singing about peace, love, and understanding while violently attacking people and/or just being a total asshole, then he was, indeed, a hypocrite.

But is that such a bad thing? I mean, obviously John Lennon’s behavior was bad, I’m not really disputing that, although I use “bad” here only to get my point across, as the good/bad duality is complicated and possibly entirely constructed, but, more specifically, is John Lennon’s hypocrisy “bad” in the sense that it undermines his message of peace, love, and understanding?

I would argue that, no, no it does not.

Take, for example, me. I smoke cigarettes, yet I tell people all the time that smoking is terrible and that you should never do it. This would make me, definitionally, a hypocrite. But does the fact that I smoke undermine my guidance? Does the fact that I smoke somehow make smoking good for you? No, no it does not. That would be ridiculous. Even though I smoke, it remains true that, regardless of what I say, smoking is pretty fucking terrible for you, as agreed upon by countless medical doctors. Smoking fucks with your lungs, makes you feel like shit in the morning, messes with your immune system, and causes cancer with remarkable efficiency and potency. Me smoking does not contradict these seemingly immutable facts.

This is what interests me most about John Lennon. He embodies this hypocritical dichotomy. On the one hand, he’s like the poster boy for peace, love, and understanding, but on the other hand, he was a narcissist who abused everyone around him. Later in life, he seemed to gravitate toward concepts of universal peace and love as a means to escape his own violent hardwiring, which he openly admitted to. The question I ask myself is, does this make John Lennon a quote-unquote “bad” person?

The answer is, I don’t know. I think John Lennon is perhaps just another person, like you or me.

Are we not all guilty of some level of hypocrisy?

I think that John’s attempts to better himself, whether successful or not, were admirable and encouraging. And, most importantly, to dismiss his philosophy of peace and love simply because he was not the arbiter of peace and love himself does us a major disservice. To carry that logic forward, we would have to declare that because Forrest here smokes cigarettes yet says you shouldn’t smoke cigarettes, cigarettes are somehow now suddenly good for you. This, I think, is what many people get wrong about hypocrisy, i.e. declaring someone a hypocrite does not undermine their position, it’s just a personal attack.

Now, if you’re intending to just personally attack someone, fine, but don’t think that’s going to win you any arguments with those who know better.

To complicate this further, it is true that perhaps, as a famous celebrity who was “bigger than Jesus” (his words), John Lennon had an extra responsibility to display the virtues he extolled. He had a huge platform, after all. Many people looked up to, and still look up to, him. When those people see that their role model was actually not so great, they might then be inclined to either A) become not so great themselves or B) dismiss John Lennon and all his peace-love-understanding talk altogether, as if to think, “If John can’t do it, then it’s obviously all just hokey, idealistic bullshit.”

But this, too, misses the point and just reinforces the fact that you should be careful who you choose as a role model, or better yet, not have one at all.

That’s not to say that we shouldn’t try to do better, or that all our behavior should be excused. I’m not giving John Lennon a free pass here. But it is important to remember that, regardless of who we are, we’re all human.

Fucked up, weird, hypocritical, but human.

Current Music: "Jealous Guy," by John Lennon

Eighteen was a weird time for me. I was a great pretender, pretending like I didn’t give a shit about anything other than video games and sci-fi novels and drugs. I read Neuromancer like five times in a row that year, had an unhealthy obsession with Syd Barrett, and, for at least one day, I was the oldest sophomore in my entire high school class.

The first time I was held back was in sixth grade, when my stepfather moved my mom and me to this giant house on a private island resort right on the edge of the Atlantic. I never appreciated this privilege, and in fact actively resented it. I would try to hide the fact that I was loaded from other kids. But it was a beautiful place, with giant palms and water oaks towering high above the ocean. You could walk out onto one of the various balconies and hear waves crashing on the sand, a pleasant sort of white noise that played at all hours of the day. It was here that my stepfather enrolled me at a Catholic private school, which, in hindsight, served his own obsession with appearances more so than anything else. The administration claimed their curriculum was “more advanced” than my previous public school’s. They said I had no chance of succeeding in “their version” of seventh grade, so they strongly suggested that I repeat sixth grade, and my parents agreed. I’m sure my abysmal test scores from my previous school also didn’t help matters. This made me quite a bit more acne-ridden and awkward than my peers, many of whom gave me a wide berth because I was very tall and always scowling. Early on, however, I made friends with some self-proclaimed misfits, who were rebels in appearance only, dressing in the emo, pop-punk fashion of the time, that being skinny girl jeans and Hot Topic tees bought by their rich island parents. Taste in music was about the only thing I shared with this group of faux misfits, so we formed a band, but they kicked me out after realizing that I didn’t know how to play a single instrument. At some point I met a pudgy boy named Aaron who wore thick-rimmed glasses and pocket protectors. I remember during one miserable school camping trip, this kid Aaron and I serendipitously bunked together, at which time we struck up a conversation about SimCity 3000, and from there it was a weak kind of kinship. We were quite different personality-wise. He took his grades very seriously and was very much a brownnoser, while I did not take my grades very seriously and was very much not a brownnoser, although I didn’t really make any trouble, because I was subtle about my rebellion, a quiet storm. I preferred not to make waves. Waves were too much of a hassle for me. My rebellion manifested in not doing schoolwork and sleeping in class and staying up real late playing video games and listening to old ’80s music and abusing my prescription Adderall. I was big into PC gaming back then, Counter-Strike Source, Team Fortress 2, Final Fantasy XI, Warcraft, that sort of stuff, and my music of choice was almost exclusively old stuff that was recorded way before I was born. I was big into The Beatles for a while, then eventually got into The Smiths. “Half a Person” was basically my teenage anthem. “Sixteen, clumsy, and shy, the story of my life.” Back then, my sole goal in life was basically to drop out of reality, to do my own thing whenever possible. Everything was a big joke to me, a parody. This, of course, was a defense mechanism, to guard myself from the harsh, intimidating expectations of modern reality. I think this air of faux-cool detachment was what drew Aaron to me, he was drawn in like some sort of awe-struck magnet. He looked up to me in a sort of misguided way. I liked the same nerdy things he liked but was also somehow a sardonic fuckup who didn’t take anything seriously. “If only I could be like him, if only I could not care,” that sort of thing. I did care though, I just pretended otherwise. I remember one time, when we were taking an algebra test, I noticed him looking at his water bottle a lot, and then I noticed he had taped the test answers to the backside of the wrapper so that he could slyly read the answers through the water itself. I whispered to him, “You? Doing that? I can’t believe it.” And he just looked at me with this look of absolute shame and embarrassment on his face. In hindsight, maybe I was a bad influence on him. Maybe I rubbed off on him in the wrong ways. I spent most of my time at school either with my head on the desk or drawing comics. I used to draw these little comics with this crude bald stick figure dude who wore big black sunglasses. He would make social commentary and tell offensive jokes. One of the comics got me into some trouble, actually, because it had the n-word in it, and one of the teachers found it in the wastebasket, at which point they gave it to the principal, and the next thing I knew, I was being called up to the front office for a little chat. Like an idiot, I guess I had written my name somewhere on the paper, or maybe all the teachers were just aware of my comics, because some of my comics were passed around from kid to kid. Thinking back, I was actually pretty popular, but not in any sort of positive way, more in an infamous kind of way. Some kids looked up to me the same way Aaron looked up to me, but most just saw me as a cautionary tale. I remember one kid, Austin, was very into my comics and would always tell me stuff like, “You should work for Adult Swim, dude.” Needless to say, I never ended up working for Adult Swim. None of my comics exist anymore, but I can draw the stick figure guy from memory, which isn’t actually a big feat because he’s very simple to draw. Anyway, the headmaster sat me down and said something like, “I appreciate this kind of humor, I really do, but this just isn’t appropriate for school, and you should really know that.” And I did know that, of course, but who fucking cares? And then he said, “So, I can either expel you, or you can write an essay on a topic of your choosing, within reason, of course.” I was happy to take the expulsion, but my mom wasn’t, so she made me pick the essay. The topic we landed on was “The Recording of Revolver,” which was my favorite Beatles record at the time, and the principal’s favorite band was The Beatles, he had Beatles stuff all over his office. I remember I put a lot of effort into that essay, probably because the topic interested me so much. I even went to the library a couple times for research. I remember the principal, after reading it, said, “Did your dad write this?” And no, my dad did not write this. My dad lived five hours away.

The second time I was held back was more of a subtle process. I wasn’t at the same private school anymore, because I had told my old counselor, “Look, I hate school, and this place is really expensive, so I kind of feel bad for wasting my mom’s money,” and I guess I made a good argument because the counselor reluctantly agreed with me. Maybe he thought I was a hopeless case or something. “I don't get paid enough to fix kids like this,” is something he might have been thinking at the time. He talked to my mom, and after some convincing on my part, she put me back in public school, where I proceeded to do absolutely nothing with my life. Everything was a big joke to me, a parody. I spent most days walking off campus, wandering around seedy downtown, meeting all sorts of crazy, borderline dangerous people, one of whom was a homeless dude who pulled porn out of his pocket, showed it to me, and said something like, “Printed it from the library. Pretty nice, huh?” No, not nice. Gross. Get away from me. Anyway, because of my truancy and general lack of giving a shit, I failed almost all my classes and was required to “make them up” during the school year, so while on paper I was a junior and eventually a senior, I was still taking all freshman and sophomore classes during those years. It was around this time that I met my best friend. We met through a girl, her name was Alison. I knew Alison had a boyfriend named Robert, but I would talk to her on the phone every night anyway, flirting and whatnot, without any real intention of winning her over. I was just an incorrigible flirty, and still am. At school one day, Alison introduced me to Robert, and from that moment, I was Robert’s boyfriend and Alison was basically out of the picture. Robert and I were not sexually involved or anything like that, it was all platonic, but we shared a sort of soul and were basically inseparable. We’d spend every waking hour of the day with each other, which Alison hated to the point that she eventually spread rumors that Robert and I were gay together and “that’s why we broke up,” which was not true at all but was funny as hell, so Robert and I would lean into the lie a little bit when people brought it up. We both loved music, Final Fantasy, and smoking cigarettes. Marlboros, Lights. He would stay over at my house every weekend, and we would take Adderall and play video games and smoke cigarettes on my private bedroom balcony, just talking about random stuff until the sun came up, all of which felt super deep and meaningful at the time. One weekend we just lay in my giant bed together watching Dragon Ball Z DVDs all day and night. We made it through the Saiyan Saga and about halfway through the Namek Saga. His dog would join in on these hangout sessions. His name was Hannibal. And despite the name, he was the sweetest black lab you’d ever meet. I remember I used to wear this oversized multicolor bohemian sweater, and one time I put this sweater on Hannibal and he wore it for like a full hour. It was the goofiest shit we’d ever seen. We took a picture of him wearing the sweater with my digital camera. This picture has somehow survived all the MySpace and Photobucket wipes that came years and years later. It’s the only surviving picture of my bedroom from that era, so it’s like a window into another world, another time and place that I can now only remember through myth and legend.

It was on the day of my eighteenth birthday that I sauntered into the counselor’s office and told him I was dropping out of both high school and reality. I told him, “Look, I’m done with school and there’s no legal way you can make me stay,” and, well, that was it. In that moment, I’m sure this counselor was thinking the same thing my old private school counselor had been thinking all those years before. I hated school, and I wasn’t going to come around. It was all a big joke to me, a parody. There was nothing my mom could do either, she was never very assertive or parental to begin with, so she begrudgingly supported my dropout as long as I promised to get my GED, which I did, and I passed that thing with basically perfect scores, which wasn’t hard to do considering one of the questions was literally, “Who is the current president of the United States of America?”

And it was Obama, because it was 2009.

It was around this time that I became obsessed with Syd Barrett. I thought he was shadowy and mysterious and handsome, and he had this reputation in the late ’60s as some sort of mad wizard recluse genius, which was an aesthetic that very much appealed to me at the time. I also wanted to be seen as a sort of mad wizard recluse genius. I was very much about appearances. I didn’t actually like Syd’s music very much, so the whole thing was kind of superficial, but I did like that one song, “Dark Globe,” which, back then, sounded like the crazy wisdom of a man who had dropped out of reality through some secret door accessible only through the imbibing of some seriously psychedelic shit. I wanted to be just like him. I wanted to drop out of reality.

Oh, where are you now

Pussy willow that smiled on this leaf?

When I was alone

You promised the stone from your heart

My head kissed the ground

I was half the way down

Little did I know back then that Syd Barrett was basically just fucking batshit insane, due to serious mental problems mixed with one too many tabs of acid, but even if I had known that, it probably wouldn’t have changed my trajectory in the slightest. When I got an idea in my head, it was impossible to deter me, and I had gotten it in my head that I wanted to experiment with a lot of drugs and officially drop out of reality, just like Syd Barrett had done. Nothing was going to stop me. I wanted people to observe me from afar and think, “that dude has done some wild shit and knows some wild things and I’m afraid to even talk to him because he's on a totally different plane than I am.” That was how my brain worked back then, and that’s still kind of how it works even today, unfortunately.

Anyway. Robert and I knew this other guy who was also named Robert, whom I’ll call Bob from now on for the sake of differentiation, and Bob was a big hippie type with his own apartment, paid for by his rich mom. He was a little older than us, if I remember correctly, and his hair was already thinning. He was very short and had a beer belly, and he had the puffy, red face of a drunken Irishman, and he often wore a cap, probably to hide his bald spots. At first glance, Bob seemed like a typical Southern boy, but when you started talking to him, you quickly realized he was batshit. He spoke almost exclusively in nonsense and riddles and old ’60s music, with long, drawn-out syllables, like his brain was totally fried or something. Sometimes Robert and I would go over to Bob’s apartment and smoke weed while he and his strange hippie buddies would experiment with harder drugs, like cocaine and mushrooms, none of which I was interested in until I got it in my head that I wanted to drop out of reality for real.

And when that happened, I immediately thought of Bob, who was the obvious choice for getting my hands on some harder stuff. My preferred choice was LSD, but LSD was impossible to find on the island, so I settled for mushrooms. I called Bob up, and I remember him saying something like, “Yeah, dude, I can get caps whenever, mail ‘em right to my house, come over next Friday, you and Robert can get shroomin’, I’ll be your guys’ chaperone. It’ll be fucking dope.”

So, next Friday night, Robert, Hannibal, and I went over to Bob’s house to drop out of reality. He lived on the second floor of an apartment complex behind the only McDonald’s on the island. His apartment was a pretty standard one-bedroom affair, but with a spacious living room and a big kitchen area, and a screened-in porch off the living room. You had to walk up two flights of stairs and through a brick hallway lined with generic doors to get to his peephole. His living room was basically barren. I don’t remember there being anything on the walls, no paintings, decorations, nothing like that. He lived very much like a frat boy who had just been kicked out of his parents’ house or something, just the bare necessities to keep him alive and entertained. Near the front door, there was a black CRT television pushed up against the wall, with a dark blue couch that could sit three or four people on the opposite wall. His bedroom door was always closed, but I snuck a peek once. There was a mattress on the floor, a shade-less lamp next to it, and an electric guitar and amp. I don’t think he actually played guitar, or if he did, I had never seen him play it.

While Bob fiddled with stuff in the kitchen, Robert and I sat on the couch while Hannibal sat by the porch door. Bob eventually stumbled into the living room with a mason jar full of brown, shriveled things. He said, “We can either bake them into a brownie or you can just eat them.” So, of course, Robert and I took the easy path and just ate them, having one each. They tasted like ass and made me gag, but I got them down with huge gulps of water. Bob didn’t have any, though he did smoke copious amounts of weed before and after our ingestion of the magic mushrooms. Thinking back now, Bob was probably not the best chaperone for our first trip into the land of magic mushrooms.

The effects were not immediate. I remember sitting around on the floor near the couch for about an hour, talking about video games and music with Robert, who was uncharacteristically quiet for most of the conversation. In between topics, I would say things like, “When’s it going to kick in? I don’t feel anything. Did I really eat shrooms? Nothing’s happening. When’s something going to happen?” At some point, Robert leaned back on the couch and closed his eyes, still awake but evidently somewhere else. Bob went up to him and said, “Robert, how’s it going? Feeling alright?” I don’t remember what Robert said, but he certainly didn’t say the words of a sober person, which prompted Bob to get up real close to Robert’s face and shout, “DON’T WORRY. YOU ARE TRIPPING. EVERYTHING IS FINE. YOU ARE JUST TRIPPING. YOU’RE SAFE,” which prompted Robert to roll over on his side and hide his face in the cushions while mumbling something pretty much incoherent.

I was sitting on the floor the whole time, watching this unfold, still thinking to myself that nothing was happening, that the shrooms weren't working, when Bob turned to me and said, “What about you? You OK?” And I told him, “Yeah, I’m fine. Nothing’s happening.” And he said, “Then why haven’t you moved in like an hour? You’re like a plank of wood.” And I said, “Am I? Am I a plank of wood? Is that all I am?” And then he started going, “YOU ARE TRIPPING RIGHT NOW. DON’T WORRY. EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE FINE. YOU ARE SAFE. YOU’RE JUST TRIPPING.” I was just sitting there, blinking at him, thinking to myself, what the hell is he talking about? Nothing’s happening. Of course I’m fine. But evidently Bob didn’t think so, so he kept shouting, “YOU ARE TRIPPING. JUST GO WITH THE FLOW. EVERYTHING IS FINE. YOU ARE STILL YOU, JUST DIFFERENT.” Which started to freak me out because I was convinced that I was not, in fact, tripping, and that I was actually totally fine, and, like, please stop yelling at me please. But then Bob’s eyes started bulging out and his lips grew into big flaps and he looked like a straight-up monster. I couldn’t stand to look at him anymore, so I crab-walked over to the porch door and opened it with my foot, then sat down on the hard cement out there. Hannibal followed and curled up next to me. I remember the porch light was very dim and everything was real dark out there. I looked down at the cement and saw what I can only describe as twinkles, like little stars going out. I was fascinated by these stars, which, in hindsight, were likely just visual artifacts we all have all the time, but I didn’t realize that in the moment, so I started thinking about that one sci-fi novel I had read months earlier, the one in which these monks are trying to build a supercomputer to record all the names of God. Apparently there were nine billion names, and if they were all recorded, then the universe would end, so the monks enlisted the help of some super smart tech guys to build this supercomputer, to start naming names. The tech guys didn’t believe what the monks were saying, of course, but they helped program the computer anyway because it was a paying job. Once the computer was built and turned on, it started naming names, and the tech guys left the monks’ temple and then went back to their cars in the parking lot or whatever. When they got outside, it was night, and when they looked up, the stars were going out, one by one. The whole world became like a dark globe. Reality dropped out. And it was around this time that reality dropped out for me too, because I must have been looking at those stars going out for over an hour, until Bob came out with some water, which he basically forced me to drink, then he started with the whole YOU ARE TRIPPING routine again.

Trying to get away from him, I crab-walked back inside, where I found Robert in the same spot on the couch. He hadn’t moved at all. Hannibal jumped up and curled up next to him, at which point Robert shot up and started patting down the crotch of his pants, repeating, “I think I peed. I have urinated myself. I have soiled my pants. Please, please check, please, is it wet? Do you feel wetness? I think I peed myself. I have urinated. I am wet.” So I did what he said. I crab-walked over to the couch and started patting down his crotch. But his crotch was totally dry, so I told him, “Your pants are totally dry.” But he didn’t believe me. “Are you sure? They’re wet. I can feel it. I can feel it dripping down my leg. My pants are soaked. I am moist. I have peed. I am soiled. I have urinated myself.” I kept trying to convince him otherwise, but Robert just kept going on and on. Bob was there too, going, YOU ARE TRIPPING RIGHT NOW ROBERT, THERE IS NO PEE, but Robert still didn’t believe it. He got up off the couch, nearly fell over, then swayed into the bathroom, where he remained for some time.

The next thing I remember was Bob coming out of his bedroom enveloped in thick dope clouds. He had a huge grin on his face and was holding a large machete high above his head, which for some reason felt totally normal. He said, “I’m going into the backyard to cut down some trees,” which also seemed totally normal, so I said, “OK, I’m going to watch some TV,” and that’s what I did. I crab-walked to the television set, pushed the power button with my big toe, then crab-walked back to the couch and propped my back up against it, still sitting on the floor.

Then I thought, wait, there’s no backyard, this is a fucking apartment complex, and that’s when I realized that even in this state of epic highness, somehow I was still the most sober person in the room, which started to freak me out a little bit. But reruns of Saturday Night Live were playing on the TV and that quickly eased my mind, got me laughing, because it was some of the most hilarious shit I had ever seen or heard in my life. They were doing some fake news broadcast, and the fake news anchors were on my same wavelength, turning everything into a big joke, a parody of real life.

Good evening. We begin tonight with breaking developments out of Iran, where tensions remain high following the disputed presidential election.

This one had me chuckling.

Turning to North Korea, where the government continues to draw international concern following recent missile launches and nuclear activity.

This one had me basically holding my sides, crippling myself with laughter.

On the domestic front, the administration is pushing implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, a major stimulus package passed earlier this year.

This one had me totally rapt, no longer laughing but now leaning close into the TV, like I was studying the comedic genius of the parodies at work, trying to figure out what they truly meant.

Apple has just released the iPhone 3GS, the latest version of its revolutionary smartphone, which is already drawing significant attention just as it hits the market.

At this point I was completely quiet, just staring into the television. Robert was still in the bathroom, and I had no sense of how much time had passed.

While I was watching the broadcast, Bob walked back into the apartment with a plastic bag full of snacks. Instead of cutting down trees, I guess he had gone to the gas station or something. He tossed a bag of Lay’s into my lap, and it landed without me reacting at all. Then he said, “What are you watching?”

“Saturday Night Live,” I said matter-of-factly, still staring into the glow.

He was quiet for a moment as he opened a bag of chips, then he slid a few into his mouth, started munching, and said, with a full mouth, “Dude, that’s just Fox News.”

And when he said that, I don’t know why, but I started to cry, watching what was apparently just Fox News.

Current Music: "Dark Globe," by Syd Barrett

Dear Daria,

I've been watching your show since I was at least nine years old. Back then, you used to come on around 10 or 11 o’clock, and I could only watch you in my sister’s bedroom. She had one of two TVs in the whole house that got cable, and she would stay up extra late on school nights drinking SoBe fruit beverages, the ones in the tall glass bottles, while talking with her friends on her laptop using AOL while MTV played in the background. My bedtime was a lot earlier than hers, but after my dad would put me to bed, if I wasn’t sneaking Game Boy time underneath the covers with my worm light, I would tiptoe out of my room, creep through the dark hallway, and slip into my sister’s room to watch you. My sister would always tell me to GET THE HELL OUT but, after a few minutes, she’d always calm down and accept the fact that I wasn’t going to leave. “Whatever, as long as you don’t talk to me. And don’t touch my SoBe.” So I wouldn’t talk to her, and I wouldn't touch her SoBe. I’d just lay on the foot of her bed, stomach down with my elbows on the mattress and my head in my hands, and stare into the glow of the big CRT, watching you. And I could usually get away with this for about an hour before I’d hear my dad coming down the hall to tell my sister to TURN THE DAMN LIGHTS OFF AND GET SOME SLEEP, at which point I’d sneak into the closet, wait for him to leave, then creep back to my room as if nothing had ever happened. I tell you all this to illustrate that I have some fond memories of watching your show back in the late 90s and early 2000s, but also, back then, I didn’t really understand any of it. I just liked the art style and the music and how you and your friends seemed to make fun of everything. Compared to the stuff I was watching, like Johnny Bravo and CatDog and Pokemon, your show was like stepping into a whole other world, one I didn’t understand but desperately wanted to be a part of for some reason.

By the time my acne came around, which was real bad let me tell you, I was watching your show pretty much religiously as it came on Noggin’s “The N” block around 9 or 10 PM. Back then, I had a crush on you, to tell you the truth. I thought we were soulmates. I thought we understood each other. I felt like an outsider, and you were an outsider too. Your parents, your schoolmates, and even your friends didn’t really understand you, and they didn’t understand me either. But you understood me. And I understood you. At least, I thought I did. I thought your detached cynicism for everyone and everything was intoxicating, because that’s how I saw the world too. You seemed to take nothing seriously. In my view, you were above it all. And you were so intelligent too. You had a sardonic quip for literally every situation, like that one time when you were at a job faire and someone asked you about your life goals and you said, “My goal is not to wake up at 40 with the bitter realization that I've wasted my life on a job I hate because I was forced to decide on a career in my teens.” I laughed my ass off when you said that. It was so true. I loved that. I remember thinking, damn, I wish I could come up with stuff like that. I wanted to be just like you. You were my dark star. You had the mind and soul of a subversive writer born in the wrong era, and I loved that about you. I wanted to be just like you. And I wanted to be with you as well. I remember getting seriously jealous when you would get all shy and blushy around Trent. What did he have that I didn't have? I started dressing like Trent, acting like him, thinking this would appeal to the simulacrum of you I had created in my mind. And when Tom came around, well, I could barely even watch as you hooked up with Tom. Fuck that guy. He was a pretentious asshole. You deserved better than that. He didn't understand you like I did. You were an outsider, and I was too. We were both born in the wrong time and place, we naturally gravitated toward things, like art and music, that were created way before we were even born, and we thought everything from our generation onwards was insipid, stupid bullshit. We both felt like the suburbs were some sort of karmic hell we were reborn into because we had been bad in our previous lives or something. We both saw the middle-class suburbanite losers around us as zombies, puppets, just walking around performing their stupid little roles, roles they didn’t have the intelligence to question or the willpower to resist. We both knew that everything was shit. Life sucks then you die, that's what you'd say. That's what I'd say too. We were above it all. We looked down on everyone and everything and we liked it that way. We would never give in. We would never conform. Tom didn't know this about you, he just pretended to. He wasn't your soulmate. I was. I understood you. I loved you.

But now, looking back almost two decades later, I realize that I didn’t really understand you at all. And that’s because I didn’t understand myself.

Maybe you can relate to what I’m about to tell you, Daria. Maybe you’ve got it all figured out already. You’ve got more years under your belt now, after all. But I’m going to tell you this stuff anyway, because maybe it will help you, who knows. I'm going to tell you that I have spent my entire life trying to figure out how to deal with the frustration of simply being here, on this earth, in this skin, with this mind. There seems to be no rhyme or reason for it. Why me? Why this body? Why this planet? Why this city, state, country? Why do I think the way I do? Why do I even do the things I do? What is my purpose? And I spent so much time dealing with this frustration simply by rebelling. Back when I had six different face creams for my terrible acne, I refused to participate in school, never did my homework, got held back several grades, and eventually flunked out of high school. Teachers thought I was stupid, they put me in special classes. Of course, they didn’t know that this was just my way of saying FUCK THE SYSTEM, but that didn’t matter to them, the end result was the same. I looked down on everyone and everything. I was cynical, sarcastic, sardonic, ironic, all that stuff, and I thought it was cool.

But really, I was just fucking miserable. And, on a certain level, I was making myself even more miserable, by solely relying on negativity to cope with being miserable. I was a feedback loop of misery.

I saw life as a big meaningless joke and pretended that I didn’t care, just like you did. But the truth is, I cared a whole helluva lot. I cared, arguably, more than anyone else around me. My detached irony belied a terrible secret, which was that I was a self-conscious, egotistical brat who cared way too much about what others thought about me. And since I felt like I had nothing to offer, I would pretend like the world was below me, because this made me feel better. I would criticize everyone with short little sardonic quips, social-media-friendly one-liners, while offering nothing constructive in return. I reveled in this destruction. I told myself that deconstructing things with negativity was meaningful in some way, but I was just a confused, angry little demon. A melancholic phantom nightmare boy. I pretended I was above the stereotypes but all I was doing was reinforcing the very stereotypes I pretended to be above. I didn’t see people as people, I saw them as characters in a TV show, characters who only existed to be subjects of my scorn and ridicule. I would reduce people to tropes and caricatures and I would revel in it. I would see an athletic kid playing soccer as nothing more than a dumbass jock with nothing going on up there in his head, and I would make fun of him and I would laugh at him and then I would go home and sit on my bed stewing in psychic garbage for hours while watching your show, and there you were, just like me, and this made me feel better, made me feel understood, so I leaned into you and wanted to be just like you, because you were my ideal, you seemed to have it all figured out, you seemed to truly be above it all, and I wanted to be just like that.

But I didn’t truly understand you. I didn’t understand that you were going through it too. I didn’t understand that you were just coping with the frustration of simply being here, on this earth, in this skin, with this mind. I didn’t understand that you were just as miserable as I was.

But I think I’m getting better. I’ve adopted a sort of mind-over-matter attitude. I’m trying to be less ironic, less detached, less negative all the time. I’m trying to be more sincere. And I find that, by reminding myself that everyone is just going through it, trying to cope, trying to figure out how to deal with the frustration of simply being here, that we’re all alike in some way, that we all have something in common, this fosters a sort of feeling of togetherness within me, a certain positivity that gives me hope. We are all in this together. No one is better or worse. No one is a trope. No one is a character in a TV show, Daria. I’m trying to see people less as stereotypes and more as real, living, breathing people with interesting hobbies and unique outlooks and deep personal lives, and this outlook is helping me, it really is, it’s helping me be less miserable.

And that’s why I’m writing this to you today, Daria, because I want you to be less miserable too.

Love always,

Forrest

Current Music: "You're Standing On My Neck," by Splendora

“I am not who I appear to be,” was what I told a co-worker on a Zoom call a few days ago. “I am so much more than this.”

Every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, my daytime routine is basically the same. My alarm goes off at 8 AM, I snooze it, it goes off again, I snooze it again, and so on, eventually waking up around 9:30 AM or so, at which point I brush my teeth, take some vitamins, say good morning to my family, hugs and kisses and whatnot, then I leave the house through the sliding glass door, walk down a cement path in my backyard, and enter my own little world, my office, which is a 10x12 tiny home. The inside of my office is segmented off with a shoji, one of those Japanese paper screens with panels, mine is tan-colored and made of paper emblazoned with the budding branches of a cherry blossom tree, framed in fake black wood, purchased from eBay years ago. This shoji functions as a divider, cutting my world into halves, the vocational-nightmare half and the truly-myself half.

In the vocational-nightmare half, there’s a company-issued ThinkPad hooked up to two big monitors, with a wireless keyboard and mouse on the desk. The desk is actually a cheap black plastic folding table I bought from Walmart years ago, upon which sit all sorts of little knickknacks, like a cat bobblehead, a model shishi-odoshi fountain with the bamboo and the rocks, some Nintendo-themed coasters, a glass TARDIS mug I got for Christmas one year that serves as a holder for my pens, and a paper unicorn my son made at the library one day. If you’re sitting facing the desk, there’s a black headset hanging within arm’s reach from the left wall, and the chair is an ergonomic black office chair I got on clearance a couple years back. Above all that, hanging on the wall, is a corkboard from the late 2000s with all sorts of stuff tacked to it, some of that stuff tracing back to my teenage years, like Pokemon cards and cutouts from The Cure’s Galore booklet and some printed anime stuff, all buried underneath pictures of my kids and various work things that just keep building up. Perhaps the corkboard is some sort of symbol, a symbol for the passing of time, or for how adulthood can quickly yet subtly smother adolescence, or perhaps it’s some sort of symbol of hope, for how, despite all this adult shit piling up, my adolescence is still there, shining through the cracks.

They say everything’s a metaphor or, like, a simile of some kind, or something.

From about 9:30 AM to 5 PM, I do work stuff behind this shoji screen. In this corner of the room, I am somebody else. I literally go by a different name, my legal first name (“Forrest” is my middle name), and I work for a software company that I do not give even two shits about. We sell software for call centers. I’m not in sales, per se, but I am dangerously close to sales. I spend most of my day on Zoom calls, talking to employees whom I manage, and sometimes to our clients, vice presidents and C-suite executives, trying to keep them happy. The company says our team exists to make sure clients are adopting our software and getting the full value out of it, but we mostly just handle fire drills all day, every day, because the software, frankly, sucks ass. It’s not a scam or anything like that, it does what it’s supposed to do, but there are so many little nuances and bespoke quirks from client to client that, ultimately, something always goes wrong, and there are so many bureaucratic layers to selling and buying enterprise software that, often, the buyers don’t even know what the hell they’re truly buying, which leads to all sorts of billing disputes, all of which my team manages. And, like every corporate tech company these days, we have added AI stuff into the software being sold. On a basic level, this AI stuff is designed to automate workflows that were once handled by humans, which means that, if it’s working properly, a client can offload large amounts of work to a single non-human worker that they pay around $100,000 a year for, which means that, when you get right down to it, I work for a company that packages and sells joblessness. We are destroyers of livelihood.

They say society will adapt, that it’s no different than the industrial revolution, that’s what they say.

On the other side of the shoji screen is where all the stuff I actually care about is located. There’s a low-to-the-floor bookcase with about fifty books slotted into it, and a glass desk upon which stand two flat-panel monitors for my PC, and a CRT from the early 2000s that I use to play old games on, one of those prison TVs made from clear plastic so inmates couldn’t hide drugs in it or whatever, it even has a cell number and block number scratched into the side, so you know it’s the genuine article. Opposite the glass desk is another desk, a wooden one, where my Xbox 360 and Switch 2 consoles sit near a large 1080p flat-screen propped up on a tall stand. The TV is surrounded by DVD cases and games for both the 360 and Switch. Behind all that is a large blue blanket tacked to the wall, depicting an astrological wheel with all sorts of esoteric symbols woven into it. There are little plastic figurines all around, characters from video games, mostly. The lights are always kept to a dim orange glow, because I like it that way. There’s a second office chair in this area, one that I can swivel back and forth from the glass desk to the wooden desk without having to scoot around much. I got this chair from the side of the road, someone was throwing it away, so the arms are all beat up with foam coming out, but it’s a La-Z-Boy or whatever they’re called, so it’s quite comfortable, despite looking ratty as hell. By the wooden desk, there’s another corkboard on the wall, tacked with Polaroids that capture fond memories. Nearby, there’s a tall, narrow cabinet with about thirty Nintendo DS games slotted into it. Opposite that, there’s another cabinet full of strategy guides from ancient times and PS1 games I’ve had since I was a kid. There’s even an old-timey boombox atop the bookcase, it sits on a vintage cassette case filled to the max with tapes ranging from Sting to OutKast to Unwound. The boombox also picks up AM/FM bands, so sometimes I’ll listen to NPR or classical music while writing or browsing the internet or playing video games. As of writing this, I’ve been on a Zelda kick, so I’ve been playing the Master Quest version of Ocarina of Time on my CRT, trying to beat the game with only three hearts. While I’m playing, I take notes on my MacBook, notes I’ll use for a future essay. This half of the room is where I do all my thinking and playing, where I feel totally and utterly myself, sometimes entering a kind of flow state where nothing else seems to matter. And sometimes, when the mood strikes me, I even dance and sing in here. This place is my sanctuary. After my son goes to bed around 9 PM, I spend most every night here, writing or reading or listening to music or playing video games, which is the same shit I’ve been doing every night since I was like ten years old.

They say people never change, that their essence is locked-in forever. I don’t know if that’s true, but that’s what they say.

What has changed, however, is that back then, when I was ten or fourteen or seventeen or whatever, my world was not separated by a shoji screen, but now it is. Back then, my room was a sanctuary without taint. The same cannot be said for my current sanctuary. I have started to view this shoji screen as a symbol, a symbol representing not only the physical divide between the two worlds I inhabit, but also the spiritual divide between me and some other version of me that, frankly, I don’t like very much. The cherry blossoms face outward, to the world I love, and the tan backside faces the vocational nightmare. I like to think that, in front of the cherry blossoms, I am my true self, the writer, the real me, the person who has values and standards, the person who bemoans capitalistic greed and incorporates Zen practices into his daily life and writes like his life depends on it. But behind the screen, “I am not who I appear to be.” I am an imposter. A shadow. I throw away my morals, my values, and I become someone else, someone who, through a series of accidents, has landed in the corporate tech world, just doing what needs to be done to survive, to put bread on the table, so to speak. Behind the shoji screen, I am participating in the grind, not because I want to, but because I feel like I have to. This other version of me has all sorts of justifications, like, “I may be supporting software that gets people fired, but it’s OK, people always bounce back.” I have built all sorts of mental bulwarks to defend myself from the existential dissonance of being, perhaps, two different people. I tell myself, behind the screen, I am not who I appear to be. I tell myself that fate has had a hand in this, that due to how things have played out, my dumb youthful choices, the apathetic outlook I had on life for such a long time, that here I am now, in the tech world, because I have to be, to pay the bills, to support my family.

But these bulwarks, these justifications, are starting to crumble. I know, deep down, that I have some kind of choice here. I could quit my job, for example, perhaps find another that isn’t so morally questionable. This is certainly something I could do. But then I tell myself, well, that would make my life, and perhaps my family’s lives, harder. We would have to tough it out for a little bit. We would have to cut back, buy off-brand shit, stop throwing money at new electronics and fancy toys. And there’s certainly the possibility that I wouldn’t find another job, or maybe I’d find another job but the pay would be shit, so I wouldn’t be able to pay my mortgage, so maybe we’d have to move to some shitty apartment or something. None of this seems very appealing. But I ask myself, are these valid reasons, or are they just poor justifications, excuses? The fact of the matter is, right now, I’m straddling two worlds, living two different lives.

So who am I, really? Am I not spending over 8 hours a day doing this whole capitalistic routine? Is this not more time than I spend actually doing the stuff I enjoy? I want to believe in the cherry blossoms. I want to believe that’s the real version of me, the one that counts. But they say actions speak louder than words, and so many of my actions are work-oriented, so who am I, really? Am I the capitalist crony behind the shoji screen, or am I the idealistic writer on the other side?

I don’t know how to reconcile this.

How do you reconcile it?

The other day, on a Zoom call, I told a co-worker, “I am not who I appear to be. I am so much more than this.” And he just nodded his head and said, “Yeah, I get it,” then he adjusted himself in the camera so that his T-shirt was showing in full. It was a concert T-shirt, depicting Sting on stage with some date over his head. My co-worker gripped the fabric and pulled it to straighten the image out and said, “I don’t really care about all this work stuff. I mean, I do the job, and I try to do it well, but I’m basically only doing this to fund my lifestyle. My wife and I are big fans of Sting. We’ve been to over thirty of his concerts. I mean, I bet half of my paycheck goes to Sting stuff.” So we ended up talking about Sting for about thirty minutes. I showed him the Sting cassette I have, Ten Summoner’s Tales, and talked about how, as a kid, my mom loved Sting, and how her love of Sting rubbed off on me, and so now I listen to Sting all the time, because his music is nostalgic for me, transports me to another time and place. I told him my favorite Sting song is “If I Ever Lose My Faith In You,” and how the synthy swells and harmonica flourishes at the beginning of the song feel like stepping into another time and place. We talked about what we thought was his best era, which albums we enjoyed most, and how Sting is supposedly a huge asshole, but how that’s OK because his music is just so damn good. At the end of the call, the guy said, “Hey, this was a cool conversation. I feel like we’re closer now, like, I trust you a whole lot more. You seem like a real person.” And that’s when I realized that I am not unique. This guy is also behind a shoji screen. He has his own loves, his own interests, his own life outside of work. He does not want to be here, in front of this camera, fiddling with PowerPoints and playing with Excel sheets, but here he is, doing it, because of the series of accidents that made up his life to this point.

Later that day, I went to the gas station to grab a pack of cigarettes (don’t even start), and the woman behind the counter was trying to get me to sign up for their rewards program, and she was being low-key kind of aggressive about it, which was starting to get on my nerves. I asked myself, who the hell would want to spend their time forcing people into signing up for a rewards program? But then I thought back to the Sting guy, about how he’s just funding his Sting habit. And then I thought about myself, and my shoji screen. That’s when I realized that, wait, actually, no one would want to spend their time forcing people to sign up for a rewards program. This woman is only doing it because of the series of accidents that led to this point in her life. The world has conspired against her, in a way, forced her into a job she wants nothing to do with, yet she does it anyway, simply because she has to, to stay alive. In that gas station, I suddenly remembered this one study I had read months ago, which claimed that over 70% of people in America experience some form of “imposter syndrome,” and this suddenly made sense to me: everyone feels like an imposter because they are, in fact, imposters. The world has forced them into impostor syndrome. The system makes imposters out of us all. This woman has found herself working at a gas station with some sort of “rewards program” quota she has to hit, and she has to hit this quota to keep her job, to pay the rent, to support her family, or whatever. She doesn’t want to do it, but she does it anyway, because she has to. She’s an imposter, and that’s OK, because I’m an imposter, too. We’re all imposters. In that gas station, a sort of universal empathy bubbled up within me, and so, when she was going through her whole spiel, instead of narrowing my eyes and getting all short with her like I would normally do, I said, “Hey, you know what, sign me up.” I gave her my name, my phone number, my email address, then she handed me the cheap plastic card and said, “Thank you so much. Have a nice day, sir.” And she had a huge smile on her face.

As I left that gas station, I remember thinking to myself: I wonder what she’s like, on the other side of the shoji screen?

Current Music: "If I Ever Lose My Faith In You," by Sting

I feel like I’m fucking up right now, so I feel the need to explain myself, maybe not so much to you, but perhaps to myself.

You see, recently I did something I consider to be a very bad thing. I did something I stopped doing over a year ago, something I told myself I would never do again, something I believed to be performative and soul-sucking and possibly the death of humanity as we know it. And that something is, well, I made a new account on the social media platform Mastodon. I rejoined the herd, so to speak.

I am, once again, an elephant.

This may not seem like a very big deal to you, but it’s a very big deal to me. When I tell myself I’m going to do something, or not do something in this case, I like to keep my word. This is especially true when it comes to my vices, of which I have many, and social media, like any bad habit, is most definitely one of those vices. My vices continuously make a hypocrite out of me, causing me no end of psychic dissonance, because when it comes to vice, well, I have a self-control problem. I have a problem keeping my word.

And to prove that I haven’t kept my word, the following are verbatim quotes from yrstruly, pulled from a number of essays and reader email responses.

“Social media does something to our fragile, validation-craving psyches. We cannot get enough of social media, and once we get a taste of the validation it provides, we bend and morph ourselves into whatever form is necessary to continue receiving that validation.”

“... these places are indeed echo chambers brought about by the human need for validation.”

“In short, on social media, we become fake versions of ourselves, all while comparing ourselves to fake versions of other people… It’s a feedback loop of fakeness.”

“Humans need community, real community, and social media is a false community. Our mental health declines because… we continue to believe that social media can replace actual fleshy people, when it obviously can't.”

“We have turned to the miasma (social media) for the very community that the miasma has destroyed, as if the poison is the cure.”

“... if we remove social media, we will become less polarized, because, at present, it’s far too easy to call for violence when we view those we’re targeting as fake, dehumanized avatar people instead of fleshy, real-life people that actually bleed.”

“People were not meant to communicate this way (i.e., social media).”

I could keep going, but I don't want to bore you with all the little details, and the more details I provide, the more figurative egg ends up on my face. The bottom line is, I was very much against social media for a long time. And I still kind of am. Yet here I am, an elephant, back in the herd, in the echo chamber, doing the whole performative song and dance, posting photos of my hip, retro CRT, passages I’ve underlined in paperbacks, and quirky one-liners in all lowercase because, one, I think it looks cool, like I don’t take anything seriously and that’s cool somehow, and two, I’ve convinced myself that social media doesn’t deserve proper grammar. Yet here I am, liking the posts, boosting the posts, compulsively checking the posts, getting those little shots of dopamine with every tap and click.

To quote Trent Reznor of the 7x-platinum industrial goth-rock band Nine Inch Nails, “I was up above it, now I'm down in it.”

So, if I dislike social media so much, why did I return? That’s a great question. First, let's examine those quotes up there, the ones I made a few years ago. Was I full of shit, or was I on to something, or maybe both?

I think this is true to some extent. I don’t think I was entirely off the mark. I think social media is a great source of validation, especially when you get none from the people around you. Perhaps the less validation one receives from those around them, the more one will end up retreating into online spaces. I don’t know. But if you’re anything like me, you probably feel like you don’t belong in the physical space you inhabit, you probably feel like a fucking weirdo. Perhaps, because your values and interests don’t align with those around you, you feel disconnected, alone, different in a bad way, so you’re withdrawn and maybe a little jaded and angry. Maybe you blend in with the crowd, maybe you don’t, but either way you feel like a stranger in a strange land, and you desire to escape, to a world filled with people who understand you.

Social media provides us a way to escape to this world, a way to join a herd of like-minded elephants. On the one hand, this is great, it makes us feel good and perhaps, by fostering a sense that we’re not alone, it can stave off despair, even save a life or two. On the other hand, we become performative, exaggerated versions of ourselves, sometimes flat-out fake versions of ourselves. Because when we receive validation, we lean into the behavior that provides us with that validation, and sometimes that behavior might not be so good, physically or mentally, or both. In the essay that the above quote comes from, I talk about right-wing echo chambers a good bit. I talk about how a withdrawn young man might receive validation from the wrong sort of people, maybe racists or sexists or whatever, and so then that young man might adopt the group’s hateful, extremist views, or at least pretend to, to continue receiving validation from said group. I think this is a common thing that happens. In fact, I’ve watched it happen to people in real time, several times. Like the quote says, I think we often bend and morph ourselves to fit in with the crowd. Maybe this isn’t always a bad thing. But the problem is, some crowds are not worth fitting into, but that’s hard to identify when that not-worth-fitting-into crowd makes you feel good. Another problem, however, and this is where I think I might have been a bit off the mark originally, is that this problem is not unique to social media, this happens in physical spaces as well, all the fucking time. So, perhaps, instead of deriding social media specifically, I should have been critiquing human behavior in general, or providing more guidance on how to think more critically about our shared human need for validation and where it might lead us.

All that being said, it does seem much, much easier to fall into the wrong crowd on social media than in the physical world. Social media disconnects us from reality, making it easy for us to flippantly adopt or espouse extreme views, whereas, in the physical realm, you run the risk of ostracization or literally getting punched in the face. I think this is self-evident just by browsing any online space for more than five minutes. People all over the world are calling for violence, based on political views, religious views, or whatever. There is barely any empathy anymore. Violent rhetoric seems far more common now than it did, say, 20 or 30 years ago. I don’t think it was like this back in the late ‘90s or early 2000s, when I was growing up. I’ve had the privilege of growing up in two different worlds, one before the internet, and one after the internet, and the after-internet world seems far more intolerant than the before-internet one, at least in my experience, which is ironic because, today, even though we’re obsessed with enforcing inclusive language and whatnot, we are more insular, echo-chambered, and hesitant to engage with those we don’t agree with than ever before. Perhaps, in our herd quest for online community, we have lost the ability to think critically?

So yes, I do think social media is dangerous, but only if you’re not able to think critically about yourself and the world around you. And this is where I may have erred in my previous writing. Perhaps I was not thinking critically myself. Instead of low-key shaming people for using social media, I should have been encouraging more critical thinking. The good news is that my writing, at least over the past year, does that in spades, at least I think it does. And perhaps, now that I’m back on Mastodon, I can share my views with more people. Maybe that will help the world in some way. Or maybe I’m just being a narcissist. Who knows.

Anyway. I think that last point, about returning to Mastodon to share my views with more people, is a nice segue into the “why” behind why I returned to Mastodon, so let's examine that a bit.

Spoiler alert, the following might reveal that I am, in fact, just a huge narcissist. This is something I’ve always suspected about myself. The silver lining here, however, is that at least I’m aware of it, at least on some level.

The idea to return to Mastodon came when my friend and I restarted our old gaming blog. Back when we were actively publishing, we would post our work on Mastodon, and it would get some traction there. In fact, I imagine most of our incredibly small reader base came from Mastodon. And some of the people I’ve met through Mastodon are some of the coolest people I’ve ever met in my life, honestly. So, when we decided to start publishing together again, I thought, “Hey, maybe we should post our stuff on Mastodon, like we used to, you know, so people will actually read it?”

Now, just to be clear, I don't need an audience to write. If I did, I probably wouldn’t be writing anymore, because I barely have an audience now. I mean, I’m lucky if one or two people read my long-form stuff. In fact, most of it goes entirely unread. I have the backend data to prove it. But again, I don’t need an audience to write. I’m not just saying that, either. I enjoy writing for a number of reasons that, if you've been following my writing or even this journal, which you probably haven’t, you already know. So, to repeat, I don’t necessarily need an audience to write. But, like most things when it comes to human psychology and life in general, things are never so black and white, everything is always complicated. Because, if I’m being honest, there is certainly a part of me that does like having an audience. There is a part of me that likes it when people read and praise my stuff. From a young age, I have had a desire to become a celebrity. I’ve written about this desire many times. In high school, I wanted to be a David Bowie-like pop star. Maybe my parents didn't give me enough attention when I was younger or something, who knows. But I’m willing to admit that this desire for celebrity is certainly an aspect of my personality, one that I don't particularly care for, but it’s an aspect for sure. And I don’t care for this desire because I know, if I were a Zen master or something, these desires for audience and praise would be purged entirely, or at least not indulged, because, like any desire, they come from a place of ego, insecurity, and longing. Every moment I seek praise, I am thinking of myself without praise. I am happier, in general, when I am not seeking praise from others. I know this to be true because, rarely, in those brief moments of Now Now clarity, when I’m momentarily enlightened, I don’t care about praise, because I know all the praise I would ever need is right here, inside of me. Plus, I know from experience that if you base self-worth solely on praise from others, you are bound for disappointment, envy, and resentment. Peace comes from within, not from compliments and five-star reviews. But nevertheless, these desires for audience and praise are part of me. They are like a Devil Gene. I recognize them, and I treat them as a vice. And, like we already covered, when it comes to vice, I have a problem with self-control, with keeping my word.

So that’s one reason I’m an elephant now, I’m indulging in a vice. And this vice, when indulged, manifests as me advertising my work and trying to appear like a cool and interesting person to people I barely even know online. In a sense, I am marketing, treating myself as a sort of product, a product being given away for free, but a product nonetheless. This makes me feel gross on some level. Human beings ought not be products. Yet here I am, treating myself as if I’m some sort of product, even though I know better. Go figure.

However, and this could very well just be the vice talking, I imagine other writers and artists have a similar desire for audience and praise. I imagine this is a very human thing. We are social creatures, after all. We like being surrounded by people who like us and make us feel good. So, when I was going through the whole dissonant “I know I probably shouldn’t return to Mastodon just to post my stuff and get praise, but I kind of want to?” routine, the last clause of the first sentence of this paragraph kept running through my head on repeat, being used as a counterpoint. “It's OK, you're only human, everyone else does it, why not you?” And eventually, I broke my word. I caved. I became an elephant, once again.

But, if you want to know the truth, that’s not the only reason I caved. It’s really not. In fact, if that were the only reason, I probably wouldn’t have returned to Mastodon. Like most things in life, things are not so black and white, everything is complicated. There was another reason, something deeper, something that, when compounded with my desire for audience, prompted me to return.

And that was, well, I missed you.

Current Mood: lonely
Current Music: "Stay (I Missed You)," Lisa Loeb

Why would anyone choose to be a serial killer?

I mean, consider how stressful that would be: sneaking around, killing people, hiding bodies, evading police, pretending you're just a normal, everyday dude in social situations. Even if we assume the serial killer doesn't feel anxiety about any of these things, think of all the mental effort involved in just doing them to begin with. It just doesn't seem worth it, especially when considering that, if you get caught, you’re socially ostracized, kept in a cell your whole life, or just flat-out killed by the state. So then why do it?

One can only assume that, for whatever reason, the serial killer enjoys doing what he does. This is a chilling thought. But again, why?

You and I both know that, for quote-unquote “normal people,” even the very thought of killing another living person makes our stomachs churn and our skin crawl. Killing people just feels wrong. Yet, there are some people out there who kill their own children. What the hell is wrong with those people? Doesn't that fly in the face of almost everything we know about human behavior and biology, killing your kids? If, by some evolutionary urge, we are driven to reproduce, to make new little versions of ourselves, to propagate the species or whatever, then why would anyone ever, on purpose, kill their own children? It just doesn’t make any sense. So why? Why would anyone choose to be a serial killer? Why would anyone choose to kill their own children? Why would anyone choose to do something that so flies in the face of both evolutionary biology and societal norms?

Unfortunately, I don’t know the answer, but I have a few guesses, and my main guess is that, well, these people are just fucked up. I know this isn’t a very scientific answer, so please forgive me, but this seems to be the most logical conclusion. For the serial killer, the child murderer, the pedophile, and so forth, something has just gone horribly wrong in these people’s brains. I might even go as far as to say that these people just can’t help themselves. That’s the only explanation. They are driven by some insatiable Mephistophelian urge to kill.

Of course, this begs many questions, all of which fall squarely within the realm of philosophy. Meaning, today I’m going to talk about free will and determinism.

Determinism is this philosophical idea that everything, including human action, is determined by prior causes, or “antecedents,” and because of this, literally everything is predetermined, meaning “free will” is an illusion, i.e. it does not exist. Think of a ball rolling down a hill. Once the ball starts rolling, we know what’s going to happen next, it’s going to keep rolling until it loses momentum, as per the laws of physics, which should be noted are also outside of the ball’s control.

So now you may be thinking, “OK, but I’m not a ball,” and my response would be, “Well, are you sure?”, and then you’d look at me like I’m a crazy person before trying to find some way to leave the room as quickly as possible. Because, yes, a human being is not a ball, that’s true. Fair. But consider this, maybe we are, though? We may not physically be balls, but perhaps our actions are not so different from balls rolling down hills? This is certainly something to consider.

Most learned individuals in the field of psychology seem to agree that something has gone terribly wrong in the serial killer’s brain. But where and when did this “wrong” happen? When the serial killer popped out of the womb, was his brain already fucked up, or did it happen later? This is where some doctors or philosophers or whatever seem to disagree with each other. Some believe that, due to genetics or whatever, the serial killer’s brain is just fucked up right from the get-go, they’re just screwed right out of gate. Others believe that the serial killer’s psychology is molded through their environment and upbringing. And some believe that it’s a mixture of both of these things, that maybe certain people are born with certain brain chemistries that make them predisposed to becoming a serial killer, but also that their environment and upbringing sort of fosters this predisposition toward serial-killerdom, meaning, if you have a serial-killer-leaning brain, you may not end up being a serial killer after all, or maybe you will, based on a number of environmental factors.

If I had to pick, I’d probably land in the latter bucket, i.e. serial-killerdom is probably a mixture of both nature and nurture. Now one may assume that, if this is the case, a combination of both nature and nurture, then the serial killer is not predetermined from birth to be a serial killer, that there’s some level of outside control over them becoming a serial killer. Perhaps there is even some level of free will involved in choosing to become a serial killer, too.

But is there, really? Remember: ball, hill.

Let’s say you’re born with a predisposition toward becoming a serial killer. What that means is there’s already one strike against you having free will, or having a choice in the matter. The ball has already been pushed down the hill, so to speak. Now let’s say your father is an abusive asshole, and his abusive behavior rubs off on you in some way, and since you’re already predisposed to psychopathy or whatever, you start abusing people yourself, until eventually you do indeed become a serial killer. Or let’s flip it around, let’s say you’re born to a loving family, and they foster you in such a way that sort of “suppresses” the psychopathy, therefore you don’t become a serial killer. The problem is, in both of these scenarios, serial-killer disposition or not, you didn’t have the luxury of choosing your brain or your parents. None of us did. I mean, we didn’t even choose to be born, right? What this means is that, regardless of nature or nurture or both, whatever happens still seems to be predetermined, you don’t have much say in the matter. Your biology, your parents, the environment around you, these are all parts of “the hill,” so to speak, the hill that the ball is rolling down, “the ball” being “you” in this hypothetical.

So, basically, it’s looking really bad for “free will” here. It seems like everything is predetermined. It seems like we’re fucked.

But I think we’re doing one thing a disservice here, that thing being your choice in the matter.

You and I both know that, in the present moment, we are thinking about stuff and making choices about things. For example, you have chosen to read this journal entry, you have made it this far, and that seems like a conscious choice on your part, does it not? Yes, I may have influenced you to read this, maybe you saw the link posted somewhere, or maybe this entry popped up in your RSS feed, so perhaps your seeing this entry was not entirely your choice, but you did not skip over it, you chose to read it. That was your choice. It seems intuitively true that, at least in the present moment, we can make choices that determine our immediate outcomes. It does not seem like our choices in the present moment are controlled by our abusive fathers or whatever, for example. And if that’s true, that seems to suggest that “free will” is actually safe, that we can choose our own destinies, so to speak.

But if we examine this closer, perhaps this sensation of “choice,” or “free will,” or whatever you want to call it, is actually just an illusion. Let me explain.

I wrote a short story recently, and in that story, there’s this concept called “The Devil Gene.” It’s this plot device from this one game, Tekken 3, where the main character, Jin Kazama, is born with this “Devil Gene,” and it sometimes takes control of his mind and body. To quote the short story, “He had the Devil Gene. He was born with it. He couldn’t control it. When he’d get really mad, his eyes would go dark red, he’d sprout feathery black wings, and he’d shoot lasers out of a third eye on his forehead.” The reason the Devil Gene is important is because, well, I think we all have the Devil Gene inside of us, on some level. Obviously, we don’t sprout wings and shoot lasers, but we all experience unwanted bouts of rage, envy, despair, and so on. And when these emotions pop up, they often feel uncontrollable, as if we’re possessed by some ancient evil, as if we have the Devil Gene.

But it's not just the Devil Gene that feels spontaneous and uncontrollable: less-extreme emotions, minor annoyances, simple pleasures, random wants and desires, these all seem to flash in our minds without our express permission, which begs the question: are we really in control if we can’t fully control our own thoughts and feelings?

The immediate counter to this is, “Well, even if I do feel spontaneous emotions sometimes, I can still choose to respond to those emotions in different ways.” And yes, that seems true. For example, let’s say your friend makes you angry, so you choose to punch him in the face, or maybe, instead, you choose to leave the room, sit down in the lotus position, and practice your breathing, to calm down. It seems like we have a choice in the matter here. But the problem with this is that however we respond to the anger, we are still having to respond to that anger to begin with, meaning we are still being controlled by that anger. So whether you choose to punch your friend or sit in the lotus position, either choice would have been inspired by an emotion that popped up without your express permission. The emotion, which was outside of your control, was the antecedent to your behavior, and therefore your behavior, regardless of whatever that behavior actually was, was outside of your full control. So, even when we’re quote-unquote “controlling” our emotions, we’re still being controlled by them, otherwise we wouldn’t have to “control” them to begin with.

How this relates to you reading my journal entry is sort of tangential, but basically, you had a desire to read this entry, and then you chose to read the entry, but the initial desire was sparked by my posting of the entry to begin with, therefore your decision to read my journal entry was not entirely of your own choosing. I’m sorry to say this, but you were manipulated into reading this journal entry, at least on some level.

This reminds me of this one great lyric from one of my favorite songs, and it goes, “Does the body rule the mind, or does the mind rule the body? I don’t know.”

To answer Morrissey’s question with something better than “I don’t know,” perhaps the mind and the body are not separate things at all, perhaps they are one and the same? I realize I just answered a question with a question, which is probably bad form, but again, I don’t really know the answers here, and I don’t want to pretend like I do. This is just philosophy, after all, which is pretty much just semantics and metaphysics and language games, i.e. pretty much bullshit, so you, reader, are free to disagree. Perhaps that’s your choice. That’s fine.

However, if we choose to believe modern science, which claims that there’s gray matter up there in our skulls, then that gray matter is certainly part of the biological construct we call “the body.” So if our thoughts, and by extension our “minds,” are simply the result of synapses firing off in the ol’ gray matter up there, then “the mind” would indeed just be another part of “the body,” similar to our hands and feet. To deny this, we’d have to reject modern science and instead take a religious or spiritual approach, which would be fine, there’s no judgment here, but these alternative approaches come preloaded with their own deterministic quandaries, for example, look up “theological fatalism.” My point being, "free will" is beset by challengers from all sides, regardless of whatever ideology you might subscribe to.

When it comes to “free will,” most of us like to believe that the mind rules the body, that we are in full control of our actions, that we hold fate in our hands and can mold it like clay. This belief gives us purpose, meaning, and drive. If we were to hold the opposite belief, i.e. that we’re solely driven by uncontrollable thoughts and feelings, life would seem pretty meaningless. After all, if we have no control, if everything is just biologically driven, then what’s the point? If whatever is going to happen happens regardless of whatever we say or do, then why should we even care? This is a depressing thought, which is why the majority of us believe we have some choice in the matter, some sort of “free will.” This belief shields us from despair, sometimes even suicide. But the problem is, there’s a conflict here, because we have a vested biological interest in holding this belief. If this belief were not hardwired into us, we probably wouldn’t make it very far in life, we’d just waste away or kill ourselves or whatever. And according to modern science, “evolution” doesn’t like organisms just wasting away and killing themselves. Life must go on, I guess. So, considering this and also everything else we’ve discussed so far, it seems possible that this belief in what many of us call “free will” might just be a biological illusion created for the express purpose of self-preservation.

So let’s recap what we’ve discussed so far. First, some people might be born with brains that predispose them to being serial killers, and these brains were not of their choosing. Second, the would-be serial killer’s upbringing and environment, both of which are outside of the their control, may have an impact on them becoming a serial killer. Third, although it seems like we can make choices in the moment, many of these choices are driven by prior antecedents, like me linking this journal entry to you in some way or all the seemingly uncontrollable emotions, thoughts, wants, and desires we experience on the daily, so, regardless of how we respond to these things, it seems we are still being controlled by them to some extent. The conclusion here seems to be that we are just balls rolling down hills, and therefore "free will" is an elaborate biological hoax, does it not?

But what I keep coming back to is this: I cannot shake the feeling that I have some sort of choice in the present moment, or at least I feel a sensation that seems like “choice.” Even if some of my thoughts and emotions are unwanted and often influenced by other people, how I choose to respond to those thoughts and emotions seems to be within my control, at least to a certain degree. I cannot shake the feeling that there is something more to this. It may be the case that many, if not all, of my choices might be in response to some external stimuli, some prior antecedent, but I’m still choosing how to respond. I guess, maybe, this could all be some sort of biological trick, but that just doesn't feel right to me.

Another thing I can’t shake is the sense that viewing “free will” through this “free will vs. determinism” lens is an overly dualistic perspective. It seems very black or white to me. I don’t like black or white. I am morally opposed to black or white. Why does it have to be all or nothing? Why can’t we have some “free will” and some “predetermination?" Why can't that be the case?

I was talking to my friend the other day about this same topic. He’s much smarter than me. He’s got a something-or-other in philosophy and teaches literature and writing at a high school. And when I asked him about free will, specifically bringing up the ball-hill thing, he said, “You know about the cylinders, right?” And I’m like, “What? No. What about cylinders?” And he’s like, “There's this one Greek philosopher, I forget his name, but he says that, yes, at the beginning of our lives, we may be balls rolling down hills, but he says we can change our shapes. The hill is like all the external stuff, how you’re born, how you’re raised, how others treat you, the world around you, that sort of stuff. But the ball is you, and through self-reflection, meditation, and how you respond to things, you can change your shape, to a cylinder, or a square, or whatever you want. He says that we may not have control over everything, but we do have control over our shape. And when we change our shape, we roll down the hill at a slightly different angle.”

This struck me as incredibly poetic and insightful. I thought to myself, yes, this seems true, it’s not black or white, this or that. It’s not “you either have full control or you don’t,” instead it’s “you have some control, but not full control.” And when I thought about this further, I came to a weird realization.

The realization was, hypothetically, if we did have free will, that would mean we’re 100% accountable for everything we do, since we would have complete control over our own actions, obviously. But if that’s the case, then why would anyone become a fucking serial killer?

The answer is, no one would become a serial killer if they were in full control of their own actions. The social consequences of being a serial killer would be too great. It wouldn’t make any sense. It’s obvious that serial killers, and other deranged people, are dealing with the Devil Gene, they have fucked-up brains, and they sometimes have traumatic upbringings, and these antecedents have changed their shape, molded them into something dark. Therefore, they are not 100% accountable for their actions. Then, I started looking at things in terms of hills and paths. For example, at the beginning of a serial killer’s life, they were pushed down a certain hill, and at that point they started rolling down a certain path, and they’ve been rolling down that path for a long time. It’s a dark path, but it’s a path nonetheless. You and I, we are also on a path. We are on much lighter paths, but our paths are still paths nonetheless. We did not choose our paths. In a way, we lucked out. We weren’t born with fucked-up brain chemistry, for example. Our paths are easier than a serial killer’s path. It’s easier for us to change our shapes into a cylinder or a square or whatever, but some paths make it much harder to change shapes than others.

When I thought about this, it filled me with a sort of universal empathy. Instead of looking at certain people as being “monsters,” I started thinking of them as unfortunate souls who were pushed down a dark path. And no, I don’t think this means that serial killers should get a free pass, they have still broken the mortal laws, committed the highest of moral crimes. They’re fucking dangerous, so of course they should be dealt with accordingly, but I wonder sometimes, since we’re so focused on treating these people as monsters, maybe that treatment is just putting them further down their dark path? When we dehumanize people, are we really surprised when they start to behave like monsters?

When you throw away this notion of “free will” and accept that nothing is fully within our control, that all of us are influenced by external stimuli, this fosters a certain level of compassion that is absent when we solely believe that everyone makes their own decisions all the time and that they are in full control, because that belief encourages us to reduce people to their worst actions and hold them wholly responsible without considering the conditions that shaped them, their paths.

To me, the empathetic path is the one without “full control,” because when we view people in terms of their biology, their upbringing, and all the other prior antecedents that influence their behavior, we start to see the root causes of that behavior, and this fosters a level of compassion that is absent when we simply assume everyone is in full control of their own actions. And taking this further, if we consider the fact that we are part of a larger system, that our actions may influence the actions of others, we begin to be more critical of our own behavior, because in a world without full control over our outcomes, we quickly realize how our own behavior may carry long-term deterministic consequences for the people around us. This encourages a greater sense of responsibility, not just for what we do, but for how our actions ripple out, impact other peoples' paths, like a small pebble thrown into a large body of water.

I realize I’m using a very inflammatory example here, that being “serial killers,” and perhaps that’s a rhetorical mistake on my part, as I imagine it elicits a sort of immediate “Treat murderers with empathy? What the fuck? Try saying that to a serial killer, they’d just stab you in the throat” type response from some people. And maybe I will get stabbed in the throat, perhaps that’s the price we must pay for being universally empathetic, who knows? But I could replace the term “serial killer” with a more down-to-earth example, like “Trump supporter” or something, and still make the same case.

For example, let’s say, hypothetically, you have an aunt who’s a huge Trump supporter. Let’s say you’ve distanced yourself from this aunt, because you don’t agree with her politics or whatever. But do you really think she had full control over her decision to become a Trump supporter? Do you not think that, perhaps, her upbringing had something to do with it? Or maybe the media, with all their insidious propaganda? Or her friend groups? Social media? Maybe, if we’re being a little mean here, maybe your aunt was just born with a very low IQ. Maybe she’s frankly just a dumbass. Maybe that’s why she’s a Trump supporter. She can't help being a dumbass, she just is. Now, considering all that, do you still feel good about shunning your aunt? When looking at your dumbass, Trump-loving aunt through a more deterministic lens, does that lens not encourage a little more empathy than viewing the situation through a lens of free will where everyone is 100% accountable for their own actions?

Your aunt, she’s on a path, just like you or I. So maybe, instead of shunning her, instead of treating her like some sort of leper, maybe you should try to help her change her shape?

I’ve found that many people believe themselves to be empathetic, but more often than not, their empathy is selective, reserved only for those they deem worthy of it. But as long as empathy remains selective, cruelty and division will continue to fester. Only universal empathy can save the world.

So, that’s why I used the “serial killer” example, because if you can have empathy for a serial killer, then you can have empathy for literally anyone. In a way, having empathy for a serial killer is the final boss.

We must never forget that everyone, including you and me, is on a path. Through empathy and compassion, we must encourage others to change their shape.

So I’m an empathetic cylinder now, hopefully I don’t get stabbed in the throat.

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: "Still Ill," The Smiths

I’ve been thinking recently about this rigid duality we find ourselves in. I look around and see black-and-white systems all over the place. I see strict ideologies adhered to even when the situation doesn’t warrant them. I see people identifying as Christian or atheist, male or female, black or white, liberal or conservative, introvert or extrovert, optimist or pessimist, realist or relativist, and so on. I see people clinging to these systems even when they’ve long stopped producing good outcomes, either because the people themselves have been indoctrinated into these systems since birth or because they refuse to admit when they’re wrong; and I suspect it’s mostly the latter, because we all know people hate to admit when they’re wrong; they dig in their heels, double down, rationalize their bullshit in all sorts of ways, just to avoid having to admit that, maybe, just maybe, their belief system might not work in every single situation.

That’s why I’m working on a philosophical framework with which it is impossible to be wrong, and I hope to flesh out this framework by writing this Very Short Introduction. So, with that being said, please bear with me, because this idea is very nascent, as in I’ve only been thinking about it for a few weeks, meaning it probably needs far more thought work to become fully coherent, and, if it were fully coherent, it would likely need far more than 2316 words to fully explain it, not to mention fully tackling all the ethical implications that might arise from its widespread adoption. But let’s be real here, no one is going to adopt some weird philosophical framework found only in some random online journal, so this Very Short Introduction should suffice for now.

Like I was typing, people hate to admit when they’re wrong. This refusal to admit wrongness, at least in terms of belief systems, seems to be rooted in this concept we call “truth.” People believe things to be true, and if something is true, how can it be wrong? And because we believe certain things to be true, many of us refuse to change our beliefs or hold contradicting beliefs; for example, a devout Christian would never believe in Odin, a determinist would never believe that we have free will, an atheist would never believe in a personal god, a strict materialist would never believe in an immortal soul, a solipsist would never believe that other minds exist, a nihilist would never believe in inherent meaning, and so forth. For people with hardline beliefs, changing their beliefs or entertaining conflicting beliefs feels like a sort of betrayal of one’s values, creating a sort of cognitive dissonance, a disharmony in the mind.

But what if it didn’t have to?

The problem with “truth” is that it’s just a word, a concept, an idea thought up by humans, for humans. The universe did not come preloaded with an app called “truth,” at least in terms of belief systems. The universe just is, with or without you. This idea of “truth” is almost like a psychic defense mechanism, to help us make sense of the world, to help us grapple with the fact that we might just be tiny, insignificant specks of stardust floating around in a deep, dark, scary void. We like to believe life has meaning, and “truth” gives us that meaning. And many would argue that this idea of “truth” is helpful in some way, that it provides some utility; with it, we can agree on certain things that might be “true,” per our own concept of truth, like a tree being a tree, or a cat being different from a human, or a PlayStation 5’s processor being faster than a Switch 2’s processor, and so forth, but in each of these examples, humans are making the categories, coming up with the definitions for those categories, and then assigning a “truth value” based on those human-centric definitions. This process of assigning categories and truths is usually through a collective effort appealing to utility, for example, we all seem to agree that it’s useful to separate the animal we perceive as a “cat” from the animal we perceive as a “human” because we observe substantial differences between these two animals, but these “differences” are interpreted through a human-centric lens via our five senses, which we all know cannot be fully trusted, as human biology has a vested interest in interpreting the universe in such a way that benefits only itself. Biology is biased. All this is to say that “truth,” at least in terms of belief systems, is far more malleable than we like to think. A large portion of what we believe to be true is dictated by words, language games, semantics, whatever you want to call it, and we all know that the meaning of words can, and do, change based entirely on the whims of the collective. This isn’t always problematic, but it becomes problematic when it’s applied to more nebulous belief systems, e.g. religion and philosophy, because here we are, in the year 2026 of our Lord, killing or being killed simply because of our beliefs; and I’m not just talking about “holy war” stuff, which is the most obvious example of killing and being killed simply because of a belief, but stuff like putting spikes on park benches so that homeless people can’t sleep on them, or refusing to increase the federal minimum wage, or cutting social safety-net programs, or refusing certain medical treatments, all because of some religious and/or sociopolitical belief we have. In this way, “beliefs,” which are rooted in this nebulous idea of “truth,” have the potential to cause great harm.

But it does not have to be this way.

What then is a boy to do? Should we reject “truth” altogether? No. I don’t think so. One, rejecting truth is itself a sort of paradoxical truth statement, and two, “truth,” as we covered, has some utility, even if most of it is based on words and definitions. Instead, I think we should use the semantics to our advantage and tweak the meaning of the word “truth.” Right now, the word “true” means something like, “in accordance with fact or reality,” with the baked-in assumption that, in the future, “fact or reality” will remain consistent. But I posit that reality is not so consistent, at least not “experienced reality.”

For example, a strict capitalist society may have experienced great success in the realm of technological advancement, which may have had some positive benefits for those living in said society, but later on, when the wealth gap was wider than the Grand Canyon, that capitalist system was no longer providing good outcomes for many people. Another example would be a chaotic, immoral society that may have developed a religion that imposed strict moral guidelines which improved the overall well-being of those in the society, but, at a certain point, when people weren’t constantly stealing or murdering each other anymore, some of those same religious guidelines may have become overly restrictive or misaligned with the society’s new stability, limiting individual freedom rather than protecting it, think stuff like “no same-sex marriage” or the various rigid gender roles imposed by Christianity. In both of these scenarios, the belief system has run its course and needs to be adapted. So, with that in mind, I propose the following slightly tweaked definition of the word “true,” and that definition is, “in accordance with fact or reality, in the present moment.”

Right now, strict capitalists refuse to budge on capitalism. They insist that it works, that it has produced the greatest country in the world, that it has given us better medicine, better modes of transportation, better housing, not to mention computer games and iPhones and virtual girlfriends and WiFi-enabled microwaves and so on, which I agree with to a certain extent, but now, in the year 2026 of our Lord, a check engine light is a catastrophic financial disaster for many people, and those same people can’t even afford to go to the doctor. So, at a certain point, we must be willing to say, “Hey, capitalism has done great things for us in the past, but now we need to shift gears into a different system, at least for the time being, because capitalism is no longer working for us.” This doesn’t mean capitalism is wrong, per se, it’s just not appropriate for the present moment.

But, again, a strict capitalist, someone who believes capitalism is the greatest economic system in the world, would not be open to this change; they would dig in their heels, double down, and rationalize their bullshit in all sorts of ways, because they believe capitalism to be the one true path. We also have this fallacious tendency to assume that if something worked in the past, it must still work today.

This is the problem I have with truth. Per the current definition of “truth,” if something is “true,” it is in accord with “fact and reality,” therefore it cannot be wrong. And we all know people hate to admit when they’re wrong.

So, good news, I have come up with a philosophical framework with which you can never be wrong, or at least that’s the idea. It seeks to remove the shame associated with “being wrong,” instead encouraging one to adapt their beliefs in accordance with the situation, meaning no belief is “right” or “wrong,” just more or less appropriate depending on the circumstances. And I’m calling this philosophical framework “Adaptivism.”

In short, Adaptivism is a pragmatic framework that treats beliefs, values, and practices as tools rather than fixed truths. It advocates selectively adopting elements from any belief system based on their effectiveness in a given situation, with the aim of producing the best possible outcomes. Adaptivism is loosely inspired by the “non-duality” concept found in Buddhism, but it is not beholden to that concept; meaning, in some circumstances, Buddhist ideology may provide the best outcomes for us, but in other circumstances, it might not. Adaptivism does not adhere to any particular belief system; it adheres only to what works at the time. This is the power of Adaptivism: the freedom to choose what you believe without being forced to believe it forever and without feeling shame for having “stopped believing” in whatever previous belief you adhered to. Adaptivism does not care about the “truth value” of any particular belief system, be it religious or philosophical or otherwise, and instead asks, “Will this belief maximize well-being for myself and/or for those around me when considering the present circumstances?”

For example, it’s often said that an atheist in a foxhole will eventually start praying to God to save their life. Now, let’s assume this is true for a moment. If momentarily believing that God exists provides some mental comfort to the foxhole atheist, is his shift in belief systems really so bad? No, I don’t think so. I think the foxhole atheist should do whatever he needs to do in order to soothe his mind. If it works for the foxhole atheist, who am I to judge or care? It’s not like he’s hurting anyone. One may think that the foxhole atheist is a hypocrite, or that he’s fickle, or that he’s unprincipled due to his sudden and possibly temporary shift in belief systems, but an Adaptivist would just describe the foxhole atheist as “open-minded.”

To use the “capitalism” example from earlier, if your society is in the dark ages, needing to foster economic growth and innovation, then perhaps a competition-based capitalist system is appropriate. But, at a certain point, that system must be revised. Capitalism is rooted in this idea that numbers must always go up, that this year’s financial report must be higher than last year’s financial report, even if this year’s goal has been met. Capitalism’s backbone is endless economic growth, but there’s not an infinite supply of resources on Earth, meaning endless economic growth is impossible. It is an unobtainable, self-defeating goal. Thus, capitalism should only be used as a tool to get society to a certain point, then, once that point is reached, that tool should be discarded and replaced with a new, more appropriate tool. We hear all the time how people can’t afford healthcare or fixing their car or even basic groceries. It’s no secret that America’s hardline capitalist system has resulted in extreme income inequality. Capitalism has obviously run its course here. And there are other economic belief systems out there that could solve these problems, like communism or its little brother socialism, yet US policymakers dismiss these systems as impractical or even anti-American because they’ve been indoctrinated into this dualistic idea of “truth” from birth, believing their precious capitalism to be the one true path.

I don’t understand why so many of us think everything has to be so black and white. It’s frustrating. We think that if we change our minds about something, we’re admitting we were wrong, and we don’t like to admit that we were wrong, so we double down, but that doesn’t have to be the case. We have a hard time adapting our beliefs to new information because we get trapped in what I’ll call “truth loops,” where we rigidly believe some dualistic truth, i.e. this thing is better than that thing, and we have a hard time escaping from these truth loops. But the thing is: philosophical, religious, and socioeconomic belief systems are not truths, they’re just ideas, concepts, collections of words and thoughts arranged in different ways. So we’re not betraying our previous beliefs when we change our beliefs, because there’s nothing to betray. It’s all nebulous, metaphysical stuff.

What I’m trying to say is, we are never wrong when we adjust our beliefs to the current situation, we are simply adapting.

That’s why it’s called “Adaptivism.”

A few days ago, I ate an entire sleeve of saltines in one sitting, and I washed it down with a can of Diet Cherry Coke®. You may be wondering, “What’s so interesting about that?” And my answer would be, “Not much.” But it does raise a few questions, the first being: Why?

No one can truly answer this question. It’s quite possibly one of the greatest mysteries in the entire universe. Why? But more specifically, why do we do stupid shit? We are constantly doing stupid shit, usually impulsively and almost always to our own detriment. I no longer question why other people do stupid shit, I just accept it and move on, and this brings about a certain inner peace, but I do question why I do stupid shit. I analyze it constantly. But it seems that, no matter how much analyzing I do, I’m still doing the stupid shit. I did not need those saltines. I knew that. Before I even walked into the kitchen, I knew that. I had known that for years. I knew that eating the saltines was a pointless, stupid endeavor. I just had an impulsive urge to eat them. Even as I was walking from my office to the kitchen, I was thinking to myself, “I probably shouldn’t eat the saltines, they’re just a bunch of empty, carby calories that’ll give me heartburn and make me feel sluggish and gross.” Yet, despite having these thoughts, I still opened the pantry drawer, slid the crinkly sleeve out of the blue-and-white receptacle, got myself a Coca-Cola® Cherry Zero Sugar® from the fridge, brought both products to my office, then opened and consumed them both within the span of roughly 7 minutes. That’s what I did. I consumed the products. In hindsight, it felt like I was overcome by some uncontrollable gluttonous urge, some biological impulse that could not be sated without consuming the products. And, in that moment, as I was consuming the products, it felt good to consume them.

So maybe that’s why we do stupid shit: it feels good in the moment. But does it really? Does it really feel good when even the simplest of everyday activities, e.g. eating saltine crackers and drinking diet soda, cause so much cognitive dissonance?

Later that same night, right before going to bed, I had yet another stupid-shit urge. I was on my PC and clicked an article about the MacBook Neo®. The article talked about how the Neo is the most affordable MacBook® ever made, how the 13” LiquidRetina™ display looks stunning even in direct sunlight due to its 500 nits of brightness (whatever the fuck that means), how the Magic Keyboard™ feels like typing on air due to how low-profile it is, yet somehow it's still clicky and satisfying to use, how the aluminum body is sleek and durable and feels like holding a straight slab of metal in your hands, how it’s super portable due to its small form factor, being only slightly larger than a classic netbook-class laptop, and how it has a super-powerful processor, especially for the price. The article said you would be a fool not to buy one. And as the article was making all these points, I was just nodding along the whole time, buying into all the bullshit, practically drooling for some reason, which is super strange considering that I’ve gone on record stating, “I will never buy an Apple product, ever.”

But, thinking back now, my dislike of Apple wasn’t really based on what I would now consider valid reasoning. I had no true qualms with the hardware or software. It was all vibes and ego. In fact, I’ve barely ever used Apple products. The only Mac I ever had was an iMac G3® in Bondi Blue coloring, one of those big fat boys with the translucent bodies, and this was at the turn of the millennium when I was like ten years old, and I only used the thing to play point-and-click Pajama Sam and Blue’s Clues games. So, I have no real experience with Macs. Yet, at some point in my teenage years, I had decided that Macs were for tech-illiterate dipshits and rich yuppies whom I did not want to be associated with, even though I was very much part of that latter demographic, albeit not by choice, for who has the luxury of picking their parents? The point is, back then, I saw Windows and Apple as camps, and I was willing to die for my camp, so to speak. But now, thinking about it, it seems kind of silly, falling into one of these dualistic consumerist camps, especially considering that my previous distaste for Apple products probably stemmed from some vestige of teenage rebellion. “Fuck you, Steve. You’re not my real father.”

I had always thought of Mac owners as having a certain vibe, like they all live in neighborhoods where the houses range from 700k–1m and everyone plays tennis on the weekends and there's a neighborhood watch and girls sell Thin Mints® on the corner near the stop sign. I picture this one family, “The Apple Family,” in which the mom is like an ex-punk or goth or something, the dad is always away on business, and the quiet teenage daughter has a Samurai X poster on her wall and Bjork CDs scattered all over her desk and also has one of those electronic drawing pads for her MacBook®. In this family, the mom and daughter are both talented artists. The mom draws flowers and landscapes, while the daughter draws anime stuff. They both dye their hair in accordance with the month of the year. They have an unbreakable mother-daughter bond, meaning they are really close, like super-duper close, so close that it's almost as if they can communicate telepathically from any distance. It goes without saying that Gilmore Girls is always playing on the living room TV, even when nobody is around. Sometimes they watch House and Grey's Anatomy, too. The mom also drives a Mini Cooper®, does yoga, hangs framed pictures of David Bowie on the walls, and puts up Nightmare Before Christmas decorations all over the place, so the house has a slightly alternative vibe to it, but not too alternative, not enough to scare off the normie neighbors who visit sometimes. The mom also wears glasses and has a smoking problem that she does a very poor job of hiding, and she always talks about how she "used to see Siouxsie & the Banshees live back in the 80s but I can’t remember it very much because of all the drugs, haha.” And, again, her husband is always away on long trips, hawking software to corporate executives or selling cars or something like that; actually, no one really knows how he makes money, it's a mystery, but he somehow makes enough to pay the mortgage and buy all sorts of Apple products for the family, which they all prefer over Windows because “Apple just works.” And the dad is actually the girl's stepdad, not her real dad. Her real dad lives a few states away, looks like the BTK Killer, and was horribly abusive to her, which left her with all sorts of deep psychic baggage that she won’t talk about to anyone except her mom. The girl in question here is pale, and she looks kind of like Kirsten Dunst, and she likes to draw and watch Cowboy Bebop and cuddle on the basement couch with her boyfriend whom she won't go any further than making out with, and that annoys the boyfriend somewhat because he's an insufferable prick, and she deserves better. She also has a cat named Pickles.

If this all feels oddly specific, well, it’s not. That was just a little writing exercise I was doing. It’s not like I was describing a particular family I used to spend a lot of time with back in high school who were actually very sweet people or anything like that. And it’s certainly not like I was in love with that girl who exclusively used a MacBook® and dyed her hair in coordination with the months of the year and watched Cowboy Bebop and drew anime on her electronic drawing pad. It’s not like I was her boyfriend or anything like that. It’s not like I’m actually pining for them, nostalgically. That's not what's happening here. It’s not like, when I was reading that MacBook Neo® article, I was thinking about this girl and her family who are totally fictional and like not real at all. It’s not like images of that beautiful girl and her upper middle-class house on the hill and her weird, punky family were flashing through my mind when reading the aforementioned article. It’s not as though I was, without realizing it, buying the MacBook Neo® in some sort of sad attempt to reclaim something I’d lost a long, long time ago or anything like that. That would be sad and pathetic and ridiculous.

In fact, I had been toying around with the idea of getting a Mac for a few weeks before reading the article, because I felt like a change was needed, and I like trying new things sometimes, and I think the MacBooks® look sleek and I wanted to see her again and the OS interface looks minimalistic and cool, but buying a Mac wasn’t really something I was serious about until I read the article, at which point I became instantly serious about it for some reason. I became giddy and excited. It was as if I had become overcome by some consumeristic urge that could not be sated without buying the product. So that’s what I did. I bought the product. I instantly whipped out my credit card, went to the Apple website, put a silver MacBook Neo® in the cart, and went through the whole checkout process. And as I was keying in my credit card information, the little angel on my shoulder was whispering to me, “Isn’t this a little impulsive? This won’t bring her back, you know. Shouldn’t we think about this a little more? We have a perfectly good ThinkPad® on the desk right over there, and you love that thing, you’ve written many stories and essays on it, you can’t just replace it like that, after all it’s done for you, can you? What are you, some kind of monster?” but of course I ignored the angel, typed in my CVC code, and hit the big PURCHASE button, at which point my brain was flooded with endorphins and I was overcome by all sorts of anticipatory joys and jitters.

Please note, this is not a brag or anything. I’m not typing this up to subtly be like, “Hey, look at me, I can afford to buy a new MacBook® on some stupid nostalgic whim because I think it will make me feel like I’m dating the girl of my dreams again.” This is not what I’m doing, especially the “girl of my dreams” part, that is NOT what’s going on here.

If I’m being honest, I experience some sort of sudden onset consumeristic urge like this more often than I'd like to admit. One might think these urges are normal, similar to the eat-a-sleeve-of-saltines-in-7-minutes urge, but the buy-a-MacBook® urge is actually uniquely distinct. We are born with a drive to consume food, it's biological, but we are not born with the drive to purchase aluminum junk, the latter is driven by societal norms and corporate mind control. Caveman John does not wake up in the morning and think to himself, “I need a fucking MacBook®,” of course he doesn’t. He doesn’t know what a MacBook® is. He’s a caveman. He just cares about CAVE and defending himself from bears and BOOM BOOM and obtaining the sharpest stick. So maybe he’s not the best example. But the point is, the consumeristic urge to purchase things comes from some hardcore materialist indoctrination, which is human-created, i.e. not biological, which is forced upon us from the very young age of forever ago. We do not need the MacBooks®. We are manipulated by corporate tech oligarchies (apologies for using the hyper-liberal, Reddit buzzwords, but they happen to fit in this context) into wanting the MacBooks®. They have ace marketing teams full of people who graduated from Stern and Ross School of Business or whatever coming up with ad campaigns that make you feel like, if you choose Apple, you are hip and trendy and a cut above the rest of the Windoze plebs. They use hip slogans like, “The ones who choose iMac® are the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels,” as if using your hard-earned blood dollars on corporate silicon is some sort of anti-establishment statement or something. It’s all fucking phony.

But my point is, if we can recognize this, that this consumeristic urge to buy stupid shit is not biologically hardwired into us, that we’re essentially being manipulated into doing this stupid shit by tech bros who only care about getting us hooked on 4k LiquidRetina™ displays and Magic Keyboards™ so that they can line their own already gold-trimmed pockets, then we can resist it. We can resist the consumeristic urges. We can stop letting them tell us, “If you buy this, she might come back.” We can stop letting them manipulate our emotions. We can fight back. It’s not like we need fancy plastic for survival. We can just stop buying their shit.

We can overcome this.

But damn, this keyboard sure does feel nice.

Current Mood: dissonant
Current Music: "Hyperballad," by Bjork

The seasons have shifted and with it, my entire fucking vibe.

For the southern coast of America, what this means is, over the course of one day, the sun has banished the clouds, the air has gone from chilly to muggy, bloodthirsty gnats have come out of their fetid pools to feed upon the young, and the deciduous trees have shed most of their leaves as if it’s Autumn when it is clearly the cusp of Spring.

To be honest, I don’t know why the tree thing happens. The remaining leaves on the trees themselves are bright green. It’s clearly not Autumn. It's like an old reheated cup of coffee out here. Maybe dead leaves on the dirty ground are normal for this time of year. Maybe they get stuck up there in Winter and are now just tumbling down. Maybe this is tea weather. I don’t know. I am not a dendrologist. It has been said that premature abscission can be caused by drought, fungal disease, and lack of nutrition. This is not so different from humans. Perhaps the trees are depressed. I like to believe that everything has a soul, even rocks. This belief is likely bullshit, as the jury is still out on whether humans even have souls, but this belief fosters a sort of compassion for all things that’s otherwise absent. Sometimes it’s worth believing in bullshit if the bullshit produces good outcomes. Truth is highly overrated. But what do I know?

What I do know is, yesterday, it felt like Twilight Princess weather, today it feels like Chrono Cross weather. For the record, I’m OK with both types of weather, but I’d prefer to slip into them, not be forced into them over the course of one day. The Chrono Cross weather came too quickly, I had gotten used to the Twilight Princess weather. Now I can't wear sweaters, and I like sweaters. I also can't wear my camo pants, which I wear because one, it’s ironic, two, I think they kinda look cool, and three, they help me blend in to both the hickass people around these parts and, of course, the local flora. I'm like Solid Snake in this here bigoted Southern town. “I'm invisible. Yeah, that's me. If you look then you'll see right through me.” That's a song by The Dismemberment Plan. It's a great song, you should listen to it right now. Also, I can’t wear my beanie, so of course my brains are spilling out all over the place.

Weather conjures all sorts of different images in my mind, all sorts of different memories and their associated moods, like Twilight Princess and Chrono Cross. Those are moods for me. I'm big on moods. For a brief stint in my teens, my mom sent me to a psychiatrist. She was a blonde woman with an angular face and an athletic figure. I got the impression she did a 5-mile run every morning and drank lots of vitamin water and ate avocado toast. She had an upper-middle-class soccer mom vibe, if you know what I mean. These are not the sort of women I'm normally attracted to, so it was easy to talk to her. I remember I told her that I could sense auras, and that these auras fucked with my mood. I told her about intrusive auras and how I did not appreciate them. I told her that I would adjust the lighting in my room very carefully so as to cultivate certain auras. The psychiatrist told me this was normal, that many people do this, and this was not something I wanted to hear. I wanted to feel special. I still want to feel special. I bring this up because, when outside, I cannot cultivate auras. There is no dimmer switch on the Sun. The clouds are amorphous and beyond my reach. This is fine, but again, I need slip time.

Speaking of, or typing of, clouds, the other day I went to the beach and the clouds were so low that I couldn’t see even a few feet in front of me, but I could cut through them with my bare hands, which felt empowering. A foggy beach is a very powerful image, mysterious and spooky. The shoreline was like a graveyard, blue blobs every few feet. They say the southern coast is where old people go to die, I guess this is also true for jellyfish. My son, who was with me, kept trying to touch them. I told him that you don’t want their death on your hands, plus they’ll shock you. Of course, he didn’t listen, and he touched them anyway, but they didn’t seem to shock him, so I guess the electricity had left their bodies, perhaps at the same moment their souls mixed with the mist. I am feeling somewhat poetic today, if you couldn’t tell.

A day later, I took my son to the park. He brought his toy sword with him. We ventured into a wooded area where he slayed at least three moblins. He’s getting good at moblin slaying. He likes to pretend he’s Link, from The Legend of Zelda. He’s been watching me play that game obsessively for about a month now. I think it may be infecting his crazy little brain. I wrote all about it on oncomputer.games. The essay is titled “Breath of the Now Now.” It functions as a sort of love letter to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild while also being a Beginner's Guide to Zen, of sorts. It was fun writing it. It covers a lot of the Zen stuff I've talked about in this journal, just in a more articulate, fun way. I think our world leaders should read it. I think maybe they would stop bombing schools in the Middle East if they read it. Maybe my essay could save the world. I realize that’s a very egotistical thing to say, like I'm some enlightened guru or something. I'm not. Besides, the essay is probably not rhetorically convincing enough to push someone like Trump into the meadows of enlightenment. And who am I to pretend that I know how to save the world? I just don’t like it when schools get bombed.

The cultural zeitgeist has been infused with death as of late. Note, “zeitgeist” comes from the German word “zeit,” which means “time,” and “geist,” which means either “spirit” or “ghost.” TIMEGHOST. Even the word itself has deathly implications. Right now, people are focused not only on kids dying in Iran but also this one missing-persons case regarding Nancy Guthrie, who was abducted from her home at night about a month ago. The cultural obsession and media coverage remind me of this one summer when I was a kid, when my grandma was watching the news a lot, and they were always talking about this one girl, Natalee Halloway, who was abducted in Aruba and never found. I believe drugs and alcohol were involved, as they normally are. There was a suspect in that case who I'm pretty sure admitted decades later to bludgeoning Natalee over the head with a cinder block after she refused his sexual advances on a beach one night, meaning he pretty much forfeited his Human Race Membership Card right there on that salt-crusted shore. Funny how a split-second decision, like bludgeoning someone in a fit of rage, can totally alter the course of so many lives, not only Natalee’s life, but also his own and the lives of all the people who watched cable news that summer. The ripples we make. But the difference with the Guthrie case is that, despite us now pretty much living in a CCTV state wherein basically anyone can be tracked at any time, we have very little in the way of leads here, outside of a creepy Ring Doorbell video. Perhaps this is why the case is so compelling, and it doesn’t hurt that her daughter is like a famous news anchor person or something. The point is, it’s been almost 40 days now, and Nancy’s still missing. No one seems to have a clue as to who did it. She has just completely vanished. And there are basically no leads, as far as I know. Although, there have been many ransom demands, none of which provided proof of life, many of which demanded “one bitcoin” as payment, which seems oddly specific and weird. Why, just yesterday, I saw that someone called in a tip to the authorities, claiming they sighted Nancy in Mexico, but they wouldn’t tell the authorities the exact location without payment of, you guessed it, “one bitcoin.” I’m starting to wonder if the same hoaxer is phoning in all these tips. But I try not to speculate on these things. I tell myself that I'm above all that. But I too am swept up in the TIMEGHOST, so I can’t help but come up with my own theories. And my main theory is that Nancy has been dead for some time, and that she quite possibly died the night the crime took place. I imagine the intruder intended to rob the house, botched it, thereby waking Nancy up, at which point she had a heart attack or fought back, both of which would have resulted in her death, because she’s old and on medication for heart problems. I then imagine that the intruder freaked out, took the body, and disposed of it somewhere, possibly in acid. There is some evidence to support this, such as blood found at the scene of the crime. And yes, I realize I’ve swayed off into very grim territory here.

What gets me is that many people still seem to think that Nancy will be found alive, despite her being super old, despite her needing medication, despite her being on a pacemaker, and despite it having been over a month now. Yet, despite all this, people still cling to hope. So perhaps I was wrong, perhaps the TIMEGHOST is not infused with death, but instead infused with hope.

But hope is a funny thing. It's a trick, almost. We trick ourselves into a present state of calm by looking forward to some supposed optimistic future. Most Zen teaching advocates against this, advising that we should stop clinging to future possibilities and instead live fully in the present moment, and since hope is grounded in future expectation, we should therefore abandon all hope, ye who enter here. I know, this sounds awful on paper. Insensitive, almost. But it seems intuitively true that if you have very little expectations, you have very little to be disappointed about.

In any case, I wish all the best for Nancy Guthire’s family and hope they find closure.

Yes, I used the bad word, “hope." I'm only human, after all.

Current Mood: poetic
Current Music: "Invisible," by The Dismemberment Plan

Reports of my death have not been exaggerated at all, because who actually cares?

I know I haven’t been posting much here lately, and I also know that maybe two people, at most, are wondering why. I’d love to say this is because I’ve been hyper-productive in writing elsewhere, but that would be a great big lie. Between November and now, the hyperactive gray matter of my brain has come up with ideas for two different fantasy novels, loosely inspired by two works of fiction: one, Earthsea, and two, Inuyasha mixed with Arthurian legend for some reason, titled Where Does the Wind Go? and The King of Arcadia respectively. I wrote about a chapter of each before getting distracted and drifting off to some other fleeting idea. Oh, and I also wrote a couple of paragraphs for a short story titled I Am a Cat II, cheaply inspired by Natsume Sōseki’s 1906 novel, I Am a Cat, except mine is set in modern-day United States. So, that’s three projects that will likely go forever unfinished. This is only a glimpse of my chaos. I’m quickly realizing that, without amphetamines, my talents, if you can even call them that, are much better suited to short-form than long-form.

Alas, it’s a constant struggle trying to balance my focus, which is basically nonexistent, and my ideas, which sometimes overflow like a small pond during a great rainstorm. This, as you might imagine, can result in some heavy cognitive dissonance when I have big ideas but little focus, as I’m always beating myself up with shoulder-angel, shoulder-devil shit like, “Shouldn’t you be writing right now?” and “But writing is hard, why not just play video games instead?” And this can be quite paralyzing, but it’s not the real reason I haven’t been posting much.

The truth is, I’m an adult with two kids and a full-time job, and as such, I’ve been busy. But that’s just an excuse really, because I’ve always been busy, yet despite that, in the past, I’ve always made time to write. So what’s different now? Could it be that I’ve lost the will to write? Has the fire gone out? Maybe I’m just getting too old to juggle all of life’s bullshit along with my numerous hobbies? Perhaps it’s just writer’s block? No, I don’t actually believe writer’s block is a thing, writer’s block is just another excuse, covering for a willpower issue more than anything. The truth is that my desire to write, like many things in life, waxes and wanes, and these moon phases are usually correlated with computer games, specifically how much I enjoy the computer game I’m playing at the time.

And it’s been particularly bad lately because, for the last two months, I’ve been playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and I fucking love that game. My two-year-old son loves the game too. “I wanna play Zelda,” he says, “Let’s go find some Koroks in Zelda,” he says, “I wanna climb the towers in Zelda,” he says, with all the cherub-like syllabic mispronunciations that come with toddlerhood. He just sits on my lap, with his own battery-less controller in hand, watching Link climb mountains and fight Moblins and dash through the meadows of Hyrule. He’ll watch me play for hours if I let him, which is crazy considering he’s more hyperactive, mentally, than I am, hardly able to keep focus on anything at all. He just loves Breath of the Wild, and so do I. It’s quite possibly the best computer game ever made, a Ghiblian masterpiece, which is a word I just made up, but you're free to use it, as long as you use it correctly.

Ghiblian (adj.)
Etymology: From Studio Ghibli, noted for its distinctive animation style and thematic depth.
Definition:

1. Of or relating to the visual, narrative, or emotional qualities characteristic of Studio Ghibli films; marked by a hand-drawn anime aesthetic, a focus on nature, and a sense of childlike wonder and magical realism.
2. Denoting an atmosphere or tone that evokes serenity, nostalgia, ecological harmony, and gentle wonderment; often blending the fantastical with the mundane in a manner that emphasizes empathy and the sanctity of nature

Example: Kakariko Village, nestled between the misty hills of the Necluda, dotted with cherry blossom trees and traces of ancient magic, has a distinctly Ghiblian charm.

I’d tell you all about it, about why I love The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, but I’m currently in the process of writing an essay about that very topic right now at this very moment. The essay functions not only as a love letter to the game, but also as a beginner’s primer on Zen ideology, with references to Thich Nhat Hanh’s Peace Is Every Step. The essay attempts to use Zen ideology to analyze the game’s flaws, such as the weapon-breaking thing and the general aimlessness of both the narrative and gameplay, to argue that these supposed flaws, and others, are actually not flaws at all, but instead some of the game’s greatest strengths.

So, if you’re interested in the two Z’s, Zen and Zelda, bookmark oncomputer.games, because that’s where I’m going to upload the essay, which will be called Breath of the Now Now. It should be up in a few weeks, hopefully, if my focus holds.

That’s another thing I’ve been doing: rebuilding oncomputer.games. A good friend and I built this site back in April 2023. The original idea was to release nostalgia-focused essays on video games, which we resolved to exclusively call “computer games,” because that’s what grandma used to call video games back in the day when it was a bright summer day and you were holed up in your room playing Chrono Cross or whatever: “STOP PLAYING THOSE DAMN COMPUTER GAMES AND GO OUTSIDE.” The first essay was a review I wrote on Final Fantasy XII, which you can still read but is about 5,000 words too long and so dry that I wouldn’t recommend it. But after that essay, oncomputer.games veered into more bizarre territory, merging philosophy, history, personal stories, and even tanuki lore with computer games. Between my friend and me, we wrote about 23 long-form essays before it all got too competitive, and we basically ended up wanting to rip each other’s heads off; and by the end of 2023, some nasty words were exchanged via text message, at which point my friend deleted all his stuff from the site and didn’t speak to me for over a year. And I wrote about this exact situation in some detail in the essay/short story titled I, SEPHIROTH, which can be read on the site, so I won’t get into all that here.

In December 2024, my friend and I got back in touch and mended the grievous psychic wound, but for about a year there, I imagine we were both stewing in envy and denial and angst, at least I was. I let the oncomputer.games domain name lapse, and the site fell into obscurity, but I kept writing oncomputer.games-style essays for a while, posting them on a different site, howdoyouspell.cool, and then eventually on Substack, and then eventually on Dreamwidth.

About a month ago, however, I realized that my desire to write was waning a bit, and I started thinking back to those oncomputer.games days, about how much I was writing back then, even though most of my writing was pretty bad, and I realized something: the competition between my friend and me motivated me, drove me to write when I otherwise would not have written, and I started to miss those days. I thought to myself, if I could temper that competitive spirit with some self-awareness, and use it all in a friendly way, perhaps that will drive me to write more, and frankly oncomputer.games was just cool as fuck, if I do say so myself. So I texted my friend out of the blue and said, “Hey, let’s do oncomputer.games again,” and surprisingly he had been thinking the same thing, and so immediately he said YES.

They say never to lease an apartment or start a business with your best friend, or at least I think they do, and I know this to be true from firsthand experience, but I hvae awlays had a hrad tmie wtih teh wohle leanring tihng. I guess we’ll see how long this lasts before we're both dead or dying.

But so and anyway, about a week ago, I renewed the oncomputer.games domain name, spent several hours on the Wayback Machine copying my friend’s old deleted essays, reposting those deleted essays and backdating them to their original post dates, and then I uploaded all my own OCG-style stuff that wasn’t originally posted on OCG to OCG, and now I’m working on an essay titled Breath of the Now Now. And I have ideas for other stuff too, like an essay about The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time titled “Pulling the Master Sword,” recounting carefree events from my childhood, pre-“pulling the Master Sword,” and comparing them to my responsibility-ridden adulthood, post-“pulling the Master Sword,” and another one using Chrono Cross to argue for and against determinism and free will. Knowing me, both of these essays will probably end up not happening at all now, now that I’ve loosely committed to them here, but we’ll see.

So yeah. That’s what I’ve been doing. I’ve also been reading I Am a Cat, which is a classic Japanese novel told from the perspective of a cat with no name that satirizes human behavior, and I’ve been listening to the band Ivy a lot, particularly their album Apartment Life, and I’ve just recently been listening to Gorillaz’s new album The Mountain, which has this one song, “Orange County,” that’s one of the catchiest songs in the universe, so maybe you shouldn’t give that one a listen unless you want the little whistle melody stuck in your head for days.

Anyway. I think, going forward, with my focus for the time being on writing long-form essays for oncomputer.games, I’ll use this space to write more general “what’s going on in my life” journal entries, like an old LiveJournal from the early 2000s or something, and occasionally I may post essays or short stories that wouldn’t fit on oncomputer.games here.

But actually who knows. My mind could change tomorrow. I have recently given up trying to wrangle the old gray matter, instead just going where it wants to take me, with the flow, as they say. When it comes to hobbies and other activities meant to be fun, I’ve found that forcing myself to do something contrary to my immediate whimsy makes those things not very fun at all, and after a long day of adulting or whatever, what I really want is simply to relax and enjoy myself, within reason.

It may be a little hedonistic, but right now, with where my head’s at, and with all the crazy shit that’s going on in the world, I think a little bit of hedonism won’t hurt.

Current Mood: hopeful
Current Music: "Orange County," by Gorillaz

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forrest

on computer games

August 2026

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just words

"How odd I can have all this inside me and to you it’s just words."

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the tanuki, pt.7

the tanuki, pt.6

the tanuki, pt.5

the tanuki, pt.4

the tanuki, pt.3

the tanuki, pt.2

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i am once again an elephant

on changing shapes

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swept by seasons and timeghosts

this is only a glimpse of my chaos

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August 2026

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