They say that every story must have a villain. 

It could be anyone. A selfish robber baron billionaire seeking world domination, a scorned mistress bent on revenge, a demon-possessed child in need of an exorcism. These same three figures could just as easily be the hero in another story though; proving that villainy is fluid. 

As further proof of its fluidity, the villain could be a thing. A rabid dog terrorizing a neighborhood, a too-narrow road that spits cars and trucks from its unguarded peripheries, a quick-moving flood/fire/storm that destroys a village. Then again, the vast majority of villainous ‘things’ are nothing more than the result of human behavior. The dog lacking the care it requires, the road a needless and gross oversight, the flood/fire/storm an unheeded call/cry/warning from the earth.  

The villain certainly makes the story more interesting though. It gives the reader or viewer someone against whom to root. Perhaps even hate. If the reader is a psycho/sociopath, however, it gives him or her someone for whom to cheer. Perhaps even love. And couldn’t this world use a little more love?  

So then what is a villain? 

It’s obviously not that black and white. (Ironic use of metaphor, given that black is usually the villain or dark force, and white represents the hero and the light. I’m certain the slaves in Africa, the Indians being colonized, and the indigenous/First Nations people of North and South America would have begged to differ.) Because NOTHING is ever that black and white. Or more appropriately, that white and black. 

It’s safe to say that, whether your actions were intentional or mindless, you’ve been the villain. At one time or another. Maybe even right now. Because even the most self-aware among us slip up sometimes. Not to mention the staggering number of those of us with no self-awareness. And yes, it’s all too easy to see the sheer number of folks claiming to be victims in the stories where they’re actually the villains. Many of them are victimizing themselves. 

Life is nutty. And I don’t have the answers. Not a single one. 

But here at week #52, the official one-year point of my Extraordinarily Brief Stories for the Attention-Span Challenged, I am shifting gears. Starting next week, the theme will be ‘What If.’ I’m not sure yet what that means. I’m hoping to spin some once again short tales that are a little more imaginative, thought-provoking, and that force me to change the lens of how I (and maybe you?) look at the world. We’ll see what happens. And I welcome you to offer me your own ‘what if’ questions – no matter how weird or unimaginable. I could use the fodder. 

As for the 52 creatures that were born from me this year, I hope to further nurture, teach, and raise some of them into something more substantial. So if you’re among the (precious few) readers who stuck with me this past year, thank you so very much. And stay tuned. 

I hope you’ll stay on board for the next installment.  

“Come and sit with me,” he beckons from across the room.

She rolls her eyes. “I think you want me to sit on you.”

“There’s no need to be lewd.”

“I wasn’t,” she says. “I was being literal.”

He giggles and laughs like a child.

She plugs her ears to silence him, but can still hear his muffled calls. Plus, she’s looking right at him. His allure is undeniable. 

“I’ll hold you all afternoon,” he says.

“No. Stop.” She squeezes her eyes shut. “I need to do my writing,” she says, attempting to plumb the depths of her creativity. But the pool is dangerously shallow today so that any attempt to dive in would render her irreversibly paralyzed. Still, she can’t fathom being any more paralyzed than she already is.

“I hope your creative juices start flowing,” her friend had said to her the hour before as they finished a long walk. The stroll was a procrastination tactic on her part – though she had hoped it would inspire her. The only thing it has inspired is her desire to eat half a box of honey nut oat cereal, scooping out handfuls of Os and pushing them into her pie hole.

“Come on,” he says again. “You know you want to. You can eat those over here and we can watch your favorite show.”

She grits her teeth and sneers at him. Her resolve, however, is coming apart at the seams. She has a weakness for him that borders on pathological. She squeezes her eyes shut again and shakes her head in an attempt to dismiss any thoughts of him.

Then she considers the term ‘creative juices’ that her friend had used. She tries to envision what constitutes creative juice. What is its origin? Is it squeezed from the fruit of a creative tree? And what does that look like? She envisions some Seussian-type tree like a baobab. But in all different colors that shimmer and sparkle in the sun. The vision brings a smile to her face. Until she envisions her creative tree which she can only presume is small and meek and prickly; stretching sadly toward the sun from the darkness of the forest floor destined to never reach the light. 

“Jesus,” she says to herself, shaking her head. “Maybe I need to up my antidepressants.”

“Nah,” he says. “You just need to spend some time with me.”

She sighs heavily. “But what about my writing?”

“What about it?”

“It’s what I do on Wednesday afternoons.”

“And what happens if you don’t?”

“Then I fail.”

“So then you fail today.”

She sighs again.

“You know what they say about failure?”

“It’s the best way to learn?” she responds. 

“Something like that.”

Hobbled by intellectual paralysis and certain there will be no juice from the shriveled fruit in her possession, she decides to give failure a try. Why the hell not? Surely there’s something to learn from this.

Shoving the last regrettable handful of cereal into her mouth, she shuts her laptop, rises from her chair, and goes to him. As always, he receives her willingly. So she lays her weary head on his arm and begins to doze. As soon as she does, she hears the familiar voices of condemnation in her head. They’re always there. But this afternoon, they are a little more subdued. 

And this is undeniably a win. 

My latest therapist seems certain that he (and he alone) is going to figure me out. It’s precious.

Trevor is his name. Trevor Deukmejian. 

I call him Duke. I asked him if it was okay – that I gave him that nickname. I don’t wish to be disrespectful to my therapist, after all. Let’s just say that Duke didn’t demure. Not exactly. I did sense some reluctance though. And yeah, that apprehension stirred something in me.

Young guy. British mother. Armenian father. Very likely bullied on the playground as a child. 

I learned the origins of his parents from him during our first session. “So, tell me a bit about your childhood,” he’d said. “What were your parents like?”

Ech. Cliché. Is this what they teach all these guys in therapist school? I’d thought. 

I’d leaned back deeper into the cushion on the couch. It didn’t have much give. I daresay it may have even been resisting me. Fuck you, couch. “My parents?”

Trevor had nodded.

“What can I say?” I’d shrugged. “Normal, I suppose,” I’d said, attempting to smile while thinking distant, moronic, useless, occasionally cruel. I’d then glanced at the nameplate on his desk. It looked like a VERY recent graduation gift.

“Interesting name,” I’d said nodding toward the nameplate, at which point he revealed his roots. It was a rookie move. And one, it only somewhat saddens me to say, that I was later able to use against him. 

Meanwhile, that he was bullied on the playground was purely my dime-store analysis. But I’m always right about such things. Most things, really.

Today’s session is our eighth and I do have to hand it to Trevor. The playground wimp has not broken under my cleverness and fortitude. Usually by now, they do. Even the most experienced among them have; those with their lavishly furnished offices, fancy degrees, and parade of letters behind their names. Never, I must say, has there been a duller parade.

Trevor opens his office door and a squirrelly middle-aged woman exits. She glances up at me for a moment, then averts her gaze. Not quickly enough for me to ignore that her eyes are rimmed in red and her face puffy. I pretend I don’t see her and instead look at a framed piece of horrifically awful artwork in the waiting room. Her ruddy swollen face brings to mind those red rubberheads you squeeze for stress relief and their eyes pop out. I’m trying to resist my urge to laugh.

“Hey there, Duke,” I say to Trevor as the woman passes. 

Trevor watches the rubberhead lady leaving and I wonder if he’s reminded of the same thing but professionalism dictates that he must not show it.

“Please, come in,” he says. 

“That’s quite a piece of art,” I say as I enter his office, glancing over my shoulder at the rectangular mess in the waiting area. As Trevor shuts the door behind me, the couch cruelly beckons me. I walk over to the chair instead, subtly flipping the bird at the couch.  

“One of my patients made that,” he says. “Part of her art therapy.”

“Ooooooh, I gotcha,” I say. I’m thinking he must be required to hang this tripe on his wall as some sort of advertisement and is ashamed of how insultingly bad it is. “Clearly, no one has given her crayons, scissors, or glue sticks since she was in kindergarten,” I say, laughing. “Am I right?”

Trevor sits in his seat. “Tell me what’s happening,” he says.

“Oh,” I’m taken somewhat aback at the coolness of his demeanor. “I see we’re getting right to business today, Duke.”

“Well,” he says thoughtfully, “this is the eighth session of the fifteen that the court has appointed. And I’m not sure we’re getting anywhere.”

I lean forward in my chair and look him directly in the eyes. “How does that make you feel?”

He sighs. “I know what you’re doing,” he says, shaking his head. 

“Do you?” 

“I do.”

See. He thinks he’s figured me out.

“So then you know,” I begin, letting each word eke out like strangely deformed puppies from a very pregnant dog, “that I’m starting to feel the urge again.”

“Hmmmmmmm.” Try as he might, Trevor’s eyes cannot betray a subtle spark of interest. “I did not know that.”

“Oh, yeah,” I say, eyes widening.

“So when did that start?” He’s attempting to stay blasé but his greenness has not allowed him the tools to hone this skill yet.

I shrug. “A few days ago, I suppose,” I say.

“And have you acted on it?”

“I have,” I smile.

Trevor is starting to believe me. I see it in his face and he leans forward and takes a deep breath. He releases an exhale and squints his eyes at me. “Can you tell me what happened?”

“I can,” I say. “I went to the aquarium.”

He takes another deep breath. “And what did you do there?”

“Have you ever heard of the parrotfish?”

“No.”

“I hadn’t either. But a friend of mine who’s spent a fair amount of time in a variety of southeast Asian countries said that the flesh of the beaked parrotfish tastes remarkably like lobster.”

“Okay,” he says with some trepidation.

“So I thought it only right that I test this hypothesis.”

Trevor is now letting evidence of concern seep through the steely demeanor he’s laboring so hard to master.

“I didn’t kill anyone,” I say.

“Okay,” he says, now holding his breath. I’m breaking him.

“No human, at least.”

“Well,” he says, nervousness in his voice, “that’s something.” Every time I notice him becoming more panicky, I find it makes me calmer. Until at last, there he is. The child on the playground wearing the wrong shoes, sporting the wrong haircut, trying so goddam hard to be funny and cool like the other boys and failing at every step.

“So I took a sledgehammer and smashed the tropical fish tank!” I say with great bluster and a hearty laugh. Then I become very calm. “It turns out that parrotfish does NOT taste like lobster.” 

Trevor sinks back into his chair. He’s been taken. And he looks as defeated and deflated as an escaped balloon flattened on the road by a truck. I’m the truck, in case you didn’t get the analogy. And just when he thought he was figuring me out. 

So precious, that Duke.

Because the thing is, there is no urge. There has never been an urge. Or a mild compulsion. Not even an inclination. Instead, I have only these ideas and notions that swirl haphazardly around me like naughty children. Or mosquitos. Neither of which can be annihilated. 

Even now, as I sit here with Trevor “Duke” Deukmejian, several new ideas detonate inside of me.