Fundamentalist Foot

If I could meet the Prime Minister, I’d like to hand him a large gun.

Then I’d invite him to shoot himself through the foot.

Remember junior high when you didn’t know how to dance? That was your foot.

The missed field goal in your senior year? Athlete’s foot. Go on, pull that trigger.

At this point, the Prime Minister might exclaim: “But my own foot!”

The foot is part of an axis of evil. That nasty fungus in the summer of ’90 was an open declaration of war.

Teach that foot a lesson.

At this point, the Prime Minister might say: “I get it.” (if indeed he gets it) “The foot is a metaphor for the Afghan people and the connection between myself and the foot is symbolic of the fact that by hurting them, all we are really doing is hurting ourselves.”

Except that it is so much more than a metaphor. We are one, and any bullet to enter an Afghan chest lies firmly lodged in each of our own, where it manifests itself as suffering…

BANG

I can’t believe he pulled the damn trigger.

collateral damage

Like all significant people, she was often made to suffer, and yet she would not have traded her lot for all the freedom in the world.

Daddy Longlegs scurried unseen, along the bottom of the plexiglass.

She rarely envied ordinary people for the cruel happy-go-luckiness, with which they blundered through life. To the driver, this smog filled inertia into which they were glued couldn’t mean much. It was too much a part of his life. Even this heat – he seemed not to sweat it. An unnatural man, made of non-melting chocolate.

It annoyed her to think that, objectively speaking, she probably smelled worse than him. She wondered if his armpits were itchy like hers, and was shocked in the very same instant, to realize that she had nearly let this thought arouse her.

Perhaps this uncanny self-awareness was her gift. Perhaps it was the source of her incredible self control to which (if only she’d admit it), she owed so much of her success.

Looking at the cars now, each in its own way exactly like the others, she tried to make herself believe that it was the entire world that had ground itself into universal gridlock, where fumes were as static as the cars that produced them. Planes were frozen in the sky, trailing vapour that would never dissipate.

Fingering once more the passport destroyed her momentary escape from what felt like non-reality to begin with. She was forced to admit that planes were still flying, the rigidity of their schedules mocking the way she was being abused by time.

She inspected her ticket in the light. Under normal circumstances, the document in her fingers might have re-assured her. Now it was having the opposite effect. She held the paper unnaturally high, that he might catch a glimpse of it in his mirror. Wanting to remind him, that she had somewhere to be.

Responsibility. She wanted him to feel that familiar sting. She might have reminded him that it was not her job to move this cab, but a plexiglass wall kept them separated, sparing her the embarrassment.

“Which one of us is this thing supposed to protect?” she wondered out loud into this block of dead air, that had the power to kill even the sound of her own voice. Perhaps they had already violated each other, in another time and place.

Another hot flash. With a wave of relief she noted that the walls of this taxi let strains of the outside cacophony seep inside. Yet somehow she missed the irony in this; that the pent up energy of these wailing automobiles was being transformed into pure sound, and that it was this noise alone that had the power to deliver her, if only from the brutality of her own thoughts.

It was not just the armpits now. An itch, she knew, was nothing but an excuse to touch oneself in public. She allowed this thought to tickle her. Every one of her garments was damp, sticky and wrinkly in all the wrong places.

She searched his rearview mirror, daring eye contact. But the mirror was something he had no need for. If he was at all aware of her presence, he chose not to show it.

She hated him now because she couldn’t help imagining that his underwear did not itch. She hated the fact that neither this heat, nor this traffic become non-traffic, made his pores leak. She knew it was hopelessly selfish to expect him to feel personally responsible, but was it also too much to hope that he might feel a part of her predicament – if not sympathy, then at least a connection of some sort? But the stained plexiglass between them made a mockery of this uncharacteristically idealistic thought.

In all likelihood, the pane bothered him more than her. Sociability came easier to his kind. Looking at the plexiglass more closely now, she noticed for the first time Daddy Longlegs, making his way up.

She was not one to hurt a crane fly, or even panic at the sight of one. Calmly she reached for her purse, digging out a paper napkin with one hand and rolling down the window with the other. The toxic air made her cough.

She set him free, napkin and all, to fend for himself on the hot pavement. In this gridlock, he stood a chance. Secretly, she hoped the driver had been watching. She hoped that he had noticed she was the kind of person to rescue this least respected of all God’s creatures. If he knew she was kind to animals, would that shatter every assumption he’d made about her? She acts tough, he would think, but she can’t even hurt a crane fly.

A strange barometer for kindness, really. To not hurt an ant, all one has to do, is to refrain from smoldering it with a magnifying glass. To not hurt a crane fly, involves not plucking each one of its legs, one by one, to watch it stagger more and more inept, until it has become a “Daddy No-Legs-At-All”. These cruel games she had played as a child.

But higher life-forms are easier to break. Careless footsteps weave a destructive path through the muck of human souls. And while she knew regret to be a useless emotion, she was not above letting it cripple her, from time to time.

For all she knew, she was heading for his homeland. Perhaps, if it weren’t for this stupid plexiglass, they could have had a real conversation. Or had he already renounced his origins in the third world? How many worlds in this world, really? Even in the confines of this taxi, they were worlds apart. The plexiglass merely formalized something that was tangible and real. Two compartments: hers, and his.

She noticed now, that his meter was running on a clock. She was paying by the minute, not the kilometer. Like a lawyer or a consultant, he was charging her for his time, not his service. There would be no refund, if she never got there at all.

She started hyperventilating, acutely aware that she’d never, ever had a panic attack not ultimately caused by the cruel, steady passage of time. His door flung open. No need to park the car; it was already parked.

“Are you alright ma’am?”

“It’s the heat,” she said, fantasizing that he would lift her in his arms and carry her to the airport. “You do realize my plane leaves at 1:45.”

“The hottest time of day,” he nodded. Behind them someone started honking, as if his having left the wheel had anything to do with their stagnation.

“Will I still catch my plane?”

He sighed. “Sometimes planes are late.”

She tried to grasp this – to allow reality to seep into her brain. But the search for alternatives only led to a further system freeze. A fatal computing error that expressed itself in a twisted grimace.

“Please lady, you must try to breathe.”

Stupid at thirty-six – a sad trajectory she could not bear to contemplate. For a moment she wished for some grave disaster to befall them both; the sudden unwinding of the universe. A lyric from and old pop tune forced its way into her mind.

“If a doubledecker bus, crashes into us, to die by your side, what a heavenly way to die…”

If it is possible to have such a seemingly random thought, is it possible to have any other kind?

“… and if a ten ton truck, should kill the both of us, to die by your side, well the pleasure, the privilege is mine.”

Nonsense. A ten ton truck couldn’t make any more headway than they could. The solution would not come. Frantic honking behind them signaled the possibility of movement.

“Get back in the car,” she said a little too brusquely. “There’s no point in giving up.”

What made her soldier on? She knew that her inspection of the new facility would include everything but an actual tour of the plant. This was for her own protection- a safeguard for her lingering sanity. “I had no idea” she would say, years later, under oath.

Suddenly, almost imperceptibly, the taxi crept forward. A few inches were gained, and then, once more, all was quiet on the Western Front.

Unbridled Enthusiasm

“And they’re off! Looks like the early lead goes to Unadulterated Greed, yes Unadulterated Greed going for the lead with Consumer Confidence on the outside. Unbridled Enthusiasm away very well has good position on the rail… and in fact is now going up with the leaders. They’re moving for the first turn. It is Unbridled Enthusiasm, Sham on the outside is also moving along strongly and now it’s Sham, Sham and Unbridled Enthusiasm are right together into the first turn. Unadulterated Greed has third behind them, then it’s Consumer Confidence and the trailer is Pigheaded Stupidity as they go by the turn. Those two together, Sham on the outside, Sham getting a head in front as they move around the turn with Unbridled Enthusiasm second – then there’s a large gap, make it eight lengths back to Unadulterated Greed in third and Consumer Confidence fourth… and Pigheaded Stupidity is still the trailer. They’re on the backstretch. It’s almost a match race now. Unbridled Enthusiasm’s on the inside by a head. Sham is on the outside. They’ve opened ten lengths on Unadulterated Greed who is third by a head with Consumer Confidence fourth, then it’s another eight lengths back to Pigheaded Stupidity who is trailing the field. They continue down the backstretch and that’s Unbridled Enthusiasm now taking the lead. He’s got it by about a length and a half… Still Sham. Ten lengths back Unadulterated Greed, Consumer Confidence…They’re moving on the turn now. For the turn it’s Unbridled Enthusiasm. He looks like he’s opening. The lead is increasing. Make it three, three and a half. He’s moving into the turn. Unbridled Enthusiasm holding on to a large lead. Sham is second, and then it’s a long way back to Unadulterated Greed and Consumer Confidence. They’re on the turn and Unbridled Enthusiasm is blazing along the first three-quarters of a mile in one oh nine and four-fifths. Unbridled Enthusiasm is widening now. He is moving like a tremendous machine! Unbridled Enthusiasm by twelve. Unbridled Enthusiasm by fourteen lengths on the turn. Sham is dropping back. It looks like they’ll catch him today as Unadulterated

Greed and Consumer Confidence are both coming up to him now. But Unbridled Enthusiasm is all alone . He’s out there almost a sixteenth of a mile away from the rest of the horses. Unbridled Enthusiasm is in a position that seems impossible to catch. He’s into the stretch. Unbridled Enthusiasm leads this field by eighteen lengths and now Consumer Confidence has taken second and Unadulterated Greed has moved back to third. They’re in the stretch. Unbridled Enthusiasm has opened a twenty-two length lead. He is going to be the Triple Crown winner . Here comes Unbridled Enthusiasm to the wire. An unbelievable , an amazing performance. He hits the finish twenty-five lengths in front. It’s going to be Consumer Confidence second, Unadulterated Greed third, Pigheaded Stupidity fourth, and Sham, who had it today, dropped back to fifth.

NOTE: The text is stolen word for word from one of history’s most famous races. Secretariat winning the Belmont Stakes in 1973, to complete his Triple Crown.

The New Body

My mother was the first to see me in this new body. At first she stubbornly refused to believe that I was really me; that’s how radical the change was.
“You didn’t?”
“Yup.”
“Where did you get that body?”
“You don’t like it?” I could tell that she didn’t.
“But you used to look just like your father.” A sob, which she tried only partially to suppress.
“Dad has a double chin”, I said feebly.
“You used to have his eyes”.
I’m not sure why I let this conversation get to me. The thing about the eyes was ludicrous. The only reason our eyes had been so similar is that we went to the same optometrist. He wore thick glasses for years until finally his eyes had to be replaced. I had the same treatment when I was still very young.
After that conversation Mom remained distant for the longest while, treating me like someone she had just met for the first time. My friends generally agreed that the new look suited me but I often caught them talking behind my back. I began hating the fucking thing.
Then I started seeing Michelle again. We had drifted apart years earlier, but this was like a clean slate. The new body worked really well for sex. Michelle said the same thing.
I can’t recall what had gone wrong between us the first time, but there was one conversation I remember. We were lying in bed, exhausted.
“You’re beautiful” I said.
“You think?”
“Sure, with a bit of make-up.” It was a dumb thing to say because her make-up was smeared and runny.
“And a face-lift?” She was being facetious but I didn’t catch it right away.
“Sure”, I said, “why not?”
The next morning she seemed withdrawn, and it was never the same after that. I hadn’t meant anything, really. If you have the opportunity to improve your looks, then why not go for it? Anyway, I would never be that insensitive again. At the time of that conversation I still had my old personality, which had a lot of flaws.
I used to be insensitive, rude and intensely possessive. Bit by bit I have long since had all of these defects surgically corrected. The jealousy resurfaces sometimes, but not often. There is one curious side-effect though. I can be pretty impulsive now. Like this thing with the new body – one day I just did it, like other people get a tattoo. I even managed to get a deal on it. I used to be indecisive about stuff like that. Now, when I sense an opportunity I just go for it, damn the consequences and all. I think it goes a bit far sometimes, but my surgeon says that there’s little that can be done about it.

Is Antibody Out There

“What is pollution?”
“Pollution is what we make honey.”
“But why?”
“What do you mean ‘why’? It’s our purpose.”
“What’s a purpose?”
“A purpose is a reason. A reason to live, or to have babies.”
“Can I go play?”
“Please be careful.”
“I know, I know. Don’t go near the kidney.”
“The kidney is polluted.”
“Why do we make pollution if we can’t play near the kidney anymore?”
“You can play in the liver. The liver is fine.”
“Mom!”
“But the kidney has cancer. I told you never to go near the kidney. Never. You can’t go out if you don’t promise to stay away from the kidney.”
“What’s cancer?”
“Cancer means that the kidney is dying.”
“What do you mean ‘dying’?”
“Death is the end child.”
“The end of the kidney?”
“Not just the kidney, child. Everything must die.”
“But why must it die?”
“Nothing can go on forever.”
“We should stop the pollution.”
“That’s silly. There are too many of us.”
“Then we should stop multiplying.”
“But that’s our purpose, honey. Our job is to kill the host.”
“What’s a host?”
“The host is the world.”
“I don’t want to kill the world.”
“We’re a virus. We have to kill the host.”
“What happens when the host dies?”
“Then we die too.”
“I don’t want to die.”
“But you’re a virus. When the host dies, so does the virus. That’s nature’s way.”
“I don’t want to be a virus.”

dreams come true

“Irene Slotnick come on down to your dreams come true”.
The audience cheers as a dazed Irene Slotnick stumbles towards the stage. The familiar theme of “Dreams Come True” fills the re-circulated air.

“Oh my God. Oh my God”.

The excitement cannot be contained. It seeps through camera three, out of the studio and into the living rooms of the nation. People everywhere are getting their handkerchiefs ready.

“You’re already a winner. Do you realize what that means?”

“Oh my God”. God hears this a lot.

“You do know how the game works?”

“I can’t believe it Rex. I can’t hardly believe it.”

“Well you’d better believe it. You are going home with one of these showcases. All you have to do is pick the one.”

“I can’t believe it Rex. It’s a dream.”

“A dream come true”, he hollers on cue, “for one lucky winner. And today that winner is you, Irene – may I call you that?” And to the audience: “Which one will she pick folks? Shall we start with showcase one?”

Irene nods.

“Take it away Jenna.”

We see Jenna now, stunning as ever. There is a dream-like fluidity to her motions. With a graceful sweeping gesture, she parts the curtain before us, like a red velvet sea. But it is Rex, not Jenna, who commands the microphone, and the proceedings.

“Behind showcase number one we have…”

The curtains draw away, revealing WORLD PEACE.

“As part of the exclusive world peace package we have an END TO HUNGER. No more famine. No AIDS IN AFRICA. No economic slavery as a result of free market capitalism. NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT.”

Irene squeals with delight. The crowd is gasping for oxygen.

“We’re not done yet. Your package also contains PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST. No more CHILD LABOUR. No sexual slavery. No more wholesale destruction of the environment. Clean energy. Freedom of the people. In a word: DEMOCRACY.”

“All this is yours, it you choose showcase number one. Remember, you’ve already won.”

“This is a tough one Rex.” Irene looks to the audience for re-assurance. The audience looks to the teleprompter. There is a momentous hush as, collectively, the enormity, the universality of this unprecedented prize package settles over them.

“Do you remember how this works?”

Irene nods.

“If you choose showcase number one, you will receive the world peace package. But if you want to know what’s behind that second curtain…”

“Then I have to choose showcase number two?”

“That’s how the game is played. Which will it be? They’re cheering their hearts out for you.” And so they are.

“Oh I don’t know Rex.”

The crowd cheers wildly. Irene! Irene!

“Oh I’ll do it Rex.” We knew that she would. “I want to see what’s behind that curtain.”

The crowd goes wild, as they say.

“Jenna, the curtain!” Jenna, of course, is already on it. The music swells.

“A brand new Kitchen Friend Mixmaster 2000. It will mix, stir and slice.”

Irene smiles, clapping her hands expectantly. The audience lets out a polite cheer, genuine, but not over the top.

“But that is not all.” The music swells another notch. We knew that it would.

The audience hovers once again, in suspended animation.

“Where would you put your Mixmaster without a DREAM KITCHEN.”

The crowd ecstatic. Irene covers her face, overcome by genuine emotion.

“Yes, this modern kitchen is a chef’s dream. Just the right mix of mahogany and stainless steel to make you feel at home. The counter tops are marble. And induction cooking means you’ll never singe that sirloin again.”

“I love to cook.”

“Who wouldn’t, in such a fabulous dream kitchen? But where Irene? Where do you love to cook?”

“In my new kitchen?”

“In your new DREAM HOME. Your kitchen comes with a luxurious mansion, overlooking the PACIFIC OCEAN. And for those romantic evening walks, we’ll throw in a PRIVATE BEACH.”

Irene starts weeping uncontrollably. Tears of joy.

“We’re not done.”

“You’re not?”

“What good would a private beach be, without your very own PEDIATRIC SURGEON. He works long hours, but he loves children, and he has his own car, if you know what I mean. James is six-foot-four, has blue eyes and his hair is real.”

James steps forward from in between the kitchen, and the backlit photo of the private beach. He’s smiling feebly, a little overwhelmed by it all.

Poor Irene, weeping now uncontrollably, as there is nary a dry eye in the studio. But Rex will not let up.

“Where would you put your dream home, without your very own PRIVATE ISLAND.”

“It’s a dream come true.” Irene blubbers feebly.

“Of course it is.”

“No really Rex. I’ve always wanted this. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

“Don’t thank me Irene. It’s your dream.”

The Prophet Re-visiting

All twenty-six chapters of “The Prophet Re-visiting” are now online. (With apologies to Kahlil Gibran)

You have a good memory, conceded the prophet.
And then it was No-one who spoke:
Suffer not yet our ears to hunger for your voice. Tell us something, anything, of the meaning of life, so that these people here (a broad sweeping gesture) shall not return to their homes empty handed and starving.

And patiently the prophet raised his voice one final time:
My dear son. The meaning of life? Tell me, dear people of Orphalese, have I tonight spoken of aught else? But let there be truly no cause for suffering, for the meaning of life can be summarized in four simple – 2

The Lottery Ticket

With a stiff right arm, outstretched, the woman in the scarf approaches the one armed bandit. They are about to shake hands.

In a beaten stroller her baby is dozing lightly.

The machine swallows her ticket, and for a moment the hollowness in her stomach is allowed to grow. It’s a machine to play the game for you. To cheat you even of the pleasure of comparing numbers one by one. One-armed robbery. But this agonizing comparing of digits is precisely the thing she has no stomach for.

Soon the ticket is returned to her. Just then, as she’s turning towards the lottery counter, the monstrous contraption goes off like Mardi Gras, with lights, music and all eyes drawn to her.

Later, much later, she will begin to have nagging thoughts, wondering what this carnival was really all about.

Several Months Later

Uninspired by the menu or the decor, Stanley lets his index finger land on the page.
“Number 21,” he says.

What had distracted him then was a preoccupation with the waitress. Something about her.
“Well done?” She looks at the time-quantification device on her wrist, making quite a show it.

Stanley adjusts his bifocals and squints a little, in an effort to see what he ordered.
“Medium rare, thank you”. He opts for a salad instead of fries. Relieved, the waitress spins on her heels.

Stanley is mildly amused by her lack of patience. As a seller of watches, he’s used to waiting for the undecided.

And then it hits him. Didn’t her hair use to be purple?

Several Months Earlier

With a stiff right arm, outstretched, Saint Nicholas is ringing his bell like a sideways metronome. His haggard middle aged body is tense; his red coat loose over a belly that someone forgot to stuff.

Ho, Ho… hum.

The shoppers can’t see him. His incessant tolling cautions them to avert their eyes, as they brush past his podium, bucket empty save for the few coins he himself put there.

Yet he is not quite invisible. The girl in the purple hair has been observing him for an hour, mesmerized by the jerky motions of his right arm. Finding his mortification revolting. With his endurance, the jingler reminds her of an old fashioned mechanical toy, never forcing a smile.

Across from Saint Nick, a youngish couple has been eying watches for some time.
“How much are you planning to spend?” she asks carefully, not taking her eye off the golden time-piece.
“What do you think?” he shrugs, in search of a ballpark.
She glares at him. “This is Christmas.”
He will never understand her at all.
“Well, how much did you spend?”
“Fifty bucks.” she says a little too promptly, then adding “Give or take.”
“Sounds about right,” he shrugs. She sighs, and moves back to the other case, where the cheaper stuff is kept.

Surely this cannot go on forever. Wearily Stanley looks up from his own watch to find Bess in the purple hair, smiling. She has frozen the moment, timed by him to have occured at exactly eight forty-seven – the moment at which they realized, simultaneously, that the day had gone on too long. A “co-incidence”.

“Your watches are overpriced” she yells silently across the mall.
“Your game is a sham,” he shouts back, likewise without sound.
In the end, the only thing capable of saving either one of them are the familiar opening bars of Auld Lang Syne.

Saint Nicholas takes his cue from the muzak. Mechanical toys, like watches, must wind down.

The man quickly pays for a designer timepiece that the girl doesn’t really need or like, and suddenly, without the incessant ringing in their ears, the mall is quiet. Not a creature is stirring.

Except for Stanley and Bess who are now alone in the mall. And Stanley, who has no particular preference for purple, decides on this, the final day before Christmas, that he will not go home without his chance at ten million.

“Hello”, he says awkwardly, making the jump from his counter to hers. Without all the people, the physical space between their respective universes suddenly becomes ridiculously small.

Bess only smiles, the naturalness of her expression accentuated by the artificiality of the hair. At least she picked one colour and stuck with it, thinks Stanley.
“I’d like one.”
Bess looks at him blankly. “One what?” she asks.
“A ticket of course. What else are you selling?” And then, more cautiously, “Before you close the till that is.”
“Already closed.”
“It was supposed to be a stocking stuffer,” he lies apologetically. Somewhere behind him, an altercation is brewing. “You sure go out of your way not to sell anything,” he adds, a little too loudly.

She grumbles, and with a huge show of inconvenience, prints him a quick pick. Not what he wanted really. But when Stanley motions to pay for it, she stops him with a showy gesture.
“This one’s on the corporation,” she says.

“Its a good thing you don’t make your living selling watches,” Stanley says, sounding a little embarrassed. Never look a gift horse in the mouth they say.

“Lotteries are dumb. The odds are astronomical, and you’re an idiot for trying.”
“Maybe, but you should be nice to me. I might not share my winnings.”
“I’ll take that chance,” she responds dryly, warming to his banter non the same.
But Stanley has noticed that she is no longer looking at him, having directed her attention to something happening beyond his left shoulder. He is about to turn when suddenly, his watch begins to beep.

“Oops, I almost forgot.” And with a slap to his forehead, he is gone, almost running over the woman in the scarf, the janitor having been unsuccessful in his attempts to usher her out.
The woman in the scarf looks to be thirty-five going on forty five. In reality she’s twenty-eight and has a small child in a rickety stroller. The janitor has given up trying to reason with her. This leaves only Bess.

“Is it too late for a quick pick?” Her stroller is creaking as she approaches the till.
“Slightly!”
Silence. Between them the quick pick that Stanley, in his hurry, forgot to grab.
“What is that?” the woman asks, pointing.
“That belongs to the gentleman who nearly flattened you”
“I don’t think he’ll be back for it.”
“The mall is closed, ma’am. Please don’t make me call security.”
No response.

“Think of it as a penny saved.” she says, avoiding her eyes.
“Are you for real?” her cold hard face betraying nothing. Fear and exasperation are feelings she has learned to mask, in the same way her scarf hides the unsightly rash on her neck. It suits her even, clashing only with the shoes.

St. Nicholas has gathered his things. Nearly invisible, he shuffles past them and out the door.

“I’m sorry,” Bess apologizes, “Its just that you don’t look like someone who can afford to blow her money on lottery tickets…” Bess is smiling at the androgynous baby where “Hello Kitty” is battling it out with the “Power Rangers”, neither accessory asserting its authority. Bess is confounded, but you can’t ask these things.

“You think because I’m desperate, I’m stupid.” The woman has the upper hand now, angry that ever so briefly, she’d let this hair-dyed hussy get to her.

“I didn’t mean to insinuate… you seemed upset…”
Nothing left to say. Bess only smiles feebly sliding the ticket towards the woman. But the woman has turned to go, tears welling up now.

“I’ve re-opened the till, Ma’am.”
The lady in the scarf digs for her purse, suppressing tears. As her fingers scramble amongst the coins, she knows that she could not possibly bear to come up short. One course of action remains. The lady in the scarf yanks her stroller around and runs.

Bess is at a loss. She grabs the stupid ticket from this stupid lottery in this stupid messed up world with stupid people in it, and runs after the woman and her baby, and presses the ticket into her free hand before she can grab the door handle.

Thankfulness too is something the woman has learned to mask. But there is genuine thankfulness behind her tears, as she clutches this ticket of destiny and Bess holds the door for her.

Christmas comes and goes, and for one day of the year, the mall is closed.

Two Days Later

Suddenly, the monstrous contraption goes off like Mardi Gras, with lights, music and all eyes drawn towards her. The baby is no longer sleeping, though her wail (a girl – who knew) cannot be heard above the din.

“Did I win something?”

“Wow, a thousand dollars!” And with this, Bess ceremoniously removes the crisp 1000 dollar bill she appeared to have been saving for this very moment, from the hidden depths of her till. A till seemingly reserved for dispensation.

The wall between them has dissolved completely, washed away by tears of joy. They are sharing the most surreal moment of their lives. A lottery that functioned as a lottery should. A game Bess had assumed to be un-winnable.

For some reason, knowable only to Bess, the lightness of the moment passes quickly. A wall of awkwardness re-appears. The woman in the scarf senses it too. Overcome by an odd fear, she bolts for the door, clutching her winnings like a common thief.

As for Bess…

Bess doesn’t work at the mall anymore. Mysteriously she quit her job soon afterwards and disappeared without a formal goodbye.

Sometime thereafter, a co-worker noticed her re-appearance at the edge of town, where she had apparently opened a small diner from her savings.

Monopoly Date

This story originally appeared in Adbusters Issue #68. I created this post with a link to the Adbusters website. Recently the story was removed from the Adbusters server. Therefore I am replacing the dead link with the text of the story itself:

She reaches for her seatbelt, realizing then she’s already wearing one. He, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to need his. Doesn’t have that kind of patience – to sit still for any length of time.

Riding in his car, she understands for the first time in her life, the feeling of being a passenger. But the car is a Jaguar. Fear and excitement mingle in the pit of her stomach, storehouse of ambiguous feelings. He steps on the accelerator. She wonders bravely about what lies in store.

He had picked her up at seven.
“Where are you taking me?” she had asked, kicking off her uncomfortable shoes.
“My place,” he had said, with the air of someone used to taking shortcuts with impunity.
And now, much too soon, they are there. The drive has left her feeling empty, like an over-priced amusement that ended too abruptly and too soon.

“Would you like to come upstairs?” he asks, gallantly holding the door. She smiles feebly, as if she has just been given an option. He leads her to the elevator. Once inside, she watches him press “P” for “penthouse.”

The studio is spartan, in an expensive way. Twin towers of speakers stand guard on either side of the large bay window, yet there are no CDs to be seen or heard. The sparsely populated bookshelf contains classics such as Seven Habits of Highly Effective People and Development for Fun and Profit.
The wide open space is dominated by a futon and a low table, on which he has set up a board game. For refreshment, there are chips and coke.

“Let’s play monopoly,” he says, as if this just now occurred to him. He seems comfortable in this mode of mock spontaneity.

“OK,” she replies unenthusiastically, wondering if dating white boys is always this exciting. Soon the game is underway – he the sports car, and she in the role of an old shoe with a gaping hole, game pieces he has chosen and laid out beforehand.

After the opening round, he owns the utilities, and she has to pay up.

“What was that?” he asks, but she didn’t say anything. The potato chips are gone, and her stomach has begun to growl.

“Nothing,” she says, rolling two sixes for the third time in a row. How appropriate, she thinks, to be rotting in jail. (For the uninitiated: Though the rule is contentious, it is a criminal offence to roll doubles three times in a roll – punishable by incarceration!)

After that, neither says anything for a while, though her stomach continues to growl conspicuously. She thinks that maybe she could like him, if only he were different somehow, or, perhaps, a different
person altogether.

He buys and buys and buys. He acquires Pennsylvania Avenue, and Park Place, and also manages to purchase Reading Railroad. “I should marry this guy,” she muses bitterly from her jail cell.

He has always been under the mistaken impression that the reason he gets what he wants is that he’s a “risk taker.” Such is the arrogance of privilege. The real reason, of course, is that there is no reason; that it is an unreasonable expectation to have everything one wants.

The experience of this date is surreal enough, for her not to realize quite how miserable it is. For one thing, she knows that win or lose, all games must end – eventually. But more keenly, she is aware of the fact that things could always be worse, somehow.

It is this mixture of hope and dread that makes it possible for her to continue, one toss at a time. A mixture that is symbolized by a stack of pink cards in the middle of the board: the stack called “Chance.”

The board itself is best described as a square circle, or perhaps a circular square. The same misery resurfaces over and over. Somehow, she manages to stretch the $200 she earns to cover her utilities and railway fares, to live another day. And every time she has to pay, she glances briefly at the pink deck of cards, taunting her like a lottery stub hidden in one’s pocket.

For him too, these are busy times. He has started to develop his properties. It begins with a few houses here and there, but he is looking ahead. His ultimate dream is for two luxury hotels – one on Park Place, and the other – he salivates as he thinks of it – Boardwalk.

It would be wrong to suggest that she owned no property at all. She does aquire Baltic, and Vermont, and a few others as well. And at one point he even lands on Vermont, and is forced to pay her for a change. He pays his 12 dollars graciously, in cash, and seems to harbor no ill will towards her.

CHANCE
“Go on, pick it up,” he says, unsmiling. And yet his voice is not without warmth. She has landed on chance after all, and he is happy for her. And then he surprises her with something akin to kindness. “Don’t be afraid,” he says.

What he noticed was not her hesitation, but the slight trembling of her fingers in picking up the card, and of her lips in reading it, first to herself and then aloud. But these tender moments pass. In the end, the card, as most things in life, proves a bitter disappointment.

“Get him a beer,” she reads, unable to mask her incredulity. But any doubt as to the authenticity of the card is quickly dispelled by his humorless smile. And so she does as she must, lingering in the kitchen just long enough to steal a pickle from the pickle jar. Surely he won’t notice it missing, even if this happens to be the only food in the fridge. She does know, of course, that in life, as in Monopoly, stealing is against the rules.

He seems genuinely grateful for the beer, even confiding that he prefers a glass, and telling her, in a completely non-threatening way, where glasses are kept. At the same time she lands on Pennsylvania Avenue, with its three pretty green houses, and for the first time in the game she can’t pay.
“I can’t pay,” she says.

“You could mortgage Vermont,” he offers. She follows his financial advice.

COMMUNITY CHEST
Though he lifts the card with some trepidation, his fears are soon laid to rest.
“The city is having a celebration in your honor,” he reads. “Your opponent shall bring you a beer.” He passes her the card to prove that he isn’t making this up. (For the uninitiated: the Community Chest is yellow, not pink). And while she’s in the kitchen, getting his beer, he does something dreadfully unsavory; he helps himself to an extra $500 from the bank. He then uses the money to build another house on Pennsylvania.

When, a little later in the game, she visits Pennsylvania for the second time, there is nothing left for her to mortgage.

“I have nothing left to mortgage,” she says.

“I will let you borrow from the bank,” he offers graciously. This is a clever bending of the rules on his part. Allowing her to borrow from the bank, rather than lending her the money directly, frees up some extra cash for him to invest. In this way the game is prolonged past its natural end, something he sees as a win-win situation.

COMMUNITY CHEST (again)
Here she can be forgiven for hoping, absurdly, that maybe, finally, it will be his turn to get her a beer. She reads the card in utter disbelief.

“You have violated the public dress code. Remove your blouse.”
She looks at him helplessly. He has no comfort for her, his cold hard gaze already focused on the garment about to be removed.

The game continues for another half hour, during which time he allows her to borrow the entire bank, so that all cash in circulation is now in his possession. At the same time, she finds herself violating the dress code on two more occasions, forcing her to remove both her skirt, and her bra. And to top it all off, she is forced to clean his toilet, on her hands and knees, leaving her to conclude that this could be absolutely the worst date ever, in the entire history of dating.

BOARDWALK (with hotel)
Finally, his grand vision has been realized. And the only sad part of it is that even the bank has no money left to lend her.
“The game is over,” she sighs, shivering slightly in her socks and panties. “I guess I lost.”

“No,” he says quietly, without a trace of humor in his voice. “The game is not over, and will not be over, until you pay back what you owe.
“That’s ridiculous. We can start writing promissory notes if you want, but I will never ever climb out of this financial hole. I have no properties, and no income to speak of. My debt can only grow.
“That’s not true.”
“How can I possibly pay you back?”

“You can suck my cock,” he says evenly. And she finds herself wondering when this game became so serious, and what it would take for someone – anyone – to point out that the rules make no sense. She tries to formulate this new-found realization in her brain. Perhaps, she is even trying to give voice to her thought, but there is no point. It has become impossible to say anything with his cock already embedded in her throat