09/07/03

Welcome to my Web site! Story pages.

Pizza (The one that started it all - based on a true story)

"Hi.  I need your help, man!"

"Okay, let's just calm down.  Now, are you at home?"

"Do you need a weapon?  Are you in danger?"

"Sure, man.  Hang on."

"Dude, where are any of us really 'at'?"

There aren’t any psychics who work for Reality 911.  There’s really not very much incentive for it.  Let’s, for the sake of argument, pretend that you’re a psychic.  You have a choice.  You can either use your ability to make you rich and famous (divining lottery numbers, finding missing children, etc.) or you can get a job as an operator for Reality 911 and earn $4.65 an hour.  Sure $4.65 an hour is thirty cents more per hour than the typical recruit earns (after all, someone who can telephone potential callers and help them before their problems occur is a bit more valuable as an employee than the poor bloke whose only skill is the ability to nurse a cup of coffee all day in the local soup kitchen), but a thirty cents per hour bonus hardly compares to a life of wealth and power.  Thus, the only psychics who apply are stupid and Reality 911 doesn’t accept them.

Rita is a psychic.  She’s pretty smart too, although not as smart as other psychics throughout history.  Whereas other psychics have written books about their prophecies or publicized their abilities on television or become highly successful gamblers, Rita enjoys only moderate income as the manager of the psychic booth in the Sawgrass Mills Mall.  Don’t misunderstand; Rita doesn’t plan to work in the mall forever.  She has goals.  It’s just that she had a dream when she was a little girl that the mall was where she met her soul mate.  Rita really wants to meet her soul mate. 

Rita is a library book that’s never been read through in its entirety.  Strewn throughout her pages are folded down corners forgotten, ideas and traits adopted, but never completely assimilated.  Only the top half of her spine has been broken in and her bed hasn’t been broken in at all, despite all the stains on the sofa.  Rita really really wants to meet her soul mate.

“Reality 911.  How may I be of service today?”

Rita’s clairvoyance kicks in.  The operator’s voice is immediately attached to a face.  Rita rubs her legs together like a little girl who has to pee.  She know now exactly how he can be of service today.  It involves leather restraints, whipped cream, and chilled maple syrup.  Oh, God, yes; Rita loves maple syrup! 

Her extra sensory perception digs under his belt, his gray slacks, his green, silk boxers.  Then, noticing the herpes there, her ability cringes back and is yanked away before even the first of his pubic hairs can stand on end (people can instinctively sense psychic intrusion).

“Hello?  Is there anybody on the line?”

It taker her a heartbeat, “Uh, yeah.  My name’s Rita.”

“Oh, it’s you again.”

“What did you mean by that?”

“Nothing, Rita.  I just recognized your voice.”

She tries to discern whether that’s all, but is distracted by the arrival of a customer, “Hold on, please.”

Rita hits the hold button before he can protest, feels a wave of hatred from the operator, “How can I help you, Ma’am?”

“I need a man!”

“That’ll be a hundred and fifty dollars.”

“Are you operating a brother or a psychic service?”

A brothel!, Rita thinks.  Why didn’t I think of that before?  That’s where the real money is!

“Are you getting a psychic impression?”

Rita slips out of her reverie, “Yeah, that’s it.”

“I guess I can afford a hundred and fifty dollars.”

Hope is expensive, Rita thinks, but then is surprised when a vision pops into her head.  It’s of that redheaded guy who works at the Athlete’s Foot only a few shops down.  His name comes into  her mind, Alan.  This surprises her, not because of who it is, but because Rita usually only gut a psychic image about one in every ten times she tries.  The rest of the time, she fakes it, like all those orgasms with the men she meets in country western bars.  Yet, this is the seventh time in a row that this has occurred.  It’s been a very successful morning.  Actually, it surprises her a little about who it is.  This woman is the seventh girl this morning who is supposed to be with Alan, “Redhead.  Works at the Athlete’s Foot just a few stores down.  His name’s Alan.”

The woman grins, throws money at Rita and runs in the direction of the Athlete’s Foot.

Rita returns to the phone, “Sorry about that.”

“You’re sorry?  You’re sorry?  The last time you called, I spent all day on the phone for a total of twelve minutes of conversation!  I didn’t go through all my months of training to spend my time on hold!”

“Uh, hold on.”

The operator tries to object, but there is only elevator music to hear him, and it has no ears.

At the mall, Rita is requesting a hundred and fifty dollars.

“But I only have forty!”

Rita is about to tell her to push off when the vision worms its way into her mind.  Of course, its Alan.

Understanding what it’s like to be lonely, Rita takes mercy on her client, “Hand it over.”

When the two twenties are snugly crumpled up in the pocket of her jeans, Rita sends the woman to her man.

“It’s so weird,” Rita tells the operator, “I keep picturing this guy Alan every time a woman comes to me looking for the man that they’re supposed to be with.”

“Is that why you’re calling, then?”

“No, no.  I’m calling because I’m lonely for the man that I’m supposed to be with!”

“How do you know that it’s not a woman that you’re supposed to be with?  Or a hermaphrodite?”

“You’re sick!”

“Well,” the operator explains, “all possibilities should be examined.”

"I’ve been with women, hermaphrodites and animals, so I know.  I am meant for a man.”

“Maybe that guy, Alan.”

“Are you crazy?  He has eight girls!  I don’t want a man who has eight other girls!”

“Listen: maybe all this time, you’ve been picturing your soul mate and thinking that he was for the other girls.”

“That would explain everything!  I thought it was strange that someone would have eight soul mates!”

“Go to him, Rita.” And let me off the line, he almost adds.

“Yes.  This feels right.  I must go.  I have a date with destiny.”

She hangs up, sees two young girls standing at the booth, waiting to speak with her.

“Alan.”  Rita screams at them, laughing, “Redheaded Alan at the Athlete’s Foot!”

She runs off.  The girls are surprised that Rita decided not to charge them for that information.

Alan is selling shoes an smiling.  He’s smiling really big.

“We’re soul mates!” Rita calls to him, knocking over a display of sneakers, “We’re meant for each other!”

“Sure,” he grins, “Sure we are.”

She catches her breath, “We are.  Really.”

“Oh, come on then.  Let’s go into the back room.  I suppose that I still have enough energy for one more.”

“I’m not like those other girls.  They all just thought that they were your soul mate.  I really am.”

”Of course.  Hurry now.  I don’t have much time before my boss returns.”

“You don’t understand!”

“Sure I do.  It’s you who doesn’t understand.  If I’m to have time to part and defile the slippery riches of your sex before my boss returns, we’re going to have to hurry.”

“That sounded kind of nice.”

Alan rests his hand on her crotch, “You have a vagina like a tornado.  There’s power there.”

“While that is actually true, you still don’t seem to understand!  You and I are meant only for one another, to be together forever!”

“Are you referring to monogamy?”  He seems to flinch as he says the word.

“Yes!”

He laughs at her, “Yesterday, I might have been okay with that, but not today.  Not ever again.  Not when I can possess my own harem!”

Just then, the two girls enter the store.  His red hair is a beacon, “Are you Alan?”

Alan immediately becomes blind and deaf to Rita, “Yes, girls.  Yes I am.”

Soon, he leads them into the back room.  As they walk past her, Rita hears Alan mention something about playing tug-o-war with no hands.  The girls giggle.  And Rita wanders off to find a phone.

“Reality 911.”