Insane
By Walter Campbell
One moment you’re making blueberry pancakes and turkey bacon, discussing the recent economic downturn with your 60-pound black and white dog while he cleans out his sugar-stained cereal bowl, and the next your wife’s called the cops on you, and they’re politely hauling you away, forcing you through a gauntlet of psychological
examinations, and sending you off to the sort of place Jack Nicholson and Ken Kesey made famous: zombies gorging on unidentified pills and talking about Pluto like they’ve got cousins with a timeshare there.
Happens to us all at some point, right?
The psychiatrists waited until I’d comfortably settled in here—bags unpacked, teeth brushed, pillows sampled, comic books organized according to super villain, and bipolar roommate high-fived—to tell me that I don’t have a dog. Not only that, but then they told me that I don’t have a wife, that I wasn’t making pancakes or bacon, and that the lady who called the cops when she found me frying butter in her
kitchen and mumbling about the GDP had never even seen me before.
“Maybe they’re the crazy ones,” my roommate suggested enthusiastically. “Maybe they’re all crazy, and you’re the only sane one.”
“No,” I said. “Crazy people always think that, and it’s never the case.”
“Well…what if it’s not about insanity at all. They’re not crazy and neither are you, but instead you’re right, and they’re lying. All this really did happen: the breakfast, the talking dog, you having a wife. All real. But they’re purposely lying to you and everyone else around you as part of some big government cover-up,” he suggested just as enthusiastically.
“Good idea, but, again, that’s one of those things I’d think if I were crazy. Can’t be. What would they be covering up anyway? A guy who can make pancakes and communicate with household animals? What kind of a government threat is that?” He lowered his eyes, and focused on the Superman comic near my feet for a minute before suddenly popping up like a lemur.
“Wait! Wait, wait, wait! I’ve got it. I think you might be someone very important, like a president or a king or the head of a software company, and the government or the rebels or Steve Jobs did something to your mind to erase your memory, so all you know is that there you are in this kitchen talking to a dog, and you have no memory of the secret nuclear codes or the insurrection or the iPhone apps or any of your past. And it’d explain the talking dog, too, because when they
erased your memory it probably fried other parts of your brain in the process, which made you hallucinate. Brain areas aren’t as isolated as we think, you know. Lots of overlap.”
“It’s not a bad theory,” I told him, and he shrugged nonchalantly.
“More original, more likely, but it still suffers from the same flaw as the rest: that’s exactly the sort of thing I’d think if I were crazy. More or less.” My roommate collapsed onto his bed.
“So what is your deal, then?” he exhaled.
“I’m an alien,” I told him.
“For real?” He popped up like a lemur again.
“For real.”
“Wow, that’s awesome.”
“I know.”
“But…how is that any better? Isn’t that also something that a crazy person would say.” I nodded.
“It definitely is, but here’s the difference: it’s true.” He jumped up to his feet, lit up like a whole troop of lemurs.
“That’s awesome. Hey, hey, hey did you know that there’s a guy in here whose cousins have a timeshare on Pluto?”
“Yeah. My family and I always vacationed on Jupiter, though. That is until they erased my memory because I knew the government’s secret codes. Then they zapped me down to Earth, and asked the government here to cover up my presence, because I’m the only one on this planet who knows the truth. I’m the only one on this planet who’s really sane. Now my family hangs out on Mars so I can’t contact them, because
all the world’s iPhone apps collectively block any telepathic transmissions to the red planet.” My roommate rushed to the door.
“I’m totally getting the Pluto dude. You two need to talk.” He sprinted out the door like a 100-meter runner trying to qualify for the Olympics. I smiled widely until he’d disappeared completely. Good, a few minutes of silence. Time to think.
Quick work making that talking dog disappear in time, but accidentally erasing the wrong part of my wife’s memory was a really huge slip up. Now I need to find a way out of here, and find a new woman who’ll allow my spawn gestate in her womb until they’re ready to hatch and fly to Mars to avenge their father’s banishment.
Oh, the problems we create while fixing other problems. It never ends, does it? Maybe the Pluto guy has a sister.
- - -
Walter Campbell lives and works in Philadelphia, went to school in New England, and grew up in LA, but he'll write pretty much anywhere. Recently, his work has been published in Dog Oil Press and Six Sentences.
By Walter Campbell
One moment you’re making blueberry pancakes and turkey bacon, discussing the recent economic downturn with your 60-pound black and white dog while he cleans out his sugar-stained cereal bowl, and the next your wife’s called the cops on you, and they’re politely hauling you away, forcing you through a gauntlet of psychological
examinations, and sending you off to the sort of place Jack Nicholson and Ken Kesey made famous: zombies gorging on unidentified pills and talking about Pluto like they’ve got cousins with a timeshare there.
Happens to us all at some point, right?
The psychiatrists waited until I’d comfortably settled in here—bags unpacked, teeth brushed, pillows sampled, comic books organized according to super villain, and bipolar roommate high-fived—to tell me that I don’t have a dog. Not only that, but then they told me that I don’t have a wife, that I wasn’t making pancakes or bacon, and that the lady who called the cops when she found me frying butter in her
kitchen and mumbling about the GDP had never even seen me before.
“Maybe they’re the crazy ones,” my roommate suggested enthusiastically. “Maybe they’re all crazy, and you’re the only sane one.”
“No,” I said. “Crazy people always think that, and it’s never the case.”
“Well…what if it’s not about insanity at all. They’re not crazy and neither are you, but instead you’re right, and they’re lying. All this really did happen: the breakfast, the talking dog, you having a wife. All real. But they’re purposely lying to you and everyone else around you as part of some big government cover-up,” he suggested just as enthusiastically.
“Good idea, but, again, that’s one of those things I’d think if I were crazy. Can’t be. What would they be covering up anyway? A guy who can make pancakes and communicate with household animals? What kind of a government threat is that?” He lowered his eyes, and focused on the Superman comic near my feet for a minute before suddenly popping up like a lemur.
“Wait! Wait, wait, wait! I’ve got it. I think you might be someone very important, like a president or a king or the head of a software company, and the government or the rebels or Steve Jobs did something to your mind to erase your memory, so all you know is that there you are in this kitchen talking to a dog, and you have no memory of the secret nuclear codes or the insurrection or the iPhone apps or any of your past. And it’d explain the talking dog, too, because when they
erased your memory it probably fried other parts of your brain in the process, which made you hallucinate. Brain areas aren’t as isolated as we think, you know. Lots of overlap.”
“It’s not a bad theory,” I told him, and he shrugged nonchalantly.
“More original, more likely, but it still suffers from the same flaw as the rest: that’s exactly the sort of thing I’d think if I were crazy. More or less.” My roommate collapsed onto his bed.
“So what is your deal, then?” he exhaled.
“I’m an alien,” I told him.
“For real?” He popped up like a lemur again.
“For real.”
“Wow, that’s awesome.”
“I know.”
“But…how is that any better? Isn’t that also something that a crazy person would say.” I nodded.
“It definitely is, but here’s the difference: it’s true.” He jumped up to his feet, lit up like a whole troop of lemurs.
“That’s awesome. Hey, hey, hey did you know that there’s a guy in here whose cousins have a timeshare on Pluto?”
“Yeah. My family and I always vacationed on Jupiter, though. That is until they erased my memory because I knew the government’s secret codes. Then they zapped me down to Earth, and asked the government here to cover up my presence, because I’m the only one on this planet who knows the truth. I’m the only one on this planet who’s really sane. Now my family hangs out on Mars so I can’t contact them, because
all the world’s iPhone apps collectively block any telepathic transmissions to the red planet.” My roommate rushed to the door.
“I’m totally getting the Pluto dude. You two need to talk.” He sprinted out the door like a 100-meter runner trying to qualify for the Olympics. I smiled widely until he’d disappeared completely. Good, a few minutes of silence. Time to think.
Quick work making that talking dog disappear in time, but accidentally erasing the wrong part of my wife’s memory was a really huge slip up. Now I need to find a way out of here, and find a new woman who’ll allow my spawn gestate in her womb until they’re ready to hatch and fly to Mars to avenge their father’s banishment.
Oh, the problems we create while fixing other problems. It never ends, does it? Maybe the Pluto guy has a sister.
- - -
Walter Campbell lives and works in Philadelphia, went to school in New England, and grew up in LA, but he'll write pretty much anywhere. Recently, his work has been published in Dog Oil Press and Six Sentences.
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Hee! Cute story, great fun!
I really liked this one as well.
Ha! that was quite clever.