by John Moe
* * *
Josh, I’m sorry about that last message. I’ve, uh, I’ve had too much coffee while I’ve been working on the screenplay at Starbucks. It’s taking longer than I thought, too, because it’s hard to type on a laptop when you have hooves. Okay. Anyway, I do think it would be a great movie. I love you. You’re my only friend.
* * *
Hi Josh, War Horse here. Just checking in to see if any movies need horses. I guess not. I know you’re doing your best.
* * *
Josh, this is War Horse. It’s been a long time since I heard from you. I’m wondering, gosh, I don’t know how to put this, are you still my agent? I don’t remember being fired or firing you. So … what’s up? I guess just no horse parts coming up lately.
* * *
Josh. War. Funny thing, I wanted to kind of relax a little bit today so I figured I’d go to the movies. Caught a double feature of Lincoln and The Lone Ranger. Sure were a lot of … oh, what’s the word I’m looking for … HORSES. And I couldn’t help but notice that NONE OF THEM WERE ME! Go to hell, Josh. Go straight to hell.
KEVIN
Mr. and Mrs. Peter McCallister
671 Lincoln Avenue
Winnetka, Illinois 60093
December 25, 2013
Dearest Mother,
Christmastime is here once again and my thoughts turn to you and the rest of my family. Or rather, the family I once had. I shall spend the holiday alone once more in our palatial Winnetka, Illinois house, just as I did that one pivotal Christmas when I was eight, just as I have for the past several Christmases after you all fled.
But worry not about me, Mother. I have my diversions, including my BB gun, of course, at which I have become quite adept with target practice, quick draw, and the like. It was nice of Buzz to give it to me after I had showed tremendous, some might even say unnerving, aptitude for it. I find it surprising how a big brother can grow to be so frightened of a little brother because of a simple thing like a propensity for calculated sadistic violence. Psychology is a funny thing, Mother.
I’ve been re-cataloguing my gangster films as well, upgrading them first to DVD and now to a series of flash drives. I keep busy.
I am saddened to say, too, that my, shall we say, civic engagement activities have continued as well. I am thirty-one years old now, and as a grown man I know I should leave crime fighting to the police department. Yet I invariably find myself constructing elaborate lures to entice would-be burglars to attempt to invade our—excuse me—MY home, all in the interest of assaulting them through Rube Goldberg contraptions that deal out immense punishment and cause severe and often permanent injuries. I want to stop. I do. I hate myself after a burglar assault, though I do admit my self-hatred is blended with what I could only describe as perverse pride in my own workmanship.
Unlike in 1990, I can’t rely on notorious burglars to simply happen upon the house. Instead, I must post Craigslist ads for house sitters, explaining that I’ll be away for several specific days and giving the address. I’ve also been known to drive to Chicago’s less reputable neighborhoods and approach strangers about doing gardening work, leave them my address, and explain that I’ll be away from home for the next week.
When they show up, as they inevitably do, then come the punishments. Oh, the punishments, Mother. I still ice the stairs or do the old iron-to-the-face maneuver, mostly for sentimental reasons. They remind me of all of you. These are my photo albums. Of course, I’m a grown man now and being a fully mature adult, I use more sophisticated methods to punish would-be bad guys. Among my recent efforts:
• Plate of perfectly prepared porterhouse steak with baked potato and small green salad positioned over a bear trap with serrated teeth. A great deal of arm damage on this one. The serrations make the removal process excruciating.
• Burning hot needles fired out of hidden holes all over the exterior of the house. Each needle is targeted to shoot just above the spot on the floor where a pressure pad has been activated by a burglar wandering where he ought not.
• Large wooden planks designed to close quickly around the intruder and then slowly squeeze him to within an inch of actual death. At that point, once he is trapped, I drop chocolate sauce or milk or urine, something harmless like that, on his head. And I laaaaaaugh.
• A cage is dropped on the intruder, very simple spring-loaded trap, and I then hold him at gunpoint until he can be chained up. Then follows several days of intense conversation wherein I convince him that all his dreams and hopes are a sham and that nothing meaningful will ever come of his miserable life. At the end of this period, the thief is a broken shell of a man.
That last one is cruel, perhaps, but I do hate crime. I’m ashamed of all these activities but I can’t help feeling some pride as well. A great deal of pride. I am consumed with pride. And some shame.
Mother, I realize that it was my calculating development of these, well, okay, we’ll call them tortures, that made the family want to get away from me, eventually settling in some house in another state for which you will not give me the address. (I shall leave this letter once again with the neighbors who will not look me in the eye but promise to forward the mail.)
Otherwise, my life is much the same. Due to my abandonment in 1990, I can’t trust anyone, of course, and as such I have no spouse or friends or employment. I thank you for the financial stipend that guarantees I stay put.
Do you remember when I told you about how I put on Dad’s aftershave and it burned so much I had to scream? It was a whimsical anecdote, naturally, but here’s the thing: I became addicted to that burn, that horror, that moment of being fully if unbearably alive. As my face aged, aftershave no longer provided that sting. I moved up to harsher and harsher liquids, but eventually my face hardened and calloused and resisted the burn for all of them. I’m currently using a bleach solution but at some point I may have to move on to liquid nitrogen just to feel the scream again. Beyond that, I’m not sure what I can do.
Well, Mother, I hope you and the rest of the family, wherever they are, have a very Merry Christmas. And now I must go. Someone’s at the door!
Kevin
REJECTED
PROPOSALS
SUPER BOWLS XLII TO XLV
SUPER BOWL XLII—FEBRUARY 3, 2008
• A very bold proposal was received, entitled “A Funeral for Original Thought.” It recognized how nearly all parts of popular culture, from film to music to television to everything else, had become nakedly derivative and was more or less composed of sequels, knockoffs, and cheap nostalgia. Clips from hit movies like Spiderman 3, Pirates of Caribbean: At World’s End, Shrek the Third would play on the Jumbotron, while an enormous brain would be lowered from helicopters. The field would then open up to reveal a grave dug deep below University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. Around the grave, mourners dressed in black would grieve. Dancing authors would reveal empty books, singers would hold up CD players instead of singing, and painters would smash empty canvases over their heads. Finally, the Jumbotron would display a message “And YOU! You’re watching Super Bowl 42! 42! You’re an asshole.”
• Tom Petty was hired because he would do fine.
SUPER BOWL XLIII—FEBRUARY 1, 2009
• The proposal “A Salute to Complicity” attempted to walk a very thin line. It was meant to draw awareness to the increasingly obvious reality that concussions and head injuries are a big problem in the NFL. At the same time, it sought to explain, through song and dance, the measures that the league was taking to mitigate this very serious health risk. Perhaps the most daring part of the proposal was a celebration of all football fans’ implicit approval of the act of inflicting severe brain damage. Floats would parade across the field, commemorating great crimes against humanity through the centuries. While that happened, dancers would merrily prance about, pretending not to notice and certainly doing nothing to stop the floats. Then the game would resume.
• Nope. The Committee went with Spr
ingsteen.
SUPER BOWL XLIV—FEBRUARY 7, 2010
• Recent months have seen the widespread and wholly unexpected popularity of Susan Boyle, the Scottish singer who went from total obscurity to international stardom on the strength of a truly spectacular audition on Britain’s Got Talent. Her success was made more remarkable by the fact that at the time of her big break, she was 48 years old, not particularly physically attractive, and had been living with her mother in a small town.
• In celebration of Boyle, a proposal called for dowdy-looking older women living in obscurity around the country to be abducted from their homes and taken, blindfolded, to Miami. The blindfolds were then to be removed and the women forced to sing. The idea was that if, say, 100 women were abducted, surely at least one of them would be as good as Susan Boyle. Any who couldn’t sing would simply be re-blindfolded and returned to their homes, no harm done.
• Surviving members of the Who were hired because apparently America needs a reminder of death’s inevitability.
SUPER BOWL XLV—FEBRUARY 6, 2011
• Proposal marked “A Tea Party Super Bowl” was received but was something of an organizational mess. There were to be protests about the government being both communist and fascist as well as about President Obama being both a tyrant and an inattentive layabout. The organizers, who seemed to have profound persistent disagreements amongst themselves, wanted a large set, complicated special effects, and millions of dollars in elaborate costume pieces, yet they felt that no one should actually be compelled to pay for anything. Various pro-gun and 9/11 conspiracy arguments were sprinkled in as well. The proposal was rejected despite strong support by Republican political groups who didn’t seem to actually share a lot of the ideas in it.
• The Black Eyed Peas were brought in because by this point the Committee sort of hates people.
DIARY OF AN OBSCURE AND UNPOPULAR STUDENT AT HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
September 1
I am on the train to Hogwarts and ready to begin my very exciting wizarding education! The buzz all about the train is that the famous Harry Potter is coming to Hogwarts as well. I found a seat with some of my soon-to-be classmates whom I do not know. They’re not speaking to me much. That’s alright, there will be plenty of time to be dear pals once we are casting spells and so forth. AND I have a feeling Harry Potter and I will be the best of friends. Mum and Dad have such high hopes for me to finally overcome our family’s long history of subpar wizard work and accidental homicides. They will be so proud that I have befriended Harry. Perhaps he’ll share my love of stamp collecting and entomology! Or my interest in role-playing games where one gets to be a muggle. I am certain Harry and I will be sorted into the same house, but will it be brave Gryffindor or crafty Slytherin? SO excited!
September 1
Well, I’m in Hufflepuff. There was much cheering from Gryffindor when Harry was placed there. And much cheering when Draco Malfoy found his way to Slytherin. As for my placement in Hufflepuff, I can best describe the feeling from my housemates as stoic acceptance. This will be good, however. Hufflepuff is known for being loyal friends. “I guess you should sit here,” said one of the older students to whom I will eventually become close.
October 14
I have no friends thus far but these things take time. I try saying hello to Harry Potter in the hallways sometimes and he smiles but then darts off with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Maybe we could all four be friends! The Four Musketeers! That’s from a muggle book I read once. It was really good. No one reads muggle books here. I guess they don’t think they need them in order to prepare for the only four jobs wizards go into: government, professional Quidditch, retail in Diagon Alley, or teaching here at the school.
November 5
I have begun playing Quidditch! Such an exciting sport! Harry is the Seeker for Gryffindor, the first time a first year has held that spot in a hundred years. I don’t play on the Hufflepuff team. Not yet anyway. I mostly practice on my own with rocks and logs standing in as my opponents and teammates. Still a BIT scared of flying, so I just run around on the ground. Also I don’t own a broom. Quidditch!
December 22
I’m home for the holiday break. I must say I’ve been having a smashing time at Hogwarts and although I haven’t made many “friends” in the classical sense or any other sense, I know that great times are just around the corner. Being home around Christmastime and away from my studies has given me time to reflect on the meaning of religion in our wizarding world. To begin with, Harry is obviously somewhat of a Christ-like figure. He was born to a mother largely thought to be pure and infallible, and he comes to the world (Hogwarts! Where I go to school also!) to guide people toward a life of goodness even in the face of evil (Slytherin! He who must not be named!). And he’s just like one of us. I think Dumbledore would be God in this scenario. Hermione and Ron would be the disciples. I don’t know, for sure, what that makes me. Perhaps some random shepherd in Nazareth who says hi to Jesus, even though Jesus doesn’t say much of anything in return?
January 23
Professor Snape is so hard on Harry in Potions class! At first, it appears he’s being strict because he dislikes Harry and wants him to fail. Professor Snape is the Head of Slytherin house after all! But other people think that Snape is very tough on Harry because he’s trying to make him stronger and that’s because he cares about him. It’s hard to tell. With me, Professor Snape is neither generous nor strict. His favorite joke with me is to look confused and say, “Are you in my class?” Totally deadpan! It’s always very funny! WELL PLAYED, PROFESSOR.
March 11
I think Hagrid, the gamekeeper, might be up to something. I began to see Harry, Ron, and Hermione going out there quite a bit and they looked very concerned. So I posted a sign in the Hufflepuff common room for an expedition to get to the bottom of this by way of a special secret mission. Maybe I overplayed the “secret” part of it because no one signed up. I went out there on my own to get to the bottom of things. I knew that even if Hagrid caught me sneaking around, he’d be nice about it because he’s really very kind.
Well, he did catch me but wasn’t nice at all. He told me to “fuck off” and then threw stones at me! Wait a minute, maybe he’s being tough on me like Snape is with Harry because he really loves me! WELL PLAYED, MR. HAGRID!
April 3
Harry looked quite upset about something today. I’m told it has to do with Professor Quirrell. I rushed to Harry’s side and said, “If you need help, dear friend, count me in!” He looked at me quizzically and asked if we’d met. I understand, he’s under a lot of stress. All those expectations!
June 3
Sorry it’s been a while since my last entry, diary! Very busy with exams and long walks by myself and so forth. It’s the end of the term now and everyone’s more preoccupied with packing up for the year. Harry Potter is in the hospital! No one is quite sure what’s happened to him but the professors are making a big production of it all, frequently coming and going to visit him. I see them pass as I wait outside for my turn to visit, a turn that never quite seems to arrive.
I’ve also noticed that Professor Quirrell is missing and very probably dead. All I can piece together is that somehow Harry, well, killed the professor. And I guess everyone’s okay with that.
THE COMPLETE RULES OF FIGHT CLUB AS SENT TO MEMBERS
1. Do not talk about Fight Club.
2. DO NOT TALK ABOUT FIGHT CLUB.
3. If someone says “stop,” goes limp, or taps out, the fight is over.
4. Only two guys to a fight.
5. One fight at a time.
6. No shirts, no shoes.
7. Fights will go on as long as they have to.
8. If this is your first night at FIGHT CLUB, you HAVE to fight.
9. No doing charades about Fight Club. It’s just like talking. Come on.
10. Using a funny cartoon voice to talk about Fight Club is still talking about Fight Club
(see rule 1).
11. How about this: when you feel like you want to talk about Fight Club, maybe write it down, get it out of your system, and then rip it up? Kevin does that and it totally works. He can help you through it, but you have to not talk about Fight Club when you talk to Kevin about it. It’s tricky. You know what? Just don’t talk about Fight Club.
12. There’s a sign-up sheet on the fridge. Please sign up for a night to bring snacks and juice boxes.
13. Tuesday nights are “Making Up with Each Other Club.” It’s an important night to share feelings and for many of us, it’s actually our favorite night.
14. You know what? If you really want to talk about Fight Club, go ahead. It actually is a pretty cool thing we have going here.
15. KIDDING! DO NOT TALK ABOUT FIGHT CLUB!
16. Don’t do the choreography from the “Thriller” video during a fight because while it’s a funny joke, it’s somewhat disrespectful to your opponent.
