I’m average.
My teachers say that. My friends say that. I think I heard my mom say that once, and my dad didn’t really disagree.
It’s like ‘normal’ but less judge-y.
It’s okay. I don’t mind being average. I like being me.
Except for one thing, one big thing about being average and normal. I’m scared of the good people in my closet.
They come in just as I’m drifting off to sleep, every night, no matter how long it takes. I always mistake the first sounds as my imagination.
Clip clop clip clop clip clop.
Horses, usually. A few donkeys or maybe mules – I can’t tell the difference. Ponies mixed in whenever. And once it was a bunch of centaurs.
The people riding them are a lot more mixed up. Tall bearded people, short bearded people, skinny people with skinny ears and glowing eyes, scared kids, and a talking cat. But they’re all the same on the inside. Clean and gentle and right and kind and wanting only the very best for me, and the very best for me is to follow them into the closet to see the Good Place.
I don’t want to follow them into my closet. In the daytime there’s nothing in there but clothes and I’m worried about what they put in there when I’m not looking, at night.
Doesn’t stop them from trying. They never force, but they always push, push push like dad trying to get me to go to grandpa’s house.
The Good Place is imperiled, they warn me. The Bad People from Somewhere Else – the ugly people, the wrong people, the incorrect and vile people who aren’t even real like me and them – are going to hurt it, they’re going to burn it, they’re going to drown it and swamp it. Only through my actions will the Good Place be saved. And I need to do this for me too, because it is only through the experiencing of the Good Place that I will be saved and fixed and matured.
I tell them that I’m happy here, that I like my life and I’m not old enough to understand some of the things they ask me to do. Isn’t there someone else, older and better at it?
But they say it over again, over and over and over and over and always: it has to be you, it has to be you, it has to be you. All the people in the Good Place are already completed; already whole and wise and kind and correct. Nobody else will do, nobody else is average enough.
I’ve asked my mom and dad about this. They say it’s a phase everyone goes through, and I just have to live with it. They told me some people even like this.
I think it must have been different when they were little. Or they were. Who would find this fun?
The good people won’t go away. They keep checking in on me, polling me. ‘Would you like to have fun?’ they ask. ‘Are you developing valuable insights into your character?’ ‘Would you like a best friend, the very best friend, one who always takes your side and devotes themselves to your existence? Would you like a love interest? They’ll be feisty, but sweet, and never leave you.’
Every night.
The gifts, too. Always with the gifts. They keep telling me to take things.
First it was a sword, a plain sword with a shiny blade. Mom told me to be careful with sharp things and I almost lost a finger a year back with her Swiss army knife, so I said no.
Then they brought in a wand – a stick with a little magic inside. I thought I could see it breathing when they held it out to me, so I said no.
They keep trying. Runes, cups, rings – every time they come for me they come with a gift, and they all look hungry. They tell me that the things are part of me, that they’re special, and that they’re looking for me, that I was missing them all along. It scares me.
One time it was a crown and it bit me.
The good people warn me, too. ‘This won’t last forever,’ they say. ‘You’re almost too old.’ ‘The danger is nearly upon us.’ ‘The time is nigh.’
But they’re always wise when they say it, not scared. And they’re concerned, not cross.
I don’t think they believe me when I tell them that I don’t want to go. They just sigh and shake their heads and tell me they’ll ask again tomorrow night. They smile at me in a patient way, like a teacher, and they stare at me as I turn over and put my back to the closet as they leave.
That isn’t what scares me, though – not the smiles, not the stares, not the promises or the begging or the invitations.
What scares me is I’m pretty sure I’m not allowed to say no.