The Ultimate Selfie
When I woke up, I was sitting on a chair in a field, naked. My hands were tied to the armrests, as were my legs. Instead of panic, I had an absurd idea pop into my head. I hope this isn’t a plastic chair, because peeling myself off it while naked in this damp heat is going to be a feat to marvel at.
I was about to giggle when I saw a person wearing all black step into my view. He had no face. But I knew who he was. I think it’s the Enforcer.
Never in my life did I expect to see the enforcer here. In front of me. What do I do? He’s such a celebrity! And I didn’t even bring my camera. Or phone. I am sure I had it when I was captured, but now I am without the ability to record this auspicious moment. How will I tell my parents? My friends? How will I inform the world of my specialness?
All these thoughts swirled through my head so I missed what he said at first. He or she, I didn’t know, but his voice was a bit gravely so I will use the he pronoun.
“Are you listening to me?” He asked, a note of exasperation already creeping into his voice. Hmm, he wasn’t the most patient of individuals. I guess, he didn’t need to be.
“Yes, Enforcer… Well, actually not. I missed that first bit. Could you repeat it?”
I felt him roll his eyes. I couldn’t tell because he had no face, but I could sense his emotions.
“I’m the Enforcer, but you already know that. I am here to inform you of your infractions, so you can do better with your time on this planet.”
“Uh-huh, I got that. I mean, I haven’t been living the best life for sure. But before all that, I have an important question to ask.”
He crossed his arms across his chest, the grass behind rustling softly as if it were scared of him as well. He didn’t seem pleased with my initiative.
“Yes, what is it?”
“Can I have my phone for a second?”
“Your phone?”
“Yes, my phone.” It was a simple enough request so I couldn’t understand why he was having such a hard time understanding.
“And what will you do with said phone?”
“Said phone? Don’t know what that means. I just have an iPhone, but I want to take a picture with you. Just one little one. Please. I want to show off to my friends.”
This time I definitely heard him sigh. And he muttered something under his breath.
“Listen to me, you are under punishment right now. You cannot have your phone. It’s time for you to — “
“Why not? Why can’t I have my phone? It’s just for a second. Really? I’m not going to call anyone or do anything else. Actually, you don’t even have to give it to me. Just take a selfie for me? You can do it by pointing the camera towards you and me. You can stand there, and then — “
“I know how to take a selfie.”
“Oh, then what’s the problem?” I didn’t get it. Why were we quibbling back and forth about this when it could be resolved in one second with him taking a photo? Why is he wasting time like this?
“The time for photo taking has passed. This is exactly why you’re here at the Field. You have been wasting your life and now it's time for you to face the music.”
“Wait, so you aren’t going to take that photo?” I was truly flabbergasted. Truly and utterly perplexed.
“No.”
“I see.” I said, and I let a note of disappointment come into my voice as well. “Well, all I can say is that I’m highly upset by this revelation. I thought you would have been better than this.”
He looked at me with astonishment lining his face and then rubbed his hand down his face as if he just wanted to disappear. “This is why I hate dealing with teenagers,” he muttered.
“Well, we don’t like dealing with you either, if you must know. It’s easy enough, simple enough to pick up a phone and take a picture. It takes but a mere millisecond. Less than that. You can just tell Siri to take the photo for you. You don’t even have to click a button. You could just blow some soft air at the screen and it will click a pic real fast. But instead of doing it, instead of that, you just want to waste time. You talk to me about not wasting time, but what about you? It seems like you need to learn your own lesson first.”
That was the longest speech I had ever given, and I felt quite proud of it. It seemed like the Enforcer needed some enforcement himself.
We stared at each other for a long minute. I was unwilling to stand down.
“If I take this damn picture, will you listen to what I have to say?” He finally said.
“Of course! Why wouldn’t I? I’m here to obey and comply. Even my mother said to me that I might not have been born with a full head of hair or even any brain cells inside my head, but I was great at following commands.”
He didn’t deign to reply to that but instead pulled out his phone and took a quick selfie.
“Now that’s done, we can — “
“Let me see it,” I said quickly before he could move on.
“What?”
“I need to see it. If I am making a weird face, or if my eyes are closed, we need to take another one. You also didn’t give me enough warning so I could make a pose. And these freaking bindings aren’t helping.”
“We are not taking another one,” he said, with gritted teeth.
“A bad picture is as useless as no picture at all. If I can’t post this picture, then what is the point of taking it? What is the point of anything at all?”
I would have put my palms up and made a helpless gesture, but my arms were tightly bound and I couldn’t move a muscle in my body except my tongue.
“I did what you asked. We have wasted enough time on this, I have other folks to speak to, I don’t have time for this.”
“Well, then don’t waste any more time arguing with me. Let me see what it looks like and we can move on.”
“It looks fine to me,” he said, looking at it with his faceless face.
“Um, you aren’t really an expert on selfies, though.”
“And you are?”
“Yes, indeed. I have taken an estimated 2 million pictures already and I’m only 16 years old. So you can imagine the frequency at which I h — “
“Alright fine. Got it. For God’s sake. Here it is. See it’s fine.”
He shoved it in my face and I took a quick glance before dismissing it.
“It’s not fine. My eyes are squinting in it and the lighting is all wrong. The angle as well. You have to take it again. Also, that’s not my phone. You need to take it with my phone. I bought the best selfie phone on the market. It’s the ultimate selfie-taker. You can’t go wrong with it, even if you are a noob at selfies.” I said that last bit pointedly.
“I don’t have your phone.”
“Then go get it.”
“There’s no going to get it. We are in the middle of a field. I can’t just hop off and get your phone.”
“Then untie me, so I can take the selfie with your phone. It won’t turn out terrible then.”
“That’s not happening.”
“Well, it has to. Otherwise, we are at an impasse.”
“There’s no impasse, since I’m the one in charge, and you have no say in the matter.”
“I do have a say because even though you’ve tied me up like this, I still have rights. And if I say I want to take a selfie, you should honor that wish of mine.”
Of course, I didn’t use the term ‘honor’ without forethought. For Enforcers, the most sacred thing in the world is their honor.
“Alright, I am going to untie you, but you take this selfie and we are moving onward with my agenda. The real reason we are here.”
“Yes, of course. No argument there.”
He untied my hands. I grabbed the phone and asked him to come closer to me, so I could take a picture of us both.
He did.
I blew air into the phone and also at the same time into his face. I had already activated the powder that was sitting in my fake molar. It created a gas that caused him to instantly go slack and fall to the ground. It wasn’t deadly or anything. I am not that kind of selfie-taker. I liked my subjects alive and well.
I untied my legs and then stood up. The Enforcer was lying on the ground, and I was finally able to take the Ultimate Selfie of my life.
Inspiration: I was in Penang, Malaysia and I watched these two girls climb up on a high divider that separated the walkway from the plunge into the ocean below. One of them was obviously afraid of heights, but she did it… for the selfies. They took about 50–100 photos after that climb. Doing so many poses in an hour that I was baffled and amazed by them. And this is quite common all throughout Asia, with people doing whatever they can to get that perfect selfie. Of course, I had to write this story about the ultimate selfie after that experience.
