Choose Your Own Misadventure: You Are Insane but Having a Blast — Part 3
Part Three of an ongoing interactive story that craves your input.
You are standing on the sidewalk outside of a convenience store from which you have just been caught shoplifting. The hated and mysterious man from your building smiles as a police officer some distance away hustles and struggles against the midday crowds to intercept you. You glance down at the object you have accidentally stolen, a luminous and thrilling bright neon green key-chain. Somehow, it seems worth it.
But you know you cannot stay here and allow the police officer to catch you, not after at least six different social workers in as many years fought so hard to secure your own apartment for you. In a rare showing of logical thinking, you embrace the cause and effect nature of this situation — getting arrested for shoplifting will likely get you booted from your dwelling.
Where to run? You have decided you cannot elude the law by making your way back home, since the man from your building knows exactly where you live (he is the MAN FROM YOUR BUILDING, after all). He will surely inform the police officer, and then the cops will be waiting for you. They have radios!
Therefore, your only option is to bolt for the park to seek the wise consul of your friend, Bingo Kim.
Your eyes widen as an elongated smile decorates your face. You are so proud of these coherent thoughts you are having! You laugh the insane laughter of pure joy. The man from your building flees toward the police officer in terror.
The police officer! You decide you better get going. There will be time enough to pat yourself on the back later, you smart, normal person, you.
You turn and run straight into traffic.
Horns blare and tires squeal as you shuck and jive between vehicles. No police officer would follow you through this automobile gauntlet. What a well thought out idea this was!
You do not bother to look back to see if the cop is following you. Better to plow ahead and not stop until you reach the park. You dance and weave as you run with your toothy grin flashing in the sun. Sometimes you pounce onto a hood in an attempt to slide across like some hotshot hero on TV, but instead you merely flop with a thud like a deer with chronic wasting disease and awkwardly roll off.
A song ignites in your brain. It is a Beatles song about a car and wanting to drive it. You remember that back in the fifties, sixties, and seventies, people did not just love cars, they wanted to BE cars. And you remember that in the chorus of this song, Paul McBeetle sings, “Beep beep, beep beep, yeah!” And no one thought this was stupid. People heard this lyric and thought it was cool as ice, daddy-o.
And you remember that at the climax of the song, Paul McBeetle successfully transforms into a car and shouts, “Beep beep, beep beep, yeah!” until the fade out with such honest exuberance and exhilaration that you cannot help but regurgitate it yourself. And so you run against traffic and against honking, squealing, and swearing while filling the sky with “BEEP BEEP, BEEP BEEP, YEAH!”
You reach the park drenched in sweat, but alive. You scan for your friend and spot Bingo Kim amongst four picnic tables on a concrete slab, and you also spot a police officer far in the distance walking across the park toward your friend’s location!
Is this police officer looking for you, or is your friend in trouble? Do you rush to Bingo Kim’s side, or do you hide in some nearby bushes and call out from cover?
It is time to choose! Post a comment with your preferred course of action. After a week (or two), the votes will be tabulated and the most popular choice will act as a springboard for the next part of the story. Your choices are:
- Approach Bingo Kim
- Hide in the bushes and call out to Bingo Kim
Good luck!
