The Ridiculous Adventures of Godman

Noel Fisher was rather surprised when he awoke one morning to discover that he was God.

This seemed a bit peculiar, at first. He had never been God before. But, as all of us surely would, Noel soon found himself growing into the role, as a small child might learn to play fireman by wearing a red coat. The first thing Noel did was turn his house into a mansion, adding a pool and foyer. To tell the truth, Noel didn’t even know what a foyer was, but it sounded fancy and he had always wanted one.

As he swam in his pool filled with money, Noel began to realize the full scope of his abilities. At first he was going to climb out of the pool, but then he realized he could always just will himself clothed and back in his bedroom. And that’s just what he did. With an ironically devilish smile, Noel turned his cat into a White Siberian tiger, and laughed as she playfully chased cars and pedestrians. Noel also went so far as to cure his ever-troublesome bald spot, while simultaneously whitening his teeth and improving his body in various other ways. Although, even he was willing to admit that he went a little overboard with the bionic nose.

But it was while he was enlarging his wife’s breasts that he realized she would soon wake up, and be quite shocked by all the changes that Noel he had made, particularly the one he was making at the time. So with a dramatic and unnecessary snap of his fingers, Noel reversed all the changes he had made, and accelerated time until his wife woke up. When she did, she stared at him sheepishly.

“Good morning, dear,” she said. “Wherever did you get that handsome bionic nose?”

Noel then realized that he had forgotten to undo that particular alteration, and quickly reverted his nose back to its original state.

“Never mind that,” he replied. “I’m facing a bit of a problem. I’m God.”

Noel’s wife, who’s name was Heather, sat up in bed.

“Oh. Well, are you certain?” Noel thought for a moment. This was why he loved his wife: She thought of these things, as well as making an excellent casserole.

“No, I’m not. Come to think of it. I can do anything, but I don’t know everything, so I guess I’m not God. But isn’t that pretty close?”

Heather nodded.

“Yes, it is. But whatever are you planning to do about it?”

“I’m not sure…” said Noel, proving that he wasn’t omniscient.

Later that morning, Noel sat at the breakfast table with Heather and his two children. His two children were a boy (Adam) aged eleven, and a girl (Annie) aged nine. As they ate their waffles, Adam piped up.

“So dad, are you really God? I heard you and ma talking.” Heather shot Adam a disapproving look. As Noel was about to speak, Annie interjected:

“Are not! There’s no way you’re God! I bet you can’t even do anything cool!” Noel smiled.

“Now children, I always tell you never to doubt me. I am God now, so I guess I should make some changes. And as for doing something cool… Adam, your name is now Jesus.” And suddenly, that’s just the way things were. All of Adam’s name tags changed, all of the digital records were altered, and every single engraved pencil was magically different in a puff of sawdust. Jesus happily looked at the new initials on his backpack.

“No fair! I want a cool name too!” Said Annie. Noel thought for a moment… What name would be appropriate? There weren’t a lot of important women in the Bible. Better just to make a name up.

“You can be Shashumba.” Declared Noel. And just like that, Annie was Shashumba.

“That’s not as cool…” she said.

“Deal with it,” said Jesus.

“Well, I guess it’s time for me to head to work. I’ll see you later.” Noel got up to leave, and then sat down again, realizing that he was God and didn’t have to. “Hmm,” he said, “This is strange.”

Jesus, who didn’t really feel like going to school now that her father was omnipotent, spoke again.

“Hey dad, how do you know you’re God? I mean, maybe you just have super powers. You could be like…. Omni-man, or something.” Shashumba agreed:

“Yeah! You could kill robbers!” Even Heather seemed to see some kind of validity in the idea.

“They have a point, dear. Maybe you should talk to someone who knows about such things.” Noel was starting to understand.

“Try the comic shop. The guy there would know,” said Jesus.

Noel nodded. Instantly, he was standing in the cool, grimy air of a comic book store. Huge red letters rested on pulpy paper, displaying words like “Paper Man” and “The Human Spitball”. The cold air began to bother him in his bathrobe, so Noel clothed himself in a fancy black suit. A rather bewildered fat man sat behind the counter.

“Your name is Earl,” said Noel.

“No it isn’t,” replied the man.

“It is now,” said Noel.

“Oh,” began Earl. “Well, how can I help you?”

“I think I might be a superhero. I was wondering if you could help me with that.” Noel shrugged, peering into Earl’s eyes, which changed from blue to silver.

“Hmmm… Well, what powers do you have? Name changing? Suit… Creation?”

“Omnipotence, actually.” Earl stared at Noel quizzically, perhaps a little annoyed. This power was probably not featured in many of his comic books.

“Oh,” he proclaimed. “That’s a bit of a tricky one. What does that make you, ‘Godman’?” Earl exhaled through his nose in a sort of miniature laugh. Noel thought for a moment.

“I suppose so. All right.” And suddenly, he was Godman. A convenient halo appeared above his head, a short white beard protruded from his chin, and a huge “G” was painted in gold across his suit.

“Well, that solves any costume needs,” said Earl. “I guess now you’re ready to start fighting crime.”

“Fighting what?” quipped Noel.

“Fighting crime. I guess… Uh… Find some criminals and uh… Apprehend them. Or something.”

“OK.”

And suddenly, Noel stood in a dank alley way. Surprised rats scurried away from the spot where he had stood, but Noel was more focused on the mugger beating the crap out of an old woman near by. Noel realized that this was exactly the kind of thing that he should be looking for. He cleared his throat.

“Excuse me, sir. Would you please stop that?” The mugger looked up.

“No,” he said, and went back to pounding. Noel was not very surprised.

“I’m God, you see. And if you don’t stop that I’m afraid I’ll have to… Um… Smite you.” The mugger shook his head.

“Sorry. The court ordered me to take an anger management course, but I can’t really afford that, so this will have to do. And aren’t you supposed to have a longer beard?” The old lady nodded, a mess of bruises and wrinkles.

Noel shrugged, and turned the mugger into a rabbit. The old woman appeared a little bewildered. Suddenly, Noel saw a silhouette in front of him. It was that of a very short man with a very long stick.

“Spatula Man, to the rescue!” he cried. Noel stared at him quizzically.

“Nothing to see here. This is all taken care of.” Spatula Man seemed annoyed.

“Who the hell are you, newbie? This is my turf!” He brandished his immense spatula menacingly, obviously irate.

“I’m Godman. I’m new here. The mugger’s over there.” Noel pointed to the rabbit, who was currently nibbling at a rotten piece of cheese in the dumpster. Spatula Man just stared.

“Well that’s not very fair then, is it? I mean, what’s your weakness?” Noel considered this.

“I’m partial to Australian wine. And… BMW’s.” Spatula Man sadly shook his head, and walked away. To permeate the awkward silence, Noel turned the mugger into a llama, and then disappeared.

When he reappeared, Noel was back at his house. It was dinner time.

“How was your day, dear?” asked Heather.

“OK,” he said. “I think I’ll get the hang of this.”

“Nice beard,” said Shashumba.

“Thank you,” replied Noel.