Miranda (Working title)

I don't own anybody. Just Miranda. And just when I feel like it. It's okay, she's not like us. She's different. She's a witch. A vampire. She feeds on lost souls. She’s the most hideous beast-demon to ever come out of Hell. She's a growth. At least that's what they say. And it all may very well be true, but to me, she is just Miranda. And I own her. At least for today.

The first time I saw her, she had a perky set of little black wings strapped to her bony back. She had a look on her face that I took to mean “get me outta hear”, and she was lookin’ at everyone. She was dressed all in black lace and high heeled shoes and her blue eyes made me giddy. I wanted to read Miranda her “Miranda Rights” right then and there, but it wasn’t the time, and certainly not the place to pretend to arrest such a beautiful young lady, as she was that evening.

Now, I’m somewhat of a simpleton. Lived in the same town my whole life. Wasn’t on the football team, wasn’t dating no cheerleader on the top of the pyramids. Never made homecoming king, either. I married my high school sweetheart, Abigail, eight months after we found out she was pregnant. We had two kids, Alvina and Jack Jr. Then I divorced my high school sweetheart and she took the kids to New Jersey, where she “really belonged”. Now I wasn’t nothing special then, and I ain’t nothing special now. I know it, and I never pretended to be it. And it’s funny how someone can just jump into the highway in front of your car and change your life. Your whole goddamn existence, and make you pretend you’re something you ain’t. Make the person you thought you was; the life you thought you had… well, make this new, Pretend You, the real you. This new Pretend Life your real life. And when that person who done jumped in front of your car realizes what you been doing, well, then you’re really in trouble.

I wanted to be a member of the New Harmony Police Department since I wasn’t five years old. Only problem was I hated school. Not so much that I hated it, more that I was bad at it. More that I was “lazy”, as some would call it. “Having strengths in other arena” is what I call it. But then again, that didn’t seem to matter much after the Chief O’ Police seen me see him down in the old gravel pit with the kindly Mrs. Launderman, wife to Jim Launderman, the Mayor of our fair city. So after he seen me see him, I got myself a whole new set of Pretend Grades, and whole new Pretend Job. No more general manager of the local Wal-Mart for Old Jack Henderson. Nope, I left that busy work right quick, took a jumbo bag of toilet paper on the way out, and I started my new Pretend Life that afternoon.