And rush over to find a group informally gathered around my pal Rolph Spengler, Flying Spear Launcher Three, engaging in some kicking activity, as Rolph continues, despite the kicking, to emit such discredited ideas as: “We pass our days enacting insane rituals of denial with which I, for one, am done! Can’t we just admit and discuss?” And: “Truth, truth! Can’t we just, for once, speak the goddamn—”

Jeez! No wonder that group around Rolph is kicking him!

Shirley from Monitoring shoots me a look, meaning: Brian, give Rolph there a kick, so I can write down that you were among those who gave Rolph a kick because you were, as we all were, shocked and offended by the boldness and audacity of Rolph’s lies and, wishing to do your part in sparing the larger community the burden of Rolph’s confusion, you, with your foot or feet, did your best to stem the tide of twisted negativity pouring forth from strange, discredited Rolph.

At this point, in fairness, Rolph is no longer saying his lies. He is just inert. Shirley’s eyes go wide, then glance down at my foot, as if to say, “Brian, I know you are one of the good guys and I would like to be able to write that down.”

It is not a true kick I give Rolph, more of a foot-tap.

But it is that foot-tap, as I stumble away, that gives me pause. Leaning against a fake elm still in its ancient shipping box, I think, That tap did not hurt Rolph, probably. Not much. Then, with my right foot, I foot-tap my left calf, in order to feel what Rolph felt. Then again, harder. It should be a comfort to me: even when I foot-tap my own calf a ton harder than I actually foot-tapped Rolph, it doesn’t hurt that much at all.

Still, it might have felt unpleasant if one was dying as one felt it.

Wait, where was I going again? I ask myself.

Monitoring & Reporting Services, I reply. To rat out Tom.

Thanks, I respond.

If you don’t wish to be dealt with harshly, don’t do anything wrong, I underscore.

Just be normal, I concur.

At least it is quick to cross the Main Plain, because, on this unsettling day, absolutely no one is mating.

Across Bridge C looms Monitoring & Reporting Services: trim mauve hut, many fluttering banners.

As I approach the bridge, my name is called, and I turn to find Gabrielle D. of FIFTIES SOCK HOP, chomping gum as usual, in bobby socks though sixty, along with her husband, Bill, whose letter sweater, it seems, grows tighter by the day. And who is always calling me Frankenstein. What is up with that? Inaccurate! Do I call him Eisenhower just because that individual is of Bill’s same theme-milieu?