From the reviews of Topics About Which I Know Nothing:

‘Here are 10 short fictions, each of which works as a showcase for Ness’s highly quirky imagination … Each story is a tasty titbit, to be savoured briefly before moving on to the next one. What makes these stories so delightful is that there actually is something very substantial at work behind them, however airy they seem at first. They’ll lodge in the mind.’ Guardian

‘Ness’s first collection brims with inventiveness and creative audacity.’ Daily Telegraph

‘Ness’s take on the absurd and offbeat is sharp, intelligent and funny.’ Time Out

‘Remarkable, an extraordinary, yet utterly convincing creation.’ Scotsman

‘Sparkling humour … Ness has a wonderful imagination: creative, unpretentious and pleasingly bonkers.’ Metro

‘Very, very funny … a unique comic manifesto from a very talented newcomer.’ Daily Express

For Vicki Burrows, Belle of Puyallup

We’ve got so many tchotchkes,

We’ve practically emptied the Louvre.

In most of our palaces,

There’s hardly room to manoeuvre.

Well, I shan’t go to Bali today,

I must stay home and Hoovre

Up the gold dust.

That doesn’t mean we’re in love.

The Magnetic Fields

Contents

Cover

Title Page

From the reviews of Topics About Which I Know Nothing

Dedication

Epigraph

Introduction to the New Edition

Implied Violence

The Way All Trends Do

Ponce de Leon is a Retired Married Couple From Toronto

Jesus’ Elbows and Other Christian Urban Myths

Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes?

Sydney is a City of Jaywalkers

2,115 Opportunities

The Motivations of Sally Rae Wentworth, Amazon

The Seventh International Military War Games Dance Committee Quadrennial Competition and Jamboree

The Gifted

Now That You’ve Died

Notes and Acknowledgements

About the Author

By the same author

Copyright

About the Publisher

Introduction to the New Edition

You always love the awkward child best, don’t you?

I get asked all the time (by teens in particular) what’s my favourite book of the ones I’ve written. I always answer that it’s the same as asking your parents if they have a favourite child: you know they have one, but they’re never going to admit it.

But Topics About Which I Know Nothing has a bit of a special place for me (not least that it taught me never to have a comedy title; funny the first time, but 500 times later…). Because these are all stories I wrote on the real expectation that no one would ever read them, and if that were true, then I could just have loads of fun amusing myself and seeing if I could get away with murder. With some of these, perhaps, it’s a close call.

‘Sally Rae Wentworth’ (even with its slightly imperfect grasp of geography) is still one of my secret favourite children. ‘The Gifted’, too – a rare instance of autobiographical writing (to an obvious point). ‘Quis Custodiet’ goes all the way back to my college writing classes with T. C. Boyle (if heavily revised), and ‘Sydney is a City of Jaywalkers’ is my first published piece of writing ever.

I love short stories and have kept on writing them. The new story in this collection, ‘Now That You’ve Died’, was written as a commission for the Royal National Institute of Blind People for ‘Read for RNIB Day’ (readforrnib.org.uk, which gets many more books into the hands of blind and partially sighted people). It was recorded as an immersive play, so imagine it in complete darkness, read to you in the terrifying and majestic tones of Christopher Eccleston.

In fact, that’s a good way to imagine pretty much any story, including the ones here. The original notes at the end thank the good and fine people at the much-missed Flamingo imprint, and I remain forever grateful to them for giving my awkward child such a good home.

London, 2014

implied violence
1

‘Implied violence,’ says the boss, ‘is our bread and butter.’

He means implied violence is what we sell, which it isn’t, we sell self-defence courses over the phone, but the boss likes to think in themes. He’s talking to the new girl, Tammy, which sounds American to me. I’ll have to ask Percy.

‘I don’t like to say we need to frighten our customers,’ says the boss, looking down at Tammy who is looking right back up at the boss, ‘but let me put it this way: we need to frighten our customers.’ This makes the boss laugh. Tammy laughs as well, too loud and too long. I look over to Maryam from Africa who meets my gaze.

There are only three of us, now four, who work in this little room, but we all wear nametags. Mine says my name, Maryam from Africa’s says hers, and Percy’s says his, but I notice that Tammy’s says ‘Terrific Tammy’. I look back at Maryam. She’s noticed it, too. She rolls her eyes as Tammy’s laugh just goes on and on.

2

On one side of me sits Percy. Percy is a very large bloke who falls over a lot. ‘I have an inner-ear problem,’ he says. Percy calls himself my mate.

On the other side of me is Maryam from Africa. Maryam from Africa is from Africa. I’m not sure which part, because I didn’t think you were supposed to ask. I’m not sure how to pronounce her name exactly either, because she says it in her accent and you can’t really ask her to repeat it. She frowns all the time but is not a mean person and doesn’t mind, I don’t think, that I just call her Maryam. She must be about fifty or so, but I wouldn’t be surprised at anything in a twenty-five-year range above or below that.

The three of us sit in a line facing one wall of our room, Maryam by the door, me, then Percy by the window. It’s one long desk with a computer, telephone and headset for each of us, but dividers separate us so we can have privacy to talk to potential customers. Behind us, there used to be only a wall, but now they’ve put Tammy at a card table against it. There isn’t very much room, so Tammy’s facing the window, and our backs are facing her side.

Why did they put her in here? There’s only room for three.

‘There’s only room for three,’ whispers Percy, but he has to lean towards me to do this and he falls off his stool. ‘I have an inner-ear problem,’ he says to Tammy and the boss, standing back up. ‘It affects my balance.’

3

‘Everyone here has a sales quota,’ says the boss. ‘It’s not a bad one, not a very high one, but it’s important that you meet it each week.’

Tammy nods. I don’t like the way she nods.

‘Because if you don’t,’ the boss puts his face close to Tammy’s, ‘we’ll have to send you to the end of the hall.’

Tammy laughs. No one else does. The boss smiles, but it’s not a laughing kind of smile.

‘And what’s at the end of the hall?’ says Tammy, still thinking it’s all for fun.

‘Only people who don’t meet their quota ever find out,’ says the boss.

‘And no one’s returned to tell the tale?’ Still smiling, still laughing.

‘I’m sure you’ll meet your quota just fine.’

Tammy’s forehead wrinkles a bit at how seriously the boss says this. She opens her mouth again but then closes it.

‘You’ve already met your colleagues, yes?’ The boss gestures towards the three of us on this side of the room. We all nod.

‘They introduced themselves this morning when I came in,’ says Tammy.

That was only because we were discussing why there was a card table with a new computer, a new phone and a new headset crammed in the corner where Percy used to slide his chair back when he needed a few minutes’ break. In walked Tammy. The room was too small not to say hello.

‘Boss?’ says Percy.

‘Yes, Percival,’ says the boss.

(‘Everyone calls me Percy,’ Percy said to Tammy this morning.)

‘I’m wondering if Tammy’s going to be, you know, comfortable.’

‘Comfortable?’ says the boss.

‘Yeah, in that small corner, like,’ says Percy, looking at the floor, scratching the back of his neck. ‘It’s usually three to a room, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, Percival, you’re correct,’ says the boss, still with the not-laughing kind of smile. ‘It is usually three to a room, but just now we haven’t an extra space to slot Tammy in.’

‘All the other rooms are full?’

‘All the other rooms are full.’

‘No one’s gone to the end of the hall lately,’ says Tammy, already trying to make a joke. No one laughs. Tammy doesn’t notice.

‘It’s only temporary, Percival,’ says the boss. ‘I trust you’ll make our newest sales representative as comfortable as your colleagues made you on your arrival.’

Maryam and I ignored Percy for a week. He replaced Karen, who had gone to the end of the hall. We hadn’t really liked her, but we were surprised she hadn’t met quota. It really isn’t a very high quota.

‘Of course, boss,’ says Percy.

‘Good,’ says the boss. ‘If you have any questions, Tammy, I’m sure these three will be more than happy to help. I’ll let you all get to work.’ He leaves without looking at anyone. Maryam from Africa gives a ‘hmph’ to the whole thing.

4

‘What you have to consider,’ I say into my headset, ‘is what would a woman like yourself do if an intruder broke in one night when you were on your own with the children?’

‘I’d call Emergency Services.’

‘What if he cut the phone lines?’

‘I’d let my rottweiler do what rottweilers do.’

‘What if he’d brought minced beef with poison in it to put your rottweiler out of commission?’

‘He’s very persistent, this intruder.’

‘They always are, madam. I assure you, it’s not a laughing matter.’

‘I’d spray him with mace.’

‘You’ve left it in the car.’

‘I don’t have a car.’

‘You’ve left it at your friend’s house when you were showing her how to work it.’

‘I’d scream.’

‘He’s taped your mouth while you slept.’

‘After he poisoned my rottweiler and cut the phone lines.’

‘There’s been a rash of similar crimes in your area, ma’am. I’m only reporting the facts.’

‘Do you even know my area?’

I check the list. There’s no town name, but luckily I recognise the dialling code.

‘Derby, madam.’

‘Listen, this horror show has been very amusing, but I really must—’

‘What if he went for your children first and made you watch?’

‘That’s not funny.’

‘As I’ve said, madam, it never is. We offer self-defence training for the entire family.’

‘My daughter is five.’

‘Never too young to learn where to kick.’

‘It’d frighten the life out of her.’

‘I beg to differ, madam. Knowing a few basic moves might boost her confidence right at the time she’s about to enter school. Think about bullies, madam.’

‘Five, for pity’s sake.’

‘Most karate black belts start at three, madam.’

‘You’re making that up.’

I am. ‘I assure you I’m not, madam. One of the major positive points that clients have told us is that the self-defence classes have given them the appearance of confidence, and over 90 per cent have never even been forced to use their training.’

‘And that’s a selling point, is it?’

‘An armed world is a safe world, madam.’

‘I suppose so …’

‘Why not make your world a little safer, madam? Why not do yourself and your daughter, no matter how young, the service of being able to face the world with one more resource?’

‘Anything to help me sleep at night, is that right?’

‘That’s right, madam. Couldn’t have said it better myself.’

5

‘So what exactly is at the end of the hall?’ says Tammy.

We’re eating our lunches. The company doesn’t have a canteen, so we have to eat at our desks. I have a cheddar and ham sandwich that I make five of on a Sunday. By the smell of it, Maryam from Africa has a cold curry. Percy seems to have just pickles. His wife sometimes forgets to go shopping, he says. Tammy has gone outside to the sandwich shop down on the corner and got herself some kind of leafy salad and a fruit drink. We spend all our mornings talking on the phone, so lunch is usually a quiet affair. Not for Tammy, apparently.

‘It is what the boss says it is,’ I say.

‘All he said is that only people who don’t meet quota know what it is,’ says Tammy.

‘Exactly,’ I say.

‘That doesn’t make sense,’ she says.

‘It is what it is,’ says Percy, who has to steady himself with one hand when he looks up to say this.

‘Is it metaphorical, like?’ asks Tammy.

‘No, it’s just down that way,’ says Percy. He jerks his thumb in the right direction.

‘I mean,’ says Tammy, openly laughing at Percy, ‘that it’s just words the boss uses to motivate us. Implied violence. Like in our sales pitch.’

‘No,’ I say, ‘it really is just down that way.’

‘But that doesn’t—’

‘You meet your quota, then you never find out,’ interrupts Maryam from Africa. Her accent is a hell of a thing, foreign and stern, like being shouted at by a vampire maid. ‘Can we eat in silence, please? I hear enough chitter chatter all day long without having my digestion interrupted by nonsense of this sort.’

6

The self-defence classes we sell have no connection with this company. We’re just the telesales firm that the self-defence people hired to push their product. I’ve never been to a class. I’ve never even seen a brochure. Neither have Maryam from Africa or Percy for all I know. So far, Tammy hasn’t asked, and I’ll bet it’s the sort of thing she would ask about, so I’m guessing that maybe she’s seen a brochure or been to a class. It would figure.

7

‘Should we invite her to the pub?’ says Percy.

‘Who?’ I ask, though who else could he be talking about?

‘Tammy.’

‘Good God, no,’ whispers Maryam from Africa.

‘It’s rude not to,’ says Percy.

‘It’s rude to ask questions all day,’ says Maryam. ‘If you invite her, I’m not coming.’

‘You never come,’ says Percy.

‘I might today, if you don’t invite her.’

We prepare ourselves for an awkward moment when the day ends, but Tammy just bags up the jumper she’s slung over the back of her chair, waves bye, and leaves.

‘The cheek,’ says Maryam.

8

I bring two pints of bitter and one pint of lager to the table. The lager is for Maryam from Africa. It seems surprising that she drinks lager, but I suppose there’s no reason she shouldn’t. I get the drinks every night, even when it’s just me and Percy, because Percy can’t be trusted to carry anything. He’s all right once he’s standing or once he’s sitting; it’s the in-between that’s tricky, and that includes leaning. The management of the Cock & Cloisters have even barred him from handling small glasses of spirits.

‘Cheers, mate,’ says Percy. Maryam from Africa nods a thank you. Percy and I each take a swig from our bitters. Maryam downs half of her pint in one long, graceful draught. It’s almost beautiful. She dabs her lip with a serviette and says, ‘I don’t like this new girl.’

‘Me neither,’ I say.

‘She’s not so bad,’ says Percy.

‘You say that about everyone,’ I say.

‘You say the boss isn’t so bad,’ says Maryam.

‘He isn’t,’ says Percy.

Maryam looks at me with eyebrows that say ‘point proven’.

‘And what kind of a name is Tammy for a grown woman?’ she says.

‘I reckon it’s American,’ I say, ‘but she doesn’t sound American.’

‘It’s South African,’ says Percy. ‘Short for Tamara.’

We stare at him.

‘How d’you know that?’ asks Maryam.

‘I asked,’ says Percy.

‘When?’ I say.

‘On the afternoon break,’ he says. ‘You were in the loo. Maryam was on the phone to her mum. It was just me and Tammy, so I asked. Polite conversation.’

Maryam hmphs again.

‘Hi everyone,’ says Tammy, suddenly appearing at our table from the cigarette haze of the pub.

‘You left before we could ask you along,’ says Percy, fast, before the rest of us even take in who Tammy is.

‘That’s all right,’ says Tammy. ‘I’d agreed to meet the boss here anyway.’ She points towards the bar, and sure enough, there’s the boss holding what looks like a pint of Guinness and a G & T. Maryam from Africa sighs and starts scooting over to make room for Tammy and the boss.

‘No need,’ says Tammy. ‘We’re sitting over there with some of the workers from the other rooms. What am I saying? I’m sure you know them better than I do.’

We all look to the corner she’s pointing at. From the silence, I gather I’m not the only one who doesn’t recognise anyone.

‘Every room is kind of its own little world,’ says Percy.

‘Of three people?’ says Tammy hysterically. Is she on drugs that she’s this upbeat? ‘Awfully small world, if you ask me.’ She punches Percy playfully on the shoulder. He falls off his chair to the green, sticky carpet. ‘Oh my God,’ says Tammy. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘Nothing to worry about,’ says Percy, helping himself back up. ‘You weren’t to know.’

We all hear the boss say Tammy’s name across the pub. He still has the drinks. He sees us, but he doesn’t come over. That’s the way everyone wants it.

‘Gotta go,’ says Tammy. ‘See you all tomorrow.’

‘I hope she doesn’t have any problem meeting her quota,’ says Percy, watching the back of Tammy move away from us.

‘She won’t,’ says Maryam from Africa. ‘Probably get the quota raised, her.’

‘And you’re married, Perce,’ I say.

‘It doesn’t mean my eye is wandering if I hope that someone doesn’t get sent to the end of the hall,’ he says.

‘Never gonna happen,’ says Maryam, before downing the rest of her pint. It’s even more beautiful when she does it this time.

9

‘I don’t mean to alarm you, madam,’ I say, ‘but it’s a fact that crime rates for Hove are through the roof this year.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘With our self-defence course, though, that fact doesn’t have to scare you.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘In fact, it’s not self-defence we’re selling. It’s peace of mind.’

‘You’ve said fact three times in a row.’

‘I believe in the product, madam.’

‘How much are you asking for it?’

‘Can you really put a price tag on peace of mind?’

‘You obviously have.’

10

Today Tammy’s nametag says ‘Tammy On Top.’ I hear her talking to a customer on the phone behind me.

‘Listen, Mrs Rosen,’ she says, ‘I got your phone number, didn’t I? Ex-directory is only a lie that keeps you from getting called by those too lazy to do further searching.’

We’re given a list of phone numbers to call every day generated by some marketing firm somewhere. It isn’t supposed to have any ex-directory numbers on it. Mine doesn’t.

‘And if I can get it, think how much more information the malevolent criminal mind is going to find out about you, Mrs Rosen. You. He’s going to come after you, and he’s going to know a lot more about you than your phone number, I can tell you that. He’s going to know when you’re alone; when you’re in your nightgown; when you make your evening cup of tea and sit down to The Times crossword. He’s going to break into your house silently. He’s going to take your phone off the hook. He’s going to come up behind you, and then he’s going to silence you. But he’s not going to knock you out, Mrs Rosen. Oh, no, he’s got better ideas than that. He’s going to keep you awake, because before he robs you, he’s … well, I hesitate to even suggest. I’d hate to give you nightmares.’

In less than another minute, she’s got Mrs Rosen, no doubt a widowed pensioner because that’s today’s target audience, to sign up for the top-of-the-line classes which include advanced jujitsu, proper use of a knife, and nighttime camouflage, all for more than what Mrs Rosen will spend on food in a year.

Jesus dammit.

11

There’s a sheet up on the wall that lists our quotas for the week and our progress towards them. We each write our daily sales numbers in a box beside our name and underneath the day. Tammy’s only been here since Wednesday. It’s Friday morning. She’s already outsold Percy and is only three behind me. The second-to-last sale I made yesterday made me reach weekly quota. Percy has to sell four more to make it, no problem really, but none of us can believe that Tammy will probably make a full week’s quota without even needing to. Tammy is in a meeting with the boss. A new employee thing, we all assume, probably accompanied by many smiles and laughs if Tammy’s performance on the quota sheet is anything to go by.

‘It’s because she’s new,’ says Maryam from Africa.

‘Aye,’ I say.

‘All that enthusiasm for the product in the first couple of days,’ says Percy.

‘It’ll wear off,’ says Maryam.

The company only gives Maryam from Africa the numbers of African women her own age, and her sales are so far beyond mine and Percy’s that her quota is higher. She passed it Wednesday morning, but she’ll only report passing it this afternoon. If they knew she’d passed it so easily, they’d raise it again, and it’s already twice the usual. She takes it easy the rest of the week, a sale here, a sale there. I’d do the same.

Tammy appears suddenly, in the way that we’re already trying to get used to, and I notice that the three of us act like guilty children getting caught doing nothing. Her nametag says ‘Tammy Triumphant’. She still has that stupid smile on her face, but she seems distracted by something.

‘There’s some kind of disturbance at the end of the hall,’ she says. She walks to her seat, almost talking to herself. ‘The boss ended the meeting to go handle it.’ We realise she’s angry. ‘He wouldn’t let me come down and see.’ She puts on her headset, already dialling the number at the top of the list. Percy, Maryam and I look at one another. We listen for sounds from the end of the hall but hear nothing. Maryam reaches over from her seat to shut the door.

Tammy’s phone picks up. ‘I know you’re alone, Mrs Wilson,’ she says.

12

Ten minutes later, the boss comes in.

‘Stay in your office,’ he says. His face is set, worried. ‘Don’t leave, no matter what you hear.’

‘What’s going on?’ says Percy.

‘Just stay here,’ he says. He looks over at Tammy. She holds his eye for a moment, then raises her eyebrows before looking back to her computer. The boss closes the door behind him. Percy looks at me.

‘What’s going on?’ he says again.

‘How should I know?’ I say.

‘Best to leave it,’ says Maryam from Africa.

‘What do you mean Best to leave it?’ Tammy says, spinning round to face us.

Maryam’s posture straightens. It suddenly looks like she’s a whole lot bigger.

‘Exactly what I say, Little Madam,’ she says. ‘Best. To. Leave. It. Get back to work.’ She looks at Percy. ‘Some of us have quotas to meet.’ Percy turns back to his terminal and starts dialling the next number.

‘Aren’t any of you curious?’ says Tammy, looking at us, exasperated. ‘They tell you to avoid the end of the hall, and you just say, Fine by me?’

I look at Maryam, who still has her eyes locked on Tammy. I look back at Tammy.

‘It’s not quite like that,’ I say.

‘Then what is it like?’ Tammy says. ‘What’s wrong with you? Don’t you want to know?’

‘Well,’ I say, ‘the reality of it is -’

‘Go look yourself if you’re so interested, Miss Missy,’ says Maryam.

‘Maryam!’ I say. Maryam looks at me.

‘The woman is not going to be satisfied until she has a look,’ Maryam says. ‘She is just gathering her courage. Well, I say leave us be with your courage-gathering and just go if you’re going to go.’

Tammy takes off her headset. She stands. ‘All right then,’ she says, ‘I will.’

‘Tammy,’ I say, ‘I really wouldn’t.’

‘And yet you can’t, or won’t, tell me why,’ she says.

Percy is also trying to mouth at Tammy not to go, but he’s on a call. It’s company policy that you never disconnect a call. Percy over-balances and hits the floor with a thud. ‘No, madam, I’m still here,’ he says, waving his hands at Tammy to stay put.

‘This is ridiculous,’ Tammy says. She looks at each one of us in turn, then opens the door and steps out.

13

‘I wish you wouldn’t have let her go,’ says Percy, finally through with his call. It was successful, leaving just three to go to make quota.

‘There is no letting involved,’ says Maryam. ‘A person chooses their own actions. We chose to stay here. She chose to go.’

‘She wouldn’t have listened to us, Perce,’ I say.

‘I suppose not,’ he says. ‘But the end of the hall,’ he says to himself, shaking his head as he starts dialling again.

14

Through the still-open door, we hear a distant scuffling, then something that might be a muted voice or it could be the air conditioning malfunctioning like it often does, then a faint crash, followed by a few more crashes, then an uncomfortable high-pitched sound, which again could be the air conditioning.

We all carry on with our calls. Maryam reaches out and closes the door.

15

Much later, the boss comes in. There is a cut across his cheek and a bandage peeking out from his shirt collar. He is walking with a limp, and there is a funny smell. Without saying a word, he walks over to Tammy’s table, folds up her jumper, puts it in her bag, picks it up and leaves. We watch him go. Percy looks at his watch.

‘Where did the day go?’ he says.

We get ready to leave, and one by one we enter today’s sales numbers on the weekly quota sheet, first Maryam, then me, then Percy.

It takes us a minute to realise we’ve had our best day ever.

the way all trends do

Nabbed! The Groomgrab¹ Phenomenon at the Turn of the Millennium

For fulfillment of the requirements of SOCI 917, ‘Methodologies, Dichotomies, Paradoxes, Iconographics, and Uncomfortable Shoes: The Millennial Nonsense and Why Everyone Made Such a Big Deal Out of It Instead of Pretending It Was Just Another Stupid Year, Which It Was.’ Professor Megan Woodhall/Sjoboen-Pimlico/Wren, Instructor, University of Western Los Angeles, Including Brentwood, Malibu, Santa Monica, and Scattered Portions of Ventura County November 30, 2015

It seems to have begun the way all trends do, with whim meeting opportunity.

The first groomgrab², as they came to be known³, can be traced back to July 14, 1999 to an area of Los Angeles then known as Westwood. James Roddick, 28, gay, single, and Anton Marshall, 27, also gay, also single⁴, were driving home from a movie when they spotted seven-year-old Aaron Booher playing ball by himself on the sidewalk. ‘“Desultory” was the word that came to mind,’ Marshall is reported to have said. Some eleven weeks later, just when groomgrabs were on the upswing, Roddick and Marshall appeared on the Sally Jessy Raphael Show to describe that historic first occurrence.

Roddick: [Booher] was just bouncing the ball, all by himself.

Marshall: It was the saddest thing.

Roddick: So Anton goes, ‘Poor kid, doesn’t look like he’s having any fun at all.’

Marshall: It was true, and you should have seen his clothes. I mean, who puts their kids outside in corduroy in July?

Roddick: Or any month?

Marshall: Really. Just because he’s seven doesn’t mean he doesn’t notice what he’s wearing.

Roddick: Right. So I said, ‘Someone should just grab him and take him to the Gap.’

Marshall: Re-do him top to bottom.

Roddick: Buy him an ice cream cone or a Mrs Field’s.

Marshall: Give him a nice time, in other words.

Sally Jessy: And that’s when you -

Roddick: That’s when we picked him up, yes.

Sally Jessy: You ‘grabbed’ him.

Marshall: Hence the name.

Three and a half hours later, Marshall and Roddick dropped Booher back on the same sidewalk, dressed in a new tan, short-sleeve, sueded crewneck sweater; khaki walking shorts; and a pair of Timberland Kids sandals. He also carried bags filled with Gap Kids polo shirts, a Guess Kids belt, a stuffed Godzilla, and a Richard Scarry book on multiples of five⁵. Booher’s parents, Mr and Mrs Donald Booher, were unaware anything had happened until Aaron returned home. The police report includes the fact that Aaron repeatedly asked his mother, his father, the police officer, anyone he could find: ‘Can I go again tomorrow?’

All arguments and counter-arguments to the practice of the ‘groomgrab’ begin here with little Aaron Booher’s question. ‘You see,’ say the grabbers, ‘Booher was never in danger and had a little fun injected into his life for the first time in ages.’ Anti-grabbers, with some merit, point out that seven year olds also often find activities like vomiting and bee-stomping fun, i.e.a seven year old is not exactly the best judge of what good, healthy entertainment is. However, the point of this paper is not to judge the action⁶, merely to map its movement across the country and see just how the country got swept away in this most peculiar of fads.

Witness Marcy ‘Pebbles’ Morrison, youngest granddaughter of (then) 9th Circuit Court Judge Bosco Morrison⁷. The younger Morrison, in her seminal Take Your Hands Back On Me!⁸, the first real study of groomgrabbing as a cultural phenomenon, reports that ‘my own, personal groomgrabbing was the most exciting couple hours of my life to date. Nothing else has come close. I would trade the best sex I ever had for that time in my childhood. In a heartbeat. It was the first time any adult had treated me like a special little human, and for no reason, just because I was there.’

Morrison goes overboard somewhat by calling her groomgrabbing an experience of feeling unconditional love⁹, but you can see her point. A research survey by the University of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Including Parts of Barbados and St Lucia conducted in 2003, roughly a year after the trend had died down, reported that the groomgrabbed children ‘overwhelmingly’ reported the grabbing as an unequivocally positive experience. Looking at the survey’s raw data, ‘overwhelming’ is actually an understatement for once. Fully 99.58 per cent answered ‘emphatically yes’ when asked if they considered their groomgrabbing to have been a good experience¹⁰. A smaller, more recent study of groomgrabbed children conducted by sociologist Zorah Blandershot-Fields at the University of Hawaii, Hilo, reported not only the same almost-impossibly-high satisfaction rate as the UMNHVIPBSL study¹¹, but also showed scholastic achievement including SAT and AP scores miles and miles above the national average¹². Naturally, in addition to the scientific studies, the anecdotal evidence is voluminous¹³.

Some excerpts:

 Ronald Laramie, Butte, Montana: ‘I didn’t even think there were any gay people in Butte, so getting groomgrabbed never really entered my mind. As far as I know, I was the only one in the whole state to be grabbed¹⁴. My grabbers were this older couple who’d apparently driven all the way down 1–90 from Deer Lodge, which, my God, has like seven people so you can just imagine the kind of risk they were taking. I was ten, and they took me to one of those pizza-arcade places, Charlie Cheese or something¹⁵. They also bought me a boxed set of The Chronicles of Narnia and this great little black suit with an antique Golden Girls tie. It was a ton of fun, and I pretty much became a celebrity. They even asked me to be Grand Marshal of the Elk Parade, which is a big deal in Butte.’

 Jessica Mankiewicz, Encino, California: ‘It happened when I was seven, and I remember it was near Halloween. My two guys were Harry and Reed. Reed was Asian, and Harry had wavy red hair. It’s funny how clear it all still is. Anyway, they asked what I wanted to be for Halloween, so of course I say Spidergirl because that movie had just come out¹⁶. So what do these guys do? They take me to the studio to get outfitted! My guess is that one of them had to work at the studio, because otherwise how would we have gotten back there? But I got this kickass little Spidergirl suit made of the same rubber they used in the movie. It weighed like 35 pounds. I dragged and sweated my way through trick-or-treating, but how cool was I that year?’

 Savon Carmichael, Carson City, Nevada: ‘I remember that I’d been kicked out yet again from my group of so-called friends. See, I was a fat little kid, and unfortunately I wasn’t even that funny which is pretty much the only thing that saves you if you’re a kid and you’re fat. Actually, my grabbers, who weren’t even black, said it’s pretty much the same thing with being gay. If you’re a sissy, you better fucking be funny, or you’re going to get your ass kicked. My grab was just the simplest thing, you know? They bought me a sweater and a watch which I still have, and I remember, of all things, this belt. This really nice entwined leather belt that didn’t have holes in it, you could just hook the little prong anywhere in the entwined leather. Do you get my meaning? It didn’t have holes in it. So I didn’t have to worry about making a new hole or being too fat for a hole. I could just wear it however. I can’t tell you how much something like that meant to me. I really believe that that little belt was a catalyst for everything I’ve achieved so far. Med school¹⁷, my beautiful wife, everything. I owe those two guys a lot.’

 Maggie Nakagama, Cadley, Georgia: “From what I’ve been told, I guess I was the first recognized fabgrab¹⁸. My couple didn’t buy me any clothes, which is what I guess happened on the groomgrabs. I remember I was playing by myself in my babysitter’s front yard, and these guys drove up and grabbed me. They left a Fendi¹⁹, and we drove to Six Flags Over Augusta. I just had the best time in the world. We spent hours there, hours, going on all these rides that my parents would never let me do, eating cotton candy, playing those parkway games. I mean, I threw up twice, but it was all in good fun. And you know, when I got back, the Fendi was still in the yard. No one had even noticed. My grabbers let me keep the flag so I could prove that it happened.’

 Hunter Poulsbo, Redding, California: ‘I guess I had kind of a weird grab. Mine took me to a mall and bought me a new outfit, but what I really wanted to do was figure out fractions. I was only nine, and I was having the damnedest time figuring them out. So when they asked me what I wanted to do next, I said, “Fractions.” And we spent the rest of the afternoon in a booth at McDonald’s doing fractions. I don’t think I would have ever cracked them if it hadn’t been for my grab.’

Working in Pairs

Most of the anecdotes mention the still-unexplained phenomenon that all groomgrabbers worked in pairs, never alone, and never more than two. It’s possible that since the first groomgrab by James Roddick and Anton Marshall happened with just the two of them an unspoken tradition formed. There is also the possibility that the still-tenuous feeling surrounding homosexuals and children²⁰added an extra note of caution to the grabbers, that is, two homosexuals together was somehow less questionable than one homosexual alone with a child²¹. Other theories include the ‘Ostensible Parental Substitution Matrix Principle’ by Dr Timothy Prong of the University of Nome, Et Al, whereby the grabbers subconsciously acted as mother/father figures as a sort of ‘Ideal Parental Pair’ to enhance the grabbee’s feeling of comfort, thereby displacing the ‘Actual Parental Dichometric Placement’ in the something-or-other for the somesuch and so on²². There is also an interesting idea put forth by the Gay and Lesbian Association for Public Statements in which the pleasure of the experience for each member of the grabber-grabbee group is enhanced by sharing it with two others rather than just one, the grabber being able to share the joy of the child with the other grabber and the child feeling as if he or she is being selected by not just one adult but by two, making the child feel all the more special.

There seems to be no consensus among the grabbers either. Given the veil of anonymity that descended shortly after the Sally Jessy Raphael interview²³, there exist only nineteen verified interviewed grabbers, all within the first two months of the trend²⁴. There is scarcely a mention of the significance or even reason for working in pairs. All grabbers seemed to act in unspoken agreement or with subconscious purpose. An (August 29, 1999) interview in the Chicago Sun Times with a grabbee known only as Colin contains the only mention this researcher could find in any of the published materials on grabbing²⁵:

“At first, my lover and I just thought it was a neat idea. You know, sort of sprucing a kid up without any of the leftover responsibility. All of the good, none of the bad. Like being a grandparent for a day. But then it just sort of took on a life of its own. It was kind of an unspoken thing between the two of us that we never mentioned and that we never talked about with anyone else until one day we saw this seven-or eight-year-old girl hopping over cracks in the sidewalk. And her hair was all ratty and her jacket was frayed, but she was having a good old time leaping over cracks. There was just this sort of feeling between me and my lover, and we grabbed her. We took her to the mall, bought her this Bugs Bunny bomber jacket that she loved and some patent leather shoes she picked out. We took her to Chinese and taught her how to use chopsticks. Then we took her back. This was before the Fendi became popular, but it turned out no one was looking for her anyway. I’ve no idea what happened to that girl, and to be honest, my lover and I don’t really talk about it. Just sort of think of it and smile together, you know?’

Colin’s remarks suggest a happy-go-lucky conspiracy, a kind of benevolent coup that one person wouldn’t have the guts to do without another to egg him on. The couples²⁶came upon the idea and it blossomed at the urging of both. This would explain the ‘euphoric’ atmosphere so many grabbees note, feeling the thrill of the danger and rule-breaking of it all. Unfortunately, given the anonymity that has remained in place for the last 15 plus years, all of this tantalizing speculation will have to remain just that.

‘A Sweepstakes Appeal’

‘I remember there was this air of excitement hanging around the neighborhood and especially the school. We’d all seen groomgrabbing talked about on TV and the web, and everyone was coming up with reasons why it would or wouldn’t happen in Monmouth²⁷. People were saying it was too small. Other people were saying that’s exactly why someone would be grabbed from Monmouth, because most of the grabs were happening in small towns. You know, it’s like when there’s a super huge Powerball Jackpot, like that one last year that got up to two billion? Everyone talks about it, everyone wants it, nobody really thinks anybody will, but everybody secretly hopes²⁸.’

Elizabeth Bopp-Twernig,

Grabbed aged seven in 2000

Bopp-Twernig mentions an aspect of groomgrabbing also discussed by Blandershot-Fields in the UHH study. She (Blandershot-Fields) writes that as the trend spread and the months passed, groomgrabbing began to take on ‘a sweepstakes appeal. The grabbings came, in a surprisingly short amount of time, to be regarded as a prize, a luck of the draw windfall which anyone’s child could win.’ Anyone else’s child, that is. According to an Us-People sidebar feature at the time, parents tended to preface any comment about groomgrabbing with something along the lines of ‘Well, my child will never be grabbed because he/she has so many friends and is so well-loved, I can’t ever imagine him/her looking quite pathetic or lonely enough to be grabbed. For everyone else, however …’

This was, of course, more or less an outright lie on the part of the parents. Economics Nobel Laureate Ken Kern-Terwilliger of the AT&T Gallup Nielsen Institute calls this phenomenon the ‘Martin Cramwell Would Be a Terrible Governor; Long Live Governor Cramwell’ Effect²⁹ in which poll participants, afraid of the opinion of the polltaker, lie about their real feelings. As a matter of fact, parents were actively placing their children in solitary spots: leaving them with only a ratty tennis ball at the public park, say, or forcing them to walk any number of miles home from school. National statistics of child neglect cases covering the years before, during, and after the height of the trend look like an especially precipitious bell curve³⁰.

Not that it mattered. Colin, in the interview quoted earlier, indicates that groomgrabbers were expert at picking out fakes:

Are you kidding? We have to spend all our lives secretly looking for other gay people in things like church and work and school. Oblivious is one thing we’re not.

Most fakes were easy to spot. As Colin puts it, ‘Children in stained white t-shirts do not bounce rubber balls off blacktop wearing Kenneth Cole shoes.’ Even more easily, all groomgrabbers usually had to do was ask if there was any doubt. Paradoxically, a child instructed to look like an appealing candidate to a groomgrabber would usually want to please the grabber so much that they would reveal the lie in an effort to win trust. Children don’t really learn irony until they get to Joseph Heller in the eighth grade.

As it is, every major study has attempted to cross-section the ‘average’ groomgrabbee and has come up lacking. Both the UMNHVIPBSL study and especially Blandershot-Fields cross-referenced, graphed, mapped, collated, coded, signified, indexed, concordanced, cataloged, enumerated, scheduled, classified, and alphabetized the grabbees until finally throwing up their hands in frustration. The youngest grabbee was four, the oldest thirteen, and about all anyone has been able to generalize is that groomgrabbees were between four and thirteen.

Grabbees were evenly split between boys and girls. They fell along racial lines at roughly the same rate as represented in the population. There were grabbings in all fifty-two current states plus Guam, with the only even mild statistical spike being a larger-than-average number of grabbings in Alaska³¹. Interestingly enough, the grabs cut across all financial and social strata as well, which would seem to contradict the point of the groomgrab. Booher, the first grabee, makes for an interesting study on this matter. West LA at the time was a fairly wealthy neighborhood. Booher, who it turned out lived in a $2 million home and had a six-figure trust fund, should not necessarily have been a test case for looking like poverty. Nonetheless, despite his wealth, as his groomgrabber Roddick said, ‘Money doesn’t always mean a kid’s not going to fall through the cracks.’ To which Marshall added, ‘Or have appropriate taste.’ The grabbers seemed to concentrate on how pathetic the grabbee seemed rather than his or her financial background. Another reason for the demographic well-roundedness of the grabbees might be the much-discussed notion of homosexuality as a vertical minority, encapsulating bits from every other group including the rich and the poor. As Blandershot-Fields writes, ‘Maybe it’s as simple as they went with what they knew. ‘

Official Reactions: A Note To Historians

Of course, groomgrabbing was, by any definition, as illegal as treason, and future historians removed from the Zeitgeist might quite credibly wonder where the hell the authorities were in all this? But picture if you will the state of the country at the time: The manned Mars mission had been sabotaged by extremist MarsFirst!ers; the Namibian Potato-Chip Debacle had its claws deep into the nation’s economy, sending unemployment into double digits; and the Argentinian War victory was turning out, thanks to the MSCNN investigation, to be even more Pyrrhic than previously thought. Malaise wasn’t even the word for it; the country was downright morose³². It’s the same reason Bonnie and Clyde and the James Brothers became cultural heroes at earlier parts of the previous century.

The Winfrey Administration, naturally, reacted to the trend with what became its legendary pragmatism. On February 17, 2001, shortly after the inauguration, the White House issued a press release stating, ‘I don’t see anyone getting hurt. In fact, I see people getting helped. What’s the problem?’ Not a single one of the over four-thousand known incidents of groomgrabbing resulted in even an arrest³³. Local politicians typically opposed it until they met someone who was groomgrabbed, then the issue just dropped³⁴. The official opinion seemed to be a need to condemn groomgrabbing, but secretly, everyone liked it and wanted it to go on.

At the bottom of it all, like so many other things about groomgrabbing, the true cause for the lack of reaction remains elusive.

The End

As does, it seems, the end of groomgrabbing. The last known groomgrabbing was on November 3, 2002³⁵, and after that, nothing. There weren’t even scattered grabs or copycat grabs. What happened? Why did it stop? It’s a circular question that leads back to why it began in the first place. A whim meets opportunity, and then the whim leaves. Blandershot-Fields touches on the subject only briefly³⁶, but suggests that groomgrabbing simply ran its course the way all trends do.

The author has another theory. Rather more than a theory, actually. An unknown fact of groomgrabbing, not shared with any of the studies so far discussed in any forum, is the fact that all groomgrabbers imparted a single instruction to all grabbees. The author knows this because, as previously stated, he was a groomgrabbee himself. He has confirmed this with numerous private interviews with other groomgrabbees³⁷ who are in agreement that the time for the instruction is near. They have graciously agreed to let the author be the first to make the instruction known, partially because this format³⁸ lends itself so nicely to rumor.

The instructions were simply, ‘Pass it on.’

The way all trends do, groomgrabbing is going to make a comeback.

The first groomgrabbing of the second wave happens sometime next month³⁹.

Ponce de Leon is a retired married couple from Toronto

From Elizabeth Bronwyn, Public Health Nurse (Ret.), Toronto, Ontario, to Dr Wayne Bronwyn, Ophthalmologist, Boston, Massachusetts. Handwritten. Mailed from unknown address, presumed to be central Australia.

Son,

As we’ve said many times, your father and I are enormously grateful to you for this trip. Our fortieth wedding anniversary has turned out to be the best we’ve ever had (except, perhaps, our always irreplaceable first). Our time here has been so wonderful, and we’ve come to know such great joy. Great Joy. How can I even say it? I can’t, son, I just can’t, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to communicate it to you in any way that you’ll understand until you’re older yourself.

We’re staying. There’s no way around it, so there it is. We’re staying. For good.

I know this is a great shock to you. Knowing you, you probably have some strong feelings on the matter, and six weeks ago, we’d have thought we were as crazy as you’re thinking right now. But such things have happened here, such wondrous, remindful things that have invigorated us. We’ve suddenly and unexpectedly rediscovered what it means to have new experiences and a new outlook. When you’re our age, I hope you’ll be lucky enough to know what it’s like to have your first completely new point of view in twenty years.

Through a friend of ours back home, we’ve already arranged the sale of the house. (We’ve known someone who’s wanted it for years; he was only too happy that we finally obliged. Don’t worry, we’re getting our money’s worth.) Because we’re from the Commonwealth, immigration doesn’t look to be a problem either, especially considering that my health and your father’s are excellent. (See what you missed when you naturalized? The only place in the world Americans are welcome to stay is America. And you, especially; a doctor in a country with no nationalized medicine. Tut tut, one last time.)

Yes, I know, what in the blazes are we thinking? After 61 years, what can I say? When you know, you know.

Your father says not to kick yourself for giving us the trip. You’ve no idea what a wonderful thing you’ve done.

All our love,

[signed]

Mom & Dad

P.S. We’ll write soon.

From Dr Wayne Bronwyn, to Derek Bell, Executive Secretary to Ambassador Margaret Gottscheid, United States Embassy, Canberra, Australia. Via facsimile.

Mr Bell:

Per our phone conversation of today, I am faxing you the letter I received from my parents, Mr Henry L. and Mrs Elizabeth ‘Beth’ R. Bronwyn, this morning.

As I cannot possibly reiterate too clearly, the letter is so utterly out of keeping with any pattern of observed behavior that I am led to conclude that they are almost certainly being held in Australia against their will through unknown circumstances or by some unknown person.

To summarize what I attempted to express over the phone, here in short are the reasons I am alarmed:

(1) My mother describes her health and the health of my father as ‘excellent.’ This cannot possibly be the case. My mother is 61 and my father 62. In addition, my father has high blood pressure, and my mother has migraine headaches. It was only after extensive consultation with their physicians that I went ahead with the gift of the trip, a trip that was originally planned at two weeks and which my parents themselves suspiciously extended to six. And for that matter, why bring the subject of their health up at all?

(2) I do not care how much anyone wants to sell a house, it seems highly unlikely that the entire transaction can be secured between two parties at entirely different points on the globe in a few weeks’ time. As they did not provide the name of the ‘friend,’ I have been unable to find out any further on the matter as of today, although I did talk to Mrs Olive Ray, a close friend of my mother’s. Mrs Ray had not heard of any such deal or of any plan of my parents’ to stay in Australia. This leads to reason number three.

(3) My mother would not have kept such a thing from Mrs Ray. She, Mrs Ray, seemed to think that the matter was not cause for much concern, that my parents had been struck by a fancy which would pass or that perhaps they were merely playing some sort of prank, the source of the prank being their ongoing enjoyment at my expense for becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen after marriage to my wife. My mother even refers to this in her letter, but in such a way as to prompt reason number four.

(4) My mother says ‘Tut tut, one last time.’ What exactly can ‘one last time’ mean? This is ominous evidence indeed.

I have included my parents’ itinerary, although they did veer from it since they extended their trip. I have also included a blown-up and darkened copy of the envelope in which the letter was sent in hopes that the postmark might be of some help.

Fax me back as soon as possible with some kind of response. My parents are elderly, and I am greatly concerned that harm has fallen them. In the meantime, I am going to do some work of my own to get to the bottom of this. I am more than prepared to fly to Australia if that is what is required.

As a naturalized citizen, I trust I can expect the same assistance from your Embassy as any native-born American. I’ll hear from you soon.

[signed]

Dr Wayne Bronwyn.

From Derek Bell to Dr Wayne Bronwyn. Via facsimile.

Dr Bronwyn:

The Embassy is in receipt of your fax dated 6 October. The fax follows our lengthy phone conversation of the same date. We are still looking into just exactly why you were mysteriously cut off, Dr Bronwyn, and also why you were not able to re-connect to my office. At any rate, on to your fax.

As I attempted to explain to you over the phone before we were cut off, I am not sure what you would like us to do in this matter. You said in our conversation that your parents were of sound mind when they left on the trip, and though it seems plausible that one older person might possibly lose their bearings on an overseas trip, it seems unlikely that both would, especially considering that you yourself felt strongly enough to send them on a trip by themselves halfway around the world. Also, while 61 and 62 are somewhat up there in years, I don’t know many people who would call that elderly. The Ambassador is 66 herself, and hale as ever. If your parents were in their late eighties, for example, I would be more inclined to lean towards some sort of mysterious circumstances or scam, again going on the inference that you believed enough in their mental states and personal health to send them on the trip in the first place.

In addition, I have never heard of any scam coming out of Australia’s center dealing with the mysterious actions of older tourists. It’s a big, red desert with a few oases, and the tourist trade there is too valuable to have missed any such scam happening on any scale. For that matter, I suddenly find myself unclear on exactly what sort of scam you might be talking about.

It is my personal tendency to read the letter from your parents at face value. Take it from a career diplomat who has been here for 18 years: this is an amazing place. Perhaps what happened is just what your parents say happened. They were rekindled by a change of landscape. It’s not unknown. Some retirees move to Florida, looking for Ponce de Leon’s Fountain of Youth, no doubt. Your parents have just chosen a different hot climate that’s farther away.

This, however, is all moot speculation, because, as you somehow failed to mention in our nearly forty-minute conversation, your parents are citizens of Canada. Although I can understand that you were quite excited and might have easily forgotten such a detail, the fact is, our office has no jurisdiction over them whatsoever. I suggest if you wish to pursue the matter that you contact the Canadian Embassy. I have included their phone and fax numbers.

Might I also suggest that if you do in fact call our good friends to the north, you might receive closer care to your problem if you choose, shall we say, somewhat less frank language than you engaged in during our phone conversation. Your fax strikes quite a nice tone (perhaps Mrs Bronwyn helped?), and this is probably the best route with our Canadian friends. Remember, they’re like Americans, only more British.

Yours,

[signed]

Derek Bell

From Elizabeth Bronwyn, to Dr Wayne Bronwyn. Handwritten. Mailed from unknown address, presumed to be central or southeastern Australia.

Son,

I’m sorry for the delay. We had intended to write you immediately with our new address, but so much has gone on in the past few weeks that there’s been barely a moment to put pen to paper. A new friend of ours has set up a post office box for us (address enclosed) in Binturang Springs, which is where we’ve been staying for the past several days. We needed to establish a permanent address for immigration purposes. We hope to have a resident visa sometime soon. As it is, we’ve decided to spend the remaining time on our tourist visa traveling around this beautiful country.

I was planning on telling you all this in our phone conversation yesterday, but you were so upset, it was difficult to get any words out. Then we were somehow cut off. Must be these international phone lines.

I do understand that you’re upset, son. I can certainly understand the shock at your parents suddenly pulling up stakes and moving 11,000 miles but, once again, what can I say? We’ve found a new outlook, a new life. As vague as that is, it’s the best way I can put it. Not all older people, not most, want simply to wind their days down in a sameness that lasts until you stop breathing. Why die before you die? Your father and I have done something daring for probably the first time since we got married. Out of character? Sure. But isn’t acting out of character part of character, too? I hope we can talk again soon, and I can try to convince you one more time that sometimes these things just happen.

One more thing, I hardly think that moving away when you’re 39 years old constitutes ‘abandonment.’ You have Jane and the kids. We only ever visited once or twice a year; hardly lifeblood to either of us, if we’re honest. I’ll chalk up most of your remarks to shock at our decision. Hopefully soon you’ll come to understand.

As I’ve said, we’re very, very busy, so I’ll end here. I think it’s clear, given the phone trouble, that letters are a better means of communication for us. All of our mail will be forwarded from the P.O. Box, so feel free to write at any time. We’ll get the letter and respond from whatever port of call we’ve set our feet onto.

Love to everyone,

[signed]

Mom & Dad

From Dr Wayne Bronwyn to Philip Wilder, KBE, Ambassador, Commonwealth of Canada, Canberra, Australia. Via Facsimile.

Mr Ambassador Wilder,

As I have received next to no help from your ‘assistant,’ I am writing to you directly and demanding your help. My parents, Canadian citizens, have fallen prey to mysterious circumstances and are either being held in Australia against their will or are mentally incapable of making the proper decision to return home. I have included two letters from my mother as proof that something is amiss. I have also included my correspondence with the American Embassy in Canberra, who were of no help whatsoever. I trust you’ll make it a matter of national pride to do better.

To be frank, my parents have always been stilted people of limited imagination. I know that sounds cruel coming from a son, but I mean it lovingly. They have lived in the same house in Toronto for my entire life. My father was an accountant for 40 years, my mother a nurse for 38. They are just not given to flights of fancy, certainly nothing as ridiculous as selling everything they own on the spur of the moment and moving halfway around the world. These are people of limited horizons! For the past five decades, their idea of a good time has been a drive to the same lake once a season! It took months of convincing for them to even take this one vacation, and I nearly had to force them onto the plane myself. I only persisted because of what my wife calls my ‘dogheaded dedication to the impossible task,’ a stubbornness you would do well to keep in mind.

Additionally, I spoke to my mother on the phone a few days ago for the first time since they reached this ‘decision.’ Her answers to my questions were vague and directionless. She kept saying ‘these things just happen’ and ‘I can’t explain it.’ Even when I pressed, she was unable to give me a straight answer.

This is clearly a cry for help. Something is wrong. Something is so obviously wrong that I cannot believe the cavalier attitude taken by some of those on your staff. And this plus the fact that I was disconnected four times in a row. I am providing you with the post office box that my mother gave for her address, and I want someone to look into it. I was a Canadian citizen until I married my lovely wife thirteen years ago. I can only hope that my expatriate country can give me assistance that can only be considered just and decent.

I want some answers. As I have said, if I get none, I will come to that godforsaken country myself.

Yours,

[signed]

Dr Wayne Bronwyn

From Ambassador Philip Wilder, KBE, to Dr Wayne Bronwyn. Via Facsimile.

My dear Dr Bronwyn,

You’ve developed quite a reputation in our office for your persistence. I am not sure whether it is Canadian pugnaciousness reborn or a healthily adapted American tenacity, but you most certainly have gotten our attention, which, I trust, was your whole point.

I have reviewed all your correspondence, as well as the notes my talented deputy, Anita, compiled on your telephone calls. I wonder, as a sidenote, whether you have perhaps misread as ‘cavalier’ nothing more than the relaxed attitude folks tend to adopt in a tropical clime. Remember, it is deep, glorious spring here, where our outlooks, while hopefully remaining professional, have nonetheless gained a rosy tint. Don’t judge us harshly, Dr Bronwyn, the sun here would cause your president himself to not only remove his shirt, but to not feel embarrassed about it.

I must say that my first inclination is to agree with my esteemed associate in the American office. While the behaviour of your parents may be accurately labeled extraordinary, I would say it is delightfully rather than ominously so. I am 63 years of age myself, and although I will miss dearly the people and trees of my beloved Vancouver, I’m staying in this wonderful place when I retire this autumn. And me, a knighted civil servant, no less, giving up my home country for one that will probably discharge the monarchy any moment now.

But I digress. Because of your persuasive, albeit somewhat quixotic tactics, I have had my office look into the matter of your parents as much as is legally and ethically possible. Your parents have broken no laws, remember, and not everyone sees the obvious foul play that you do. Nevertheless, your commitment to your belief is stirring enough for us to have uncovered the following:

1 Your mother and father requested immigration proceedings on September 21, some weeks before your mother’s first letter. Perhaps given your reaction to the news, she was deliberating on ways to soften the blow, as it were.

2 A post office box was indeed established in Binturang Springs. We have been in contact with the clerk who rented the box. He remembers the box being rented by a young woman. He says that she was friendly and otherwise unremarkable except that her voice seemed slightly accented, meaning of course, slightly accented Australian. This would seem to be the ‘new friend’ that your mother refers to in her second letter. As you can see, despite your accusations, your letters were indeed read. Let me also, as a sidenote, just say that Binturang Springs is a very small town, as are most in central Australia. Tourists have a very high visibility, making the likelihood of foul play even more remote as any larcenous behaviour could not possibly be kept hidden for long. It’s a big place, the red centre, but an empty one. You can see from one horizon to the other and everything in-between. Only the aborigines know the secrets, and they’re not telling.

3 Though we have checked some cursory leads tracking older travelers from Binturang, this office has been unable to locate your parents. Apart from simply sending a letter and asking them, finding out where your parents’ mail is being forwarded is illegal unless we have clear just cause, and I am sorry, Dr Bronwyn, I don’t see just cause anywhere in this situation.

Perhaps you should just believe what your parents have told you and be happy for them in their newfound youth, if you will. And frankly, even if you will not, it is my duty to inform you that this office will aid you no further. Again, I can understand your passion and even forgive the rough edges with which you pursue it, but I can see no reason for my office or the government of Canada to put more resources into what is bordering on harassment of two adults acting legally.

You are welcome to follow through on your wish to write the Canadian Foreign Affairs Ministry concerning our actions in this matter. I am confident we will be easily acquitted.

Having said all this, if more, or rather any hard evidence comes to light or if you are not satisfied with ending your investigation here, which I strongly suspect is the case, you may want to contact the Australian Ministry of Immigration here in Canberra. They would certainly be interested if there were any hint of immigration fraud. There is clearly not; I am only suggesting a tactic you might use, again, if you insist on pursuing the matter. I make the suggestion because I believe in your sincerity, despite your casually deleterious way with spoken language.

If you decide to come to this country as part of your quest, might I suggest that you not miss the opportunity to visit any one of the larger cities’ Royal Botanical Gardens? The bulk of tourist highlights are well-covered in most guidebooks, but I find that visitors often overlook the abundant gardens available here. Most are lovely for a leisurely stroll, like those I used to take in Stanley Park, only not so often gray.

I will leave you here, Dr Bronwyn. Good luck in your future endeavours, and please refrain from contacting this office in the future.

Your humble servant,

[signed]

Ambassador Philip Wilder, KBE

From Elizabeth Bronwyn, to Mrs Olive Ray, Public Health Nurse (Ret.), Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Handwritten. International Express Mail from the Cavalcade Hotel, Perth, Australia.

Ollie,

Here are the tickets and the cashier’s check. Henry and I can’t wait to see you. We can’t wait for you to see us. You won’t believe the change, and I mean that in ways you can’t possibly imagine. You won’t regret coming, and I have very little doubt we can persuade you to make the same decision we did. It’s unbelievable here, Ollie, in all the best ways.

Your plane leaves on the 3rd and, because of the way the dateline works, arrives here on the 5th. We’ve become close to a young couple with whom we have a lot in common (you’ll see what I mean; Henry says, ‘Boy, will you ever!’). They’re going to pick you up at the airport. Don’t worry, we’ll see each other shortly afterward. You can write to Paul after you get here and explain everything. Trusting me on this issue is essential.

Swallow your trepidation and brush away your fears. If there was any time in your life to act in the face of caution, it’s now. You’ve earned it after all these years of living. We both know you’re only old when you decide to be. Decide not to be, Ollie.

Looking forward to seeing you,

[signed]

Liz

From Elizabeth Bronwyn, to Dr Wayne Bronwyn. Handwritten. Mailed from unknown address, presumed to be central Australia.

Son,

There is going to come a day when I’m finally going to be fed up with you. I thought today might be that day. I’m referring, of course, to the outlandish, embarrassing, and ultimately infuriating phone call I have just been put through with the gentleman from the Australian Ministry of Immigration.

Do not think, as has been your tendency for far too long for me to expect you to act any differently, that it was anything but you that got me angry. The gentleman was quite polite and friendly, even charming, as he went through his list of humiliating questions about supposed actions of ours that you’ve insinuated. Questions about our sanity, our health, our finances.

Then, my dearest son, questions about our alleged criminal pasts, our financial dire straits in previous years, our possible willingness to smuggle drugs. You couldn’t have implied diamonds or rare birds, could you? Obviously you thought it would direct them to us most quickly (and it did), but I would have thought that even in your haste you might have realized that the idea of two sixty-something drug smugglers, from Canada no less, is nothing short of absurd.

How dare you, you child? How dare you slander us so grotesquely because you are simply too selfish to see that we’ve acted of our own free will? Being unable to abide our decision is one thing, but what you’ve done is nothing short of dangerous. I’m trying my hardest to view this as some misguided idea of loving behavior on your part, but I am having difficulty.

Almost the only thing that keeps me from cutting you off completely is that the good people at the Ministry of Immigration clearly believe you’re as loony as we think you are. I doubt most suspected drug smugglers get off with a simple phone interview. Can you imagine in the midst of your frenzy how awful such an accusation could have been for us? I’m sure you think everything would have turned out okay, but what if it hadn’t? What if things had gone horribly wrong? What if they weren’t so inclined to listen? What if your father and I had had to sit in jail while we waited for you to come and clear things up? Is any of this getting through to you?

And all this as we’re suffering the death of Olive Ray, which, in your investigative zeal, you must have discovered and, it must be concluded, disregarded its impact on your father and me. We were unable to return for the funeral, so if you showed up and looked for us there, I hope you at least had the good grace to leave some flowers.

How dare you? That’s my benediction, son. Consider it clearly. How dare you?

[signed]

Mother.

From Dr Wayne Bronwyn to Brian Coppedge, Senior Investigator, Australian Ministry of Immigration, Canberra, Australia. Handwritten. Mailed from Hughes Gaol, Darwin, Australia.

Mr Coppedge:

I am writing this letter to you because of the increasing difficulties I have had in getting through to your office by phone, a problem exacerbated by the limited phone privileges I have in here. I find it hard to believe, in a modern Western country like Australia, my phone calls would be cut off so often, even when I’m calling from this little bunch of shacks you people have chosen to name after Darwin.

In a final attempt in what I see as my increasingly futile search for my parents, I will recap the events that led me here to try and get someone, anyone, in this godforsaken shithole desert of a country to help me track them down.

As you know (as I have explained to your belligerent staff many, many times), a week after the last letter I received from my mother (enclosed), I received a phone call from Paul Ray, son of Olive Ray, a close friend of my mother. As indicated in my mother’s letter, Mrs Ray suffered a massive stroke and died shortly after this whole farrago began. Because of funeral arrangements and family responsibilities, Paul Ray was unable to go through his mother’s effects in any detailed fashion for several weeks, but when he did he discovered a letter from my mother urging Mrs Ray to fly to Perth (enclosed) along with plane tickets and a check for expenses.

Paul Ray then contacted me. He indicated that he had spoken to my mother the day after the funeral, when she called to speak with Mrs Ray. He told her the news of Mrs Ray’s death and said that my mother took it badly. He was surprised that my mother didn’t already know, as he remembered the two women being friends, but, having had somewhat limited contact with his mother for several years, he thought nothing further of it until he found the letter and plane tickets. He told me that my mother made no mention of inviting Olive to Australia and did not even mention that she was calling from there. How many more odd circumstances do I need to point out before someone will take me seriously?

I then contacted your office again (even after you had done such a botched job of investigating their activities. A phone interview for possible drug smugglers? What’s wrong with you people?) and offered this new information. I was rebuked and, indeed, told to stop ‘harassing’ my own parents. Harassing? I’m trying to get to the bottom of a very serious situation. Why can’t anyone see that I am motivated by nothing but compassion and concern?

Receiving no assistance whatsoever from your office (or in fact anyone at all throughout this whole ordeal; I’ve already sent you copies of the letters from the American and Canadian Embassies that show just how outrageously I’ve been handled), I took a trip to this blackened landscape myself, and in the past six weeks, I have been to every bare corner of it.

I first went to Binturang Springs, the location of the post office box, and talked to a Mr George Kingfisher, manager of the inn where my parents initially stayed. After trying with limited success to convince him of the desperation of the situation, he finally directed me to Henry Badgery, a tour operator who had conducted my parents on a personalized tour of the surrounding desert area. Mr Badgery said that he remembered my parents, that they were pleasant people, that they had befriended a young married couple, but he told me nothing more. I did not and do not trust this Mr Badgery, let me tell you right now. I am almost certain he’s a liar.

I then contacted the Binturang Springs Post Office, where I was thwarted in my attempt to discover my parents’ current forwarding address by a callous postal clerk named Armando Bravada who refused to bend the rules despite the obvious gravity of the situation.

Having received no help, I embarked upon what ended up being a nearly complete circle of your country. I flew to Perth, where my parents had earlier planned to meet Olive Ray if she had been able to use the tickets they sent. I visited the hotel indicated on the return address of the Express Mail to Mrs Ray, but no one gave me any useful information. I then headed east along your southern coast, following backwards the middle part of my parents’ original itinerary through impossibly named towns like Wagga Wagga and Wollongong. I took a dip down to Hobart, then back up to Melbourne, through Canberra (where your office was closed due to some royal holiday or other), then to Sydney and up to Brisbane and Cairns. Occasionally, I came across people who thought they recognized my parents’ names but not the pictures I provided. On the whole, I found out very little.

It finally occurred to me while driving the considerable miles between resorts scattered along your northeast coastline that my method had been a thoroughly inefficient way to canvass for my parents. Actual Australia was much bigger than the picture I contained in my mind. It seems obvious, but I have been recently upset and my concern has sometimes taken over the better part of my reason. I realized there were a lot more people here than I’d thought, and I couldn’t just go looking without some guidelines. Again, embarrassingly obvious, but once you get an idea in your head, it’s hard to shake it.

It was at this point that I returned to Binturang Springs and, unable to find either Mr Kingfisher or Mr Badgery, I paid another visit to Mr Bravada.

Having had some long hours in my cell to reflect, I can honestly say that I regret that I acted like less than a gentleman to Mr Bravada. Although I would hardly regard my contact with him as ‘assault’ or ‘false imprisonment,’ it would seem that the Western Australia authorities disagreed enough to contact their Darwin counterparts. If I ever see Mr Bravada again, I would do my best to apologize. My arrest, though extremely inconvenient, is beside the point, however.

I was able to get two interesting bits of information out of Mr Bravada. One was my parents’ current forwarding address here in Darwin (enclosed). The second was a telling comment about this Mr Badgery. Mr Bravada didn’t know all that much about Mr Badgery (or was keeping it to himself) but was able, after exhaustive interrogation, to tell me, and I quote, ‘Some people say that he [Mr Badgery] takes old folks out into the bush and brings young folks back.’

Due to an unexpected loss of consciousness, Mr Bravada was unable to tell me anything more, but my concern for my parents’ wellbeing immediately increased. Using the address Mr Bravada had provided, I flew to Darwin and went straight to my parents’ hotel. The front desk clerk told me that there were a Mr and Mrs Bronwyn checked in. The young woman had not checked them in herself, but a bellhop thought he remembered a young couple by that name. Undoubtedly, these are the ‘friends’ my mother mentions in her letters. He believed that they had mentioned an older couple travelling with them and perhaps (there was some confusion) he had misheard who, in fact, was named Bronwyn.

You can imagine my dismay that it was at this moment, when I finally had some answers within reach, that I was accosted by the Darwin Police and taken away.

So, here I sit in Hughes Jail (or Gaol, is it?), awaiting heaven knows what fate, and I’m asking one last time for your help, Mr Coppedge.

I’ve been thinking through scenarios that might have engulfed my parents, and I think I’ve figured it out. It involves Mr Badgery, and I shudder to think of it. He ‘takes old folks out and brings young folks back in.’ It’s clearly some sort of immigration scam. Mr Badgery lures some older folks into a tour group, takes them out to a desolate area, does dire misdeeds to them, and replaces them with younger couples who want to immigrate who then assume the identities of the ‘older folks.’ I am sure Mr Badgery makes a tidy profit.

Murder is what I’m talking about, Mr Coppedge, something much more serious than these trumped-up ‘assault’ charges for which I sit imprisoned. I contend that my parents have been murdered by Mr Badgery and their identities have been assumed by a younger couple who have written letters as my mother saying that they’ve ‘suddenly decided to stay.’ It’s the only explanation that fits.

Unless, of course, Mr Badgery has actually found a fountain of youth, but even I am not yet desperate enough to believe that.

It’s so clear, Mr Coppedge, so clear what’s happened. I apologize for any past rash behavior on my part in my eagerness to find the truth, but there is murder most foul here and I humble myself and beg you one last time to investigate.

Very truly yours,

[signed]

Dr Wayne Bronwyn

Letter from Brian Coppedge, Australian Ministry of Immigration, to Dr Wayne Bronwyn, Darwin Jail. Hand delivered by messenger.

Dr Bronwyn:

Let me begin by saying that you have become the stuff of legend here at the Immigration Ministry, right alongside the Filipino man who had a sex-change operation so he could marry his Australian friend and become a citizen (made even stranger by the fact that the gentleman knew that we allow homosexual partners to immigrate yet went ahead with the operation anyway) and the Romanian woman who was not satisfied with just one Australian husband and somehow managed to wed four. You’re going into our folklore as the Son Who Harangued His Parents Right Out of Their Own Country.

You may well find this insulting, but, after your verbal tirades, threats, and extraordinary actions, I feel little compunction to hide my personal distaste for you. You should, however, take it as a measure of pride. Even after you’ve left this country for good, which, I assure you, will be sooner rather than later, you’ll be remembered.

All rancor aside (or most anyway), your behaviour has been of such astonishing effort that, as a parting gift, we have investigated enough of your claims to file this matter away permanently.

Although we have yet to schedule an in-person interview (one step among many in the long immigration process: immigration doesn’t just happen, you know - we do look into things), I have spoken to your mother several times by telephone. She has been helpful in providing both factual details of their vacation as well as illuminating anecdotes about her son’s particular personality quirks. I can safely say that there is no doubt in my mind that your parents are safe and sound and simply wish to immigrate to this great country. I have also spoken with Mr Kingfisher, general manager of the Hollingsworth Hotel in Binturang Springs, as well as Messrs Badgery and Bravada, who, at the behest of our office, has generously agreed to not press charges in exchange for your prompt expulsion from the country.

First of all, Dr Bronwyn, your murder claim is little short of ridiculous. As I’ve said, I have spoken many times to your mother by phone myself, and though she is somewhat confused and embarrassed by your persistence, she is vibrant, energetic, and very much alive. She provided details on the sale of their house back in Toronto, details which we independently verified with Canadian authorities, details which no ‘immigrant imposter’ could possibly know. In addition, we were able to obtain credit card receipts (matched again with cooperation from your mother) from various hotels along their entire itinerary, and signatures from the earlier part of your parents’ trip match exactly with signatures from later. If your parents had, in fact, been replaced in some bizarre immigration scam, I would have thought you would have noticed a change in the handwriting of your mother’s letters. No one is an exact enough forger to fool a son.

As for Mr Badgery, we have discovered that he is a quite well-liked fixture in Binturang Springs, having led tours as far back as anyone can remember, something along the lines of forty years or more. I highly doubt that he could keep any murderous scheme afloat for four-plus decades and not raise an eyebrow until now. As for Mr Bravada, he recalls saying nothing along the lines of ‘old folks going in and young folks coming out,’ but then again, he remembers rather little of your attack, so traumatized was he at the literal and figurative browbeating he underwent at your hands. Once again, you may count yourself very lucky that Mr Bravada has agreed to let you move back to America rather than press charges. You may also count yourself lucky that our office chose to make the case to Mr Bravada to do so. There was strong sentiment here to let you sit in Hughes Gaol for as long as they would have you. However, we are a compassionate country, and as your mental capacities are clearly under some strain, we will choose to believe that you are acting outside your normal operating behaviour.

And that, Dr Bronwyn, is that. We shall do no further investigating, though some of us here believed that we should have ceased after the illegal drug wild goose chase you tried to send us on. The case is closed. We are more than happy to welcome your parents into the country, and we are just as happy to usher you out. Accompanying this letter is an order to escort you to the airport and onto a plane back to America. Do not attempt to enter Australia again, Dr Bronwyn. It would be unwise.

As a last note, may I implore you to get some help once you arrive home? As you are a physician yourself, I hope that you will be able to somehow objectively see your current state of mind and the actions that have resulted. Take our decision not to press charges as a second chance to get some professional assistance for what has clearly been a shock to your psyche. You might start with fear of abandonment issues.

I am confident that you will reject these entreaties out of hand, but despite what you might think, we are

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