Just Send the Box Of Doughnuts to Brinkman, Oklahoma

My name is Charlie Howitzer Randolph, and instead of lipstick, I wear duct tape.

That was a metaphorical statement, of course. I don’t actually go around wearing a piece of brightly colored duct tape to coordinate with whatever outfit I’m wearing, I would have to end up explaining the duct tape to every person and their mother and it would end up causing more trouble than it solved in the first place. But man, oh man, do I wish that I could.

The metaphor that the duct tape stood for was that I do not speak. Ever. It sucks. I expect a thank you card from everyone who reads this from now until forevermore because I am quite done with putting this much effort into saving your miserable little lives, and yet unfortunately I have morals and must continue doing so.

Neon orange envelopes, everyone. 

Let me explain it this way. Imagine that one day, you are a kindergartner. You think like a kindergartner. You act like a kindergartner. Your favorite food is popsicles dipped in ketchup because you are a kindergartner and kindergartners are weird little things with no taste whatsoever.

 Now that you’ve got that picture solidly in your head, you can start picturing that kindergartner you is over playing with kindergartner Jeff at---where else—kindergarten. Poor, sweet, naïve little kindergartner Jeff has a kiddie crush on another kindergartner--let’s call her Suzie. Now, on this day, kindergartner you is feeling positively evil and decides that Jeff and Suzie should become the kindergarten version of Romeo and Juliet, so you lean over and tell kindergartner Jeff in the most innocent of ways,

“I heard Suzie got hit by a bus.”

Sounds totally evil, right?

Naturally, Jeff goes off and cries in the corner, then decides to make Suzie a macaroni paper plate at craft time to make her feel better during craft time. Kindergartner you laughs at your admittedly quite funny joke and thinks nothing of it—until kindergartner you gets home later that day and finds out that Suzie did, indeed, get hit by a bus.

Confession time.

Kindergartner you actually isn’t kindergartner you, they're kindergartner me. And that last story wasn’t “Charlie Howitzer Randolph’s Fun Imagination Story Time”, it was more like “Charlie Howitzer Randolph’s Actual Lifetime Event That was Possibly Traumatic”.

See. I have this thing where any rumor I spread comes true.

No. It is not cool.

It’s really not even rumors, either. That’s just a thing I say to make people slightly less terrified of me by making it sound like I have a choice in the manner. The more accurate description of what I do would be; Charlie says words, words come true.

Back when I used to talk about it with people (read: relatives who would ask about it at thanksgiving and the occasional FBI agent), they would always try to make me feel better about it by telling me about how it was kind of like a superpower.

Yeah. No.

If I one day told my dad that I thought maybe that my aunt Agnes had cancer because I heard from a friend of a friend of a cousin, boom! She now has cancer!

Or if I were looking for a spot to park at the zoo and I told mom that I thought I saw one open three rows back, we may come back around to see that the three cars that were in and around the spot I thought I saw open had compacted themselves into the next two cars over just to prove me right, which was really nice of the cars but not nice of the owners to sue us.

Doing it on command and say, rumoring myself a nice doughnut with neon sprinkles into existence at any time of day...now that would be a superpower. But unfortunately, I don't get to have that kind of fun with things.

It used to be kinda funny. Back when I was just learning how to talk I would drive the newscasters nuts just because they would start broadcasting and go: *deep news caster voice* "breaking news. The Queen has now-- goo goo blep da da? Jeff, Why is this on my report again?" I still watch some of those occasionally and laugh at the poor sop who got trolled by a baby 5,000 miles away.

There are so many bad parts about this whole gig that I feel rightfully entitled to complain about them for a lot more, so buckle in and grab some popcorn.

How about friends. You wanna hear about friends? When it first got out that I could rumor stuff into existence, I got insanely popular. Like, so popular that if I had wanted to, I could have been called the Neon Queen and run an extortion racket of everyone’s pop tarts. Yes, the idea occurred to me.

At first, I got so many requests to say things. “Hey, can you say that this guy likes me?” , “You should tell everyone that I’m making the cheer team.”, “You need to say that on Friday of next week a herd of screaming goats will disrupt gym class.” For a while, I took the requests--started actually talking to people again for a bit. Said some weird stuff. Told the vice principal that the Governor of Oklahoma had decided to dye his hair purple. And guess what? Every single request went wrong. The guy did “like” the girl—in the school play they both ended up in. The one guy who asked to be on the cheer team made it but gave himself a compound fracture showing off his first meet and missed the entire year. The herd of screaming goats was the only thing I can remember going exactly as planned, but they traumatized the entire class of fourth graders, so how was that expected to work? (Never heard back about the Governor, though. That one might have worked.)

I really think it was the screaming goat fiasco that did my newfound popularity in—it showed the school just how badly I could screw things up. After that, all the people who would hang out with me to ask me to say things all left and I began the rest of my life alone.

Or how about the sheer amount of bookwork needed for this gig, hmm? Bet you didn’t think of that one. It just so happens that the only way for me not to spread a rumor is for me to be able to say things that are absolute facts. Therefore, reading. And no, I don’t get to have lots of knowledge about the inner workings of the secret codes for the CIA or the classified ways into the White House, I get to memorize the specifics of my boot strings so they don’t strangle me one day if I were to accidentally make an offhand comment about them. Mom says I can learn about the inner workings of the codes of the CIA if I ever start wearing the CIA on my feet.

So, yes. I expect that thank you card addressed to Charlie Howitzer Randolph, 34 Main, Brinkman, O.K. And possibly a box of thank you doughnuts with neon sprinkles.