Mythomania

Another fantastic spot for a person like me is a shopping centre. A shopping centre is a fancy way of saying outdoor mall or shopping district. Best retail centers for me have trees and umbrellas. Nobody wants to talk to anyone while they’re roasting like a worm surrounded by cement, especially a stranger. 

This is why I like my spot. There are not enough trees. However, the stores make sure there’s at least some artificial shade on the sidewalks. My story takes place in this spot on a sunny summer day. 

Before I started my afternoon of tricks, I wanted a treat. Something cold and sweet, ice cream would hit the spot. My adventure began by grabbing some frozen custard over at Foo’s Fabulous because it’s basically the same thing. While I’m there, I try convincing the kid who’s mixing candy with my frozen dessert that diet soda isn’t bad for you. Drinking diet pop is no different than drinking water.

“What about all of the fake sugars and chemicals?” asks the Teenager of Foo’s Fabulous.

I say, “Those are safe. Designed by scientists in a lab. You think stores would sell it if it was dangerous?”

“I don’t know man.” says the Teenager of Foo’s, unconvinced but on the ropes.

“You know how they make those fake sugars?” I asked as if I did.

“No.. How?” Teen of Foo asked curiously.

The question gives me, in the kid’s eyes, at least a sliver of authority on the subject. Afterall, what would anyone gain by lying about such a thing? 

“So what they do is, they take the glucose- you know what glucose is?”

“Yeah it’s the stuff people are allergic to in pizza.”

“No, that's gluten. That’s something else entirely.”

“Oh.”

“No, glucose is what sugar is made of. So they take particles of glucose and break them down into even smaller particles, and then they break those particles into even smaller ones, and they rinse and repeat until the particles are so small you can’t even see them.”

“Like invisible sugar?”

“Invisible to the human eye maybe, but it’s there, and in our diet sodas sweetening them up while being too small to affect anyone. That’s why it has zero calories.”

Teen of Foo handed me my ice yogurt and professed, “Huh..”

Got ‘em.

“Sounds like bullshit to me,” Scoffed another customer behind me.

“A lot of complicated things do. I’m not a scientist, so forgive me for not being savvy with all the nomenclature, terminology, and whatnot of the subject.  Think about it though. It makes sense. I did my research. Just because I don’t know all of the minutia of the subject doesn’t mean I don’t know what I’m talkin’ about. You know what I mean?”

“Makes sense to me.”

Obviously agitated, the scoffer behind me cleared their throat loudly. 

“Have a good day sir.”

“You too kiddo,” I said, throwing in a wink for good measure. 

So the customer behind me didn’t buy it. The Teen, though, had a seed of the lie planted. Again, why would anyone- outside of soda pop executives- lie about how diet soda is made? 

The Teen probably never bothered to look it up. Their brain most likely filed it under Useless Information. Until maybe one day, the Teen is talking to someone and wants to keep the conversation going. Maybe they wanna sound smart so they share the fact I created. 

A fantasy of mine is creating a false myth that is devoured by the masses, imprinted into the minds of the bored and afraid, and eventually makes its way back to me. It would be a dream to happen upon multiple people who believed something I made up. Creating a myth that lasts generations is the ultimate fantasy.

I noticed her for the first time exiting The Corner Candleshop next door. A middle-aged couple were looking at candles through the front window while pondering aloud how many scents could candle place possibly have. She introduced herself to the couple as Coraline. She convinces the couple that the place has every scent you could imagine. Strange candles like bacon, new car, and fresh paint. Terrible ones too like dirt, farts, and ammonia. Coraline told those people she had bought a couple of the terrible ones last week as great gag gifts. The couple thanked Coraline and went into the store. Coraline giggled as she walked away. Probably thinking of how funny it would be for the couple to ask the employees where the fart smelling candles are. I know for a fact she lied to them because I’m a regular at The Corner Candleshop, and I would’ve noticed and also bought them as gag gifts. The only good gifts are gag gifts in my opinion. 

So why would Coraline lie? Entertainment? Is she like me?

Coraline walked past me before a canvasser stopped her, looking for signatures. Enough signatures would get the community’s elevated officials to invest in reliable public transportation. The canvasser introduces themself as Megan and asks for Coraline’s name.

“Bianca, nice to meet you,” Coraline answers automatically, as if it’s her real name. Bianca- now formerly known as Coraline- signed Megan’s petition and told Megan all about how she’s from New York, so she knows how important public buses and trains are for a city. Bianca says goodbye to Megan and carries on her way entering another business called SKIN, a skincare store selling soaps, lotions, and makeup.

Now, I don’t ever do this. Just this one time, however, I kinda followed the woman into the next store. My curiosity got the better of me. I was pretty sure Bianca Coraline was lying for fun. I take a couple of minutes to finish my dairy before entering SKIN. Hopefully Bianca Coraline was in the middle of another juicy deception. She did not disappoint.

As far as I could tell Bianca Coraline is a white woman. What she told the white employee at SKIN was the exact opposite. Bianca was saying she’s now able to pass as “one of you” thanks to various whitening soaps and lotions. That she had to due to how often she was being pulled over or singled out in public. It was obvious to anyone around this conversation that it was making everyone at SKIN uncomfortable, except for me. This fabrication was one of the funniest I’ve ever had the pleasure to be in on. I had to stop myself multiple times from laughing out loud. Bianca Coraline is a pro. She even changed her accent to sell this particular falsehood.

After being told repeatedly they do not carry any skin bleaching products, by the staff and the owner Bianca Coraline tells the employees, “Well since you don’t got what Robin needs then Robin gonna go ahead and bounce. Nice to meet ya’ll.”

“Nice to meet you Robin!” the owner tells Robin Bianca Coraline as she leaves. When the door shuts the owner sighs deep and asks their employees if they thought Robin was really black or crazy, and if stores really sold bleaching skin products. It turns out, to my surprise, such products actually do exist and are actually sold. The world’s even more fucked up than me.

I follow Robin Bianca Coraline across the street to a coffee joint named The Roasterie. Robin pays for a coffee and takes a seat at a table outside. I bought a hot chocolate and took a seat next to her. The name on her coffee says Mia.

“Hi, I’m Donny,” I lied.

“Hi, Donny. I have a dick,” she replies nonchalantly.

“What a coincidence, me too. We already have so much in common.”

“I have a feeling that’s about all we share. Now, if you’ll excuse yourself-“

“I can prove we’re alike.”

“What’s stopping you?” she asked

“Your lack of attention,” I told her.

Mia Robin Bianca Coraline looked at me suspiciously, “Alright, go on then.”

I proceeded to introduce myself to the nearest stranger walking by us. I told them my name was Rudy. I was looking for my little dog named Nippy, a blonde pomeranian chihuahua mix. The stranger told me, “So sorry, but I haven’t seen any wandering pups.”

I ask if I can show them a picture. They say sure. So I download a picture of a blonde pomeranian mix online and pretend it's mine. The stranger tells me how cute my dog is. I agree. The stranger tells me they’re also a dog person and they’ll keep an eye out for mine when they go for walks with their dogs around the neighborhood.

I point to a house and tell them I’m the owner. The Dog Person tells me, “I’ve always wondered who owns that house.”

“Well now you know.” I said. I tell the Dog Person on Saturday mornings myself and other neighbors get together for a dog walk. That they all meet at my place at 9 am sharp. I invite the Dog Person to stop by my house next Saturday and invite as many people as you’d like. “The more the merrier.”

Dog Person tells me “sounds lovely”, they’ll be there, and bring friends they’ll bring their dogs. The Dog Person told me they’ll “keep an eye out” and wished me luck.

I go back to sitting next to Mia Robin Bianca Coraline.

“What was the point of that?”

“That’s not my house. Now a group of strangers with dogs are going to knock on that house early Saturday morning and confuse the hell out of everyone. Most likely annoying the house owner.”

“Kinda funny.”

“I think so.”

“What’s your real name?”

I reach out to shake her hand. “Alex Jones, what’s your real name Mia?”

“Sarah Sanders.” she lies, shaking my hand.

“Pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure is all yours, I’m sure.”

“Probably.”

“So what did you have in mind?”

“Something dramatic.”

I can’t believe she agreed to my pitch.

Next thing I know I’m sprinting into a chain pharmacy as if I’m being chased by a dangerous murderer, which was the story I told the store employee that found me ducking behind their counter. I burst through the doors so fast the employee dropped the box they were stocking shelves with.

As soon as I jumped the counter they were like, “Sir. Sir you can’t go back there.”

The employee walks around the counter to find me hiding. I explain someone is after me and they’re trying to kill me. They were right behind me! I beg them to please not tell them I’m here when they come looking. I told them my life depended on it.

Electronic bells ring welcoming the next customer. It’s Sarah coming in, about two thirds my size, looking frantically and angrily for me.

To my surprise, the employee stops talking to me, and asks Sarah, “Can I help you find something?”

Sarah looks the employee up and down before answering “I didn’t think this place had cashiers anymore. Haven’t seen anyone back there since you got the self checkout.”

“You’re not wrong. We still have to come back here every once in a while though.”

“Huh. Well to answer your question no, but you can help me find someone.”

Sarah gave my exact description to the employee. Again, the employee surprised me by acting oblivious to my presence. They actually thought they were saving me from a life threatening situation. Ha.

“Are you sure you haven’t seen him?” Sarah presses, leaning closer to the counter.

“Yeah. You’re the first person that’s been in for like ten minutes.”

“Well. If you do see him. Tell him I’m gonna kill him.”

You should have seen this employee's face. Hilarious. It was like they couldn’t believe they were in this situation, especially with us being in a “safe” part of the city. Sarah really played her part well, I was impressed.

The employee states the obvious, “I can not do that ma’am.”

“Alright. That’s reasonable. It’s just frustrating, you know? When you’re trying to kill someone and they keep getting away.” Sarah delivered the line perfectly, I almost started laughing.

Before the employee could respond again I faked a cough.

Sarah then peeked over the counter to find me. “There you are!”

Sarah hopped the counter no hesitation. I barely get away from her by running around. That employee stood stunned the entire time Sarah chased me around the place. It must have been at least five minutes before I was chased out by Sarah too.

What a blast. Sarah was worried we took things too far. I assured her though, that doing crazy shit in corporate stores is great because there’s such a high turnover among them that people hardly stay on longer than a year. In my experience, as long as you didn’t break any laws, there were never any consequences, and I could do it again with a whole new set of employees in around six months.

Next stop on our date night was a local library. Sarah found the most populated quiet area in the bibliotheca and texted me. Sarah then found a book to pretend to read until I got there.

Once I was there, I also pretended to read until Sarah recognized me as her long lost brother. We really got wild with the act. Both of us sobbing crying thanking God we finally found each other after the war. 

Nobody knew what to say. However, we could tell what they wanted to say was “Please take this somewhere else.” The annoyance of our crowd fuelled our performance. We hugged random strangers and overshared our “life story” with everyone in the vicinity until we were asked to leave very gently by a security guard.

At a corporate coffee shop, I pretended I was holding a baby wrapped in a blanket, when actually I was only holding a blanket around nothing. Sarah came in yelling at me, “Give me my baby back!”

I told her. “I bought it fair and square.” There were audible gasps to that line.

We argued over the baby until we noticed the police arrived. Before any cops could make it in, we had dropped the blanket, composed ourselves, held each other's hands, and walked out. Sarah even held the door open for them.

At this point it was getting late and Sarah tells me she can do one more before she has to call it quits for the night. For our final trick we found an old man handing out pamphlets on how to avoid eternal damnation. It turns out all you need to do is believe Jesus Christ is your lord and savior… never take drugs other than alcohol, Xanax, and pain meds, never consume secular entertainment, protest women’s health care, don’t be gay, don’t be yourself, don’t be happy, and few other caveats I can’t recall.

We convince this guy not only do we believe the crazy shit he’s peddling, but we’d also like to help him. The peddler was happy as a clam to have, as he put it, “nice white christians” on his side. He was especially happy to hear we were married and trying to have as many babies as possible to expand our religion. The peddler was delighted until we revealed we also happened to be siblings.

Then something magical happened. Sarah kisses me. I kiss back. We kiss each other. The peddler asked for his pamphlets back and refused any more of our help.

I thought afterward we would exchange information and end the night. Instead Sarah invites me to her hotel room for a drink. At first I thought I was maybe her next mark, as the night went on though we both got comfortable. We drank. We talked. We connected. We told each other truths about ourselves. We shared our real names. We shared a kiss. We shared love. We shared the night. I fell in love.

I guess she didn’t though. When I woke up the next morning she was gone along with her luggage. No goodbye, no note, nothing. No way to get in contact with her. She ghosted me. I don’t know what I did wrong. I finally found someone like me, and I blew it. I showed her my true self, and it wasn’t enough.

“Why do you assume you did something wrong?” asks Doctor Ryan.

“Why else would she ghost me?”

“It may have had nothing to do with you. Maybe she was in town for only one night and was scared of a weird goodbye. Maybe you were the other man, and she didn’t want to face you in the morning. Maybe she liked you a lot, and it scared her. Maybe, she left you before you could leave her.”

“I wouldn’t have done left though.”

“She wouldn’t know that.”

“Point.”

“Or maybe she knows how hard it would be for two pathological liars to build trust in a relationship.”

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe it simply wasn’t meant to be between us.”

“Consider the possibility that your lying isn’t what impressed this woman. Maybe it was the truth.”

“What do you mean?”

  “The first thing you did when you introduced yourself to her was tell her the truth. You shared that you lie for fun, like her. You shared with her your favorite places and ways to lie. By the end of night you shared with her real personal truths. I mean you told her your real name. How often do you do that?”

“Good point.”

“I try.”

“Whoa… Yeah, you’re right. That’s the silver lining. If I was able to find her, there’s bound to be others out there for me to connect with.”

“That’s the spirit.”

“Do you know of any dating apps for pathological liars?”

“Are you kidding?”

“Totally.” Not really.

“Good. Unfortunately we’re out of time. I think we’ve made real progress today, Mitch. So I’ll see you next week? Same time, same place?”

“Yeah. Definitely.” Maybe.