Allergies and Fallacies

“May, this is a bit of a random question, but do you ever wonder what’s up with that guy on our street who only goes out at nighttime?”

It was a bright Saturday afternoon, and May Farrowday was eating lunch in the park with her best friend, Casey Collins.

“Well, yeah, of course I do. He’s real strange, isn’t he? He avoids sunlight like the plague. That’s like, something only vampires do.” May gave out a little snicker. Casey stared off into the distance, letting her blonde hair flutter in the wind for just a moment.

“You don’t think that man’s an actual vampire, do you?”

May instantly burst out in a fit of laughter on the spot upon hearing that. She found the thought absolutely absurd.

“Of course not! Vampires are obviously fake. Let’s suppose they are real for a second. So they die if they’re hit with sunlight? Well, moonlight’s just light from the sun reflected off the moon, so that should kill them as well!”

May gleamed with pride after stating that fact. Casey nodded in agreement, and then asked,

“So then what do you think the deal is with that guy?”

May thought to herself for a moment. She thought of multiple reasons and scenarios, but they all just were illogical to her.

“Hm. What a good question. I’ve never seen the guy really interact with anyone, so I doubt anybody else knows why. Maybe I might just go meet up with him later this night and ask about it. Could prove to be interesting.”

“Yeah! Go solve that mystery! I sure hope you get good results from your interrogation.”

And on that note, the two finished their lunches together and both went home to continue on with the rest of the day like normal.

After a long day, nighttime finally fell. May’s entire neighborhood was quiet, except for one house which finally opened up its door that day. A man in a light beige shirt with extremely pale skin came out. Unbeknownst to the man, May was silently watching him come out from behind a bush. 

“This man…” she thought to herself. “He has the color palette of a vanilla ice cream cone!”

She carefully watched him slowly walk down onto the street, and made her move. “Hey.” As she came out of the bush, the man jumped. “Who are you?” He asked, startled. “Name’s May Farrowday. I wanted to ask you some questions about your… unique behavior.”

“Unique behavior? I’m the one with unique behavior? You were the one who jumped out of a bush! Why couldn’t you just walk up and start a conversation with me like normal?”

May looked away in embarrassment. How in the world had she not thought of that?

“Look, that’s not important. The main point is that I just need you to answer a simple question for me. That’s it.” 

“Well... I have no clue who you are, but I can sense that you have no malicious intent. So, I guess I can give you my permission. What about me do you find so very odd?”

“I just wanted to ask… why don’t you go out during the day?

“Oh, that? Well, you see…”

May was waiting for the man’s answer with great anticipation. She just stood there gazing at him awkwardly. The man took an unreasonable amount of time to finish his sentence; he took over thirty whole seconds to do it. After that perplexing interaction, he finally spoke.

“I have a really bad allergy to sunlight. Even just slightly being hit by it would probably kill me.”

May’s jaw dropped to the ground. She could not believe what she had just heard. She knew that having an allergic reaction was entirely possible, but with how extreme he made it out to be, she just could not accept that.

“If it’s really that bad, then how do you know that for a fact?” The man simply smiled at that. May was completely unprepared for what he said next.

“Just a gut feeling.”

May was completely and utterly blindsided by the man’s simple statement, and she was unable to not let it show.

“Just a gut feeling? Really just a gut feeling? How in the entire universe does that prove a thing?!”

“Well, you can’t prove that I’m wrong.”

At that moment, she wanted to scream. She could not comprehend the man’s logic one bit. Her mind was furiously racing around at the sheer absurdity of it all.

“I literally can prove it wrong! Moonlight is sunlight reflected off of the moon, so if your allergy is that extreme, you shouldn’t be able to go out at all!”

“Well... can you prove that that fact is true?”

Every single interaction with the man made May feel closer to exploding each time. Every single sentence by him existed solely to infuriate her. Every single word that the man said was uttered purely to leave her hopelessly perplexed. She was speechless for the next ten seconds, which made the man continue on.

“You have no argument, therefore I can conclude that that statement is false.”

‘BUT WHAT’S YOUR ARGUMENT FOR BELIEVING YOU’RE ALLERGIC TO THE SUN?!”

She was unable to resist shouting there. Because of that, she ended up grabbing the attention of a few others living on the street. The man did not, in fact, answer the question that she had asked. Instead, he just stood there, smiling forcefully. For an extended period of time, the two were silent. Everyone spectating watched with great interest. Suddenly, the man started once more.

“Oh! I just realized I haven’t told you yet! My name is Peter Arkins.”

“WHAT. DOES. THAT. HAVE. TO. DO. WITH. ANYTHING?!”

She had legitimately stomped her foot with every single syllable there, unable to contain her unbridled rage towards him.

“Well, I sure am hungry. I definitely could use something to eat just about now.”

“DON’T JUST TRY TO AVOID THE ENTIRE DISCUSSION AND ACT LIKE NOTHING HAPPENED!”

She verbally protested with all her might, but the man had pretended to not hear a thing and simply walked away. She was infuriated with the entire situation, however she did not attempt to further continue the debate. She realized that it was ultimately all futile, and that she should not have even attempted to try in the first place. As everything was starting to dissipate, she suddenly heard the man cry out.

She did not see the event it its entirety, but she immediately knew what had happened. The man had simply tripped over a rock, fallen, and was now lying face first on the ground, without movement. A small crowd of seven people had been watching it all play out without even the slightest bit of interference, but after the man’s fall, one of them finally spoke. A small eleven year old boy with red glasses had asked,

“Is he dead?”

Silence.

“I think he is,” replied a young, dark-haired teenage girl besides him. A tall, brown-haired adult proceeded to walk up towards him and check for his heartbeat. “Nope. He’s still hangin’ on.” The teenager let out a disappointed sigh, then quickly realized that she had done that out loud, looked at all of the others in the crowd nervously and scuttled away. At this point, nobody really knew what to do now, so they all started to leave one by one quietly. May was the only one left now. She felt a bit reluctant to leave him there without doing anything, but she was still mad about the previous discussion, so she had decided to go home in the end. The man was unconscious for the entire night. When he finally woke up, it was 6 AM, and the sun was shining right in his face for the first time ever. May and Casey happened to be walking along the street at the same time he woke up, and May smugly smiled when her and the man locked eyes.

“So, are you sure you’re so allergic to the sun now?”

The pale skinned man was now being fully basked in the rays of sunlight that had traveled all the way through space solely to spite him and all of his previous beliefs. May was confident that the man could do nothing but accept the cold, hard truth right in front of him. The man gazed down at the path beneath his feet for a couple of seconds, and had finally answered.

“This light probably comes from a fake sun.”

May had passed out on the spot.