"I take it you haven't done much skydiving?"

"Nah, man," Brad said. "I mean, c'mon. You heard how it would go. That can't be good. And I'll bet they don't give you your money back if you pull that sort of stunt, either. I know my own limits. Plus, I know my own strengths. Most people, they might not realize they've got any options when they get down to one. Or zero. But me, I'm flexible that way, yo. I find options. So beginner skydiving classes probably wouldn't work out for me."

"Maybe you'd just need tough-love skydiving." Marion said. "Something with no countdown, just this giant instructor who picked you up like cordwood and tossed you out the door when it was your turn."

"Yeah, that might work," Brad said. "But then what if you pee on yourself in abject terror? They probably charge extra to dry clean the suit. Although that does open up an interesting thought experiment: What happens if you take a leak in free fall? I mean, if you unzipped your fly on the way down and let loose."

"I'm not sure if that's something anyone has ever given much thought to," Marion said. "And I don't think I want to be the one to start."

"Yeah, sorry, that's probably a little gross," Brad said. "Sometimes my imagination kinda betrays me. Yours ever do that? Take you places you didn't want to go, like when you're not paying attention? It's like my brain is a car, and usually I'm at the wheel, but sometimes I lean over to change the CD, or mess with the air conditioner. Next thing I know, I'm doing mental donuts in the Denny's parking lot. Figuratively speaking, y'know."

"Sorry, Brad, can't say as mine does that," Marion said. "Sounds like a personal problem."

"Got a world of those, man," Brad said. "That's what makes me so interesting, y'know, such a quirky member of the staff."

"Quirky, eh?"

"Sounds better than nuts, yeah?"

"Yeah," Marion said. "It isn't like you're the only one, anyway. Being out of your mind's sort of the norm around here."

"Sure, for most people. You seem sane enough," Brad said.

"Or just crazy enough," Marion said, "to seem sane by comparison. But I've been here seven years now. I can't be that sane. It's okay, though. I'm at peace with it."

"Seven years, man," Brad said. "Guess that does kinda rule out well-adjusted. But you're definitely way-high functional crazy, if nothing else. Which is probably nearly as good as being sane. Maybe better, because the crazy bit gives you something more interesting to hang your hat on than the average bear."

"The average bear?" Marion asked.

"Oh, you know, it's, like, the standard benchmark. Like when you say someone's much smarter than the average bear," Brad said. "It, like, goes back to Yogi Bear, maybe? I dunno. But I always figure if you do something better than most, you're doing it better than the average bear. It sorta captures the danger element of being better than most, of standing out. Because just like poking a bear with a stick is a bad idea, being better than average has a way of getting you hammered back down 'til you're equal with all the dumb twits who make up the base level of the curve."

"Bit elitist there, Brad."

"Yeah, I know," Brad said, slumping down again, staring at the carpet. "It's one of the ways I'm a real ass. But I don't really know what to do about it. Plus, I'm only a partial elitist. I just figure I'm better than lots of people at the few things I really care about. Take those away, and I'm mediocre at best, maybe a lot worse than mediocre. So if I lose my elitism, I kinda have to start asking: What's the point? I'd rather look down my nose than into those dark places. They're scary. Like the skydiving, but no countdown – just the long yell…and the splat afterwards."

Brad rubbed behind his ear, careful not to scratch, lest he unleash a cascade of fresh skin. When he'd popped out his shirt earlier, a small flurry had fallen to the floor. Marion hadn't seemed to notice, which either meant she was enjoying his conversation enough that she truly hadn't noticed, or it meant that she was considerate enough to pretend she hadn't seen. Either way, he was pitifully thankful, like a starving dog suddenly handed a fresh ham, only with less nervous growling.

"Could be worse," Marion said. "I know plenty of people who aren't good at anything. They just muddle along. They don't even care. We've got a couple here in the office, as a matter of fact. Which'd be worse? Be honest. Being a little full of yourself, but being honestly better than most people at something in the process – or being no better than anyone at anything, and not even caring that you weren't?"

"How the hell can you ever know?" Brad asked. "I mean, yeah, I'd rather be how I am. But would I really? Those people always seem so damned content, y'know? Every philosopher and decent musician since the dawn of time talks about those kinds of people. The sheep. The cattle. Whatever you want to call them. They chew their cud, they make their cow patties, and they seem blissfully unaware of just how depressed they should be to have the lot in life they've got. But, hell, if they're happy, just how does that put we few in the elite ahead of the
game?

“It's like when you look at pre-contact, pre-industrial, pre-everything societies. Little villages and stuff. Most everyone is fairly happy, most of the time. We've got cable TV. We hardly ever have ticks or fleas or have to chew some weird flavor of bark because we've got intestinal worms eating us from the inside out. But we're pretty miserable.

“It probably goes back to that whole business with the stupid apple in the Garden of Eden. If you take that stuff literally, then it isn't like God didn't warn us about ignorance being bliss, or warn us about the alternative, anyhow. He was pretty up-front. Don't eat that thing. Stay stupid. You're better off."

"I never really figured you were particularly religious," Marion said.

"Oh, nah, man, I'm not." Brad said. "Lapsed atheist, I guess, is how you could describe me. It's the best description I've been able to come up with. But I don't really know what it means yet. I'm pretty sure God exists. I just don't know whether I like Him very much. And I'm pretty sure He's got his doubts about me, too. Not that I blame Him, given my own ambivalence. If I’dcreated the universe and puppies and rainbows and everything, I'd probably be a little irate if one
of my creations thought of me as kind of a dick."

"At least you know what you're not afraid of," Marion said.

"What's that?"

"Blasphemy," Marion said. She grinned at him as she did. In Baton Rouge, he knew that there were a lot of people who wouldn't have smiled as they said it. They'd be too busy showing how much they loved him by praying for him with those cold, angry eyes such folks always seemed to stare at him with. He hadn't ever been sure about Marion, and seeing that she wasn't one of "those" people was a big relief. It wasn't exactly like finding a new friend, but it wasn't the creation of a new nemesis, either… For Brad, that was a big success. He set his sights fairly low of late.
"Oh, blasphemy is real easy for me," Brad said. "Never been afraid of it. God, I'm afraid of, but not blasphemy. Whatever beef He has with me, the way I see it, He's already got it. And there isn't anything I can do which is gonna change it. So I'm not afraid of making things worse. They're already as bad as they can get. How do you get worse than having the Almighty ticked off at you?

“I mean, I guess I could get PETA pissed at me. Y'know, go design a line of robes made entirely from cat hides. Or is it only nasty, angry animals that PETA defends, like minks? Damned if I know. And damned if I don't. All goes back to the whole 'God hates me' thing."

"I'm not going to preach to you," Marion said. "But I have a hard time believing you'd have God all that upset with you."

"Yeah, I know, it sounds stupid," Brad said. "Trust me, I've got plenty of ideas that sound even stupider. Or more stupid. Whatever. I just don't bring them up much. And I know there's no way I'd ever convince you I was right. But, honest, I'm not kidding here – I'm pretty sure I'm on the Big Guy's bad side. Supposing He exists, of course. Can't exactly forget my atheist roots. Even if I'm fairly certain I no longer dig the idea that God's a figment of man's imagination.”

Click here for Part XIX.