Challenge Accepted

Dear Ms. Evers,

I have received your latest chapters and, as your editor, I must say that I find them lacking.  It seems of late your writing has had a bit of fanfaronade to it, as though your voice is not authentic.  People want your typical voice, the run of the mill whining and complaining they usually read.  Turn on the TV!  Look at the schadenfreude that surrounds us all!  That is what the masses want now.  They will read any kind of blatherskite as long as it makes them feel better about their own lives as compared to yours.

Have you recently become, dare I ask, happy?  If so, again as your editor, I suggest you quit whatever shenanigans in which you have been partaking and go back to being depressed.  Not suicidal, of course.  We do want a three-book deal with you.

Go off your medication for a while and I am sure all this discombobulation will cease.

Best of wishes,

Wesley Wyndam-Price

Editor-in-Chief
Wolfram and Hart




My Dearest Wesley,

It is very magnanimous of you to take the time away from your very busy schedule. I would hate to bother you unprovoked with all the goings on of my usual days filled with flibbertigibbets and details.  If I am to understand correctly, you are not pleased with my recent writings and feel they lack a certain despondent ennui that the masses crave so that they might feel better about themselves.

You will be pleased to know that I have still been frittering my days away as I murmur obscure ideas out loud. For instance, I found myself acting  like a pure rube in the market the other day staring at the fruit that had a slight anaranjado hue. My mind immediately took me (and the fuzzy slippers I had donned) to the flower section where I stood among the forsythias (much preferring their bright yellow to the more ambiguous orange) and nearly dropped into a yoga pose right there because the smell was so powerful.  Or maybe it was the hyacinths.

All fuckery aside, I have not stopped my medication; in fact I am now seeing a therapist once a week who is trying desperately to make sense of the ginormous spaghettification of my mind. Having been through that black hole, he will doubtlessly have an easier time untangling the Christmas lights that have been rotting in a moist mess under his house.

I imagine my poor, poor therapist was wishing he had a funicular to descend to the recesses of my issues; at least the path would start with a better view.

I have to admit, Mr. Price, that I find myself recalcitrant to the idea of you wanting me to be unhappy for the sake of sales.  On the other hand I do need a new car.  Are you suggesting I am a better writer when I am not filled with splendor and light?

Must I continue on the path that leaves my body and brain in a such a condition of monstrosity -- that state which one coming from my home town would only have ever before seen in the bordering town of Parsippany?  I am almost so appalled at your blatant disregard for my own life that, were you standing here, I would throw a biscuit at you and probably resort to immature language as well.  You may be an editor but you are certainly a fucktard as well. Perhaps they are the same thing.

I am fully aware that in these political times people are looking for something else to read about other than the supposedly impolitically correct blathering of Mister Drumpf.  Must it be up to me to put the kibosh on the world's distressing obsession with sociopolitical entertainment?

I long for sultry summer nights, a debonair man reaching out to hand me an aperitif.  Yet, you want me to write about the hullabaloo that exacerbates my every thought, my debonair man replaced by a spooky squirrel.  Is my last name Plath? Dickinson? While it is true that my various mental maladies would scarcely fit into the ginormous Balenciaga bag I own, I see no reason to dredge them out time and time again for the mere sake of others' amusement.  What possible misconduct could I possibly write about that would cause such a hullabaloo in the minds of my readers?

Shall I rob banks? Kick puppies? Shall I commit murder? Write of the guilt that would certainly exacerbate the torment of my being, my very soul? Seriously?

Mr. Price, has it occurred to you that all of this does not even exist?  That my angst, my writing, my sorrows all belong only to me and you are made up?  A fictional character in my solipsistic world?

If so, then all is moot.

Good day,

Amy Evers