I breathed into my hands, waiting anxiously with the other passengers on the boat, each of us alert to sudden movements in the water. But I did not see her first; I heard her. It began as a low hum, a barely perceptible noise hanging in the air. Then as it grew in pitch, I knew she was here, about a mile west and approaching. My music teacher always said I had an ear for echolocation.

And then there she was, just as I remembered her. The small of her back appeared first, peeking above the water, and then her head, as wide as a sedan, rose out of the ocean. I knew she recognized me too. Her eyes were drenched in tears.

The other passengers bunched up to the side of the boat, caught up in a frenzy with their cameras. The captain’s voice came on the speakers and described the animal as a gray whale, one of thousands who pass by California on their annual migration route, but he had no idea. This was no ordinary gray whale. This was Gabrielle.

I took off my shirt, shoes, and socks, then pushed the other passengers out of the way. Without saying a word, I leapt off the boat and crashed into the water. Gabe swam up to me, and I got a closer look. The years have not been kind to her—her skin bore the scars to which her species was particularly susceptible—but she was beautiful just the same. I held her close, and the world felt just like before her father banished me from her home.

It was almost five years ago, at about the same place. I had been swimming alongside her while her parents swam further up ahead. Hiding from them was usually not hard for me. First, I was about the size of a cockroach to them, and second, if I refrained from shaving for a couple days, I could easily pass for a floating piece of seaweed. This time, however, I may have been too frisky, because Gabe accidentally let out a giggle.

Her father, the behemoth of the group, spun around and saw me. Outraged, a stream of water shot out of his blowhole. This may seem unbelievable to the more uneducated among you, but unlike human beings, the males of this species have blowholes too.

“Who intrudes my home?” her father asked. His voice shook the water.

I identified myself, but he was not impressed.

“But dad, you never like the guys I bring home!” Gabe complained. “I love him!”

“You’re a whale, Gabe! A whale! How do you expect me to tell our relatives that you’re dating a piece of seaweed?”

“But he’s not—”

Gabe knew it was no use to continue. Ignoring all of us, she sped up and swam away. Her father glanced at me, then left with a grunt. I thought then that I would never see Gabe again.

But, things were different now. Gabe has grown into a woman, and could make her own choices. I did not even have to ask before we began our dance.

I circled her like a firefly around a lamp, marveling at her bulbous body. Slowly, I began brushing up against her, feeling her skin against mine.

I do not wish to spare the details because it was a beautiful, loving thing. She opened her gargantuan mouth, and I entered her, wading with all my strength until my entire body was inside. Using her baleen, I filtered myself of plankton that have attached to me, then left it for her to swallow. This may seem a bit unsanitary to some of you, but I hear there’s a lot of protein in that.

When it was over, we stayed silent, just enjoying the moment. Even if neither one of us wanted to admit it, her dad was right. I was me, and she was a gray whale. Sure, we could have bouts of romance every now and then, but how could any of it last? I knew that she loved me, but how could she even try to integrate into my life? I cannot afford having to buy tickets for 101 seats every time we go to the movies, not to mention the buckets of water I need to throw on her to keep her wet. And of course I loved her, but I could not swim 10,000 miles every year and pretend I’m okay with it.

In the end, we accepted that it was best we moved on with our lives, and I promised her that I would come see her every once in a while. Perhaps one day, I told her, I would see her with her own family, and I would know then that we have made the right choice.

I let the current carry me back to the boat, where the other passengers helped me up. They thanked me for keeping a whale around, and were all eager to show me the photos they took. In one of them, Gabrielle was smiling at the camera, and I made sure I would be sent a copy when we got back to shore. Nobody seemed to have any clue what had just happened, except for a young man in his 20’s. He came up to me, holding a beer, and raised his hand for a high five. I hated to leave anyone hanging, but as I told him, I simply wasn’t in the mood. He seemed a bit offended, but by then the boat was starting up again, and somebody said they spotted a dolphin.

Andy was a small kid, shorter than the rest of us, and wore a flat, round face beneath his delicate bowl-cut. His eyebrows slanted at an angle, converging just above his nose, giving him a look of constant contempt. But his anger was not purely cosmetic: when Susan asked to borrow his eraser, he punched her in the face, then demanded to know where her family was so that he could finish the job. And when Daniel asked what job, we could all see the regret in his eyes, realizing that those would be his last words.

The highlight of the field trip came at the end, when we were each given a bottle, and were told to put inside it our most undesirable thoughts. If anyone irritated you, just quietly bunch up that anger, and squeeze it through the opening. Tighten the cap, and resume whatever you were doing.

Andy was never the same again. When Susan once again forgot to bring her eraser and had to ask Andy, this time in a squeak of a voice, she did not receive another punch. Instead, Andy turned around, fiddled with his bottle, and then turned back, his eraser in hand. Susan reached for it carefully, hypnotized by the unexpected beauty of the moment, as most people are after a near death experience.

The school year continued without a hitch, and ended before long. Andy left the school to attend a better one, then moved on to become a successful entrepreneur. This is not, however, a happy story. The last I heard of him was in the local newspaper: he had beat his girlfriend, then jumped out of his high rise window, a broken bottle lying beside him. It seemed that in an alcohol-induced daze, he had reached for the wrong bottle, and in opening it, unleashed years of pent-up anger. Not cool.

But I do not mention this because I want to make you sad. I mention it so that you can understand my fear of opening my own bottle, which stood in front of me on my table, after years of being hidden away in an unmarked box. I no longer remembered the contents, but I knew I had to face them sooner or later, and would much prefer to do it while I was sober.

I carefully twisted the cap, set it on the table, and waited with my hands over my mouth. I told my girlfriend to leave the room, and she did.

It started like a balloon, a rubbery blob slowly expanding at the bottle opening. Too big to fit through the hole, it turned and shook as it freed itself, until finally it pushed its way out with a pop, then stood beside its former abode. If I had to describe how it looked, the closest would be perhaps an oversized jelly bean.

“HI!” it said.

I could see that it was gaining texture. And hair. A face began to form, and tiny limbs shot out. I wondered if in the moments before Andy killed himself, he too was greeted by what appeared to be a miniature monkey.

“HEY I SAID HI!” It raised its tiny arm.

“Um, hi? Are you, uh, my anger?”

“NO I AM MONKEY! HEY WATCH ME JUGGLE!”

I was about to ask it to stop, but by then it had already gotten to five balls, and to be honest, was quite impressive. When it stopped, I felt the urge to applaud.

“Hey, are you going to make me beat my girlfriend and make me jump out the window?” I said, “Because that’s not cool.”

It thought for a moment, its little hand on its chin. Finally, it held up a finger and declared, “I LIKE PAPAYA!”

This was quite unexpected. It stood there, staring at me, and I stared back, not knowing what I was supposed to do. Then oh, right. I ran to my fridge, and pulled out some leftover papaya, and handed a small piece to my rather peaceful anger. It devoured it, papaya juice spilling onto its lips.

“MORE!”

I pushed the whole piece towards it, and it finished with a satisfied grin, rubbing its little belly.

“HEY WANT TO GO TO KOALA LAND?”

Slowly, I began to understand. I was never really an angry kid, so did not have the anger to bottle up, but in wanting to better fit in with friends, I have had to put aside my most random thoughts. And as I aged and had to be more mature, the more I had to put these away, lest people found me weird.

“THEY HAVE HUGGABLE KOALAS.”

It reached out to hold my hand.

“LOOK AT MY WINGS!”

Then, yes, wings grew from its back.

“WE FLY TO KOALA LAND OKAY?”

I realized then that my problem was not unlike Andy’s: in order to fit in, we had to hide who we were. Perhaps not so much for me now, but there will come a time when I can no longer afford to have these thoughts. Successful people in their mid-life do not think about koala amusement parks.

“I don’t know,” I said. Already I worry about the effects this will have on my career and my life. Perhaps it was indeed time to stop it all, and just grow up. Be mature.

Finally, I sighed.

“Yes,” I said. “Let’s go.”

Because fucking hell, they have huggable koalas.

This was why I was a little hesitant a couple days ago, when the company confronted an increase in work without more workers, and I was asked to help in the warehouse. Part of me was flattered in that I was entrusted with more responsibilities, but the other part was frozen in fear, knowing I was about to enter a highly dangerous area to do work that involved the movement of muscles. I called my girlfriend and told her I loved her.

I stepped into the warehouse carefully, tiptoeing around the forklift before I got to a work station set up for me. Stacks of cardboard boxes awaited, and I was told all I had to do was move them. I let out a sigh of relief. The boxes were small, and it all seemed relatively harmless. I even got through a couple boxes before it happened.

One of the boxes was open, and I had to tape it shut. But as I reached across it and pulled the tape back towards me, a particularly stubborn piece of cardboard snagged my thumb, and sliced into my skin, leaving a cut at least 1/8th of an inch long.

Tears poured out of my eyes as I collapsed unto my knees. With my arms outstretched, I screamed towards the sky, while the camera above me pulled away in a slow, dramatic fashion. It started to rain, and I let it drench me. O, I am fortune’s fool!

“You got a papercut?” my colleague said.

A papercut? A papercut? Did he not see this violation of my flesh, from which my crimson life fluid threatens to spurt? He quickly continued with his work, and I had never felt so alone.

Even now, when I can’t even remember whether it was my left thumb or right thumb because it had long healed, I suffer the scars. Not physical scars, of course, because it healed pretty well, but emotional ones.

And as I stare at the moon, pondering the meaning of my life, and why bad things happen to good people, and when the television show that everybody says I should watch is going to start, the question lingers.

Will I ever to be able to dance again?

Life was pretty easy-going, just drifting here and there in various fluids, absorbing nutrients through phagocytosis, a process at which I had gotten quite good. Ladies would wave at me and ask if I was single, and I would answer yes, in that I was single-celled. Reproduction was as easy as mitosis and splitting myself in half.

After a while, however, the reality of microscopic life began to dawn on me. Without a developed nervous system, I could not comprehend even the simplest forms of entertainment. Anything beyond VH1 made my nucleus hurt. And I missed dicks terribly, in that I yearned to understand all the old detective novels I used to read.

Last week, I decided I had enough. I introduced myself to a fellow cell, and convinced it that this whole survival thing would be easier if we worked together as one organism. Soon after, others took an interest and joined us, allowing each of us to be designated increasingly specialized roles. I have always wanted to take part in an orgy, and this was the closest I’ve gotten, in that things were inserted into other things, and we became a salamander.

From then on, we continually adapted to our surroundings, and got fitter, by working out and occasionally growing more hair. It was around this time that we didn’t have to crawl anymore, and just walked on our two feet. We held a rock, and it became a hammer. We pushed a button, and the television changed channel. We had become me.

I know what you’re thinking. That is the most ridiculous case of evolution ever, bordering on nonsense. But to this day, it is still the only time macroevolution has been observed. No, really, ask my roommate, Greg. He saw the whole thing.

I have to say: life as a human being is infinitely better. Conversations can actually be thoughtful, sunsets actually conjure up emotions, and cheesecake tastes better. Also, I was finally able to get back to the dick I missed, in that I regained my penis.

About the only drawback I can come up with is that reproduction has gotten considerably harder. Is there an alternative to mitosis that I have forgotten? Because this is hurting like a bitch.

Not bad in a positive kind of way, but rather actually terrible. In fact, the adjective in my nickname did not refer to my cool demeanor as much as it did my notorious wrinkleless balls.

This much was evident during my last heist, which took place in 1935 when my partner, Ben Shamone, told me he wanted to be starting something. The local bank had installed a new safe, and the prospect of beating it seemed thrilling.

We arrived at the door at 3:34 after midnight, him in his fedora and white glove, and I in my billie jeans. Once we were inside, I rolled out my tools, and began drilling in a wall, hoping to reach the wires within.

“Shh. We are not alone,” Ben said.

Appearing out of the darkness was a slender woman, a pretty young thing of perhaps twenty-six. As she walked closer, the light carved out her features: a cute, pointy nose, and eyes that glowed like blueberry jam. Her skin was not a color I was familiar with, but for me, it did not matter if she was African American or white.

She introduced herself as the banker’s wife, who had heard about our job and wanted to help. She was looking to get back at her husband for his infidelities. “A man should be faithful,” she said, “and walk when not able, and fight ‘til the end.”

I nodded, because that made complete sense, and got back to work.

“Ow!” I said, as a piece of plaster flew off the wall and hit my face. It seemed I made a horrible mistake. I had broken a pipe, and now water was gushing out, quickly creating a flood on the lobby floor. The alarm rang.

“He.. he.. is running away,” the woman said.

“Who!?” I did not know why I asked that in such a shrill voice, because I already knew who it was. I spun around, and then around again, and there was Ben, who at the first sign of danger, just upped and ran away.

I laid down my drill, and slowly accepted my fate. But if I was not going to remain a free man for much longer, then at least I could make this girl mine. It seemed she had the same idea.

“It looks like it’s just the two of us,” she said, as she slid closer. “So why let my husband have all the fun?”

I wrapped my arms around her waist, and defied gravity as I leaned her back and kissed her. In the distance, I heard the approaching sirens.

“Looks like we don’t have much time,” she said.

I assured her that she needed not worry, for women did not call me a speed demon for nothing.

“Tell me why you want me,” she beckoned.

I pulled at her earth-colored thong, and declared, “I like big butts and I cannot lie.”

She pushed me away and looked offended, as if what I said was inappropriate and grossly out of place. Noticing my error, I corrected myself.

“Your butt is mine,” I said. “Gonna take you right.”

A smile replaced her scowl, and she came back into my arms. That was a close save.

She placed her lips against my ear, and told me her name. Her hands glided to my belt.

The headlights of police cars pierced through the windows. People outside were shouting. We had at most half a minute, but I wasn’t going to stop until I had enough.

“Is it true what they say about your balls?”

Oh, Diana. You dirty.