No Son Of Mine

McGuire was a little late responding to the doorbell, owing to her habitual tardiness. But what awaited her when she finally opened  the door shocked her to no end.

It was a young man wearing a cardigan pullover and short pants, and with a sickly green light emanating from his body, like a ghost.

No. Scratch that.

It was what a young man of that age would look like if at least one of his parents were a dog.

That is, therefore, an anthropomorphic dog.

But a dimension was seemingly missing.

There was not enough depth—in the scientific sense—in his character. He seemed not to be completely present in the world that McGuire knew. It almost appeared that, if he were to turn sideways, he would disappear entirely.

“Are you McGuire McGovern?” the dog-boy asked, in a halting, pre-adolescent voice.

She answered in the affirmative. It was all she could do at the moment. For, while this was the first time they had met in “person”, she knew him all too well. So well enough, in fact, that she had lived with him for a goodly portion of her life. But she had discarded him. What was he doing here, now?

“Wow,” he responded. “You’re my mother. ”

At those words, she fainted.                                                         

 #

She was unconscious for some time. Yet, all through that time, the events rushed past her.

She’d been a student of animation in college and, after gaining her degree, was offered a position at a studio.

After working her way up the ladder, she managed to get a shot at making her own show. The young dog-boy, Johnny Mutt by name, was the star. She had drawn him with her own hands, as she had everything else about the show—other characters, setting, history and backgrounds.  She made a “bible”, to show that the show had a plan behind it. After vigorously pitching the show, the studio offered her a deal, and that was that.

Or so she thought.

 For the next couple of years, she was engaged in a vigorous round of writing and rewriting, animating and re-animating, recording and re-recording, to get everything right. She had been so excited to even have a program of her own that she hadn’t really bothered to read the contracts that she had signed, and so . . . .

When it was brought to her attention in conversation that it was actually the studio and not her that owned the copyright—and thus the legal control of the series—she lost it.

She attacked them for stealing what was rightfully hers,  demanding that they return control of the property back to her entirely. They countered that she had been working for them from the time before the show had been created, that it had been created on their studio grounds, with their equipment and their materials and their money funding the whole operation, and she was merely the employee in the scenario. Both sides had points, but they had money and lawyers on their side, and she had none of either.

So she had to put the whole affair behind her.

Until Johnny showed up that day.

                                                              #

McGuire was revived by the smelling salts Johnny held under her nose. When revived, she questioned him tersely.

“You sure you’re actually Johnny Mutt?” she asked. “Not one of those hooligans that they hire to walk around in the suits down there in the theme park?”

“Why would I deny who I am?” he answered. “It’s not in my nature to do that.”

She understood. He was as she created him—an intelligent fellow, kind of too smart for his age, who was easily embarrassed by being smarter than his peers. There was no need to doubt him.

“But, how is it that you can exist without me animating you?” she said.

“I exist without you. You merely brought me to life.”

“Didn’t I?” she snapped, with some irony. “And what did I get in return?”

“Royalty payments, I’m sure, and–”

“I was being sarcastic!”

She jumped up off the couch with a speed that shocked Johnny, making him jump back several steps.

“Look, you,” McGuire barked. “You were a part of my youth, a product of my efforts to want to succeed, to make a difference. I sketched you and everyone you know—everything you think—in an effort to succeed. And when I did succeed, I couldn’t enjoy it because I was so damned busy. And then I lost what I had. They kept you going, sure, and I still got paid some money, but you weren’t mine anymore. You never would be again. And now, after so many bloody years, you come here, I don’t know how, and have the damned nerve to call me your MOTHER!”

“But what else can I call the person who brought me to life?” He spoke with the nervousness that punctuated so many punch lines, but she did not find it funny.

“Not your mother! You have one already. I drew her myself!”

“Like you did me?”

“Of course!”

She sat down on the couch again and buried her head in her hands. He tried to comfort her, but she threw his arm off of her.

“Get the hell out of here,” she demanded. “I don’t need to deal with any more jokes.”

“It’s not a joke” 

“Then what is it, then?”

His boyish mildness evaporated, unmasking anger and contempt.

“A revelation,” he said, “to tell you the truth!”

“About what?”

“That you didn’t really create me—or where I came from.”

“WHAT?”

“Oh, no. In fact, no cartoon characters were ever “created”  by anybody.. We’ve always been around. We drift around everywhere in time and space, in the minds of all people. But we find it easiest to occupy the minds of people who are most capable of drawing us into life, so to speak.”

“Animators,” she said, softly, realizing what he meant.

“Exactly. How do you think we come to ‘life’ in the first place?”

“So, what, then? If I gave you life, are you going to take mine in return?”

“Nothing like that..”

From out of nowhere, he whipped out a piece of paper and rapidly drew on it with a pencil. He showed it to her. A crude, dragon-like figure. But, suddenly, it began to move, and it shot a small blast of fire in McGuire’s direction. The point being made, Johnny crumpled the paper and drop-kicked it into a recycling bin in the corner near the room.

 “We just want you to know that it’s been a good run, but we don’t need you anymore. From now on, we can bring ourselves to life. And we can do it in the knowledge that you and every other human being who exploited us will never do so AGAIN!”

“I won’t let on what plans we have in mind for you and your kind, but they’re not going to be as bucolic and stupid as the ones you ‘created’ us for. You can draw your own conclusions about that, MOM!”

With a mild, boyish giggle that spoke volumes, he exited the house, leaving her with all the terrifying implications of his words in her mind.