When she talks her words are the lyrics to The Sound of Music, although she doesn’t look like Baby, and that’s a fact. Sometimes she has inky hair and jump-rope eyebrows and New York jewelry and sometimes she’s Audrey Hepburn, and sometimes she’s both, and I always ask which one she is today because sometimes I can’t tell them apart (but sometimes I can). She thinks she’s clever, calls herself Alicia, but she’s not that smart because she kept the ‘A’ and even I can tell she’s playing.

She strokes my collar and calls me ‘honey’, but I know I didn’t come from bees, so she’s playing and that’s a fact.

And speaking of bees she calls herself Alicia, kept the ‘A’, and isn’t that amusing, isn’t that aggravating, isn’t that a game. Sure I know it is because she brings me apples, says they’re my favorite, and I might not laugh but she also brings me books and cartoons and what’ll she bring next, doctors? It’s an alphabet game, an alphabame, and I know it is because she says my name’s Ethan Filler, and, gee, she repeats that so I guess it’s serious. Says I’m her brother but that’s out of order, next comes ‘honey’ and then ‘ill’ and then ‘joker’ cause that’s what I am, one big joker, and ain’t that a fact. And then when she’s playing she’ll skip right down to RST, right down to Rome and songs and Tiffany’s, although you can’t ask her because she thinks it’s ranting and schizo and troubled, and she doesn’t think that’s funny. She’s not a joker like me.