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As a child, he reconciled a mother with her daughter by asking a naive question. “Do you want to die angry at her?” he asked. And with that, he completed his life’s work but continued living for thousands of insignificant days with nothing to do but digest resources and blindly gaze on the loveliness of the earth. To pass the time, he taught himself to conjure complex flavors in his kitchen. While his garden thrived, he merely survived the seasons. He grappled with partners on whatever bed was nearest, once each. And while his landscaping matured, his attitudes grew thorns until his friends stopped calling. Without much interest or insight, he ran another man’s business, which prospered despite his guidance, rebounded with the economy, and was absorbed by an abstract conglomerate that immediately severenced him. Already superfluous, now also redundant, he nevertheless lived on, collecting dividends and stacking up honors like boardroom chairs. He told risky jokes in mixed company with mixed results, texted recklessly, and died in a Truth-or-Dare wildlife incident without redeeming a penny of his pension. His loves were many if shallow, and his passions were varied if a little oblique, but the good earth never took to him. He left behind a modest estate and a widow who was mostly annoyed. Once he had kept his appointment with the mother and her daughter, once he had asked his question, he could have misspent his life anywhere he chose, failed at any enterprise, followed any impulse. Nothing could have undone his achievement. As for the mother and daughter, they drowned together in a lifeboat, or just outside a lifeboat, but together, thus completing their life’s work, not by reconciling—that was his job—but by reminding him briefly, as alligators devoured him, of all that he had accomplished.
Original Copyright © 1999
Revised Copyright © March 25, 2026
He wasn’t doing enough, for the world, and he knew it. It was killing him. Getting through another day was hard, for this man, knowing how little he was doing, for the world. It’s not like he wasn’t doing plenty. He was doing plenty, but however masterfully he did the indispensable work for which he was appreciated and renowned, and believe me there was plenty of that, there were others, he knew, who did it better, for less (in most cases much less) with fewer expectations, in places he wouldn’t practice, for patients who needed it more and who might even say thank you instead of suing you afterwards for crooked stitches. He hated those pussies, but he felt he needed to be more like them. He’d been enjoying having wealth while publicly despising it and acting suicidal about being so pampered by life (and again ridiculously overpaid) amidst such suffering, in the world. It was an appealing character, but it couldn’t, I’m looking for an analogy: the character couldn’t take root in his behavior, I guess. Anyway, it was hard to pull off “Woe is me I got another pay increase through arbitration; they basically forced it on me,” for a man who declined to donate to charities until he could scrupulously study their financials. After his reboot, he deflected all talk of money, saying he had accumulated wealth inadvertently by making more than he spent and not losing any. All the world required was that he be timely, do no harm, remove the proper organs and leave neat stitches, but he did more, for the world, but never enough. I should have told you. He deprived himself and resented it. It turned him into a bore. “Good deeds not done rob the world,” he said, and died.
Copyright © January 15, 2026
Very Short Novels 