Editor’s Note: This is Satire (or it could very well be prophetic—we won’t know for sure until the administration makes its call).
The year is 2035.
You have everything you’ve ever wanted. A beautiful house in the suburbs where you’ve settled down with the people you care about, a fantastic job doing what you love … you want for nothing, perfectly content.
Yet, something is … off.
An emptiness fills you. A hole that gnaws away at you, confounds you, day after day … and every night, you cannot help but lie awake in bed, your mind racing. After all this time, you still cannot quite understand the feeling that something is missing. With all you have—your idyllic life, the envy of all—something has been eating away at you, a longing for more, whatever that may mean. It’s indescribable, yet always there. A second heartbeat beside your own. A piece of you, out of place.
Then, suddenly, one day, it happens.
It starts off as another idyllic day. The kids are at summer camp. Your wife had kissed you goodbye with a peck on the cheek as she went off to run errands. You’ve been left home alone.
That’s when the gnawing is at its worst.
You pour a glass of whiskey and swig it down, barely feeling the sting of the alcohol anymore. You’ve poured enough Scotch into that tortuous void—it’s immune to the technique. Numb.
You settle down in your reclining chair, a tear trickling down your face.
A knock at the door. Another day’s mail. Grumbling, you stagger to the front door. A pile of envelopes greets you, but one catches your eye.
You stop dead in your tracks, dumbfounded.
The emptiness, for the first time in years, is … gone.
What you’ve been searching for, it’s … it’s here! After all this time! It all makes sense! You are … complete. A full human being! Now, you have everything! When your wife and children arrive home, you take them in your arms and embrace them. The world has meaning again! You eagerly take them inside to your study, where you show them the letter, a broad smile across your face.
At last! The Georgetown Fall 2020 Reopening Plan!
John Scudero (SFS ’23) is the Managing Editor for Satire for The Georgetown Review.
