I, the Otter

A Collection of Allegories

Thanks to Binh for telling me that she thought me an otter, or some other form of sea life, Kelsey M—for her story, Maggie for hers, and the rest of the world for subjecting themselves to my metaphorical terms.

Assume the unreliability of the narrator.

An allegory: A bird is trapped in a glass building. He catches his reflection on the wall by accident and, believing it to be another, flies quickly towards it, breaking the glass and finding freedom.
***
Another, even better still: A mouse, gloriously innocent, notices an ominous shadow, that of a giant hawk. He hides behind a boulder, only to look up in terror and realize that the hawk is, in fact, a few petty branches on a walnut tree. His conscience settled, he is crushed by a piano a day later.
***
Kelsey M—once told me a story of two unsuspecting lovers walking towards each other in central park. The male, walking slowly, notices the female from a distance. Once they are closer, he tells her he loves her and she says the same. They are married the following day, living happily ever after, amen.
Kelsey M—says this story is true because she saw it one time, hiding behind the only apple tree in Central Park, just last fall.
***
I imagine that I am an otter, about to be eaten by a harmless manatee in the Gulf of Mexico. I am in the last moments of my life; I am searching desperately for answers.
I will find only this: my own sense of comfort came from my frantic uncertainty; my only source of perfection came from a compromising lack thereof. I found God in everything, realizing that He does not exist.
I, the otter, was spared.
***
A fox, on the other hand, wasn’t as lucky. He thought eating unimportant, and so he stopped. Not only did starvation bring his death, but his prey lost the fear that they had been living for.
***
A moose buys salads everyday in a cafeteria for one week, just for the baco-bits. On the final day, there are none left.
***
The neighbors spent every dime they had ever earned on a television that ate their living room wall for breakfast. Having no further possessions, they sat before the machine day and night, day and night, enamored by the glow.
What was the television’s lunch?
***
I was told that I spend my days hiding in my bedroom, watching Disney movies and eating ice cream with a Disney spoon. When my parents knock on the door to inquire as to what I am up to, I tell them I am being emo. It is not a lie.
***
I was given an origami flower this morning. Should I crush it in the palm of my hand or give it to you?
***
The is a strange gentleman hiding in the male bathroom who gets paid to look from behind the one way mirror and turn the lights on and off accordingly, as I walk in and out.
He fell asleep.
Not only were the lights not on, the floor was flooded as well.
***
He grew a beard, just to shave it off.
***
A girl walks through the hallways, searching for her lover. She catches a glimpse of him once and forever travels the same path in search of him.
He went looking for her, eternally altering his path.
They never meet.
***
The moose in search of baco-bits returned to the salad line the following week. Who knows what he will find?

(P.S.: It's a filler story. I'm trying to take up time until I get another legitimate idea.)