It’s difficult to recall how long I’ve been in this desert. Two nights, I think. A few days. The nights I’ve spent lying atop billions of grains of sand, looking up at the sky, my mouth dry and my stomach empty.
The moon, Jian Ghomeshi’s smug, smiling face, peering down at me from a blanket of stars which spell out words; consent, rape culture, victim blaming. I check my revolver. It’s nearly spent from firing at Jian Ghomeshis.
One bullet left. For me. When the Ghomeshis overtake me.
By day I march. I don’t know what direction I’m going, but I keep moving, trying to find a way out.
The sun, Jian Ghomeshi’s glaring smile, beats down upon me relentlessly. Hardly anything grows here. Some stunted Jian Ghomeshi cactuses. The occasional Jian Ghomeshi weed tumbles by on the breeze. Jian Ghomeshis circle above me, waiting for me to expire so that they may name-drop while they feed on my still-warm flesh. A diamondback Jian Ghomeshi slithers by me, its tail rattling a warning. Each segment of the tail’s rattle is a little smiling Jian Ghomeshi face.
Then, my heart leaping to my throat, I see something in the distance.
It can’t be.
A post about something not Jian Ghomeshi.
I limp toward it as fast as I can muster, passing a Jian Ghomeshi sinking its teeth into the soft neck flesh of an exhausted Jian Ghomeshi. I approach the glorious vision. It begins to take form.
It’s… I think it’s a cat pic.
I thought the desert had stolen all the moisture from me, but I begin to weep with joy. A cat pic. Nothing has ever looked so beautiful in all my days. But as I stagger toward it, it distorts. With each lurching step the adorable cat face warps and shifts. My tears of joy turn bitter. To tears of anguish.
Exasperation.
Resignation.
It was a mirage. A damned mirage.
There is no cat pic. I fall to my knees in the sand at the foot of a towering photo of Jian Ghomeshi’s face, and I vomit. Or I try to, but I have nothing inside me. I fall forward, and I retch and cough into the sand.
I close my eyes. So I don’t have to see that each shard of sand glimmering in the sunlight is the grinning, jackass face of Jian Ghomeshi.
