text: “Argh” Jeff shouted while slowly regaining consciousness, as he lay flat on a hospital bed. The fluorescent lighting beaming into his eyes. Throbbing pain pierced his skull. His legs felt tingly and his butthole was itchy. The type of itch you get when you don’t wipe well enough. Sure, you can adjust yourself in your chair to scratch the itch, but that’s only a temporary fix. Eventually you’ll have to do a walk of shame back to the bathroom to re-wipe. Jeff shook his head in disgust with himself. ‘32 years old, I should have this figured out by now’ The door swung open and in walked a doctor. “Oh, good. You’re awake. You gave us quite the scare back there. How are you feeling?” “Like my brain is going to explode.” Jeff answered. “Well, that will happen when you faint and slam your head on a tile floor. We’ve run some tests already, but we’d also like to give you an MRI. You may have had a concussion. Other that your headache, are there any other ailments? Dizziness? Sensitivity to light?” Jeff hesitated just in case the doctor brought up itchy buttholes, but apparently that’s only a symptom of laziness. “No,” he replied. “Pretty much just the head- HEY WAIT A SECOND! WHERE IS SHE?” Suddenly Jeff remembered the reason he was in the hospital in the first place. Seven hours prior he walked through the sliding glass doors downstairs with his pregnant wife who was going into labor. It was to be their first child and they were beyond excited. Neither one of them knew the gender. They both thought it would be best for it to come as a surprise. That was the only thing they agreed on. “If it’s a boy, we’ll name him Kobe” Jeff declared not caring about his wife’s opinion on the matter. He was flexible with girl names. “Helen, Patricia, Blanche, whatever.” He’d always say. “I don’t care. But if it’s a boy. We’re naming him Kobe.” “Those are all old lady names.” His wife angrily replied. “When was the last time you met a baby named Blanche?” “What does that matter?” “It’s a stupid name, that’s what it matters.” “It’s a great name. It’s vintage. It’s ageless.” “It’s a terrible name. It’s dull. It’s antiquated.” Jeff groaned. His wife picked up the big book of baby names and began rifling through the pages. Oh how Jeff hated that book. In his mind, it was the main reason they couldn’t come to an agreement. The book provided too many options which made the decision far more complicated than it needed to be. Jeff’s wife stopped in the P section and fawned at one name in particular. “What about Penelope?” She said excitedly. “We could call her Penny for short.” “If you want to call her Penny, then just name her Penny. Why name her something and address her as something else? It makes no sense!” “Oh you’re impossible!” She shouted before storming out of the room. Jeff picked up the big book of baby names and shot it into the trash, “Kobe!” “Jeff!” The doctor shouted. “Are you paying attention?” Jeff’s ears perked up. “Where’s my wife!” He shouted again. The doctor sat down next to Jeff, leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, took off his glasses and held them in his lap. He called it, the empathetic stance. It was his go-to seated position for delivering bad news to a patient. “There were some complications during your wife’s delivery. I don’t know how much you recall before you blacked out, but it wasn’t pretty.” Jeff gave the doctor a blank stare. The doctor continued. “Sir, I’m very sorry to inform you that your wife is now longer with us. She has perished.” “She went to church!” “What? No, she didn’t go to church.” “Ok, good.” Jeff, a devout atheist, said with a sigh of relief. “No, to perish means to die.” Jeff gave the doctor another blank stare. “Sir, your wife is dead.” “Oh.” Jeff said “Oh man!” He continued. “Oh my fucking god! Are you serious!” Oh man!” He added finally grasping the severity of the situation. The doctor leaned forward and handed Jeff a Kleenex, then leaned back and uncrossed his legs because the way he was sitting was crushing his balls. “Wait.” Jeff called out. “What about my baby?” “The baby survived” the doctor answered. “Oh, thank Judas! Can I see him or her? Is it a him or a her? Is it a boy? Please tell me it’s a boy!” The doctor was silent. “Tell me, man! Please.” Jeff whined. The doctor leaned forward, put on his glasses, then leaned back, crossed his legs, removed his glasses and placed them on his lap. “Sir, your baby is a panda.” “A what?” “A panda.” “As in, a panda bear?” “Yes.” “A panda bear?” “Correct.” “So, you’re telling me that my baby is a panda.” “Precisely.” “Argh,” Jeff screamed in pain. “What’s the matter?” The doctor inquired. “I’ve got a charleyhorse.” “Calm down, try to relax.” The doctor said. “I’ll get you some water. Jeff laid his head back on the pillow and tried to relax. But he couldn’t. There was simply too much on his mind. Then he began laughing. “Ok, ok, good one!” He said amusedly. “You’re joking, right?” “No, I’m not.” The doctor replied. “Come on, you’re pranking me, right?” “Nope” “You’re yanking my chain.” “I assure you I’m not.” “You’re pulling my leg.” “Oh, sorry,” The doctor apologized while trying to massage out the charleyhorse in Jeff’s thigh. He loosened his grip. “That better?” “Yes, thank you.” Jeff answered. Jeff was at a loss for words. There was a lot about the world he didn’t understand. For example: why does an inquiry into your credit affect your credit score? Why does Facebook show you ads for things you’ve already purchased? And why isn’t the government telling us the truth about birds being drones sent down to spy on us? You see, Jeff was also a conspiracy theorist. He questioned the moon landing and had his suspicions about the earth being round, but nothing left him more perplexed than the notion of two human beings conceiving a panda. “It just doesn’t make any sense.” Jeff said. “It’s impossible.” The doctor leaned forward and pushed his glasses up on his head. “Let me tell you something I’ve learned over the years.” He said “Nothing is impossible.” “Nothing?” “Nothing. I’ve been practicing medicine for 37 years and in that time I’ve seen things I would never believe possible had I not witnessed them with my own eyes. Just last week I watched two red-headed freckle-faced parents give birth to a baby with brown hair and brown eyes. I witnessed a colleague pull a 12 inch spike out of a little girls eye socket once and not only did she not lose her vision, but she didn’t even cry. It was astonishing. Three years ago, a homeless man was admitted complaining of abdominal pain. And, I shit you not, an X-ray revealed a live beaver living inside his chest cavity.” “Oh, my Judas.” Jeff exclaimed. “Oh, my Judas is right,” The doctor concurred. “The human body is an incredibly complex mechanism. I may not be able to explain some of the things I’ve seen. Because, simply put, some things are unexplainable. But I firmly believe that nothing is impossible.” “Ok,” Jeff said apprehensively. “But there’s gotta be an explanation. There just has to be.” The doctor leaned back in his chair and pushed his glasses back down on his face. Then he took them off and placed them on the table beside him. He didn’t even need them. He had LASIK surgery two years ago but his wife insists that he continues to wear them. They make you look smarter, she tells him. “Well, I have a PHD from Johns Hopkins.” He argues back. Of course I’m smart. Why do I need to prove to people I’m intelligent. I’m a fucking doctor for Christ’s sake. “Why don’t you give me your theory on how this happened,” The doctor asked Jeff after noticing his trademark blank stare. “Ok here it goes,” Jeff started out. “Eight years ago I went to Manila for my friends bachelor party.” “Well, that’s quite the trek.” “Indeed it was. But his fiancé was native to the area and my friend wanted to acclimate himself to her culture.” “Well, that’s very thoughtful. How did they meet?” “She was a mail order bride.” “Ok,” the doctor paused for a moment. “Well, continue.” “Anyways, we bought some pot off a cab driver but I’m pretty sure it was PCP or something, because minutes later I jumped out of the moving car and tumbled down a hill.” “Why’d you do that?” “I thought I was getting attacked by a snake.” “And?” “Turns out it was my seatbelt.” “Continue.” “I wound up in this shady back-alley hospital getting a blood transfusion. It was super scary. The place doubled as a meat processing plant. They were slaughtering pigs in the very same room.” “Is it possible that they weren’t slaughtering pigs and that you were hallucinating?” “Doubtful. But I wasn’t going to bring it up to the doctor.” “Why not?” “Because he was a demon.” The doctor sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes for a moment. “Continue.” “I’m about 97% sure they put animal blood in me that day.” Jeff said. “Up until this point I assumed it was pig blood or raccoon blood. There’s a small chance it could’ve been rhinoceros blood. My stupid idiot friend tried to convince me it was giraffe blood. The moron--giraffes aren’t even real. But now I’m thinking it was definitely panda blood instead. I mean it has to be panda blood, right?” The doctor checked his pager to see if he was getting paged. He wasn’t. “Continue,” he said. “Well, about a month after the incident in Manila, I was doing electrical work for a friend of a friend and I received a pretty significant shock.” “Ouch.”the doctor said. “You’re telling me.” Jeff replied “It hurt like hell. singed all my ball hairs off. It’s just--I don’t know man, there’s something about that day that’s always seemed off to me, ya know? Like, I felt something inside me that day. Something I’ve never felt before.” “Electricity?” “No, something more.” “Like what?” “I’ve never been able to comprehend it but perhaps that feeling I felt was the fusing of my DNA with Panda DNA, and that moment was the moment I became a panda. Even though, on the outside, I’m Jeff, a living walking human being, on the inside, I’m a panda.” The doctor cleared his throat, and took a strong sip of coffee. “And what evidence would you have to support that theory?” Jeff paused for a moment to thought about his life and what character traits he had that simulated that of a panda. “Facial hair!” He shouted. “Facial hair?” “Yes, facial hair. Before the incident, I had a baby face. I hardly ever had to shave but soon after I began growing hair like crazy.” “I was the same way,” The doctor replied. “All my friends could grow beards in high school but I couldn’t grow anything until my mid-twenties. It’s not uncommon.” “This was different.” Jeff said. “It wasn’t a gradual change. I went from not having to shave at all to being able to grow a Fu Manchu overnight.” The doctor chuckled. “Fu Manchus are silly,” He said while giggling. “Haha, yes they are.” Jeff agreed. Jeff wiggled in his bed as subtlety as he could to avoid the doctors suspicions of his itchy butthole. The doctor checked his pager once more. It was a slow day. “Continue” he said. “Well, I guess now I should tell you about my bamboo phase.” “Your bamboo phase?” Jeff nodded. “It was right after I bought my house. I’ve never been much of a decorator but after I installed bamboo flooring in my living room, I became infatuated with everything bamboo. I had bamboo wall paneling, bamboo furniture, bamboo place mats and bamboo window shades. I even owned a bamboo turtle neck.” “Well, I’d imagine that would be quite uncomfortable.” “It was itchy, that’s for sure. But it was a conversation starter. I was wearing it the night I met my wife. She was also a bamboo enthusiast.” The doctor’s pager beeped. He took it off his hip, glanced at it, and placed it back. “It’s time for your MRI.” He said. “Ok.” Jeff replied still a little shaken over the whole ordeal. “Wait!” He blurted out. “I forgot about Glenn. Yes, Glenn. It had to be him!” “Who the hell is Glenn?” The doctor inquired. “Glenn was my college roommate.” Jeff answered. “The two of us did not see eye to eye. He worked at a research laboratory and I know for a fact they did animal testing. What if... bear with me now, but what if, they developed some kind of panda transformation serum and Glenn injected me with it while I slept?” “And why the hell would he do that?” The doctor asked. “Because he didn’t like me, man. Haven’t you been listening? To his credit, I wasn’t the best roommate. I’m actually ashamed of the person I was back then. I’ve changed. But I was doing a lot of drugs at the time and didn’t exactly help pick up around the apartment. And there was the time I ate all his pizza rolls while he was at work.” “My god!” The doctor yelled. “You’re a monster!” “Yeah, I know man. Geez! I was just saying how ashamed I was. Jeff said in an emotional tone. “You know I’m going through a lot right now. I just found out that I’m a widow and a panda. And I haven’t even seen my son yet. You could be a little more understanding ya know.” He softly muttered while a single tear rolled down his cheek. The doctor fought the urge to roll his eyes. Deep down inside he knew Jeff was right about him. He could be more understanding. Every evaluation he had over the last decade stated that same thing. He was a terrific doctor but he wasn’t exactly known for his bedside manner. You need to be nicer to your patients, his supervisors would always tell him. He was working on correcting that issue. That’s why he created the empathetic stance. “They’ll see”, he told himself, sensing an improvement in his demeanor. The empathetic stance will revolutionize medicine. “Doc,” Jeff called out. “So, what do you think? Do you think Glenn gave me the serum? Nothing is impossible, right? You said so, yourself.” “No, I think the answer is simpler than that.” The doctor replied. “What do you mean?” Jeff asked. The doctor leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, removed his glasses and placed them on his lap. “Your wife fucked a panda.