Silly Daddy

I have the most silly daddy, but he's such a nice daddy.  He's always so nice to me.

This morning, my daddy said to me, "If you do all your chores today and listen to all I say and tell you to do, I will give you a big cookie at the end of the day!"

I was very excited and asked to see the cookie now.  He smiled and said, "Trust me, sweetie.  Just do everything right, and I'll give you the cookie."

Of course I trust my daddy, so I set out to do everything he asked me to do.  He asked me to put my clothes away, and I did!  He asked me to wash the dishes, and I started to, but washing dishes is hard, so towards the end, I just rinsed them off and left them in the sink.  I'm sure mommy will finish them later.

Then Daddy asked me to work on my homework for one hour.  I started and I tried, but my desk is right by the window and it was so shiny and happy outside.  Surely Daddy didn't really need me to work for the full hour.  It was so nice outside!  He's always telling me to go play outside instead of playing video games.  I was sure he would want me to go play outside instead of doing homework if he had only noticed how nice it was outside.  So I sneaked out into the backward after half an hour and played with my soccer ball.

When I came back inside, Daddy was sitting there reading a paper.  I felt a little guilty, but he looked at me and smiled and I smiled back and ran on up to my room.  I tidied up a bit more even though Daddy didn't ask me to!

Then Daddy asked me to help my little sister with the tower she was building.  My little sister is kind-of  a brat.  She's so little and frustrating and can't do much right.  But I was still feeling back about not quite doing what Daddy had asked before, so I went and tried to help.  But she is so annoying.  She'd ask me to help and then she'd get upset when I did.  Eventually, I go angry and knocked her stupid tower down and of course she cried and Daddy came to see what was wrong and I said the tower fell.  He looked at me a little bit like he wasn't so sure and I almost blurted out that I did it, but then he just said, "Well help her build it up again.  And be nice to her about it."

I was much nicer the second time.  And my sister didn't seem like quite such a brat.  But she is a real brat.

Then my Daddy asked me to help Mommy bring in the groceries for dinner.  I did that really good!  Mommy is nice and pretty.  After we unloaded the groceries, Mommy asked if I wanted to help make dinner and I said, "Okay!"  I love helping Mommy make dinner!

After I had finished helping, I went back out and watched some TV.  My daddy smiled at me.  He's such a nice daddy.  I had almost forgotten about what he promised me at the beginning of the day.  But then Mommy called us for dinner and I remembered!

"Eat all your peas," Daddy said.  I might have let a couple of them fall onto the floor when no one was looking, but I ate all the rest.

"Can you please pass the butter," Daddy said.  That was easy to do.  I did that and was very happy.

After dinner, Daddy pulled me aside.  "So," he said.  "How was your day?  Did you do everything I asked you to."

I beamed and nodded, thinking about the yummy cookie I was about to get.

Daddy had been holding the cookie behind his back, and now he held it out in front of him.  I got a big smile and I reached for it.

But Daddy pulled the cookie away.  "Hold on," he said.  "Are you sure you did EVERYTHING I asked you to do?"

"Yes Daddy, of course!" I said.

"Everything?  Just like I asked."

I frowned and my tummy felt all heavy and sad.  I had kind-of done what Daddy asked, but not quite.  Surely he knew that I had tried really hard.  That should be good enough!

"I tried really hard, Daddy!" I said.  "I tried really hard."

"But were you perfect?" he asked.

I looked down and shook my head no.  I felt the tears coming.  It was so sad and so mean.  That cookie could have been mine if I had just done everything Daddy said just like he said it.  But I didn't.  It was too hard.

I felt something under my chin and realized it was Daddy's hand and I looked up at Daddy.  "Sweetie," he said.  "You know this cookie is from me, right?"

"Yes," I muttered.

"It's my cookie," Daddy said.  "I could do whatever I'd like with it."

"Yes, Daddy," I muttered again.

Daddy looked right into my eyes.  "You know that you can't have this cookie unless I choose to give it to you, right?"

"Yes," I said, not quite so muttering.  I knew Daddy was right.  He's always right.

"Did you earn this cookie?" he asked.

"No," I admitted.

"Could I still give it to you if I wanted to?" he asked.

My face lit up.  "Yes!" I said.  "Oh yes, of course, Daddy!  You can still give me the cookie!  Please, Daddy!  I know I wasn't perfect, but I tried, and I will try harder tomorrow!"

He smiled at me.  "So you admit you didn't do it all perfectly?" he asked.  "And you're sorry and will try harder?"

"Yes of course!"  I was so excited.  I might get my cookie after all!

But he still didn't give it to me.  Not yet.

"And you understand that I'm the only one who can give you this cookie?" he said.  "And if you trust that I will give it to you, then I will give it to you?"

I was getting a little nervous.  I wasn't sure if Daddy was actually going to give me the cookie or not.  "You are saying you will give me the cookie?" I asked.

"Yes," Daddy said.  "You just have to trust me."

I was a little unsure.  I wasn't sure if he meant I was getting the cookie now or if I would get it later, but he seemed to be saying I would get it.  So I nodded.  "Yes, Daddy," I said.  "I trust you."

He smiled.  "Here you go, Sweetie," he said.  And he held out the cookie to me.

This time when I reached for it, he didn't pull it away!  I was so happy!  I didn't have to be perfect!  I just had to try really hard, and to trust Daddy.

I took a bite of the cookie, so happy, but then something bothered me.  "Daddy?" I asked after I had swallowed that first piece.  "What if I can never be perfect?" I asked.

He smiled and squeezed my shoulder.  "You don't have to be perfect," he said.  "You just have to trust your Daddy and say you're sorry when you do something wrong.  I know what's in your heart, Sweetie."

I smiled and marched happily away with my cookie.  My Daddy didn't seem to demand too much of me, but he was such a nice daddy.  I wanted to try to do what was right and make him happy anyway.

Let the Story End

People are always asking for what happens next.  It's not enough for them that I save the world and found the love of my life.  Maybe I just want to live a quiet, normal life now, with a nice home with my husband, maybe a couple of kids.  Sure, I was created to be a fighter, but I just want to be done fighting.  I just want to be left alone.

But that's not enough for people.  The first story was so interesting and intense and moving that they want more.  There was never intended to be a sequel.  My story was intended to have an open-ended but implied happy ending.  It was supposed to end in beauty and victory and hope.  And that was supposed to be the end.

But because so many couldn't accept it, because so many claimed to have loved me and wanted to hear more, my author felt forced to write a sequel.  I'm not sure his heart was in it.  He had done so well with the first story, how could he do better with the second?  He couldn't possibly write the happy, boring ending he originally wanted for me.  He had to do something amazing, drastic, moving, heart-breaking.

That's why he killed the love of my life and left me alone and angry and seeking revenge.  The entire sequel revolves around my descent into darkness and near insanity following the loss of the thing that mattered most to me.  Readers were forced to question their love for the character who was so brave and noble in the first book and wonder if I was really all they thought me to be.

Of course, at the end, there is still a glimmer of hope.  There has to be or else the fans would riot even more. It was just enough glimmer for them to think that it was all worth it.  They ended up enjoying the book in the end.  They applauded it as "not quite living up to the hype, but certainly living up to the original."

And at what cost?  They had demanded this second book, they had created the hype, they had forced my author to do something drastic in an attempt to fulfill it all.  But what about me?  What about my life, the life they ruined?  They forced my author to warp me into something I was not originally intended to be.  Sure, the second book is still about me, but it's more of a shadow or dark cloud of who I was in the first book.  I couldn't be the same as I was before.  Of course I had to be different.  Otherwise, the reviews would have pegged it as simply "a rehash of what had already been written" and my author certainly didn't want that.  They didn't want more of the same, they wanted MORE.  They demanded to see another side of me, and so that was what they got.

And in seeing that other side, they destroyed me.  I'm wreck of what I once was.  My happy life is gone, and I'm left worse off than at the beginning of the first book.  Hope, yeah, whatever.  Hope is nothing compared to actually having the life I had always dreamed of as a little girl.  I had my dream, my heaven, for a few short time suspended years before the sequel came out.  And then it was over.  Forever.

Fans are satisfied now, for some reason.  They must like my pain, because they don't seem to be begging for another book quite as much as they were before.  And so, it seems likely I will be stuck in this state forever, without my love, without my life, even without my friends being fully back on my side, but with this blasted glimmer of hope.

I have to hand it to him, he did leave it open for a third book, much more so than he did with the first, when he wasn't expected to be forced to write a sequel.  There would be a final story, maybe something that more closely mirrors the first.  Maybe he was expecting, hoping himself, that people would want a third book, that he could do a sandwich type thing, the two good slices of bread with the bad bologna in the middle.

But its all about the fans.  The "real" people.  What they want is what they get.  That's what happens when you become a little successful.  If you're not successful, you might as well do what you want.  If you're already super successful, you might as well do what you want.  If you're in the middle, like my author, you have to do what the fans demand.  The fans demanded my demise and he gave it to them.  Goody for them.  I hate them all.

You might just think that's my dark side coming out.  And I say, of course it is.  I wouldn't even have this dark side if it wasn't for all of you.  So thank you.  Thank you for loving me so much that you demanded more, more to a story that was already concluded, nicely wrapped up with a bow on top.  Thank you for wanting to see another side of me, the dark side that was never meant to exist.  Thanks for all of that.  I really appreciate it.  Of course, you don't really care.  You loved me so much, but I'm still just a character to you.  Someone who isn't real.  Someone who doesn't actually matter, just put here for your entertainment.  And wanting more entertainment, of course, you couldn't just let the story end.  Why couldn't you have just let the story end?