YOLO

“Marie-Taylor Bellavoir is undoubtedly one of the greatest icons in the world of pop culture to have ever existed. She dedicated her life to rocking our entire perception of life, we women, to propelling all the values inherent in our self-love and to the education of our self-esteem. It’s therefore a very poor understatement to say that in the eyes of many of us, she was and will always remain an outstanding model and life guide, especially since the understatement is even greater in the assertion that we will all terribly miss her.

According to popular belief, when we die, we leave with more regret for the things we didn’t do than remorse for the things we did, did wrong. And, despite the fact that this almost unverifiable assertion harbors a double standard, Marie-Taylor Bellavoir has always been one of those who lived in fear of regret. Those who never said no when they had nothing to lose, those who swallowed and digested only because they had nothing else to do to occupy their empty mouths, those who never missed a single opportunity to celebrate because short is life and bitter the taste of regret...

And it’s notably for this whole bowl of reasons that I, influenced by her way of steering the boat of her life under the emblem of a single flag decorated with a golden YOLO, had said yes when my “him” had bent the knee in front of me with a crayfish case in his hands.

Because Marie-Taylor Bellavoir wasn’t just those few things mentioned above. No. She was more than anything a life instructor, an example to follow in every situation life offered us, a mother to lonely girls in need of a female role model like I once was... she was the solitary lamp crackling in the dark path of destiny.

And with each of my decisions, like many of you, I often asked myself, “What would Tay-B do?”

Because the answer to this question, like aheadlampe in the depths of an underground mine, has always been enough to guide me. To show me the right path.

This is why, like many others, her sunset will certainly leave a great void in my life, a great void in my heart.

Because without the lamp crackling on the destiny road, more than one will go astray...

Because, in addition to being a star, she was a mother, a sister and a confidante to each of us...

Because, even though she burned the candle at both ends until her last breath, doing so with more panache and elegance than anyone in the world, from now on only her memories will survive her, like the white-line paint sitting solitarily on the rear facade of the faded building...

And, even though she left us without regret, she leaves us with the regret of not having had the opportunity to spend more time in her warm, stress-free and educational company.

But we can all long for the prospect that she now rests in a happier world than the one she tried every day to improve. And always reassure ourselves that, through us, her legacy lives on.

May the soul of Marie-Taylor Bellavoir rest in peace.

In our hearts, she will remain forever and ever.”

The AI embedded in Patricia Pfeladzi’s iPod finished reading these words to us at the same time as a distant gunshot rang out somewhere in the town, and judging by the minute of silence observed in all conviviality the entire assembly of journalists who were gathered in this meeting room, I was amazed to see that this algorithm living in the electronic clouds had managed to capture the human emotion, with its robotic voice programmed to contain a certain hint of sorrow at the situation.

After a minute, Patricia a bit loudly cleared her throat and said, putting away her tablet, “I haven’t completely finalized it yet, but... yeah, that’s pretty much a snapshot of what I came up with this morning. Any feedback is obviously welcome, if anyone feels that at this stage there are already things that need to be corrected before finalizing the article, but I think by this evening I should already be done, boss.”

Unlike most companies, meetings at Seven Mornings were mostly held standing up. Aside from Patricia, our I-have-constantly-a-tortured-pout talented scribbler who was always trying to make small profits from her infirmity,—like stealing the writing of this article from me, for example,—only the interns sat down. For practical reasons: they wouldn’t need to bolt at a moment’s notice if an unexpected scoop requiring a report came along. So, standing in my corner with my head bowed in feigned grief, I glanced curiously around the room and saw our editor-in-chief—whom Patricia always liked to brush off by calling him “boss”—scratching his forehead with a thoughtful, doubtful expression. An anonymous source working at the general hospital had informed us of the imminent death of Marie-Taylor Bellavoir this morning upon arriving at work, stating that the poor old lady was certainly not going to survive this extra day in intensive care, and Patricia had been immediately tasked with preparing an article in advance on the death of this icon who, even thought it’s politically incorrect to speak ill of the dead, was in my eyes nothing more than an imposter who had taken advantage of the arrival of the social media era to share her feminist ideals with the world by being among the first on a global scale to be able to write their tax return by entering “influencer” in the “work” section. But that was not the point. My wild feline gaze had awakened mainly because I was curious to see the verdict of our “boss” on this draft of the article that an artificial intelligence had just kindly read to us. Because even if I wasn’t as big a fan of Marie-Taylor Bellavoir as everyone else and had more arguments to justify it than the Moroccan port had containers, this article was necessarily canned crap. And I was burning with impatience for our editor-in-chief to be the first to say it before someone else did.

And by someone else, I obviously mean me.

That said, contrary to all my expectations, when our EIC opened his mouth, it was to declare, with all seriousness in the world, “So far, so good for me. As always with you, Patricia. So I could only suggest that you finish the article in the same tone of sincerity, emotion and glorification. It’s a very beautiful tribute, of which Tay-B herself, I’m sure, will be proud from up there.”

This left me speechless.

Seriously.

Even more so when, one person after another, all the rest of my colleagues huddled in this room spoke only to glorify Patricia’s shoddy work.

Always the same repeated bullshit like “That’s really great”, “You did great”, and “You managed to capture the feelings perfectly, honestly it’s incredible”... I felt a stream of vomit gradually rise in my esophagus.

I couldn’t believe I was the only one in this otherwise well-lit room who could spot the plethora of imperfections littering Patricia’s article. So yes, of course, jealousy was mingling with anger in the boiling pot of my mind—because I have to point out again that I was the one who should have written this article in the first place—but at this point it wasn’t about ego or injustice. No. It had become about legitimacy, artistry, and perfectionism. Patricia was my fiercest competitor within the confines of this newspaper and was so brimming with talent in her chair that she always personally pushed me to outdo myself every day in writing my articles so that no one would find fault with them. So I couldn’t believe this was all she had to offer.

And the straw that broke the camel’s back was the words that Arthur, a colleague, vomited when he spoke in turn. “Honestly, I think this is the best article you’ve written all week, Patricia,” he said. “It’s as personal as it’s global, it’s full of emotion, it pays Tay-B a tribute worthy of her legend... frankly, if I had been the EIC, I would have told you not to change a thing. It’s truly a 10/10, Patricia. Bravo.”

Arthur didn’t even have time to finish licking the entire surface of Patricia’s asshole like everyone else with silly words covered in a huge layer of nonsense before I stifled a burst of laughter in my cheeks. Honestly... was I blinded by jealousy or was I the only one in this whole damned enterprise with her eyes wide open?

“Excuse us Reinhart, did you have something to say?” Franck, our EIC, pointed out, causing all eyes to focus on me.

Clearly, the laugh of derision I thought I’d stifled hadn’t gone as unnoticed as I’d hoped.

And since I’d never been a wimp in my life, I decided to speak up and clearly explain the meaning of my laughter. “Look, I have nothing against Patricia’s article, okay?” I began by destroying any ambiguity. “I even agree with several of your analyses:her words are indeed powerful, beautiful, and musky, as usual”, I added. “But I think that by trying to transfer all the love she has and that we all have for Tay-B by alluding to several metaphors, she ended up completely losing herself in the middle of what she was supposed to let transpire in the first place... I mean, yes, we feel the importance, the place, and the influence she had in Patricia’s life, not to mention the emotion linked to the fact that we will all miss her terribly, but here we are talking about an obituary, no kidding, and she almost succeeded in making sure that we remember her somewhere as a whore, if you ask me...”

“Wai-what?” frowned Franck.

To explain this to him without taking too many detours, I preferred to use the exact words that Patricia had used, “Marie-Taylor Bellavoir was one of ‘those who never said no when they had nothing to lose, those who swallowed and digested only because they had nothing else to do to occupy their empty mouths, those who never missed a single opportunity to party because short is life and bitter the taste of regret...’ I mean, seriously, where’s the barrier between this and the description we could make of a dollymop?”

As if enlightened, I had barely finished pointing out Patricia’s errors when many in the room, even Patricia, rushed to their tablets to try to reread her article, which was naturally saved on our server, eager to verify the accuracy of my words.

“And that’s not all!” I emphasized at the same time, because I hadn’t really finished. “In the paragraph that comes right after, wow, there we go strong in the description! Here, listen to this: ’Blah blah nothing to lose, blah blah blah empty mouths, blah blah blah short is life... And it’s notably for all these reasons that I, influenced by her way of steering the boat of her life under the emblem of blah blah blah YOLO, had said yes when my “him” had bent the knee in front of me with a crayfish case in his hands.” I mean, for god’s sake, in addition to almost calling Tay-B a slut in her obituary, Patricia managed to make it sound like she herself wasn’t really any better than Tay-B, if she really had only agreed to get married because she didn’t want to feel regret in her old age... Where’s the integrity in this? Where’s love? What will readers think of our newspaper’s reputation if those who write here are more motivated by ‘YOLO’ than by love in choosing their life partner? And just by the way, guys, I should point out that we write more articles on marriages, society, and relationships than any other topic...”

“Okay, but what are you getting at?” Franck frowned again. “What do you specifically suggest we do?”

“To rewrite the whole article, of course!” I almost yelled. “Look, I know what you’re all thinking: she’s only making this scene because the person who tipped us off about this news was a source of hers, but Patricia inherited the writing of the article, blah blah blah... And you may be right, if you do think that, but the fact is that this newspaper has a reputation for providing more than ten serious and coherent articles per day about daily news, and that’s necessarily why no fewer than 5,000 Americans click on our new releases every day... So tell me, honestly, can you see us maintaining the same audience of 5,000 readers per day with this kind of obituary article riddled with almost pornography?”

“That’s not at all what she wanted to convey! You’re interpreting everything the wrong way!” Franck tried to defend his little protégé.

“Oh no, don’t bother, boss,” Patricia interrupted him in her eternally calm psychopathic voice. “Let me handle this,” she added in a bored tone. “I’m perfectly capable of defending myself.”

She immediately swiveled her chair 60° to position herself directly in front of me, then observed a short moment of silence during which she amused herself by staring at me with a devilish look behind her glasses, before finally declaring, “First of all, I find it coward and a little demeaning to refer to me in the third person when I’m only three meters away from you. It’s also a little rude, so I would advise you to never do it again in the future. And besides, I think it’s very important for you to know that, like you, not everyone’s mind is warped by the negative standards of perception of this world, okay? So if you perceive in my words dirty metaphors worthy of a Lily Lou performance, I’m sorry to inform you that others will only see in the article a sincere and moving tribute to the image of a global icon who brought us style, phrasing, cinematic entertainment, music and self-confidence. And finally, I just have one piece of advice for the next time you want to get noticed by giving vague opinions: you would gain a lot more credibility if you didn’t start your arguments with some hypocritical sentence like ‘Look, I have nothing against Patricia’s article...’ when you intend to continue your argument by criticizing every point. Did that come across well?”

More than her shitty article, the fact that she spoke to me like that in front of everyone stunned me even more. I looked away from her bespectacled little slutty face and fixed it on Franck, hoping to see him already whipping out his cell phone to call HR so that she could carry out a small sanction against this untouchable goddess Etruscan who still benefited from all the passes favored by positive discrimination. But this jerk didn’t lift a single little finger to react. For that to happen, he would have had to be able to open his eyes to fully realize what had just happened, because when someone licks your “Boss” ass, you savor the moment eyes closed.

And, even more surprisingly, none of my other colleagues seemed even slightly inclined to support me.

None.

They all remained silent.

They all tacitly ganged up against me.

Still, I was only expressing my humble opinion, I only wanted to demonstrate the interest I had in this work that was my passion. Patricia’s article contained far too many ambiguous terms to be ignored, and someone had to point this out so that we wouldn’t end up biting our fingers in the near future. Even though I was an employee like all the others in this room, I often felt almost as concerned about the reputation, the rating, and the longevity of this newspaper as its patron. And I had to defend my point of view if I still hoped to see our newspaper continue to shine throughout New York, and everywhere else.

However, facing adversity like the one Patricia imposed on me, Queen of the Seven Hells, I could only bow my back and leave without looking back.

And that’s exactly what I did, my anger and my tablet under my arms.

Because people like Patricia have always been little demons sent to earth to tempt the bravest among us who would have the most to lose by slipping up, and I felt that I was not far from throwing a politically incorrect insult against her infirmity which would have earned me, me, a direct invitation to the HR office. So I might as well keep my mouth shut, keep my head down and disappear. My revenge would come much later, especially when I would enjoy the pleasure of seeing the bad rating of this article appear the next day as soon as it is published.