Authoress' Note: This story takes place in 2017 and ignores the Direct to DVD movie 'Dead Like Me: Life After Death'. I don't want to give away the main character, Zoey Violet Barrett, too much, but she's connected to all the original cast, and you'll know exactly who she is by the end of the story, so please go the distance and read til the end please. I might write a sequel or two as time goes by, but I've got several other series and a novel in the works, so writing time is at a premium. P.S. My beta reader expressed concerns about my portrayal of Charlie the pet reaper, but Charlie always struck me as bitter about his being a dead and homeless child, and twelve more years of that life would likely twist him as I have it do here.
Alive Like Me
By Arianwen P.F. Everett
"So I brought a ton of hot dogs and buns. Some of the dogs even have cheese or chili inside. We can have a big weenie roast and stuff ourselves silly!" I announced to my fellow pet reapers, digging through the cooler I'd packed for this reap. This was a working vacation, but whatever graveling inspired chaos was destined to cause the deaths of six people and 23 animals in Olympia National Park wouldn't begin till 5:51 AM tomorrow morning.
"We raided four fully stocked vending machines last night, and Amira boosted two boxes of Twinkies from the Shop and Save. We don't need your fancy weenies, Pulse," Charlie, my boss and arch-nemesis snapped back across the newly-lit campfire. The guy hated me, but like all reapers, neither of us had a choice in who we worked with. I've tried everything to win him over; I even saved up my allowance for three months last year in order to buy him a gift card for a new board, but that just angered him more. Nothing I ever do is good enough.
I probably shouldn't have brought the weenies, but I'd hoped they might help me make friends with the other kids, even if Charlie would never appreciate the gesture. I guess it's time to face facts, I'm not like them. For me, the Pets and Service Animals Division is just a stepping stone to full-on human reaping. You see, unlike Charlie, Amira, Kyle, Dove, and Marco, I haven't died yet. I have no idea when my post it will be written, but due to what Uncle Rube likes to call my parents' crowning achievement in F-Uppery, I'll be a grim reaper til the moment the ink dries on Z.V. Barrett.
Zoey Violet Barrett, that was the name my parents gave me in the hour between my birth and both of them getting their lights, leaving me behind with the balance of their reaping quotas. Not that I'm complaining or anything. I just wish I could have known them in person, but my Aunt George, Aunt Roxy, and Uncle Rube have told me story after story, and I have the diaries, videos, and letters they created for me. That's why I keep my own diary. It makes me feel connected to them.
Overall I've had a pretty cool life, even without parents. Grant it, it's not as cool as I thought it would be when I was little. I remember being five or six years old and watching all the adult reapers going on group reaps and discussing their days reaping at Der Waffle Haus, and I thought that would be my future.
Then, on my eighth birthday, Uncle Rube brought me into the kitchen and informed me that the higher ups had made it clear that it was time for me to start learning our trade and assigned me to the Pets and Service Animals Division. Aunt George escorted Charlie in and he handed me my first post it, told me not to screw it up, and then simply walked out to gorge himself on ice cream and birthday cake, my ice cream and birthday cake.
An hour later, I'd had to leave my own party to sneak into our next door neighbor's house, reap her canary who'd managed to open his own cage door, and then watch as he got tackled by her two cats, his soul immediately flying off into his lights as the two felines fought over who'd get credit when they presented the mangled bird to their owner. To make matters worse, I had to shimmy out the bathroom window as Mrs. Kline had just gotten home.
That was the first time I'd seen Charlie's sneer. He'd watch me push myself out the window and into Aunt George's waiting arms, while Aunt Roxy and Uncle Rube distracted Mrs. Kline, claiming they'd been taking a break from the party and had heard a crash inside her house. By the time Mrs. Kline unlocked her front door, Aunt George and I were back in the kitchen, cleaning the window sill muck off of my party dress.
In hindsight, I'm certain that was the moment Charlie started hating me, and I guess I can understand why. I mean, when he shimmies out of a pet's home after popping its soul, there's nobody to catch him. When he died and became a pet reaper, he stopped having a family that loved him. His parents got their lights as did mine, but when mine left, Aunt George, Aunt Roxy, and Uncle Rube were there to raise me. They changed my diapers when I was a baby. They put a roof over my head and food in my belly. They signed me up for an online K-12 program, so I could schedule my school day around my reaps, and when I'm not reaping or doing schoolwork, Uncle Rube takes me to my swimming, skating, and coding classes, so I can spend time with living kids my own age. In short, my family has given me an awesome life, all the while training me to become the best grim reaper I can be. I'm lucky to have them. Charlie isn't so lucky, and neither are my other colleagues. No wonder they don't want anything to do with me outside of work.
Ignoring Charlie's attitude problem, I resolved to enjoy the campfire as much as I could and slid two hot dogs onto one of the roasting tong I'd brought for the trip. "Suit yourself. If you change your mind, there's plenty."
After a brief moment of indecision, Dove, the newest pet reaper in our division, moved to sit next to me and requested a chili dog, refusing to retreat when Charlie gave her the evil eye. Though she died less than a year ago, she's tougher than the others and has adapted better, probably because she spent most of her life in foster care and never really had much in the way of family to feel the loss of. Her death ended a year long battle with cancer, and the few times we've managed to have a conversation where Charlie or one of the others didn't butt in, she's extolled about how strong and healthy she feels now that she's dead.
As our hot dog roasting neared completion, I handed Dove my tong and began rummaging around the bottom of the cooler, feeling for the baggie of condiment packets I'd put there. "So, you want ketchup or mustard or just plain?"
"Mustard's good," Dove replied, taking the packet I offered her.
"I like mustard too, but on plain dogs. To cookouts," I toasted, tapping my hot dog bun with Dove's before taking the first bite. They were cooked to perfection, and I could see bliss on Dove's face as she bit into hers.
"So, what's it like being a reaper while you're still alive?" Dove suddenly asked after taking a drag on her soda, probably from one of the vending machines she and the others had hit yesterday.
"Busy, very busy, but its the same for the adults. I mean Aunt Roxy and Aunt George each have jobs, and Uncle Rube runs all over the place doing his reaps along with overflow from other divisions, so he's busy most days as well. He got wifi installed just for me, so I could come over after breakfast to do my schoolwork, and when he sets off to reap, I tag along with my laptop. He takes me to my reaps as well, and usually, by the time Aunt George or Aunt Roxy comes to take me home, all my work is done for the day. It requires a little juggling, but all in all, when I lay my head on the pillow at night, I sleep the sleep of the righteous," I summarized, happy to finally have someone near my own age to share all of this with.
"Sleep the sleep of the righteous?" Dove asked incredulously, as if she believed I was being sarcastic.
"Yeah. I mean, when I pop the soul of a dog or cat or some other animal, I know I'm helping that creature move on. I can't stop their dying, but I can make sure they get to a place where they'll be safe and hopefully, one day, reunited with the people that loved them. My Uncle Rube says that being a reaper is a sacred duty and that we must treat the job with the grace and humility it deserves. We do a great thing, you and I, and most nights when I go to sleep, I feel like I've accomplished something important with my day. Few twelve year olds can say that," I explained with pride, hoping Dove would understand.
"Oh please! You kill pets for a living, Pulse! We all do! There's nothing sacred about that," Charlie interrupted, grabbing my second hot dog off the plate and stuffing it into his mouth before I could protest.
"Oh F*ck off, Charlie! You wouldn't know sacred if it bit you on the ss like that poodle did last week!" I retorted, sick of his abuse.
Turning red-faced from the laughter aimed his way, Charlie marched to my side of the fire and stood over Dove and me, snarling like a threatened animal. "You think you're so much better than us because you're alive, don't you? You think we should all just worship at your feet because you deign to throw us your table scraps from time to time! We're pet reapers, not pets! And just because the powers that be have forced us to work with you, doesn't make you're one of us! You're a reaper girl with a pulse, a freak of nature, and that's all you'll ever be!"
"Actually, someday she'll be a reaper WOMAN with a pulse, and you'll still be a miserable, little brat!" Dove interjected, joining Charlie and me on our feet. Looking over at Dove I felt a deep comradery usually reserved for my family and the other grown up reapers I'm close with. Yes, maybe Dove and I can be friends, Charlie or no Charlie.
Suddenly, unable to contain his anger, Charlie pushed Dove to the ground and attempted to punch her in the face. Jumping into action like Aunt Roxy taught me, I grabbed his arm and twisted it behind him. She called it a lock and said it was meant to incapacitate the person so that they couldn't continue doing what they were doing, but that didn't stop Charlie from trying to get free. Fighting to keep him still, I finally lost my own patience and shouted. "Stop it! Just stop it or you'll dislocate your shoulder and that really, really hurts!"
"What in blazes is going on here?!" a familiar voice called out as Uncle Rube broke through the tall bushes surrounding the campsite and stalked over to our group.
"Charlie attacked Dove and tried to punch her so I put him in an arm lock like Aunt Roxy showed me," I answered, wanting Uncle Rube to know that I hadn't been the one to start things.
"Is that true? Did you physically assault a member of your team?" Uncle Rube questioned Charlie as I released the lock.
"What business is it of yours, Old Man?! This is my division, and I'll run it how I like!" Charlie insisted, dusting himself off and flexing his sore elbow and shoulder.
"Now you listen here, you little miscreants! This is a joint operation and I have seniority, so sit back down and act like professionals! That goes for all of you!" Uncle Rube added, not wanting to appear to take sides.
"Whatever," Charlie spat back with an eye roll, plopping back down in his original spot to stare at the fire.
The adult reapers chosen to take the human souls tomorrow, Uncle Rube and my parents' replacements in External Influences, Myrna and Sam, had previously claimed they'd be arriving in Uncle Rube's truck at 5:00 AM, but judging by the lit campfire at the other end of the campgrounds, they'd changed their minds and were spending the night here.
On one hand, I was grateful for their presence. When Charlie first announced the operation this morning, my stomach had clenched in panic. I'd never even spent the night away from home before, and now I had to do so out in the woods, with nobody around but my fellow pet reapers, most of whom resented me. However, none of that changed the fact that I had post-its for two of the horses at the stable attached to the nearby rangers' station, so earlier this afternoon Aunt George and Aunt Roxy had been forced to bite back their own worries, provide me with the $4 fare, and put me on the tourist van that brought me and my colleagues to the campgrounds.
Still, as much as I hated to admit it, Charlie did have a point. What had just happened between Dove, Charlie, and I was an internal matter within the Pets and Service Animals division. Uncle Rube might have authority over tomorrow's maneuvers, but in the reaper community child reapers were under no obligation to obey adults the way living children were. It was like the stories where Aunt Roxy and the cops in her precinct got into arguments with firefighters or state police. It was a matter of jurisdiction. Charlie had a right to resent Uncle Rube's intrusion, and as member of the Pets and Animals Services division, I was supposed to side with him no matter how much I personally hated him.
Needless to say, I was still conflicted when I sat back down and watched Uncle Rube return to his own team. Looking to Charlie, I was grateful to see he, Kyle, Amira, and Marco had started playing spit with their ragged, old deck of playing cards. Turning to Dove, I noticed that she had pulled out a library book and set it next to her soda as she finished off her hot dog. The amicable moment between us had been broken, and she obviously had plans for the rest of the night. Not wanting to look desperate, I pulled out the tablet computer I use for my math homework and finished off that part of my weekend assignments, saving my work to the cloud courtesy of the park's campground wifi, lest Charlie or one of the others decided to play keep-away with my tablet for a few days like they did several months ago. Thankfully, I have another tablet at home. It's sad that I can't trust my coworkers, but if living kids can be *ssholes at times, dead kids are worse.
After reading the five pages assigned for Monday's history lesson on the run up to the civil war, I turned off my tablet and placed it into its protective case before climbing into my sleeping bag. Listening to the sound of playing cards slapping to the ground across the dying fire, I drifted off to sleep. With 23 animals and 6 people loosing their lives, and two teams of reapers required to coordinate their efforts, whatever fate had planned for tomorrow morning was nearly guaranteed to be chaotic, making a good night's sleep imperative.
The banging of a metal ladle against a frying pan woke me and the other pet reapers the next morning and even I wanted to beat up Uncle Rube. He's lucky Sam and Myrna were there or Charlie and the rest might have piled on, and I'm not sure whose side I would have taken had things gone down that way. "Rise and shine, kids! Milk and breakfast burritos are at the picnic tables, my treat! Up-and-at-em!"
"We're awake, Uncle Rube. You don't need to keep banging that thing," I grumbled as I pulled myself to my feet and stretched before packing away all my stuff from the previous night, the others having taken off for the nearby tables and their free, warm meal.
This put me in a bind. If I joined them for a decent meal there was always the possibility something or someone would drag off my colleagues' possessions. If I stood guard, I had to wash down a honey-nut granola bar with soda, which was both gross and unhealthy to say the least. After a moment of indecision, I figured enduring an unpalatable breakfast was better than dealing with my team's accusations when their stuff went missing and ripped open the granola bar's orange and yellow wrapper. But I'd be damned if I packed up their stuff along with my own. I'm a pet reaper, not a maid.
Twenty minutes later, as I finished off the granola bar, Myrna approached with a small carton of 1% milk. "The boss man says to drink this. You're a growing girl, and he's responsible for you."
"Are the others almost done? Because I need to get to the stables; I spoke with one of the rangers yesterday and they don't take the horses on rounds until 8AM, so I know my reaps are there. I think Kyle has the other two. I know he has the cat that lives in the stables with the horses, and the rest, well, I don't know what kind of animals they have," I detailed, explaining to the reaper I'd known since I was a baby how important it was that I be relieved of guard duty to do my actual duty to the universe.
"Then why aren't you on your way already?" Myrna asked, a look of confusion written on her face.
"Because the rest of my division ran off without packing their things first. Raccoons or bears, or just a plain old hungry human could wander by and take it all. Then I'd be blamed by my team, and Aunt George and Aunt Roxy would likely end up shelling out money to replace things, and I'd be blamed a second time. I don't need that kind of drama, but if they don't get back here in the next ten minutes, I have to go regardless. Loops and Marigold are counting on me to lead them to their lights, and that has to be more important, right?" I asked, needing council. Most of the time my responsibilities as a pet reaper are straight forward and I carry them out efficiently, but on rare occasions I get stuck.
"It's the most important thing, Child. Now don't fret, I'll inform your team of your need to leave. If they choose to abandon their possessions out in the wild, they deserve to have them stolen. You're a good girl Zoey. You could have packed your own stuff and left theirs, but you didn't. You put your people's needs first. That's very grown up," Myrna stated, seeing the position I was in and feeling a need to help me out. She'd once been the mother of six children back before Uncle Rube was even dead, so I guess she knew what she was doing.
"Thank you, Myrna," I replied, before throwing my arms around her for a hug. While I'm grateful for the praise, I'm not so sure I want to be a grown up. I certainly want out of the Pets and Service Animals Division, and teenagers are cool, but being grown up means so much more. Sometimes Aunt Roxy and I cuddle in front of the TV and watch old movies, looking for my mom in the background. I know teenagers don't do that. There are good things about being a teenager, like staying out late, and driving, and dating, but you loose a lot of stuff too, and from what I can tell, there's a lot more work to get done and you don't get a choice about doing it. I'm just not sure it's worth the trade offs.
"Well, drink your milk and run along. I've got to get back to Rube. Less than half an hour to showtime," Myrna quipped, leaving me to finish my breakfast. Milk and granola was much nicer than soda, and while I intended to get a big lunch later, it would do to tide me over.
Once finished, I tossed my garbage in the bag Charlie brought so we wouldn't draw attention to our adult-free team by using the public trashcans in the common areas, and set out to attend Loops and Marigold in the last hour of their lives.
As I entered the stables, I immediately headed for my day's reaps who had already woken and were mildly agitated. Working as a pet reaper these past four years, I've gotten good at interpreting the moods of animals and these two weren't the first horses I'd reaped. I seem to get a lot of horses, more than the rest of my team. Uncle Rube suspects it has to do with the fact that horses, as prey animals in the wild, are instinctively able to sift out the undead from the living, and would be more weary of an undead child than a living one like me. Whatever the reason, they were still antsy this mourning, despite my attempts to calm them with a few pets and whispered, soothing words about the beauty of the lights they'd soon see. Looking around, I finally found the cause of their unease; two gravelings were leisurely resting in the rafters, each one sipping from a take-out cup and smoking a cigarette, as they quietly grunted and grumbled amongst themselves. I quickly looked away and returned to stroking Marigold's buttery mane before they suspected I'd spotted them. After popping Marigold's soul, I turned my attention to Loops, and did the same. Thankfully, both seemed to calm a bit with my presence and my touch.
As I turned to leave, I was suddenly doused with a warm, brown liquid and watched as two cardboard cups hit the stable door in front of me. Turning back around to confront the little nightmares who'd chucked their half-finished coffees at me, I noticed the small, but growing, mound of burning hay under the rafter where the gravelings had been. They'd used their cigarettes to start a fire in the stables. All I could think about was that my mother had died in a fire, and I was out the door in panic, nearly colliding with Kyle on his way to his reaps.
"Pop the souls and run: the stable's on fire!" I managed to hiss out as I pushed past him, not wanting to alert anyone but my laziest colleague to the emerging threat.
Despite the adrenaline rushing through me at the understanding of what was about to go down, I'd been well trained. Reapers stayed on the periphery and weren't permitted to effect the outcome, so once I was far enough away from the now smoldering stable, I forced myself to stop and watch for Kyle's emergence. After what seemed like forever, he ran out, coughing on the smoke and giving a thumbs up sign to inform me he'd gotten the job done in time. Despite Kyle's close reap, by the time the first shouts of 'fire' began, the two of us had returned to the more secluded part of the campground where our team planned to meet up.
Then without warning, a large man in a park maintenance uniform came out of nowhere and roughly gripped my arm, pulling me along. "Come on, kids; there's a fire! Run!"
When I started to struggle, the man lifted me up, pinning me against his side as he ran away from the campsite in the opposite direction of the now visible blaze. Again, panic flooded me as it had in the stables, but this time there was no reaper training I could fall back on. The hulking man, desperate to save the little girl he'd found alone in the woods, crushed me against him as he ran and I was frozen with fear. With what little self control I had left, I screamed as best as I could with that muscled arm clamped around my arms and chest. "Help! Help!
Then just as suddenly as the man had grabbed me, we were falling down the steep drop into the basin of Merriman Creek, where the famous falls emptied into. At first I was grateful I only came away slightly bruised and drenched in creek water, mud, and moss slime, but when I looked back at the man who'd been carrying me and took the brunt of the spill, my heart fell into my stomach. He seemed torn up bad. Two bones jutted through his skin and blood-soaked uniform, and around his slightly dented head pooled a halo of blood.
I kept waiting and waiting for his soul to step out of his body as the blood continued to drain and the rise and fall of his chest faltered, but nothing happened. He'd not been reaped, yet he was dying. In terror, I jumped to my feet, ignoring the shooting pain in my ankle, and howled for help. "Uncle Rube! Sam! Myrna! He's over here! We're over here!"
Seconds turned into minutes, and nobody came. There were three human reapers nearby at least. Somebody had to have this person's post-it. "Come on, guys! Who has this man's post-it! He's dying! Come on!"
I looked back over at the dying park worker and noticed his breathing appeared to have stopped. If nobody had his post it, then I figured he be meant to live. Remembering the red cross CPR class I'd taken, I fell back to my knees and crawled over to the man. I tried to breath and pump like I was taught, but having been around the dead and dying all my life, after three rounds I knew it was hopeless.
There was no reaper around. The man was dead and there was no post-it. My mom's diary told of a man named Ray, who she dated and who had hurt her when she tried to break up with him. Then daddy had killed him with a mirror to get him off mommy and Ray became a graveling. No post it meant a graveling.
This man had tried to save me from a fire and was going to be transformed into a graveling for his heroism. I couldn't let that happen! I wouldn't let that happen! In my head I heard Aunt George telling me the story of her first few days as a reaper and Uncle Rube's scolding 'What you do now matters; what you don't do matters.' Well, if Uncle Rube had a problem with what I was about to do, he could blow me!
Summoning the power I'd only previously used on animals, I trailed my hand down my unnamed hero's arm and felt his soul leaving his body. I didn't have to look up. I'd seen this a million times. I'd just never been the cause for another human being before.
"Who are you? What.. what are you?" the astounded man asked, looking down at the body he'd just vacated then back at me.
That was a good question; what was I? I'd been a pet reaper for over four years, but obviously this man wasn't a chihuahua or a tabby. I'm twelve years old, and a girl, but I'm also a grim reaper.. with a pulse, as Charlie likes to dig at me. Uncle Rube and the other adult reapers call me a 'scythe child', which is supposedly some sort of weird astrological happenstance where two grim reapers conceive a child on Halloween, during a total lunar eclipse, with specific planetary alignments and some other new age stuff about destiny restoration thrown in for good measure; I don't really understand it, but it's what they say allowed two people who'd been dead for decades to have a living child. They also say I'm really rare, like only the seventh scythe child in all of human history. But all that put together failed to reveal just what I was, and it certainly didn't explain how I was able to reap a human being, especially without a post-it.
"She's growing up," Uncle Rube's voice calmly explained as he finally arrived, climbing down the steep ditch we'd gone down in. Never so happy to see him as I was at that moment, I flung myself into his arms and the tears from the panic and fear just streamed out of me. I hadn't realized just how frightened I'd been until now, but I never wanted to let go of Uncle Rube in that moment.
"Shh, it's okay, Pumpkin. I got you. Everything's okay. Shh," Uncle Rube repeated over and over, trying to calm me down.
"He didn't have a post-it! He was dying and then he was dead and I didn't want him to turn into a graveling and so I reaped him! I had to, Uncle Rube! I had to!" I gasped out, trying to both breath and talk around the fabric of his shirt and the tears and snot on my face. I was totally coming apart and I had no idea how to reform back into myself.
"You did what you were meant to do, Pumpkin. I know you probably won't be too happy about this, but the higher ups needed a test," Uncle Rube tentatively explained once he could pull me off of him and look me in the eye.
"A test, what do you mean a test? A test of what?" I questioned, unable to figure out what he was going on about.
"Of you. Not everyone grows up at the same speed, and you can't reap human souls if you're not mature enough to handle the work. When you were left with nobody to back you up, you demonstrated you were able to keep your wits about you, access the situation as it developed, and reap this man's soul when there was no longer any hope for his survival. You proved you're ready to move onto human reaping, and I'm very, very proud of you, Pumpkin," Uncle Rube finished, planting a kiss on my forehead, while placing a thin slip of paper into my right hand.
I immediately knew what I was holding by the size, shape, and sticky backing. Looking down, I read the post-it. 'A. Golan. Merriman Creek, Olympia National Park. ETD 6:09 AM.'
"He was never meant to become a graveling. He was always your reap, Pumpkin. Sorry I couldn't tell you, but then it wouldn't have been a real test, would it?" Uncle Rube asked rhetorically, patting my back soothingly, before looking up at the park maintenance man.. A Golan.
Following his eyes, I stepped away from Uncle Rube and wiped my face with my sleeve. "So, what does the A stand for, Mr. Golan?"
"Alex.. Alexander. I.. I'm dead, aren't I? I'm dead and your.. dead as well?" Alexander Golan queried, trying to wrap his brain around these two strange people, one of whom he died trying to protect.
"No, I'm alive, and I thank you for trying so hard to keep me that way, but you're right about your being dead. You didn't survive the fall," I expounded, gesturing to the man's body and letting him absorb the reality of his demise. Everyone said that was always best. The dead needed to connect to their passing before they could go into the lights.
For a moment, Alexander Golan just stared at his lifeless body, then a thought struck him. "The little boy, the one that was with you? Did he get out? Is he…"
"Kyle got away, but he was already dead, going on ten years now. He's a pet reaper, like a grim reaper for pets. I was one till this morning, but now Uncle Rube tells me I'm old enough to be your reaper, and I'm honored to have the privilege of helping you find your peace," I continued, letting the man know I took his afterlife seriously and would do my best to help him through this. If the powers that be really were watching, I wanted to show them I could be a professional.
"Thank you. I'm not sure I get all of this, but how can you be a grim reaper if you're a living, breathing kid?" Alex asked, taking the arm I offered to help him move away from his corpse. From what I've seen, walking away from the physical remainder of their lives helps dead people begin to think of what comes next, and I've always suspected this has something to do with their souls being upright and moving freely and painlessly again.
I had to think about my answer for a second, but after all I'd been through since waking up this morning, I began to understand a bit more than I had last night. Yes, I was a grim reaper, but I was alive and living things were always subject to change. My time as a pet reaper was behind me; my work as a human reaper had begun with this man, this Alex Golan. Today I was a girl, but as Dove pointed out to Charlie, one day I would be a woman. That meant that unlike the undead I'd be working with, and the undead I loved, I'd still have to build a life for myself on top of my reaping responsibilities. It was my destiny and was what it was. Finally figuring out the best way to put it, I looked Alexander Golan in the eye and sighed. "Well, it's like that Lady Gaga song, I was born this way."