Parakeet.

"Tell Corey what you thought of this story in the guestbook... or die."

My agent Peter was reciting the last line from the newest story up on my creative writing website. It was a trademark of mine that I asked for feedback at the end of each of my stories. The "... or die" bit was used as extra incentive for my reader to reply.

"Corey, you can’t keep threatening your audience with death. That’s why they’ve stopped coming to your site." Peter explained.

"Bollocks! People visit my site every day!" I countered.

"Yeah. FBI agents, just checking to make sure you don’t put that Foolproof Guide To Successfully Bombing The White House essay back up!"

I stayed silent. I knew he was right. Less and less people had been coming to my site lately. I’d also seen a distinct decrease in the amount of depresso poetry groupies willing to give themselves to me.

"Look at this stuff." Peter continued, fumbling through printouts of my most recent stories. "SARS laden corpses" he read off one page. "Necrophilliac’s Christmas Cadaver party" he read off another. He threw the sheets away and approached me slowly. He placed one of his hands on each of my shoulders and looked deep into my eyes. He then spoke to me.

"Corey, you’re writing is getting more obscene with each story. I didn’t think that was possible after reading your series on how to turn stillbirth fetuses into human pin`atas - but somehow you’ve done it!"

I took in his words and couldn’t help but smile. That stillbirth series was the best writing I’d ever done.

"I guess I want to know why, Corey. Why are you writing such sinister things? What has happened to you?"

I took a deep breath. He had given me an opening. One I had to take. I had many things I needed to get off my chest. I turned away from him and faced an imaginary camera, Bold and The Beautiful style.

"It... it was a long time ago."

"Tell me Corey. I want to know." Peter implored.

I breathed in deeply again, and then let it out. All of it. The cause of my recent sadness. The cause of my perverse writings. Out.

"Well, it was shortly after my mother’s fatal car accident."

"You mean the one that happened the same day your father was diagnosed with face cancer?" Peter asked.

"Yes. The day after my twin sisters spontaneously combusted. I had just met the girl of my dreams. Fiona Apple. We had been going out for a few months and everything was going great. We were even discussing marriage... then she told me her secret."

"Her secret?" Peter asked again. "Was it about her heroin addiction?"

"No. I knew about that. Hell, I shared half of my stash with her. Her secret was much worse than that."

Suddenly I looked right through Peter. I looked through the wall behind him. I looked through everything. For a moment all there was, was a memory. The day she told me.

We were sitting together at a Cafe` in Camberwell discussing all the usual things. Music, love, the birth weight of Phil Donahue. Then it came. She said: I have something to tell you.

"Then what was it?" Peter’s voice asked. I’d been staring silently since the heroin comment. The memory of the terrible day still fresh in my mind, I confessed it all to Peter.

"Her secret was - she wasn’t born a woman."

"You mean she was born a ... a..." Peter seemed almost too shocked to finish his sentence, so I did for him.

"That’s right. She was born a Parakeet."

"A Parakeet?!" Peter took a step back and repeated my words, wide-eyed. He couldn’t comprehend so I began explaining.

"She said it was a long and grueling procedure. As a baby, she always felt as if she was an alternative rocking junkie stuck in a Parakeet’s body. In the end it got so bad she tried to kill herself. Of course, being a Parakeet, she found it impossible to tie a noose, so she never did."

"Of course." Peter echoed.

"It was in the height of her depression that she met a young experimental doctor named Blight McAvaney."

"He was experimenting with medicines?" inquired Peter.

"No." I replied. "He was experimenting with Parakeets."

Peter took a moment to process this statement. He then asked me to continue.

"Well," I said "after several dates, the doctor felt compelled to help Fiona. He liked her and knew of her desires to become human. It was a tough decision for him - to give up the he loved for her own well-being. But in the end he chose to help her." I said, then paused. A short moment of silence was broken by Peter.

"Help her become human? HOW?" He asked, absolutely incredulous.

"It was a complicated procedure using fridge magnets and propaganda. I can’t be bothered going any deeper into it than that."

"Oh... so that was her secret? She used to be a Parakeet."

"Yes. It destroyed our relationship. I couldn’t go on seeing her after knowing she used to date a doctor."

Peter put his arm around me. He understood. Everyone close to me knew of my utter disdain for people in the medical profession. I sighed. The story had saddened me. Peter spoke with a calming voice, attempting to cement a purpose for this odd tale.

"So that’s why your stories have gotten so perverse as of late?" he asked.

"No." I responded. "My stories have gotten perverse because I have no morals."

Peter nodded. He knew this, and it dawned on him that he should have know this was the reason all along.

"Well, we can’t really change that. I guess we’ll just have to find another way to get your audience back."

"Yes." I agreed. "Yes we will."