BY DR. tRUTH

Today's discussion with the 15-year-old from hell was most illuminating.

(A swift guide before commencing: capital letters denote volume, indeed, shrieking.)

Anti-Christ's henchman: If you die tomorrow, I'm your next of kin.

(Shuddering): So, what's your point?

I'll get your business and all the equipment, the house, everything.

I hardly think so. You'd have to stand in line.

(To whom reality means nothing): I'm the oldest. It all comes to me.

The bank is older. Get behind it and the IRS.

But you've got insurance.

Yup. Your share will amount to about $33,000 which should net out about 15 grand when everything's done. That'll last you about two months after the parties and the drugs.

Yeah, but you wouldn't be around to make me spend it on college.

What would you take at college? Space?

I'm not going if you don't pay for it.

I'm not paying for it unless it's over my dead body. Should I stay awake at night while you live in my house?

Nah, I don't need the money until I'm 17 and have moved out. Then I'll reconsider.

Hah! Gotcha there; I've made the insurance beneficiary a trust fund that you can't get until you're old enough to make sense. And that may be never!

I'll just prove you were mentally incompetent.

Mentally incompetent? Of course I'm mentally incompetent, I have an alien disguised as a teenage human being living in my house who is gradually driving me out of my mind. But I'll be dead and I won't care what happens to you anyway, so what's the point of the whole exercise? You're only behaving like an idiot teenager so you can drive me crazy and I'll die of a broken heart so that you can prove your power over me. BUT I WON'T BE HERE FOR YOU TO GLOAT OVER! I WILL BE DEAD! AND HAPPY! AND FINALLY GETTING SOME SLEEP. AND NOT WORRYING ABOUT YOU. AND DOING WHATEVER IT IS PEOPLE DO WHEN THEY'RE DEAD WITHOUT HAVING TO CONSIDER EVERYBODY ELSE. AND I WILL BE HAPPY, I TELL YOU, VERY VERY HAPPY! AND DEAD. AND HAPPY.

See?

See what?

How can you expect me to be normal in a household run by someone like you? It's all your fault.

And your next line is:

I didn't ask to be born.

WELL, I DIDN'T ASK TO BE TORTURED OR TO PUT UP WITH THIS KIND OF INSANITY. IN FACT, NOBODY ON THE FACE OF THE PLANET ASKED TO BE BORN. SPERM DON'T TALK. THEY JUST ARE. AND YOU ARE. SO GET OVER IT AND GET WITH THE PROGRAM. WHATEVER THE STUPID PROGRAM IS.

How much did you say the insurance would be worth?

I truly believe that children are our hope for the future. And teenagers provide a use for stakes, garlic and silver bullets. Soul-sucking little shits.

With a new wariness, I regard my three younger children, who couldn't possibly become teenagers with such evil attitudes. Could they?

Dr. tRuth vents now and then in POINT as therapeutic exercise.