There came a knock at my door late one night and I called out “who is it?”
Came the reply “Perry, this is the Batman.”
How I have come to know Batman is another story for another day, but I’m not used to him showing up unannounced late in the evening at my house in Havertown PA.
“Batman, to what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?”
“I’ll cut right to the chase. Commissioner Gordon fired me!”
“What happened?!”
One day I was intoning to him in my deep gravelly voice that ‘I’m whatever Gotham needs me to be’ and he said ‘What we need you to be is outta here!’”
“OMG! Why.”
“I'm over 40 now. He told me to check with millionaire Bruce Wayne to see if he might have something for me. I ... um ... don't even know him!”
“But why are you here at my house? Doesn’t your alter ego, whoever he is, have a place for you to go?”
”Yeah, but the place is being painted. I can’t stand the smell.”
Batman told me he’d just need to stay for a few days, but it stretched into weeks. To be honest, he wasn’t too much trouble except for the batshit - literal batshit - I had to clean up all over the house and the way he just totally hogs the bathroom.
The first couple of weeks the Dark Knight mostly moped around on the sofa, drinking my beer and binge watching The Gilmore Girls.
"Batman, you've got to get going," I said. "Besides, I'm running out of beer."
Then he did start pumping out resumes, lots of resumes, but it wasn’t going so well.
“Perry, I’ve been turned down as a cosplay crimefighter by Cleveland, Albany, Pierre South Dakota, Zanesville Ohio, and Sibley Alabama.”
“But why?”
“They all say the same thing: You got no superpowers. We're thinking maybe we can land Green Lantern."
I started thinking maybe Batman needed some career counseling but believe it or not there are no placement agencies for winged creatures of the night in Havertown.
Then one day he burst into my room, all smiles - if anyone can actually smile under that headpiece - and announced in that deep gravelly voice:
“I got me Chicago!”
“That’s great, Batman,” I said “Chicago is much bigger than Gotham City.”
“And it has the distinction” he added, “of being an actual city instead of a fictional one.”
“So will you be leaving for Chicago right away?” I asked.
“You bet your bottom dollar! But first I need to ask you for one more thing.”
“Of course, Dark Knight sir. What?”
“ I have to meet with Governor Pritzker.”
“Yes, and…”
“Can you teach me how to say ‘Whatever Chicago needs me to be’ in Yiddish?”
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