The Man Made of Marshmallows Mailbag

As a recurring feature, we'll be taking reader questions and prompts sometimes. How often this feature will recur after this one: Probably never, honestly.

Anyway, James has a question he'd like me to answer! Haha. Let's get it started!

Alex, what was your most recent dream? -James

Thanks for the question, James! Well, because of the intricacies of the human mind and the cycles of sleep, I normally would have no answer for you, James! Most dreams - through some pre-Lovecraftian sense of mercy - are actually forgotten and never see the light of waking life! Normally, that is. Luckily for you, I've just experienced a terrible daydream.

So I wake up in a room lighted like a film noir. You know, it's gritty. Single coffee table in a kitchen somewhere in the Great Plains. Smoky, dank, everywhere. Loose playing cards provide evidence of recent solitaire games resigned in frustration. I'm sitting at the table and my head hurts really badly, as it does in the waking world. And sitting next to me is a man made of marshmallows.

The man made of marshmallows smiles like an icon with a seemingly painted-on face. The man made of marshmallows sports human clothes: jeans with a belt and a tank top, I can see the outline of a chiseled-looking-albeit-marshmallow-made upper body under the tank top. The man made of marshmallows maintains a toothless, mouthless smile. The man made of marshmallows hands me a business card from a human wallet in his human jeans.

The business card reads as follows:

MARSH MALLOW
"The Man Made of Marshmallows"

Adorable, I think. I smile at Mr. Marsh Mallow in happy acknowledgement of his card. And then I look deeper. Mr. Mallow opens his marshmallow mouth. Rows of human teeth line a very human palate and a very human tongue. His nose, which is made of marshmallows, has nostrils and I am dimly aware that a human respiratory system must then connect up to this marshmallow nose. I see Mr. Mallow breathe and real air comes in and real air goes out. And he doesn't seem happy. And if he is processing the air then he must have human lungs. I notice bite marks in his skin and tears around his eyes. I see the hints of blood stains all about his marshmallow skin. Mr. Mallow must thus have human nerves, and human eyes, and, of course, human nerves imply a human spine and a human brain. Scars assorted around the viscera and limbs lead me to believe that surgically, but not precisely, that his bones and muscles must have been largely replaced (preserved just enough to give him rudimentary motility and marrow)... replaced with not just mallow of marsh but with malice aforethought... Who had done this to him? His only source of food is, of course, himself. This was the dilemma of design by whatever entity had deigned to place him in this room. His many rows of teeth line a human mouth kept cosmetically in a forced smile. Mr. Mallow seems to be smiling but on closer inspection was leering out from human eyes, glass marbles in a soft doughy core. And then I begin to wonder: why am I here? Why have I been sent to the man made of marshmallows? I am still a human being and Mr. Mallow appropriately terrifies me. He pulls out another business card.

THERE IS ONE EXIT TO THIS ROOM
FIND IT
THE MAN THAT DID THIS TO ME
WANTS TO DO THE SAME TO YOU
CAMERAS EVERYWHERE
RUN AND NEVER LOOK BACK

I look at him and he was smiling and his human teeth were showing, shining with human saliva, and he nods slightly and I dash madly for every possible exit. I begin to feel trapped and Mr. Mallow tries to speak to direct or warn me but all that comes out of his hollowed-out vocal cords is a crying whistle - always the same pitch - crossed with a choked-to-inaudible whisper.

And the one exit to the room is to awake. And, since this is a daydream, I am immediately startled to full alertness and remember that James had sent me this question, perhaps years ago, and so I create this mailbag to provide some relief from inevitably searching the unexplored possibilities in the existence of Marsh Mallow.