LXVIII. Don Draper

The Little Martian knocks back an espresso, takes a deep drag from his candy fag, and waggles his hands around.

“You're a public hazard, at this point,” he tells me, his feet up on an imaginary mahogany desk, his starched white shirt, a perfect canvas for his artfully askew mad men tie.

The Little Martian thinks he’s an intergalactic Don Draper. I think he ‘s delusional.

“It's all numbers,” he says, out of the blue.

“What is?”

“I need a smoke, too goddamn old for this shit.”

“You don’t even know how to smoke.” I remind the Little Martian and he ignores me.

He tried a blueberry vape at a friend's party the other night and almost passed out. Between his juddering hacks, and phlegmy coughing fit, the Martian decided once and for all, that vapes were for humans with a death wish. Not Little Martians with existential missions.

“It’s the damn media.!” He spits another cliché with great authority.

The Martian is enjoying his imaginary new post, his corner office overlooks a mountain of concrete pyramids, punctuated with a pretty white gurudwara in the middle. Andheri doesn't feel as dark as he thought it would.

The Little Martian eyes the files on his desk with beady eyes and loosens his checkered tie. He flips open the glossy Macbook in front of him and begins to type steady streams of gibberish into its panels.

"Can I have my seat back now, please?"

He shrugs, with a little giggle and snorts through his candy cigarette, “Are we Mad Men yet?”