In a forgotten suburb wedged between a landfill and a chakra crystal outlet, there existed a secretive cult dedicated to finding The Missing Sock.
They believed that somewhere, in some divine dryer cycle, one sock had transcended. And that all of humanity’s suffering stemmed from our separation from this sock—The One With the Little Blue Stripe.
Pilgrims came wearing mismatched pairs. They fasted on lint and whispered into static. They chanted: “Where is the twin? Where is the twin?” as if it were the password to unlock the grand secret of the universe.
One day, a child wandered in. He had a popsicle, sticky hands, and no socks on at all.
He saw the High Priest rolling in a pile of unpaired cotton, sobbing.
“Why are you so sad?” the child asked.
The High Priest blinked. Looked down. And for the first time in thirty years he was captivated, nearly moved to tears by the gorgeous fungal morphologies embedded deep within his toenails.