His wingless angel protests, “You won’t like it,” but Derrick insists.

In the world in which he’d never been born, his parents haven’t divorced, his wife married Ryan Gosling, and the Beatles are all alive and still together.

“Nothing’s worse without me?” asks Derrick.

“Fruitcake still sucks,” his angel offers.

Tony Jasnowski teaches English at Bellevue University and is sure that we’d all be one step closer to living in Pottersville if 50-Word Stories didn’t exist.