Yesterday morning during a read-aloud that mentioned “Backwards Day,” I watched students getting into the concept. One boy twisted his sweatshirt around so that he could pull the hood over his face. He took off his sneakers and tried, unsuccessfully, to put them on his feet backwards (note: these are second graders). Others said “What a terrible story!” meaning, of course, “What a great story!” And the guest reader, Gabby, said her name was “E-Bag,” to howls of kid-laughter.

It took me back to my own childhood, when a friend and I decided to call each other by our backwards-names: I was Narf. She was Irret.

Hysterically funny! So utterly original!

Until I mentioned it to my father, who burst my bubble: “I did that when I was a kid, too.”

“Oh,” I mumbled. So much for inventing one’s own new fun thing.

“Yeah,” Daddy went on, matter-of-factly, “I was Nodrog.”

NODROG?!

I collapsed in the floor, convulsing with laughter.

It sounded almost like a sci-fi/fantasy name. What would a character named Nodrog be like? Would he be an inept superhero who was basically good-hearted but forever blundering (à la Inspector Clouseau)? Or a giant, rugged, comic book character, a cinderblock kind of robot whose foosteps shook the Earth?

In either case, nothing like Daddy, with his silvery crewcut, work uniform, and photo gray eyeglasses. Who knew he’d actually been a real kid?

After the second-graders and “E-Bag” stirred the old memories, I found myself wondering:

What would a character named Narf be like?

Associations like Nerf and Nerd crowd my mind… but perhaps these are useful.

Maybe Narf would be athletic. Very fast and agile (I was a fast runner as a kid, whenever asthma didn’t do me in, but never really athletic, emphasis on never). I should like to think a facet of myself could be so skilled at sports, in something greater than Tetherball (if you know what this is, you are, like me, from a bygone era).

Or maybe Narf is from another world (my favorite kind of story!). This spawns all sorts of questions: How would Narf get to our world? And why? What would Narf’s world be like? Should we go there instead? Is it in danger of being destroyed? Is Narf on some kind of mission? Can Narf operate advanced technological devices and spacecraft, or even build them? … the possibilities here are endless…

Somehow I cannot think of Narf as an elegant being, except for maybe graceful while playing sports, but more likely a scrappy player. I can, however, envision Narf as something else entirely, a comical character wearing a big fascinator with giant, garish fruits fashioned from sponge (toldja those first associations might be useful).

And then I wonder…would Narf be my alter ego? My evil twin? (I accused my own children of having one).

—OH OH OH OH—

As the wan light began to fade, they stood side by side on a dune looking out over the desolation. Nothing but rippled sand to the smoky white horizon. No other living thing in sight. This was once the shoreline of the Great Sea, long since dried up.

Nodrog broke the deafening silence: This is where we must go our separate ways.

Narf nodded. After a moment, she spoke: Will we ever meet again?

She knew the answer.

Not in this world, Child. It is the last day. The end of Drawkcab. You must remember what you have been taught.

His spear fell into the sand. He was already fading like the light, becoming the mist, same as all the others. Her hands shot out, grasping at nothing. She could not hold him.

Nodrog was no more.

She bent, picked up his spear, and leaned on it, weeping.

We will meet again, she said aloud, sure that he could still hear — is it not the last sense to go?

We will meet again, she repeated, louder, if not in Drawkcab, then Drawrof. Yes. Drawrof.

And she set out over the dry Great Sea-bed, shells crunching under her feet.

—What shall I do with them now, Nodrog and Narf? Should these newly-materialized characters live out their whole story, somehow?

Ot maybe I’ll save the names for a different manifestation, in case Nodrog and Narf should come to me in the form of, say, two pet dachshunds.

Somewhere, Daddy is shaking his head about all this.

In amusement.

I’m sure of it.

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” sylvar. CC BY 2.0.

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Composed for Day 2 of the annual Slice of Life Story Challenge with Two Writing Teachers.

Q: Where might your name in reverse take you?