Literally Reruns – Bathroom Throne by Yash Seyedbagheri

Nobody knew at the opening of 2021 that Yashshar Seyedbagheri would have a record breaking year on the site. At this moment, on an otherwise forgettable Saturday morning in the Summer of ‘21, Yash has appeared thirty times, with more to come. In fact we will be running out of year before all of Yash’s acceptances in 2021 will be posted. It looks like 2022 will be another Red Letter year for this author at Literally Stories.

Today’s selection, Bathroom Throne, hails back to the winter, at the time in January when resolutions are already forgotten, yet great things to come start to shine.

Q: During the year the story of Nick and Nan is presented in byte-sized vignettes that do not follow a linear path but hop to and fro in time as to match the theme of the specific piece. It’s an effective pattern, how did you arrive at the decision to present their story in this fashion?

Q: Nick is a complicated character who seems to be very much aware of what is wrong in his life, yet he does little about it. He seems to be ever stuck in the cycle of grief, mainly at a form of denial that he denies the existence of. Without giving anything away, do you know if he will ever recover, or is that something which, in your mind, is still very much up in the air?

Leila Allison

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Yash’s response:

The nonlinear pattern just came together. I never thought of it consciously, to be honest. But it’s a story about stories people tell, so I suspect that played a great deal into the form.As to Nick’s plight, I think personally that he’ll never recover in full. He’ll grow up, he’ll assume the mantle of adulthood, but in my mind, the grief will keep him from fully achieving. One can speculate on what might happen, and I certainly could see him channeling that grief in even more destructive ways as he gets older. Part of me sees him as an unhappy drunk down the road.

Bathroom Throne