The Chairman of the World found himself in the middle of a corn field,
doing what he was prone to be doing: wandering.

He approached the end of the field and came upon a rather large
farmhouse.  30 years ago it was crisp white with a plain brown roof;
now it was the way a crisp white farmhouse with a plain brown roof
looks after 30 years.  But it didn't look out-of-place.

In the yard between the house and the corn, there were two children,
probably a brother and a sister, sitting at a picnic table carving
some pumpkins.

"It must be that time of year again," thought The Chairman.  "Time to
tell the world the truth."

The children didn't seem to mind the approach of a overly tall, ugly
and jagged sort of man who could have been their grandfather.  He
could have just as easily been their son, but no one seems to think
that time is allowed to flow that way.

The Chairman stopped.

The children didn't look up.

"What on earth are you doing to that pumpkin?" The Chairman asked in a
louder voice than he was used to using.

"We're making Jack-O-Lanterns." replied the girl, before her brother
could say anything.

"Did you grow those pumpkins yourself?"

"Yup."  she popped her "P" the way only kids do.

"And how long did that take?"

"A while... like, months."

"I bet you had to water them and keep the bugs away and everything, huh?"

"Sure did!"

"Then why are you stabbing it whith that knife?"

"To make him happy.  See?"  she held up the pumpkin and pointed to the
curved orifice she had made using the knife.

"He's not happy, that's just a smile.  Actually, it's only a smile
because you say so.  You think the pumpkin is happy because you put a
smile on it.  But what you've really done is carved out a piece of who
he is, and look, there it is on the ground, along with all of his
insides.  Without all that stuff inside him, he can't really be
himself.  He won't know how.  And even if he did, he couldn't, because
you've taken away from him everything that made him who he is.  You
lured him into a false sense of being; you provided for him all this
time, but you knew in the end that you were just going to strip it
away.  Your intention was set from the start, but you never made it
known.  He knows now that you don't want _him_, but what you can make
him to be, even if it means he can never be returned to his true self.
He was born for dying, and you're the one who's just now brought that
to light."

Silence.

"You'd better beware, someone might try to make _you_ happy some day."

More silence.

"His name is Jack," she said.

Her brother ate a pumpkin seed.