If you had to switch lives with a fictional character for a week, who would you choose?

Morticia Addams. 

There is no need to assemble a list of candidates. No interviews will be conducted. The position has been filled.

But before I agree to anything, I need to see the contract. What exactly does “switch lives” entail?

I assume I remain myself. I simply move into Morticia’s home and take over her daily life for one week. She comes here and takes over mine. This is a household exchange, not a romantic one. Gomez remains devoted to Morticia, Billie remains mine, and everybody keeps their hands to themselves.

Now that we have cleared that up, I’m ready to pack.

Let’s be honest. I will never fit into Morticia’s dresses, and that is perfectly okay. I don’t need her body or her wardrobe. I’m not trying to become Morticia.

I want her house.

That glorious, gloomy mansion with its endless rooms, secret passages, enormous staircases, dusty corners, and complete lack of beige. I want to wander through hallways where nobody has ever suggested adding a cheerful throw pillow. I want to discover an abandoned conservatory and fill it with plants, books, comfortable chairs, and every member of the Sunstone Grove Menagerie.

There would finally be enough shelving.

I’d drink my coffee while Thing handed me whatever I had misplaced. Lurch could reach everything on the top shelf. Grandmama and I could discuss plants, potions, and which ingredients are technically frowned upon by the homeowners association.

Wednesday would silently judge me, which is fine. I have survived teenagers before.

I would also like to spend some time with Morticia’s carnivorous plants. I feel certain they are misunderstood. Most creatures improve considerably when someone learns what they need and stops demanding that they behave like something else.

Of course, I’m not going alone.

Maya is coming with me.

This is not really my decision. Maya would see the suitcase, attach herself to my leg, and personally amend the contract. She is emotionally dependent on me and would not accept “I’m spending a week with the Addams family” as a reasonable explanation for my absence.

She would love the mansion anyway. Acres of shadowy carpet to patrol, mysterious noises behind the walls, and plenty of people who would admire her intensity rather than ask her to calm down.

Rowdy can stay with Morticia.

He would adore her.

Rowdy is not emotionally dependent on me. He is emotionally dependent on having an audience, and Morticia would appreciate his dramatic range. He would greet her with one of his long, mournful speeches, and she would call his voice exquisite.

That would be the end of it.

By the second day, he would be following her from room to room like a tiny banshee. She would encourage him terribly. When I returned, he would have a black velvet collar and several new vocal exercises.

Dani would stay home too. Someone has to supervise Billie and maintain a thread of normalcy while Morticia and Rowdy conduct their gothic recital.

Vivie, naturally, would ignore the rules of the exchange. She would forge credentials granting herself unrestricted access to both homes. She would hold staff meetings at the mansion, return to Fort Mill to check Morticia’s progress, and submit a full report before either of us realized she had appointed herself executive producer.

This is beginning to sound less like a fictional-life swap and more like the greatest lost episode of Wife Swap.

At the end of the week, the families would gather for the traditional meeting.

Morticia would calmly report that Billie was cooperative, Dani was sensible, and Rowdy had tremendous untapped potential.

I would explain that the Addams mansion now contained more plants, several dozen glass animals, and one comfortable reading corner that nobody was permitted to disturb.

Then the producers would ask what we had learned.

I would say I learned that I do not want to be Morticia Addams.

I do not need her dresses, her figure, or her particular brand of elegance.

I just want to spend one week in a house where strange things are not hidden, unusual creatures are welcomed, and nobody is expected to make themselves smaller, quieter, brighter, or more ordinary for the comfort of visitors.

And yes, I would come home when the week was over.

But only because my dogs are here.

Unless the Addamses let me bring all three.

Then Billie had better start packing.