(Happy Thanksgiving Day to America and to the World in General. Jim and Alice will return on Christmas Day–so, till then good tidings from Saragun Springs-Leila)
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Elmer Fudd’s laugh speeded up ten-thousand times comes close to describing the sound of a woodpecker beaking the holy hell out of a metal chimney cap. A pneumatic “uh-huh-huh-huh-huh,” with a little “phu-bub-buh-tuth,” thrown in for variety, gives you the soul of the thing. Wikipedia calls this behaviour drumming.
Continue readingA few nights ago, Jim identified the great, distant sun Naazar in the autumnal sky, and then attempted to sell me tales of its splendor and glory. This had caused an old memory to trip my inner As If Alarm. Some claim my inner As If Alarm underscores the ever-suspicious side of my personality; all things considered, I find it a useful and necessary device.
Continue reading
(It seemed appropriate for me to end this collection of Saragun Springs Books with what song writers call an “outro.” In the next few months new stuff will be coming–again, fair warning–Leila)
Outro
I met the Boss at the spring at three AM. This happened “the other day”–the most useful time reference in all literature. You can say it ten years from now in either direction and it will still be its effectively vague bad self.
She was seated at the picnic table, and the stench bubble encapsulating the evil water glowed green in the Pinglight.
Three A.M. has its own truth; but it doesn’t translate well to daylight. Maybe it is the lingering last call in the voice, or steady hands that lose their firm dexterity after a night of uneasy sleep, which then flop like a docked Halibut until you mercifully push the Fish back into the 80 proof sea. In Saragun Springs we call that activity “Hook of the Halibut that docked you.”
“So, you finally finished a three week project in just under two years,” the Boss said.
“Art is infinite–it knows no time limit. The same can be said for unagented submissions sent to reputable publishers who actually pay for the work instead of soaking you for every nickel,” I said, as I sat on the other side of the table.
“How so?” Her voice had a Gordon’s edge to it, and “smelled” like a cross between tobacco and jumper berries. Since we have similar habits, I did not make mention of it.
“Well when you cast an unasked-for, non-touted opus into the structured world of, say, Knoff, you never see it again. It speeds on toward infinity.”
“Are you suggesting that the ‘pending’ notifications at Submittable aren’t as candid as they should be?”
“Not at all,” I said. “Hell, the apocalypse can honestly be categorized as pending–yet something tells me that we will hear about it long before we do Doubleday.”
She looked at me for a long time. “I guess it’s pretty hopeless.”
“Of course it is–everything worth a damn is hopeless. And you should let it get you down as long as you don’t stay down,” I said.
She thought about that, and I could tell that the fifty or sixty things wrong with my statement were running through her mind. She sighed. “I don’t want to end this book on a philosophical note–let’s lay down a story for the road and adjourn to the bar.”
“Now you’re getting the hang of hopelessness,” I said.
I knocked on the fourth wall, just the other day, and left a message you will be reading, about now.
“Hi reader, here’s a little something for the road. A little ode to the upside of being involved in a hopeless cause.”
Only a Jellyfish Would Live Forever
The Scenario: Part I
He crushed two pills between his teeth and swallowed. That made four in an hour. A stomach that wanted to stay alive would have objected; but for once there was consensus. He believed that two more similar doses within the next thirty minutes should punch his ticket to the Undiscovered Country. Perhaps such an important event as flirting with self destruction should come accompanied by an unfilched metaphor, but when in doubt go with Shakespeare–Besides he’d used up all the sparklers in his suicide note. It was a fine suicide note. Well written, streaked with effortless pathos and humor. It was the best thing he had ever written. “All show, no tell,” he’d said after lighting it on fire and watching it curl to black in the kitchen sink. “Best punched ticket ever.”
He repaired to the drawing room because ever since childhood he liked to think that better than “let’s go to the front room.” In happier times, when he had friends, he even said “Let’s repair to the drawing room,” often, too often. It was one of the small things that people disliked about him. He got it from the vividly colorful Hammer horror movies, which starred Cushing and Lee and ran endlessly on Saturday afternoons when he was a boy. Upon sitting down in the easy chair where someone would find him, he wondered for the first time in all those years if he had heard it wrong; maybe the actors had said something else other than repaired. Maybe he had got it wrong the same way that people who speak more than write put down “should of” instead of “should’ve” on the rare occasions in which they must write. For anyone else it might have been awfully late in the game for such a banal triviality–but as it had stated in his burned suicide note, “I’m not like other people.”
Although his head was getting fuzzy, he opened his phone and Googled “repaired.” He felt ignorant until he thought to Google “repair(ed) to the drawing room,” and found it proper. Then he Googled “Hazel Court”–a Kapow! “Eyes Up” British actress who appeared in Hammer’s version of Frankenstien, as well as some of Roger Corman’s Poe pictures. He wanted to see if Hazel Court was still alive. She wasn’t. He then immediately Googled “Barbara Steele,” another Kapow! “Eyes Up” sort of actress from the same era. She was alive. Although knowing that Barbara Steele was alive came as happy information, it didn’t gentle his grief for sudden loss of Hazel Court.
He opened Word and wrote: “Dear Someone: I refuse to live in a world without Hazel Court in it. Thus I have repaired to the Eternal Drawing Room. No offense to Barbara Steele.”
The trouble with attempting suicide via happy pills (which were the nature of the unnamed stubstance) is pausing too long during your deliberate overdose. This allows the pills time to show you the reason why people get addicted to them. He had come across such during his suicide research. He figured that Kurt Cobain used the shotgun soon after injecting enough heroin to drop a boy band because of the drug’s charming effect. He figured that Cobain had foreseen such and had taken the preventative Hemingway measure, just in case the smack coerced him into changing his mind and calling 911 to get help for the overwhelming amount of heroin in his system. Shotgun blasts to the head change your brain, but not your mind. Not with the organic computer needed to do that dripping–
“No! No! No!” He said, snapping off each “No!” like it was also a gunshot. He was in the habit of snapping off three No’s whenever his ever incessant mind took an image too far.
The First Intrusion
The preceding scenario has been freshly concocted by me, a Pen Name. The Pen Name appears at the top. The reason for this intrusion, and for the others to come will be made clear to you, by and by. Vanity tells me that the appearance of my name might be the reason why some of you are reading this. It could also be the reason why more of you aren’t reading this, which, of course, renders this sentence meaningless. If the latter is the case, I humbly beseech the ones who are reading this on the strength of my name to deliver a message to the others who avoid the piece for the same cause. Tell them I said “I know who you are and it’s high time you learn that I only scan your stuff and check the categories before I phony up a seemingly high-minded, positive comment on your behalf.” You see, the main reason why Pen Names exist at all is to catch the hell-fallout produced when the real person behind the veil exercises the fallacy called Free Speech.
Wait a second–veil gives me a big idea. Let’s return to our unnamed, insincerely suicidal hero and see what he can do with it.
The Scenario: Part II
He had researched how many happy pills it would take to kill a man his size. It was a mathematical, time dependent equation which had factored in the prevention of vomiting, and had a tipping point of no return. Whilst in the chair where someone would find him, he envisioned himself running blindly toward the end of a great cliff, then coming to a devil may care skidding stop, just standing there with his toes hanging over the crumbling edge, only one forward urge of weight standing between him and eternity. There are things further from the truth than what he had imagined; mainly, he was actually more like a man on his hands and knees creeping up to the safety rail at the rim of the Grand Canyon.
Still, the pain caused by his incessant mind was real enough. Since he was eleven he had been plagued with a horrible twisted perversion of something called “Cherophobia”–the fear of happiness. Whenever he got too happy or witty inside, a dark amorphous shape that he uncreatively but accurately named “Black,” would rise from his subconscious and negate the positive with a hellish image. Although there is nothing funny about Kurt Cobain’s suicide, his little touches of “enough heroin to drop a boy band,” and “Shotgun blasts change your brain, but not your mind” had helped. But the visualization of the ruined substance that had created Come as You Are “dripping” from the wall behind Cobain’s exploded head was the work of Black.
Usually, the conditions present in his Black attacks were much wider set apart than what appeared in the Cobain thing. Instead of getting nipped for whistling in the graveyard, a true Black attack would manifest itself when he’d be doing something like joyfully opening a birthday present and then suddenly remember the time he had entered the kitchen and saw Mom’s latest insane, grinning boyfriend holding a bread knife to her throat. And a great shame would encompass him, as though he had done something wrong. That’s an example of a major Black attack. All Black attacks great and small always ended with him biting off “No!” aloud three times if alone, and in his head if in public.
He had grown up surrounded by hellish images not of his own creation. His beautiful, mentally ill mother attracted abusive men. Although no major event such as murder had ever happened, the threat of such was always there. He was a caged rabbit housed between a wolf and a stoat enclosure. Funny thing was that none of it was really anyone’s fault, or so he had reasoned. But the worst part was how everything had a way of falling to normal afterwards. Not ten minutes after the bread knife episode the three of them were eating dinner as though it was just another day.
Over time he developed a defense called a “Tuesday Dream.” There is a metaphysical, non linear reason for the name. Yet nothing felt truer. He once theorized that Tuesday was the one day of the week in which things were at their most settled. Unlike most other children he feared the weekend, for that was when alcohol was added to the craziness. And in that sort of world, the weekend begins where Thursday gives over to Friday, and leaves too big a stain for Sunday to hold on its own, so it dribbles into Monday.
A typical Tuesday Dream required a brightly lit, bizarre yet sense-making vignette of his own creation to take shape in his mind. It had to be comedy, made by him, thinking up the Marx Brothers didn’t help much. You must slay your dragons with your own goddamn sword. No! You must hit the villain in the face with a pie you baked. He considered the last two items, and although the pie thing was truer, the dragon one sounded better.
He sat up in the easy chair and said, “Betcha’ ain’t heard this one. It’s a real side-splitter, an aisle roller. Imagine uptown New York on a sunny day in 1962. And imagine looking at it as though it were a movie. Then the camera catches the ogling reaction shots of men in the streets. Each guy catches a glimpse of something that turns him into a human boner–even though something that crass was only inferred back then.
“Anyway, you get a low back shot of the commotion in a skirt as she goes up the front stairs and enters an office building. She’s a Kapow! ‘Eyes up’ sort of girl, who does things to an arch business suit that are unholy. She really swings it. And how.
“You then see the Kapow! ‘Eyes up’ woman passing out more boners when she gets on an elevator inside the building. All the guys–including the elevator operator–a balding guy wearing an organ grinder’s monkey type of suit–gawk at her even though her face is hidden by a light colored veil that obscures her face. The few Plain Janes around glare at the woman with jealous contempt. The Kapow! Woman in the veil seems oblivious to all of them. But she knows. She knows. This role usually went to Marilyn Monroe or Jayne Mansfield when the producers didn’t have Monroe or Mansfield money. This time the mystery actress behind the veil is Miss Hazel Court.
“Anyway, there’s a cut to a shot inside a plastic surgeon’s office. The plastic surgeon is played to the hilt by Tony Randall. And you know that he’s a plastic surgeon because of the witty repartee exchanged between Tony and his nurse/receptionist who is either Eve Arden or Thelma Ritter.
“For plot reasons it is necessary to get it across that the plastic surgeon is bored with his family man life. Maybe he does this during a phone call while he’s seated at his desk. Then Eve or Thelma buzz the doctor and tell him that his appointment is here…
“No-wait! Tony buzzes the desk to ask if his appointment is there and the next shot is of Eve or Thelma wryly looking up at the veiled mystery woman. Eve or Thelma says ‘Yes. And how.’
“Tony gets an erudite boner when he sees her. There was nothing boring about the shape in front of him. After the perfunctory stuff is out of the way, Tony says, “How may I help you, um, (he consults her name written on something on his desk) Miss (he says hopefully) Aphrodite?
“Her cultured, flirtatious, yet oddly muffled English accent comes from behind the veil and informs Tony that it’s ‘Just Aphrodite.’ Before he can respond she speaks mystically into his soul. ‘I am the Goddess Aphrodite. Immortal and all powerful in love. Yet, alas, this mortal shape I occasionally must take currently requires the services of someone like you.’
“And as she unclasps the veil she says, ‘It’s been a thousand years since I last took this mortal form. And as you already must know, dear Doctor, the ears and nose never stop growing.’ The veil falls away.
“Jeezus! Get a load of the look on Randall’s rubber face when he gets a load of her and her thousand year nose and ears. She’s about as likely a boner passer-outer as a Mrs. Potato Head…”
Then he faltered. The animation in his voice and form dissipated. It was as though he had become unplugged. The imagined image of Hazel in prosthetics reminds him of Mrs. Doubtfire, which immediately dissolved into the thought of Robin Wiliams with a belt around his neck…
“No! No! No!”
Second Intrusion
The notion that people might be characters of writers’ invention is as old as thinking; I suspect that it came about the week philosophy was invented. Writers taking up the safety of the nom de plume is nearly as ancient. There’s nothing philosophical to be found in that. At one time there used to be physical penalties dealt out for the trap called Free Speech. A head in the basket here, ten years’ hard labor in the gulag there. Although getting dragged out into the cyber-public square for a virtual stoning proves that the soul of intolerant stupidity travels from age to age as immortally as the Plague, most nations now have laws against inserting heretics into the iron maiden. But maybe that would be more merciful than nailing a Bad German to a cross planted in the never-never wasteland called Social Media.
There isn’t an even distribution of pain and happiness in the Universe. There is an equal amount of those two qualities in the Universe, but it’s pain that is found everywhere whilst happiness tends to be found in globs which are separated by eons of spacetime. Most of those thoughts, too, are hardly original. Still, like the inclusion of slavery at the founding of the United States, the uneven distribution of equal amounts of pain in the Universe is probably a condition that could not be eased prior to the start of the Universe, lest there be risk of there being no Universe at all. A compromise, however, was hashed out between unknown factions. One side wanted an even distribution of both pain and happiness. The other said they preferred the concept of cause and effect. As it goes with political compromises, everybody shook hands and announced a Great Accord; which meant that one side gave up on its principles and returned home smiling and reassuring and waving a document as empty as that brought back to England by Neville Chamberlain, after he’d been sold a pot of magic sauerkraut by Adolph Hitler.
All the preceding gobbledygook results in as good a definition for the meaning of life as a human being deserves to get. Cause and Effect. Plain and simple. Life is like floating through a sea lightly, yet always poisoned with pain, and very few of us run into the widely interspersed islands of happiness. Such is the case of the “he” in our scenario. His life has been a horror show put on by Cause and Effect. But something, if not new, at least rare is going to happen to our anonymous, hapless hero. He is going to run smack into a glob of happiness. For I am the Pen Name who created him and his history and pains and his various strangenesses, and have endowed him with a will, if not exactly free, is, at least, had at a steep discount. Unlike the gods real people beseech for help, I am going to take responsibility for this guy I have created today.
I could just go in and change both his nature and nurture, but since he believes that he has accrued his scars honestly, it would be as unfair an action on my part as was my drawing him up out of boredom because I could not think of anything else to write about in the first place.
The only difference between a hallucination and reality is the ethical, if not moral, choice, if any, made by the god or Pen Name in charge of a particular person or persons. The preceding sentence is of the kind you have to read ten times for it to almost make sense once, for it is similar in flavor with this current sentence, which is about to end, without actually saying anything useful, right now. With all that left rattling about like ghosts summoned from the grave only to discover that their necromancer might be high on something, and that she has no idea why she had called them forth from their cozy holes, I exit and present a implausible/plausible happy ending for this nameless soul conjured by my indiscrete scribblings. Since I drew him up I feel responsible for his well being. Alas, I don’t want to deal with him much further, so here goes with the implausible/plausible happy ending. It’s an open ended happily forever after. All writers do such as means to get the reader’s imagination to do their work for them.
Scenario Happy Ending
Too many happy pills too soon tend to make their takers dozy. Many honestly suicidal people who consume them as a means of discovering the Undiscovered Country pass out before they have paid the sufficient fare. They usually awaken confused, many hours later, perhaps half-wondering why the Afterlife has the same stuff in it that they have at home…
Sincerity-Challenged Afterthought Intrusion. Or: A Pen’s Attempt to Cover Her Ass
Suicide is plain wrong. It is a preventable tragedy. Although it seems like people care more after the fact than they did before, and tend to lay dollar store votives and fake flowers in the typical barn-door-after-the-cows response inherent to the human race, trust me, doggone it, people care. Giving a fuck about the pain of others is what people do. So, don’t forget to wipe and stay off the pipe, take your vitamins, say your prayers, take everything you read literally and give obsequious props to whatever geographic-dependent god your ancestors told your family to believe in. It’s gonna be (: (: (: (: (:!!!
Happy Ending Continued….
Such happened to our hero, who finished four tablets shy of Nirvana. Whilst he had been studying Hazel Court’s image gallery, he fell into a sleep so profound that his building’s fire alarm didn’t stir him when it went off due to a neighbor’s misguided attempt at cajun-style blackened chicken. Although the First Responders put the fire out quickly enough, there was much smoke and confusion. The EMT’s went from door to door with a master key provided by the building’s super to check out unanswered knocks.
As he slowly came to with the aid of an oxygen mask, he saw a beautiful angel with red hair and green eyes in a Torqwamni County Fire Department uniform. She was holding the mask to his face. She shushed his first attempts at speaking. Her name tag said V. Aphrodite. And she gazed into his eyes, glanced at the vial then back at him, then said, ”Do you know that the nose and ears grow forever?”
THE END
(I had this one lying around–LA)
Ping Beams of Jim
No matter what type of dimension you inhabit, watching and hearing a Moon roll noisily toward you from the sky is an odd thing. Such happened the other night as I was out in the Barnyard shooting the evening breeze with Daisy Cloverleaf the Pygmy Goatess and my Lead Imaginary Friend and second in command of the realm of Saragun Springs, Renfield.
“Ping’s coming down,” Renfield said.
“You hear that? He’s making a noise, like thunder,” Daisy added.
Renfield held a hand to her ear. “Yeah, I think you’re right, Daisy. He sounds like a rolling bowling ball.”
“Hope he’s not attempting a three pin spare,” I said. But I had been expecting the visit.
Ping is the realm of Saragun Springs’ newly acquired Moon–his brother Pong is our Sun. There are also two-hundred-twenty eight stars in our sky. One for each Fictional Character (FC) in the realm. (They are of varying magnitude, much to the consternation of the dimmer FCs.) Ping glows greenish-purple and is self luminous; unlike regular Moons Ping does not reflect sunshine–or in his case Pongshine. But he isn’t star hot; his cold light resembles that of a glow stick and never wears down. Scientifically speaking, Ping should not be able to sustain an unaided everlasting glow, but ever since the Discworld realm briefly passed through our skies during the Sargun Springs’ birthday celebration to honor the Disc’s creator, the late Terry Pratchett on his birthday (coincidentally the day Ping first rose), we assumed that Ping was the recipient of a glowing, yet otherwise useless magic spell of some kind. Of course, once more scientifically speaking, no Moon should be able to roll down like a bowling ball, either. So maybe there was a little more to that spell than what was initially observed.
Ping eventually arrived where we were in the Barnyard. While up where he belongs, Ping, like his brother Pong, is the size of a blueberry held at arm’s length. In person he is the size of a yoga ball (no one knows Pong’s real size). He stopped and hovered near us about three feet above the ground. You cannot mathematically deduce Ping’s distance from the floor of the realm because the laws of nature in Saragun Springs are affected by my limited knowledge of science and infinite capacity to ignore the few laws I do know. All the little places on the ground are always “‘bout a mile away” at the farthest. The Saragun Springs world/dimension is only partially flat and is as over all amorphous as one of the asteroids not big enough to gather itself into an orb. So Ping could be a hundred feet away when in his normal station or at the otherside of the freaking galaxy as far as anyone can guess. Studying the process depends greatly on how much of your sanity you want to invest and watch go down the swirly. The smart ones quit early and sing Kumbaya.
Both Pong and Ping are sentient, but until Ping began pissing and moaning, they’d kept to themselves. Little sun Pong does pretty much as he damn well pleases between “the lit sixes” which is the interval of daylight of every Sargun Springs’ day. He rises precisely at six A.M. and sets exactly at six P.M. on the dot. He shines for exactly twelve hours, but traverses the sky in a wandering sort of way that is impossible to predict. Sometimes he will just stand there–other times he’ll speed here and there and mess with the shadows. Pong sets wherever he wants and makes a game of it because he appears to know that the residents of the realm “Pongspot”–a gambling activity in which you predict exactly where Pong will go down on the horizon behind the Nameless Hills. North, south, east, west, west by east west–whatever. He’s liable to land anywhere–and often fakes setting one place before dashing to another. But one thing is for certain, exactly twelve hours later he will dawn at the precise point he had set the night before behind The Nameless Hills that encircle the realm. Except for whatever mysterious places Ping and Pong go when off duty, nothing exists beyond the Nameless Hills–you can go there and climb one but the second you approach the crest, you are instantly transported back to where you began the journey.
Ping works the “dark sixes.” He always rises in the south at precisely the instant Pong sets wherever, then our little Moon staggers north, weaving to and fro but still plugging along, and manages to sink kinda-sorta in the north at daybreak. We figure he spends the day rolling around behind the mountains so he can rise in the south the next evening–due to an incessant yet distant rumble of daylight thunder. Recently, Ping began voicing inarticulate comments from the night sky. Wolves in service of the Witch HeXopatha (A powerful Fictional Character–or “FC” in the realm–whose star shines brightly indeed), conversed with Ping. Theirs was an echoey, howling discourse that didn’t make much sense; sounded like a bunch of drunks bellowing show tunes in an empty parking garage.
After a few nights of this, I asked one of the Wolves what all the noise between them and Ping meant. He just looked at me and said “Huh-woo-woo-hooo.” All FC Wolves are extreme capitalists, especially HeXopatha’s, you can’t ask one the time without first greasing a paw. I rented the venal bastard’s loyalty with a bag of That’s a Good Boy Treats (“So Smelly You’ve Just Got to Roll in it” flavored). I asked him to spread the loot around with the pack and to deliver a message to Ping: “Come down and tell me about it, or shut the hell up.”
The bribe hadn’t gone to waste.
“Hello Ping,” I said. “You must know that I am Leila, the ruling Penname of Saragun Springs. May I present Miss Daisy Cloverleaf and Renfield, our second in command.”
“Hiya, Day-field. and Renzy, a treath-zure,” Ping said with a voice juiceingly like my grandfather’s after he’d return from the bathroom for the fifth time in forty-five minutes whenever his 12 Stepper brother, my Great Uncle Errol, visited the house accompanied by whatever temperance thumping “harpy” Errol had taken up with at the time–he sure knew how to pick ‘em up at the church social. Ping didn’t show us a face, but he made the voice which matched quick greenish purple pulses of light that flashed across his shape.
“Sounds like you’ve been hitting the Pingshine,” I said, wondering how he drank–but also glad to see that they serve alcohol behind the Nameless Hills, in case I needed to visit.
“Ye wood tupe, i’ youse hadda bruther li’ my-yun.”
(The preceding are the only remarks that will be written as Ping had enunciated them. The rest is edited for sense and not altered other than for the sake of it. Fortunately, I am fluent in drunken gibberish.)
“Great,” I said, “we got a Ray and Dave Davies’ sibling beef going on in our sky,” I said.
“Just like the Gallaghers,” Renfield said.
“Do they smash watermelons?” Daisy asked.
“Um, she means Oasis and not the late sledge-o-matic comic, Daisy,” I said.
“I see,” Daisy said, with a bit of frost in her voice, for she doesn’t like to be corrected.
I smiled at Ping. “You guys are never in the sky at the same time–except the day you were born. Never behind the Nameless Hills at the same time, either. How can you get on each other’s nerves?”
“Pong’s an egotistical snob,” Ping said. “He’s always messing with my things while I’m up at night. And he leaves me self improvement suggestions.”
“I see,” I lied. “So, you want me to ground him for touching your stuff?”
“That would be an idea.”
“No can do, Ping, things would get a bit dark around here, and the drunks wouldn’t know when to pass out. But, I’ll tell you what, since my life isn’t hell enough already, Miss Renfield and Daisy will figure out a solution, then tell the Wolves who’ll send word tomorrow night.”
The Delegates of Hell
Did Pilate dry his hands after washing them? Did he use a blower or paper? Or did he just wipe them on his toga? What did they use for sanitizer back then? Beats me, but if Heaven is as dull as it sounds, and on the extreme off chance that the standards are low enough to allow me entry, I figure it’s a good idea to bring fresh conversation starters.
If I recall my Jesus Christ Superstar correctly, Pilate first attempted to delegate the Jesus problem to a Herod who resembled the late Robbie Coltrane, topless and in a mini skirt. But the Son bounced back to the Roman prefect, and, well, anyone who’s seen the film knows the rest.
Such is the trouble with delegating tasks to individuals who have Free Will. All the Fictional Characters (FC’s) in Saragun Springs are abundantly rich with Free Will. So, whenever I arrogantly assign them a task instead of first asking nicely, such as sloughing off the Ping complaint on Daisy and Renfield, I get what I deserve.
The downside of blackout drinking is the return of the reality you temporarily avoided but can never escape. It’s sorta like one of those botched rocket launches you see on YouTube.
I always wake at 3:00 A.M. no matter what. My Creator gave me Free Will, too–except she wired me to be up at three because she has to be, and so should I, damn it. That’s the baseless logic of gods if you ask me. Still, no matter what dimension you are in, one of the primary features of 3 A.M. is darkness (unless you are at an Insomnia latitude). Yet when I came to my desk, beside a mostly killed fifth of Jim Beam, I realized something was wronger (a three o’clock in the morn’ word) than usual. It was as bright as mid-afternoon out the window. For a moment I thought my Creator had at last come to her senses, or had died,; but a quick glance at my phone confirmed that it was three in the morning, as always, as freaking always.
Passing out with a bit left in the bottle is a blessing. Things being the way they were, I put down the last two fingers of Beam and lit a cigarette. As I consumed, I had dimly hoped that the unexpected daylight would go away without my having to do something about it. No such luck. In fact I heard a bunch of voices out in the Barnyard once my head cleared some. Though clad in sweats and my cleanest dirty bathrobe, I figured I was dressed well enough to see what hell lay on the other side of the door.
I went out in the Barnyard and saw about twenty FC’s yammering excitedly. Along with Renfield and Daisy, there were Tallywhacker and his wife Taffypuller the Berkshire Hogs, various Black Cats and Rats in service of HeXopatha (who represented the missing Witch who is never seen at the same time with Renfield around and vice versa), Gordon Cormorant, the Ghost of my Great to the fourth Grandfather, Judge Jasper P. Montague, and so forth. Every one of them was a daily Pongspotter, and they were wagering like stock brokers smelling blood (except Pie-Eyed Peety the PDQ Pilsner Pigeon who was passed out on a haystack). No one noticed my arrival.
I looked in the sky and saw both Ping and Pong toward the north, a few degrees above the Nameless Hills, circling slowly, like gunfighters, sharing a common axis, holding a separation about the width of my shaky hand.
“Hello, Miss Leila.” Daisy appeared at my feet. “Would you like me to tell you what’s going on or do you know more about that than me, too?”
“I’m sorry, Daisy–I didn’t mean to infer that you know less about a subject than I do, the other night. I have no doubt that you are far better versed in useless knowledge than I will ever be. And in that spirit, everything you know about what’s going on here is superior to my understanding of it, which is absolute zero.”
Daisy is as bright as she is reluctant to let a perceived insult go; you can’t lay it on too thick without risking an increase of her singular passive aggressive rage.
She blinked and I could tell that she had decided to review what I had said “later.” She showed that sinister little grin of hers and explained.
“After you dumped the Ping and Pong issue on us, Miss Renfield decided that their beef should be decided in the wrestling ring.”
Renfield popped over, she had been listening, as usual. “Now that you are up, darling, we can begin the rumble.”
One of HeXopahta’s Owls flew off, and soon a bell rang in the tower on HeXopatha’s estate. This ended the wagering and Ping remained north while Pong dashed to the south. The bell tolled again and they flew at each other. I was half expecting a shower of Moon or Sun stuff to result from what was certainly going to be a high speed collision.
Instead they came within the thinnest separation and began to spin wildly around together like one of those black hole arrangements in deep space. I didn’t know it until later but the brothers have different magnetic properties and cannot touch. This caused them to spin a tight bright circle from which a series of paisley aurora replicated themselves in the sky. Soon the entire sky looked like a loud necktie.
Then Pong broke off, took what he must have thought to be a victory lap above the Nameless Hills. The Pongspotters began wagering on where he’d go down. Whoever picked southwestish, won. He went down and rose there about three hours later; hence it was dark as it should be a bit past three in the morning.
Ping stayed up, but there was a weird yet perceptible boastfulness in his attitude as he resumed his course north that suggested that he thought he had won. The gamblers argued about this but I had stopped listening to them because the thousands of paisley auroras in the sky did not fade away. Even after Pong had set, they glowed and could be clearly discerned. In fact they are still up there–day and night.
“Great,” I muttered, “now what are we going to do about a paisley sky?”
“Wear solid colors,” Daisy said. “Unless you already know that too.”
Behold the little god of half-assedness
Officially nameless, Charleston’s “Alone Park” was once part of neighboring New Town Cemetery. “Once” because In 1973 two-hundred square feet of graveyard property was accidentally left out when chainlink replaced New Town’s original fencing. Upon discovering the error, the city council refused to cough up another cent for link-fencing, but it didn’t want an inch of their property left unconquered, either.
The solution was inspired by the little god of half-assedness–the deity of governments, great and small. Ever since its founding in 1897, the Charleston city council has been keenly devoted to the little god of half-assedness. Council members come and go, but the gospel remains the same.
Since there were no graves in that part of the cemetery, someone hit on the idea of turning it into a small park; another someone remembered an old wood bench stored in the cemetery tool shed (how long and why it was there were mysteries); yet another someone removed a young Cherry Tree in the graveyard and planted it beside the bench because a final someone (the mayor’s nine-year-old daughter) complained that the space didn’t look “parky” enough. A trash receptacle was added for a final touch.
Little has changed at Alone Park since it “opened.” Save for the immediate theft of the trash receptacle (never replaced) and substantial growth of the Cherry, It remains two-hundred square feet of crabgrass surrounding the same bench, now extravagantly stained by decades of birdshit and graffiti. When people think about it at all, they mistake it for a bus stop. And it wouldn’t be much of a subject if it wasn’t enchanted.
Yes, Alone Park is magic. It got that way from being a part of the cemetery, which has always been magic because the land it is on has been magic since shortly after the formation of the Earth; yet somehow, the little god of half-assedness, though not magical, has a way of swaying the spells. Regardless, there are fewer magical places on Earth than there are instances of unconditional love performed by anyone who is not a parent, child, spouse or pet, but there are some.
In the religious sense, bad prayers are the bounced checks of the soul, forwarded to Hell for collection. But Alone Park is neither holy, nor human, nor artificial nor does it come with strings attached. You don’t have to believe in something even more unlikely than Alone Park itself for it to want to help you; but its magic is small, perhaps even slightly half-assed.
Caught in a Mirror Ball
An extraordinarily bitter yet bright woman named Wendy Gray had been mysteriously attracted to Alone Park on a raw November Saturday morning better suited for indoor ruminations of hate and anger. Intelligent, imaginative people, even those who have bad attitudes (such as Wendy), are much more susceptible to magic than dopes are. It has something to do with the basic dope’s smoothness of brain–’tis the crinkles from which we think. Regardless, a strange insistence entered Wendy’s dreams during the night and, unlike a dream, grew stronger upon waking. Impossible to shake off, Wendy experienced an overwhelming need to go to the little park across the road from her apartment and wait. And something else told her that bringing a newspaper along might be a good idea. The urge would not let go and grew into a command; Wendy eventually found herself dressing to go out after breakfast.
In a triumph for the little god of half-assedness, there’s a sign in front of the cemetery tool shed (the same one in which the bench was stored) that claims it is the original “Caretaker’s Cottage.” The building has never been anything other than a tool shed, but that’s what the sign says. Regardless, it is an enchanted tool shed (by association) that stands about a hundred yards uphill from Alone Park.
A moment after Wendy arrived at the park (the cleanliness of the bench made it clear what the newspaper was for), the Cottage door opened, and out stepped a tall young woman wearing a knit trapper cap, down vest, flannel shirt, carpenter jeans, and bright yellow “Wellies” that worked a “Duckies” motif.
The woman was Gwen Cooper, the volunteer Weekend Caretaker at New Town Cemetery. Whatever your personal criteria for a “perfect 10” is, in the female sense, please apply it to Gwen–but let’s try not to get pervy about it. By doing so you will eliminate the further abuse of tired adjectives that describe an overall state of healthy goodlookingness. Gwen was carrying a waterproof seat cushion, the type people take to ballgames.
And although it may be a touch beige to suggest that attitude is what sets beings with nearly identical molecular structures apart, some might suggest it goes a long way to explain the differences between Wendy Gray and Gwen Cooper. But that sort of thinking cheapens the experience. Regardless, other than gender, high intelligence and the name Gwendelyn, Wendy (roughly two and a half times Gwen’s age and a foot shorter) was hearing just one more “Hey, turn that frown upside down” away from committing a felony, while Gwen led a less perturbed existence.
“Hey-hey Wendy,” a smiling Gwen said upon arriving at Alone Park. She placed the cushion on the bench and sat next to Wendy.
Enchanted persons, even bright ones, are slightly out of step with time, and a bit slow to react. But Wendy’s wits gathered enough for her to regard Gwen with suspicion, “Do I know you?”
“Not yet, but I know someone who does, and for the longest time,” she said and took one of Wendy’s hands in her. A static charge passed between them, and Wendy’s mind vacated her body. Gwen let go of Wendy’s hand and softly thunked her between the eyes with her forefinger, like checking a melon. No reaction. Complete enchantment. She gently closed Wendy’s eyes because they creeped her out.
Gwen removed her phone from her jacket and selected a special app that would exist only while Wendy was “away.” The app was a spinning mirror ball, which appeared on schedule. After opening it, Gwen watched the mirror ball spin like a connection swirl.
1977th Heaven
Actual time travel is immoral. Consider this: if you go back to a certain moment in the past, not only have the persons and places you contact return as they were, the entire Universe takes a step back. It raises good things as well as all the pain and the shame and violence at the time. And since there are much more evil actions taking place in the world at every moment, Magical Beings, like the Eternal Earth Spirit (not to be confused with the little god) who has been far below the land that the cemetery was founded on since before the days of oceans and various Ice Ages and melt offs (and has been named Keeper by Gwen–who also thought up “Alone Park” and “the little god of half-assedness”), refuse to engage in the practice, although it is uncertain if any of them can actually do such.
But sending a mind back to a time known to that person, with utter clarity, and an absolute sense of thereness, for a few minutes, in a “time bubble” while the rest of the past is on pause is possible for that kind of entity. But there is only one major rule that cannot be altered–the traveler may never enter a time when she didn’t exist.
Gwen was slightly disappointed that she’d been born in 1994, thus could not accompany Wendy (who debuted at the end of 1953) to a little time bubble in the brave year of 1977. So she had to be content watching the scene on her phone.
The turning mirror ball on her screen resolved itself and Gwen saw her beloved, a Ghost named John Mallory, who died at thirty-two in 1978 due to a stupid accident. Technically speaking John was not yet dead in 1977, but he was traveling back to that year as a Ghost from the future, to a point when he was alive again, if only for a moment. John was seated on a bench at what appeared to be a booth in a diner. Nothing fancy, the kind in which plastic menus are already on the table and the ketchup bottle is always at half mast (with nasty vulcanized bits on the cap and the menus), and where it is best to make certain that no comedian has loosened the salt and sugar container lids before use. John knew Gwen was watching and he gave her the thumbs up.
Above the bench across from John, another mirror ball was turning, “connecting” the mind of Wendy Gray to 1977. The recreation of 1977 was entirely in the time bubble that Keeper had formed. Only a small piece of the paused greater when was visible as a shimmering veil of silver, bordering the scene.
Before leaving the Cottage–Gwen for Alone Park, and Mallory’s Ghost to 1977, Gwen had taken stock of the outfit John was clad in. White bell bottoms, orange Puma sneakers, a “tuxedo tee-shirt” and a set of rainbow suspenders similar to what Robin Williams sported in Mork and Mindy. Keeper always “dresses” otherwise wispy, ethereal John in clothing he had owned in life only.
“Nanu, nanu,” Gwen had whispered, with a dopey grin on her face. Although John died shortly before the series first aired, thus his suspender selection was coincidental, he got the gist of her comment anyway. Gwen always got that dopey grin on her face when she encountered what, in John’s mind, was high fashion.
“We slayed back then,” he said, pleased with himself, his hair –perfect–as that of Barry Gibb and/or the Werewolf seen drinking pina coladas at Trader Vic’s.
“You certainly knew how to slay the ozone,” she said. “Does the hair move when you turn your head naturally, or do ya gotta give it a shove?” Gwen added with a sarcastic twitch of her head.
The trip down the recent visit to Memory Lane ended when Wendy’s mind, and form, finally uploaded at her side of the table.
The concept of “disbelief” is usually inaccurately presented. Smart people who see a Creature From the Black Lagoon shambling toward them on the beach, with obvious bad intent, will disregard everything their parents taught them about there being no such thing as a Creature From the Black Lagoon and run. Smart people do not examine the impossible until they are safe. People who refuse to believe their eyes wind up as Creature From the Black Lagoon shit. It’s all part of the preternatural disorder of things.
And although roughly forty-five years were extracted from “Then” Wendy’s face, she was indeed the same person as the insensate being seated beside Gwen on the bench. Twenty-three-year-old Wendy was just as small and immaculate as she was in the present. The major difference was the 1977 version wore her long dark brown hair parted in the middle, and the modern day Wendy sported a close cropped, spiky silver style that went well with her face. And despite being sent back decades in but a moment (although sent back, Wendy retained her “future” memories), the instant she saw who was seated across from her in the booth she leapt onto the table and began pummeling John with a furious flurry of well flung fists.
Gwen began laughing out loud. She and John were of Team Alone Park, a project to make the world a slightly better place–and while discussing the “Wendy Project” with John earlier in the Cottage, Gwen predicted this sort of reaction due to what John had told her had transpired between him and Wendy in 1977. He had broken up with her–like a coward–by phone and not in person. He held the opinion that Wendy, though notoriously quick tempered, would be temporarily confused by her sudden transformation, which would give him a chance to explain.
“You fuckery-fucked-fucker!” or something similar accompanied each and every blow Wendy delivered to John’s arms as he protected his face.
“Don’t touch the hair! Watch the hair!” Gwen said to the phone, stomping her feet up and down, laughing like a child.
“Jesus Christ! Holdup for a second–hold–hold on will you!” John said.
Wendy eased off because she saw the ketchup bottle. John had a good idea what that might lead to and grabbed it in the nick of time.
“Aren’t you at all curious about what’s going on–it’s not a dream, you know?” he asked, somehow able to push Wendy back into her seat without enraging her further.
“Of course I know Prince of Assholes,” Wendy hissed. “The thing that Chicky-poo calls Keeper told me all about it on my way over from the future–that’s what took so long.”
(Meanwhile…at Alone Park:)
“‘Chicky poo’?” Gwen said, with a sharp tilt of her head, holding the phone close to her face.
(We now return to 1977:)
“Do you think Keeper sent you back just to attack me?” John said. He’d been dead a long time, but for the bubble he was as physical as he had been and discovered he did not miss being slapped and punched.
“Didn’t say shit–just made me believe and know–the kicking the shit out of you theory is what I’m sticking with unless you can convince me otherwise,” she said, sliding the sugar dispenser to her side of the table, but at least exhibiting a cooler attitude for the first time since her arrival. “But I swear to God if this is some sort of half-assed apology for dumping me–just to make yourself feel better, this,” Wendy added, with a nod at the dispenser, “will be in you–as quickly and uncomfortably as possible.”
John smiled weakly. “Technically speaking, I’ve yet to ‘dump you’ as you put it…”
“Great!” Wendy said sarcastically. “Consider your ass dumped. Forget crawling back. I’ll screw with a Pig first.” She eyed the sugar dispenser even more dangerously. “If you think that makes up for anything, your ass will be much sweeter, soon.”
“Did you hear that I died in ‘78?”
“I heard about that in ‘90 or so,” she said. “My reaction lay somewhere between bittersweet and doing the hokey pokey on your grave. Anyway, so what? You seem to be doing all right now–you and Chicky-poo back on the bench.”
(Meanwhile…back at Alone Park)
“You’re just one Chicky-poo away from walking around with a penis on your head,” Gwen said to the enchanted Wendy, extracting a Sharpie from her vest pocket.
(We return to 1977)
As it had been true when they were a couple from 1976 to late ‘77, John found Wendy’s attitude tiresome.
“All right, have it your way,” he said, quietly. He had been hoping to accomplish a little more than just the intent of the mission, but forgiveness was clearly impossible. “But before whatever your bad self has planned with that thing transpires, you should know that a lot of effort has been made on your part–including the blatant disregard of the most fundamental laws of the universe. You can go on hating me until the end of time, far as I care–but try to remember that there are some good things about existence that you overlook because it is easier to be a bitch–Sally.”
Those were two magic words that appeared at the end of John’s dialogue–”bitch” which can move mountains (and sugar dispensers), and the truly magic name that deleted bitch and sent a shock through Wendy’s system. When John spoke “Sally” a seed was planted in Wendy’s mind–an “anti-tumour,” that would slowly grow and eventually result in a small good thing; the intent of the mission concocted by the powerful mind of Keeper
At “Sally,” 1977 closed and Wendy awoke on the bench in a new timeline. She had no idea that her life had been altered–for she had no memory of Keeper, John or Gwen. In her mind she had been in a daydream that blew off when she looked down and saw Sally holding one of those waterproof cushions people take to ballgames. Someone had written “Chicky-poo?” in marker on it.
Sally is a Toy Poodle, very bright and much inclined to bring stuff she finds lying about to Wendy. For five years Sally was a Toy Poodle because she had died of parvovirus which could have been prevented with a booster shot at the Vet’s, which Wendy kept blowing off because making Sally get out of the car at the clinic was a drag. The seed sown in the return of 1977 had bloomed in time, forty-three years after it had been planted, forty years before Sally had been born. The second chance moved Wendy to take Sally to the vet in time. This caused two separate histories, but since Sally is a good girl whose reappearance in the Book of Life harmed no one, the old line in which she had died in 2021 withered and was replaced by the new.
And for a second, seeing the cushion gave Wendy a glimpse of something much greater than her power to imagine–not a visual glimpse, but something of the soul. And for a heartbeat, she thought about an old boyfriend, and for the first time ever, she remembered him with tenderness.
Epilogue
Gwen was half-way up the hill by the time Wendy returned to her body.
She entered the Cottage and selected another app on her phone that appeared only when she was alone with John at New Town–she always assumed that Keeper took this precaution to prevent her from *butt dialing Mr. Mallory while at her day job (*remember what I said about getting pervy).
Keeper had clothed him in bright blue cowboy boots, flared blue jeans whose belt featured an immense buckle, a quilted western shirt and a white Stetson; one mustache away from Burt Reynolds in Smokey and the Bandit.
The usual dopey grin appeared on Gwen’s face. “Urban cowpie,” she whispered.
“Say what you want,” John laughed, “but it looks like we have a happy ending courtesy of the Alone Park Team.”
“Don’t forget the little god of half-assedness.”
“And the little god of half assedness.”
Part One
Small God Syndrome
Gwen Cooper, the volunteer Weekend Caretaker at New Town Cemetery, was raking leaves one fine autumnal Saturday morn’, singing a groovy song first heard on The Brady Bunch called Sunshine Day:
“I just can’t stay inside all day
I gotta get out, get me some of those rays
Everybody’s smilin’ (sunshine day!)
Everybody’s laughin’ (sunshine day!)”
I, the Godlike Narrator, placed Sunshine Day in Gwen’s mind because I’d finally “got” an initially puzzling remark she’d made earlier, during the first draft of this story–call it “rehearsal”– because she, like all my Fictional Characters (FC’s) has Free Will, and often shares observations during the drafting process.
This is what happened:
Godlike Narrator: “I’m unhappy. The opening is an unsustainable strangeness. And I cannot face another backstory. It’s a recipe for shame and embarrassment and tautology.”
Gwen Cooper: “I thought you were ‘Unsneezy.’”
At six-feet, Gwen is thirteen inches taller than your Godlike Narrator. You may call me anything but late for Happy Hour; but sometimes I get sensitive when the subject is verticality.
“Hello, Gwen,” I said, as she continued singing and raking, my “from up there” voice a gentle breeze passing through the boughs of an Enchanted Oak Tree in the cemetery. I was invisible and somehow everywhere at once, as most Godlike Narrators choose to be. “Glad to see you’re having a groovy, sunshiny day.”
“Omnipresent,” Gwen said. She ceased raking and singing and directed her comments at the from up there voice.
“Gesundheit.” I said, not caring for the lack of awe in her voice.
“The word is omnipresent. If you say ‘somehow everywhere at once’ you damage your claim as a Godlike Narrator because the readers will wonder ‘Hey, if she’s Godlike how come she doesn’t know the word?’ That proves you are not omniscient, which, for your information, means all knowing. For my money omniscient kicks the crap out of omnipresent–but omnipotent rules both. What I’d give to be omnipotent. Again for your information, that means I can make anything happen because I say so. It would be sweet. For me, that is–I wouldn’t be as enthusiastic if it described you. Which it obviously doesn’t or I wouldn’t need to tell you this stuff.”
“Ha! Being the Godlike Narrator allows me to roll how I want. How do you explain Sunshine Day stuck in your mind? If that ain’t omni-whatever I don’t know what is. I need not pluck down the stars.”
“No, someone has to hand them to you.”
The second short joke fell flat, even with the bit o’ Shakespeare added in, as predicted by Gwen during the earlier draft. It looked good in my mind, but, as you can plainly see, it was as “I Saw it Coming” as Godzilla to the residents of Tokyo when he stomped in from the sea. It was meant to infuriate your Godlike Narrator into smiting Gwen as a device to move the story along. But as you also can plainly see, Gwen and I were still rooted to our spots. Unless one of us thought quickly, a chorus of crickets would sing us home with Sunshine Day.
“First, get that dumbass song out of my mind then follow my lead,” Gwen said. “Do so and I will spill the backstory. Just describe me as I tell it and don’t butt in.”
“Ha! Just as I had it planned,” I said, but without conviction. I sighed and removed the song from her mind.
“And change the ‘key,’” she added. “It will sound better in the present tense.”
“Your wishes are my commands, sire,” I say.
“And maybe you could display a sunshinier disposition.”
“Don’t push it sister.”
“Anyway, dear Reader, here we are together at the same time. Gwen has something to tell you. Feel free to imagine her anyway you want, but I insist that she be on the fresh side thirty, tall and such a spectacular looking type of person that you cannot imagine her having an excretory system–like a damn Barbie doll.”
“Why are you suddenly speaking in italics–and what the hell does ‘fresh side’ mean?” Milady asks.
“Chalk it up to mysterious ways, Gwen… all deep and meaningful.”
Gwen wants to say something. Perhaps a little sarcasm. Maybe something about how I now eschew italics when I describe her. But, maybe, she is thinking that I know lots of even lamer songs I can place in her head than Sunshine Day if she forces me to repeat myself about my mysterious ways; so, she shakes it off and addresses you.
“Hello, Readers. My name is Gwen Cooper–”
“Jesus Christ Gwen, I’ve told them that at least five–””
“Silence! Godlike Narrator, can’t you see I’m talking?” Gwen says, all snotty-like, with a scowl directed in the direction of my invisible from up here voice. Now she’s looking back your way, friendly-like, as though you guys are juuust a little better than me.
“Anyway,” she continues, “ if you can remember back to the opening, I’m the volunteer Weekend Caretaker here at New Town Cemetery. And although it is my objective to enlighten, the next few things I’m going to tell you will probably create confusion because the Godlike Narrator has just pissed away nearly a thousand words that could have been used to establish a bit more than what there currently is.”
As I prepare to smite Gwen for her little blasphemies and character assassinations, she points at the small cube-like structure pictured in the heading of this piece and says:
“That there is called the ‘Caretaker’s Cottage’ even though it is obviously a tool shed and no more a Cottage than Sylvia Plath was the composer of Sunshine Day. But it is magic inside. Via the Enchanted Oak tree that the Godlike Narrator is hiding in, an Elemental Earth Spirit known Keeper passes Enchanted Electricity from the Oak through the little brass eagle atop the cottage and inside I can summon the Ghost of my co-star and love interest, John Mallory John and I walk our fantasyland and have adventures, like Kane in Kung Fu or Jules in Pulp Fiction.”
Gwen winks at you. “You know,” she says, “that is all the backstory you really need for now. But it still leaves me with the job of ending part one of this story so we can move on towards something more elevating. As you already know, the Godlike Narrator is preparing to smite me for some untoward comment I will soon make about her lack of ‘verticality.’ For that, the recent use of ‘elevating’ and other shit supposedly long forgotten–for though low built, she has a tall memory.”
The smart ass is now feigning a thoughtful gaze into the distance, arms crossed, but one hand frees to rub her chin in the time honored mime of cogitation. Now her eyes are wide and bright; as though an “idea” light bulb, like in a Daffy Duck cartoon, has appeared above her head.
“Psst, guys,” Gwen says. “The Godlike Narrator up in the sky isn’t really invisible. We can’t see her cos Smurfs are blue.”
Although that one was even lamer than the other short joke that fizzled, I returned (as you already may have noticed) to the “key” of the past tense and took great offense to the dopey remark because Gwen was right about one thing– the three thousand word budget was looking to take the big swirl, so we had to get moving. Clouds gathered, rain fell, wind blew; and a single bolt of lightning, just close enough to get Gwen’s attention, hit across the street from the cemetery. She dashed into the safety of the Caretaker’s Cottage.
-Part Two-
John Mallory suffered an essentially pointless death by accident in 1978; he was thirty-two and died never knowing true love. How sad. (Of course he was never abducted and anally probed by aliens either; but on that account he has never expressed his gratitude.)
Fortunately, Mallory was buried at New Town Cemetery between the Enchanted Oak occupied by the Earth Spirit called Keeper and the Caretaker’s Cottage. Keeper was able to bring back Mallory as a Ghost as long as specific actions were followed. And via a series of previous events that would blow the word limit to revisit, Keeper had arranged it so only Gwen Cooper could perform those specific actions and interact with Mallory (which, when you think about it, in no way eases a suspicion that she might be crazy).
Although the cottage is a tool shed not much larger than a walkin closet, when Gwen enters and closes the door the far wall withdraws and the space fills with a Victorian era parlor because she believes that such is an appropriate meeting place with a Ghost paramour. Upon being chased inside by the offended Godlike Narrator, the cottage transformed. To “access” Mallory, Gwen must “phone” 1978. She also opens a bluetooth speaker on a table for Mallory to “speak” through. As a shape, Mallory is ethereal but no more impressive than Casper or the Canterville Ghost. But as has been established in previous performances by the Ghost, he has eyes the color of city rain, which appeals to Miss Gwendylyn Cooper.
Although it is highly unnecessary, Gwen likes to sing “Heathcliff, it’s me, your Cathy,” from Kate Bush’s 1978 hit Wuthering Heights upon calling John. Apparently, she operates under the delusion that the fiftieth time is as charming as the first.
John Mallory is always charmed by this, and was again, for the fifty-first time. Of course, even though dead, he is still a guy and Gwen is, as also established, beautiful. This combination allows her to say the stupidest shit conceivable and have it regarded much higher than it would by an objective observer.
“Hi, Gwen,” John said, upon the culmination of the process.
Despite those city rain eyes of his, alive or dead John is one of those guys who probably should never be allowed to dress himself. Some otherwise intelligent people need to go from start to finish with Mom (or her proxy) laying out their clothes on the bed. Then again the popular wardrobe of the late 1970’s didn’t allow much for good taste. Hence, John’s Ghost “gathered to” clad in red high rise silk jogging shorts; knee high white socks with two stripes at the top; an orange pair of size thirteen Traxx and a sleeveless puke-colored polyester tee shirt that had some sort of hood attached in the back.
“Trick or treat,” Gwen said, which she always says when his outfit stuns her.
He smiled as he always smiles when she says that because he never gets the joke.
“Hark!” Gwen said, holding a hand to her ear, in the time honored “hark” gesture–”Doth I hear the tense of our reality slipping like fault lines.”
Naturally that unscripted remark was meant as a jab at the Godlike Narrator. Due to word count issues, I couldn’t/can’t act on it then, now or tomorrow. But soon. I will smite her again. I put it on my Retroactive To Do List.
“Winners aren’t funny,” John said.
Gwen was used to strange little announcements made by John. For they were the words of Keeper, that ineffable Earth Spirit who has the entire life histories of all the persons buried in New Town Cemetery contained in her mind. Thousands of years, which she explores via the ad of Gwen and John as though they are human Rossetta stones.
“I said, Winners aren’t–” John began to repeat himself, because Gwen had yet to reply as planned.
“I know, lover,” Gwen said, “but I was listening to the enhanced backstory.”
“Cut!” I yelled. The scene vanished and resolved itself to my office in my realm of make believe.
-Part Three-
There we were, Gwen, Mallory’s Ghost, Boots the Impaler and myself. The first three are Fictional Characters (FC’s) of my creation who act in stories that I try to write. Every FC has a Self and (as stated before and plenty) they all have Free Will, which, I, the Godlike Narrator stupidly endow them with upon creation. Free Will often leads to unpleasant side effects such as unionization–and the Union of Imaginary Friends and Fictional Characters now demands that I offer roles in all my productions to my stable of extant FC’s before I may create new characters. Although Gwen and Mallory played themselves in this production–they have appeared as many different creatures in the past. The role of the Eternal Earth Spirit, however, was/is to be played by a FC Siamese Cat named Boots the Impaler. Boots (or BTI) is attracted to roles in which he holds great power. But when he isn’t on call he’s usually cataclysmically stoned on crack nip and sleeping on my desk. Which was precisely what he was doing when we zapped out of the Caretaker’s Cottage and immediately zotted into being in my office.
“‘Zotted’?”
“Yes, Gwen zotted,” I said. “It seems to me that it will be impossible to tell a story with you guys in it if you keep peeking at the narration as we go.”
“It’s a little hard not to, Leila,” Mallory said. “You are right there in the room with us, practically yelling to the readers through a big hole in the fourth wall.”
“Right?” Gwen said.
I sighed and consulted the word count. Only 776 left in the budget prior to the start of this sentence.
“All right, kids, let’s adlib a finish,” I said.
At this point BTI awoke and yawned. Like all Cats he had been listening to everything that had been going on while he slept and did not care much about anything other than what concerned BTI. So it was a rare thing that he actually made a useful suggestion.
BTI speaks with what is known as a “mid atlantic” accent–that was once used by the Hollywood stars in old movies because being American they felt inferior to British actors in matters of class and sophistication.
“Seems here that we should finish the same as we began,” BTI said.
“What–with Gwen raking leaves and singing Sunshine Day–c’mon Bootsy you can do better than that,” I said.
“Not literally, dullard Human–but in the theme of it. You got over sensitive about the ‘Unsneezy’ remark dear Gwen made in rehearsal, and you carried it into the tale, thus ending any chance the material had of going anywhere.”
“So?”
“The Godlike Narrator said shortly,” Gwen added.
“Yo ho, Judas.”
BTI sighed as though trying to communicate the simplest idea to a single cell organism. Then a light shone in his ice blue eyes. He jumped onto Gwen’s lap and whispered something in her ear. She smiled and the same light shone in her equally icy blue eyes. She shared the idea with Mallory’s Ghost whose eyes like city rain shone just as brightly.
Then all together they began to sing:
“Short people got no reason, short people got no reason to live…”
Although that blasphemous tune hails from 1977 and not ‘78for a sense of symmetry, I understood the idea behind it.
“You guys can consider yourself smited,” I said as I immediately zotted the three of them back to New Town Cemetery. But not before hearing Gwen say “Smited?”
I just sat there for a long while, so long that the past eventually caught up to and merged with the present, as it is right now.
“Well,” I say, “too many tense issues for a sunshine day.”
The Haunting of Miss Gwen Cooper
4 A.M. New Town Cemetery, Charleston, Washington
******
Eternal Keeper reached into the sky and plucked threads of starshine. The sheared strands merged as a multi-colored lightning bolt which struck the only oak tree inside New Town Cemetery. Thunder failed to tattle on the bolt; no one saw it strike; nor were the plentiful, watchful, sensitive, nocturnal creatures in the graveyard aware of it; nor did it in the least disturb the slumbering daybreak birds, nor squirrels, nor even the insects that inhabit the lone graveyard oak. But something did happen within a set-aside dimension where Keeper and the spirit of the tree coexist. Come sunrise, the shape of a ghost, whom Keeper had woven from the threads of plucked starshine, rose from his grave and proceeded to the power and safety of the enchanted tree.
Continue readingIntroduction
We conclude Volume One of Welcome to Saragun Springs this month, with Book Five, The Caretaker’s Cottage, which is our “Featured presentation.”
Unfortunately (in my point of view), terms such as “vignettes” and “episodic” tend to describe my longer productions. Although I do not pretend to be in her league, Dorothy Parker discovered she was not a novelist the hard way and drank a bottle of shoe polish to get out of writing one after the advance had been spent. Fortunately, Mrs. Parker was much better at attempted suicide than at the successful version–so she survived and went on as a short track writer.
So, this piece isn’t a “real” novel, but it is a book, thus I have no plans involving the ingestion of cleaning products, nor is there an advance (or “minus-vance”) for me to squander. Regardless, the book brings back Miss Gwen Cooper, the Leading Lady FC who first appeared in Book One and sporadically since.
And for those of you who noticed the first mention of “Volume One” in this post, consider yourself forewarned of something that will arrive on this site sometime in 2025.
Leila
(Today we conclude this look at HeXy and the boys–but they will be back someday–again, fair warning-LA)
billigitmania
-1-
It’s hard to ignore five shadows cast on your desk by as many hovering beings outside the window. I do not know if there is an achievable degree of determination to successfully ignore such a situation; if so, it lies beyond my level of sticktoitiveness.
With a sigh I closed my computer and without looking I motioned to the hovering individuals outside to come in. I heard the window go up and I sat there at my desk, staring straight ahead at nothing until Penrose the Flying Weasel and the four billigits–by name, mothball, weasel (coincidental to Penrose), pinto and flounder appeared in my sight. (billigits do not believe in capitalization.)
“You guys still working for HeXopatha?” I asked because all five are minions of the Witch HeXopatha.
I heard “We serve our magnificent master.”
Each spoke one word of that– starting with “We” at Penrose and ending when flounder said “master.”
“Excellent,” I said. “You guys must be lost and need directions home. Just head toward the Enchanted Wood, thatta way,” I added, pointing out the window.
The crystal ball on my desk flashed red. That happens when the Magnificent Master herself has something to tell me. HeXopatha’s fair yet damned face appeared in the crystal.
“What now?” I said.
“‘Hello, HeXopatha, how are you on this fine day?’” she said with a mixture of sarcasm and some other smartass quality that no word can precisely describe; a sort of benign affection that can go malignant at any time.
“All right,” I said, “pretend you heard me say that, but remember it is the sort of thing a person asks but doesn’t mean. Anyway, funny you should call right now–since there are five of yours loitering in the office.”
“I sent my darlings to you for career advice,” she said. “They want to break into show business and since you are an endless source of inspiration for futile dreams, enjoy their company.”
The crystal went dark, but I could hear her standard bray of evil Wiccan laughter echoing. At that moment, my second in command in the make believe realm of Saragun Springs, Renfield, who bears an uncanny resemblance to HeXopatha, entered the office. There was an expression on her face that suggested she had just finished laughing maniacally at one of her own witticisms.
“Hi fellas!” Renfield said. “So you want to form a Boy Band!” All five of the winged fiends nodded enthusiastically.
I scrolled back through this story that we were acting, and, as I had thought, no one had yet to mention “Boy Band.”
“Didn’t know you read minds, Renfield–considering only these guys and HeXy knew the score on that.”
Renfield scowled–a sort of nose crinkle– in the “eww” manner that only pretty girls can do correctly–at the mention of our Witch. Despite their uncanny physical resemblance neither Renfield nor HeXopatha are willing to appear “on stage” at the same time as the other. And yet both always know what the other is thinking in a telepathic way that defies even the loose standards for such in Saragun Springs.
“Never mind, never mind,” I said.
“I’m going to be the manager, the Brains behind it all,” said Penrose.
“Yes, I can see a Weasel in charge of the money,” I said. “That’s the way it usually goes.”
“You other four have to adopt a type,” Renfield added.
“Type?” asked either mothball or weasel–billigits are identical and a bit hard to keep track of.
“Indeed,” Renfield said, “one has to be the bad billigit that the fans will want to reform.”
“Another has to be the sensitive billigit, the billigit you know who will listen and care about your miserable existence–preferably closeted Gay,” I said.
“What’s ‘Gay?’” All the billigits asked at once.
I had forgotten that billigits are a tad innocent. Since it was in nobody’s best interest to shine a light on their ignorance, I made like Penrose and Weaseled my way out of the topic.
“Um, happy in an old timey bicycle built for two sort of way,” I said, “but never mind that–whoever can feign a sympathetic ear to whining best should be that type.”
“And one has to be posh, the spoiled billigit,” said Renfield.
“And one gets to be the billigit who tells the backstory,” I said. “That’s going to be you, flounder. Lucky you. Congratulations.”
The expression on flounder’s face was contrary to that you’d expect to see on a face that had just received good news. But it brightened when Daisy Kloverleaf, the Pygmy Goatess and the lead FC in the realm, entered the office.
Penrose spoke up: “Meet our press agent, Miss Kloverleaf–please direct all enquiries toward her.”
“Hello Daisy,” I said. “So will it be up to you to put the spin on various sins committed by the boys?”
“The ‘boys’ resent your humancentric label. Please refer to them by name or as a billigit or gits in the pronoun sense,” Daisy said. Great, Daisy, not so innocent, had learned about labeling. Guess it was bound to happen.
“Fine,” I said. “But the next thing I’d better hear is the backstory or the lot of you will be gitting the hell out of here.”
Daisy is now tapping a hoof on the inside of the screen of the device you are reading this on. When it comes to supplying the backstory, Daisy is an Occam’s Razor type of Goatess. The simplest is the truest, and she has no problem removing the fourth wall.
“Hello readerly Readers. The billigitly billigits are wingly winged androgynous folksy folk about eighteen inches tall, orangey orange skinned and are cladly clad in identically identical blue polo shirts and khaki slacks. They also wearingly wear hemp slippers that usually fall off in flight.”
“Thank you, Daisy,” I said, and I cursed myself for giving the narrative to the adverbially inclined Miss Kloverleaf.
“So, you have a band, a manager and a press agent,” Renfield said. She had just mixed a pitcher of VooDoo juju at the bar (vodka, Bacardi 151, grenadine, crushed ice and Fresca).
“And the backing of a Witch,” I said, just to rattle Renfield’s cage.
“A what? Oh, that,” she said.
“You just missed Hexy a while back,” I added.
“‘Dear Diary, today I just missed meeting someone who’s got the combined charm of amoebic dysentery and sandpaper buttwipe. Now I cry myself to sleep.’” Renfield laughed bitterly and took a long pull from her drink.
“All right, gang,” I said. “Sounds like you got all you need–why come to me?”
“We need some songs,” said Penrose.
“Yes, I guess those would come in handy to prevent dead time on stage, but I am a bad songwriter.”
“But Daisy is very good,” Penrose said.
“Oh, I see–you want me to give Daisy permission to write her own material in the realm.” Being the CEO Penname of the Springs requires that I must okay side projects of the other citizens. I try to discourage that, but there are times when it comes in handy.
“Sure, knock yourself out. I was just telling Renfield the other day that there aren’t enough adverbial pop songs in the universe–right Renny?”
“Yeah, fucking-a-doodle,” she slurred (VooDoo Juju is powerful stuff, goes to work almost instantly.)
“Well, now that’s resolved, see you kids on the next Behind the Music. Don’t let the autotune hit you in the ass on your way out.”
The flyers exited via the window, and Daisy trotted happily out of the office on her way to her songwriting gig.
I checked the word count of this production: 1262 of the 3000 budget spent.
It was a critical moment. I had to make a decision then and there. No more putting it off. I either had to think of a snappy way of ending this production now, or go to the top add “-1-” and return and add…
-2-
A month later I was engulfed in one of those little handheld games which feature placing bb’s in tiny holes. It was the constellation Orion. I was going crazy because I could do everything except land the middle star in his belt. Thus occupied, I hadn’t noticed that Renfield had wheeled in the furniture dolly that holds an immense Philco television set, made circa 1950. It‘s a heavy-ass thing with a small circular screen in the middle, which bugs out like one of Marty Feldman’s eyes. We use it to watch programs telecast from Saragun Spring’s sister realm, Other Earth (which can be visited through an interdimensional portal near the foul spring the realm is named for).
“Shitandpissandbastardandbitchandhell! Why does this goddamn thing hate me! I’ve had it!” I screamed, not for the first time that day, but, as always, despite my at quits proclamation, I was going back for more abuse until I glanced up and saw Renfield adding tin foil to the set’s rabbit ears. It had been awhile since the last transmission from Other Earth, but not nearly long enough.
“Oh Jesus,” I said, “what Hell of the day club thing now?” The game was instantly forgotten.
Renfield shone her best punch me in the face smile. “You are always so negative, darling.”
“Maybe so,” I said. “But it’s been a long time since I’ve had a six-year-old on Christmas Eve buzz about the future. You see, mostly,” I added, holding up the game, “life is a minefield of futile shitbombs to be defused like this effed up thing.”
She didn’t take pity on me and turned on the set. After nothing but a prolonged static whine, Renfield gave it a good kick in the side (which is the accepted method of dealing with ancient electronics), a rolling picture formed on the screen. And there was also semi-sense making sound coming out of the tinny speaker.
The rolling black and white picture tube finally settled and I squinted, and saw Daisy Kloverleaf’s face on the screen. “Greetings, hip Cats and wild Kittens! Welcome to Goatenanny!”
This was followed by the enthusiastic cheering of an unseen studio audience, But the voices sounded like a gathering of “wild Kittens” ages ten to thirteen. I then heard the unmistakable voice of Penrose announce that week’s lineup of guests while stock rock music blared in the background–the generic stuff they used on shows in the sixties as to avoid licensing fees. There was only one guest that week, as it turned out, but the announcement was protracted to squeeze the last drop of teen spirit from the audience:
Penrose shouted “mothball!” And there mothball was–clad in a tiny leather jacket, his hair arranged in a Ducktail, a sulky look on his face–the bad boy billigit.
“weasel!” Apparently the gang had opted to include a “regular kid” billigit–for weasel had put on some weight and wore glasses…yet there was something about the weasel that made you root for him–the underdog, comic relief billigit–perfect for wild Kittens best described as having a “good personality” (billigits have no real gender–but they act like boys).
There was a loud “awww” mixed in with the reaction to pinto’s introduction. He was grinning shyly and was wearing a perfect little Beatles’ suit and tie, and had affected Paul McCartney Puppy eyes. The sensitive billigit, the one you can depend on never having a girlfriend to get between him and your fantasies.
A strange mix of friendly boos and wild hormonal shrieking greeted the posh billigit, flounder. He was wearing a cardigan and holding a polo mallet. He winked arrogantly at the audience and conveyed an “I know” cockiness that made him as slappable as Bieber.
Then Penrose and Daisy appeared together on the screen. In unison they bellowed “Meet the billigits!”
The speaker nearly blew in the set, because the shrieking had reached a tornadic level of sound. I figured that was a good thing because “Foreverly Yoursly Yours” appeared on one of those inserts that television used ages ago. I figured that it must be the name of the song; sounded like something Daisy would write.
The boys were flying about doing little aerial acrobatics, and the “Goatenanny Dancers” (composed ot Black Cats and Rats who are also minions of HeXopatha) jumped enthusiastically on stage.
Then another insert, much larger, informed the viewer that Goatenanny was presented by PDQ Pilsner. The image of Pie-Eyed Peety the PDQ Pilsner Pigeon (another one of my FC’s) then filled the screen. Below him the “quotation” “Whether it be at work or when you’re screwed blue and tattooed, don’t forget to make it PDQ!”
After a half hour of this nonsense went by, the broadcast ended. I turned the set off. Renfield mixed a pitcher of VooDoo JuJu.
“What year is it on Other Earth now?” I asked, taking the drink she handed me. Other Earth had recently fallen out of time sequence with the Springs and was decades behind us.
“Near as I can tell they bounced off 2023 and went back at least sixty years and are moving forward again. No one there has noticed the disruption, except us. And no one can interfere with their timeline unless they become a part of it–they can’t shoot anyone or prevent it–they exist only in the moment, but the moment can be profitable.”
I was about to opine on the morality of a bunch of Saragun Springs FC’s going into the Other Earth’s past and making a fortune, but thought better of it. Actually the VooDoo Juju made it much easier to overlook.
“Ha!” Renfield said. She had plucked the Orion game off my desk and sank all ten bb’s in under
as many seconds–something I hadn’t been able to do once in two days.
All I could do was drain my glass and say “Fucking-a-doodle.”
The Riddle of the billigits
Meet the Hammy Dodgers
The crystal ball on my desk flashed red. This happens whenever the Witch HeXopatha (nee “Hezopatha”) wants to pee in my lager.
HeXopatha is an immortal Wiccan. She has been around for thousands of years and will continue to be around for however long it takes for her to get bored with the world and retire permanently to Hell–but I don’t count on that happening soon. Once upon a time the “peasants” might have been able to do something about HeXopatha, but her skill level has risen beyond river tossing and the pyre. In fact it is a bad idea to mention such previous activities in HeXopatha’s presence; nor is it advised to claim to be of “Puritan stock,” unless you enjoy long hours in pillory stocks.
Still, despite her negative attitude toward Witchunting, it may be of interest to know that HeXopatha claims that no actual Witch had been a victim of the various persecutions, and that the Salem debacle was actually a ruse concocted by one of her associates to rid herself of a budding “Sadie Goodwife” type named Rebecca Nurse. “Sadies” have preternatural Witch senses, tiresome morality streaks and tend to tattle. It was easy to frame Nurse, for the elders’ brains, again according to HeXopatha, “Were heavily rotted with paresis.”
I’ve noticed that the two extreme sides of being share a similar smile; the same perma-set grin that we saw on the faces of Warren Jeffs’ “wives” when the FBI came for them is on HeXopatha’s face–but the key difference is a light of powerful, gleefully evil intelligence in the Witch’s eyes where there were only gone fishin’ signs hanging in the soul windows of the Utah harem.
And there she was in the crystal ball, smiling, glowing with bad intent.
“Hey you,” I said, “how come you changed the spelling of your name and added that pain in the butt cap X in the middle without consulting me, the Ruling Power, first?”
“Because I have Free Will. I don’t have to ask–besides, you must admit that HeXopatha makes more sense for a Witch.”
She had me there. Although a Fictional Character (FC) of my own creation, the endowment of Free Will ended any real authority I had over her. Actually, other than selecting who appears in my stories, I have no real sway over any of my FC’s.
“Since when must Ruling Powers make sense?” I said. “Anyway, that’s neither here nor there. The reason I called you–”
“It’s the other way around, darling,” HeXopatha said, her malevolent yet oddly cleancut image glowing even brighter in the crystal ball. Being a Witch, HeXopatha changes her appearance every time she returns to Earth from long sabbaticals in Hell. For this incarnation she opted for an olive complexion, honey colored eyes and jett hair. Two constants about her are extreme beauty and a necklace that contains charms of Cats, Rats, Owls, Ravens, Bats, Wolves, Spiders, Scorpions, Snakes and Stoats–her beloved critter familiars. She has a host of human sycophants, but they do not rate a charm on the necklace. (There’s also a “billigit” charm, which we will explore later.)
I glanced back to the start of this piece and discovered that it was indeed she who had placed the call.
“Don’t you think I know that?” I lied via a question (I call the act of rhetorical fibbing “quie-ing”). “What now, your serene lowness?”
“Do you remember the Riddle of the Sphinx?”
“Do I look like I don’t know my mythology?” I quied. “But for the sake of the readers who may not be as up on the tale as we are, do tell.”
“Let’s have a little play,” she said.
With that the Rat and Cat charms on her necklace glowed, and within three seconds a golden-eyed Black Cat with a Black Rat riding on her back leapt through my office window–which had been closed, yet opened on its own to let them in. (For the record, HeXopatha’s girl Cats have gold eyes, the guys’ are gray. Her female Rats wear black hair bows, this one did not.)
The Cat leapt onto my desk. The Rat dismounted as though the Cat were a Horse. He stood on his back legs, bowed and said, in a surprisingly deep voice, for a rodent “I am Shrewsbury and this is Lady Hisskit.”
“Charmed,” I said.
“We are members of the Hammy Dodger Players,” said Lady Hisskit, who, like Shrewsbury, spoke with a lovely, trained voice. “We salute our benefactor, our Magnificent Master, Her Highness HeXopatha.” Both ebon fiends turned and bowed before the evil visage in the crystal.
“Just a moment please,” I said. I removed the portable breathalyzer I keep on hand for reality checks and blew into it. The result was no higher than normal. “All right,” I continued, “I guess this must really be happening. Umm, ‘Jolly Rancher Players’ you say?”
“Hammy Dodger, we said,” Hisskit replied, all superior and Helen Mirren-like. She then assumed the pose of the Sphinx and said: “Behold The Sphinx and Oedipus.”
Shrewsbury was a method actor. He wasn’t ready and we watched him slowly channel the character of Oedipus, like an emoting little Brando. Lady Hisskit, being a Cat, had little patience with her co-star.
“Hurry the hell up, you little motherfu-”
“Now, now, Hissy, darling,” HeXopatha spoke from the crystal, “save your rage for reality.”
“My apologies, Magnificent Master.”
“Quite all right, sweetheart.”
When it became apparent that Shrewsbury was ready, the Sphinx spoke: “Hideous piebald meat bag, tell me what creature walks first on four legs, then two and ends on three?”
“Man,” Oedipus replied, with great confidence.
“Sexist prick!” The Sphinx said, taking a swipe at Oedipus, who leapt nimbly away.
“Curtain! Bravo babies, bravo!” HeXopatha called out. The Hammy Dodgers bowed.
I figured they’d go away faster if I applauded, so I did just that. Shrewsbury climbed back on board Lady Hisskit and they exited by the same route they’d entered.
HeXopatha was about to say something, but I delayed her with a raised finger. I opened my top desk drawer and removed two hotel bottles of Jack Daniels and downed both. I again blew into the breathalyzer and upon seeing that I was now at a blood/alcohol level high enough to make whatever she had to tell me easier to swallow, I shivered and said, “Proceed.”
“I believe it will be easier to explain if an idler FC will just happen to wander past your office door right about now and perhaps explain the backstory,” she said, not volunteering to do so herself.
“Swell idea,” I said, and lo and behold Tallywhacker the Berkshire Pig just happened to be wandering past my door, which is always open because most of my FC’s are animals who lack thumbs to turn knobs, and only about half can fit through the pet door–which Tallywhacker might have been able to pass through the day he was born but at no time after. He’s a big fella. Good hearted, but a bit of an ear talker offer. Such an individual comes in handy when a backstory needs addressing.
“Tallywhacker, old chum–gotta big job for you,” I called out.
“By waddle, Miss Leila,” he said, “I’m your Pig.”
HeXopatha and I glanced at each other, both with “By Waddle?” in our eyes, but neither of us said anything. Tallywhacker has his little verbal dingleberries, which are all a part of the varied richness that is the Tallywhacker experience. (For the record, he was named for the sheep counting rope device used by shepherds–not for the male device responsible for nearly all the wars in history–though such an allusion does make a humorous appearance in the classic film Porky’s.)
The Backstory, By Waddle
Tallywhacker is a big guy. He’s dark brown over white, shaped like a giant artillery shell and weighs at least four-hundred pounds. Fortunately he’s gentle, impossible to insult and talks non-stop. The last item isn’t always a blessing, but it is helpful when I need the backstory filled.
“Tally, old chum,” I said, “Miss HeXopatha and I were discussing–um, hold on a minute–” I then spoke at the crystal ball “Jesus Christ, HeXy, what are we talking about?”
“The Riddle of the billigits,” HeXopatha said as though speaking to a small, dumb child.
“I bet if I scroll backwards I’ll discover that this is the first mention of that,” I said.
“You could,” she said, “or you could just let Tally go whole hog and pretend we have already addressed it.”
“The Riddle of the billigits,” I said to Tallywhacker.
“Yes, yes, by waddle,” Tallywhacker said, gathering his words for a long and windy verbal gale.
I noticed out of the corner of my eye that HeXopatha “hung up” the crystal ball, for it went dark. Interestingly, it happened just before my second in command and Imaginary Friend Renfield entered the room. Renfield was wearing her usual sinister grin, which went well with her olive complexion, honey colored eyes and Jett hair.
“You just missed HeXopatha,” I said.
“Guess that gives me cause to hang myself,” she said. The antipathy between Renfield and HeXopatha is known to all. You never see them at the same time.
“By waddle, Miss Renfield,” said Tallywhacker. “What happened to that lovely necklace I saw you wearing in the lobby? With the charms?”
“The billigits, Tally,” I said, a bit quickly. “We’re up against the word budget enough already.”
“Oh, yes, by waddle, those daffy billigits–only four of the little winged orange fellows you know. Small, standing about hock high, and they wear identical blue polo shirts, khaki slacks and hemp slippers that fall off in flight. They do not use capital letters, by name they are mothball, weasel, pinto and flounder. Little rascals, by waddle,” Tallywhacker finished with a little chuckle.
It soon became evident that Tally had forgotten his lines.
Renfield fake sneezed “Minions.”
“Bless you, by waddle, Miss Renfield…why yes, the billigits currently serve as minions to the lovely Witch HeXopatha–who looks an awful lot like you, Miss Ren–”
“Pork Cheops,” Renfield fake sneezed again.
“‘Cheops,’ by waddle, of course. Mistress HeXopatha has founded the Valley of the Queen in her section of our realm known as Saragun Springs. She plans on building pyramids and such to her honor her esteemed witchyness…”
“And-wha-wha-wha-what-the-fuck-duh-do-fuh-four-billi-billi-billigits-have to do with it,” I faked sneezed.
During my fake sneeze, Renfield had quietly left the room; soon the crystal ball flashed red. HeXopatha was back, adjusting her charm necklace.
“That’ll do, Pig, that’ll do,” she said.
“Yes, and thank you Tallywhacker,” I added. “There are some tulip bulbs out in the barnyard that need rooting, if you are so inclined.”
“By waddle, that does appeal to my fancy,” Tallywhacker said. And as he passed through the office door, I realized that he was maybe three hundred calories away from not being able to squeeze through it, and I made a note to widen the passage.
Now, please imagine an attractive woman who has an olive complexion, honey-colored eyes, jett hair and is wearing a charm necklace knocking on the inside of the screen of whatever you are viewing this on. Since you are willing to do that much, please further imagine that your device is a crystal ball. The attractive woman wants your attention because she has something to tell you.
“Hello, readers or reader or no one at all, I am the Great and Powerful Witch HeXopatha. Through trickery and magic I have converted the four billigits that Tally mentioned into an army of a quarter million. I recently joined them to form a single giant billigit that is two-hundred-forty feet long and about sixty high. The size of the Sphinx. Why? Because I can. And for my further entertainment, I have devised the Riddle of the billigit. Only the correct answer to the riddle will break the spell and return the big billigit to the four individual billigits.”
Well, by waddle, there you have it.
Channeling Arnold
The Bard says “There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” That pretty much sums up Horatio, but it doesn’t apply in this realm called Saragun Springs, where I’m the ruling Penname. Here, if you fail to dream up weird enough stuff, even weirder stuff will come looking for you. Some say it is because the vile, extravagantly poisoned, perhaps even sentient spring (which is a bit more like a geyser) that the realm is named after spews tons of vaporized LSD into our air every day. Some say lots of things, but this item might be true.
The Great billigit of HeXopatha, like everything else in my symmetrical realm, is about a mile downwind of the spring. In fact everything is downwind from the spring. No such condition as being upwind of it. Thus the air contains a vague scent similar to that spray polite people use in a vain attempt to conceal a particularly nasty toilet event.
Since the path to the Great billigit passed the spring, it was decided that the two persons with the least evolved senses of smell in the realm would try to solve the Riddle of the billigit. I went because I’ve been a smoker since childhood; I notice stenches, but only in a distant sort of way. I brought along Pie-Eyed Peetie, the PDQ Pilsner Pigeon– a perpetually pickled cartoon beer mascot who is offended by nothing due to his continuous consumption of PDQ Pilsner (which is brewed from the foul water of the spring). We rode on an old Vespa that could only be turned off by the removal of the wire leading to its lone spark plug.
We saw the Great billigit before he* saw us.(* Although technically neither male nor female, I call billies guys. For anyone offended by that, the answer to the Riddle is for you.) Several of the individual billigits were playing soccer, which proved to my satisfaction that they didn’t hold the Sphinx pose when no one was looking.
But a lookout finally saw us and the collective billigits took the shape of a winged orange Sphinx that wore a blue polo shirt and khaki pants. A pair of giant hemp slippers lay close by.
I pulled up to the Great billigit, yanked the plug wire and said “We have come to solve the Riddle. I’m certain that you guys want to end this nonsense even more quickly than I do. So I recommend a Riddle from the bottom of the Riddle jar, if you catch my drift.”
I could hear the Great billigit’s thoughts. Actually it was the four original billigits, each playing himself and 62,249 other billigits,
by name mothball, weasel, pinto and flounder, excitedly chatting about putting some distance between themselves and the nearby putrid spring.
The four addressed us in one combined voice.
“Behold the riddle: ‘Hey, buddy, did a cat die in there or what?'”
Fate had smiled on us all. The billigits knew that Peetie’s an authority on the slob coms and popcorn films of the 1980’s. It was obvious they wanted no further part of HeXopatha’s Valley of the Queen.
“Fuck you, asshole,” Peetie said, quoting the Terminator, who answered the same “riddle” with those words decades ago.
With that 249,996 doppelganger billigits zapped out of existence, leaving but the original foursome. They bowed and immediately flew off as fast as possible.
Epilogue, By Waddle
Later, I was back in the office supervising the widening of the doorway for Tallywhacker’s benefit.
The crystal ball flashed red.
“What now?”
“Hello, darling,” HeXopatha said. “I want to introduce you to the newest member of the Hammy Dodgers.”
Tallywhacker’s honest face appeared in the crystal. “By waddle, this is certainly a big career move for me.”
“Good job, on the audition,” I said. “Glad you got out before you got too big for the door to hit you in the ass–Tell me, HeXy, why did you waste the time to create a Sphinx that was so easy to disperse?”
HeXopatha smiled that Mormon harem smile of hers. “Because I can.”
The crystal went dark. A moment later Renfield entered with a tablet in her hand. She smiled that Warren-wifey smile of hers and handed me the tablet.
The screen was connected to a security camera near Saragun Springs and the Valley of the Queen. The air was filled with the 249,996 billigits I thought we had dismissed. Each one was carrying a small stone carved from a quarry near the spring. A billigit sized stone. There was a conga line of the guys, which ended where the Sphinx billigit had been.
“So, HeXy is getting her pyramid after all,” I said, handing the tablet back to Renfield.
“I bet it’s a scam,” Renfield said.
I glanced at her, then took the crystal ball in my hand, spoke “Tallywhacker” thrice into it.
“Okay gang, all together before we run out of words,” I said.
“By Waddle,” we said.
Saragun Springs 