Banana Hammock

by Jack Kilborn

  I opened the refrigerator, only to stare at a single rotten cabbage. An old girlfriend had left it there two months ago, and never came back for it. Besides the cabbage, the only other things my fridge contained were ketchup, pickle relish, and half a beer, which had been there since 1983. A ketchup sandwich would have been okay, if I had had some bread. But I didn’t.

  My thoughts drifted to the fish, and how fresh they were. But a quick sniff of the tank made me want to yak, so I decided against it.

  At this point I was really hungry, probably because I was dwelling on the fact. So I went back to the fridge and looked at the cabbage. It was kind of brown, with purple fuzz on one side. I took it out and peeled off a leaf without fuzz on it. Closing my eyes, I stuffed the leaf into my mouth and chewed. Then I passed out.

  Chapter 6

  I awoke as there was a knock at the door. My face was completely frost-bitten, and my lower lip was stuck to the metal handle of the drawer marked “Crisper” in the refrigerator.

  “Jusss a minute!” I yelled, trying to remove my lip and only succeeding in pulling out the drawer with my face.

  “Harry? Are you in there?”

  It was Mrs. Tatas. I tried to yank the drawer off but instead stretched my lower lip down to my navel.

  “I’m in da bafroom! Ow ve wight out!”

  I stumbled over to the utensil drawer and took out a steak knife.

  “I can come back later…”

  “No, juss waid a shecond!”

  I scraped the knife across my lip, causing the drawer to fall and land on my foot, corner first. I screamed.

  “Are you okay, Harry?”

  “I’m fine! Just fine! I’ll be right there!”

  I grabbed a greasy napkin and pressed it to my bleeding lip, then ran to the door.

  “Hi,” I said, trying to stop the blood and look nonchalant at the same time.

  “What happened?”

  “Cut myself shaving.”

  “You shave your lips?”

  “Would you like to come in?”

  She was wearing a pink dress, but with a dame like her, you rarely pay attention to the clothing. You pay attention to what’s in it. And inside this dress was the most irresistible thing I’ve ever seen, next to Inflatable Debbie with the vibrating grip. I held her in the doorway, tightly, like I was trying to crush a beer can between our bodies.

  She said she wanted my body. I told her I was still using it, but she could have it on loan. I pressed my lips to hers and she gagged on the greasy napkin stuck to my face. I pulled the napkin off and began to bleed on her dress. She stepped on my injured foot with her spiked heel, and I jerked my leg up and kneed her in the stomach. As she doubled over in pain, she hit her head on the doorway and collapsed in a pile on the floor, digging her nails into my chest on the way down. I bit my lip to control the pain, only to scream as my teeth sank into my open wound.

  You could probably say the whole scene was not very romantic.

  But the situation wasn’t a total loss. Here I had a gorgeously well-endowed dame unconscious in my room. This was what I used to pray for in college. I dragged her inside and was just about ready to pull out Jack the Fun Machine when a cop appeared in the doorway.

  “Harry McGlade?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you know this man?” He handed me a picture of the late Sneaky Earl.

  “No,” I said, and slammed the door.

  But the cop knocked again. I hated dedicated cops. In fact, I hated all cops. I opened the door.

  “Mr. McGlade, I’m afraid you’ll have to come with me.”

  “I’d much rather stay here and come with her.”

  “That will have to wait, Mr. McGlade. Let’s go.”

  I left the apartment realizing I still didn’t know the broad’s name.

  Chapter 7

  They charged me with seventeen counts of first degree murder, and jay-walking. My lawyer said I could beat the jay-walking charge but I’d be serving two hundred and fifty years to life for the murder rap. So there I sat there, locked in the slammer with a bunch of hardcore criminals, trying to make sure my pooper stayed a virgin. Then good old Detective ninth class Fitzmoron appeared and removed me from my cell. He took me to my lawyer, who was in the prison chapel, praying.

  “How do things look, Sal?” I asked.

  “Not good, Harry. I’m going to try to plea bargain for only three life sentences.”

  “But it’s only a hearing, Sal.”

  “Trust me, Harry.”

  I trusted Sal about as much as I liked him. And I hated Sal. But I didn’t really have a choice, unless I represented myself. And I’ve only been dressing myself for two months.

  I would just have to hope for the best. Sal genuflected and we left the chapel.

  Chapter 8

  To make a long story short, I was acquitted. Sal had a nervous breakdown in court and the judge decided to just drop the whole matter and break for lunch. I took a cab back to my apartment and wasn’t surprised to find Mrs. Tatas gone.

  But she did leave a note. It told me to meet her at Chez Guevara for a six o’clock dinner reservation. And it was signed Mrs. Bertram P. Niss. So I finally found out who I was looking for. That was the break I needed.

  I looked up Bertram’s name in the phone book and called up his house to see if he was home. He wasn’t. This was going to be harder than I thought.

  I had a few hours before dinner so I decided to try and get some leads. So I left my apartment and went over to “Fat Louie’s” to see… Fat Louie. He was in the back, eating a Fat Louie Burger. If anyone knew the streets, it was Fat Louie. If anyone knew fresh produce, it was Fat Louie. We went back a long way, and were like brothers.

  “How you doin’, Fat?”

  “Fuck you.”

  “You know where Bertram P. Niss is?”

  “No. Get out.”

  “Nice talking to you, Fat.”

  “Keep in touch.”

  I left “Fat Louie’s” feeling optimistic. I wasn’t any closer to finding Bertram P. Niss, but at least I wasn’t Fat Louie. I decided to approach the situation differently, and went to sleep.

  Unfortunately, I was driving at the time, and I ran over a Cub Scout Troop practicing CPR in a parking lot. Rather than be sent to jail again, I dumped their bodies into the retention pond and spread towels and suntan oil along the shore to make it look like a swimming accident. Then I began tracking down leads again, though my spirits were considerably dampened for the next two hours.

  Chapter 9

  Seven years ago, I had a minor crisis when I thought I was the reincarnation of Fatty Arbuckle. That flashed back into my mind as I sat at a table in Chez Guevara, watching some fat broad stuck in the revolving door. How fat was she? She was so fat, she got stuck in the revolving door. But I wasn’t there for the entertainment. I was waiting for Mrs. Niss and her big tatas to join me for dinner to discuss my recent developments. Since we had last met, I discovered some startling evidence that would conclusively prove Jimmy Carter was an alien from the planet Bonzo. Unfortunately, I had learned nothing concerning her missing husband. But she didn’t have to know that.

  She arrived a fashionable six hours late, wearing a slinky pink silk wrap that hugged her curvaceous body, along with a smile. She obviously expected good news. Oh well. She sat down on the mashed potatoes I had left on her chair.

  “Oh. How stupid of me to leave those mashed potatoes on your chair. We better go to my place and soak that dress.”

  She was noticeably impressed by my clever ploy to remove her from her clothing. Now all I had to do was wait for the Mickey I slipped in her drink to take effect. Unfortunately, she noticed it, and ordered another drink without a mouse.

  So the only way I was going to get her unconscious was to match her drink for drink, or hit her with a ball-peen hammer. And I left my hammer at home.

  Fourteen drinks later, when the welders were almost done removing the fat broad, I had discovered th
at trying to Mrs. Niss drunk was like trying to get Mr. Rogers hard. I gave up and decided to lay my cards on the table.

  “Want to play elevator?”

  “How do you play?”

  So I showed her my shaft. Then I asked her if she was going up.

  “I’m not that kind of woman.”

  “Why? Do you have a penis?”

  “No. I’m married.”

  Then it hit me. Why she had gone from coy to prude in less than twelve hours. I should have known it right away. It was the old hire a private investigator then set him up for the murder of the husband and collect the insurance scam. When all the while, she was the one that killed him.

  “Where did you hide the body?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Don’t play innocent with me. You killed him. Right? Am I right? You did it. Right?”

  She laughed villainously. “Yes, I killed him. He had a life insurance policy worth more than the merchandising rights to Star Wars. And you’re going to take the fall for it. While you were here waiting for me, I put his body in your apartment along with some revealing pictures of him and Jim Bakker. It will look like you tried to blackmail him, he didn’t go for it, and you killed him with your gun.”

  “My gun?”

  “Yes. I took a slug out of one of the Japanese tourists you shot when you were trying to protect me from the car I hired to shoot blanks at us in front of your apartment. Then I just substituted your bullet for the one I used to kill my husband. That’s the one in his chest right now.”

  “You won’t get away with this.”

  “Oh no? By now, the police are probably at your apartment and they’ve got all the evidence they need to put you away for life.”

  Boy, did I feel stupid. She set me up perfectly. I should have known, especially after seeing Body Heat. I was always a sucker for the ones with big cans. Worst of all, even though I solved the case, I knew I probably wouldn’t get paid. At times like this, I wish I had gotten that sex change operation.

  “So what happens now?” I asked.

  “Now, we say goodbye. If you hurry, maybe you can make it to the border. I’ve got a date with an insurance company.”

  She got up to leave, but I unsheathed my .44 and yelled after her. “Me making it to the border has nothing to do with you being alive or not.”

  She turned around and laughed. “You couldn’t hit a legless elephant from ten feet away.”

  Then she looked at my gun and froze.

  “How do you like my new telescopic sight?” I asked.

  And with that, I blew her head off. It was a shame. I never even got a chance to feel her up.

  A waiter looked at me inquisitively.

  “The lady will get the check,” I said, and then left.

  Chapter 10

  I never did get arrested for killing her husband. The bimbo made one mistake. When she was putting the slug from my gun into her husband’s body, she lost her wedding ring in the bullet hole. So I didn’t really need to kill her, but it felt good. Besides, she was a tease. And that was the defense I used when I stood trial for her murder. The judge understood, and I only got sentenced to twenty hours of community service. Now, every Friday, I become troop leader for a group of Boy Scouts. This week I’m going to teach them how to cop a feel and pretend it was an accident.

  Sometimes private investigation isn’t pretty.

  The end.

  To restart the Amish adventure, click here.

  Cub Scout Gore Feast

  A Bonus Short Story by J.A. Konrath & Jeff Strand

  “Isn’t this when you start telling scary stories, Mr. Hollis?”

  Hollis grinned, staring at the boys around the campfire. Cub Scouts, none of them older than ten. For some, the first night they’d ever spent away from their families.

  “Are you scouts sure you want to hear a scary story?”

  “Yes!” they chorused.

  “Even though it’s dark and we’re all alone in the spooky, menacing forest?”

  “Yes! Yes! Yes!”

  Hollis sat down on his haunches. His face became serious.

  “Okay, I’ll tell you a scary story. Scary because it’s the absolute, hand-on-my-heart truth. You’ve all heard rumors about Troop 192, how they disappeared without a trace not too far from here, right?”

  Several of the boys nodded.

  “Well, the rumors were wrong. There were lots of traces of Troop 192. There were traces all over the place…on the ground, up in the trees, by the lake, maybe even under where you’re sitting right now. Imagine if you took a blender, like the kind your mothers use to make smoothies, but it was a giant blender, maybe…I dunno, eighteen feet high. And then you dropped the entire Troop 192 into it, and accidentally left the lid off, so that when you pressed the ‘blend’ button they sprayed all over the place. That’s what it looked like.”

  “I heard it was just one kid who went missing,” said Anthony.

  Hollis shrugged. “If you think one little kid has that many guts inside of his body, more power to you, but I was here. I saw it. It was gross.”

  “My mom said they found him the next morning. He was playing Nintendo.”

  “Oh, well, I guess your mom is in a position where she was allowed to accompany the law enforcement agencies on their search, huh? Did she somehow become deputized without anybody hearing about it? Do Hooters waitresses typically get to tag along on searches for missing children?”

  “She works at Olive Garden.”

  “Whatever. She wasn’t there on the night of the investigation. I’m telling you that it was the entire troop, and their insides were strewn as far as the eye can see.” Hollis made a grand gesture with both arms to emphasize the extent of the carnage. “And do you know who got blamed for it?”

  Several of the scouts shook their heads.

  “Madman Charlie. Oh, they arrested him, and sent him to the electric chair the next morning. But it wasn’t Madman Charlie. When Troop 192 was massacred, he was off murdering a young woman in a completely different county. No, Troop 192 wasn’t slaughtered by Madman Charlie. They weren’t even slaughtered by something…human.”

  One of the youngest scouts, Billy somebody, raised his hand. No doubt because he was too terrified to hear more.

  “Billy, are you too terrified to hear more?” Hollis asked. “Because that’s okay. Nobody here will judge you.”

  “No, Mr. Hollis. I have to go to the bathroom.”

  Hollis sighed again. “Go ahead, Billy. But don’t go too far away. Anyway, there’s something inhuman in these woods. Something that hungers for human flesh.”

  Theolonious raised his hand. Probably wet himself he was so scared.

  “Do we have any more hot dogs?” Theolonious asked.

  “You already had three.”

  “Jimmy ate the one I dropped on the ground.”

  “Jimmy didn’t come with us on this trip.”

  “Well, okay, I ate it, but it wasn’t as good as the two that didn’t get dropped on the ground. Can I please have another one?”

  “This inhuman creature,” Hollis said, ignoring him and raising his voice, “slaughtered Troop 192 on a night very much like tonight. It cracked open their bones and sucked out the marrow, and slurped up their intestines like spaghetti, then flossed its sharp fangs with their muscle fibers. And rumor has it this insatiable monster still hunts in these very woods, on the night of…” Hollis paused for dramatic effect, “the full moon.”

  “Was it a Dracula?” Cecil asked.

  “Draculas don’t rip people up,” said Anthony. “Draculas just look unhappy a lot, and kiss girls like in that movie my sister watched seventeen gazillion hundred times.”

  “Those were dumb Draculas,” said Cecil. “But there are cool Draculas, like in Lord of the Rings.”

  “Those were orcs.”

  “Not those! The other ones!”

  “That was a Kraken!”

  “The horrible creature,” Holl
is said, standing tall and raising his arms over his head, “was a werewolf!”

  “I thought werewolves just took off their shirts a lot like in that movie with the Draculas.”

  Hollis shook his head. “In real life, werewolves like to crack open the rib cages of little boys with their sharp claws and bite their still-beating hearts right from their chests. That’s what happened to Troop 192.”

  “If they were attacked by a werewolf,” said Anthony, “wouldn’t they become werewolves?”

  “Not if their bodies were shredded and thrown around all over the trees and lake and ground. If you’d been paying attention when I started telling the story you could have caught that little detail.”

  “What if a werewolf bit a skunk?” Theolonious asked. “Would it become a werewolfskunk?”

  “A werewolf wouldn’t bite a skunk,” Hollis said.

  “Why not?”

  “Why would it bite a skunk? Would you bite a skunk?”

  “I wouldn’t bite a skunk today,” said Mortimer, “but if I was a werewolf, I think I’d bite a skunk if there was one sitting there. You’d have to bite it gently, y’know, so that its whole head doesn’t come off, but I think, y’know, werewolves can bite gently when they want to, even though they usually don’t. They couldn’t use their whole jaw or, y’know, anything like that, but if they just used their front teeth and didn’t close them all the way, I think they could bite a skunk without its head coming off.”

  The other cub scouts murmured their agreement.

  “Y’know,” Mortimer added.

  “And what if the werewolfskunk bit a deer?” asked Theolonious. “Would it turn into a werewolfskunkdeer?”

  “I want to know how one werewolf ate all of Troop 192,” said Cecil. “How big is a werewolf’s stomach?”

  “Haven’t I already explained that twice?” asked Hollis. “The werewolf didn’t eat their whole bodies. He ate the best parts, then scattered the rest of them all over the place so that the kids couldn’t turn into little werewolves. Do you want a demerit? Do you?”

  “I need toilet paper!” Billy yelled from the woods.