Lunatics

by Dave Barry

  But then the folks who were passing me along, now curiously sporting red hats as well, started moving me faster. And when I took a slight lead, the Peckerman handlers stepped up their speed and an impromptu race was on—with me and Peckerman now being batted like beach balls from one group of revelers to another and spending more time aloft than in their hands.

  But where are we headed? I wondered, because it now felt like this crowd was sending me and Peckerman in a particular direction. As if this race had a finish line.

  So I looked ahead and saw, at the north end of the square, beyond the sea of people and stalled tanks, a gate that we were now bearing down on at an accelerating speed. And that we arrived at precisely the same time that a rather large truck pulled up with its rear doors open and, after we were thrown inside, pulled away.

  We were now both lying facedown. In the back of a speeding rather large truck. Not knowing where we were going. I just assumed that, once again, we were being kidnapped.

  To say the least, I was upset. A person can be abducted just so many times before it starts wearing on him. He’s overcome by fear. Anger. And a depression resulting from the helpless feeling of not having any say in where you’re going or what you’ll be doing once you get there. Fact was, I no longer controlled any aspect of my life and I felt empty. Sapped of all physical and emotional strength. On the verge of tears, but too weak to cry.

  My guess is that any human being who’d experienced what I’d been through since this ordeal began would feel similarly. On the other hand, what does someone who isn’t a human being feel?

  “I’m so hungry I can eat a sorority.”

  “Jesus, Peckerman . . .”

  “Maybe you’d like some Moo Goo Gai Tits,” said a female voice that sounded vaguely familiar.

  So I pushed myself up from the floor of the rather large truck and found myself looking into the face of our Air China flight attendant.

  “Huh? Why are you here?” I asked her.

  “Why is who here?” asked Peckerman, who was turning the act of getting off the floor into a Kabuki art form as his unfortunate head was now between his legs.

  “You speak English?” I asked her.

  “My name is Julie,” she answered, nodding.

  Finally, when Peckerman was geometrically able to look in our direction and see who the woman was, his face lit up the way I imagined it did every time he discovered there was more custard than usual in his morning donut.

  “I believe this is yours,” he said while removing his Air China blanket and attempting to hand it to her.

  Now, to my mind, her reaction (drawing a Luger and threatening to blow Peckerman’s head off if he didn’t immediately take back the blanket and cover those underpants “with stains dating back to the Ming Dynasty”) was not at all over the top. If anything, I applauded her restraint.

  I then asked her to please explain who she really was and to tell us what this was all about.

  “I work with Moishe and Shlomo,” she said. “My assignment was to track your movements in China. Those folks in red caps were planted to protect you from the authorities, who were less than thrilled about that little party in Tiananmen Square. And now I’m supposed to make sure your exit from the mainland is swift and without incident. So . . .”

  She raised a thumb, and in a hitchhiker’s motion indicated an extremely large wooden crate behind her.

  “What are you saying?” I asked.

  “Get inside,” she said, pointing to the crate again, this time with the Luger.

  Peckerman and I stood and walked toward the crate which, according to a manufacturer’s label on its side, was for Sub-Zero refrigerators. Its door was wide open, and a vertical plank down the middle divided the inside into equal halves.

  I took the compartment on the left, Peckerman the right, and we stood there looking outward as Julie started to close the side that would box us in.

  “What are you doing to us?” I asked.

  “Not to worry. In twenty-four hours, you’ll be thanking me. In the meantime, try to stay as comfortable as possible. There’s some food and water in there. If it gets cold, you can cover yourselves with these,” she said, tossing us fresh Air China blankets.

  She also handed us pharmaceutical vials that had pills inside. “And, if either of you gets claustrophobic, just take some of these.”

  She then closed the side all the way and we heard her nailing it shut.

  What happened after that? Well, I’ll tell you as much as I can remember. Which means the time before I took a pill and then after I awakened.

  Before I took the pill . . .

  Just know that I didn’t take it to deal with the confined quarters. Fact is, the airholes in the roof of that box were big enough not only for purposes of breathing but allowed me to catch a glimpse, after we were wheeled off the rather large truck, along a flat surface, and then up a ramp, of a few dozen crates that looked just like ours.

  And then, everything turned dark. Pitch-black following the sound of a heavy door closing. Followed by more movement and then (I could tell by a new angle that sent me slamming into the side wall of the crate) a liftoff.

  It took a few seconds to shake it off, but I was okay.

  “We must be on some kind of cargo plane,” I said to Peckerman through the wall that separated us.

  No response.

  “Peckerman?” I said louder.

  Still no answer.

  “Peckerman?” I said even louder, as I pounded on the wall.

  I wondered if he was hurt. That perhaps when the plane suddenly tilted upward, he was caught off guard, his head hit the wall, and he was knocked unconscious.

  “Peckerman! Peckerman! Peckerman!”

  Or that he was dead.

  “Peckerman! Peckerman! Peckerman!”

  I then pressed my ear against the dividing wall and heard the following coming from the other side.

  “Jesus, Horkman. Show some fucking respect, will you? I wouldn’t make that kind of racket if you were shaking hands with the sheriff.”

  This was followed by the sounds a man makes during the act of self-induced pleasure. Followed by him shouting “Oh, the humanity!” to herald the arrival of that pleasure. Followed by the words “Good job, Mr. Wigglestick” in its aftermath.

  This was then followed by me taking my ear away from the wall and swallowing one of the pills Julie gave me.

  Exactly how long I was asleep is hard to say. However, I do know from my experience as a pet store owner that when a caged animal that’s been given a tranquilizer to quell its nerves arrives at The Wine Shop, it tends to drift in and out of consciousness until the calming agent is totally out of the system.

  So all I could really recall were the intermittent patches of hazy sound bites. A plane door opening. A man saying, “Change of plans for this one, customer needs a replacement a.s.a.p. Put it on that truck over there.”

  The next thing I remember is the sound of the crate being opened.

  CHAPTER 52

  Jeffrey

  To be honest, I didn’t mind the crate. I’ll tell you why.

  When I was a kid, we had a Weimaraner named Jimmy Carter. Seriously. My dad named him that because Jimmy Carter was the president at the time, and my dad thought he was a douchebag. He named the dog after him specifically so he (my dad) could say stuff like, “Look, Jimmy Carter is licking his balls again.” Or, “Look, Jimmy Carter is dragging his ass on the carpet.” Or, “Look, Jimmy Carter puked on the bed.” My dad really didn’t care what Jimmy Carter (the dog) did, because (a) he got to say, “Look, Jimmy Carter did whatever,” which he always thought was funny no matter how many times he said it; and (b) whatever it was that Jimmy Carter did, my dad never cleaned it up. My dad believed cleaning was a woman’s job, along with food shoppin
g, cooking, laundry, yard maintenance, minor home repairs, and anything involving children, except teaching them to throw like a fucking man.

  Anyway, in warm weather we used to keep Jimmy Carter outside on this deck we had over the carport. So one day, we were going to go to the mall, and when we got outside, Jimmy Carter, who like basically every other dog in the world had the IQ of a glazed donut, decided he wanted to join us, so he jumped off the carport. The problem was, he was tied to the doorknob by a piece of rope, which was supposed to keep him from jumping off the carport, so all of a sudden he’s hanging by his neck with his legs about seven feet off the ground, making really high-pitched noises for a dog his size, sounding more like a squirrel.

  So we’re all yelling, and my dad runs over and gets underneath Jimmy Carter and is trying to hold him up, and meanwhile he’s shouting for somebody to forgodsake go inside and untie the fucking dog. So my brother runs to the door, but it’s locked, so he runs back to my mom to get the keys, and just then—it was probably some kind of nervous digestive reaction to being choked—Jimmy Carter releases a serious load all over my dad.

  For a minute there it was really quiet, and then my mom said, “Look, boys, Jimmy Carter pooped on your father.” Which was probably the funniest thing my mom ever said. The three of us busted out laughing so hard, we were crying. That went on for, like, thirty seconds, us laughing, my dad standing totally still while Jimmy Carter’s stool dribbled down his head. And then Dad just let go and walked away, leaving Jimmy Carter hanging there making squirrel noises. My brother got the keys and ran upstairs and untied Jimmy Carter, and he dropped to the driveway and took off running, and we never saw him again, which to be honest was fine with everybody.

  The reason I bring this up is that Jimmy Carter had this big crate that he used to sleep in, and after he ran away, my dad had this idea of using it for car trips to keep my brother and me from fighting. He’d put it in the back part of the station wagon, and the first time either one of us hit the other, which was usually while we were still in the driveway, my dad would make whoever he thought was guilty ride back in the crate. It was supposed to be a punishment, but I actually liked it. I could curl up in there and get comfortable, and it was farther from my dad, who was always in a bad mood when he was driving, because all the other drivers were such fucking assholes. After a while it got so whenever we drove anywhere, I just automatically got into the crate, and nobody even thought about it.

  This caused a problem one time when we drove to Canada on vacation, and on the way back a Canadian border officer saw me in the crate, and he pulled my dad over because he thought maybe it was some kind of kidnapping. My mom tried to explain that I was their legal child who just liked to ride in a dog crate, but she was overruled by my dad, who preferred to explain to the officer, who my dad referred to as Dudley Do-Right, that who the fuck did he think he was, stopping an American citizen on his way to America, and was he aware that if it wasn’t for America, Canada would have had its ass kicked in World War II? So we ended up spending an extra day in Canada, and my dad ended up on a special Canadian list of people not allowed to return. (He’s on a similar list for Disney World because of the time he put Dale, of Chip ’n’ Dale, into a chokehold because of what my dad claimed was a clearly anti-Semitic gesture, but I don’t want to digress here.)

  Anyway, I really liked Jimmy Carter’s crate, and I kept riding in it until one day my mom, without asking me—and I never totally forgave her for this—threw it away, because according to her it was inappropriate for a child entering tenth grade. But the point is, as a youth I spent many hours in a crate, and those were some of the happiest hours of my childhood. So when the Air China stewardess bitch put me and Horkman into the refrigerator crate, I wasn’t nearly as upset as he was. It was nice to be alone for a change, and I enjoyed myself, and if you’re going to tell me that you never enjoy yourself when you’re alone, we both know you’re a fucking liar. I actually enjoyed myself four times, including one involving Charo, before I got bored and decided to swallow the pills.

  After that I don’t remember anything, until I heard Horkman calling to me from the other side of the crate.

  “Peckerman,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Are you awake?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I think somebody’s opening the crate.”

  I felt the tapping on the crate, and heard voices.

  “Where are we?” I said.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “But they’re talking English, and they sound like Americans.”

  “Thank God.”

  “Why thank God?”

  “Because, asshole, if they’re Americans, that means we’re back in America.”

  “Right. In America, where we’re wanted terrorists. Who could be shot on sight.”

  I’d forgotten about that. I figured the stewardess bitch must have set us up, claiming she was helping us, but really shipping us back to the U.S. to be killed. Fucking Chinese, with their lies and their fucking little soy packets.

  I could hear the front being pried off the crate. I edged forward, my plan being that as soon as there was space, I’d jump over to Horkman’s side and use him for protection in case there was any shooting on sight. By the time the front came all the way off the crate, I was crouched behind Horkman with my eyes closed.

  I waited for shooting, but there wasn’t any. Instead, there was a voice saying, “What the hell?” And then, “Who the hell are you?”

  “Allow me to introduce myself,” said Horkman. “My name is Murad Fazir. The gentleman cowering on the floor behind me is my colleague, Yasser al-Fakoob. We come in peace.”

  Yes, he actually said “We come in peace.”

  I stood up behind Horkman. Standing outside the crate, looking in, were two guys, one older and one basically a kid, both wearing khaki pants and blue shirts that said BEST BUY. Behind them was a huge industrial kitchen, with some guys in chef suits on the far side of the room.

  “What the hell are you doing in there?” said the older guy.

  “What the fuck does it look like we’re doing?” I said. I don’t honestly know what I meant by that, but the guy’s tone just pissed me off.

  “This crate is supposed to contain a commercial refrigerator,” said the guy. “Which we’re supposed to install.”

  Horkman—and even though he’s an asshole, I have to give him credit for this line—said: “Clearly there has been some mistake.”

  There was a pause there, while the older guy pondered the situation, two guys wearing blankets in a crate that was supposed to contain a refrigerator. Finally he decided to do what guys like him have been doing for as long as there have been guys like him.

  “I’m going to call my supervisor,” he said. He pulled out his phone and said, “Shit. No service down here.” He turned to the kid and said, “Nick, you stay here with them.”

  He left the kitchen. Horkman and I stepped out of the crate. Nick was looking at us, and our Air China blankets. You could tell Nick was not the brightest firefly in the forest. After a few seconds, you could actually see his head jerk back a little bit, from the unexpected impact of having a thought.

  “Wait a minute,” he said. “Are you those guys?”

  “No,” I said.

  “What guys?” said Horkman.

  “The Whaddyacallits,” said Nick. “Of the Gnocchi.”

  “No,” I said.

  “The what?” said Horkman.

  Nick was looking hard at us now. “You are them,” he said. He turned and yelled toward the kitchen in general. “It’s those guys! They’re here!”

  “Fuck,” I said.

  “Yes,” agreed Horkman.

  We looked around. There was an exit close by, with two big swinging doors. We trotted over and pushed through. Now we were in a long corridor lined with racks of trays and kitchen
stuff. There were people to the left in waiter uniforms, so we started trotting to the right. We came to another corridor, turned left on that one, kept trotting. We kept going for a while, making random turns, I’m puffing and sweating through my blanket. We didn’t really have a plan except get the fuck out of there.

  We were coming to another corridor junction, and up ahead a sign that said PARKING GARAGE and an arrow pointing around the corner to the right. That was the good news, because a garage would be a way out. The bad news was, there were voices coming from the same direction, moving our way. In a few seconds, they’d come around the corner and see us. Horkman grabbed my arm and said, “Over here.” He yanked me toward an elevator and pushed the button. We were staring at the door, waiting for it to open, going “come on come on come on.” Finally, just when the voices were coming around the corridor, the door opened, and we ran inside. Horkman stabbed a floor button, and now we were waiting for the fucking door to shut. Come on come on come on . . .

  The door started to close. We exhaled.

  Then a hand stuck in the door, and it opened.

  Standing in the doorway were a bunch of guys in suits, including two guys the size of forklifts who were obviously security. The reason for the security was obviously the guy standing in the middle.

  Donald Fucking Trump.

  For a second, everybody stared at everybody else.

  Then both forklifts pulled guns.

  Then Donald Trump held up his hand and said, quote, “Wait a minute.” Then he looked right at me and said, “Jeffrey Peckerman?”

  I nearly shat my underpants. Donald Fucking Trump knew who I was.

  “It’s an honor to meet you,” he said. To me, he said that. Donald Fucking Trump.

  Have you ever been in one of those situations where you’re thinking of two different things you could say, but instead of picking one, you say part of each one, so they morph together into a new thing that is not right, kind of like what happened to Jeff Goldblum in The Fly? That’s what happened with me and Donald Trump. I stuck out my hand, and the two things I was thinking of saying were “I’m a big fan” and “This is an honor,” but what came out was “I’m a bonor,” with “bonor” sounding basically like “boner.” At the same instant I realized I was telling Donald Trump that I was a boner, I also remembered that he hates to shake hands because of germs, so I yanked my hand back really hard, and my Air China blanket fell off. So I was standing there in basically my underpants. Donald Trump turned to Horkman and said, “And you must be Philip Horkman.”