Billy and Jack come down the street in fine Italian suits. The boy does not like Billy and Jack. They are bullies. Their skin swelters in the heat. The boy thinks, “Why are they wearing such heavy clothes in the summer?”
Billy says, “One lemonade please.” He flashes Jack a malignant grin.
Billy’s politeness makes the boy fear him even more. He pours the lemonade into a cup. “Twe...twe...twen...tyfi...fi...five cen...cents p...p...p...p...please.”
Jack removes a Tommy Gun from his pants, which contain an interdimensional dimension transcending time and space. He pours the lemonade on the sidewalk...slowly. “Faggot,” he says, “You’re cutting into our business, faggot. Go inside and stay there, faggot, unless you wanna be filled full of holes and eaten like Swiss cheese.”
The boy cries.
Billy says, “I like cheese.”
Tears fall into the boy’s collar. It is both uncomfortable and refreshing.
The boy’s mother comes out of the house. She is screaming. She is not screaming words. She is screaming sounds.
Rata tat tat. Jack shoots the mother in the chest with his Tommy Gun.
She is not bothered by the bullets. She is unfazed.
Mothers are indestructible.
She screams some more. Cacophonic sounds.
Billy and Jack cry. They run away.
The mother picks up her grieving son and carries him inside the house.
Alligator in Space
The alligator astronaut is hungry. His shuttle is floating two million light years from Earth and he wants some meat. But mission control has forgotten to pack him freeze-dried deli slices. The only things they left on the shuttle are astronaut ice cream and bread. The alligator astronaut is not fond of astronaut ice cream. He does not understand what is ice cream-y about it. It is not cold. It is not wet. The alligator astronaut thinks astronaut ice cream is what you get when you leave cotton candy in a dark basement for 100 years. So he chooses the bread and opens the bread bag. The loaf floats out of the bag and away from his grasp. He tries to do the backstroke across the room and capture the bread. But it is no use. He floats in the opposite direction. He gives up and cries tears of hunger. The tears float across the room. It is beautiful, but the alligator astronaut is not prepared to appreciate its beauty.
Scenes from the Life of a Greeting Card Designer
OCTOBER 31, 5008 BS
Missiles fly through Tim Hallmark’s cardboard window while he puts the finishing touches on his latest creation. He loses interest in calligraphing, “I bear about you,” underneath a drawing of a big bear crushing the life out of a little bear. He gains interest in the flames eating through his cardboard couch. He picks up a cardboard fire extinguisher and shoots cardboard foam at his cardboard couch. The flames grow in stature. He is ashamed of his inability to afford an aluminum extinguisher.
Outside, a little boy in a Patrick Swayze mask yells, “Give us some candy or prepare for annihilation.”
Tim Hallmark grabs his cardboard AK-47, crawls over to the window, shoots cardboard bullets at the little boy and his masked posse, and yells, “Didn’t you read the greeting card I stapled to the front door?”
Yes, the masked children have read the greeting card he stapled to the front door. No, they will not give their deep and heartfelt sympathies to Tim Hallmark during his time of need. No, they cannot bring themselves to forgive him for being unable to afford non-cardboard flavored Halloween candy. Children do not enjoy cardboard Halloween candy. Children enjoy cardboard Halloween candy even less when it is presented to them inside a cardboard box with “One per person PLEASE!!!” calligraphed on it. Children have been known to misbehave when presented with cardboard Halloween candy. Children have been known to misbehave on Halloween. They may obey the rules of their parents and the state on every other day of the year, but on the last few Halloweens they’ve become the scourge of the Earth.
Tim Hallmark loves children, but the masked children have just grenaded the cardboard roof off his cardboard house and Tim Hallmark does not love masked children who grenade his cardboard roof off his cardboard house.
Tim Hallmark looks through the hole where his roof used to be. He sees a nuclear warhead hurtling towards him. He sees an airplane, but not the little girl in a Chewbacca mask giggling in its cockpit.
Tim Hallmark watches the nuclear warhead and thinks about his life. He screams out the words from his favorite creations:
Happy birthday! You are one day closer to your putrification!
Happy Mother’s Day, but I never asked to be thrust out of rotting taco!
Sorry your grandma died! She molested me when I was eight!
He doesn’t understand why the American public has never understood his genius. He doesn’t understand why they haven’t showered him with riches. He regrets never finding true love.
Tim Hallmark is very depressed. He is very depressed and a nuclear warhead is about to disintegrate his head.
OCTOBER 31, 5009 BS
This year, Tim Hallmark saved up his money from his new part-time job as a sideshow attraction and bought poison eggplant candies in bulk. “One for you,” he says to a little naked boy in a 42-foot white beard, “and one for you,” he says to a little girl in a naughty nurse costume. He has been poisoning thousands of little girls and boys all night from the comfort of his dumpster. They have been complimenting him on his mask. He is very bitter about their compliments. He does not tell them that it is not a mask, that his face has been maligned by radiation poisoning. He does not want to horrify them with this factoid. He does not want them to run away. Instead, he wants them to stay put and thank him for his delicious poison eggplant candies.
The effects of the poison begin. A horde of little girls and boys stammer towards his dumpster with an amalgam of pus and blood spewing out of their orifices. “What have you done to us?” they ask.
A little boy tears opens a greeting card envelope and card, sees a picture of a skeleton in a thong bikini. Under the picture, he reads:
Roses are red
Violets are blue
You have been poisoned
and it sucks to be you.
Below the poem, he deciphers Tim Hallmark’s flowery handwriting:
Help me overthrow the government if you ever want to see your mommies and daddies again. My antidote tastes like chocolate milkshake.
XOXO,
Tim Hallmark
The little poisoned girls and boys overthrow the government for Tim Hallmark. This makes him happy. He is the new dictator.
The little poisoned girls and boys are not happy. They are still spewing an amalgam of pus and blood out of their orifices. They are taking an extremely long time to die. They are in agony.
They look at Tim Hallmark as if he were a cruel man. But he is not a cruel man. The sideshow business just isn’t very lucrative. It may have paid for his supply of poison eggplant candies, but it wasn’t enough to afford the antidote.
“Stop looking at me like that!” Tim Hallmark says as he addresses the nation on live TV. “My first amendment to the Constitution is to send everyone who doesn’t stop looking at me like that to rape camp. My second amendment to the constitution is to send everyone who doesn’t buy at least one of my greeting cards a day to rape camp.”
And so begins Tim Hallmark’s reign as the top-selling greeting card designer in the country.
OCTOBER 31, 5010 BS
Tim Hallmark leaves the White House with an army of bodyguards. He wants to visit Fort Knox and rub his testicles over every gold bar in the treasury. He wants his testicles to feel that cold, refreshing sensation millions and millions of times.
Tim Hallmark only travels by parade float. His float rolls towards Fort Knox. He stands in the center of a giant chocolate rose and takes a nibble whenever he gets a craving. His army of bodyguards march on the side, hoping to avoid rape camp, hoping they won’t accidentally insult their dictator.
Tim Hallmark is easily insulted.
Terrorists attack Tim Hallmark’s float with airplanes. Many bodyguards save Tim Hallmark’s life by blocking the crashing planes with their bodies.
By doing this, they avoid rape camp. Getting hit by an airplane is preferable to rape camp.
Tim Hallmark does not negotiate with terrorists.
Terrorists = the parents of the children he poisoned last Halloween.
Tim Hallmark arrives at Fort Knox. He goes inside, leaving his bodyguards behind. There are too many to fit inside the lobby. All of the bodyguards or none of the bodyguards—this is the principle that Tim Hallmark’s dictatorship is based upon.
Fort Knox’s lobby looks like the inside of a savings bank. He does not think this is peculiar. He is too busy leering at the teller’s exquisite beauty. He wants to have sex with her. He will have sex with her. He is the dictator and no one wants to go to rape camp.
He cuts the line and hands the teller a greeting card. She opens it. It shows a newborn baby holding a human heart as if it were a rattle and reads, “Will you be my Valentine?”
The teller looks horrified. She looks a little less exquisitely beautiful. Tim Hallmark is ok with this. He winks at her and says, “You’re too beautiful for rape camp but just right for my collection of camel skin condoms.” He feels a little sad. He knows his tryst with the bank teller will be identical to the thousands of empty sexual experiences that have come before. He is beginning to think saying, “You’re too beautiful for rape camp but just right for my collection of camel skin condoms,” isn’t the best way to start a meaningful relationship. But maybe this time it’ll be different and he’ll find true love. Feel something warm and fuzzy in his head rather than just something warm and gooey down below.
The teller tries to stop looking horrified. She says, “Follow me to the vault, Mr. Dictator.”
She leads him into an enormous room. It is empty.
Tim Hallmark asks, “Where are my gold bars? Where is your golden lingerie? Where is my true love?”
The teller transforms into a tank. The tank shoots Tim Hallmark in the crotch with an armor-piercing kinetic energy penetrator.
Tim Hallmark is very stupid for being tricked into believing Fort Knox is run by a bunch of bankers instead of the U.S. Army and their killer robots.
OCTOBER 31, 5011 BS
Tim Hallmark is not the dictator anymore. He is an exile and a eunuch. He hides in the sewers because the parents of the children he poisoned two Halloweens ago are still trying to work out their grief with acts of violence and he no longer has an army of bodyguards to threaten with rape camp.
The sewers are awash in greeting cards. Tim Hallmark has been very productive since journeying down below. Right now, he is sitting on a pipe, working on his latest creation. He is calligraphing the words, “I’ll never flush you, my darling. We’re purr-fect for each other.” He has already drawn a cat blowing kisses at an unflushed bowel movement. All of his soggy greeting cards have been designed for bowel movement and urine recipients. Tim Hallmark does not care if bowel movements and urine cannot read. Tim Hallmark does not care if bowel movements and urine lack the sentiency to be classified as recipients. Tim Hallmark doesn’t have anyone else to make greeting cards for besides rats and alligators, and Tim Hallmark is no friend of rats and alligators.
A little boy in a black person’s mask rises out of the sewage, holding a Super Soaker. He says, “Give us some candy or prepare for annihilation.”
Many little girls and boys in masks representing various ethnic groups emerge out of the sewage.
Tim Hallmark asks, “Didn’t I kill all the little girls and boys?”
The little girls and boys say, “Yes, but that was when we were babies. Now we’re all grown up and you must give us some candy or we will annihilate you.”
Tim Hallmark says, “I don’t have to buy Halloween candy anymore. I live in the sewers. Little girls and boys do not live in the sewers.” He stares at them in terror. “Little girls and boys should not be in the sewers. I should not have to avoid annihilation by buying candy!”
The little girls and boys say, “We tracked you to the sewers to avenge the deaths of our older brothers and sisters. We would also be happy with a bunch of candy.”
Tim Hallmark is nervous. He twitches. The little girls and boys aim their Super Soakers at his head. He realizes the Super Soakers are just water guns. He wonders why the manufacturers designed them to resemble bazookas. He stops twitching. He starts to cackle. He says, “What? Are you going to soak me to death?”
The little girls and boys do not say anything. They press the triggers on their Super Soakers. Flames shoot out. Tim Hallmark is on fire.
Tim Hallmark considers jumping into the sewage. He hesitates. That is where the little girls and boys are standing. He does not want them to shoot more fire at him. He does not want to be engulfed in twice as many flames.
The little girls and boys say, “Now we’re going to put you out because we like you...Our older brothers and sisters were really mean.” They each press a button on their Super Soakers and pull the trigger. The guns now shoot water. Tim Hallmark is not on fire anymore. The little girls and boys say, “Give us some candy or prepare for a second round of annihilation.”
Tim Hallmark says, “Ok.” He pretends to look for candy. He is actually looking for dry greeting cards. He is actually folding them into origami shuriken.
He kills all the little girls and boys with his origami shuriken.
Tim Hallmark is ninja.
He does a little dance to celebrate being ninja. He notices his reflection in the sewage. He falls in love with it. This love is a by-product of not being in the presence of a woman since last Halloween. This love wouldn’t have been possible without the help of the armor-piercing kinetic energy penetrator that evaporated his crotch. He is not sexually attracted to his reflection. He is spiritually attracted to his reflection. He lacks the capacity for sexual attraction, but not spiritual attraction. He has found true love.
He takes out a piece of cardstock, draws Cupid with a bow and arrow in his mouth, calligraphies, “I’ll love you until your flesh rots off your skeleton,” puts the card in an envelope, gives it to himself, says, “Thank you.”
Then he takes off his scalp and prepares for spiritual penetration.
Defeat of the Mountain Spirit
Mount Holyoke packs a thermos and trail mix for its hike up Bradley Sands. Mount Holyoke gets up early in the morning to avoid other hikers and full exposure to the summer heat. Mount Holyoke drives to the foot of Bradley Sands. Mount Holyoke is very excited about the hike. Mount Holyoke gets out of its car. Mount Holyoke looks down at Bradley Sands and whimpers. Mount Holyoke realizes a hike up Bradley Sands will only take nine-tenths of a millisecond. Mount Holyoke releases a flash flood of sadness.
One of Those Poorly Written Stories That Are Impossible to Follow Because There Are Too Many Goddamn Characters
Grover pogo-sticked up the staircase, passing a tour group. Arthur, their guide, recited the stair’s criminal history, placing particular emphasis on the time it tied a rope ladder to the subway tracks, greased its mustache, and cackled like Regis Philbin.
Jenny envied her husband’s ability to use the lecture as a sleep-aid; he dreamt of a never-ending urinal deposit.
The stairs wondered if the man always slept standing up and considered giving it a try, hoping to cure its lower back pain.
Frank regretted selling his collection of witty retorts to finance this vacation and scanned his brain cells for a suitable insult to heckle the tour guide, locating only: your chest is as flat as a two-year-old dry-erase board.
But not everyone is an uncultured piglet who can’t appreciate a good trip back into the annals of European history–Kamikaze Cohn was so excited by the lesson that she punctured through the twenty-third step with the concrete Dolce & Gabbana shoe her mob boss dad gave her for her sweet sixteen, which sent a shockwave of destruction up and down the staircase.
S
tan’s life flashed before his eyes, which mostly consisted of waiting on the couch for someone on TV to get decapitated by a ball.
Sharon was a bit bored by the feature presentation, so she found solace in a box of Sno-Caps and was overjoyed that for once she hadn’t finished the nonpareils before the end of the trailers.
Then Grover hopped onto the final step, and he and the climbers plunged into oblivion....
Hold-up
Parker pulls the giant-sized fedora over his face, peeks through the eye slits in the crown, turns the safety off on his .38 Special, yanks the door open, runs inside. The cashier is watching a movie on his portable DVD player. Parker leans over the counter, touches the cashier’s forehead with the tip of the .38, shouts demands. The giant-sized fedora muffles his speech. The cashier experiences confusion. He figures Parker is asking for directions to the expressway. It is difficult to locate. He’s never dealt with someone who was so hard up that he expressed his frustration with a gun. He says, “Well, first you’ve gotta turn right onto Elm, then drive past two lights until you see a . . .” Parker pulls the trigger. Bits of skull splatter across a stack of American Spirits. Parker jumps the counter, shakes violently since he hadn’t meant to pull the trigger, blames his nervous finger. He presses the NO SALE button on the register. The drawer opens. Parker can’t see stacks of bills. It’s too dark, shadowy. The rest of the store is bright. Parker lifts his fedora, sticks his face into the drawer for a better look. The darkness engulfs his nose. It feels numb. He lifts his chin, reaches for his nose. The center of his face feels smooth. His nose is gone. He panics, sniffs, smells vinegar. Feels an itch. Tries to scratch it. Becomes unbearable. Tears his nails into the center of his face. Draws blood. No relief. A hundred dollar bill rips through his forehead and asks to borrow money for cigarettes. Parker does not respond. He cannot respond. His left ear does it for him: “Sorry, I’m an ear. We’re always out of cash.” The center of Parker’s face remains silent.
Sorry I Ruined Your Orgy Page 6
