by C. L. Bevill
“Ah, Peter Pitcock,” David said. “He decided that he wanted to become one with nature and bought ten acres of land in the Alaskan wilderness. He intends to ‘live off the grid.’ That’s what his attorney said when he presented me with papers advising me not to go within 1,000 feet of Peter. Of course, there are no NASA bases in Alaska that I know of, so it’s not a problem.”
“I think there is a NASA base in Alaska,” Marquita interjected and then shut her mouth when Bubba looked at her.
Bubba rubbed his chest again where he had knocked himself on the side of the hole. How much trouble could an astronaut be? “What did you want to talk to me about?” he asked David.
“I wish to use the back ten acres of your property to build a rocketship,” David said and twirled away, this time doing the extreme slo-mo effect from The Right Stuff very effectively. Over one shoulder he said slowly, “So…I…can…go…to…the…moon.”
Chapter 6
Bubba Gets to Work Mostly
Bubba looked pointedly at Marquita.
Marquita made a face. “He’s a pretty good cameraman,” she said defensively. “Must be all his varied experience.” She shrugged and added weakly, “Tandy said he was a steampunk super villain at your wedding.”
“Baron Von Blackcap the Revenger,” Bubba muttered reluctantly.
“Really?”
“Yep.”
“What was he revenging?”
“He had an archnemesis and a lot of glued-on gears were involved,” Bubba said reluctantly. “Also, he thought his social worker was his archnemesis.”
“Huh,” Marquita said. “The social worker didn’t say anything about that.”
“Well, ifin David’s right, that one would be new.” Bubba made a face. “Dogley has a real problem keeping social workers.”
“All right then, is he dangerous?”
“I’ve never known David to hurt anyone,” Bubba said slowly, “although he did tie that social worker fella to a chair and put makeup on him. A lotta makeup. And he gagged him with something that wandered in from a really seedy movie.”
Marquita clapped her hands together. “We’ll put a pin in that one and revisit it later. I expect you want to go look in the tunnels and see if you can find any clues, or even better, to find the Boo itself. You should take a camera with you. One of the cameras that has infrared on it.”
“Why was there a hole in the path?”
“The hole is in a later scene,” Marquita said in a precise manner. “Ambushes and snares are in parts of the movie. The setup crew worked on the area for two weeks before I even drove in.”
“Ambushes and snares,” Bubba repeated doubtfully.
“Yes, yes,” Marquita said. “I’ve got a diagram for you so you won’t fall in…again. I’ll let you get to it.” She got up and went inside, and Bubba heard her say, “God, I feel so much better now. Who’d a thunk?”
Bubba didn’t feel better. It was true that his mind was occupied with something other than Willodean’s health. (Do I need to call her again? No, it hasn’t bin long enough. I don’t want to drive her nuts. How about now?) It was also true that fishing wouldn’t have done it. He would have sat in the boat and ruminated about his wife, not about what was biting and what wasn’t biting. It was one good thing about this particular day. The other one was that no bodies had been thus far discovered, but it wasn’t even close to lunch.
No point tempting fate, he told himself, after all, I got the whole rest of the day to trip over a corpse.
Bubba glanced down at Precious, who stared out at the woods in a meaningful fashion. She glanced up at him with wet brown eyes. Now what have you got us into, dumbass? She asked silently.
“You ready, girl? You got my back?”
No. Bring me Milk-Bones, human slave. Also, gently rub my paws.
“There might be rabbits around,” Bubba said. “I seem to recollect that one of my uncles used to hunt up here regular like. He’d bring home a few bunnies, and it was rabbit stew for supper.”
Bunnies? No. I hate bunnies.
“Unc never said nothing about the Boo anyway. But hey, there’s squirrels, too. All shaking their tails at you and chittering like loons.”
Squirrels? No. I hate them, too. Also, humans who won’t give me Milk-Bones on an hourly basis. That’s you, by the by. Wait, there’s a…SQUIRREL! Precious leapt to her feet baying as she dove headlong into the forest next to the house.
Bubba looked after his hound longingly. He wanted to go diving headlong into the forest too, but first he needed some more coffee and that diagram Marquita talked about. Also, he needed to speak with all of the crew.
* * *
There was an impromptu meeting of the crew in the back of the house. Once upon a time, the room had been a den complete with a river rock-encased fireplace. The walls were shiplap and stained a golden oak color but were weathered by decades of use and the sun that poured into the eastern-facing window. There was a window unit in that very same window, and it sputtered cold air into the already muggy, heated room. There was a couch that might have been thrown out by a family of ten after a decade of use and then picked up by frat boys who used it in their basement headquarters before it got too yucky for them. Then someone had brought it here and thrown a brown blanket over it that only marginally concealed the parts where the innards were exploding outward with tufts of stuffing and the springs visible to the casual observer.
“Thou purple-hued coxcombs,” one of the crew said. She adjusted one of her three sweaters and wiped sweat from her forehead.
“I resemble that reeemark,” another one said. He was dressed in a white sheet that was clearly sweat stained, and the light from the window revealed the sheet was all he was wearing unless one included his high-top Air Jordan’s.
“It would give me time to build my rocketship,” a third said.
Bubba sighed. He knew all of them. The first was Thelda, a mousy woman in her thirties or forties. Her hair was gray like her eyes. Sweaters seemed to be her constant companion, and she often wore them in extreme multiples, although the wilting August temperature had clearly limited her to only three. Shakespearean insults were her favored method of communication.
The second was Jesus Christ. Not the real Jesus, of course, but a man who thought of himself as Jesus. All of the psychoactive drugs and all of the king’s men apparently couldn’t put him back together again. In his thirties or forties like Thelda, he was a short balding man with a manner of speaking that made Bubba think of a fire-and-brimstone preacher on a particularly vexing Sunday morning.
The third was David Beathard, who had acquired a helmet from somewhere and tucked it under his arm so that he would better resemble the common everyday astronaut. “We’ll pile into the astronutmobile,” he said to the others, “and go work on my grand project. NASA will beg to get me back. They’ll throw packages of Tang at me in order to persuade me! Bwahaha!” He paused. “Uh, wrong persona. Anyway, I’ll spring for pizza, not the dehydrated kind, and loads of Gatorade.”
Thelda shrugged.
Jesus shrugged. “If it is God’s wiiill.”
“I’m in,” someone else said and brushed past Bubba.
Bubba looked up and saw a Sasquatch. A seven-foot-tall Sasquatch with a big grin that showcased a significant gap in his front teeth. Bubba jerked away before he remembered that there wasn’t any such thing as a real bigfoot and certainly not one who called out, “I’m in,” in a very human if overly deep voice.
It took Bubba a moment to figure things out. Apparently, one good night of sleep didn’t make up for weeks of missed sleep in any case. There was only one person in Pegram County who was that tall, and it wasn’t the Boogity-Boo.
Despite the intricate costuming, the man was a hair above seven feet in stocking feet flat on the floor. It was said that he had come out of his mother’s womb at nearly three feet in length. His mother had never publicly denied it, but she also never had another child, which was just as well because h
er only child had been a pure-D hellion of the highest order. The man was well known to have a vicious temper. He’d once dumped a load of manure in his ex-wife’s convertible, but Bubba couldn’t remember which ex-wife it had been because he’d had six at the last count. (Or was that seven?) The man’s most infamous action had been urinating on a police car while the police officer had been inside the vehicle. (Regardless of what that particular officer said in later years, he had not gotten out to protest the action until a platoon of other officers had arrived upon the scene.) More recently the man had become a practicing Buddhist, but sometimes his temper still got the better part of him.
Daniel Lewis Gollihugh was, in fact, the Boogity-Boo in the room.
“Dan,” Bubba said amicably.
“Almost gotcha, Bubba,” Dan rumbled. “Ain’t this a kick in the pants?”
Bubba had to agree that it was a kick in the pants, although it didn’t appear as though Dan was wearing pants.
“Ifin y’all give me about ten minutes,” Dan said to the others, “I kin give you a lift in the Oldsmobile, so you don’t have to cram into David’s Smart car.”
“The astronutmobile,” David corrected. “I got rocketship wraps on it now. They’re endorsed by three real astronauts.”
“Where’d y’all park?” Bubba asked, since he’d only seen a Mercedes and a Range Rover near the front of the Hovious place.
“You should have gone up the back side of the mountain,” Dan said. “That’s where Marquita’s got all the trailers and such. There’s even a gut truck, but it’s almost always empty these days. Them other folks saw the real Boo and ran off until Marquita could get this here shindig under control.”
“Uh,” Bubba said, trying to rationalize his speaking to a Sasquatch-like creature that had a very human grin. The costume looked pretty real. “You just git here?”
“About an hour ago which was all spent in the makeup trailer with Simone, and dang, that girl can put makeup on me fast when she’s so inclined. Also, I got four used tires from Culpepper’s. They sent that new guy, what’s his name?”
“Probably John something,” Bubba mumbled. They had a lot of Johns about, and one more wouldn’t be amiss.
Dan scratched the side of his head like there was a flea biting for all it was worth. It was possible a flea had decided Dan was entirely edible. Seven feet and three hundred odd pounds of blood and flesh probably looked very tasty to a flea. “Gideon was right nice and all. Gave me a discount on them tires, too. Like to catch me whoever flattened mine. Right outside the house, too. I’d use his little pea brain to flatten his tires.”
Bubba tried to remember where Dan and his latest wife lived. It was a mobile home in the mobile home park, so traffic came and went at all hours. “And you dint see that other guy in the costume?”
“What other guy?” Dan frowned and then winced because he couldn’t frown in the heavy costume. “Marquita ain’t hired someone else, has she?”
“It was the Boo,” David said. “The real Boo. I got it on camera. Ask Bubba, he saw it. The Boo almost ate Tandy, but she fended him off with a Zippo.”
Dan shrugged. “Dang. Sorry I missed that. The Boo would be spitting her out on account that she smells like an ashtray and all.” He glanced at Bubba. “Seems nice enough for a movie star and all, but that gal smokes way too much.”
“Have you seen the Boo?” Bubba asked Dan.
“Last week,” Dan said. “I was in makeup and waiting for that gal, Simone, to put my face on when the Boo went across the road and freaked out half the crew. After all, they could see me sitting right there in the chair and looky, looky here comes de Boo. They look at me. They look at him. They plumb lost their minds.”
“Heeere comes the Booooo,” Jesus said. “Praise Hiiim who art my faaather. He maaade the Boo, too. Hey, I rhymed.”
“Anyone get that on camera?” Bubba asked.
“Folks were struggling to git their smartphones out. I left mine in the car on account that Marquita has a hissy fit when someone’s phone rings when we’re in the middle of a scene.” Dan shrugged again.
“I don’t think it was that it rang exactly,” David said.
“It might have been the ringtone,” Dan said. “It was Trixiebelle. She programed that dang phone to play ‘Baby Got Back’ when she calls. That song says a whole bunch about women’s butts, you know.”
Bubba didn’t know, and he was happy that he didn’t know. Something else occurred to him. “So ifin you’re playing the Boo, who’s the Armand guy?”
Even with the heavy makeup Dan appeared to be shamefaced. “That’s me,” he mumbled.
“Armand?”
David, Thelda, and Jesus all giggled at once.
“Shut up,” Dan said mildly. “Buddha said, ‘Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future’ and so on. Also, some other stuff that makes me feel better ‘bout myself.”
“Buddha didn’t take on a stage name of Armand LaPoo,” David tittered.
Dan looked at Bubba. “Trixiebelle thought I should use a fake name in case the movie was so awful that it tanked at the box office and got nominated for one of those Golden Raspberry awards. Not that I’d mind having one of them on my entertainment unit.”
“But Armand LaPoo,” Bubba managed to say without choking.
“It’s the name of her favorite pet poodle,” Dan said. “That little piece of crud used to chew up all of my shoes, and I’ll thank y’all not to keep bringing it up.”
“And all y’all,” Bubba said trying to keep his face straight, “did you see the Boo?”
“You know I did,” David said. “It was just like that time in space when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin saw UFOs on the moon. There’s an alien base there, you know. I’m going to visit and bring them an edible fruit arrangement to break the ice. Maybe two arrangements. Extra chocolate and strawberries. Everyone knows that aliens love chocolate and strawberries.”
“Hooow is seeing the Booo just like an aaastronaut seeing a UFOoo?” Jesus demanded. “You sooound like a fruitcake.”
Bubba thought, That’s like the fruit calling the other fruit fruitier, and then he felt bad for thinking it.
David shrugged. “It’s all paranormal.”
“You see it, Jesus?” Bubba asked.
“The time wheeere he threw rooocks,” Jesus said. “Praaaise Him for maaaking the Boo’s aim pooor.”
“Thelda,” Bubba said.
“Thee was a detestable carbuncle,” Thelda said with a nod. She pinched her nose shut with thumb and index fingers, “And had a despicable unwashed stench, too.”
“Okay, the Boo smelled bad,” Bubba said. “You reckon this is a regular fella dressed up like…Armand LaPoo here?”
“Could beee real,” Jesus ventured. “Mine father who aaart in heaven has mysterious waaays.”
“That’s what you’re goin’ with, Bubba?” Dan asked. “That it’s a fella dressed up in order to scare everyone?”
“Seems like the easiest solution,” Bubba said. “I reckon I’ll be out of here by dinner time.”
“That reminds me,” Dan said, “of a little get together we’re having Saturday. Miz Willodean asked me to include you. Go out to The Hogfather’s and have us some BBQ and some of them corn muffins they deep-fry. Mebe stop in Grubbo’s for a beer and take a gander at the Jell-O wrestling contest. I don’t think you’ll be doin’ any of that for the next six months or so.”
“I don’t think Willodean approved the Jell-O wrestling part,” Bubba said. That was considering what had happened the last time Jell-O wrestling had occurred at Bazooka Bob’s, and even Trixiebelle and Dan had been involved. The event had certainly tested his Buddhist based levels of patience, and Dan had spectacularly failed that particular test.
“No, she dint,” Dan said reflectively. “But Grubbo’s has these cheese sticks, and you know how I have to et better and all. Well, it turns out that some of that stuff I bin eting has a face, so I got to stick to things that don’t. And chees
e is made from milk, and animals don’t git kilt for that. My point being that ifin I et at The Hogfather’s, them don’t have nothing that don’t have a face on it on the menu, like pork, ham, and chicken, and all. So then I have to make it up by eting right the rest of the night and Grubbo’s has the best cheese sticks. They deep fry them after drenching and dredging ‘em and I believe they put some kind of special spices in the dredge. Hey, I just drooled on myself.”
Bubba had tuned out about the time Dan explained about cheese being made from milk. He realized Dan had paused, obviously waiting for an answer. The four people looked at Bubba intently and in a way that made the hair on the back of Bubba’s neck stand up. His brain wasn’t operating at normal capacity, but he knew when something was being manipulated.
“And y’all need to get me back to the Snoddy Mansion by 8:00 pm.?” Bubba guessed.
“8:30 pm,” Dan said. “How’d you know?”
“Zip it,” David hissed at Dan.
“It’s an early morning for me,” Dan rushed to cover up. “Shooting starts at 8:00, but makeup starts at 6:00, so I have to roll out of bed at 5:00, and since Trixiebelle’s teaching them classes at Bazooka Bob’s, she’s in about midnight, so we have to git our lovin’ in, and anyway, I’m ready for a nap about 10:00 am.” He glanced at the other three, and David nodded.
Bubba’s eyes began to glaze over.
“What kind of classes is Trixiebelle teaching?” David asked.
“Pole dancing,” Dan said. He crossed his hair-covered arms over his chest and scratched at the side of his face again. “For beginners and for pregnant women, too. Miz Willodean went until her blood pressure started to pop.”
Wait. Willodean went where until what? Bubba felt his cheeks go warm and had to stop himself from fanning them.
“Yeah, I reckon I’ll go ifin Willodean wants me to go,” Bubba said. He rubbed the spot between his eyes that was starting to hurt. “I expect we need to be back by 8:30 for a reason.”