Tim Dorsey Collection #1

by Dorsey, Tim

  “My God!” said Jim. “I didn’t know!…Why are you still involved with her?”

  Serge grinned sheepishly. “I think she’s kinda cute.”

  Sharon lit a cigarette in the ladies’ room and checked her eyes in the mirror. She took an airline miniature of Jack Daniel’s from her purse.

  “Want some?”

  “No thanks,” said Martha.

  “Whatever.” Sharon downed the bottle. She went in a stall and closed the door and began snorting.

  Martha came back to the table alone.

  “Something wrong?” asked Jim.

  Martha leaned and whispered. “I’m not sure, but I think she’s doing cocaine.”

  “I know,” Jim whispered. “Serge just told me. It’s a tragedy. He’s trying to get her help.”

  Sharon came back to the table, now wearing sunglasses.

  “Oh, great,” said Serge. He grabbed her wrist under the table and leaned over. “Don’t ruin this!”

  “Let go!” She pulled away, and a glass of water went over. A waiter ran up with a towel.

  Serge smiled at the Davenports. “Everything on the menu’s good.”

  Sharon sniffled and played with her nose. “I’m going to the rest room.”

  “No, you’re not!” said Serge.

  Sharon stood up and Serge grabbed for her, but she jumped out of reach and took off. Serge held the large tassled menu in front of his face. He looked over the top at Jim and Martha. “Try the seafood.” Then ducked back behind the menu.

  The bread basket arrived, looking like a floral arrangement.

  Sharon came back with the jitters and sat down. She saw Jim looking at her. “What the fuck are you staring at!”

  Jim lowered his eyes and buttered a roll.

  It went that way through each course, soup to nuts, Sharon popping up and down from the table, back and forth to the rest room. Serge was ordering another bottle of wine when he felt something in his lap. Sharon had slipped off one of her shoes and was rubbing his crotch with her foot. Serge kept a poker face. He folded the wine list and handed it to the steward. “Try to find something in those heavy rain years in Burgundy during the 1880s. Surprise me.”

  Sharon had a mischievous grin. She rubbed harder. Serge glanced to see if the Davenports were wise, but they were pointing at something in the aquarium.

  “Stop it!” Serge whispered under his breath.

  “Nope.”

  The Davenports eventually realized something was amiss. Serge had both hands in his lap, wrestling with something under the tablecloth.

  “Stop it! Right now!”

  Sharon shook her head and wiggled her toes.

  Serge grabbed the ankle and pulled hard, and Sharon went down in her chair, grabbing china on the way.

  Waiters arrived at the table again.

  Sharon stood up, grabbed a glass of Chablis and threw it in Serge’s face.

  Serge smiled at the Davenports as the wine dripped down his nose. He ran his tongue around his mouth and smacked his lips. “Well-stated bouquet. Full-bodied yet uncomplicated.”

  The maître d’ came over. He lowered his voice so only their table could hear. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

  “But we haven’t had dessert yet,” said Serge.

  The maître d’ looked around the table. “You three may stay, but she has to leave.”

  “Oh, Sharon,” said Serge. “Don’t worry about her. Just a little feline distemper.”

  “I’m sorry. We don’t serve people like her.”

  “Come again?” said Serge. “I didn’t get that last part. For a second I thought you said, ‘people like her.’ ”

  The waiter didn’t respond.

  “She may be a little rough on Hints from Heloise, but she’s still my date,” said Serge, standing and folding his napkin. “And you have insulted my lady’s honor.”

  Serge discreetly snapped his knee up. The maître d’ doubled over with a groan, and Serge wrapped his arms around him, like he was helping. People at the other tables began staring.

  “Nothing to worry about! Go back to your meals!” said Serge.

  The maître d’ tried to say something, so Serge kneed him again, producing a louder groan.

  Everyone was looking now.

  “Just a little food poisoning,” said Serge. “You might want to lay off the seafood tonight and stick with the mad cow.”

  A chorus of forks went down in plates. Jim and Martha jumped to their feet.

  “You don’t want to try the chocolate mousse?” asked Serge.

  “We have to leave.”

  The Davenports quickly headed for the entrance and the waiting limo. Serge caught up from behind and grabbed Jim’s arm in the lobby. “I have to talk with you.”

  “This is out of control, Serge. I can’t tell you how upset Martha is.”

  “That’s what I want to talk to you about. Just take a second.”

  “I’ll be right back,” Jim told Martha. She gave him the eye.

  Serge and Jim huddled by the grand piano.

  “What is it?” Jim said, impatient as he’d ever been in his life.

  “I’m really sorry about tonight,” said Serge. “I don’t know what I was thinking bringing Sharon. The whole thing was doomed right from the concept stage.”

  “Your heart was in the right place,” said Jim. “Let’s call it a night.”

  “I just had this fantasy,” said Serge. “I was thinking maybe I could have what you have. A stable family and a normal life. Instead, look what I have to go home to. You have the ideal nuclear family. I have the fucking Chernobyl family. My domestic partner is a femme fatale Lucille Ball meets Nancy Spungeon by way of Squeaky Fromme, and we have de facto foster custody of a colicky man-child from the Island of Misfit Toys.”

  Serge pulled out a big roll of bills and began peeling off hundreds. “I’m going to make it up to you.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “I absolutely insist.”

  Serge marched across the lobby and tossed money on the front desk. “We’d like the honeymoon suite.”

  Jim ran up from behind. “Serge, really, stop…”

  “You want sparks in your marriage? Here’s your sparks…” He jammed a couple more hundreds in Jim’s breast pocket. “That’s for the champagne.” Then he put an arm around Jim’s shoulder and whispered. When he was done he stepped back. “You can’t miss.”

  “I don’t know about that last part,” said Jim. “I don’t think she’ll go for it.”

  “That’s the most important facet of the plan,” said Serge. “You can buy one in the gift shop. Trust me. I know women.”

  They walked back to Martha and Sharon.

  “What’s going on?” asked Martha.

  Serge just grabbed Sharon by the wrist—“C’mon you!”—and yanked her out the front door toward the limo.

  “Hey, that’s our ride!” said Martha.

  “Doesn’t matter,” said Jim. He held up the key to the honeymoon suite.

  SHARON DID MORE coke in the limo on the way home.

  Serge laid back in his seat and fiddled with some controls. “You ever think about having children?”

  “Are you out of your mind!” said Sharon, sitting up with a rolled twenty-dollar-bill still hanging out her nose.

  “I was thinking it might be kind of cool to settle down and maybe go straight for a while. I’ve been studying Jim…”

  “Jim’s a dork!” said Sharon, leaning over again.

  “He’s my new role model,” said Serge. “Takes guts to walk in his shoes.”

  “And that’s what you want?”

  Serge turned on the tiny TV set installed in the bar and changed channels. “It does have a certain appeal. I wouldn’t mind seeing what it’s like.”

  “Boring! That’s what it’s like!”

  “Maybe I need boring.”

  A HALF MOON reflected off the still Gulf of Mexico behind the Don Cesar. It was qu
iet in the honeymoon suite.

  Martha sat at the edge of the bed on the verge of sobs. Jim sat next to her with his arm around her shoulders. He tried to console her, but Martha didn’t seem to want to be touched. He took his arm away.

  “A flashlight!” said Martha. “What on earth were you thinking!”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “You had to be thinking something!”

  “I guess I wanted to liven up the marriage.”

  “You certainly accomplished that…But where did you ever get such a crazy idea?”

  36

  FOUR PAIRS OF EYES BLINKED IN THE DARKNESS.

  Midnight in the retention pond. No sound except

  frogs and crickets.

  “I thought we’d be rescued by now,” said Eunice. “It’s been five days.”

  “Nobody’s coming,” said Edith.

  “They can’t see us down here,” said Ethel. “The weeds must be hiding us.”

  The E-Team had survived so far on the contents of four purses, and the floorboards were littered with wrappers from Life Savers, Altoids, chewing gum, Rolaids, SweeTarts, Motrin, Maalox, Necco wafers, Ricola cough drops and Beano. They had fashioned a condensate funnel from a rain hat and attached it to the cattails just outside the driver’s window, channeling morning dew into a “World’s Greatest Grandma” travel mug. The Buick’s interior was hot and humid, and the women were down to their underwear.

  A band of hobos camped in the woods on the side of the pond, and each night the woman could hear drunken revelry in the distance. They tried the horn, but it had shorted out in the water.

  “Listen,” said Eunice, “you can hear ’em again.”

  “Help! Help us!” yelled Ethel.

  “They can’t hear you.”

  “How long do you think we can last?” asked Edith, licking spearmint adhesive off a postage stamp.

  “You’d be amazed,” said Eunice. “Mrs. Natofsky spent nine days with a broken hip in her shower before they found her.”

  “How was she?”

  “Dead.”

  “Great,” said Edith. “Thanks for sharing that, Miss Sunshine…”

  “The point is she lasted eight days.”

  Edith noticed Edna was the only one not talking. “What do you have in your mouth?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You’ve got something.”

  “No I don’t.”

  “Grab her!”

  “No!”

  Eunice and Ethel scrambled over the headrests from the front seat and joined Edith, who already had Edna’s left arm twisted behind her back.

  “Lemmo go! That hurts!”

  “Check her mouth!” said Edith.

  Edna clamped her jaw shut. Eunice and Ethel pried her lips apart with their fingers but weren’t having much luck with the clenched teeth. Edith pulled back with a fist and slugged her in the stomach.

  “Aaaaahhh!” yelled Edna. The others briefly saw a tiny white oval on the back of her tongue before it disappeared toward her larynx.

  “Tic Tacs!” yelled Edith. “She’s got Tic Tacs!”

  The three woman tore through Edna’s purse, finding something hidden in the lining. A plastic container with three pellets left.

  “No!” said Edna. “I’m gonna die!”

  “Survival of the fittest,” said Edith, and she and the others chewed up their breath mints.

  Edith felt something else in the lining and slowly extracted an unending string of perforated foil packs from the Trojan plant.

  “Girl, you are living in a serious fantasy world.”

  “Just because you’re a wet rag…”

  They began wrestling.

  “Knock it off!” said Eunice. “We have to save our strength.”

  Edith cleared her throat. “This is probably a bad time to bring this up, but there really is no good time. In situations like this people have to face it sooner or later. And it’s getting to be later.”

  “Face what?”

  “Cannibalism. How do you want to do this?”

  “Shut up,” said Edna.

  “I’m serious. This is a practical matter.”

  “We’ve got a long time before we reach that point.”

  “Not as long as you think.”

  “I’m not sure I can take part,” said Ethel. “It might be against my religion.”

  “You’re Jewish. You just can’t eat pork.”

  “I think this would be a little worse,” said Ethel.

  “I don’t think that’s it at all,” said Edith.

  “What are you talking about?” said Ethel.

  “I think I know what it really is. We’re not good enough for you.”

  “What!”

  “Yes, it’s all coming out now. The Chosen People…”

  “You’re crazy!”

  “Ethel’s right,” said Eunice. “You’re cracking up.”

  “No, no, no!” said Edith. “I know exactly what I’m saying. I think her meaning’s perfectly clear.”

  “I can’t believe what I’m hearing!” said Ethel. “You’re mad because I won’t eat you?”

  “Look,” said Edna. “If it’ll make you happy, I’ll eat you.”

  “You’re Presbyterian,” said Edith. “You’ll eat anything.”

  “I don’t think I want to talk about this anymore,” said Ethel.

  “I do!” snapped Edith.

  “Ethel, for heaven’s sake, tell her you’ll eat her.”

  “I’m waiting,” said Edith.

  “This is the stupidest conversation I’ve ever had!” said Ethel.

  “That’s why I want it to end,” said Eunice. “Just tell her and we can move on to another subject.”

  “This is crazy!”

  “Tell her! C’mon. She tastes like chicken.” Eunice clapped her hands quickly. “Let’s go. Goy—the other white meat.”

  “This is nuts.”

  “I’m still waiting!”

  “Okay, okay, I’ll eat you.”

  “Like hell you will!”

  There was a rustling in the cattails.

  “What is it?” said Ethel.

  “A moose?” said Eunice.

  Dark forms broke through the reeds. There was crash on the hood of the car. Two men wrestled on the windshield, Christ and the Antichrist.

  “We’re saved!” said Edith.

  The men pulled each other’s hair and gouged eyes. They rolled off the hood and fell in the swamp water. The four women watched the tops of the cattails thrash in the moonlight as the wrestling moved farther and farther from their car until it was still and quiet again.

  “Shit.”

  37

  I’M TELLING YOU, THERE’S NO WAY!” SAID SERGE.

  “You’re in denial,” said Coleman. “Look at the obvious overtones.”

  Coleman pressed a button on the remote control, increasing the volume. Serge leaned forward on the couch for a better view. Coleman pointed with the remote. “See the way Race Bannon is looking at Dr. Quest? I’m telling you, they were getting it on!”

  “You’re reading things into it that aren’t there. I can’t accept it.”

  “I’m surprised at you,” said Coleman. “After all you’ve said in support of gay rights.”

  “It’s not that,” said Serge. “Quest’s and Bannon’s sexual preferences are nobody’s business but their own. I’m just saying it didn’t happen. It would have been an office romance, and they were much too professional.”

  “Believe what you want,” said Coleman. He picked up his beer and went out on the porch.

  Serge followed. “Remember the Sargasso Sea episode? The mad scientist with the pterodactyl? And who can forget the giant mechanical spider that they fire on with tanks in the closing credits?”

  “So?”

  “So, if their judgment was clouded, they never would have gotten out of all those jams. You can’t think clearly under those conditions if your lover is in peril.”

  Tires screeched
in the distance. Serge and Coleman looked up the street. A ’76 Chevy Laguna tore around the corner and down Triggerfish.

  Serge stood up on the porch and yelled at the car. “Hey! Slow down! Kids play around here!”

  “He didn’t hear you,” said Coleman.

  The car pulled up in front of the Davenport residence and honked the horn.

  Serge yelled again: “Go up to the door and knock like a human being!”

  “Why are you so upset?” asked Coleman.

  “The guy’s pushing my buttons. And he’s much too old to be going out with Debbie.”

  “That’s Jim’s business.”

  “I know,” Serge said with resignation. “I promised I wouldn’t interfere.”

  Debbie never came out of the house, and the Laguna took off up the street.

  “What I’d like to do to him!” said Serge.

  “Remember, you’re going straight.”

  “I know, I know. What would Jim do in a situation like this?”

  “Look,” said Coleman. “He’s turning around.”

  “Jim would have a talk with him.” Serge stood up and nodded. “That’s what I’ll do.”

  “I think his name’s Scorpion,” said Coleman.

  Serge jumped off the porch and ran down to the corner. He waited at the stop sign.

  The Laguna screeched to a halt.

  “Hi,” said Serge. “Would you mind driving just a tad slower around here? We have a lot of children who play—”

  The driver raised his middle finger. “Fuck off, pops!” He patched out.

  Serge walked back to his porch.

  “Did you talk to him?” asked Coleman.

  “Yep.”

  “Well?”

  “It’s a start. You have to begin somewhere.”

  Coleman pointed. “He’s coming back.”

  Serge ran down to the corner again.

  “Excuse me, Mr. Scorpion,” said Serge. “I was trying to point out that we have a lot of little kids—”

  The driver flicked a cigarette at Serge and sped off.

  Serge returned to the porch.

  “How’s it coming?” asked Coleman.

  Serge was looking down at his chest. “He threw a cigarette at me.”

  “It made a burn mark.”