THE RED BEACHES
by CJ Jones
“What names have they given us this time,” asked the woman who wore a
boa made of poor little animals she killed with her bare hands in
Siberia.
“We will be Shelly and Hamilton Beach,” replied the man with the evil red bowtie.
“The names sound fake. ‘Hamilton Beach’ is a company that makes
kitchen appliances for lazy capitalist Americans. So what is our
mission, ‘Mr. Hamilton Beach?’”
“We will live in a Washington DC suburb. Our KGB handlers have photos
of J.Edgar Hoover looking at a red dress in a store window, so he must
have been imagining it on a beautiful woman. They want you to wear the
dress, to seduce Hoover and lure him to a
motel room where I will be hiding in the closet, with a camera.”
“This plan sounds absolutely foolproof. Do I kill him with a hammer and sickle before or after I make love to him?”
“Nyet. No killing. Just heartless lovemaking. The footage will be for Premier Khrushchev’s viewing pleasure alone.”
Weeks had passed since the Beaches settled in a DC suburb and they
still waited for the command to seduce J.Edgar Hoover. Li’l Jimmy, a boy
scout and all-around snoop from across the street, gazed in the window
of the Beach’s house, then ran home to his
father.
“Golly, Dad, I just saw something awful at the Beaches!”
“Goddammit, son, are you still peepin’ in people’s windows? What did you see?”
“The Beaches were wrasslin’ each other, in the buff! There was lots of grunting and slapping.”
“A lotta couples do that, it’s how babies are made.”
“Jeepers, Dad, they were wearing Soviet army hats and pouring vodka on each other!”
“Jimmy, I think you’ve just uncovered some commie sons-a-bitches. I
had a suspicion, like when Mrs. Beach cut the hedge in front of their
house with a sickle, and the hedge looked a little too much like
Stalin’s moustache after she was done. Or how Hamilton
knew what ‘KGB’ stands for. Or how they like chess more than checkers.
All of these are ‘red flags’. This could be the beginning of a commie
invasion. We have to stop it. Before your Mom gets home.”
“Wowsers, Dad, we’ll crush these commies good! What’s the plan?”
“I want you to get the cattle prod and the bullwhip from your mother’s dresser, it should be under her Wonder Woman costume.”
“Oh boy!”
“I’ll get the hammock, which I’ll use as a net. I’ll drag them back
here where I’ll finish them. You’ll stay in your treehouse and hoot like
an owl if you see anyone coming.”
“Jeepers Dad, wait till I tell the fellas about this! I‘ll be the most popular little squirt in the whole forth grade!”
“Son, you can’t tell anyone. These are some cold blooded commie
bastards. They aren’t like us, they were built in a factory and they
can’t feel pain. They can only be killed with electricity, because
electricity will fry their circuits. We’ll strike at night.”
While Dad laid out his plan, the Beaches drove away. They visited a
local college to find young communist sympathizers. The Beaches returned
a few hours later. Hamilton scoffed, “Gullible Americans! We will keep
planting the seeds of communism and soon all
will worship dark lord Stalin and quote the prophet Karl Marx. Nothing
can stop us…nothing!”
A loud crash was heard.
“The noise came from the basement,” hissed Shelly. “An American must
have broken into our garage, fell through our trap door and into our
basement of horror! Let’s rush down the stairs to the basement since the
intruder must certainly be incapacitated from
the fall!”
When the Beaches entered the basement, Dad was waiting, suspended
upside down from a pipe above the door. He used the cattle prod on the
commie couple, who then tumbled down the stairs. He used the whip to tie
them and bagged them in the hammock. He was
disgusted to see a shrine to Stalin, complete with a large Stalin
poster, candles, an offering of wheat, and a Ouija board with Cyrillic
letters.
Jimmy could not see what had happened and he panicked. He jumped from
the treehouse and ran to the phone to call his brother who lived at a
nearby dorm.
“Fred, you need to trot, ski, do whatever you can to rush’n over here! No stallin.’ Dad might be in trouble!”
“I’ll be right over, pipsqueak.”
Jimmy felt relieved when he saw his father drag the limp commie
neighbors toward the house. In the backyard was a ten foot deep pit that
his father dug last week in preparation for a bomb shelter
installation. He helped his dad push the couple into the pit.
Jimmy retrieved a radio and several cans of soup from the garage. The
Beaches awoke when Dad sprayed them with a garden hose.
Hamilton yelled, “You cannot drown us! You cannot drown an ideology!”
Shelly added, “You cannot kill us so easily, we have Rasputin blood! Why is your son throwing soup cans at us?”
“Can it, Commie, my son is doing it to distract you from this!” Dad
threw the radio and the Beaches were too distracted to catch it before
it landed in the shallow water. “Soup’s on, you sons-a-bitches!” Shelly
and Hamilton fried in the electric water as
soup cans exploded around them.
“Will anyone miss them, Dad?”
“No, son. All that will remain of them is an expertly painted
portrait of the couple, made by the artist down the street, I think his
name is Manney Kencher or something.”
Dad felt a cold hand on his shoulder. He turned around to see his
expressionless son, Fred, home from college. “Dad, you murdered my
friends, Shelly and Hamilton Beach. Today at school they planted
communist thoughts inside my head and now I am a godless
commie and I want to destroy America.”
Dad raised his fist to the sky and yelled “Nooooooooooooooooooo!”
The End?
_______________________________________________________
Several of the stories shared wonderful sentiments. Shannon Stroud, V.
English and Matt O’Malley had some really great ideas. I like the whole
idea that this couple were so linked together. These stories were part
narrative and part poetic vignettes. Each had that kind of sweet kinda
zany but all good quality.
In some ways Michael West’s “Codswallop” was sort of mélange of all the flavors for the stories in this round. The story had a sense of humor and irony that really appealed but also played with ideas concerning life and relationships. One line that leapt out at me was,
“His day/life is so unremarkable that the thought of calling the police makes him a little horny.”
A kind of David Sedaris realism that was at once true and funny.
Speaking of lines that really satisfied I think that CJ Jones’ line, “Fred, you need to trot, ski, do whatever you can to rush’n over here! No stallin.’ Dad might be in trouble!”
So I think CJ is the favorite this week and get’s to take the Beaches home with him. The sense of humour expressed by CJ Jones was right up my alley, well you know what I mean you commies!
In some ways Michael West’s “Codswallop” was sort of mélange of all the flavors for the stories in this round. The story had a sense of humor and irony that really appealed but also played with ideas concerning life and relationships. One line that leapt out at me was,
“His day/life is so unremarkable that the thought of calling the police makes him a little horny.”
A kind of David Sedaris realism that was at once true and funny.
Speaking of lines that really satisfied I think that CJ Jones’ line, “Fred, you need to trot, ski, do whatever you can to rush’n over here! No stallin.’ Dad might be in trouble!”
So I think CJ is the favorite this week and get’s to take the Beaches home with him. The sense of humour expressed by CJ Jones was right up my alley, well you know what I mean you commies!
Read them all here:
More competitions on my site:
| Renovated Reputations: A Collaborative Installation
of Paintings, Fiction, Music and Vintage Furniture
by Kenney Mencher, Patrick Nelson and others at: The Art Museum of Los Gatos, California 4 Tait Ave Los Gatos, CA 95030 December 1 - January 6 Reception: Saturday December 3, 2011 5PM-8PM Show up in costume and get into the photobooth! You may end up being my next painting! Price: FREE Phone: (408) 395-7386 The Art Museum of Los Gatos presents Renovated Reputations, an immersive exhibition experience featuring works conceived as a collaboration in painting, creative fiction, and design. At once noir, bohemian and pulp in style, the works invite the viewer to step inside and sit awhile, discover their stories and spark engagement. More info at: http://www.kenney-mencher.com/ |
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