Posted by NL on September 08, 2004 at 21:11:55:
Why They Killed-- Part 10
That question, why did they kill, and why did YOU kill-- it resonates in our time, you know? The killin' impulse, why, it reaches even into Umbleburg, the town of my birth, and where I lived until a few years ago. In Umbleberg I had long been content to wind and rewind the electric motor armatures and stators that have fascinated me since my youth. The copper wires are so shiny, and the strands so long, and then if you have a great big ten horse or more motor the sense of awe and danger in the thing, the heavy castings, the smell of ozone, oil, dust, metal shavings and my own honest sweat would make me wax poetic. My love of my work and my own naive rapture led me to compose what I proposed to be a song in homage of Umbleburg: Oh Umbleburg my Umbleburg/ It is upon my heart you turg--/I shall throw a fit if I cannot fit/ In my own little Umbleburg. Any fool can see from this that I was a good Christian man, a man of fine sentiment, a man of parts. And that is why it shocked me so when my very own Wunita, wife of my loins, gathered herself and our little daughters, all two of them, and ran away with the butcher. When I thought of all the pork loins I ate from that place, and then of that great, gross, hairy, greasy man, that butcher, with his great hairy greasy and bloody reeking ham hands all over my petit Wunita's butt and boobs and belly and thighs, roaming and wandering all wanton and lusty and leaving streaks of pig and cow and sheep's blood upon her fair flesh, it fairly made me want to hurl. Hurl and weep, hurl and weep, is what I did, and many a day I prayed to the Lord to take my pain away.
The devil only needs a crack, so they say, in the armor of the soul. Wunita left some of her clothes behind, and one Friday night after work I dug one of her big bras out of her clothes closet, and carried it to the kitchen sink. And then I gathered up by the light of a slivery moon two fat honey doo melons from my garden and carried them to the sink, and placed them side by side upon the stainless steel, and draped Wunita's bra over them, pulling it tight-- I stripped naked and with one hand I stroked my manhood, stiff it was already, and with the other I grasped a fine sharp knife, and on the very brink of orgasm, as I gazed upon those boob-like honey doos, that budging bra, I brought that knife down and stabbed and stabbed God's innocent fruits until the sweet juice ran and spattered and I shuddered in all my fibers, cumming and cumming before burning with a shame never felt before. Yes I was so ashamed, and I thought I would never again contemplate a melon of any sort without blushing fiercely.
They fired me at the motor winding works not long thereafter because my quality and production declined, and justly, for a business cannot tolerate a slacker, and a mooney mopey slacker I had become.
And then a great enthusiasm came upon me! The Bible was always a great solace to me, and it was as though a confluence set in. The time just happened to be growing upon the annual Umbleburg October Fest, and I realized that the awesome Bible words: "I yam what I yam, and that's all what I yam" contained a message for me! Escape from thoughts of Wunita's tits and ass and belly and thighs, those sweaty fat budgy bras of hers, and cleanse, cleanse, the soul in a mad dash of civic pride and good old-fashioned values, in a good old-fashioned context! The bosky yam! Humblest fruit of all! Far removed from the wicked melon! I would, I could, indeed, I would be known as-- The Yam Man! I would use what was left of my savings to purchase space for a small food booth at the Festival! And the food I would serve would be none other than that bosky delight, that wholesome spectacle: The Yam! Who would be able to resist, among the trashy confections, the cotton candy and the funnel cakes and the obscene foot-long corn dogs with that dollop of yellow mustard on the end like a diseased penile discharge, the one true alternative food: a nice steamy hot Yam, split down the middle and laid out in a little paper boat, afloat on a cushion of joyful tissue paper, just dripping butter, and yes, maybe even a mushmellow sauce! The people would rejoice! Amid a welter of little red and blue and white plastic forks I could cleanse my soul, and do a power of good at the same time.
I didn't have any trouble getting the permit, but all I could afford was a little six-by-six foot spot by the entrance, right next to the Umbleburg JayCee's Spook House. But the Spook House was always a popular spot, especially among the men, although I had never been in there. They said you had to see it for yourself-- see it to believe it. But I had very little time! There was not much money left in my bank account! I'd have to build the whole darn booth, and I'd have no running water, no electricity! It took some serious scrounging, and then working all through the night on the festival grounds to put up my booth of plywood and 2 x 4's, and haul in the paper boats, the plastic ware, the tissue paper, the squeeze bottles of flavored cotton seed oil I'd have to use instead of butter, buckets and buckets of yams, a tin pail of loose change and one dollar bills, and a big jar of mushmellow sauce, which would only be enough for the first day. If I did well that first day I could head for the all-night market and buy more supplies. I figured two bucks a yam would be enough for my time and labor. And, of course, my trusty propane BBQ grill to grill the yams. There was barely room for me, in my big overalls with lots of pockets, same as I used to use in the Motor Winding shop (got all the grease cleaned out of it) and my BBQ grill in there, but I was so proud of the red, white, and blue stars and bars I painted all over the plywood, and the wonderful little mottos and sayings that came to me while I worked: MAY I have a YAM, and Way Down In Alla-YAMA, and I YAM that I YAM, and I am what I YAM, and YAMmer YAMmer YAMmer, you alla time YAMmering! I liked that last one the best.
And business went well! Everybody wanted a yam! I had maybe a hundred people stacking up and I could hardly service them, when, PLOP! some little kid dropped his yam in the dirt and spit and cigarette butts. HEY! his Dad said, My kid, he dropped his yam! And then, plop, plop, the yams started dropping and kids started whinning, and somebody said, the damn things are too hot! Goddamn it, my boy burned his hand! Yeah, and my little girl burnt her mouth! I'm gonna sue you you son of a bitch! Motherfucker! Gimme back my money! Yeah, we want our money back! Right out of the corner of my eye I caught some big guy whacking his little boy right across his face-- blood squirted out right away and the half-eaten yam joined all the others in the dust. Shit, the guy said, your goddamn yam had a pin in it! Lookit here, my kid's face is bleedin'!
I had nothing left by the time I'd refunded all the money, but no, they weren't happy. Several big guys kicked my stand over and while two held my arms the rest of them stomped up and down on the poor raw yams, making a sad yellow mash, full of grit and pebbles.
At last, it was all over. There was nothing left of my stand but scattered boards. Somebody stole my BBQ grill. And then one of the important festival officials, very important looking in his tailed jacket and striped pants and spats informed me that my booth was far too shoddy for the Umbleburg festival, and my "area" was a disgrace. "You'll have to clean this up or we'll write you a citation," he said. What could I do, but clean up? I gathered the bits of broken wood, the yam skins, and scraped up the mashed yams with my bare hands because I had no brooms or scoops and none would be supplied. If I wanted cleaning equipment I'd have to rent the stuff from the festival officials. But it wasn't good enough. "You haven't erased every trace of your existence yet-- all these marks in the dirt around here are non-random. Look, that's where you obviously dragged something! There's a yellowish stain on the asphalt over there, didn't you see that?" But, But, I said, that's just where a dog peed! "No, no," they said, "that's a yam stain for sure. That has to be removed. This isn't clean! Don't you realize some of your customers carried those yams of yours onto the midway? You've got to pick up every skin, even if it's in a trash barrel. And by the way, you've been stuffing things in our trash barrels. You can't do that unless you want to pay the waste disposal fee, and your contract didn't include that..."
I worked so very hard that day. I guess the toughest part was being laughed at and spat upon, and sometimes I overheard the big busty ladies waddling by, in groups of three or four, or with their male friends, saying things like, is that a yam or is that a man? Ha ha ha. I bet HE don't even know. Be careful, Felatia, he might can hear us! Ha ha ha. You ain't afraid of a YAM, is yew? His wife ran away with her butcher-- I bet HE wouldn't eat no yam..." I hurt in my very soul. By the time the Festival officials released me from my contract (I had to stuff all the refuse in my car) it was late, and the festival was getting ready to shut down. I turned my back on the midway and began to trudge off to the parking lot when I heard somebody going PSSSST! PSSSST! It was coming from the shadows, over by the JayCee's Spook House. I squinted and could barely make out a little guy in something like a zoot suit leaning against the wall near the Spook House entrance. It looked like the last customers, all men, were slowly filing out. I sort of cautiously walked in that direction, hoping I wasn't going to get a yam skin handed to me. The closer I got to the guy, the more he looked sort of like a cartoon character. With his sharp, pointy face he seemed to be a kind of large mutant rat, big for a rat but small for a person, in a zoot suit, with a reet pleat, with a long watch chain-- he was swirling that watch chain. His eyes were shaded by a big panama hat. There was just a pool of darkness between the brim of his hat and the tip of his pointy nose. All I had to see by were some security lights down the midway and outside in the parking area. An occasional headlight swept across us as people pulled out. His watch chain gleamed like gold. "I seen what you were up to," he said, in a very quiet but very clear and evenly pitched voice. He had a slight accent, but I couldn't place it. "You made a good try. Those yams were not a bad idea, but this is carny, man, and you sort of came muscling in." I looked at him like I had no idea what he was talking about, and I didn't. "Those guys who started the trouble, they own concessions out here. You come in, a new guy, and you start taking away bidness, well, you're lucky you just got your stand kicked down." A conspiracy, I said. I knew it! "So," he went on, "your wife left you, took the kids, you had a wild idea, you sorta wished upon a star, and now you got nothing left, right?" I complained that everybody and his dog spot seemed to know about me and my troubles. But he told me he knew more than most people, had to, in his business. I asked him if he was a JayCee and he doubled over laughing. He sounded silly when he laughed, it was like TEEEHEEEEE! "No way, man," he said, "I got a contract with 'em, I provide the entertainment in this half-assed Spook House. Come in, come in here with me, and I'll show you what we do-- give you a free ride. You deserve it, you took such a beating on your yam enterprise. By the way," he said, turning toward the entrance, "I like yams! I munch them up!"
It was pretty dark in there, and as soon as we were in sounds became muffled, like there might be sound-proofing everywhere. "We are going right back to the stage," he said. "Spook House is just a blind. There's a two-bit little spook house in here, we got some college kid this time in a gorilla suit who jumps out at you-- real stupid and then you're out. That happens if you're not in the know, not in the club." I asked him if the JayCees were in the club, and he said: "Some. Don't ask who is in the club. Don't look to see who is in the club. All anybody needs to know is that there IS a club." And then, after some shifty turns, we were in what looked like a midway shooting gallery, except it was fancy in a compact sort of way. There was a small stage with a lot of thick plastic material on the floor, and what looked almost like deep red plastic shower curtains-- you'd sort of expect velvet. "Yeah," he said, seeming to read my mind, "we gotta use a lot of plastic in this place-- easy to clean. Got some ingenious stuff in the back to stop bullets in a hurry, light but very strong, no ricochet, easy to move from site to site. You know, we do a lot of shows, all over." Every place, I said, there's a JayCee Spook House, huh? I'd always had a feeling about the JayCees, about those Spook Houses. He didn't reply to that. Instead, he started pointing out some things around me. "OK, we got these nice theater chairs where you can not only wait your turn to shoot-- if you thought this place looked like a shooting gallery, you were right-- and while you sit here waiting you can watch the show while others shoot. In fact, a lot of guys just sit and watch. But there's no discount. Whether you shoot or not, it all costs the same." I asked how much, and when he named the figure my breath went out of me. "What the hell are you using for targets," I asked. "Sit," he said, and he pushed me into one of the chairs close to the little central dais in front of the stage that seemed to serve as both arm rest and gun cabinet. He was surprisingly strong-- a grip of steel! He got out a nice remington .22 semiautomatic rifle, unlocking the gun cabinet to get it, and checked it in the dim light. "Full clip, ten rounds, .22 long rifle-- I like neat holes," he said, "and plenty of 'em." Then he whistled. I couldn't figure out what was supposed to happen next. A lady walked out, a very pretty woman, I thought, wearing a very revealing black bikini. I was sort of embarrassed at this hootchy kootchie aspect. I figured this must be something like a magician's assistant. She would undoubtedly fetch whatever the heck it was they were using for a target. I noticed she was middle-aged, at least; her boobs would undoubtedly droop if it wasn't for that bikini top holding them up and firm and pointed front and center, and I could just faintly tell that she had stretch marks on her belly, but the belly itself was soft and sexy, with a nice round bellybutton, deep, like my wife's. But this woman had a very nice, open, honest, look to her; pretty green eyes, light auburn hair with little touches of gray done up in an old style beehive. She could have modeled in one of those men's magazines of the fifties, like Stag, or Argosy, or True. She sure had nice legs! And she was barefoot, and I could smell a nice fresh sort of floral perfume coming off her. I found myself with a hard-on. Obviously, this was some sort of men's club, a stag society-- those darned JayCees! Now I knew what they were up to!
"Well, Jenna," the zootsuit said, "we got a use for you at last. You ready?" "Ready?" she asked, "I've been ready a long time-- I thought, I was afraid, I might be too old. Nobody ever picked me, I always seem to be the one left over, like tonight." She squinted into a spotlight that had suddenly come on, a light that made her pale flesh vivid and realer than real. "Who have you got out there? I thought we were closing down. Old Jensen already cleaned up the stage..."
"We got a newbie, Jenna, a poor guy who got his hopes and dreams stomped into the dust today, out on the midway-- I read him, and he's one of us, but he don't quite realize it yet. So it's gonna be something special. I'm doing the shooting this time, a demo, to get him hooked-- you know the drill."
"Yes," she said, looking sorta dreamy and excited, staring into the spotlight, "yes I do! That's perfect! That's a great way to go! Do it good, please do me good..."
And at that moment I had a sudden scary thought. I realized what was going down, and I was just about to stand up, say somwthing, I don't know what, when the first shot cracked sharp and fell silent in that weirdly muffled little theater. Jenna, that was her name, it seemed, made a kind of keening sigh and clutched herself, low, holding both hands over her lower belly, just above the hem of her bikini bottom. Another shot! It was like a ride on a fast elevator, going down and down, sending my stomach in free fall. The woman on stage gasped and this time I saw a small, dark, hole appear just under her bellybutton, and almost instantly after that a stream of blood came out of it, and another stream of bright red began to run out from underneath her hands and splatter on the floor. There was not a thing I could do. I was frozen in my seat, scared, but that hard-on didn't go away. There were a lot of shots in succession then, and the little holes worked their way up her midriff, and into her chest, where they sort of got lost against the dark bikini top, but the blood that came out came out faster and harder, and she dropped to her knees, with her eyes rolling up under her lids. She swayed on her knees a little while and then pitched forward, her head hitting the plastic sheeted stage planks with a dull thud. And then she was still, with her face mashed against the floor and her butt in the air-- it was a pose something like some I've seen in skin magazines, something Wunita would never do for me. But it wasn't over-- there was one more bullet shot into her, into her back, and it made a definite dark hole in her back, just below her butt crack, or above her butt crack if you think of her standing up. But she wasn't standing up. She was dead, and bent over like she wanted it doggy style. It's like the whole wholesome yam thing got swept right away. I'd creamed my jeans!
"Good God! Who the hell ARE you!" I really wanted to know.
"You can call me-- Mr. Sunshine," he said, and he moved real fast, getting behind me and clamping me down in my seat with that iron hand of his. "Jensen," hae hollered, "last one! Time to clean up, fella!" And after a while a fairly ordinary guy came out, out from where Jenna had come; he was wearing coveralls, like me, except his were more like a garage mechanic's, and he had plastic dishwashing gloves on and he was sweating and blinking in the spot, looking around, like he wasn't sure where to begin on this one. Mr. Sunshine, right behind me, said, in his low voice, so the guy Jensen couldn't hear--"I read 'em true, and I calls 'em like I sees 'em. Jensen's never been with the program, not completely. He's getting the conscience disease. I knew it would come to this someday." And he shot Jensen in the head. Poor Jensen flopped right down and across dead Jenna, knocking her onto her side. They were both sprawled on the floor. "Clean it up, son. I'm gonna call you Yam. From now on you're Yam, right?" I didn't think it'd be smart to contradict Mr. Sunshine. I just very respectfully, asked (I was even more scared than before, truth be told) "How, how, can this be! How can you DO this? Where did you get that woman? Where do you get ANY of these women-- how..." But he wasn't having any of that.
"You don't want to ask how, Yam my man, you don't want to look too close. The less you know the better off you are. Think of it like a dream, a wonderful and very gratifying dream, this bidness of mine, that will all go away if you look too hard, like waking up from the best wetdream in the world, and finding the dead cold day all around you, the same crap, the same nothing existence. No fun for Mr. Yam, eh? The unspeakable beauty is gone, eh?" The quality of Mr. Sunshine's voice changed, getting darker and larger as he spoke-- "You're a man who stabbed to death a coupla goddamn melons in his sink, dressed 'em up in a budgy bra and stabbed 'em right to death! Don't ask me how I know, never ask, just trust that I KNOW! And one thing I know is, not anybody else in the whole wide world ever did anything as stupid and twisted as that. No, Mr. Yam, you belong here. And you will be happy with me, you will be in the club someday, and right now you are in my debt-- you know what I charge to see a show like this. You got to work it off, work it out. You belong to me, Ysm, body and soul until you pay your debt to me, and then, I do believe you will stay of your own free will. The pay is great! I'm a generous employer, and we haven't even come to the fringe benefits..."
It hasn't been that bad. That first night I thought I might have to dig a big grave the hard way but count on Mr. Sunshine to have a nice little Kubota ditcher available, like one I used once, to lay my own sewer line, years ago, in my past life. My past life! That was before that killin' impulse got set free. Looking back, it sure wasn't much of a life. One thing I learned to appreciate pretty quickly, was that my new employer didn't really care what I did with, or to, the bodies before I buried them. Gee, if you could see me now, you'd see me wearing the biggest old goofy grin. I've never been so happy in my life, truth be told.
So, if you've got the dough, or you're looking for an interesting line of work (we could always use a little help, if you're the right sort of person), check out that JayCee Spook House next time you're at the county fair. Look for a hidden door, a hidden passage-- if a guy in a gorilla suit jumps out at ya, it just means you missed the turn. Go back, and keep looking. It's there. I promise you.