Its like a bad habit you wont give up.
Page 20 of 26
He turned to me and sourly glowered with his gloomy, sideways-looking-wall-eyes. "I done took a nine volt charge, is all boy," he grumped. Well jeez, what the hell is THAT suposed to mean.
During supper I was in charge of watchin little Spike. This was to give my brother and sisterinlaw a break. He sat in a highchair next to me. I tried to ignore all the hatefull stares. The meal was pretty uneventfull. I was sort of waiting for a big fight to occur, but we all sort of made uncomfortable small talk. Granfather kept trying to bait his brothers into a fight but everyone behaved.
"Years ago," Zeke drawled, while chewing a peice of gristly pot roast and pointing his fork at his old basterd younger brothor, "Yer granfather over there done caused me to burn my tounge by tellin' me that some brand new, square shaped new-fangled nine volt battery which I ain't never seed before until that very day happened to taste like sasparilla."
His adam's apple bucked nervously as he swallowed hard. "This here hurt a damn piece more," said Zeke.
"OH BOY!," Granps whispered excitedly, "TIME TO BUST CHOPS!"
My sisterinlaw Darlene snapped back at him. She threatenned Granfather NOT to start a scene. Granfather screamed back that he did not have to listed to her.
"Fine!" huffed Darlene, "I'm eating my supper at the counter!" And with that, she got up and moved her plate over there.
Granfather does not know how to leave well enough alone. Also he does not like to be one upped or defeated and he sat at the table scowling.
"Let it go," Spike warned Granps.
"KISS MAH ASS!" Granfather snapped back at him. Spike told Granfather that he is to STAY SEATED -- and that if the old basterd gets up to bother his wife, or throw somthing at her or anything, he will kick his ass right there in the diner.
And Granfather actualy LIKES Blankenship -- the County Clerk he hates with all his might. And of course the danm Clerk had to taunt Granps.
"Why, howdy, Grampy," he trilled sweetley. Arriving in mincing steps, he placed his knuckles on our table right in front of where the basterd sat, and sort of leaned foward so his blazer draped open, purposely revealing the butt of a pearl handoled revolver. "Ah, what a pleasent sight," said the Clerk sarcaustically, while pointing to the Egyptian headress. "Granfather in a sarcophagus. Or perhaps, advertising that you are a carrier of West Nile Virus?"
I honestly think the man is going batty. Specifically with Post Traumatic Exposure To Granfather Sindrome. Only reasen I say it, is this is how poor Dr. Ripke acted in the begining.
"GIT LOST, MISTER," Granfather muttered. Little Spike began whimporing. He coud tell something scary was going on. The entire diner grew silent. They were all aware of the bad blood between Granfather and the County Clerk. Hell, the whole county did.
"Feeling confident?" the County Clerk mocked.
"QUIT WHILE YOU'RE BEHIND , CLERKY. 'CAUSE YOU PLAYIN' WIT FIRE."
But the county Clerk kept it up. "I want you to publically apologize to me by taking a full page ad out in the paper," he continued.
"OH YEAH? WELL, HERE'S HOW CONFIDENT I AM: I AIN'T DOIN' IT," said Granfather, looking away and poking at his pot roast.
"Is that your final answer?" said the Clerk. I honestly beleived he was on the verge of being insane.
"YES. THAT'S MAH FINAL ANSWER," said Granfather dejectedly.
"Is that your final, final FINAL answer?" the County Clerk grinned insanely.
Then the old basterd started his fake weeping again. I knew what he was up to. He wanted to draw pity to himself while making the Countyclerk look bad. He sobbed, "NOW LEAVE ME TO FINISH THIS HERE MEAL IN THE BOSOM OF MAH LOVING FAMBLY."
Sudenly Uncle William mustored up enough strength to gasp out to the County Clerk, "Come closer! Let me grab yer gun, and plug this sumbitch in cold blood!"
By now I was in tears and I blubbered, "Uncle Will! Don't ever say such a thing!"
William heaved and wheezed, "Please, Mister County Clerk! I'll say you wasn't involved! George Dubya can go on and execute me too, it'd be worth it!"
The crazy Clerk actually stepped toward William and brought the revolver close, but beffore the elderly dying man coud grab it he buttoned up his blazer. Smirking at Granfather, the County Clerk tugged his own lapels, hiked his trousers up a bit, and confidently swaggored away back to his own table.
Granfather, meanwhile bit his lip and closed his eyes. From the counter came a sudden piercing blood courdling scream. It was Darlene. The dishes in front of her began to clattor and the food upon it bubbled and sputtored. Granfather was "throwing his voice" again. Darlene contineud to scream and scream. Sudenly it stopped. The diner was silent, exept for the panting of Darlene tryin desperately to catch her breath. Just then a waitress stopped at our table.
"I'LL HAVE WHUT SHE'S HAVING." Granfather deadpanned.
Later on as we were leaving, we saw the County Clerk gettin into his car. Granfather thrashed and bucked from the back seat where he was restrained by all three seatbelts.
"LEMME OUT THE CAR! LEMME OUT THE CAR!", he howled. But I woud not. In any case the evil beast somehow slithered free. He leapt out and ran quickly, exactly like one of those Namibian lizards across the 200 degree hot desert sands on the tips of his claws and headed straight for the County Clerks white County-owned Chevy Impala.
Granfather furiously motioned the slightly stunned Clerk to roll down his car window on the passengor side. As he did Granfather sort of half grinned and crowed to him, "I WUZ ONLY JOKING! I WUZ ONLY JOKING! THAT WEREN'T MAH FINAL ANSWER!" and just as Granfather barely finished the words out came the most loud fart I ever heard in my life. All the windows on the County Clerk's car shattored, both airbags exploaded in an enourmous ear splitting blast and with an even louder sound, all four steel belted radiol tires boomed into smithoreens. The hood of the car buckled and crumpled up. The passengor side door swung open by a thread of twisted smoking blackoned steel, and dropped to the ground in a clattor.
There is a small ornamentol moat around the front of the diner, which you cross a little wooden foot bridge ovor to get inside the restuarant from the parking lot. It used to be filled with giant swimming gold carp but they all instantley floated belly up dead at that instant. Also a whole lot of car alarms, some of them quite far away all went off.
And fully a minute lator, the flaming air filter covor of the brand new county owned vehicle re-entered the atmosphere and landed with a metallic clattor three hundred yards up the road right in the center of the State highway.
The County Clerk, no longer feeling like such a bully, stared unblinking at Granps with fear, his face frozen in terror, stuck, cramped, bone white and contorted, his mouth twisted painfully agape in fright like that of Lee Harvey Oswald in that famous photo where he got shot.
The basterd finaly spoke, barely audible over the rolling waves of windy dust that was still now sweeping in concentric circles outward from the epicentor, bending and flattening vegetation in its path across the prairie landscape like a pebble in a pond; a thunder of sonic booms reverborated as the monstrous mushroom cloud of toxic malignant gas corrupted both sound and sight of all surviving life close to Ground Zero with distorted ruptures of heatwave warps which rose in a poisonnous wave up to the sky, and slashing with the strength of a silent-but-deadly cutting the air, the basterd spoke:
THAT...
...WAS MAH FINAL ANSWER," said Granfather.