Another wacky episode of "THE FREEDMANS" - America's Favorite Dysfunctional Militia Family! -------------------------------------- The funky-brown fragrance of simmering government surplus beef circled the Freedman compound like nuclear fallout. But Ethel Freedman could not bring herself to enjoy it.
She flipped the furry burgers onto a platter and sighed. It was 12:00 hours, and her son, G. Gordo, was still AWOL. It could only mean trouble. If anyone cared to notice.
"Mess hall's open," she screamed unenthusiastically.
Fred Freedman was the first to respond, a hungry man. He took his seat, the one with the foam-doughnut pillow, and lowered his head in prayer.
"Lord, I realize now that bran is an evil government conspiracy designed to control my prostrate. I thank you for the glory, the honor and the taste of Crisco. Amen."
Fred looked up from his prayer and unbuckled his trousers. "Where're the troops?," he asked his wife.
"Missy's stalking the mailman," said Ethel.
Missy's all man. thought Fred. Would that would make it a double sin? He shook the impossible image from his mind. Must think of something unpleasant.
"Where's the bed-wetter?," he blurted.
"G. Gordo," piped-up Ethel, "went on a sortie with the Delta Dawn Death Force."
"I told him to stop hanging around with those little girls!" He spat a crispy burger bit onto the table in anger.
"It was an innocent raid on a B'nai B'rith bake sale."
"He better not bring home any bran muffins--"
"That's just it," wailed Ethel. "The bake sale was hours ago. He hasn't come home. I'm worried, dear."
"A Freedman, AWOL?" Fred was clearly pissed.
He cocked his ear towards the port-hole. A bogie was approaching from the west. Outside, the early-warning junkyard guard dogs tightened the slack on their chains, then lunged.
"Bow-wow-wow-woo," moaned Janet, the hound dog. "Warf-warf-warf," warned Hillary, the pitbull.
"Omigod, help me," cried G. Gordo, the weasely teenager.
"There he is." Fred signalled Ethel into combat position. Husband and wife backed into the shadows. "Kill the lights," ordered Fred. Ethel shot the chandelier to pieces. It tinkled to the ground.
G. Gordo opened the door and threw himself into the kitchen. For a brief, sacred moment, Janet, Hilary and G. Gordo formed a snarling Norman Rockwell, back-lit by a butterscotch sun.
Damn pretty sight, thought Fred.
G. Gordo slammed the door on a salivating snout. Hillary's pain-ridden "yipe-yipe" and Janet's comforting "woop-woop" faded in the distance.
The kid fell against the bulkhead and gulped a gallon of air. "Despair gives courage to the weak," he prayed.
"Freeze, weakling!," screamed Fred as he pressed a 9mm Barretta against G. Gordo's right temple.
G. Gordo froze everything except his bladder.
"There's towels in the pantry," scolded Ethel.
G. Gordo stepped out of his puddle and hopped towards the pantry. The bouncing caused a slim, rolled-up newspaper to dislodge from its back pocket hiding place. G. Gordo fumbled for it. Too late.
The newspaper hit the floor with a pornographic THUD!
Fred was the first to see it. His face screwed into a death grimace of Old Testament proportions. Ethel covered her mouth and gagged. There, on the floor, in plain view, lay a copy of The New York Times.
Ethel lost control. "Have you picked out my coffin, you ungrateful child?," she continued.
G. Gordo grabbed the paper. He fell to his knees and begged. "But -- it's only for English class..."
"No, it's a calling card from President and Mrs. AntiChrist," barked Fred.
Wiping away a mother's tear, Ethel undid the safety on her kitchen Luger. She poked G. Gordo in the back. "You know the drill."
Fred kicked the rag-rug aside, revealing a two-foot, square trap door. He grabbed the metal handle and yanked. The rusty hinges squawked like a metallic rooster. Murky, limburger air escaped from the subterranean chamber like a herd of sulphurous ghosts.
"Anything to say before sentence is imposed?," Fred asked, out of breath.
"'Tis a far, far better thing I do, than I have ever done before.'"
"Tis a long-long stay in the pit for you, Liberace."
Ethel didn't much like the idea of her son living beneath the kitchen like a common goblin. Of course, she learned her place the hard way, so she said nothing.
But, dammit, she was still a mom. She grabbed a plate of cookies.
"Wait, a couple of macaroons never hurt anyone down the hole."
"Drop those cookies, woman," ordered Fred. "Punishment is a man's domain. No place for sweets."
"Don't worry about me, mother," announced G. Gordo, as he stepped dramatically into the hole, "I purchased some bran muffins at the bake sale. Oh, you should have been there--"
Fred slammed the trap-door on G. Gordo's head. He returned to the table and calmly stashed a chaw of manly tobacco in his cheek. Chomping on a wad of Skol was a good way to drown out the vomitus sobs that emanated from underneath the floor boards.
As if to answer a secret prayer, Missy burst through the kitchen bulkhead with a rat-a-tat-tat! Bouncing like a well-endowed cheerleader with a camoulflage uniform several sizes too tight, she marched to the wall, unsheathed her bowie knife and proudly gouged the image of a Mailman next to six other similar notches.
"Seven government-sucking dipwads down. Forty-seven thousand to go."
Fred started laughing but choked on his wad. Ethel slammed Fred on the head with a frying pan to dislodge it.
Twenty minutes later, Fred came to lying face-down in a tin plate of cold surplus burgers. Across the table, Missy hunkered down on her last french fried pattie.
"Where's your mother?," asked Fred, carefully.
Missy spat a some gristle onto her father's plate. "She's out back, burning your clothes."
Even though Ethel was a safe distance away, Fred whispered his next question. "So, how'd you bag the mailman?"
"You're going to love this," she purred. "I stripped off my fatigues, painted my entire body silver and posed as a mailslot."
Little eeky noises escaped through Fred's nostrils. His tongue felt like a bag of wet pennies. "Did the mail get through?," he mumbled.
"It certainly tried."
All of a sudden, Fred remembered that he had more work to do in the field latrine. He threw himself, head first, through the bulkhead.
----------------------------------------