A Doubleheader

CUTE AS A BUTTON

"Three out of four people now believe in angels...

What are you fuckin' stupid?!?"

― George Carlin

"Isn't that cute as a button?" Phyllis queried.

"You bet!" I responded. "The button pressed by el presidente to initiate thermonuclear war," I silently concluded.

Am I the only person who's never looked at a fucking button, exuberantly exclaiming, "Well, that's cute!"?

The Phyllis/Owen scenario was bizarre, as the latter attested he enjoyed beating the former; to which the former asserted how much she loved said rough treatment.

Naturally, I inquired, "Beating? You mean like winning in chess?"

"Hell no," replied Owen, as he made a fist. "I'm talkin' beating!"

To this, I asked if the hinterlander meant spanking.

"Yeah, that too," was Owen's rejoinder.

"Slapping?"

"From time to time, but I mean beating!"

Again with the balled-up fist, and a right cross into empty air.

"You punch her?!?" I asked, appalled.

"Does a bear shit in the woods?!"

"Not if it lives in the zoo," I responded.

Strained silence, as rusty wheels attempted to turn with no luck.

"Well, I love it!" Phyllis chimed in.

"Where the fuck do you punch her?!" was my next obvious question.

"In the woods," came Owen's inebriated reply.

"No, I mean where on her body?"

"Oh, gotcha'. Ribs and sides."

"Sounds like a menu entree in Louisiana," I offered.

At that point, Owen displayed a quarter-sized scar above Phyllis' butt crack, and produced the pocketknife that ostensibly caused the mutilation. Said senorita elucidated how she thrills when her man marks his territory.

"Couldn't he just take a page out of Lassie's book, and piss on ya'?"

Blank stares.

At this point, I'm wondering what's to prevent Prince Violent ― sporting an NRA shirt, and alluding to owning several guns ― from givin' me the shiv, while I'm humpin' his chick.

I recalled Owen mentioning something about attempting to bring one of his shootin' irons with him from the boondocks. I couldn't recollect if he was successful in doing so, but with TSA comprised of pedophiles and the cast from B.J. and the Bear, that seemed vital info.

All this on top of Owen's proud predication he thought he'd once killed Phyllis, while choking her against a tree. According to the object of his "affection," she couldn't sleep for two days afterward. When she did, she'd awaken in cold sweats, unable to breathe, clutching her neck.

As if this crap wasn't enough, Owen begins a drunken rant about "Towel Heads," and how it's imperative the U.S. nuke the entire Middle East, and commandeer its oil.

It was a brilliant plan, on the order of jumping off the top of a 50 story building, to determine if you can fly. Wouldn't it be safer to launch yourself from the ground on that one?

"Excuse me, folks. Hi! I'm Hugh. I'm a sex addict. I just came here to get laid. Uh, thanks?"

It seemed Seal would successfully market his own line of facial skin care products before this couple would invite me into their cabana. All that changed with a single swig, as Owen suddenly crossed that delicate line between drunkenness and lucidity.

As if by miracle, my hands were suddenly cupping Phyllis' 38-Ds, and I was being drawn into this remote bungalow by that all-powerful tractor beam known as sex.

Moments later, the woman in question was faking orgasms with the proficiency of a '70s porn actress, a thin sheath of latex separating our naked frames. From an undetermined locale, Owen wandered about, certain he was engaging in conversation with Grandpa Jones from Hee Haw.

MAKE LOVE, NOT WAR

"The planet has been through a lot worse than us. [...]

Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sunspots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles, hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages, and we think some plastic bags and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference?

The planet isn't goin' anywhere. We are. We're goin' away. Pack your shit, folks. We're goin' away.

And we won't leave much of a trace, either.

[...] Just another failed mutation. Just another closed-end biological mistake; an evolutionary cul-de-sac. The planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas."

― George Carlin

Staring down the barrel of the well-oiled handgun, I pumped away at the sweaty, black, female Marine beneath me. The Sun set through the hanging blinds partially covering the sliding glass door to this shitty apartment.

Beside us, stroking himself like the family dog, was the dark damsel's dude ― discount hairpiece more lopsided than a popularity contest between Kanye West and a high school nerd. "Fuck her! Fuck her like she needs to be punished!" the rotund, brown man barked.

"Is it loaded?" I motioned to the weapon on the dresser beside the squealing mattress.

"Always," the chiseled woman under me replied.

I took in the menagerie of war paraphernalia perfectly placed along the walls, as if done with loving attention. Some people exhibited sports trophies; others displayed pictures of their kids in the fuckin' 4-H club. This woman had explicit photos of what's known as war porn ― in this case, pictures of herself posing with murdered Middle Eastern civilians and soldiers.

The onset of orgasm, as my pro tempore paramour began to cum. Her head turned to the side, and I took the opportunity to direct the muzzle of the firearm away from me. In doing so, I noticed the safety was more off than Bill O'Reilly's unbalanced brain.

"That's it!" shrieked the squat suitor squeezing snake at the precipice of the bulging box spring. "Make her pay for her sins!"

Thanks to the dying light, I couldn't discern if the agglomerate of objects hastily piled at the other end of the room were avocados or hand grenades.

Everywhere I looked were portraits of pillage, and trophies of trench turmoil. I felt as though I'd transported to the survivalist shelter of a backwoods militia member. Either that, or the wet dream of a creepy, combat-craving 17 year old, using fake ID so he could "serve" his country by killing people with brown skin.

I surmised this weird woman masturbated to the stack of Soldier of Misfortune magazines I observed alongside the bed when I'd entered. I conjectured the glossy pages of the propaganda rags were stained with plenteous amounts of chick juice.

As the solar ball ― friend to us all ― descended beneath the mountain range in the distance, and whatever illumination gracing the room died, I once again became afraid of the dark. When the lights went out, what would stop this woman from diving deep into an Iraq War flashback, scrambling for her piece, and stuffin' me full of more lead than a refillable pencil?

For all I knew, on the other side of that closet ― no more than 10 feet from where I was using my depth finder ― she might possess an arsenal that would make a Blackwater subcontractor drool.

Given her physical conditioning, the woman could easily breach, fire, and fill me with more depleted uranium than the 300-plus tons U.S. assassins unleashed on the populations of Afghanistan and Iraq.

"Fuck her! Fuck her!! Fuck her!!" came the maniacal war cry, somewhere in the nebulous dark beside me.

I pictured a pair of blood shot eyes ― stripped of fluid ― having been open longer than a 24 hour fast food joint. Behind said psycho sockets ― within a rotting husk termed a skull ― lurched a brain that was never meant to be; a Dr. Frankenstein invention.

Was it possible these two were conspiring to do me harm? Seemed a stretch the likes of a straddle split spanning the Grand Canyon, but stranger things have occurred. Just look at Mickey Rourke's current face.

In the blackness, a door opened. Since horny hubby was beside me, and his wife beneath, it was a sound ― like a fart from a man with no asshole ― neither could've generated. In less time than it would take Ray Charles to flunk a driving test, I was scrambling for my clothes and racing for freedom.

Behind me, muted voices emanated:

"What happened?"

"I don't know."

"Where'd he go?"

"And I was just about to fake another orgasm!"

In my sprint for safety, I tripped over something alive. Between my feet, I heard a yelp of pain, as I stumbled across a warm, breathing, furry whatever.

Wrenching the apartment door open, I looked back. In the scant illumination, provided by the communal hallway lights, I caught sight of a cowering Chihuahua behind me. It didn't matter. Pooch or land mine, I was more gone than individual thinking in church.

― authored by Hugh Mungus