Luigi DiAngelo, Marigold's Grandfather from "Emilio & Marigold"

 

Grechin Cooley, Benjaman's Divorced Mother from "The King Smells Like Formaldehyde"

 

Revenge Against the Innocent

VERSE 1

Getting laid off at work makes you go berserk

And then a minor inconvenience turns you into a jerk

A tender voice says, “Daddy?”, you scream, “WHAT?!”

Call your daughter every slur from bitch to slut

She runs to bed crying while your self-esteem is dying

Nobody’s on your side, they had no choice but to hide

A raging ball of fire launched from the depths of hell

Leaves your heart seizing up and no one to wish you well

 

CHORUS

Revenge against the innocent, it sounds so ignorant

They committed no crimes, yet they’re on borrowed time

Before a nervous breakdown or a violent takedown

Revenge against the innocent, you’re absurd and insolent

 

VERSE 2

Your nuclear family had a nuclear explosion

Of every single tearful and screaming emotion

Hey, don’t complain, you’re the one who pressed the button

You always had the launch codes, so keep on truckin’

Couldn’t pay for therapy with a bleeding bank account

Inflation raised the price to a ridiculous amount

Credit cards can’t help, lenders hand you the shovel

And you can’t say, “I’m sorry” with an invisible muzzle

 

CHORUS

Revenge against the innocent, it sounds so ignorant

They committed no crimes, yet they’re on borrowed time

Before a nervous breakdown or a violent takedown

Revenge against the innocent, you’re absurd and insolent

 

VERSE 3

Fifty-one-fifty, free room and board

And all the cigarettes you could possibly hoard

I’m making this place sound just like a prison

But you know damn well they’ve got the same system

Seventy-two hours without a warm shower

Piss and moan all you want, but there’s no people-power

Your daughter’s grown up and got her own wedding flowers

She broke the cycle, her love is stronger than a tower

 

OUTRO

This could have been avoided, nulled, and voided

If you didn’t let your anger turn into a Big Banger

Cosmic explosion that pissed off the universe

Now you’ve got no ride home except the back of a hearse

Rebecca Rogers vs. Her Ex-Husband Avery

 

Stay Down

VERSE 1

Your childhood sucked, so your offspring must pay

Beat them with a belt to make sure they’re not gay

A piece of leather passed down from your father

You could throw that shit away, but why the hell bother?

Whip them, lash them, and verbally trash them

Their spirits and dreams, go ahead and smash them

When you’re taken away with cuffs around your wrists

You can tell the courtroom about the gripes on your list

 

PRE-CHORUS

Mr. Narcissist, next time you get pissed

Make sure the gun you put to your head doesn’t miss

 

CHORUS

Stay down! X4

 

VERSE 2

You hate your wife, because she ruined your life

That’s the story you tell on your way to hell

Too much nagging from her led you to a divorce

You’re so innocent, so you owe her, of course

You say the system’s rigged with a voice so big

But your dick’s so small and so are your balls

One last check in the form of alimony

Your bank account is dry, keep pissing and moaning

 

PRE-CHORUS

Mr. Wifebeater, Mr. Cheater, Mr. Geezer

Next time you keep a dead body in your freezer

Call your victim anything but a skeezer

It’s not a good look when you’re locked up and booked

 

CHORUS

Stay down! X4

 

BRIDGE

I’m sorry life didn’t turn out the way you wanted

I’m sorry you grew up with a mind so haunted

But my real sympathies lie with the ones you hurt

You didn’t have to do that, no more bodies in the dirt

Nobody walks away from this life unscathed

Doesn’t mean they need to feel even half of your pain

You could have broken the cycle, but you broke their bones

You broke their minds too, so forgiveness is a hard no

 

CHORUS

Stay down! X8

 

OUTRO

Lay down!

And stay down!

‘Cause if you get back up

You’ll get jacked up!

Life After Seduction

VERSE 1

When the only chicks who like you are femme fatales

When she separates you from your family and pals

When she won’t let you speak to any other gals

And then stabs you in the heart until you cry and howl

Just remember that the world doesn’t center on her

And that you did nothing at all to deserve being hurt

It’s toilet time for your expensive wedding ring

“We’re fucking divorced!” is the tune you sing

CHORUS

You can break the pattern, but it’ll only matter

If you cover your ears from the toxic chatter

Life after seduction comes with no instructions

But the light at the end needs no introduction

VERSE 2

You swear to yourself that you’ll never love again

It took so long to get back your family and friends

Single as a Pringle, no need to stay and mingle

Because the only thing that matters is how you feel

She calls you and leaves a thousand voicemails

Begging for forgiveness behind the walls of jail

But you put away your phone and go back to sleep

Because you earned your freedom, it’s yours to keep

CHORUS

You can break the pattern, but it’ll only matter

If you cover your ears from the toxic chatter

Life after seduction comes with no instructions

But the light at the end needs no introduction

VERSE 3

On the therapist’s couch, you’ve got lots to talk about

And then here come the tears and the need to shout

None of your pain will ever leave that cozy room

Don’t hold the detonation switch to your own doom

EXTENDED CHORUS

You can break the pattern, but it’ll only matter

If you cover your ears from the toxic chatter

Life after seduction comes with no instructions

But the light at the end needs no introduction

Life is beautiful and it’s still worth living

As long as you learn the limits of your giving

Takers have no limits to their narcissism

Now you see it all with twenty-twenty vision

I Don't Have a Dog

CHORUS

I don’t have a dog in this fight

I can’t decide who’s wrong or right

We can go all day, go all night

If only there was an arena in sight

VERSE 1

He said this and then she said that

What they said was a whole lot of jack

Hidden agenda, open challenge policy

Open the door for verbal sodomy

Everything’s on the table for the media

Sooner or later, it’s marked with tedium

Whatever happened to keeping the peace?

When will the madness finally cease?

CHORUS

I don’t have a dog in this fight

I can’t decide who’s wrong or right

We can go all day, go all night

If only there was an arena in sight

VERSE 2

Slinging mud and slinging shit

They’re hoping for a critical hit

Drinking poison, wishing for death

On each other, it makes no sense

This isn’t a wrestling or boxing ring

Stop fighting over every little thing

Diplomacy is what you all need

Before you fuckers start to bleed

BRIDGE

Conscientious objection

This ain’t some kind of election

Digging up the dirt

Will cause both of you to hurt

Friendly fire, both are liars

It’s what the camera requires

I don’t have a dog in this war

I don’t want to see any more

EXTENDED CHORUS

I don’t have a dog in this fight

I can’t decide who’s wrong or right

We can go all day, go all night

If only there was an arena in sight

I don’t have a dog in this battle

I don’t blindly follow like cattle

Reality TV is rated TV-MA

Disgusts me so much, I turn away

Run Like Hell

CHORUS

Run like hell from the perfume smell

Run like hell from the wedding bells

Get your ass home before you turn to stone

Find another place to bury your bone

VERSE 1

Locked in a contract like Christian Grey

This newfound prison is your wedding day

Shotgun loaded and pressed to your head

Say the words “I do” lest you end up dead

Run like the wind, it’s your only chance

To get your ass out of this toxic romance

A hellish honeymoon in a seaside resort?

Time to cut that shit so fucking short

CHORUS

Run like hell from the perfume smell

Run like hell from the wedding bells

Get your ass home before you turn to stone

Find another place to bury your bone

VERSE 2

She screams like a demon, bites like a vampire

A virgin sacrifice is what she will require

You’re strapped to a cross naked as a baby

Gagged with a sex toy, screaming like a lady

Your heart beats fast as the seconds pass

Sweat pours down, you start to drown

Here comes the blade, the pact is made

I now pronounce you lonely and afraid

CHORUS

Run like hell from the perfume smell

Run like hell from the wedding bells

Get your ass home before you turn to stone

Find another place to bury your bone

VERSE 3

Get the fuck out like a scared little mouse

Get your ass free and run like the breeze

Never turn back for a heart so black

Suck down air to calm your standing hairs

Take your ring off and give it a toss

An instant divorce is what you get of course

I know you’re tired, I know you’re scared

I know the trauma will never be fair

FINAL LINES

Run, motherfucker, run, motherfucker, run! X3

Run! Like! Hell!

Don't Tell Me Who to Love

“Mr. Hamlet, I’m only going to ask you this once and you’d better give me a meaningful answer…What the hell were you thinking when you started this relationship with Miss Peters?” College Principal Rich Lucas’s hands formed a pyramid on his desk as he posed the question to Keith Hamlet. Principal Lucas’s glasses-wearing eyes burned into Keith’s soul like a Molotov cocktail, yet the math teacher and his student Vikki Peters sat across from him in his office hand-in-hand like nothing was wrong.

“Normally, that would qualify as a rhetorical question,” said Keith as he straightened his tie and argyle sweater vest, seemingly the perfect picture of calmness. “But if you really want me to take it seriously, then here’s my answer. I was thinking the exact same thing when any other man falls in love with a woman. I pursued a relationship with Vikki here because she was the one for me, end of story. She’s a consenting adult, I’m a consenting adult, so I really don’t see what the problem is, Principal Lucas. In other words…” Keith leaned in closer and tensely whispered, “Don’t tell me who to love.”

Rich leaned his wrinkly face closer and said, “I’m not telling you who to love. I’m telling you to use some common sense. You took this job as a math teacher knowing full well what kind of influence you’d have over your own students. It’s not a matter of non-existent statutory rape. It’s a conflict of interest. You could very well show favoritism to Miss Peters knowing other students would suffer.”

“If you actually bothered to look at her grades,” said Keith. “You’d know that math is a subject she struggles with. She gets no favoritism from me just because we’re dating. She certainly didn’t date me because she’d thought she’d have an advantage.”

“I’d love nothing more than to believe that,” said Rich as he leaned back in his chair and interlaced his fingers behind his bald head. “But you knew the rules long before you took this job. This school forbids teacher-student relationships no matter what the age difference is. You broke the rules and now you’re about to lose your job because of it. I’m sorry, Mr. Hamlet, but I have no choice but to…”

“Wait!” shouted Vikki while holding her bare arm up in defense. Her long brown hair and lovely figure in the frilly blue dress she wore already made her hard to resist, but Keith’s heart beat faster upon watching his love come to his defense. She was no damsel despite what Rich thought; she was a badass metal armor-wearing knight. “You do this to him, Mr. Lucas. This job is all that he has left!” Not the best argument ever made, but the spirited delivery was what counted the most.

Rich chuckled with his mouth closed and said, “You’re right, Miss Peters. It is all he has left…aside from his wife, his children, a house, a dog, a car…whatever will he do without a lovely lady such as yourself?”

“I wasn’t going to tell you this, because quite frankly it’s none of your goddamn business,” said Keith. “But my wife divorced me long before I started dating Vikki. I know you can’t relate to something as complex as having a heart, Mr. Lucas, but hear me out. Being divorced is bad enough with the alimony payments and the bitter words exchanged in a courtroom. But the loneliness, the emptiness I felt afterwards, THAT was what made me lose focus of my job. I couldn’t concentrate, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat…but Vikki took my pain away. I’ve been doing great up until the point where you called the two of us to your office, Mr. Lucas.”

A tense silence was shared between all three occupants of the room before Rich Lucas burst into mocking laughter and slapped his desk with the palm of his hand. When asked what was so fucking hilarious, he said, “Jesus, Keith, you should have been a poet instead of a math teacher! That was pure gold! Maybe when I fire your ass, you can get a career writing songs for sour-faced rock bands!”

The horse laughter came to a quick end when Vikki shot up and barked, “Enough!” Rich peaked up at her like he was taking her more seriously than when she gave the weak defense earlier. “This is why I hate going to school,” she sobbed. “Aside from the stupid classes, you’ve also got ridiculous rules that don’t mean shit in the real world! We’re not doing any harm to each other or the other students by being together! Keith says I took his pain away? Well, he took mine away too! If he hadn’t come to me when he did, I’d probably be dead with a bloody wrist somewhere!”

Rich held his hands up defensively and said, “Calm down, Miss Peters. Have a seat.” After she complied with both of those requests, Rich leaned in closer and said, “I certainly didn’t mean anything by what I just said to your…boyfriend, for lack of a better term. I was just…you know…Are you sure you don’t want to major in poetry too, Miss Peters?” The obnoxious hee-haws and desk slapping continued, much to the tearful dismay of Vikki and the teeth grinding rage of Keith.

“Laugh all you want, you smelly little prick!” belted Keith as he stood up and pointed his index finger at his accuser.

The donkey gut-busting was replaced with a serious stare into Keith’s crumbling soul. “What did you call me, Mr. Hamlet? I’d choose my words carefully if I were you. You’re not only facing termination, but you’re also in danger of being blackballed from the educational community as a whole. No college is going to want a sexual predator on their campus. Say what you will about the Brock Turners of the world, but at least he never pretended to be a romantic lover boy like you, Mr. Hamlet!”

Keith’s dynamite veins pulsated throughout his body. His fists clenched and turned his knuckles bright white. His muscles tightened underneath his dress shirt and sweater vest. Visions of him punching the shit out of Rich Lucas danced in his head like wild flames. Oh, how he would have loved to turn this disgusting human being’s face into slime and sand. He was close to carrying out his fantasy when he flipped over Rich’s desk and caused him to scatter backwards into the corner while Vikki barricaded Keith with her arms.

Pointing his index finger like a colt forty-five ready to blow, Keith shouted, “I am sick and tired of you judging me like a common criminal! Who’s going to take YOUR job for saying stupid shit like that?! Who’s going to put YOU on the fucking chopping block?! If you want to take my job, go ahead and take it, but if I fucking fall, you’re going down with me!” Vikki managed to push Keith back a little further to calm him down slightly.

The loving gesture did nothing to mask the massive flood of saliva Rich Lucas gulped nor the quaking in his tan slacks-wearing legs. With a shivery voice, he said, “Save your empty threats, Mr. Hamlet. You can’t do a damn thing to me or my credibility.”

Vikki sat Keith down in his chair and rubbed his shoulders and head in a further attempt to calm him down. While she achieved that small goal, Keith’s rage still caused Rich’s balls to shrink even in silent mode. “if there’s one thing I’ve learned in divorce court, it’s that the truth doesn’t mean shit. Men will try to screw women and women will try to screw men. The winner of any court case isn’t about who’s right or who’s wrong. It’s about who has the most believable pile of happy horseshit. I’m not necessarily saying I’m going to lie in court to get one over on you. I’m just saying…my shit smells like a my girlfriend’s cologne while yours smells like a fucking cow pasture. I’ve plead my case to you and got nothing. What’ll happen when I plead my case to a state judge?”

Still convulsing in the corner, Rich threw his glasses to the floor and said, “You’re fired, Keith. I’ve heard all I want to hear from you and your mistress. Just do me a favor, Mr. Hamlet: when you show up in court, try not to flip over any tables like you did in my office. You see…I too know what it’s like to lose someone I love. I’ve been alive a long time and had six marriages. The judge isn’t going to like your anger. You’d better learn how to keep that under control without your woman present. But then again…you millennials aren’t exactly known for your wisdom!”

A fiery aura radiated off of Keith Hamlet and he didn’t give two shits if he was proving Rich Lucas right. The now former math teacher could feel his own blood singeing his skin like a vat of acid. His exploding heart could have been powerful enough to level Hiro-fucking-shima all over again. Every time Keith closed his eyes in an attempt to quell this anger, his eyelids felt like little skillets burning breakfast as well as the whole house. Anything Keith Hamlet could have done in this moment would have jeopardized his chances of keeping his teaching license. And then…

“So not only are you an asshole in general,” sobbed Vikki. “But you’re also a flaming ageist. You’re a bitter old man in a school full of young students. I bet that just eats you up inside. That probably won’t look good in the eyes of an impartial judge. You know, somebody who can apparently be more impartial than my boyfriend here!”

Rich Lucas ran out of verbal ammunition as evidenced by his quivering lips and slurred speech. Keith, on the other hand, had plenty to say if only through his actions. He wiped away Vikki’s tears with his thumb and shared a lengthy hug with her in front of a disgusted, yet defeated Principal Lucas. “Don’t worry, Vikki,” said Keith. “This asshole can take away a lot of things from us…but we’re not going down without firing the first shot. Look at him, he’s pathetic! He knows he’ll lose miserably, but he’s too jittery to put his words together and admit it!”

“I love you, Keith,” whispered Vikki.

“I love you too, Vikki.” The romantic couple shared a gentle tongue kiss in front of Rich, who turned his face into the corner in a failed attempt to avert his “innocent” eyes.

Belts and Welts

Owen Hall’s silent rage steamed hotter than the mashed potatoes and gravy he was eating for supper. Delicious food, though right in front of him, was the last thing on his racing mind. Sitting across from him at the dinner table was his wife Valerie and his daughter Leila. Both ladies smiled arrogantly at Owen while the father’s expression was dripping with ogre-like hatred. “Come on, old man, smile and make people wonder about you!” said Leila with a mockingly saccharine tone. Owen’s mouth curled even further downward as he tried to eat his dinner.

“Did you do your homework tonight?” asked Owen with disturbing calmness.

“I’ll do it after America’s Next Top Model is over,” said Leila. Her phone vibrated in her jeans pocket and she immediately went into text-messaging mode. Her eyes never left the screen even after Owen waved his meaty hand over her face.

“Relax, Owen,” said Valerie with her hand on his shoulder. “She’s a teenager. You know how they are. I’ll bet you anything you were like that at her age.”

Owen cracked his thick neck on both sides and said, “I wouldn’t know anything about that.”

“Of course you don’t, because you’re an old fart,” said Leila while her thumbs continued to dance around her smart phone’s screen. The sharp jab got a small giggle from Valerie.

Owen shook his head and put his fork down to address his daughter. His muscular hands formed a steeple underneath his hairy chin as he said, “You know, Leila. I got a call from the school today. They said you haven’t been keeping up with your homework. In fact, it’s pretty much the same song and dance for the last few weeks. Whenever the school has a problem with you, they always phone me and I get the blame for it.”

“Honey, eat your potatoes and we’ll talk about this some more after dinner,” said Valerie as she patted her manicured hand across her husband’s sausage fingers.

“I don’t want to talk about it later,” said Owen. “I want to talk about it now. If we don’t talk about it now, we’ll never talk about it again. You keep saying we’ll have all of these chances and those chances are always squandered. Put the fucking phone down!” The last sentence directed at Leila had some extra bite to it.

Instead of honoring her father’s wishes, Leila mocked his words with a semi-retarded voice and kept texting. Valerie smiled at Owen and said, “Come on, it’s not like this is the end of the world. She’ll figure it out soon enough.”

“No, she won’t!” snapped Owen as he stood up, garnering Leila’s attention at last. “She’s going to keep fucking up and nothing’s going to get done! What about college?! What about a job?! Does she not care about these things?! Last time I checked, sitting on your lazy ass watching TV isn’t exactly a nine-to-fiver!”

“Dude! Chill!” said Leila. “You don’t have to bite my head off! School’s been really hard lately!”

“School is supposed to be hard, you dumb shit!” barked Owen. “That’s how you grow and develop as a human being! If everything was easy, there’d be no fucking point!”

Valerie shot up from her chair and pointed at her husband while shouting, “Owen, sit down and eat your food! You’re acting like an old bastard!”

Owen took off his glasses and rolled up his flannel shirt sleeves. “No, Valerie, you’re wrong. That’s not what an old bastard acts like. This is.” With no trace of high voltage anger in his voice, Owen took off his leather belt and slowly walked around the table to Leila’s side of the table. Both wife and daughter looked up at him with wide, horrified eyes while Leila kept asking him what he was doing with a stutter.

The towering father grabbed Leila by the hair and slammed her torso against the table, not caring if the violent act got food on her T-shirt. Both ladies screamed like they were trapped in a real-life horror movie while Owen smacked his leather belt across Leila’s ass five times, each strike more sadistic and louder than the last. Both women collapsed to the floor and hugged each other while sobbing and screaming simultaneously. Leila could only bury her face in her mother’s chest while the mother looked up at Owen with puppy-dog eyes, asking, “Why?” over and over again in a whispery voice.

“I’ll tell you why, Valerie,” said Owen with trembling jowls. “I’m tired of being the bad guy at this dinner table. I’m tired of being the principal’s scapegoat when this whole shit storm is clearly my daughter’s fault. I’m tired of being disrespected. I’m tired of being walked on. And to think, this is Leila’s first belt whipping and she got to experience it at age fourteen. Too little too late. She’s grown up to be a bigger super-bitch than her mother.”

Leila pulled her face out of her mother’s hug and tearfully mouthed the words to her dad, “I hate you. I hate you so much.”

Owen slowly crouched down beside his daughter, placed his free hand on her convulsing shoulder, and quietly said, “That’s okay, darling. I hate you too. I hate you so much that I want to get the fuck out of this place as soon as I can. That belt spanking wasn’t out of discipline or even love. It was out of rage. It was out of a whole decade of disrespect and nothing being done about it. I’m done with you, Leila. I’m done with your mother. She better hire a good divorce lawyer, because I’ll be doing the same. Don’t expect a huge custody battle, little girl. Not even that creep Roy Moore will want you after all of this.”

Owen stood back up and his tree trunk knees popped like fireworks. Valerie also stood up, but brought her daughter to her feet with her and continued to hold her in a loving and sorrowful embrace. Valerie sobbed, “You can’t divorce me, Owen. After what you did tonight, I’ll take you for everything you’re worth!”

“Funny you mention that,” said Owen. “Because you probably will make more money off of my child support payments than you will busting your ass at a real job. Same goes for you, Leila. You’re both a bunch of losers. If you’re this disrespectful to me, what makes you think you’re going to be any better to your bosses? Oh, did I say bosses? I meant johns and pimps.”

“How can you say these things to your own family, Dad?” cried Leila. She could wipe her tears and comfort her sore buttocks all she wanted, but the sorrow continued to be painfully obvious.

“Family? What family?” said Owen with shrugged shoulders. “I don’t see a family in front of me. Just because you’ve got my DNA, doesn’t mean you’re anything more to me than a couple of bloodsucking leeches. The ride’s over. I’d tell you both to get your shit together, but you’re not even capable of getting that right, let alone an answer on a fucking math test.” The hulking father turned around and lumbered to his bedroom looking for a suitcase and some clothes.

“I’m sorry, Dad!” pleaded Leila while on her knees. “I’m sorry! I’ll do better in school! I’ll get a good job! Please, don’t leave us!”

“You’re too late for redemption, honey,” said Owen as he nonchalantly packed clothing into his suitcase and rolled it out to the kitchen. “It’s not my job to save you anymore. You can be someone else’s problem now.” He pointed at Valerie and said, “And you! You’ll be hearing from my lawyer first thing in the morning. Enjoy your dinner. I’m going to get a real meal at McDonald’s.” He waved goodbye and proceeded towards the front door with his suitcase in tow.

“Goddamn you, Dad!” shouted Leila as she picked up her dinner plate and threw it across the kitchen at Owen, who ducked down in the nick of time. The plate shattered and the mashed potatoes oozed down the kitchen wall.

But instead of white hot rage, Owen smiled for the first time in forever and said, “Thanks for giving my lawyer more talking points in court. Maybe your mother will start paying ME alimony instead. Bye-bye!” He waved again and stepped outside to the sounds of screaming teenagers and sobbing wives.

The chilly night air felt heavenly on Owen’s skin. The air tasted sweeter than anything on his dinner plate. A singular tear traveled down his husky cheek. He may have weighed well over three hundred pounds, but he felt lighter than a feather. He wasn’t going to just get away from this prison of a home. He was going to fly away like a caged bird.

There was a small moment where he questioned his need for spanking Leila with a belt. But as the screams and screeches from inside grew less tolerable, he shrugged his shoulders and rolled his suitcase out to the family SUV. He figured even sleeping in the back seat would be more comfortable than any fluffy mattress shared with his soon to be ex-wife.

Rx

“I am so frickin’ bored. Nothing to do today. I guess I’ll sit around and medicate,” sang Nathan Toney as his heavy body sprawled across the living room couch. Getting off that couch was a feat of strength akin to power-lifting a small Japanese car. His eyes were glazed over like a frosted donut. The multi-colored afghan blanket did little to cover his flabby torso.

The coffee table in front him was covered in pornographic magazines and cigarette ashes. The center of this table represented his only two choices in this world: a steak knife to end his misery or a bottle of Floydicon to numb him out. Nathan gazed at the scars on his wrists with a single tear in his eye. He wanted to go through with it. He wanted any excuse he could to exit this world forever and free himself of the unnecessary pain. But the bottle of magic pills was right there in front of him.

“Eh, what the hell…I’m too lazy for this shit anyways…” said Nathan flatly as he opened the bottle and popped one of the large white tablets. Another five hour nap was on the horizon. What kind of weird ass dream would he have this time? Unicorns and rainbows? Teeth falling out? Being naked in school? But then again, who said anything about a dream?

Nathan’s eyes shot wide open and pulsated as he watched the rain outside come to a complete standstill. The drops of water just floated there and changed colors at random whether it was clear to green, green to purple, or purple to blood red. “What the fuck is this?” asked Nathan in a hushed voice. The lights flickered in his tiny apartment before completely blacking out and leaving him in the shadows. “Oh no…not this shit again…not again!”

“Yes, Mr. Toney, we’re doing this again!” belted an ophidian voice. Nathan held his sausage fingers over his eyes and slowly uncovered them to reveal a woman in a business suit with a cobra’s head and scaly green skin. The chubby depression patient shivered and cowered further into the couch while pulling the afghan under his double chin. “It was a simple offer,” the snake woman said. “You could have had a promotion. You could have been the boss’s boss. All you had to do was one small little favor for me.” That favor was clear the minute the snake boss licked her fangs.

Nathan trembled and stammered as he struggled to say, “You knew I had a family. I can’t just do that to them. I can’t go sleeping around with whoever I want!”

“What family? This family?!” shouted a scorpion woman in a nightgown with two crying daughters clinging to her legs as tightly as they could. Nathan pulled the afghan over his whole head, but the scorpion’s tail ripped it away and poked him in the bare chest. “I knew I was right to divorce you, you son of a bitch! How could you ever consider taking that whore’s offer?!” She shed bloody tears and wiped them away with her pincer. “We didn’t need the money that badly! We needed a father and a husband!”

“Man, fuck you little bitches!” shouted Nathan as he tossed the blanket aside and shot up to his feet. “I gave you all nothing but hard work and this is how you repay me?! By taking it all away and making me live in this filthy piece of shit apartment?! You’re all poison to me! Fuck you bitches! Fuck you all!”

The two crying daughters morphed into wasps and pointed their sword-like stingers at Nathan’s face, but the disgraced father wouldn’t be deterred. “We didn’t do anything!” they said in synchronized demonic voices. “We wanted you to come home with us! We never wanted this divorce to happen! We miss you! Come home with us!”

Nathan’s raging face softened into solemnity when he hugged the two wasp children and said, “I can’t come back anytime I want. Your mom changed the locks. She has an order against me. I tried to fight her in court, but she wouldn’t let me win.” The wasps poked him in the gut with their stingers and sent their father sprawling on the couch screaming in pain. “Son of a bitch!” he yelled while clutching his green bloody wound.

“So this is it, huh?” said an elderly toad woman with red slime dripping from her amphibian skin and gnashed flies between her teeth. “You’re just going to give up on your family like this? As your mother, I can’t allow that, Nathan. I raised you to be a real man and a real man takes care of his family! A real man fights for what he believes in! But if you don’t believe in your own wife and children anymore…” With one flick of her poison tongue, she captured the wasp children and devoured them while drooling a river of thick goop.

“No!” shouted Nathan. “You can’t do that! You can’t take them away from me!”

The scorpion wife, cobra boss, and toad mother spoke in unified demon voices, “We can do whatever we want to you, Nathan. You gave us permission when you walked out on us. You gave us permission when you gave up the fight. All you had to do was see a psychiatrist about your…little problem! But you couldn’t do it, could you? You didn’t have the guts to do it then and you won’t do it now!”

“Little problem…” whispered Nathan with growing fury in his voice. “Little problem?!” He pointed to his brain and roared, “You call this a little problem?! Newsflash: I’ve been living with this shit for nearly all of my fucking life and all you three bitches did was make it worse! You all did this to me! I don’t owe any responsibilities to you pieces of shit anymore!”

“Do something about it!” said the three creatures. With every repetition of that phrase, their monstrous auras grew brighter and their voices grew louder. Nathan covered his ears and crouched down to the floor, yelling for them to shut up, but they never did. They tormented him further and began to form a circle around him. They danced and sang their demonic tune while Nathan’s eyeballs were glued to the steak knife on the coffee table.

“I know what I have to do…you want me to do something about it…you’re damn right I will!” Nathan scrambled for the knife and held the jagged blade to his throat while the horrifying ladies taunted and teased him some more. He made one small incision and a tiny droplet of blood hit the carpeted floor. He made another cut and smeared even more blood on the floor.

The blade made a full on slash and the monsters around Nathan were dropping dead one by one. Their bones snapped and their own slimy blood mixed with his. Nathan struggled for oxygen, but all that would come up in his throat was his own life juices. His stomach grew queasy at the thought of his death coming so soon and he barfed up what little oxygen he had left. All that was left of Nathan Toney and his demons was a mixture of biological sludge that made chemical plant explosions seem mundane. The goopy red rain fell once more and washed them all away in the storm.

A lightning bolt flashed across the sky and awakened Nathan Toney from his drug-induced haze. He pulled his face out of the toilet and coughed profusely until he could breathe fresh oxygen once again. He gazed around with bloodshot eyes and saw that his apartment remained in the same messy state as when he first took the Floydicon. He placed his fingers to his throat and saw that a nasty scar had developed there, but it wasn’t bleeding heavily like it was in his high.

After a while of shaking heavily, Nathan steadied his body long enough to pull himself to his feet using the rim of the toilet. He limped his way out to the living room and spotted the bottle of Floydicon resting conveniently next to the steak knife. With an expression of boiling fury etched on his jowly face, Nathan marched over to the coffee table, grabbed the medication, and stomped back to the bathroom to flush the pills down the toilet.

“What kind of dip-shit takes these kinds of pills anyways?” Nathan vengefully whispered. “What kind of doctor prescribes this shit to begin with?!” He eyeballed the label on the bottle and saw that the medication was prescribed to him by Tri-Circle Enterprises, the company he used to work for. “Figures…it fucking figures!”

He discarded the bottle in the trash and marched back over to the coffee table to grab the steak knife. Instead of holding it to his throat or his wrists, he held it like a samurai warrior and gnashed his teeth together like a rabies-infected wolf. “I’m taking my family back one way or another,” Nathan vowed. “If I have to kill every last one of those motherfuckers…so be it! No more lawyers! No more judges! No more courtroom bullshit! Ass-kicking is what’s called for!”

“But first…I need to get out of these god-awful clothes…” He spent the last few days in pajama pants and a 3XL white T-shirt. The clothes had seen pizza stains, cigarette ashes, and liquor spills of the worst kind. They smelled as though he’d been shit on by a horse in the middle of a burning junkyard. He changed into fresh jeans and a red polo shirt with black combat boots on his feet. His boss always told him to dress for the job he wanted. With a steak knife tucked firmly in his back pocket, his new job was corporate assassin. He could have done this the legal way, but it didn’t take a tripped out Floydicon user to know the law was one big conspiracy against the underdogs anyways.

El Divorcio

VERSE 1

Is this the life you really want?

Is it worth the price of the ring you bought?

Is it worth the senseless fights?

Do you have to do this every night?

Starting arguments for the hell of it

Your rage and tears are irrelevant

Does any part of you want to break up?

Is it time to dry your eyes and wake up?

CHORUS

El divorcio, el divorcio

It’s all over forever and now

El divorcio, el divorcio

There is nothing to smile about

No more holding hands in public

No more kisses that are sudden

No more passionate love making

When your heart is breaking

VERSE 2

Who was right or wrong all along?

Who’s to blame for this sorrowful song?

Lawyers and judges get to decide

Who gets the gold, who gets the hearse ride

The tiring war goes on for months

It soon turns into a bounty hunt

Is this the result you really need?

Surrendering to aggravated greed?

CHORUS

El divorcio, el divorcio

It’s all over forever and now

El divorcio, el divorcio

There is nothing to smile about

No more holding hands in public

No more kisses that are sudden

No more passionate love making

When your heart is breaking

VERSE 3

Is it too late to start over again?

A newfound lover or just a friend?

A shattered dream to mend with gold?

Another soft hand to gently hold?

Is it too late to turn back the clock?

Find a shoulder to cry on and be your rock?

Are you your own hero? Can you save the day?

Or will you forever push the masses away?

BRIDGE

It’s not over until you say it’s over

Don’t be afraid to pull her closer

Don’t be afraid to say you’re sorry

Let’s start again, my precious darling

Toy Trauma

Every careful step downstairs to the kitchen sent a thunderstorm of pain across Marty Hunt’s head. He held his temples and whined “Ouch!” the entire way down. It was a slow and laborious process, but reach the bottom floor he did. Wearing only plaid pajama pants and white socks, the pain-wracked father dragged himself over to the kitchen table and sat down with a quickness.

He leaned his head all the way back and breathed a sigh of relief. No more ouches, just a nice self-head massage with sinewy fingers. The coffee pot could wait a few more minutes. Marty wanted to milk this small moment of relaxation for all it was worth. He might have even fallen asleep at the table with his head in his arms if he wanted to.

“Morning, Dad!” yelled little five-year-old Kevin. The high pitch jolted Marty awake and the thunder and lightning in his brain was going batshit crazy. The single father rubbed his temples even harder while Kevin ran around the kitchen with his favorite action figure, the beefcake barbarian Deus Shadowheart.

“I’m going to eat your soul like a bowl of cereal!” yelled Kevin in his version of a manly barbarian growl. “I shall chew your flesh like bubblegum! And I shall drink your insides like Coca-Cola!” The little son shook the Deus Shadowheart action figure in front of his father’s face and roared some more.

“Please don’t do that to me this early in the morning, Kevin. It’s been a shitty couple of months with this divorce hearing. Cut Daddy some slack today,” said Marty as he continued to massage his temples.

“I shall enslave your people and force them to make bowls of Quaker Oatmeal for the rest of their lives!” said Kevin in his warrior growl.

“Is that what this is about? You want Quaker Oatmeal? Alright, I’ll get you a bowl…”

“Silence, peasant! You shall bring me a bowl of oatmeal and put extra brown sugar in it! Raaaaaaaaaaargh!” Kevin shook the action figure in his father’s face some more, causing him to clench his eyelids as tightly as he could. No matter how many times Marty rubbed his own temples, his head would always feel like it was under Deus’ mighty fur boots. The thought of his own brain popping out sent a shiver through his body.

“What’s the matter?! Do you not like that I am king of this wasteland? Too bad! I rule with an iron fist and a big bloody battleaxe!” yelled Kevin a la Deus. In between words, Marty kept pleading with him to shut up, but the overly energetic child said, “Bow to me and my big bloody battleaxe! You cannot win, mere mortal!”

“That’s it! I’ve had it with this shit! Give me that goddamn thing!” screamed Marty as he stood up and knocked his chair over. He and his son played tug of war over the mighty toy with the little guy screaming, “No!” repeatedly at the top of his lungs. The screeching voice to Marty was like having Deus’ meat cleaver go through his skull. He felt like his brain was a hand grenade ready to go off. His heart was pumping and thumping like a barbaric war drum.

In one harsh pull, Marty yanked the toy out of his son’s hands and yelled, “I don’t like this thing! And here’s what I’m going to do with this piece of shit!” Despite Kevin’s foot stomping and repeated “No!” screams, Marty ripped Deus Shadowheart’s arms and legs off before throwing the dismantled mess across the kitchen floor.

Kevin knelt down beside his toy and cried a tearful storm over the broken remains. Marty watched on with a sorrowful guilt over what he’d done, but remained strong in the face of having to discipline his son for his ballistic behavior. The father’s defenses were knocked down a few pegs when Kevin turned his tear and snot-covered face to him and said, “I want to go live with mommy! I hate you, Dad! I hate you!”

Headache and heartache were one in the same for Marty Hunt. Every pump of blood throughout his body made him groggy with depression, yet his face maintained its angry expression as a sign of strength against such powerful words. “You can’t go back to your mother, Kevin! We had a divorce and it’s been finalized! She cheated on me with another man! She cheated on us! She’s the one who’s tearing this family apart, not me!”

Kevin stood up and rushed over to his father to pound his tiny fists into his hairy stomach. “Stop it, Kevin, you’re hurting me! Knock it off, kid!” yelled Marty. The little spitfire wouldn’t listen. He pounded harder and harder until his father’s breath was completely drained from his system.

The old man collapsed to the ground and clutched his chest in pain. His breathing was raspy and shallow as he said, “Call 9-1-1, Kevin! Hurry!” When Kevin folded his arms and refused to move, Marty let down his authoritative guard in an act of desperation. “I’m sorry!” He wheezed. “I’ll buy you a new toy! You can have any one you want!”

As Marty’s vision was fading to black, he could hear his son’s voice shout “Daddy!” as well as little footsteps scurrying across the linoleum kitchen floor. Hopefully, those footsteps were on their way to the house phone to call an ambulance. Marty didn’t even know if Kevin was physically capable of making such a call. He lost hope as his breaths grew shorter and the peace he wanted at breakfast was finally obtained. Nothing but a dull gray screen clouded his vision. No tears, no angry words, no sorrowful thoughts, just the kind of grayness one could expect from an Emergency Alert System screen.

And then the father could feel his heart beating again. Little by little, the thumping and pumping was dominating his overly sensitive ears. His heart raced a little faster with each passing second. The gray screen before him became a field of blurry shapes and lights. He had a strange plastic mask over his face and the air pressure felt overwhelming to him. Soon the blurs and lights concentrated themselves into a clear picture. He was riding in the back of an ambulance with EMT’s by his side. Even more important to him was little Kevin staring down at him with a worried look on his chubby-cheeked face.

“Kevin…Kevin, dear god. I’m so sorry about this morning. I meant what I said about the toy. Come on, little guy, just give me another chance,” said Marty, his voice weak through the plastic mask.

Little Kevin Hunt held his father’s index finger in his tiny hands and said, “I don’t care about the toy. I just want my daddy back.”

Marty’s eyes began to well up with tears and his heart rate sped up. He cursed himself mentally for being “stupid” enough to not realize it was never about toys. He made enough money at work that he could buy the entire Hasbro catalogue if he wanted to, maybe even a few collector’s items. It was love that he failed to show at breakfast time, not finances. The whole divorce proceedings with his wife were all about who loved Kevin more and in the end, Marty ended up pounding the sides of his gurney in frustration that he became the world’s biggest hypocrite.

The EMT’s tried to pin Marty’s tight arms down in an attempt to slow his skyrocketing heart rate. It was Kevin’s voice yelling, “Daddy, don’t!” that finally subdued the hypocritical father. He collapsed into the gurney bed sobbing hysterically while his son hugged him around the waist. Hugging around the chest would have been ill-advised due to Marty’s heart condition.

“Hey, Kev…” said Marty with a little more conviction. “Have I told you lately that I loved you and that you’re the best son a father could ever have?”

“Do you mean it?” asked Kevin with dewy puppy dog eyes.

“Absolutely, little guy,” said Marty. “Me? I’m just a monster…” He took a while to catch his breath before he said, “I’m the monster who’s going to have the biggest battle with Deus Shadowheart this universe has ever seen!” His throat got more hoarse and villain-like, much to Kevin’s beaming delight. “I shall unleash hordes of minions upon the barbaric wasteland and I will burn everything to ashes! Nobody is safe, not even the big badass Deus Shadowheart!”

Father and son laughed together while hugging around the waist. In all of this legal mumbo-jumbo, the one thing all three members of the Hunt family forgot to do was laugh. How such a simple gesture could change a man’s heart rate and give his burning headaches a heavenly cure. Isn’t laughing and playing what action figures and families were all about? 

"A Pedigree To Die For" by Laurien Berenson

BOOK TITLE: A Pedigree To Die For: A Melanie Travis Mystery

AUTHOR: Laurien Berenson

YEAR: 1995

GENRE: Fiction

SUBGENRE: Cozy Mystery

GRADE: Pass

Melanie Travis is a single mother who tries to balance getting her life back in order with solving the murder of her uncle Max Turnbull. The Turnbulls made their living by breeding poodles and showing them off at dog competitions. Their most prized stud, Beau, is missing from his kennel after Max’s aggravated heart attack. With her firebrand Aunt Peg coaching her along the way, Melanie shows up at the dog contests looking for evidence as to who might be in possession of the kidnapped Beau. She starts off with a bunch of hopeless dead ends, but as the mystery progresses, blackmail, corruption, and murder become much stronger themes in analyzing the clues.

When I first started reading this, I had my doubts as to whether this would be a realistic mystery due to all of the dead ends Melanie hits along the way. And then I realized that trial and error have always been a part of the mystery genre. Narrowing the suspects down to one is hard and tiring work, especially with as many enthusiastic dog show competitors as there are. Sometimes the pieces don’t click together right away. Sometimes Aunt Peg seems more like a pain in the butt than a true detective. However, if you continue reading, the plot will thicken near the middle of the book. The further you delve into this mystery, the more you want to know until the search hits its climax. That is the true nature of mystery stories and my doubts have been blasted out of the water by Laurien Berenson’s masterful storytelling techniques.

Another thing I love about this book is how realistic Melanie’s parenting skills are and how they make her into a sympathetic and likeable character right away. She’s recently divorced from her husband Bob and is left to take care of four-year-old Davey. The little guy is a bundle of energy that can keep on going like the dynamo he is. Even though Melanie is driven nuts by his ballistic behavior, she handles it like a champ and shows infinite patience for her special little guy. She knows when to tell him no and knows when to let him play and discover. She also takes him to McDonald’s every once and a while for yummy food. The fact that she can balance raising Davey by herself while solving her uncle’s murder will make any reader believe in girl power all over again.

Where would I be without mentioning the cuteness of the puppy-duppies being displayed in the pages of this wonderfully-written novel? They’re just as energetic as little Davey and show undying loyalty and love to whoever is around them. They sit on laps, they stick their wet noses into people, they smile like they’re actually capable of saying cheese, and they play around like innocent little cherubs. I wouldn’t mind scooping up some of these puppy-dups and bringing them home with me. One thing I would like to clarify is that you’ll hear the words “stud” and “bitch” quite liberally in this book. They’re not meant to refer to sexually active men and nasty women respectively, but rather to the gender of the dogs and whether or not they’ll be used for breeding. Try not to laugh when you hear about a “stud servicing many bitches.” It doesn’t mean what you think it means. You can laugh a little bit, but do try to contain yourself. It’s a cozy mystery, after all, not an erotic romance.

The pacing of this book is smooth and steady. As a reader, you can get inside Melanie Travis’ head, process the clues she picks up, and sense the body language of others while maintaining a reasonable speed. No purple prose here, which is probably the wisest option if you’re going to write a mystery novel. It also helps that the clues are easy to put together and that the explanations don’t take too many lines of text. Many avid readers could probably blow through this book in twenty-four hours. Even with its slick reading pace, it doesn’t feel over too soon and it’s a complete story with no stone left unturned. That’s the best kind of mystery you could ask for from an author like Laurien Berenson.

Maybe this isn’t the most life-changing book you’ll ever read, but it’s definitely a fun-filled, well-thought-out story that will keep you entertained from cover to cover. If you like dogs, strong female characters, or murder mysteries, I’m sure this book will have something to your liking. I happen to like all three of those qualities, so I enjoyed the book very much. A passing grade goes to an author I’ll definitely want to read another book from. Congratulations on a successful debut of Melanie Travis!

Giving Up On Romance

VERSE 1
An army of girl crushes narrowed down to one
High speed chases have never been so much fun
The diamond ring that costs god knows how much
The divorce bill from the one you couldn’t trust
Broken and alone is what you’ve truly become
Liberty for your ex and only justice for some
Do you remember the fun times you’ve had?
Or does the stinging pain just hurt so damn bad?

CHORUS 1
Giving up on romance!
Never stood a single chance!
Giving up on romance!
This will be your final dance!

VERSE 2
Sex education says to wait until you’re married
How can that be when you’re dead and buried?
How does a broken heart heal instantaneously?
How do you know she’s feeling simultaneously?
Sell that golden ring for a hundred million bucks
Tell the whole world you don’t give two fucks
Everyone I know is tired of all the fights for two
Once everything is done, there’s one thing left to do

CHORUS 2
Giving up on romance!
Tighten that belt around your pants!
Giving up on romance!
Let them know your final stance!

VERSE 3
The army of crushes has been taken down to zero
There are only villains left, none of them are heroes
Your knight in shining armor has blood on his sword
Your fairytale princess has been taken by the horde
Romantic fiction is a statement so damn repetitive
One hundred other suitors feel so damn competitive
This is not your fight and she is not your prize
If you’re blinded by beauty, then just open your eyes

CHORUS 3
Giving up on romance!
Sick of being in a fucking trance!
Giving up on romance!
I could go on with a hundred rants!
Chugging alcohol!
Bouncing off the padded walls!
Crashing on the bed!
This stone cold heart is dead!

Cheaters

TV SHOW TITLE: Cheaters

CREATOR: Bobby Goldstein

YEARS ACTIVE: 2000-present

GENRE: Reality Television

RATING: TV-14 for language, sexual content, and mild violence

GRADE: Mixed

Deep in the heart of Texas, the Cheaters Private Investigators go undercover as they try to catch their clients’ significant others cheating on their relationship with other partners. Each “story” starts with the client giving a brief description of his or her relationship issues and then the PI’s go on a camera stakeout of the cheating partner’s whereabouts.

After seeing the footage of infidelity, the client then is given the choice to confront his or her cheating paramour, to which they always say “yes”. Every confrontation is nasty, violent, and laced with censored swear words.

Let’s face it, the confrontations are the only real reason anybody watches the show. We like action and WWE and UFC won’t always come through for us. Unlike those two organizations, the fights on Cheaters aren’t even close to being graceful or athletic. Sometimes it’s a slap fight. Sometimes drinks are thrown. Most of the time, people just roll around on top of each other and throw haymakers.

It’s not Jackie Chan cinema, but it’s entertaining to watch nonetheless. It’s even more entertaining when these fights end up in the favor of the clients and not the cheating bastards he or she is confronting.

But sometimes it doesn’t always work out for the client and he or she gets an undeserved verbal or physical beat down. The reason this show gets a mixed grade is because the injustices happen way too often. One example is with the Trevor Olson case, where Trevor was really skinny and his girlfriend’s lover Sean was this hulking behemoth. Guess who won the shoving matches while having an over-inflated ego about it? That’s right: Sean.

The most infamous example of romantic injustice was with the Lily Santiago case, where the cheating husband shouted curses at her and the female paramour beat the crap out of her on live TV. Despite the mountain of evidence Lily had against her husband in a potential divorce case, the husband still had a massive ego and was still verbally abusive, which led me to believe he might have won the case.

Another issue that needs to be touched on is the revolving door of hosts for the show. First it was an unexciting bore named Tommy Grand. And then we had Joey Greco, who was full of puns, delightfully condescending to the cheating party, and protective and valiant toward his clients. Joey was such an awesome host that he got to do the show for a little over a decade before his hosting duties were turned over to Clark Gable III.

No, you didn’t read that wrong. The grandson of famous actor Clark Gable is now doing an unsophisticated piece of television called Cheaters. During the first season he did, Clark raised his voice and was generally annoying to listen to. The following seasons, he was too laidback and had no passion for his duties whatsoever. Maybe instead of asking “Scooby-Doo, where are you?!”, we should pose that question to Joey Greco.

In spite of the mixed grade I give this show, I continued to watch it with religious zeal. It was my Saturday night ritual: watching Cheaters with my best friend Susan as the two of us make fun of the dumb characters. We also like to poke fun at the commercials for Belviq that come on during the show, where the actors seem overly confused about their eating habits and then all of the sudden have an overactive social life after taking the pills.

This WAS our Saturday night ritual and then for some reason, Joe TV, a local Seattle channel, decided to stop showing Cheaters. My Roku won’t come through for me either. To say I’m having Cheaters withdrawal is an understatement. Come back, guys! Come back! I’ll raise your grade to Extra Credit if you do! I promise! Scout’s honor, even though I’m not a Boy Scout.