Chapter One: Little Ovella gets 'tapped
Little Ovella had been acting up all day. According to Buddy, Momma's current live-in love interest, Little Ovella had "...right pissed me off". Buddy was a gap-toothed, beer-guzzling, tobacco-chewing, pot-smoking man-boy who drove a muddy 4x4 monster pick-up that smelled vaguely of blowback and stale Redman, with several questionable plastic bottles of what-looked-like Diet Coke tossed willy-nilly in the cab.
Little Ovella didn't approve of the way most of Momma's boyfriends treated Momma like she smelled funny, but she had to admit that Buddy seemed to really be in love with Momma. Little Ovella thought it was so sweet the way he switched from Marlboro Reds to Salem Lights 100's, Momma's brand, just so's he wouldn't have to go out and buy his own cigarettes. That gave him more time to spend on the sofa, watching the TV and baby-sitting Little Ovella while Momma tried to advance her career down to the SOAK-N-SUDS 24-Hour Coin-Operated Laundromat and Package Store. Momma started working there when Little Ovella was just a lump in her stomach ("I thought you was cancer", Momma always teased Little Ovella after she'd downed a double-shot of Tequila and licked lumpy salt and lime juice off her good thumb). Little Ovella swore that when she was almost old enough to drink, she would try to be more lady-like and lick the salt and lime juice off her pinky.
Little Ovella was not sure what she had done to make Buddy "right pissed off", but she was sure it had something to do with the blood-curdling scream she let out when the little black-boy-who-lived-next-door showed her his thing. It wasn't her fault. She had never seen one before, or if she had, it couldn't have been that big, that thick or that black. Anyhow, she must have interrupted Buddy's 8-hour nap, or a rerun of his favorite show on the HBO, "OZ". Buddy swore that Christopher Meloni had actually once served time, like Buddy his own self, just by the way he pissed into a bucket in his make-believe jail cell. "Ain't no way a man can hit a bucket like that without spilling a drop," Buddy said, "not 'less he's been incar-cim-erated hisself". Little Ovella politely declined to mention the puddle of piss she routinely found next to the toilet after one of Buddy's all-night Budweiser binges. She thought it best to remain impartial in case she ever served on a petit jury charged with convicting jobless stoners of toilet abuse.
The little black-boy-who-lived-next-door had innocently showed Little Ovella his Haitian great- great-grand-momma's thumb, cut off by the Haitian mafia after she was tortured into admitting she plagiarized Harriet Beecher-Stowe's classic "Uncle Toms' Cabin" as a French-language musical called "La Cabine d'Oncle Tom". The musical, an instant success, had taken Haiti by storm during the sugar-cane harvest of 1933 (much like hurricane Ivan). The Haitian mafia (or MA-HAI, their nom-préféré) struck a deal with Ms. Beecher-Stowe that gave them exclusive distribution rights in the Western Antilles in exchange for not using the ancient art of voodoo to turn her into a white woman. MA-HAI lost millions of Gourdes (even at the current exchange rate of 1 Haitian Gourde = $0.0259 U.S. Dollar, that’s a lot of do-re-mi to the average Haitian) when Beecher-Stowe’s estate did not share the royalties it received after her novel was used in a segment of Rodger’s and Hammerstein’s “The King and I” on stage and screen, which was in turn adapted (with a much bigger budget) as "Anna and the King" with Jodie Foster playing the non-singing role of English white girl fucks bald-headed Asian man because he owns Thailand, and because the food is so good! , and Chow Yun-Fat playing the non-singing role of the only Asian actor to penetrate the lesbian Jodie Foster. The little black-boy-who-lived next-door's great-great-grand-momma had committed the ultimate crime of forgetting to pay off the Haitian mafia kingpin, Napoleon "Baby Coq" DuBois. "Baby Coq" had the poor woman tortured until she admitted the truth. So she could never write again, her big, thick, black thumb was snipped off faster than a skin-tab on Merv Griffin's ass. The little-black-boy-next-door’s family saved the thumb in wax paper, and passed it down from generation to generation as a reminder of how much you have to suffer to write a decent musical.
Personally, Little Ovella thought Jodie got gypped when she didn’t receive an Oscar nomination for "Anna and the King". She was of the opinion that the Oscars for "The Accused" and "The Silence of the Lambs" were both sympathy-Oscars for her stellar work in "Bugsy Malone", which excused the Academy from ever acknowledging Jodie again, at least, not until she died or came out of the closet.
The blood-curdling scream woke Buddy from a crazy, mixed-up dream where he was Christopher Meloni's puppet, or bucket, or something with an "et" on the end. Buddy ran to see who was a-screamin', and when he saw Little Ovella, he mustered a monstrous shit-eating grin, even though he didn't eat shit as far as little Ovella was aware, although she had to admit his gums were starting to recede just a little. Buddy bared his gap-teeth and said, “When your Momma gets home, Whirly-Girly,” that's what he called her when she was acting up, “you’re gonna get 'tapped!” and stumbled back into the trailer.
The little black-boy-who-lived-next-door, whose name was Thatcher, quickly rewrapped his great-great-grand-momma’s big, thick, black thumb and took off like the Haitian mafia was after him. Little Ovella was alone now, with time to ponder her predicament.
It’s not that she minded being ‘tapped. In fact, sometimes it was the only way she could get a full night’s sleep, what with Buddy snoring and Momma making air biscuits all night on account of her lactose intolerance and addiction to microwaved Velveeta nachos after she’d downed double-shots of Tequila and then switched to White Russians made with heavy cream.
What bothered Little Ovella the most was knowing that she was being ‘tapped because she had been a bad little girl. She tried, she really tried to be less nerve-wracking for Momma and Buddy, but the pressures of living in the Tremont Mobile Home Park and Auto Court on Highway 12 in Walla Walla, Washington sometimes got to her, and she acted up. Momma and Buddy often gave her Dimetapp, or ‘tapped her, to get her to unwind and go to sleep like a good little girl.
Little Ovella hoped that Dimetapp had been on sale this week at Wal-Mart. Even though the generic cost less, she liked the real McCoy. It made her feel like the richest girls in the world, Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen, when she took the name brand. Besides, she liked the pretty purple color of the real Dimetapp. The generic was a boring eggshell white, so she always swallowed it quickly. On the rare occasion that Dimetapp was on sale, or Momma had a coupon, she sometimes pretended to swallow the pill in front of Momma and Buddy, but kept it in her mouth and sucked on it until her teeth and gums turned purple. It tasted bitter, but Little Ovella had swallowed a lot of bitter pills in her seven years on this earth.
Momma’s 1982 Chrysler K-Car pulled up in front of the trailer right on schedule, at five minutes past one in the morning. Momma finished up at the SOAK-N-SUDS 24-Hour Coin-Operated Laundromat and Package Store at midnight, but hung around for a few shift drinks afterwards. Momma was proud of her negotiating skills when she got the job. In lieu of a shift differential for working the second shift, she’d talked the owner into giving her all the free drinks she could handle in one hour. She always left promptly at one a.m., making the five-mile drive in exactly five minutes. Little Ovella admired Momma’s punctuality. Since it was almost bedtime anyway, Little Ovella thought it was as good a time as any to take a Dimetapp. She sighed, waved to Momma, and ran inside and prepared to be ‘tapped.
Little Ovella didn't approve of the way most of Momma's boyfriends treated Momma like she smelled funny, but she had to admit that Buddy seemed to really be in love with Momma. Little Ovella thought it was so sweet the way he switched from Marlboro Reds to Salem Lights 100's, Momma's brand, just so's he wouldn't have to go out and buy his own cigarettes. That gave him more time to spend on the sofa, watching the TV and baby-sitting Little Ovella while Momma tried to advance her career down to the SOAK-N-SUDS 24-Hour Coin-Operated Laundromat and Package Store. Momma started working there when Little Ovella was just a lump in her stomach ("I thought you was cancer", Momma always teased Little Ovella after she'd downed a double-shot of Tequila and licked lumpy salt and lime juice off her good thumb). Little Ovella swore that when she was almost old enough to drink, she would try to be more lady-like and lick the salt and lime juice off her pinky.
Little Ovella was not sure what she had done to make Buddy "right pissed off", but she was sure it had something to do with the blood-curdling scream she let out when the little black-boy-who-lived-next-door showed her his thing. It wasn't her fault. She had never seen one before, or if she had, it couldn't have been that big, that thick or that black. Anyhow, she must have interrupted Buddy's 8-hour nap, or a rerun of his favorite show on the HBO, "OZ". Buddy swore that Christopher Meloni had actually once served time, like Buddy his own self, just by the way he pissed into a bucket in his make-believe jail cell. "Ain't no way a man can hit a bucket like that without spilling a drop," Buddy said, "not 'less he's been incar-cim-erated hisself". Little Ovella politely declined to mention the puddle of piss she routinely found next to the toilet after one of Buddy's all-night Budweiser binges. She thought it best to remain impartial in case she ever served on a petit jury charged with convicting jobless stoners of toilet abuse.
The little black-boy-who-lived-next-door had innocently showed Little Ovella his Haitian great- great-grand-momma's thumb, cut off by the Haitian mafia after she was tortured into admitting she plagiarized Harriet Beecher-Stowe's classic "Uncle Toms' Cabin" as a French-language musical called "La Cabine d'Oncle Tom". The musical, an instant success, had taken Haiti by storm during the sugar-cane harvest of 1933 (much like hurricane Ivan). The Haitian mafia (or MA-HAI, their nom-préféré) struck a deal with Ms. Beecher-Stowe that gave them exclusive distribution rights in the Western Antilles in exchange for not using the ancient art of voodoo to turn her into a white woman. MA-HAI lost millions of Gourdes (even at the current exchange rate of 1 Haitian Gourde = $0.0259 U.S. Dollar, that’s a lot of do-re-mi to the average Haitian) when Beecher-Stowe’s estate did not share the royalties it received after her novel was used in a segment of Rodger’s and Hammerstein’s “The King and I” on stage and screen, which was in turn adapted (with a much bigger budget) as "Anna and the King" with Jodie Foster playing the non-singing role of English white girl fucks bald-headed Asian man because he owns Thailand, and because the food is so good! , and Chow Yun-Fat playing the non-singing role of the only Asian actor to penetrate the lesbian Jodie Foster. The little black-boy-who-lived next-door's great-great-grand-momma had committed the ultimate crime of forgetting to pay off the Haitian mafia kingpin, Napoleon "Baby Coq" DuBois. "Baby Coq" had the poor woman tortured until she admitted the truth. So she could never write again, her big, thick, black thumb was snipped off faster than a skin-tab on Merv Griffin's ass. The little-black-boy-next-door’s family saved the thumb in wax paper, and passed it down from generation to generation as a reminder of how much you have to suffer to write a decent musical.
Personally, Little Ovella thought Jodie got gypped when she didn’t receive an Oscar nomination for "Anna and the King". She was of the opinion that the Oscars for "The Accused" and "The Silence of the Lambs" were both sympathy-Oscars for her stellar work in "Bugsy Malone", which excused the Academy from ever acknowledging Jodie again, at least, not until she died or came out of the closet.
The blood-curdling scream woke Buddy from a crazy, mixed-up dream where he was Christopher Meloni's puppet, or bucket, or something with an "et" on the end. Buddy ran to see who was a-screamin', and when he saw Little Ovella, he mustered a monstrous shit-eating grin, even though he didn't eat shit as far as little Ovella was aware, although she had to admit his gums were starting to recede just a little. Buddy bared his gap-teeth and said, “When your Momma gets home, Whirly-Girly,” that's what he called her when she was acting up, “you’re gonna get 'tapped!” and stumbled back into the trailer.
The little black-boy-who-lived-next-door, whose name was Thatcher, quickly rewrapped his great-great-grand-momma’s big, thick, black thumb and took off like the Haitian mafia was after him. Little Ovella was alone now, with time to ponder her predicament.
It’s not that she minded being ‘tapped. In fact, sometimes it was the only way she could get a full night’s sleep, what with Buddy snoring and Momma making air biscuits all night on account of her lactose intolerance and addiction to microwaved Velveeta nachos after she’d downed double-shots of Tequila and then switched to White Russians made with heavy cream.
What bothered Little Ovella the most was knowing that she was being ‘tapped because she had been a bad little girl. She tried, she really tried to be less nerve-wracking for Momma and Buddy, but the pressures of living in the Tremont Mobile Home Park and Auto Court on Highway 12 in Walla Walla, Washington sometimes got to her, and she acted up. Momma and Buddy often gave her Dimetapp, or ‘tapped her, to get her to unwind and go to sleep like a good little girl.
Little Ovella hoped that Dimetapp had been on sale this week at Wal-Mart. Even though the generic cost less, she liked the real McCoy. It made her feel like the richest girls in the world, Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen, when she took the name brand. Besides, she liked the pretty purple color of the real Dimetapp. The generic was a boring eggshell white, so she always swallowed it quickly. On the rare occasion that Dimetapp was on sale, or Momma had a coupon, she sometimes pretended to swallow the pill in front of Momma and Buddy, but kept it in her mouth and sucked on it until her teeth and gums turned purple. It tasted bitter, but Little Ovella had swallowed a lot of bitter pills in her seven years on this earth.
Momma’s 1982 Chrysler K-Car pulled up in front of the trailer right on schedule, at five minutes past one in the morning. Momma finished up at the SOAK-N-SUDS 24-Hour Coin-Operated Laundromat and Package Store at midnight, but hung around for a few shift drinks afterwards. Momma was proud of her negotiating skills when she got the job. In lieu of a shift differential for working the second shift, she’d talked the owner into giving her all the free drinks she could handle in one hour. She always left promptly at one a.m., making the five-mile drive in exactly five minutes. Little Ovella admired Momma’s punctuality. Since it was almost bedtime anyway, Little Ovella thought it was as good a time as any to take a Dimetapp. She sighed, waved to Momma, and ran inside and prepared to be ‘tapped.
posted by bob m at 9:24 PM
2 Comments:
i can't wait to get out of work-and tap my own self!
Make sure you buy the real McCoy, and send me a pic of your purple gums and mouth!
Thanks for writing!
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