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20

-¡He is not your father! -Screamed a new Dr. Berger, who had just arrived, and arrived with a freaking gorilla-. ¡He’s a teepee! ¡No! ¡He’s a wigwam! ¡No! ¡He’s a teepee!

-¡He’s two tents! -Charlie couldn’t resist a straight line, let alone a whole string of ‘em.

-He’s one of my experiments gone wrong -The newish Dr. Berger continued, putting his arm around his gorilla friend’s shoulders-. ¡Don’t touch him or you’ll be instantly incinerated!

You’re the experiment gone fucked -One of the Dr. Bergers - the one with the hatchet raised over his head - said.

Margaret and Charlie were mesmerized and paralyzed and also really, really bored and hungry.

-I could eat an otter -Charlie said.

-¡Kids! ¿¡What the heck have you been doing?! -Mrs. Berger exclaimed, absent-mindedly taking one of the Dr. Berger’s’s penis in her hand and started stroking it.

-¿¡What the heck are you doing?! -Margaret exclaimed back, putting her hands over Charlie’s eyes.

Charlie, who couldn’t’ see, didn’t know how to talk when he couldn’t see.

-I... can’t see... I cant sing -He said finally when Margaret lifted her hands.

“¿What did he just say?”, Margaret said to her self, advertising that everything was going to crap.

-¡Gimme some destruction! -Screamed the Dr. Berger with the hatchet, looking, for all appearances, like a copy of a copy of Dr. Berger.

And a bad copy. One of the plants reached out and took the hatchet from his... uh... its hand. And now the serpentine lions were in the house.

Everything was turning green and surreal.

-¡Gimme back my ax! -The ax-less Dr. Berger cried, arms still raised over his head-. ¡That’s not yours, numb-nuts!

-¡Give me some destruction! -Another Dr. Berger copy copied. That was the problem with cloning - no original thoughts. And just when you thought that the bull crap would be piled to the ceiling, the bathroom’s blinding white lights all went on at once.

“Daddy never turns on all the lights for us -Margaret thought-. Charlie and I have to use a dank, dark porta-potty like idiots. And now his blasting bright lights in a real bathroom is just one more reason I hate my father... ¡and my mother!”

“And, come to think of it... ¡Everybody!”

“Who else do I hate?” She axed her self, trying to think of who had fucked her over besides her entire family. She came up with: a giraffe at the Brookfield Zoo and those fucking air traffic controllers.”

“¿Who else do I hate?”

Margaret screamed in desperation as she realized that she also hated trying to figure out which of the imposters was her real, bastard dad.

These thoughts moved through her brain like a hamster through a Habitrail, like white through rice, like stink through shit.

   

-¡Give me the tv remote! -Margaret screamed. One of the Dr. Berger’s was holding the remote control over his or its head-. ¡Give it to me, you miserable motherfucker!

-¡Margaret, please! -Mrs. Berger said-. ¡Your language!

Mrs. Berger had become accustomed to the psycho-babble of the notary public, and now she was being terrorized by tongue-twisting teenager.

One of the Dr. Bergers slid over near the plants and snatched back his ax.

-¡The devil is in all of you! -He screamed-. ¡I don’t know what you were worrying about, but being horribly ax-murdered is going to be the least of your worries!

He screamed all of this and then he implored them to scratch the middle of his back.

-¡It’s fucking killing me! And the hatchet doesn’t reach it.

Margaret pretended she was going to scratch its back, and then she grabbed the ax:

-¡Gimme that goddamn hatchet, George Washington! ¡I’m going to permanently chop you into donkey mess!

-¡Goodness gracious! -The periodontist screamed-. ¡I can’t get over on anyone! ¡This is fucked up! -And then he looked at Margaret and screamed-: ¡Damn you to hell!

Margaret vacillated.

-¡¿Damn me to hell?! ¡Damn you to hell! -The Kentucky Fried contrarian countered.

Then she turned to her mother-: ¿What did you say about language, you silly old twat?

Mrs. Berger couldn’t believe her hearing aid. It was on, but everything was coming in fucked up.

-I... I don’t remember.

-Princess, don’t listen to that old hag anyway -One of the Dr. Bergers said with the alacrity of Imelda Marcos.

“¡He called me Princess”, Margaret said to her self. “I like this dad best”.

None of those other “dads” had called her shit.

“¿Does this mean that all of the other Dr. Berger’s are my dad?” Margaret “reasoned”.

-¡Margaret, damn you to hell! -It was getting to be embarrassing.

-¡Do overs! -Margaret was getting desperate-. ¡¿Everyone?! ¡Let’s start over!

-It’s too late to start over -The Dr. Berger who was against starting over said-. And... it’s dangerous. You heard me, motherfuckers: ¡dangerous!

-¡Do overs! -Margaret had pressed her “repeat” button, in a desperate ploy not to “deal”.

¿Which was the actual dad?

¿Which? ¿Which? ¿Which? ¿Whi...?

¡Oh, fuck it!

Everyone’s eyes were spinning in everyone’s heads. It looked like a convention of walking dead slot machine salesmen. It was this that gave Margaret an idea.

-There’s an old Navajo Indian code talker down the street -She said-. He can figure this out. ¡Go get him!

Charlie, obedient as always, instead ran around in circles like the yil-doi he was.

-¡Hey, no one ye-tsans me, tkele-cho-g!

Margaret pointed with her eyes at the hatchets he held over her head and started screaming in Navajo.

-¡Margaret, gimme the ax! -Insisted the Dr. Berger who was for Margaret giving him the hatchet.

-Margaret, ¿what the fuck? -Charlie asked from a lack of understanding the basic tenets of terrorism.

-I have an idea -Margaret responded-. That’s the fuck.

And she grabbed a Dr. Berger - the one that was being grabbed by Margaret - and swung the hatchet into his nether regions.

      -- on to chapter 21   or   back to the Bathroom --