The Cab Driving Terrier

-So, ¿what’re ya gonna do with him, Dad? He can’t sing. He can’t “trip the light fantastic”. He can’t even “shake his booty”.

-Don’t worry about it, Mike -My dad sure was a condescending prick sometimes-. I already know what I’m going to do with him. ¿Did you expect less from the man who gave you the Museum of Misery and Hysteria? I’m gonna have him eviscerated and served up as Matzo Ball Soup. It will be a fine addition to the museum’s Misery Menu.

Dad sure was a brazen and seamy – as well as a condescending - little prick. Carly was more of a condescending little cunt. There was no denying the dad influence there.

-Let’s go pry him open now -Dad said, sensing fear-. Just think: we could pry him open, eviscerate him, open the museum and hand out free Entrails o’ Jackass to everyone.

Even Carly thought that extreme.

-He was a disagreeable maggot.

-Let’s make him a dead, disagreeable maggot -I was my dad’s son and my sister’s something.

Dad yawned.

-Wait until I tell your dead Uncle Basil’s will all about this. I’ve been throwing salad at it, but tonight I’m setting it on fire, and putting it out with “Entrails by Tom”.

-¡Mr. Conway! -A sound was coming from the museum’s front door-. Mr. Conway, I’m Stanley, mundane and boring Stanley.

Stanley was not only mundane and boring, he was exceedingly trite and annoying.

I looked at Dad, like “Get rid of this jackass”. Dad looked at Carly, like “Carly, get rid of this asshole”. Carly looked at me, like “¿Why are you staring like that?” The three of us were incoherent and useless. But at least our Porsches were all being polished by a soon-to-be-eviscerated knighted cowboy.

We all turned and ran at Stanley like he was a human popsicle with headlights.

-¡¿What the fuck?! -I was looking at an enormous coffin that stood where Stanley once stood. It had red letters that said “Fuck... you... idiots” ¿Fuck you idiots? ¡That bastard Stanley! It was Stanley and his type that made me pour coffee down my gullet like I was Arnold Schwarzenegger opening his wallet for payola-. ¿Who sent this shit?

-I don’t know -Dad somehow knew the appropriate response. His usual, automated response was “¿Who the fuck cares?” Ya gotta hand it to dad - the walking sack of shit could throw you a curve ball every once in a while. Anyone who opens a museum of misery and hysteria - on Fear Street no less - and moves his family into the basement - has got seriously brass balls.

It was a concept I’d contemplated too many times: clanking Dad’s brass balls like those clickety-clack desk things from the 70’s.

We pulled the coffin into the museum and opened it. It was full of corrugated paper llamas.

-I don’t get it... -Carly was dumber than a lab rat-. I thought it would be something cool. I didn’t think it would be a bunch of corrugated llamas. That’s fucked-up.

-Usually I’d say “Shut the fuck up, Carly” -Dad was insisting on being profound-. But I would’ve been leaving off “¡You stupid cunt!” -He said this and I thought even the paper llamas would start laughing.

We all continued breathing.

I was gonna ask Dad where he borrowed the brass to talk like that, but, hey, every dad knows they can beat-down their kids whenever and however they want.

So I lightened up.

Seriously, ¿maybe this was a casket for a ferocious man-eating styptic pencil? Or it might hold cold goo and human feces - Dad’s favorites. Or it could hold more purple charcoal, asbestos and baby seals.

Dad turned and kicked me in the balls. Everything went white.

-¿What is this? -He was such a fucked-up cynic that he didn’t know he was holding an envelope-. ¿Fan mail from some fuckhead?

-It’s an envelope.

I was seeing white, but I knew that was Carly, and I also knew those were her last words and testaments.

But before Dad could kill Carly, or pummel her into compliance, a strange thing occurred.

Nothing.

Well, at least none of the old, ultra-violence.

-It’s a note from your dead Uncle Basil’s will -Dad said solemnly.

-¿What? -Carly and I had never learned when to shut up-. ¿His freaking will is sending us notes? ¿What next? ¿It’s gonna make our dentist appointments?

I saw dad raise his hand, but this time to the heavens, asking for help.

-¿What does it say? -Carly asked.

I grabbed the envelope from Dad and opened it. And fuck me if I didn’t get away with it.

-It says: “Dear Barnaby Jones, Mannix and Kojak. I hope you’re all still on television as the Spanish Armada is no longer up to its old tricks. I don’t know if you all know this, but, my nephew and his family are the biggest jackasses this side of Manimal. I am not shitting you. ¿¡Are you fucking listening?!”

Man, Uncle Basil’s will was out of hand.