Fungo Summer 4

Fungo Summer 4: Baal

Danny Dale Dennis slowed his Newgo so to not pass the tiny, black on white, hand-painted Lonesome Dive sign planted amongst weeds and grasses. The Lone Dive sat on the corner of two seldom-used roads and no credible marketing consultant would ever recommend this location. Being over eleven miles from the next-closest watering hole did provide a compensating advantage, however.

Danny Dale pulled into the clay and gravel parking lot and spotted his cousin Ben’s matching white Newgo, the only other car on the lot. He pulled in next to his cousin who was parked close to the front door. Ben immediately ejected and moved unusually fast meet Danny Dale on his driver side.

“Let’s go inside,” Ben blurted out as soon as the window was rolled down.

“Can’t we talk right here?”

“No. I know the bartender. We go in, order two Cokes, sit at a booth and we both leave happy.”

“Are you sure this place is open?”

“No. They don’t open for another hour. Which is why we came here at this time. The bartender is a friend of mine.”

“We could have met at my house!” Danny Dale stated with a shade of anger.

“You will thank me later, Three D.”

Danny Dale pout-slammed his door behind him. Ben hopped and skipped to the front door and opened it for his cousin.

The barroom was predictably dark. Pool table. Games. Tables, booths, chairs. Most of the west wall was consumed by a painted plywood bar. To the left of the bar were the two washrooms. To the right was the kitchen. The bewhiskered barkeep dressed in a black pocket t-shirt stood with hands resting on the counter.

“Two Cokes, Steverino,” Ben yelled from across the room.  The bartender silently placed two cans on the counter, exited the bar and entered the kitchen. As soon as he exited, two large men emerged from the kitchen.

The larger man, who Danny Dale estimated to be six foot seven and who was almost as wide, planted himself at the kitchen end of the bar and crossed his arms. The smaller man, who was a few inches shorter and more beefy than muscular, walked behind the bar and exited to Danny Dale’s left. He too, struck a cross-armed pose.

Danny Dale had not yet cracked his Coke when he heard a noise behind him. A trio that spanned age race and girth entered the front door. His heart jerked when he saw the smaller, middle-aged white man bolt the door. A swarthy thirty something bloke calmly approached Ben and gently clasped his arm. “Come on,” he said gently.

 Ben jumped from his barstool and accompanied the man as unhesitantly as a groomsman to a bridesmaid; He held his head down, not even looking in his cousin’s direction. Danny Dale watched the couple exit and turned to face the two patrons who stood behind him.

“Hands on the counter!” a rotund, charcoal-skinned commanded in an ursine voice. Danny Dale did ask for credentials. He slowly placed his arms on the bar and tried to make sense of what was happening. Bunyanesque hands frisked him and removed his wallet, his keys and his phone and placed them in a plastic bag that read “Patient Belongings.”

“Now remove your boots,” the black man growled.

“I have a knife in my left…”

“Remove your boots.”

Danny Dale sat in a chair placed by itself ten feet from the bar. He methodically removed his left boot, and then his right. He glanced up at the shaved black head that stared back at him through something that resembled welding goggles. The gargant turned his gaze to the inside of Danny Dale’s left boot, where he had concealed his blade. He left the knife in its sheath and placed both boots in a second hospital bag. “You’ll get these back if you’re a good boy,” he said in summary. He then placed both bags behind the bar and returned to stand behind Danny Dale’s chair.

On cue all four men removed their windbreakers and folded them in unison. Windbreakers on a Tennessee morning? Who but the police…and suddenly a uniform came into focus! Danny Dale gasped. These were not police. These were members of The Club.

The Club! The most feared gang on Planet Earth. The Club! Founded by a man named Stuart Garfield but who was always referred to as Baal. The Club billed itself as the one percent of the one percent.

They were not the biggest motorcycle gang. They did not use their brand name to sell t-shirts and tote bags. They were not the most famous but they were the most notorious.

Baal had originally called his two wheel thugs, Satan’s Sadists. Then he learned that was the title of an old cheesy biker movie. He tried all sorts of monikers referencing dark forces and pain infliction only to find that another bike gang or worse yet, a death metal band, had already staked their claim. Not wanting to invite comparison with a lesser gang or a bunch of pansy rockers, Baal decided to call his fraternity, The Club, the informal name they had used all along.

Under the Ace of Clubs Flag, Baal broke all of the old biker rules and conventions. He let it be known that membership was open to all races and ethnicities. He would further thumb his nose at the iron horse establishment by allowing Japanese and European bikes. They would expand their interest to include ATV’s, willing to traverse mountain and swamp and to boldly go where no Harley had gone before.

In addition to setting high and measurable standards in fighting and mechanics and criminality, in addition to their ongoing tests of courage and loyalty, The Club had one standard that set them apart from other organizations. Each member had to enjoy perpetrating pain and suffering on people and animals and they had to display their passion on an ongoing basis.  

A brief, noxious silence filled the barroom. Then, the kitchen door swung open and a small, middle-aged man with black and gray hair emerged. Danny Dale immediately recognized that the new arrival was also wearing The Club colors, the originally white vests that did not hide blood stains and featured all sorts of patches involving cartoonish dogs and cats and women.  The older man approached with monkish silence and positioned himself on an invisible mark.

“Good morning, Mr. Dennis,” the serious face stated clearly. It was then that Danny Dale recognized the man standing an arm’s length away. It was Baal! He had aged since the last mug shot that news sites displayed, but yes, it was Baal.

“Good morning,” Danny Dale replied.

Dramatically removing a phone from beneath his vest, he glanced at the screen and showed it to Danny Dale. “Do you recognize this house?” he asked in a soft voice.

“Yes,” Danny Dale replied.

“Who lives there?”

“My mother.”

“And who lives here?”

“My father.”

“Actually, the house is in your stepmother’s name,” Baal said with an air of confrontation. Danny Dale refused to acknowledge kinship with his father’s second, third or fourth wife.

“Who is this?” Baal continued.

“My nephew,” Danny Dale said with a dry throat. “He’s like nine,” he added. It was then that Danny Dale noticed the loose=hanging necklace that draped around against his inquisitor’s breast. Teeth! He squirmed in his seat and looked closer. Yes, those were definitely of human origin.

Baal concluded the slideshow with a series of questions. “Does your wife think Dr. Riegel is a good doctor?” “Does your stepson like Dr. Tallman?” “When the time comes, will you bury Queenie in the backyard?”

Danny Dale answered the inquiries with brief responses. His eyes were glued to the bracelet. There was blood on those teeth. Dirty, dried blood that had turned brown.

“Your employer will ask you to sign a series of affidavits disavowing the contents of the news reports. You will sign whatever is put in front of you.”

“I already signed affidavits for the reporters,” Danny Dale whimpered.

“I am not surprised.”

“If I contradict that affidavit, I can be charged with perjury.”

“You signed them under duress.”

“What duress?”

Baal moved close enough to touch noses. “Duress,” he said slowly and deliberately. He then moved away and told Danny Dale to pay attention because there would be no written instructions. Specifically he told them what to say to a grand jury.

You and your coworkers joked about a confession machine but they did not believe that one really existed. There were three dimensional gaming headsets now on the market and the inmates were sometimes allowed to wear them. When in doubt, say you cannot recall. We will review the transcripts.

Baal dragged a chair and placed it perpendicular in a close but not crowding distance.”What we are doing today, would cost a fortune. And we wouldn’t do it anyway. But look around you. These men are my brothers. My family.”

Danny Dale scanned the room as instructed.

“One of our bothers is in a jam,” Baal explained. “And we will do anything to help our brother. Do you understand?”

Danny Dale nodded.

“The mafia never bothers the families,” Baal explained. “But we do.”

Silence. A long slow silence.

“This isn’t all bad. Your employer is willing to overlook the fact that you failed to disclose that you had a first cousin employed at Amerijail, so long as you both keep it secret. “He then briefly expounded on Amerijail’s expansion and Danny Dales prospects for advancement.

“If you help out my brother, our families will be friends.” Baal extended his hand to Danny Dale, who gripped it gently.  Baal clamped the younger man’s hand with alarming strength. “But if you let my brother twist in the wind, our families will be eternal enemies.”

Baal released his grip and stood up. He slowly walked toward the kitchen door. He did not look back. He did not say another word.

Fungo: Winter 1

Fungo Winter: 1 DHD Reflects.

David Hunter Duncan sat at the desk at Declutter Self Storage assembling a model chopper as he listened to the screen high on the opposite wall. Since opening Declutter, Hope had set the workplace TV to The Horizons Network, a blended format of life hacks and mysticism. The assortment of motherly shrinks and blow-dry preachers and grinning swamis had initially aggravated David’s sensibilities. After a while, the daytime hosts seemed more like eccentric neighbors than irritants and David had grown attentive to the daily dispersal of wisdom.

David’s favorite life consultant, Dominic DeAngelis, was now on the screen. DeAngelis had done time at serious facilities and was now sharing his percipience with a live audience. “Don’t just sit and listen. Write his down in your power journal,” the graybeard commanded.

David made a mental note to christen a power journal and to rewatch this show and to commit himself to absorbing “Dominic’s Didactics.” For now, David’s hands and eyes were deployed in the assembly of the San Quentin Custom Cycle designed and built on “The Choppers of the Gods” by the late Thomas Nathaniel Tompkins. TNT’s estate had issued model kits that required bright lights, magnifying glasses and jewel-maker hardware to construct.

David liked to assemble things when his hands were not occupied elsewhere, especially when watching TV. Living without tools in prison was almost as hard as living without women. The option to handle a screwdriver anytime he pleased was a simple pleasure David treasured deeply.

There were some people David might not inform of his interest in models instead of the real deal. His biker persona was created long ago but David had less street cred than people imagined. Yes, he had owned and built and rode Harleys and groundups but he barely got a taste of the biker lifestyle. Every time he started forming bonds with other motorcyclists, legal problems would surface and he would have to sell his bike to feed his family or pay his legal bills. Now, when he found time to ride, he rode a preppy BMW. German engineering had spoiled him.

“Your right hand will include the five people of the same gender who have influenced your life the most. These five people are not relatives. Not mothers or fathers or brothers or sisters or sons or daughters. These are five people you have drawn into your lifeweb…”

DeAngelis then went tangential and defined poly dactyl, focusing primarily on people born with six fingers. Everyone has five fingers in their lifeweb but some people have six? “If there is someone you cannot omit, then you probably have a sixth finger.”

David did not have to reflect much to label each digit. His sixth finger was Ray Bohm. Loyal, fierce and quiet. Big, clumsy guy who staggered when he walked and always ran into moving and stationary objects. His body was funny-looking and Ray was not an athlete but man, could he fight!

Ray was more of a companion than an influence and David was unsure if he would qualify as an appendage. He probably saved Jim Garfield’s life one time and he offered David ongoing friendship and support. Maybe Ray was more like a big toe, David mused.

The pinky was easy to determine.  A long ago mentor who might not still be active in one’s life. That would be the late Harold Remick, the career outlaw who taught a young David Hunter Duncan what it meant to be a good convict. Of course, in the old days, every cellblock had a Harold Remick. So it wasn’t him, it would have been another jailbird. Still, Harold was David’s first good criminal tutor. Death did not dampen Harold’s light.

Ring finger? The finger primarily used to showcase marital status in this case expresses a longstanding friendship that has weathered storms and has stood the test of time.  Easy choice. Glen Dale Woods, that mechanical and criminal renaissance man whom David met when they were both teenagers.

Gearheads are tribal people. Monster truck guys don’t hang with Formula 1 fans and neither group flocks with street rodders. It goes beyond social dynamics. Diesel mechanics don’t like working on Civics and a 9/16^th guy will cringe at the thought of touching metric.

Glen Dale Woods was different. He went from trail bikes to Harleys to hot rod quarter milers before devoting himself to power boats. He would later get his pilot’s license and currently runs a lucrative small plane maintenance service.

Glen Dale’s aptitude for motors was exceeded only by his scholarship of crime. He stole bicycles as a child and stole cars before he was old enough to drive legally. He stole truck cargo and heavy equipment and even a few head of livestock before raking in a fortune stealing airplanes.

Most impressive of all, Glen Dale Woods never did time. He would get in, get out and move on to something else. Glen Dale always offered sound advice and he could be extremely helpful if the price was right.

DeAngelis explained the criteria for the middle finger and that made David think of Joe Fungo. David Hunter Duncan had met a lot of interesting people but none of them were anything like Joe Fungo. He was a master chemist who created obscure smart drugs. Hunter and Garfield and Bohm had made a solid middle class living selling Fungo’s potions.

For a long time, Jim Garfield had kept Fungo away from David and Ray. Then David met Fungo personally and found out that he could manufacture meth. Garfield did not want to sell meth because he thought it would draw too much heat. Ray and David overruled Garfield. Maybe he wanted to be overruled. At any rate, money rained from the heavens ever since.

It wasn’t just drugs that Fungo manufactured. He could produce nerve gas and anthrax and germs no one had ever heard of. “The middle finger can be dangerous to display.” David agreed. He suspected that Joe Fungo might be the mastermind behind all the biological attacks on Houston law enforcement. After all, he had tried to get Delbert Wayne out of a Memphis jail with biochemical attacks.

Although David had sold kilos of smart drugs, he never ingested them himself. After getting to know Fungo, the chemist persuaded David to sample his elixirs. The results were so good as to be disorienting. David, who had always struggled with phones and computers, now consumed technical manuals like gumdrops. He would not have had the organizational skills to launch a self-storage business and Fungo’s muscle-building powders were equally impressive.

The desktop phone rang and David paused the TV. A few questions about price and a polite good-bye. David pressed the remote and restarted the broadcast. “Is the index finger more important than the thumb? No, but…”

Jim Garfield! Mentally physically strong. The unlikely brainiac. He knew computers. He knew phones. He knew cars and weapons and how to run an organization where few of his contractors ever knew who their boss really was. He talked about synthetic currencies before there was such a thing and he could take one immigrante and create a dozen aliases.

 Jim liked to read military history and true crime. Not serial killer sensationalism but profiles of mobsters and kingpins. Crime books were forbidden but Jim paid CO’s to paste the covers of “Tom Kill a Mockingbird” and “Moby Dick” over books that chronicled bluegrass conspiracies and Corsican Mafiosi. Reading 10 to 15 hours a day—he never slept much even before access to slumber inhibitors—Jim Garfield spent three years earning a PHD in professional crime.

In David’s eyes, Jim was more distinctive as a leader than as a craftsman or scholar. In prison Jim Garfield was asked to sit in at a Scholars meeting and a short time later, the youngest member of the group was running the show. Every prison has its share of alpha dogs and wannabe leaders. The gorillas can pound their chests all day long but they can never make someone want to follow their lead the way Jim Garfield could.

DeAngelis was now explaining the significance of the human thumb. There is a reason why it is called an opposable thumb. Coordination is enhanced by opposition.

Ulysses Johnson! Somehow, every paroled Scholar from Harris County ended up on that probation officer’s caseload. They were always treated with respect and they would receive hand-delivered messages from mysterious figures and opportunities to work for professional wages.

Everyone knew Ulysses went crazy and was killed in a street drag accident. Ray Bohm said that Ulysses Grant Johnson had been spouting off about family business but David did not see it that way. Ulysses shared some pillow talk with a Federal Probation Officer with whom he would create a son. He probably had to give up some plausibly deniable info to get the family anchored in the Federal system.

The only other non-Johnson Ulysses shared confidence was with Jim Garfield. They would ride in Ulysses’ purple Grand Marquis for hours, bouncing ideas back and forth. Ulysses recognized that he had found a diamond amongst the broken glass. He needed to share a few deniable generalities to win Jim’s trust, to get the professor to open up.

Even after his death, Ulysses still seemed to shape the world. For reasons unknown to outsiders, the Johnsons had wanted to set up shop in and around Memphis, Tennessee. Delbert Wayne Duncan had never met Ulysses but he followed one of the probation officer’s graduates to northern Mississippi, where they would move meth and marijuana from the Houston area.

“Without the thumb, civilization might not have happened…”

All of Ten Gentry’s crew had been brought down by a super narc named James Charles Pearce. The only Houstonian who was not caught on tape committing a crime was Delbert Wayne Duncan. Nonetheless, Pearce agrees to testify against Delbert Wayne. Thank you, Ulysses, wherever you may be.

David was ready to snap on the wheels, the last steps in building a model that was destined to occupy an empty shelf behind his desk.  He reflected again on Ulysses’ might shadow. “The thumb and the middle finger formulate a simple mudra…” Did Ulysses recruit Joe Fungo, either wittingly or otherwise, to execute the Houston bio-attacks?

A customer walked through the door, triggering a familiar chime. On first glance, David recognized the vampiresque figure of Joe Fungo creep into the office. With his newfound meth fortune, Fungo had purchased a self-storage facility himself, just a mile down the road.

“The middle finger without the thumb?” DeAngelis executed a dramatic pause. “The middle finger is radioactive.”

David Hunter Duncan was grateful for having discovered the wisdom on Dominic DeAngelis.

Fungo Outline

Combined Outline June 4, 2019

Winter

1.        DHD reflects.

2.        Bike trail.

3.        Mindy Watkins and Dr. Wu respond to confession machine expose.

4.        DHD and wife (Hope?) and Denise Finnagan meet.

5.        Problem at the lab.

Springsummer

1.        Leaker or leakers arrested.

2.        Phil McDaniel/Jim Garfield slice of life…lab problem and related security…Jim advises his cousin to stockpile and then take a vacation.

3.        NVN listens to Denise Finnagan’s date via her phone.

4.        Confession machine publicly discredited.

5.        DHD is demoralized. Delbert is hopelessly delusional…DHD is helping Phil McDaniel set up shop in the deep burbs.

6.        NVN lays it on the line. Major creep.

7.        Phil McDaniel interrupts Joe Fungo’s date…Is frantic about the spy research he has done.

Autumn

       1.Amerijail people approach DHD about moving son to luxury unit…Cereal images persuade DWD

           to fire lawyer to delay proceedings.    

       2. Countermeasures/Fleeing/Precautions/Protocols. DHD/JF/JG meet off-camera.

       3. Joe Fungo an a date.

      4. Denise proposes to Air Force boyfriend out West.

      5. Finale…PM is pursued and captured. Start finale with DHD set to announce that he is going to TN,  

         MS to settle a score…Joe Fungo on date when he gets the word.

========================================================================

Josephs Springsummer 6

Josephs Springsummer 6: Martin Goode

Walter McVey coasted his lime green Grand Marquis past the house where his father had spent most of his childhood. The port city of Georgetown had long ago been swallowed by the District of Columbia but it was still Georgetown. Every American city has a few pricey neighborhoods and several nice suburbs but Georgetown remained special in the eyes of Walter McVey.

Yes, the historical societies had done a good job of preserving her unique charms but there was always unique charm to preserve. Some of the hottest real estate on Planet Earth had once been built, owned and occupied by everyday people. Nothing like the Maryland suburb Walter now called home. In his father’s day, rich people lived alongside working people and young couples with their growing families and teenagers who left home to fight wars. If you looked closely you could still see a Georgetown that was every bit American as Bowling Green or Hibbing or Topeka.

Charles McVey handed down stories of mean kids who would steal bikes and kill cats. Stories of slingshots and tree houses and endless arm-punching contests. Whatever else present day residents might contribute to society, they probably did not build many tree houses, Walter mused.

A zig and a zag from his father’s house and Walter was pushing the barge into Martin Goode’s driveway. He parked snugly behind Martin’s generic sedan. By fitting bumper to bumper Walter would allow a third car to park behind him in the asphalt driveway.

Walter bounded from his seat, gently closed the door behind him and absorbed his surroundings. Martin was flanked on one side by a semi-famous green policy advocate to his left and a deliberately unfamous defense lobbyist to his right. Directly across the street the ex-wife of a former news anchor kept her summer quarters.

Martin sometimes mused aloud about the minimal contact he shared with his neighbors. He knew their landscapes and housekeepers better than he knew the mysterious figures behind the Ban-Rays and the tinted windshields. Given Martin’s background and livelihood and demeanor, Walter surmised that he was probably every bit as reclusive as his neighbors.

 Gate, fence and camera. Walter’s own Maryland neighborhood was much the same way. He briefly reflected on an era when children thought nothing of cutting a path through the neighbors’ yard or helping themselves to low-hanging apples and families adopted stray dogs who refused to leave their porch.  Something to be said for Lockdown America, Walter concluded once more.

Martin, for all of his efforts to stay current, still retained the atavistic habit of receiving all guests through the front door. It might seem like the wrong jacket button to others but it was the way Martin did things. Before Walter could ring the bell, Martin had swung the rounded door open and pressed the lever on the screen door.

Walter hurried inside and Martin closed and locked the doors behind him. Martin led Walter down the hall to the library. To Walter’s eyes, every room in the house looked like a library. Books of all kind lined most walls and even the kitchen and laundry room featured small bookcases. A touch of heraldry gave the house a British affect, which is what Martin intended.

At 82, Martin seemed younger than his stated age. He had repeatedly shared his Methuselah techniques with Walter. He moved with deliberate speed and exaggerated motions—flourishes he deliberately practiced in front of a mirror—so as to not look like an octogenarian. He always listened intently and on those rare occasions when he could not understand the speaker, he always accused the rube of mumbling and insisted that he speak slowly and distinctly.

Walter held no doubt that had he chosen a different career he would never have met anyone half as interesting or engaging as Martin Goode. Lightweight boxer, Notre Dame Grad, Naval Intelligence, DEA, and most significantly, auxiliary management. Had Walter not met Martin, he would not have been inducted into the cryptic world of guided direct action. It was a world that Walter did not understand and a world he might not ever understand and a world he might not ever be able to explain to outsiders, even if some day he leveraged a grasp of the subject.

Martin still flew to Montreal and Bogota and Mexico City to conduct business. When he had to fly to Asia or Australia, he generally laid over in Hawaii. On a routine day Martin rose at 5 AM. The alarm clock had been replaced by a fifteen minute “Energized Breathing” narration designed to prompt the abandonment of a cozy bed. The Kai Kundalini regimen was always followed by a ten minute ice cold shower.

Next, Martin would exercise his body, emphasizing strength, flexibility and poison hand kung fu. We would write and review his goals and would then peruse his messages. On most days Martin walked a quarter mile to Holy Family’s 8 AM Mass. He would then return home and put in four to six hours of Bridge Club business. At the end of his workday, Martin would pray the Rosary as he paced his upstairs hallway.

At the conclusion of his prayers, Martin would indulge himself in his real passion: the daily walk and read. Depending on his Bridge Club workload, Martin would spend four to eight hours pacing his perfectly-lighted hallway reading from a book and drinking dromedary quantities of water. Greek History. Roman History. Lives of the Saints. Thackeray. Austen. Dickens. Westerns. Crime novels. Biographies of people familiar and strange. Business books. Conspiracy theories. Bram Stoker. Mary Shelley. Robert Louis Stevenson. Edgar Allen Poe. Oliver Sachs. The paranormal. 100 to 200 pages, 8 to 15 miles, three quarts of water.

Martin would then eat the only meal of the day, usually a mixed leaf salad loaded with tree nuts, avocado, hard boiled eggs, olives, anchovies and raspberry-flavored goat cheese all soaked in olive oil and vinegar. He would sometimes add a side of sardines or kippers or shellfish with a glass or two of bold red wine. He would then consume his nutritional supplements followed by a large chunk of organic chocolate and a few slices of pineapple.

Martin would rinse his dirty dishes and place them in the dishwasher for his thrice weekly to wash thoroughly at a later time. With dinner out of the way, Martin would check his messages one more time. He would then take a warm shower, care for his dental investments and retire to his bedroom. In Notre Dame sweat pants and t-shirt, Martin would kneel on his bedroom floor and say his evening prayers under a cast iron crucifix mounted on a small wall between door and closet. He would then consume his sleep-time supplements and pull back the covers on hi Perfect Bed. On the nightstand rested a small glass of plum wine, a few slivers of organic cocoa on a porcelain saucer and a transparent plastic tumbler filled with a quart of ice water.

With the Perfect Bed set to a reader’s incline and the illumination of a Midnight Sun mood lamp, Martin would don his reading glasses revisit books he had read in boyhood: Jules Verne, Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie, a biography of Richard the Lionhearted. Mostly he read Hardy Boys stories.

Walter invaded the orderly kitchen and percolated a pot of Cowpoke Coffee. Of all the people in all the houses he had ever visited, no one made him feel more at home than Martin Goode. For all of his security measures, Martin took the mi casa es tu casa to another level. He would sometimes ask a guest to go upstairs and retrieve something from a dresser drawer or something hidden away in a closet. Walter recognized the tactic was used to convey a feeling of trust and that feeling was always present at bridge club gatherings.

Walter loaded his coffee with heavy cream and blended sugar and hiked back to the library. He placed his coffee on an Edinburgh Castle cork coaster and sat at the round table about ninety degrees from Martin. Despite Martin’s penchant for hording books and the fetishes of knighthood, his house was always looked like a furniture showroom. Plenty of open space on and between pieces of furniture.

“Did you drive past King Joseph’s house?” Martin asked.

Walter sniffed and smiled and briefly turned his head. No, he had not gone anywhere near John Joseph’s Georgetown home, the runt of a dead end litter. John Joseph had purchased a house in Washington to be close to his baseball team. He had intended to buy the surrounding properties and house acolytes and friends and associates. So entrenched were Georgetown residents that Joseph had failed to purchase a second property five years later.

Walter studied Martin’s face. He had a full head of transplanted and dyed blondish hair. He had access to cutting edge cosmetics and he utilized his choices wisely. Face lifts and botox injections were still performed on the masses but Martin’s doctors opened eyes and smoothed wrinkles without leaving fingerprints.

Walter savored his creamy coffee and listened keenly as Martin discussed world events and other matters that concerned the bridge club. Coming from a large family with a career-driven father, Walter had always cherished the times he had spent alone with his father. The ever-busy sage down the hall spewed insight and wisdom whenever you could get his attention. He now had a similar feeling whenever he could enjoy one to one time with Martin.

Long ago it had been relayed to Walter that long ago before then someone had asked Martin if he ever regretted marrying or raising a family. He instantly and flatly answered, “No” and he was never asked those questions again.

Walter took mental notes of Martin’s recently discovered news sites as well as his tangential information about Islamic imperialism and psychic warfare. Oh if only he had more time to spend with his Obi-Alec Guinness. The enchanting monolog was terminated when Martin observed a mounted screen catching Don Lambert perking his blue Volvo SUV in the driveway bumper to bumper behind Walter’s Grand Marquis.

Martin executed a practiced I-am-not-your-typical-octogenarian spring to his feet and swaggered to the front door. A moment later Walter was asking Don about his heart, his health and his recovery as they strolled back to the library. Walter had grown more comfortable with Don over time. There was something foreign about his proudly bald scalp and oversized moustache that reminded Walter of clam digger bathing suits, penny-farthing bicycles, frothy beers and bare knuckle fighting. He still seemed a bit out of era but he won the trust and respect of his bridge club partners and had been designated Martin’s successor.

 On this day Martin Goode employed the shortened ritual to open their meeting. A brief prayer, some demasonized mumbo jumbo and a short recital lifted directly from the Knights of Columbus.

“To be named is to be blamed,” Martin often said. Keeping with that philosophy, Martin’s crew had never been christened. The bridge club was the perfect cover for a meeting of geezers dedicated to supplemental governance. Of course, only 3 of the 5 non-members to the non-existent club knew how to play bridge, so Martin substituted Chinese checkers as the background activity. The game had yet to find its Oswald Jacoby and Martin devoted enough thought and theory to basic strategy and had emerged as the dominant player.

Martin had mused that Chinese checkers might be the perfect metaphor for auxiliary management. In real life, groups raced, blocked, evaded and sometimes assisted other players in pursuit of their goals. Martin had once more selected his leaf green cat eye marbles and play commenced.

As he moved his first piece, Martin opened the discussion. “The Joseph media are investigating our domestic surveillance infrastructure. I have it on record that they can do serious damage to our program.”

With Walter playing the red cat eyes to his left and Don Lambert in direct opposition playing the yellow cats, questions and answers ensued. The Joseph wire service was preparing a data drop that would be the equivalent of 500 pages of newsprint. The expose will focus primarily on the technical aspects of domestic satellite security.

“Our space coverage ranges from absolute to absolute zero and everything in between.” Martin then elaborated on the technical details that captivated his audience’s attention and distracted them from his board game superiority. Not every satellite was of the same vintage. The old ones recorded fewer details than the new ones. Being that they were designed and maintained by private firms, there was a wide variance in dependability. Some stations were usually functional and some never worked at all.

Some satellites could see through clouds and some could not. Some could record through storms and some could not. Some could see in the dark and some could not.

Organized crime had procured some cloaking technology. Unmanned flights from Canada or Mexico would sometimes disappear from surveillance. This was a secret that both the elite cartels and the intelligence industry wanted to keep secret.

The network had its regional quirks as well. Chicago’s focus was a bit skewed, capturing more of Northern Indiana than the Western suburbs. Detroit had a small diameter scope. New Orleans was almost absent from view but the surrounding swampland was displayed in all of its flourishing detail.

Only four cities were provided 24-hour door to door monitoring, the latest being Houston. Space City had been the scene of several biological attacks directed at the law enforcement establishment. Sensing a weakness, every cartel and gang and weekend dealer headed to Houston to set up shop. It could not be leaked that Houston had become the most-watched city in the world.

Game 1 went to Martin and Don shifted to a diagonal position from the champion. “Amber Wayne can no longer be considered an innocent trollop,” Martin decreed at the start of the second game. “She is an active participant in the Joseph agenda.”

Both listeners nodded. Amber Wayne had lost her collateral status. But what about the pilots and security and the Josephs’ ever-changing entourage? Martin was ahead of his inquisitive pupils. Two of John Joseph’s pilots had been unindicted coconspirators back in the hippy aviator days. Justice will get another shot at these two.

Martin concluded his tutelage by informing his companions that one of the two pilots, Steve Foust, was the only pilot of John Joseph’s four-seat jet. “If Foust fell to the ground with Joseph and Wayne, there would be no innocent loss of life.”

“Provided they did not land on innocents,” Walter interjected before Don had a chance. Yes, of course. Usual restatement of parameters and limitations and safeguards. Consensus would be reached easily and Martin would win all three games of Chinese checkers.

Josephs Winter 3

Winter

Josephs

 3. Library

Walter McVey sat in Leo Kelly’s hometown library pretending to read “The Washington Post.” He had seated himself in a mauve vinyl cushion chair ten minutes ago where he awaited the arrival of his comrade. He glanced up to see Lee Kelly sprint-walk past the periodical section pretending not to see Walter.

Leo kept up the late-for-job-interview pace all the way to the spy fiction section, where he grabbed a Brad Thor novel off the shelf. Barely looking at the title, Leo slowed his tempo as he made his way to the periodicals. Moseying over to the newspapers, Leo scanned the rack for “Wall Street Journal.”  With a hint of disappointment he determined that the only unclaimed newspaper was one of the many copies of the Joseph Family’s “American Morning Paper.”  He grabbed the paper and pretended to peruse the headlines as he ambled over to Walter’s chair.

What are you doing here?  What a coincidence! You impersonating a reader? Doesn’t your two horse town have a library? How’s the wife? Blah blah blah. I got to get back to work. Why don’t I walk you to your car?

Walter McVey stood at a friendly distance as Leo checked out the Thor novel. The blatantly libraryish elderly woman surprised both men with her megaphone voice and her revelation that she had read all but three of this writer’s stories. Leo stated that he had only started reading Thor and liked him so much that he was now reading his work in chronological order. Have a nice day.

Walter studied Leo Kelly as he deliberately placed his library card back into his wallet before leaving the counter. With his charcoal suit, dark gray tie, black-gray Wingtip polish and dull gray overcoat topped off with a thick crop of silvering hair, he reminded Walter of a grounded storm cloud. Thunder? Lightning? Flash flood? Leo Kelly could make it happen.

Walter walked curbside on the leisurely three block stroll to where both men had parked. Walter was rambling on about Brad Thor. His daughter, Mary, had given him a Thor novel last Christmas and he had yet to start reading it. In front of Killa Coffee, Leo interrupted.  “Look. All tracks are covered. So don’t ask me again.”

A surge of cold, wet air slapped their faces and Walter reflexively turned his back to the wind. Leo faced the onslaught with a Rushmore demeanor. He took the Northwest’s best shot without blinking and turned ever so slightly to look his friend in the eye. “So much for global warming,” Leo said flatly.

“How did you get him to change his mind,” Walter inquired with clear mucus creeping from his nostrils.

A rare grin flashed across Leo’s lips and vanished a second later. “He’s a technical genius,” Leo explained. “But he’s as gullible as a college student.”

Walter performed a brief circular motion to prompt Leo to elaborate. A Danish au pair approached the duo pushing a perambulator and seeing her, Leo resumed walking in search of a little more privacy. The Friend-N-Flow tavern would not open till afternoon so Leo crept past the intruder and ducked into the covered doorway. Walter followed closely behind him.

Scouting the area nonchalantly, Leo took on a didactic presence. “It’s folklore. A corollary of the compensating universe. Attractive people are stupid. Poor people are noble. Smart people are miserable” He paused and concluded “And rich people are diddlers.”

Walter McVey erupted. “A man who fathers children with multiple women is probably not fettered with any moral ground wire…” Realizing that his voice was approaching a yell, Walter cut the sermon after one sentence. He took a deliberate breath and changed his approach. “So, how did you do it?”

“It would be nice, if we could stop in for a brandy,” Leo remarked, gazing into the picture window that enclosed a darkened barroom. Leo pivoted and resumed his tale. “He was dead set against taking the assignment. It took graphic evidence to win him over. Fortunately, we have tools that make Photoshop look like an Etch-A-Sketch. “

They resumed the walk to their cars. Walter knew the floodgates had opened. Leo loved to brag and Walter was one of the very few people who he trusted with his war stories. “Most men react stronger to girl rapists than boy rapists. Makes sense. Young girls can get their birth canals permanently damaged. It’s bad for both sexes but men sense that girls are more fragile.

“But our ace is the father of two boys. How do we play this one for maximum impact? Easy. My elves had an actual photograph of a small man on top of a prepubescent girl. Her brother was tied to a chair nearby, forced to watch his sister get raped.

“A little cut and paste by the elves and our superstar was chomping at the bit. Put me in coach!”

Walter stuck his face out of the alcove to test the wind. Sensing a calm between gusts, he stepped onto the sidewalk. Leo followed and the two men continued their stroll. “We have two concerns,” Walter said.

“The method?” Leo asked.

“That and collaterals,” Walter responded.

Leo Kelly nodded. Joe Grieve’s specialty was helping planes fall from the sky. He did a job in Mexico where a Gulfstream crashed in the dessert.  He did another gig in Quebec where a puddle jumper with four Corsicans fell into a wooded area. In each case, Leo had to assure Walter that the pilots were not so innocent, that no family or mistresses tagged along, and that the gravitational climax would take place in a secluded spot.

Yes, Grieve also volunteered for more conventional assignments stateside and had been involved in murkier events in places far removed from his homeland. There were a few don’t ask, don’t tell, scenarios in Central and South America where quality assurance was not assured. But bringing down John Joseph in the US of A might also mean killing a girlfriend, a bodyguard, a pilot and who knows what else?  What if the plane descended onto a private home? Even worse, what if the pilot or bodyguard just happened to be a cousin of someone in the community? The network was not ready to greenlight this project.

Leo looked Walter deep in the eye and paused before speaking. “Our boy has expanded his repertoire.”  Leo feigned a cough but kept his fist in front of his mouth. “His preferred medium is the mini-drone. You might actually be familiar with some of his work. He could hit a midget in a crowd of Watusis.”

Walter looked up and away and paused before uncrossing his arms in an expression of approval.  He turned his attention back to Kelly and extended his ungloved hand. “Hope we have a winning season,” Walter said to the smaller man.

“We have the ace on the mound. Major league heat and pinpoint control. The best season ever.”

With that reassurance, Walter pivoted and pointed his key chain at a parked silver Continental, starting the ignition and warming the driver seat and cockpit.  He abruptly crossed the street, never looking back. “The best season ever.”

Josephs Winter 2

Winter

Josephs

 2. Joe Grieve

Joe Grieve lifted himself off the Jaguar toilet seat and pivoted enough to look down at the bowl. Even better than he had thought. Yes, there was a prolonged, continuous exit but gravity sometimes damaged the yield. Not this time. The Titan Missile had landed!

Mr. Grieve moved ever so delicately to minimize sound. His older son, Stan, was somewhere in the house and he knew how perceptive children could be. Like a lot of kids, Stanley Patterson Grieve had an inordinate interest in personal habits. He also seemed to have some lurk and listen tendencies.

Joe Grieve carefully positioned then phone and snapped three quick photos. He would send all three variations to Dark Secrets. He sent an overhead anterior shot to his Auld Lang Syne app for analysis and sent the same version to Flushed With Fortune to discover what prophecies might be gleaned.

Joe turned off the phone and stealthily tucked it into the left pocket of his Baltimore Ravens fleece. He silently zipped the pocket shut and pivoted to face the Bay City toilet paper holder mounted on the wall. He bowed politely to the dispenser and then used his right hand to measure out exactly one dozen perforated sheets.

With a surgeon’s precision Joe separated the strand between the twelfth and thirteenth square. Swiftly but deliberately he performed a wrinkle-free stack-and-fold. He squatted a little, bent forward ever so slightly and reached around with his right hand. He dug deep and paused before excavating. His spirits rose as he viewed the results. “Immaculate,” he said under his breath.

Joe studied the output ever so carefully, scanning the white surface for signs of discoloration. Nothing. No caulk. No paste. No goo. Nada. With a flourish, he dropped the exam paper into the bowl.

Joe decided on an insurance read and he repeated the process with another dozen sheets. This time he went harder and deeper and utilized a twisting motion for good measure. Clean as a morning snowdrift!

With his right hand forming a sword mudra, Joe used his left hand to flush the Jaguar. He elevated his Fruit Of The Loom briefs and Baltimore Ravens sweat pants to their public position and stepped in front of the vanity. Joe lathered up his hands with disinfectant soap and pressed his faucet with his left knee.

For a solid minute, Joe Grieve dutifully scrubbed his digits. He tried to be mindful of the process but his mind drifted from topic to topic. He lamented the Jaguar failing to live up to its vaulted reputation. The secret gram-sensitive scale should have weighed each event and sent the results to his phone but it failed in that endeavor... He had spent many a weekend trying in vain to troubleshoot the problem and he was not about to explain to his wife why a Jaguar porcelain technician was needed to fix a perfectly functioning toilet.

Fortunately, the Auld Lang Syne app could estimate the weight of each harvest based on size, buoyancy, consistency, continuity and color. They had laboratory studies to validate the accuracy. Yes, it would be good to learn each Jaguar user’s productive volume but for now Joe would content himself with his own readings using the ALS app.

Joe Grieve turned off the faucet with his left knee. He flipped his hands with fingers extended and left them elevated as he approached the paper towel dispenser mounted next to the vanity mirror. He activated the laser reader and twelve inches of paper descended. Joe did a tug and pull to cleanly sever the extension as it rubbed against the piranha-sharp slide cutter.

Joe silently voiced his prediction before checking the Auld Lang Syne estimate. Joe says 351 grams. Auld Lang Syne says…351!

If only, Joe mused.

If only.

If only.

If only there was a game show with big cash prizes where his observational skills and judgment would be rewarded. A brief moment of lament.

Recently it seemed that Joe had become almost as proficient at forecasting the Flushed With Fortune forecast. He silently estimated The Pile Of Sooth’s predictions but decided to check the results at his work station.

Using a second twelve inch cut to insulate the door knob; Joe Grieve exited the second floor bathroom and quietly stepped across the hallway to his office. There, he sat in a black vinyl swivel chair and pressed the computer power button. As the unit performed its start up rituals, Joe clenched his phone.

Unsurprisingly, the POS predicted a day filled with insight, opportunity and good fortune. Joe overlooked the excess verbiage and trite analogies. He endorsed the magician card parallel but was unable to make sense of the I Ching, runic and astrological comparisons. “You don’t need a weather vane to know which way the wind blows,” Joe said aloud. He could not lose. Not today. Not on Super Sunday.

Joe did a few cyber swerves and backtracks and landed on the doorstep of a betting site where point spreads and propositions were displayed. Joe glanced at the screen and placed a dime on the six point underdogs. Carpe diem.

Ever conscious of his stealth, Joe silently descended the stairs and made a hairpin turn to the TV room set off on the left side of the hallway. There he found his older son, Stan, but was surprised to see his son watching a football game.

Joe was going to ask why the game had already started but then he remembered that the upstart league, The Southern Football League, soon to be renamed the Real Beer Football League, played their championship games immediately before the start of the Super Bowl. “What’s the score?” Joe asked his ever-analytical son.

“Twenty-one to nothing,” Stan said methodically. “It just started and it’s over. I just want to see how many points Mississippi racks up.”

Joe asked his firstborn a questioned and was astounded by the detailed answer that filled the father with a mixture of sadness and pride. Not so many years ago, Joe changed his son’s diaper and now his baby had grown into an oracle.

It was not just the breadth and depth of his son’s knowledge that impressed Joe Grieve. Rather, it was Stan’s ability to explain things to his father in a gentle, paternalistic manner. The son did not flaunt his knowledge. The father asked a question and his son answered in a manner and tone that Joe found engaging.

Stan knew the dollar values of TV contracts, franchise fees, player salaries and coaches’ salaries, as well as the rumored net worth of the owners. He discussed the SFL’s business strategy to start out in Southern states and hoard the better players before branching out to bigger cities and ever-expanding franchise fees. With deeper pockets, fewer teams, and the absence of a salary cap, the SFL was assembling an all-star league and the established league had not taken the challenge seriously.

Stan spoke highly of John Joseph, the league’s architect who also owned the charter team, the Mississippi Christmas Elves. In Stan’s words, Joseph “cheated without cheating.” He stacked the deck with team owners drawn from the richest people on Planet Earth. They all had boundless resources, inflated egos and an unacknowledged ignorance of American football.

“There is something deceptively simple—or is it deceptively complex?—about American football.” Stan hesitated so that his father could field the linguistic question. Unsure as to which phrase was more appropriate, he asked his son, “What do you mean?”

Stan provided a salt mine of detail. The two oil barons owned teams that flopped for different reasons. One micromanaged the coaches, the players, the marketing team and the concession crew while fending off sexual harassment suits leveled by the team’s cheerleaders, secretaries and lawyers. The other sheik liked to watch his team’s games from an island in the Mediterranean where he refused to take phone calls for weeks at a time.

Meanwhile, the owner of the Louisiana Leopards, a real estate tycoon named Haruto Uwasa, hired his son as general manager. Koki Uwasa had attended the University of Southern California where he saw his first football game and became an instant devotee. Koki did what most under-informed fans with a gold card would do. He purchased aged marquee players who ultimately spent a lot of the season in street clothes.

Joe studied his darker-haired son as he heaped praise on John Joseph. It was Joe Grieve’s opinion that most kids liked John Joseph until they went off to college and learned that they were supposed to hate him. So he asked Stan outright, “What do you think of John Joseph, the person?”

The father was taken aback by his son’s bold statements of admiration. This was not what Joe Grieve wanted to hear. A few weeks ago Joe’s real employer, the anonymous wizard behind Rely Consulting, the gracious employer who had helped Joe Grieve purchase a spacious home in rural Maryland and fund the construction of a second house on the same property, forty acres bordering a depleted coal mine, a place where he could watch his sons grow and fish and build tree houses, had asked Joe if he was ready for the biggest job of his life.  Then, just two days ago, Joe Grieve had been formally asked to assassinate John Joseph.

“A little help.” It was Joe’s wife, Camille, who had entered the kitchen door with nine year old Christopher. They had returned from Wilt’s Groceries with supplies for tonight’s Super Bowl gathering. Joe and Stan bounded to their soles and merrily transported cans of soda, cans of diet soda, amethyst cookies, chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal cookies, fudge brownies, a Frito-Lay variety pack of 1 oz. bags, an Utzheimer variety pack of 1 oz. bags of pretzels, potato strings and chips, a 36 unit pack of Key-Toe 2 oz. mixed nut variety pack, a survivalist-sized box of Meato-Keto Meat Treats featuring a variety of 36 individually-wrapped Tenderized Jerky and Tenderized Jerky with Cheese packets, a Rubicon variety pack of 1 oz. market-tested-and-failed chips now offered at a discounted price, an artificially-sweetened cheesecake with sweetened and unsweetened aerosol whipped cream and a five pound bag of Rainbow Marshmallows.

The gentle flow of gemutlichkeit was briefly logjammed by Joe Grieve’s discovery that Camille had purchased a house brand bathroom tissue in place of his oft-mandated Premier brand. Camille would defensively explain in a hushed tone that his stated preference was not stocked at Wilt’s and she was not about to drive twelve miles to test her luck at Marge’s.

In silence, Joe helped his wife stack and store the cargo in fridge, on shelf or in cabinet. He excused himself to the smokehouse in the backyard in the backyard where he had started a pork roast, a leg of lamb, four Cornish hens and two ducks in the Vulcan Windowed Smoker. Joe loved the smokehouse because it was the first structure he had completed with his two sons. More a labor of love than craftsmanship, it featured a not so level concrete floor, four block walls, two plexiglass windows, a slanted metal roof and a sheet metal chimney that leaked rain and failed at all normal chimney functions.

The room was large enough to host the windowed Vulcan, a discount charcoal grill and two lawn chairs. Joe had originally planned to keep the propane grill in the enclosure but unresolved venting issues made him reconsider the wisdom of storing explosive gas in its designated stall. The propane grill now rested in a Super Cool Shrink Wrap Moisture Guard Tarp under a large red maple tree.

The door was propped open and Joe rested on the foldout black and purple lawn chair planted just inside the entrance. Through the Vulcan window he could see the meats were cooking nicely. He planned to grill hot dogs and hamburgers and conclude all cooking duties prior to his in-laws’ arrival so that he would be able to provide his guests undivided attention.

Outside it was a cold, drizzly 42 degrees but Joe was warmed with the Vulcan’s cozy emanations. He took advantage of his respite to perform a review of upcoming events. He had stashed a couple of rolls of Premier in ready-to-go travel bags in his bedroom closet. He could route the cheap rolls to other toilets and keep the Premier in the master bathroom. A lot of stores ran out of select items on weekends. On Monday, Wilt’s would have the shelves nicely congested.

Then again, Wilt’s could fall behind with just one or two call-outs. A few Super hangovers could mean that Premier might not be available until Monday evening or even Tuesday morning. Might have to drive to the larger and more dependable Marge’s and stock up. Maybe Marge’s would be the first stop after he dropped off the kids at school.

Tonight could be tolerable and it could be a dumpster fire. Camille’s parents would be their kind and gracious selves. But Camille’s brother, James, and his Brillo pad wife, Sissy, and their three smart ass daughters were not so easy to predict.

Everyone expected James to upgrade his personality after he stopped drinking. No Camille, your brother is not a dry drunk. Your brother is an asshole.

The girls do not engage in normal kid banter. Stayce to Paige: “I hope you get raped by a pack of Negroes.” Who talks like that these days?

Paige to Maggie: “I hope your kids get cancer.”

Maggie to Stayce: “Your breath smells like a yeast infection.” How does a nine year old know what a yeast infection smells like?

The girls save their most toxic comments for their mother. Why do they hate Sissy so much? Sure, Sissy is stupid and callous and rude and manipulative and she talks incessantly but even on a bad day she is easier on the senses than her greasy haired, ferret-faced husband. It’s not that they are afraid to sass their father. They constantly remind him that he is an unemployed jailbird loser with bad teeth and thinning hair but those are just factual assertions. With Sissy, the insults are more personal.

Got to give them structure, Joe Grieve reminded himself. The master of ceremonies will keep the show moving. Yeah.

Joe Grieve’s attention drifted back to his professional life. He had been asked to assassinate John Joseph. Never before had he been asked to slay a public figure. Typically, he was asked to eliminate a shadowy character in someplace like Juarez or Montreal. Stateside, he usually worked the DC suburbs. None of his previous assignments were household names and now he was asked to eliminate one of the most famous people on the planet. Why?

The Super Bowl went better than Joe thought possible. A little over ten years ago, Joe had a house built at the bottom of the hill that was specially designed for large people. One story, reinforced floors, walk-in tub, Nephilim furniture that could easily accommodate 500 pound loads.

Frank and Joanne would leave their split-level Georgia home to move into their dream house downhill from their loving daughter and her lively family. The Pattersons would discover the wonders of ketosis and each would shed over forty percent of their body weight, though medical professionals would still consider them obese. Frank was able to once again drive his rig and things were almost idyllic. Then James got another DWI, did another stretch in the county jail and ultimately moved his family to rural Maryland where they would live with his mother and father. Bye bye idylls.

The horde arrived an hour before kickoff. The Grieve home had long ago been fitted with Brobdingnagian accessories and Joe seated Frank and Joanne on the Titanic bison leather loveseat that directly faced the wallscreen. The girls seated themselves between and beside the Grieve boys on the brown leather Rephaite wraparound. They always seemed intrigued by the boys’ new gadgets and interests, no matter how short the parting.

With Camille’s devoted and refined kitchendom on display, Joe was able to fully to engage his audience. The wallscreen was transformed into a board displaying the numbers 00 to 99. “Mom, as the matriarch, you have first choice. Please pick a number from double zero to ninety-nine!” Joe instructed in a strong imitation of Ed McMahon.

“Seventeen!” she replied innocently and the word “Mom” was written in the square.

“Dad! A number between double zero and ninety-nine that is not seventeen.”

“Forty-five.”

Sissy was offered a pick, followed by James, followed by the three girls and finally, the two boys. “The winner will receive one hundred dollars,” Joe announced to the assembled. This was met by shrieks and gasps followed by an endless stream of questions concerning the rules of the game.

As the national anthem was sung Joe passed around a basket of envelopes. Seven of them contained blank note cards. One had the word “Tails” written on it, another “Heads”. Following the ritualistic coin toss on television, Joe barked out further instructions. “Whoever holds the heads card wins this crisp ten dollar bill. Ladies and gentlemen, please check your envelopes.”

Christopher winced a childish noise and accepted the prize from his father. Thus, the stage was set. In all, Joe would hand out $242 in prizes, more than offset by the thousand dollar wager he landed when the six point underdogs won outright.

At various points of interruption the master of ceremonies was able to conduct an informal focus group on their opinions of John Joseph. Frank mentioned that James Joseph, John’s father, had opened treatment facilities to treat dangerously obese people. They located them on Indian reservations and rural areas to stimulate impoverished communities.

James cut in immediately. “Old man Joseph spun off reality TV shows about his bullshit that generated a fortune for his company. And he took a tax write-off for starting those fat boy clubs. He’s a con artist. The whole family should be thrown in Leavenworth.”

The room turned into an ongoing argument interspersed with the occasional touchdown and the more frequent announcement of a Joe Grieve contest winner. Camille served homemade potato salad, potato salad and pasta salad to all but Frank and Joanne who repeatedly confirmed their devotion to the keto lifestyle.

Joe observed his three nieces repeat everything Stan said but with louder, shriekier voices.  Mostly, James and Frank exchanged opposing viewpoints and nothing James said or did redeemed him in Joe’s eyes. James was a ferret-faced stickman from a family of cuddly cumulus clouds. He was so different in voice and manner and temperament that Joe privately questioned his mother-in-law’s virtue. Your husband was on the road for how many days at a time, Mrs. Patterson? Was the mail in that God-forsaken Georgia town delivered by a ferret-faced stickman, Mrs. Patterson? Were there no four-legged animals at your disposal, Mrs. Patterson?

James called the halftime entertainers “a bunch of slurpy faggots” and shouted over their vocals. For the duration of the evening, James would alternate his professed expertise of the gridiron with his antipathy for John Joseph. “I hope the whole Goddamn family dies in a plane crash."

Midway through the third quarter Joe Grieve reached the conclusion that he would decline the offer to assassinate John Joseph.