Scary Rednecks & Other Inbred Horrors (18 page)

Around the table sat Enid, the twins, Henry, Mable, Granny and Adam.
 
But the only two that were seriously eating was Enid and Adam.
 
Henry had expertly carved several huge slabs of juicy white breast meat and laid them on Adam’s plate.
 
The turkey had been carefully basted in honey and the meat fell apart in his mouth.
 
He didn’t even need to chew it was so perfect.
 
It wasn’t until the second plate that he voiced the question that had been bothering him.

“Why aren’t you eating?
 
I’m feeling more than a little guilty sitting here and devouring your excellent food.”

“Don’t you worry, Mr. Connor,” said Mable.
 
“This food is for you and Enid.
 
The rest of us are humanitarians and we don’t like to eat animals.”

“Humanitarians?” asked Adam.
 
The political term seemed out of place in the kitchen and he’d never heard it mentioned with food before.
 

“But as you see, Enid’s joining
ya
,” added Henry.
 
“We could never get her to stop.
 
Even though she’s thin as a
sassyfras
tree, she never turns down a meal.”

“Enough of this shit, Henry.
 
I’m tired of waiting and getting hungry as hell,” said Granny in a reedy voice.

Henry cast a glance at his mother and then locked eyes with his wife who nodded in return.

“As soon as you’re finished, Mr. Connor, we’ll get down to business and finish this once and for all.”

Adam gulped down his mouthful of food and nodded sharply.
 
He wiped his mouth with his napkin and pushed the plate aside.
 

“Let me just go and grab my briefcase,” he said, pushing away from the table.

“Not yet, Mr. Connor.
 
We got something special to show you first,” said Henry.

Adam paused and glanced around.
 
If it was more food, there was no way he’d ever be able to eat it.
 
As it was, he felt what could only be what a woman pregnant with sextuplets must feel like on delivery day.
 

“Well, I don’t know, Mr. Wheaton,” he said.
 
“I really can’t imagine eating another bite.”

“Then it’s perfect timing.
 
Come on and
lemme
show you what I mean.”

Henry stood and gestured for Adam to follow.
 
Adam pushed away from the table and ambled across the wooden floor of the kitchen and into a room he’d previously mistaken for a closet.
 
Instead, it was a large room dominated by an immense stove set against the outside wall.
 
Henry tugged open the door which opened downwards.
 
The small man pulled out a six-foot metal tray.
 
Deep grooves had been cut along the edges to catch juices as they bubbled out of the meat.
 
Five bands of metal were arrayed along the stainless steel.

“Take off your clothes Mr. Connors,” Henry said, as if he said it to men all the time.

“What?
 
Take of my clothes?
 
But... ”

“Come on.
 
Either you do it, or I’ll have my boys do it for you,” Henry said, his voice hardening.

“But why do I need... my... clothes... off?” his voice trailed away as he spun around to see the smiling faces of the family and realized that the oven wasn’t made for pigs, or cows, or horses.

He spun and ran toward the door and hit the Mongoloid brothers at full speed.
 
He bounced off and hit the floor hard.
 
They grinned stupidly, picked him up and held him fast.
 
Enid slid next to him and with a long knife, began to cut away his last good suit.
 
He soon stood naked.
 
He struggled the best he could, but the iron-like grips of the twins made it virtually impossible to move.

They threw him on the metal tray.
 
Carefully, they secured his arms, legs, and neck with the metal bands.
 

He screamed for them to stop, but they ignored him.
 

They left him momentarily and he found himself offering them his car, his savings account, his house, his condo in Jamaica and his first born child if only they’d let him go.

They reentered.
 
Granny carried a large twenty-gallon pot of breadcrumbs, parsley and celery.
 
A garden shovel stuck out from the top of the mixture.
 
It took his panicked mind but a few seconds to realize that it was stuffing and it was meant for him.

“Go on ahead and chop off that, pecker, Mable,” said Henry.
 
“We’ll make jerky out of it.
 
You know how much Momma loves to chew on her jerky.”

Four things happened at once:

Granny approached his ass with a garden shovel full of dressing.

Mable approached his manhood with a paring knife.

Henry approached his stomach with his fish knife, apparently ready for the gutting.

And Adam realized that being a humanitarian had absolutely nothing to do with politics.

by David Whitman

Casey stared down at the corpse, a big smile erupting underneath his mustache.
 
“I can’t fucking believe you killed Santa Claus.”

Renny
was poking the fat man with his boot, his face pale.
 
“You made me do it.
 
You told me it was a prowler.”

“No, my friend.
 
I told you it
might
be a prowler.
 
You’re the one that got all gung-ho and shot the fat fucker.”

Renny
leaned down and studied the dead man.
 
Santa’s mouth was open, showing off white teeth in an even whiter beard.
 
His blue eyes still registered the shock of being shot.
 
Blood was pouring out of the Santa suit from the side.

Renny
jumped when the camera flashed.

Casey pulled the picture out of the instant Polaroid camera and shook it back and forth in the air.
 
“Well, that was a Norman Rockwell Christmas moment if I ever saw one.
 
Who you going to get next?
 
The Easter Bunny?”

Renny
threw the shotgun to the carpet in front of the Christmas tree.
 
“This shit isn’t funny.
 
He can’t be the real Santa Claus.
 
There
ain’t
no such thing, man.”

Casey looked at the developing picture and smiled.
 
“Well, there
ain’t
no such thing anymore.”
 
He sang in an off key voice.
 
“I saw
Renny
shooting San-tee Claus.
 
Underneath the mistletoe last night.”

Renny
frowned.
 
“I’m glad you think this is so fucking funny.
 
There is a dead man on my living room floor in a goddamn Santa suit, and you’re cracking jokes.”

Casey handed
Renny
the picture.
 
“You need to learn to appreciate the absurdity of life, my friend.
 
This is too ludicrous to not laugh at.”

Renny
stared at the picture, shaking his head.
 
He was leaning over Santa, his face a mask of horror.
 
He handed the photo back to Casey who stuck it in his back pocket.
 
“We have to get rid of this body.”

Casey was pulling at the dead man’s beard.
 
“Yep, it’s real.
 
This is
so
fucking bizarre.
 
Why don’t you just call the police?”

“Well, number one, we have enough drug paraphernalia in this house to start a commune.
 
Number two, this gun is unregistered.
 
And number three, once they find out I have a gun, I’m going right back to prison.”

Casey smiled.
 
“As opposed to killing Santa Claus and then trying to dispose of his body?”

“Would you cut it out with the Santa Claus shit?
 
This is serious.
 
I can get sent to prison for a very long time.
 
It’s like this: we either dispose of the corpse, or get rid of the drugs.
 
You choose.”

Casey looked down at the red and white body.
 
“I guess it’s the corpse then.
 
We can’t afford to get rid of the drugs.”
 
He searched through the deep pockets of the Santa suit and pulled out about five tightly rolled joints of marijuana.
 
“Looks like Santa likes to partake of a fat blunt or two now and then.”

Renny
stared down at the joints.
 
“That bastard.
 
He
was
a prowler. Those blunts were on my dresser.
 
The Butler brothers gave them to me for Christmas.”

Casey laughed.
 
“Well, see? I was right.
 
He was a prowler.”

Renny
grabbed the joints from his friend, pocketing them quickly. “Let’s get this corpse the hell out of here.
 
There’s a wheelbarrow in the garage.”

After about ten minutes of struggling with the amazingly heavy corpse, they managed to get it inside the trunk.
 
Renny
tried to close it, but realized the man was too fat for it to shut all the way.

Casey burst into laughter.
 
“Oh this is too fucking much.
 
Now what you
gonna
do?”

Renny
moaned. “We’re
gonna
have to tie the trunk closed.”

“Yeah, but then he’ll be sticking out.
 
Then everyone will see what you did to poor Santa.”

Renny
growled. “I’ll throw a sheet over him,
godammit
!
 
Stop it with the fucking jokes!”

“It’s hard, man!”

Renny
looked around the garage for some rope, but only found some cheap fishing line.
 
“This is
gonna
have to do.” He tied the trunk closed.

“You forgot to put a sheet on him,” Casey said, snickering.
 
He could see the Santa suit peeking out from the half open trunk.

Renny
picked up an old blanket and shoved it through the crack of the trunk.
 
“Happy now?” He waited until his friend nodded and then muttered, “Asshole.”

Renny
opened the garage door and they got into the car.
 
He pulled out into the snow-covered road and watched the white flurries bounce across the windshield as they drove.
 
Many of the houses on the streets flashed with festively colored lights.

“Dashing through the snow, with a one corpse we did slay,” Casey sang in a surprisingly good Sinatra-like voice. “To a field we go, laughing all the way.”

Renny
turned to his friend, saying nothing, his face reddening.

Casey looked over and tried his best to hide his smile.
 
“I’m really trying.
 
But it’s too ridiculous.
 
Look, it’s Christmas, you shot Santa Claus and now you have him stuffed in your trunk.
 
Not to mention he had five fat blunts in his pocket.
 
Five of
YOUR
fat blunts.
 
All of this and you expect me not to laugh?”

Renny
actually smirked.
 
“It is kind of funny I guess.”

“Kind of funny?
 
It’s hysterical.
 
I can’t wait to answer the inevitable question, ‘How was your Christmas, man?’ I’ll be like, well,
Renny
killed Santa in front of the Christmas tree and I helped him get rid of the body.” Casey noticed a glowing 7-11 off in the distance.
 
“Hey, can you stop there?
 
I need to grab some smokes.”