Brokenhearted in Bakersfield

 

90 - JUST ANOTHER DAY IN BAKERSFIELD

I must have made it to the couch sometime during the night, because the next thing I know Maggie’s kicking me and shouting, “Hey, wake up, look at this.”

Through bleary eyes I could make out this annoying happy face shouting into my hangover from the new TV.

“Good morning, Bakersfield!  This is another weekday edition of ‘Good Morning, Bakersfield!’ with your hosts, Russ Trade and Winney Fisher!  Now heeeeeere they are, Bakersfield’s favorite unmarried quipsters, Ruuussssss and Winnnnnney!”

“Good morning, Bakersfield.  I’m your host, Russ Trade.”

“And I’m his grip on reality, Winney Fisher.”

“This morning a dream of mine is coming true.  Winney is bungee-jumping from a hot air balloon with some Bakersfield naturists.”

“Gee, Russ, that makes me wonder…you must be tired from hot air-blowing your comb-over, huh?”

“Right, Winney.  But first, we have a special report from the Sheriff’s Department in beautiful, downtown Bakersfield about a daring jailbreak.  So we go now live to correspondent and analyst, Kookoo Chew.  So, Kookoo, what’s news with you?”

“Good morning Russ, good morning Winney.  And good morning, Bakersfield!  With me life couldn’t be better, but not so for Sheriff Big Bud Humboldt who was fatally stabbed with an emery board during a jailbreak from the city jail just hours ago.  Alleged suspect, Christos Francis Kartone, the head of the Broken Heart Park franchise in Bakersfield, was being held on suspicion of killing several people when he somehow managed to pick the lock of his cell with a nail file.  He then proceeded to make his daring escape.  But not without running into beloved Sheriff Big Bud first.  Technically, the alleged suspect ran into Big Bud over forty-two times with the pointy end of the nail file.  Being held for questioning is Mr. Kartone’s alleged administrative assistant and gun moll, Mitzi Goldschlager, who is commonly called Doll-Face.  Ms. Goldschlager is believed to have slipped Mr. Kartone a nail file during a conjugal visit.  So far Miss Goldschlager has refused to talk to authorities, so the authorities have taken away her gum and cigarettes, and they’re withholding all alcohol, in an effort to get her to talk.  This great escape appears to have been engineered by Mr. Kartone’s alleged four sons who were outside the station in a red pickup truck playing banjos and waiting to spirit him away.  When last seen, the Kartones were speeding out of downtown Bakersfield, but their ultimate destination has not been disclosed.  And that’s it from outside the pokey.  This has been Kookoo Chew reporting live for ‘Good Morning, Bakersfield!’  Russ, Winney, back to you.”

With the news that Christos Kartone had broken out of jail and was on the loose, Maggie began running around our shared double-wide like a squirrel in a paint can.  She pulled her silver snub-nose pistol out of her purse and double-checked to make sure it was loaded.  She opened a cupboard door and reached up to the top shelf to bring down three or four boxes of Happy Trail bullets.  (Even though I’d heard quite a bit about her little heater before, this was the first time I’d actually seen it.  Maggie sure was pretty, standing there in the kitchen, loading her piece like that.)

Then there came a rapping on the door.  I practically spit out my morning beer from nerves.

Maggie challenged the outside intruder, “Who’s there?”

Came the reply:  “Safety!  Security!  The—”

Maggie swung open the door.  “We’ve heard it all before.  Now hurry up and get in here before someone sees you.”

The Silver Ghost entered with his trusty helper, Little Billy, fast on his heels.  While sporting his foil-wrapped uniform, the Silver Ghost held up an old ghetto blaster.  “Listen to this,” he turned up the volume so we could hear the announcer:

“…The suspected murderer’s attorney, Manny Levy, held a hastily called news conference with the media just moments ago.  We taped his comments, and here’s what he had to say regarding today’s daring jailbreak:

‘My client is innocent of nothing more serious than seizing an opportunity.  After Ms. Goldschlager had her way with him in the conjugal visiting room, it was Ms. Goldschlager who then thrust her nail file upon my client, and my client was left with little choice other than to follow nature’s course.  It is quite an unfortunate circumstance that Sheriff Big Bud was an unwitting victim of these fast-moving events.  But I ask you, would we condemn the storm for flooding our home?  Would we blame the winds for tearing off our roof?  If we cannot, then we cannot blame my client, Christos Kartone, for being a mere force of nature.  Nature moves in mysterious ways, after all, and who are we to question its grand design?’

“Again, that was a recorded statement from celebrity lawyer Manny Levy, in a spirited defense of his client, local business and charity leader Christos Kartone.  This news is brought to you by El Loco Pollo Fried Chicken….”

“Gimme that damn thing,” Maggie grabbed the boombox from the Silver Ghost’s hands and smashed it to pieces against the wall.  At that moment, from somewhere outside the First Coach at #1 Broken Heart Park, we heard the ominous sound of truck tires skidding and screeching along the dusty driveway.

Maggie carefully pulled back the café curtains over the sink’s open window and looked outside.  “Damn it,” she cursed.  “It’s him.  Everyone get down.”

I could tell this was real serious stuff.  Maggie immediately threw herself against the wall next to the window.  The Silver Ghost threw himself against the window next to the wall.  Little Billy was nowhere to be seen.  Then I heard the firing of guns and the shattering of glass.  I threw myself against the floor.

The voice of Christos came through loud and clear.  “Miz Gato?  Ohhh, Miz Gato?  You come on out now, okay?  I ain’t gonna hurt no little woman in a fambly way.  You just come on out wit dat Park Manager guy, okay?  Please, so we can’t all just get along?”

“No!” Maggie growled real defiant.  “You’ll have to come and get me, you bastard.  You might have the numbers on your side, but I got the truth!”

“What’s trut?” Christos shrugged.

Not waiting for an answer, I guess, hot lead whizzed around the Manager’s Coach.  Maggie popped off a round or two herself.  I looked up from my place on the floor in time to see the legs of Little Billy disappearing out the front door with his towel cape flapping behind him.  He was armed with only a few sharpened Popsicle sticks.

I lunged to snatch him but missed badly.  I cried in desperation, “Billy, noooo, don’t try to be no superhero!”

Then more bullets whizzed through my managerial double-wide, which made me wonder why they never armor-plated the damn thing, especially considering our neighbors’ God-given right to get drunk and shoot automatic firearms.  The Park Manager deserves extra-special protection, like any leader of a shithole country or high school principal.

Maggie yelled, “I hear you knocking Christos, but you know the rest of that tune,” and she fired off a few shots of her own at him and the Kartone Boys.  Even more bullets came zinging back in reply.  Suddenly I heard a ka-thump and looked up from my position on the floor.

Maggie was down!  Holy shit, she’d been hit.  She grabbed her leg and cursed like a sailor as she rolled around on our brand new carpet gushing red blood like a geyser.  The Silver Ghost ran over to her side, picking up her pearl-handled weapon he headed for the door.

Holy crap.  The Silver Ghost must have been feeling lucky.  I was left with little else to do but watch as our special guard from The Brothers of the Mythical Nights sprung into action.  I prayed Little Billy might be helpful to him in our time of need.

With danger all around, I just had to see what would happen next.  I crawled myself upright and leaned close to the refrigerator so I could pull back the kitchen curtains and take a little peek.  Since I was right there, I figured I’d take the opportunity to grab a longneck beer (which was as needed as much as it was deserved).

Across the driveway, I could see Matt, Marko, Lucas and Juan hiding out in a big ol’ hole in the ground where the Kachingas had been digging for Injun treasures.  Christos was there, but a little off to the side.

I gotta hand it to the Silver Ghost, he was out there and standing tall.  He held Maggie’s pistol at arm’s length and went straight after them Kartones.  I watched him walking down our iron stoop strolling just as calmly as could be, when his aluminum foil uniform got hooked up on the railing.  The snagged foil began tearing away, but the Silver Ghost was unstoppable.  (I could also see he was going commando.)

Christos covered his eyes.  “Oy, I can’t look at dis junk.  Oy, da shame.  Da shame.  Cover it up!”

The Kartones sprayed their fire blindly.  Since they averted their eyes from the target, the bullets missed badly.  It was almost like the Silver Ghost had some invisible protection once his foil duds fell away.  Why, maybe there is something to this Mystical Brotherhood thing?

“Safety!  Security!  The Silver Ghost!”

From nowhere, what looked like a white ball went flying through the air and dropped onto the Kartone position.  Suddenly the air was full of all kinds of hoots and shouts and blood-curdling screams.

Then, I saw an orange ball fly over.  Then a striped ball.  Then a calico ball.  With each flying ball, the cries grew louder and louder.  Matt, Marko, Lucas and Juan stood straight up and slapped at their chests and legs and backs, like they got heebie-jeebies real bad.  I craned my neck a little forward for a better view.

Then, I saw it.  It was Little Billy.  I could see Little Billy in his underwear and his towel cape perched atop a trailer, pulling kittens from a bag and firing angry feline missiles down on the Kartone position.

The Silver Ghost continued to pridefully press forward, without any shame or modesty, hollerin’ at the top of his lungs, “Safety!  Security!  The Silver Ghost!”

Just then, across the way, Miss Dorothy’s trailer door opened and she stepped out with a tray of coffee and sweet treats and a great big smile.  With the Kartones hunkered down in their hole, and bullets and kittens and the Silver Ghost’s private parts all taking to the air at once, it seemed not incongruous at all that our own Miss Dorothy would decide to serve coffee and goodies.

But with Maggie winged and bleeding all over the carpet, and me strategically stationed behind the fridge with my beer, I wasn’t exactly concentrated on Miss Dorothy’s snacks.  Still, I must admit, Miss Dorothy was always courageously there for those who might be somehow snack-deficient, especially if they was men in official attire.

It seemed as though everyone’s attention turned to Miss Dorothy and her tray of treats.  All, that is, except mine.  Which is why I witnessed what must be one of the last surviving piss-lizards in all of Bakersfield skitter under the foot of the Silver Ghost while he advanced.  Fatefully, the Silver Ghost planted a foil-wrapped size-12 Air Jordan right on top of the endangered reptile, and with an audible pop, the lizard was drained.  The Silver Ghost was tripped up from underfoot.

Time slowed, like in a dream.  It was as if time and space was unhinged.  That’s exactly what it was like.  Our naked defender’s foot squashed that Three Horned Piss Lizard, and Joe's legs flew straight up into the air.  The Silver Ghost fell back, his bandaged head rammed smack onto a sharp rock on the ground.  At that moment, Maggie’s silver firearm discharged and, I swear, I watched the bullet fly as it exited out the barrel of her little heater.

Flying right toward the Kartone’s red pickup truck, it first clipped the outside rear-view mirror, then it took off at an angle, hitting the corner of an abandoned milk crate, then it dove a bit and spliced through the neck of Miss Dorothy’s ornamental lawn flamingo, decapitating the plastic bird and sending the pink head hurtling right at Miss Dorothy’s exposed skull.  Miss Dorothy stood frozen stiff, her sweet smile stuck to a stunned expression, as a piece of plastic flamingo beak wedged squarely into her forehead.

After that, the bullet turned tail and totally changed trajectory, and it took a wild swing toward the copper piping that attached Miss Dorothy’s trailer with two giant propane tanks from the Ulele Gas Works.  I braced myself.

KaaaAHHHH-BLAAAAAMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

In a gigantic explosive blast, gas and flames and folks flew in a fiery ball of orange reckoning.

I witnessed Little Billy vanish into thin air off the trailer roof.

The corpse of Miss Dorothy torched like a freakin’ Roman candle as the chemical additives and saturated fats loaded on her snack tray created a rainbow of flames around her melting form.

Kartones and kittens and even a kitchen sink littered the ground in lumps of burning debris.

Miraculously, the Silver Ghost was thrown back into the managerial double-wide by the force of the blast.  He swore a bit as he dragged himself off the couch.  He stood there naked before us. 

After I pulled myself up and dusted myself off I handed the Silver Ghost a box of foil.  “Get dressed,” I urgently commanded as Park Manager.