Hidden in the Mayonnaise

Jeremy Blanch’s troubles began after he dined at a Burger Castle, a local fast food chain in Oscaloo, Florida, where he discovered a puddle of spilled mayonnaise on the floor underneath a neighboring table. He went in for a closer look, because he thought there was something shiny hidden in it. He reached down to grab it only to discover it was part of a candy wrapper. Jeremy grumbled as he walked into the restroom to wash off the warm mayonnaise from his hands. He reached for the paper towel dispenser, but it was empty. “What the heck do they expect me to do, wipe my hands on the wall?” he grumbled. He dried his hands on his jeans and stormed out of the building and into the parking lot where he noticed that his car was missing. “What the heck?” he said. “I parked the darn thing right here!” As Jeremy looked all over the parking lot, he was finally able to locate it. Except, it was all the way across the street. “What the heck? I didn’t park it there!” Dumbfounded, Jeremy proceeded to cross when a black, 1968 Mercury Cougar came out of nowhere and hit him.

A fat man named Herman garbed in a cheap, brown suit and horn-rimmed glasses that were situated on the tip of his nose emerged nervously from the driver’s side door. A large crowd of mumbling gawkers were already gathering around the front of his car. Herman gasped horrifically and then ran full speed down the road from the direction he came. “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh,” he muttered to himself incessantly. During his frantic run, he approached a group of anti-fur picketers and accidentally pushed one over who spilled a can of red paint all over herself.

Across the street, 12 women cloaked in mink coats laughed gleefully, and so did their small Pomeranians. “Serves ya right, ya bush hippies!” one of the women yelled. “And we’ll keep killing your precious little forest creatures!” added another. The leader of the anti-fur picketers, Harrison, had a look of extreme disgust etched on his face as he yelled out “How would you like it if we made coats out of your precious little mongrels?” The 12 pro-fur picketers and their dogs immediately ceased their laughing and twisted their lips. The leader of the pro-fur picketers, Jill, roared: “How dare he talk about my Schnukums!” In a rage, she proceeded to cross the street, high heels clicking on the pavement. One of her compatriots yelled out: “No Jill, what are you doing?” Once Jill walked up to the anti-fur picketers, they didn’t hesitate but to drench her and her mink coat with red paint. Jill fell to the ground, and the anti-fur picketers cheered. The remaining pro-fur picketers and their dogs snarled. “Ready girls?” one of them said, cracking her knuckles. The anti-fur picketers lined up in position, holding their buckets of red paint, preparing to launch. As the two sides marched towards the middle of the street, they were interrupted by a loud whistle.

With his eyes crossed, Lieutenant James Smith ceased blowing his shiny brass whistle and screamed: “Break it up! We’ll have none of that!” Lieutenant Smith stepped back into his patrol car. He then grimaced and pressed his fingers to his chest. “Oh, this heartburn!” he huffed. “It’s been bothering me for weeks.” “Here, try this,” a man sitting in the back seat said, handing Lieutenant Smith two tablets of Flummox Antacid. “What’s this?” Lieutenant Smith asked. “It’s an antacid that’s perfect for treating stomachache, indigestion and heartburn. I’ve used it for years. In fact, Flummox is so effective that it’s recommended by eleven out of ten doctors.” Lieutenant Smith skeptically accepted the two tablets and plopped them into his mouth. He chewed briefly and then let out a surprised smile. “Wow! This stuff really works! Hey thanks, buddy, how can I ever make this up to you?” The man let out a sleepy smile. “I’ve made a happy man. That’s payment enough.”

“Now, whose idea was it to disguise our 100-thousand dollar supply of cocaine into antacids, again?” asked Bangs Smythe, a short man with a tiny mustache, looking up from a pair of binoculars. “I dunno, boss,” replied his minion, Lex, a dopey man who was about as big as a refrigerator. “That dimwit Marcus just gave one to a copper!” Bangs continued. “What the frig was he thinking?” “I dunno, boss,” Lex responded. “Well at least we have some of our stash left,” Bangs said as he removed a package of Flummox Antacid out of his pocket. “Lemme see yours, Lex.” “I dunno, boss,” Lex responded. “What?” Bangs quacked, squinting his eyes. “I dunno, boss,” Lex repeated. Bangs walked up to Lex and with little struggle, he removed a wad of torn-up Flummox packaging from Lex's pocket. “Lex, where’s your stash?” Bangs demanded. “I dunno, boss,” Lex responded. Then Bangs clapped a palm to his brow and screamed “You nincompoop, you ate our stash!” Bangs then pushed Lex out the window.

“Aaaaaaaaaaah!” Mrs. Binks screamed as she saw a man fall from the sky and land not ten yards away from her. She tucked her two small identical twin children, Freddie and Danny, behind her. They struggled to peak around her body to see the carnage. “Where did he come from?” Freddie asked his twin brother. “The sky,” Danny responded. “What was he doing up there?” Freddie asked. “I don’t know.” Both siblings gazed up into the sky while their mother continued to scream. “Wherever he’s from, I’d like to go there one day,” Danny said. Then out popped a small green man who hovered between them. “Well you can!” the green man said with an aw-shucks voice. “We can?” Freddy and Danny asked in unison. “Of course!” the green man responded. “What do we have to do?” Freddie asked. “Just think happy thoughts,” the green man replied. “Happy thoughts?” Danny asked. “Yes, happy thoughts!” “Like what?”“Well, like yellow roses and orange, fluffy kittens!” “We’ve never seen a yellow rose,” Freddie said, rather despondently. “And we’re allergic to cats,” Danny added. “OK, OK, can’t you think of something that makes you happy?”“Well,” Danny said. “We would be happy to go to the sky where that man came from.” He pointed to the dead man on the sidewalk. “Very well, just think of that,” the green man said. Then he added with pressure in his voice: “Think with all your might.” The twin siblings strained their eyes shut and thought of being in the sky. After a while, Freddie asked: “May we open them?”There was no response. He slowly opened his eyes and much to his surprise and wonderment, he realized that he was soaring in the sky—there was a large mass of fluffy cloud below him and a yellow sun beaming rays on him from above. Next to him was Danny keeping pace, but his eyes were still shut. “Danny, Danny! Open your eyes!” Freddie yelled. Danny did so. “Whoah!” he yelled gleefully. “We are in the sky!” Danny extended both arms and Freddie did likewise.

Liza gasped after taking a look out a first-class window of a 747. She didn’t know what compelled her to look out the window just then—she was deathly afraid of heights, after all. She wiped beads of sweat that were accumulating on her forehead. Her husband Jim, who saw her in distress, turned to console her. “Dearest,” he said. “Nothing is going to happen. We’re as safe as can be.” Lisa turned to him and said frantically “You don’t understand, Jim, I just saw two little boys flying outside.” Jim crooked his head and said: What?” Liza cleared her throat and then repeated herself. Jim then narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms. “You want the aisle seat, is that what this is all about?” Liza’s eyes suddenly relaxed. “Deal,” she said. At that moment, an excessively perky airline stewardess by the name of Alicia approached and offered them Moon Pies.

They didn’t want a Moon Pie either, Alicia thought to herself. Perhaps I should try these ginger schnapps. Alicia put the Moon Pies away in her apron and took out a handful of individually wrapped ginger schnapps. She then approached the couple sitting behind Liza and Jim. Their names were Lawrence and Frida. “Hello sir, would you like a ginger schnapp?” she asked them in a sweet, pleasant voice. “Ginger schnapps, eh?” Lawrence said. He smiled and clasped his two palms together. “Why not, indeed?” Finally! Alicia thought to herself. Then she looked to Frida and asked: “Would you like one as well?” “Yes I would,” Frida replied. Wonderful! Alicia thought. Now I’ve reached my quota! Her already wide smile widened even more as she watched the couple unwrap their ginger schnapps. Lawrence chewed noisily. Frida followed.

A metallic ding woke up Lawrence, Frida and a handful of other passengers on a rocket ship. An intercom switched on and started spewing an interesting dialect of English. “Hopyur comfie,” it said. “Yur gointo space tu Alpha Cenuari. Congratspeeps, yur nowar slaves.” Lawrence rubbed his eyes. Frida scanned her surroundings quizzically. They were buckled in with a heavy duty seatbelt. Another passenger by the name of Nate uttered an obscenity. Alicia emerged from a narrow sliding door. “Hello, Earthlings! Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to make your ride more comfortable. By the way, if you act up, I’ve been instructed to shoot you.” She removed a large ray gun (that strangely resembled a trombone) from a hip holster. The passenger by the name of Nate raised his hand. “Yes?” Alicia said, pointing the ray gun at him. He screamed: “What in tarnation is going on here?” Immediately, a streak of diagonal lightening emitted from the ray gun, and Nate exploded. “Have a nice day,” Alicia said. Then she was joined by another excessively perky individual who went by the name Hans. “Greets,” he said in that unusual dialect of English. “Welcometo duh Staship Jrejk. Imyur captun. Hopya havina nice ride. Dontfret itllonle be fivyrs for werech Alpha Centuari.” The passengers gave the captain a puzzled look, as they didn’t understand most of what he just said. “Katgotcha tung? Teresting fraze, indit!” The passengers continued to glare at him blankly. Alicia tapped Hans on the shoulder. “Um, sir,” she said. “Your English language-plug is about five hundred years ahead of them.” Hans narrowed his eyes and ripped out what looked like a plastic cork from his throat. “Qua gradda grertwe frag?” Hans asked. “No sir, they’re 21st Century, like it says in the order,” Alicia replied. “Haghta grifka!” Hans ordered. “Sorry sir,” Alicia said. She ripped a plastic cork out of her throat, just as Hans had done. “Hattj grest ting ratf trag!” he exclaimed. “Brath! Quag tragga kree!” she replied. “Gahh! Hrughtra frewee gritta!” he screamed. Han’s face had turned purple in anger. He then aggressively snatched Alicia’s cork from her fingers and popped it into his neck. “I’m afraid there’s been a terrible mistake. We’re returning you to Earth now,” Hans said. The passengers promptly fell asleep.

Clyde Harrison frantically opened the front door of the Oscaloo Times. “Stop the presses! Stop the presses!” he screamed. There was only a receptionist by the name of Betsy occupying the front office. She had been talking on the phone and she pressed the receiver to her chest. “May I help you?” she asked him. “Stop the presses!” he repeated. Betsy pushed a bunch of buttons on the phone. “Security?” she whispered into the receiver. Clyde, who knew what she was up to ran up to the desk and leaned over it. He grabbed her telephone and ripped its cord out of the jack. “Now, miss!” he yelled, stuttering a bit. “You don’t seem to understand! I was abducted by aliens from Alpha Centuari! They said they were going to use me as a slave. But I’m back now because they accidentally took me from the wrong year. You see, they were supposed to get human slaves from the 26th Century, but there were some mix-ups, you see. They were mistakenly snatching people from the 21st Century, and they couldn’t use us for whatever reason, so they returned us back here. I wasn’t the only one they took, you see. There were others. This would make a very interesting story, don’t you think, miss? We should warn the people of the world that there are hostile aliens out there. We need to be prepared. It is your duty as a news organization to—” Harrison’s arms were suddenly grabbed by two large police officers who quickly dragged him out of the building. Clyde continued to scream: “I was abducted by aliens, I tell you! And they’re going to return 500 years from now! Can’t you hear me? Stop the presses!”

“What a wacko,” said Frank, a bearded, middle-aged hobo as he sat on a sidewalk, leaned up against the Oscaloo Times building. It was nighttime, and he couldn’t see much of anything that wasn’t directly under a street lamp. Then suddenly, at a distance Frank could hear footsteps approaching. They were coming at him quickly. “I wonder what this guy is running from?” Twenty seconds later, the running man zoomed past, and Frank heard a thud. Something was dropped on the sidewalk nearby. Frank was rather comfortable where he was, and he didn’t much feel like finding out what the thud was about. However, curiosity eventually got the better of him. He got up and saw there was a box of some sort laying on the sidewalk that hadn't been there before. Frank picked it up and felt the box. Its cardboard was soft. Then he felt a flap. It looked like a good place to open it. He ripped it. Inside he felt soft pieces of paper. While he didn’t know what they were, they did have a familiar feel about them. Then it struck him. Could it be? he thought. Money? Frank, with an ecstatic expression on his face, took the box underneath a street lamp to examine its contents further. “Money!” he whispered with excitement, careful not to let others hear, as he thumbed through the paper under the light. “I’m rich! Waahaa!” he whispered. Examining the contents further, however, Frank noticed that these pieces of paper were actually napkins. His expression of glee turned sour, and he threw the box of napkins down disgustedly back on the sidewalk. He walked back to his spot and sat down, unknowingly at the time, upon the tail of a cat named Gulliver.

“Meeeeeeeeeowwwww! Watchit, willya?” Gulliver exclaimed. My tail is frag-ile, ya know!” The cat walked on all fours down the sidewalk and into an alley. “We live here too, ya know! Human’s don’t own the place!” Then, suddenly, Gulliver made a huge realization. “I can talk?” He widened his cat eyes and exclaimed: “Wow! This is amazing!” The cat then began to quietly sing “Three Blind Mice” as he crept slowly among trashcans and piles of rubbish, on the prowl for mice. When Gulliver realized there were no mice to be found, he sang the nursery rhyme louder. Then he got on all twos and began to dance. “Hey!” Gulliver exclaimed. “I can dance, too!” The cat then proceeded to kick his legs in the air like a can-can girl. Then, Gulliver found a bottle cap that he used as a hat and a plastic straw that he used as a cane and then proceeded to sing and dance like Maurice Chevalier. Gulliver went through number after number, act after act. When he tired of singing and dancing, he picked up a mouse skull and enacted a scene from Hamlet. “Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.” Gulliver continued these antics until afternoon the next day when he made the grandest realization of them all: “I should turn professional!” Bottle cap, plastic straw, and mouse skull in tow, Gulliver walked unnoticed through the doors of the Oscaloo Arts Theater and into a rehearsal.

Theater director Harold Danes was massaging his temples as his leading lady was badly singing “Jungle Love,” a song from a musical adaptation of The Jungle Book, written by an Oscaloo local named Zigler Farley. Something knocked over a microphone, and the speakers emitted an ear-piercing screech. Director Danes was not happy about this at all. “Stop, stop, stop!” he yelled. “What happened?” Then he heard a beautiful male voice clear its throat and start to sing Frank Sinatra’s “Strangers in the Night.” Harold squinted his eyes and saw a cat hunched over into the knocked-over microphone singing. Danes then relaxed his eyes and slowly sat back down in his seat. “I’ve gotta get outta this town,” he said, mournfully.

Image borrowed from Wikimedia Commons.