In an effort to promote my book More Stories, and Additional Stories, I considered posting the entire 83,329 words in a single entry on the Express website. Why not give readers something great for free and ask them to pay for it anyway? It’s known as the “Wikipedia Business Model.”
Then one day I got some life-enhancing advice: “Pull your head out of your ass.” I wish I could show proper gratitude for that wisdom, but it would take too long to thank all 28 of those people. (Although I will quickly tip my cap to the editor, Milwaukee scribe Tyler Maas.)
Scaling back, then, ‘cause I’m a pretty reasonable guy, here’s a vignette from the first story, “The Cat Lady and the Munsons.” The former was a mysterious crone who deferred her dilapidated house to feral cats. During my childhood visits to my best friend’s neighborhood, her life was intertwined with the latter, a family of crude hellions who were like the Trailer Park Boys—minus all the redeeming qualities.
“X-Men Battles at the Park” is a Munson story. A link to purchase my collection of funny short stories is posted below. Feel free to buy it with the money you would have otherwise donated to Wikipedia.
http://www.amazon.com/More-Stories-Additional-Nick-Olig/dp/1329076117
Nature's dimmer-switch was turning from dusk to dark when Chet Munson Sr. shoved past a screen door and stepped onto his front porch. The old man tussled with the bill of his meshed hat and lurched tobacco through a gap in his incisors onto the bush beside him. Through oversized glasses, he scowled in the general direction of the park located a hundred yards away from him, across a steady stream of traffic on the adjacent street. At Grant Park, among the slides, swings, and jungle gyms, kids were at play, his own kin Rex included—and he didn't like it one bit. Chet Sr. folded his arms and set his mind to transmitting psychopathic threats to his grandson.
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Grant Park was the site of our X-Men battles. The cartoon series was a Saturday morning phenomenon to us. When we fake-fought each other, no one was willing to play the part of a villain like Magneto or Juggernaut. Instead, we all opted to adopt the character of one of the X-Men. It now seems like a delightful paradox: all these good guys trying to destroy each other because nobody wanted to be the bad guy.
Even though the sun was becoming less and less of an issue, Rex sported Shutter Shade sunglasses with fluorescent yellow frames. He did this to emulate Cyclops, the straitlaced leader known for shooting optic blasts through a visor. I thought it was a lackadaisical costume. Sure, he wore blue jeans and a turquoise tank top to affect Cyclops' color scheme, but anyone could do that. Plus, his argument was that he could kill us simply by looking at us, and that hardly seemed fair.
To his deadly gaze through garish sunglasses, Rex added laser beam noises to let us know when we were supposed to be dead. I was running across a wobbly wooden bridge when he emerged from behind a tree on the fringe of the park and looked at me.
“Bee-ooh-bee-ooh, bee-ooh-bee-ooh!” he exclaimed. “I got you!”
I ducked behind the protective barrier at the peak of the winding slide.
“Nope! You missed me,” I said. You're damn right I tossed out the “You missed me” card.
“Bullshit, Olig!”
I resented that. At the time, I was Gambit, whose mutant power allowed him to explosively charge playing cards (and other inanimate objects, for that matter, but he was a gambler, and so a deck of cards was his first choice). Gambit also wielded a bo staff, which I simulated by carrying around a three-foot stick I'd found in Willy's backyard. Disposing of “RexClops” called for my long-range attack, though. The breast pocket of my shirt was stocked with playing cards, all of which had pennies duct-taped to them to lend the cards a chance in hell of cutting through wind resistance.
I sprung to my feet and sidearm dealt the Ace of Spades at RexClops. It missed the strike zone, which happened more often than not. I ducked back down as RexClops cackled at my errant throw.
“Not even close! Ya dead guy.”
Blast! I devised a new plan to go down the winding slide, hide behind the foot of it, wait for my enemy to grow bored and wander over, target his sunglasses, and then chuck my stick at him.
I plopped my butt onto the lip of the slide and positioned my stick carefully so that it wouldn't snap on the way down. Next I buttoned shut my breast pocket to prevent cards from falling out. In that moment of readiness, my right hand grabbed the support bar above me, I inched back, and then jerked and let go of the bar. I propelled forward and down the winding slide.
When I got to the brief straightaway at the bottom, sheer horror awaited. Willy had made use of his dad's duct-tape as well, strapping three nails to both knuckles. Nails! Sharp, pointed nails capable of puncturing jugulars. As my feet hit the ground, he held up his lethal fists a foot away from my face.
“Jesus!” I blurted out.
“No, you can call me Wolverine,” Willy said. “Heh, heh.”
“Are you nuts, Willy?!”
I was not immune to breaking character.
“Relax,” he said. “I know what I'm doing. These nails aren't even rusty.”
In a momentary truce, RexClops called to us.
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“He's done for! He's gotta be out of the battle now.”
WillyVerine nodded nonchalantly.
“He's right. Sorry, pal.”
“Dude, you almost stabbed me.”
“Exactly. That's why you're out.”
Before I could dispute the rationale of this boy with murder weapons stuck to his hands, RexClops was heard making laser noises again. I turned to see he was not looking at us.
“I shot you, too!” he proclaimed.
“Oh, calm the hell down, Rex.”
That was McNash. He lived about a block away on the other side of the park. His mom was of Korean decent and his dad was Irish. His mom's genes dominated his physical features, while his dad had reign over his last name and love of hockey. McNash was carrying what appeared to be a bulky green tube.
“I just got here, so you ain't killin' me,” McNash added.
“Game off!” I announced.
As McNash leisurely made his way across the playground, Willy pointed at the tube. I flinched and jumped back when he raised his spiky hand.
“What's that?”
McNash strode to the slide casually. He held up the bulky green tube for display.
“Bazooka.”
“No way!” Rex said as he rushed to us. “A bazooka?!”
The branches of a faraway bush rustled and Calvin emerged.
“Did someone say bazooka?!”
Calvin was cloaked in a clear, plastic tarp. To explain: he had taken on the problematic role of Nightcrawler, who could teleport—vanish, move elsewhere, and reappear. Calvin had told us beforehand that we were supposed to be unaware of him while he had the magical sheet of plastic draped over him. Only when he removed the tarp, so said Calvin, could he be seen or unleash an attack. To insure his invisibility tarp, I suppose, the kid hid in the bushes an awful lot, too.
“Yup. It's a bazooka,” McNash confirmed. He showed us the thin, rectangular front-sight and the hand grip grafted to the trigger that fired the weapon (which was unloaded, solidifying Willy as the most dangerous kid at the park).
“My grandpa got it in World War II," McNash went on. "Souvenir or something.”
“It's like an antique,” I said.
“An antique that blew up Nazis, yes,” McNash said. “Anyway, can I get in?”
“Sure,” Willy said. “Olig's out.”
“Which X-Man are you supposed to be?” I asked.
“Bishop.”
That was one of the more obscure X-Men. Bishop was from the future, which was apocalyptic in nature. I seem to recall he could shoot laser beams out of his hands, and he also had a big laser gun. Now that's what I call a shit-load of lasers.
“Fair enough,” Willy said. “OK. Everybody scatter. Olig, since you're eliminated, you can be like the referee. Give us a minute and then yell, 'Game on!'”
I burned disdainfully but was unwilling to bike home until nighttime. With a begrudging nod, I accepted. As McNash turned away toward his hiding spot, I nudged him.
“Don't let him stab you,” I said, gesturing to Willy.
Rex darted back to behind his trusty tree. Willy and McNash stalked far apart over the grassy ridge to the alcove that included a merry-go-round and another swing set. Everyone but me and Calvin dispersed. He lingered conspicuously as though he was about to say something of grave importance.
“Which one's Bishop?” he whispered.
I exhaled a long sigh, realizing I had sunk to both the acting ref and the X-Men historian. After my sigh but before my explanation, a gruff and heinous voice boomed throughout the landscape.
“REX! GET YER ASS HOOOMMMEEE!”
That was Chet Sr. He sounded like a drunken coyote. His grandson jerked his head in dejection and kicked the tree trunk in front of him. Rex would not be mutating into RexClops anymore that day.
“GIMME 10 MINUTES!” he pleaded.
The Munson voices were so adept at long-distance screaming that they proved capable of communicating this way—across 100 yards, muddled by passing vehicles on the adjacent street.
“YER ASS'LL BE MUH SHOE HORN IN 10 MINUTES!”
If the Munsons had a saving grace, it was their quick-witted rancor. Rex had no retort. He stared vacantly at the grass and its declining vibrancy and plodded past me.
“Rex is out!” I announced.
He feigned a punch at me but couldn't muster the verve to follow through. He removed his sunglasses and plodded on, barely dodging oncoming traffic and barely caring. Upon seeing his grandson cross the street, Chet Sr. did an about-face and entered his household. Thirty seconds later, Rex trudged onto the front porch and flung open the screen door. Neither Munson was satisfied, but between them, there was a winner and loser and the matter was settled.
