Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Ewie: Chapter 1

Old man Ewie was a part time clown. He just wasn't funny enough to support himself as a full time clown. He supplemented his clown income by selling men's shoe insoles from a stand on the shoulder of where highway 44 and route 6 intersect. You know, over by the Jameson's old farmstead.

The horse flies were bad that hot summer day, and Ewie had to wear a shady, floppy hat to cover his bald head and weathered brown face. He groaned and tried to get comfortable on the cracked vinyl of the barstool. His skin was sticky and wet, and the sweat ran off the end of his nose.

"Easier said than done," Ewie said, swatting furiously at the circling pests. He tried to stay busy with a tv guide crossword puzzle.

"Ouch," he exclaimed as he slapped at a fly on his neck. "Buggers."

A orange-red pick-up slowed down with a scraping of brakes and pulled off the road onto the dusty shoulder across from his stand. A pudgy woman climbed out of the passenger side, grimacing against the heat and brightness. Slamming the truck door, she pulled a blue and orange scarf around her head. After tying a sloppy knot below her chin, she yelled over to Ewie.

"Hey, you over there, I need some insoles for my tenny runners," she said in a raspy chainsaw-like tenor. "I've got five bucks that ain't doin' nothin'. Whatcha got for a hottie like me?"

Ewie looked over and shaded his eyes with both hands. He had forgotten to bring his clip-ons so his eyes were watering and he could barely see through the blur.

"Sorry," he said. "I only carry men's insoles. Maybe you could try the CVS in town off Marble avenue and 10th."

"Good Lord you are a moron," the portly woman chortled back at Ewie. "If I wanted damn CVS insoles I would've just gone there right? Jeemeny Christmas." A sudden gust of wind tugged at her scarf, and gray wisps of hair framed her face as she rolled her eyes in disgust.

Ewie stuck his thumbs in the waistline of his trousers and shrugged his narrow shoulders. He wished he would have taken that serpentine belt job at the Tankton assembly plant last month.

"Anything has to be better than this," he sighed under his breath.

He was right.

The lady climbed back into the truck and it ground into gear and sped off in a cloud of gravel and dirt.

"A dish of pineapple sherbet would hit the spot right now,'" Ewie thought, rubbing his belly. "And a big fat cigar to smoke and forget all those damn kid party contracts."

The kid party contracts. It was a secret that he would take to his grave. See the things was, even though he was a part time clown, he had worked some kid parties that were earmarked for full timers only. It was a racket, and a shrewd one, but he had danced with the Devil. He loved to dance that dance, and who doesn't? Carnal gratuity had him on the fast track to the land down under. Not Australia no, no, not Oz. H, e, double toothpicks. He felt the knot in his stomach.

"Damn agent. Wish I'd never met him. He dragged me into this mess and now I have no life," he said.

Not a good mental condition for a clown. He knew it. The kids knew it. Even the fish knew it. But for now he was stuck. Like a pork chop in a mud puddle.

It was time to pack it in for the day. He closed up his little silver-gray lockbox and with his satchel under one arm and the lockbox under the other, he started walking home. The wind was getting stronger, pushing his hat back on his head, and billowing his shirt as he made his way along the barren interstate.

His legs were tired and his lower back was aching like a sad winter ptarmigan when he finally passed the gas station and crossed the parking lot of Mama Cho's delicatessen. He had been dreaming about sherbet and that firecracker-hot Mama Cho all day long. What a sight for sore eyes!

Mama Cho had been selected from over 1,000 Chinese refugees to relocate to Hartleyville over two years ago, with a federal loan, and a new lease on life as well as a delicatessen. That was the day Ewie fell for her like a shaken cake.

Mama Cho was a natural sandwich queen, the way she moved, the way she sliced, and the way she spread the condiments. Nothing escaped her sandwich-maker's eye as she flew around the kitchen north, south, east, and west.

Ewie would sit for hours with his nose pressed against the window glass of his 1982 Chrysler Le Baron, watching her as she molded balls of poor man's meat for foot longs on the back deck of the deli. She knew he was infatuated, and she would play with it, daring it, tempting it to develop into a situation that neither could handle.

What type of future could a part time clown and a sandwich queen possibly have? Oh it burned in the back of their minds, but neither would make a move. Neither would take a step towards the light.

He saw his old car sitting out back so he decided to sit in it and watch her for a while without her knowing. Even though that made him feel like a peeping-tom pervert he did it anyway. After all they were kind of dating.

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