Archived: May 07, 2007

> Arts & Entertainment

Episode IV of IV: The final genital measurement

Elders: You're still alive?

By Tyler Gaskill

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Nurse backs away, bewildered, "What's wrong with your skin! It looks rusted."

In Episode III, at his 20 year high school reunion, Carl Mark offered Adam Smith, his former college roommate, a fortune in gold for Adam's brain. Despite Carl's endless wealth, provided by his globe-spanning corporation, he was not powerful enough to persuade Adam. 50 years later ...

Adam Smith raises the banana cream pie tin with a shaky arm and aims for the male nurse. There's a small window of time between the nurse turning around to reach for the pre-packaged meal on the cart, and turning toward Adam to hand him the meal.

The nurse whistles a song only familiar to Adam because of the new generation's control of the radio station. Reaching for Adam's meal, the nurse turns around. The moment arrives. Adam's 88-year-old frame attempts to fire with that quickness, vigor and precision of years before.

Adam's near-sightedness prevents any accuracy. The nurse appears as a large white blob in Adam's field of vision. Something pulls in his bicep as he tries to heave the pie at the young man as Ahab would a spear into his white whale.

Adam wants to scream, "I'm not dead yet;" instead, he lets out a defiant, shrill, screech as the tin awkwardly launches from his palm. Adam's weak grip slips free of his walker. Before hitting the floor, Adam sees another blob appear behind the white blob.

Adam lands on his side, and hears the cream pie make a direct hit in the form a of a sloppy plop sound. A voice says, "What the hell?"

Adam squints to see what the tin hit. When his vision clears, he sees the pie went high, and missed the nurse; however, it made direct contact with his former college roommate and debatably the wealthiest human to exist, Carl Mark.

"Answer me, Mr. Smith," says the nurse. "What the hell was that? We don't hit our guests with pies at Convenient Passings Retirement Home."

The nurse turns to Carl, "I'm so sorry about that. I didn't realize visiting hours had be-" He pauses mid-sentence for a moment and points at Carl screaming, "By Jove! You're Carl Mark!"

Carl runs a comb through his silver hair and pulls a Saran-wrapped-brick of $1,000 bills from the vest of this pie-stained three-piece suit. He grabs the nurse by the shirt, shoves the brick into his stomach and says, "Live a happy life." Carl leans close and whispers, "I wasn't here."

Nurse backs away, bewildered, "What's wrong with your skin! It looks rusted."

"Get out of my sight," yells Carl.

Adam wheezes, "Beat it kid. This is between me and him!" Adam squints, and looks into Carl's eyes, "I'm ending this feud."

Carl walks closer to the feeble Adam who is shaking on the floor next to his walker. "Look at where we are Adam," says Carl. "You're there, circling the drain, waiting to go off the radar of existence. At least you've lost some weight since we last met."

Carl's footsteps emanate crisp click sounds as he approaches, "I, on the other hand, am a living legend standing before you atop a monument of success. Perhaps you're ready to admit that my business major, which you deemed 'unoriginal,' afforded me a richer life than your 'whatever art major' did for you."

Despite the constant ringing in Adam's ears from a lifetime of loud music, he hears a buzzing sound over Carl's droning speech. In a nagging voice, he interrupts Carl yelling, "What's that buzzing sound!"

Carl replies annoyed, "That's just the fan for the processor in my bionic brain." Carl continues without hesitation and slumps in a chair next to Adam, "Damn it! You interrupted my speech! I was in a good rhythm, and now it's all just wasted."

Adam uses his bed to climb to his feet. While struggling to get up, he says "More machine now than man."

Carl puts his dress shoe on Adam's shoulder and pushes him back to the ground. "Twisted and evil," says Carl.

Adam hears a hydraulic hiss come from Carl's calf as he hits the floor for a second time.

"Your life," says Adam grabbing his side, "was only material. Mine was rich."

Carl replies with a quick twitch, "W- what?"

Adam replies with a wet laugh, "Couldn't buy my brain so you got the next best thing, eh?"

Carl gets out the chair, removes a piece of paper from his vest and places it on the floor for Adam to see.

Adam reads it for a moment and replies slowly, "You want to buy my family?"

Carl timidly replies, "Despite all I achieved in my life, I was never good at making ... What's the word? I never had any f-" Carl twitches and a Mr. Spell-like voice replaces his and sounds out the word, "F-R-I-E-N-D-S." Carl snaps out of it and says, "Damn brain. Well? Are you gonna give me your family, or not?"

Adam looks around his empty room. He sees the cart full of the same food he's had for the past eight years. Before he sells out his family for a luxury cruise into the after-life, his son, John-Stuart enters the room and says, "Dad! They're making your book into a movie! What are you doing on the floor?"

Carl jumps from his seat, "Oh come on! That trite piece of [expletive]!"

Adam's cataract-ridden eyes welled with tears, "They're making 'Biggerest Explotioncano' into a movie!"

John-Stuart helps his father off the floor and says, "Apparently, your three-decade-long rights battle with Miramax was settled yesterday."

Adam Smith pushes the contract away and smiles, "They like my idea."

Suddenly, Carl Mark drops his pants and screams in frustration the same words he used 70 years ago to the day, "I demand a measurement!"

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