Mr. Gecko and the Picnic Basket

An adult faerie tale not for kids

One Wednesday, the heavens opened up and the Great Gecko in the Sky on his mushroom perch looked down upon all his creatures. He was not happy. He saw way too much fornication going on down there on earth. So much fornicating that it got his blood boiling. He had to do something, and what he had in mind was something hard and destructive.

Since it was such a pleasant day up there in gecko heaven, the sun shining all nice and warm unlike a week earlier. His heaven had been all gecko hell with the snow and the blizzard. Down-right freezing it was. Not being a fur-bearing kind of god Mr. Gecko hated the cold. But this particular day was a nice heavenly kind of spring day and Mr. Gecko looked around and saw his favorite tree just a bit of a ways off.

It was a tree all fluffy with cherry blossoms. The kind of tree that Mr. Gecko loved to siesta under when he was taking a break from his gecko-god duties or doing his chores assigned to him by Mrs. Gecko, his wife for nigh-on eight and a half eons. A rather long time for a heavenly pair to stay coupled together but still they were as happy as any two middle-aged gods could be under the circumstances. But enough of that. Mr. Gecko had work to do, coming up with a destructive methodology for those fornicating fools.

He strolled over to the cherry blossom tree and sat himself down on the green grass and leaned back to do some thinking. But thinking being what it is, Mr. Gecko could only do it so long and then he was famished. This particularly day in April, the “so long” was about fifteen minutes long and he still had not come up with anything of the destructive ilk yet.

He reached over and pulled his picnic basket closer. A picnic basket Mrs. Gecko had risen up early that morning before sunrise and prepared for him. It was like she read his mind. Like she knew that he was going to have some hard thinking to do that day, knew that he’d need a good nutritious, delicious meal so he could come up with just the right destruction for his fornicating creation.

Mr. Gecko opened up that picnic basket, and lo and behold, what he saw was good. Very good. There were three watercress sandwiches with mustard…oh, yes and a pickle. One of Mrs. Gecko’s prize sweet pickles that she had grown in her vegetable garden behind their lovely white cottage.

In the basket, there was a thermos of his favorite green tea and a bag of Indonesian chips, the chips that made Jakarta famous. And there…no, it just couldn’t be. But it was. A large slice of key lime pie. If he hadn’t known better, he would have believed that he was in hog heaven. But he was a gecko god and he was in heaven just the same.

Then it hit him. If he consumed all that food, he was going to need a siesta. A long siesta. He was not going to be in any kind of destructive mood for quite some time. This was Mrs. Gecko’s way of preventing what he was about to do. First he would come up with The Plan, then he would eat.

When he would comment to Mrs. Gecko on what a fornicating crowd he’d created, all she could say was, “Well, dear, you know that’s how the eight ball bounces. It is in the nature of creation to be about itself creating. And how exactly do you expect your creation to create with nary any fornication?”

Mr. Gecko took another look into the basket. Those chips looked enticing. Well, maybe he would eat just one…no, two…just two…ah, shoot…three then. Soon he had completely consumed not just the chips, but the sandwiches, the pickle and the key lime pie, tossing it all down with his tea. And he was snoring the afternoon away, dreaming of Indra dreaming of Gecko dreaming.

Restaurant Blues

The waitress stuck her head through the open doorway of Doug’s cramped office at the back of his restaurant. Doug absentmindedly took a sip of the black coffee on his desk and studied the large sheet spread out on his desk.

“I’ll give you one of my world famous massages,” she said, “if you come over and hang out at my place. You look like you could use a break.”

He set his cup back on the desk and looked up.

“Sounds enticing, Cali,” Doug said. “I can’t though. I have a new waitress to interview.”

“Too bad,” she said. “If you change your mind later, come on by.” She turned and left for the day.

Doug went back to his paperwork. It seemed never-ending. As soon as he went through one pile of papers, another took its place.

He reached for the cup and realized that it was empty, empty just like his life. He set his pencil down and leaned back in his chair and listened to Louis Armstrong playing “West End Blues” on the Bose CD-player behind him. He sure did love that Satchmo. A slight smile came to his lips, then a frown as the music coursed through his body and he remembered.

Since his fiancée, Sheryl, broke off their engagement, Doug had developed a new rhythm of working, sleeping, working more. Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen hours a day seven days a week he worked and it had paid off. His restaurant, Doug’s Tabard Cafe, had prospered. It had earned more in the last four months than in the entire previous year. And it kept him from thinking about his ex. But, for some reason that rainy Wednesday afternoon in February, it didn’t do the job.

He went back to his work. As he weeded his way through the paper on his desk, he stared down at an imagined Sheryl’s face smiling back at him. His eyes watered up with tears. He brushed them aside and went to take a drink out of the coffee cup. Realizing that it was empty, he ignored it and continued his bookkeeping. The blurry figures on the sheet before him didn’t want to add up.

He looked at his watch. Three-thirty. What time had she said she’d be in for the job interview? He glanced up at the door and quickly straightened his tie.

There she stood, a tall, lanky blonde in her early thirties.

“I’m here about the waitress job,” she said and introduced herself as Diane.

“Yes, you are,” Doug said, his dark brown eyes meeting her large blue eyes. They smiled at each other. He reached over to the coffeemaker at his side and poured himself a new cup of coffee. For the first time in a long time, he was happy.

The Second Coming, Maybe

Some folks think they know something even Jesus doesn’t know. I’m talking Second Coming here. In May of 2012, some radio preacher predicted it. Second Coming didn’t happen. The Mayans had predicted it for the following December. It didn’t happen then either.

Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye, author of the Left Behind books, gave it the old college try. Nostradamus said it would be Y2K, and we know what a bust that one was. Pat Robertson predicted 2007. He first thought 1982 was to be the big year, but he re-evaluated. Edgar Cayce and Sun Myung Moon both said 2000.

The astrologer Jean Dixon even put in her two cents. Said it was to be 1962 according to the alignment of the planets. The planets forgot to check with her. They didn’t align properly and we didn’t get the fireworks she promised. She checked her charts again, and lo and behold, it’s supposed to be 2020. These are just a few of the ones who have blown it. And when they blow it, they don’t admit they blew it. Doesn’t this sound a lot like politicians?

No, they’re like software. They give us an update. Unless they do a Jim Jones and drink some Kool-Aid.

Guess the reason Radio Preacher Guy and the others blew it was because they were getting a little impatient. And they had not read Hal Lindsey’s book, “The Late Great Planet Earth”. Old Hal thought he had the road to the Second Coming down pat. He put his guesses in a nice, neat package and wrapped it up with a ribbon. He even gave it a name. Called it his stepping-stones to Jesus. First we get a temple, then we get an Armageddon. Then a Pope named Six-six-six.

The Catholics disagree on that one. The pope of the Second Coming is supposed to be Peter. And named Peter 2. The Mormons added their own take on the Second Coming. Jesus is supposed to set down in Missouri. Seems Hal didn’t check with the Mormons or the Catholics. Never did Radio Preacher Guy, Pat Robertson or Tim LaHaye.

Well, I think it is time I cleared it all up and gave you the real skinny. I have spent many years studying the hieroglyphics of the Book of the Dead Folks and the cuneiforms from the Tower of Babel. That last one turned out to be a lot of talk, talk, talk. I studied the Dead Sea Scrolls. They were a little dusty, so you can’t always trust them. The Nag Hammadi Codices were really not that helpful. It was hard to read what they said was the handwriting on the wall. Turned out it was written on a cave wall in a sandy spot in the desert. Them Gnostics were real kidders, you know.

I read the Vedas and the Tao te ching. Meditated on Mount Nanda Devi and Mount Fuji. Talked to a voodoo priestess. She read the entrails of a chicken for me. Smoked some, well I am not saying what we smoked, but just take my word for it. The Rastafarians know where the good stuff is.

Checked my Aztec calendar and it seemed to be running slow. Finally figured it was running on Aztec Savings Time. And the Aztec god of whatever, big Q, wasn’t talking. He is very upset that everybody took him to be Cortez. Well, he wanted me to let all the good Aztecs everywhere know. He wasn’t Cortez and he’s not taking the rap for Montezuma’s boo-boo.

Besides he’s been working the Star Trek gig and he is not about to give that up yet. He likes the money. He doesn’t have to work too hard. It’s only an occasional appearance he has to make after all.

I prayed at Olympus and checked with the Sibyl at Delphi. The Vestal Virgins only wanted to party. What else can you expect from the toga lobby?

I went through the Bible frontwards and backwards. You have to read it backwards if you’re reading it in Hebrew. Read the the Torah and the Talmud and the Kabbalah too. I studied the Old Testament, the New Testament and the In-Between-Testament. Read what Enoch said and what Adam wrote. I interviewed the lion that was going to eat Daniel. I visited Elijah’s cave and sailed to Patmos and hung out with an old guy who actually hung out with John when he was writing the Book of Revelations. I consulted the stars and I consulted the planets. Even checked with my crystals.

Finally, yes finally, I came up with the time. Not an exact date but a specific time. It was amazing but it made sense. And thanks to your patience I am about to reveal the revealable.

Before I do let you in on the secret, I have to tell you that none but none of those other guys and girls were right. They were all way off the mark.

So when is the Second Coming to be? You are not going to believe this. It will be the day, the exact day, when the White Sox beat the Cubs and win the World Series. That is also the day when hell freezes over.

Where do you get your ideas?

“Where do you get your ideas?” the woman in the audience asked one of the writers on the panel of the Writer’s Conference.

“Oh, I have some fairy dust,” he responded. “I keep it in a gold box right next to my computer. I open its top and reach in with my index finger and thumb when I need an idea. I take out only a few particles because I want it to last as long as I can.”

A second writer, Marsha, a bestselling author from Texas, leaned forward and commented, “I used to use that stuff but I finally got rid of it. I’m here to tell you it was addicting.”

“You did?” a third writer, a Ph.d. candidate from the School of Hard Knocks, asked. “I sure wish you’d shared it with me. It would have saved me a lot of pain. My gosh, six months on that last novel almost killed me.”

The woman in the audience, whose name happened to be Alice, smiled. “I want to be a writer. But I can’t seem to come up with an idea.”

Sam from the other side of the room stood up and addressed Alice. “I have ideas but I can’t write worth a toot. Maybe we can get together.”

The first writer, let’s call him Joe, laughed. “That’s how I ended up with my first divorce.”

Bestseller from Texas looked at him. “I thought you looked a little familiar. It’s been twenty years. The beard sure hides that s. o. b. face of yours.”

Joe was surprised. It was his first wife. He leaned forward, looked down the row of panelists and asked, “Marsha? Marsha.”

“You still with that little tart?” Marsha wanted to know.

“I caught her with a bestselling novelist. She was after his ideas too. It was a coitus interruptus. I shot the bastard before he could do a complete coitus and kicked her butt for three blocks. That was how I met my third wife. She was the arresting officer. Come to think of it. He was from Texas just like you. Anyway the judge said I had every right to do what I did and he let me off scot free.”

“It’s a big state. Guess that serves you right,” Marsha said. “Hope that cop keeps you in line.”

“She does. She’s the lady in uniform at the back.”

Everybody turned and saw this six-foot-three female cop standing at attention beside the door. She saluted the audience.

“You always did like uniforms,” Marsha said.

“And you never would play in one,” Joe said, then went back to the original question. “Where do we get our ideas, Alice? Life I guess. In fact, I just came up with an idea. Writer meets his ex at a writer’s conference.”

The female cop at the back of the room took out her handcuffs and headed toward the panel. “We’ll be having none of that,” she said.

Where do you get your ideas to write?

Blue

Linna always looked good in blue. Everybody said so. Blue was her color. So, of course, she wore a blue when she went to have her portrait taken.

She sat in front of the camera, posed with her smile, waiting for the photographer to come back. But she was thinking, “What the hell am I doing here? Is this really what I want to do today? But it’s what Robert and David want, so it must be what I want.”

Her two sons stood behind the camera and watched her as she posed in her blue suit and blue shoes.

“Had she been a good mother?” The question flittered through her mind. Of course, she had. Just look at the two of them, standing there, smiling back at her. They seemed so happy.

Robert, the older, now worked in a prestigious law firm and pulled in a great salary. He took after his father, her first husband, even walked like his father in that plodding kind of way he walked. He was walking back and forth, impatient for the photographer to return from the bathroom.

What about her younger son? He was more like her than she wanted to admit. He leaned against the wall, hands in the pockets of his jeans, and watched her watch him as she posed.

David. Son of her second husband, that sad bastard of a son of a bitch.

Three husbands down—all bastards—and here she was, posing in blue and thinking about them. Couldn’t get them off her mind. They were always with her. And they all insisted that blue was her color. Damn them!

Now here she sat in blue, a middle-aged woman with her middle-aged smile, with three ex-husbands and two grown sons, and she didn’t know what had happened to her life.

She had always worn blue, even as a baby. Guess that was because her dad wanted a boy.

Her blue strapless gown had caused such a stir at the high school prom, had caused all the boys to turn their heads her way and stare. She’d liked that.

Her first car, a mustang, it was an almost blue—a bit of a turquoise—but it drove nice. She didn’t mind that it wasn’t completely blue.

The gown at her first wedding was white. But she’d had a blue corsage. Everybody said she made such a beautiful bride. So why had she felt so shitty inside when she said her I dos that day? Though it had been a clear blue sky of a day that day of her wedding, it had rained all through their honeymoon. And she’d given up a promising career as a singer to have babies and be the perfect wife and mother Bruno wanted her to be. Course that was what her mother told her a woman did in those long ago blue days.

Five years to the date and one kid later, she woke up to the phone ringing. It was four o’clock in the morning and Bruno’s side of the bed was empty. She picked up the phone.

“It’s Bruno,” the blue phone said. “I’ve been arrested.”

In the next week, she lost everything—her blue car, her blue house, her blue life. She was on her own with a four-year old-son to feed and care for and a husband who was going away to prison for embezzlement and a whole lot more. So much that she’d forgotten all the charges. She didn’t even like thinking about the stuff the prosecutor had thrown at him. And that was not counting the things the feds had on him. The day of his sentencing was a real blue day.

After that, she moved on with her life. She started selling real estate and found that she was good at it, showing the clients around in her light blue suits.

She winked at youngest son. David smiled back. She tried to wink at Robert but she couldn’t bring herself to it. He was much too serious for winking. She tried not to play favorites, but she knew she had a favorite. It was David, son of her second husband Charlie.

Charlie may have been a bastard, but, at least, he was a lot of fun. And the sex had been great. With Bruno, it was slam-bam-thank-you-ma’am. Charlie’s lovemaking lasted all night long with lots of romance and lots of foreplay. Just thinking of him gave her goose pimples still.

She’d met Charlie when a coworker, Joan Vargas, insisted that they go to Vegas and get in a little gambling.

“Sorry,” Linna said and took a last sip of her coffee just before showing a house, “I’m just not interested. I’ve got way too many houses to show to take time off.”

“It’s been five year since you divorced Bruno and you’ve been working your ass to the bone. It’ll do you good. And the kid too. He’ll love being with his grandma. She’ll spoil him like crazy. Grandmas do that, you know.”

“But I can’t,” Linna said.

“You’ve been working like since forever. You need a break. It’s just a week off. Doug can show your houses. You still get in on the take if they sell. All work and no play…well, you know.”

She was right, of course. But Linna wasn’t sure she wanted to go off with Joan and her don’t-give-a-shit attitude. Linna wasn’t sure she was ready for the kind of time Joan would show her. If there was a good time, Joan would find it. After much coercing, she decided a trip to Gambler’s Paradise might be the thing she needed to get her out of the blue funk she’d been in lately.

She left her nine-year old with her twice-divorced mom, and off to Vegas she and Joan went. They’d only been there for one night when she met Charlie. Tall, blue-eyed Charlie with that killer of a smile of his. She should’ve known he was trouble. He was wearing a blue suit with a blue tie when she met him, throwing dice at the craps table. Three nights later she woke up in bed with Charlie and a wedding ring on her finger and a wad of hundreds in his pocket.

Charlie was a professional gambler. Lately he’d been on the winning spree to end all winning sprees. It seemed he couldn’t lose. That is, until two months later when they were dead broke and in hock up to their asses. She left Robert with her mom and followed her second husband from poker game to poker game, living in cheap motel after cheap motel, always broke and on-the-bum. It got so bad that they would’ve been living in his old beat-up Buick, except he lost that in a crap game.

One night, she found him in an alley with a knife in his gut, almost dead from loss of blood.

“I really fucked up this time, Linnie,” he said, looking up at her leaning over him. Then he closed his eyes and died.

She was six months pregnant. She went home to her mother’s I-told-you-so’s and Robert.

Lloyd came along a year later. He was Robert’s Little League coach. Though she didn’t love him, he seemed like a stable guy, a secure bet. He had a job, he was a real gentleman, and he would get her away from her mother’s constant nagging. It was a whirlwind of a courtship, three dates, and then they were married. He even wore a blue suit to the wedding at the justice of the peace.

Three days later he came home drunk and punched her in the gut. Linna grabbed her two kids and left him on the floor, vomiting from the booze. She jumped in the car he’d just bought and off she went.

She drove for three days until she came to Florida. She pulled up alongside a small motel and walked in and told the lady behind the desk that she needed a job. She had two hungry boys and no gas for the car.

Now here she sat twenty years later, waiting for the photographer to come back from the bathroom. During those twenty years, she’d scrubbed floors, sold real estate, sang back-up, even worked as a bartender at several of the Disney resorts. Her Robert was a hot shot attorney and David had just been hired on as a graphic artist. She was proud of them. Proud of the way she’d raised them. Proud of all she’d done to get here.

It was her fiftieth birthday and the boys were treating her for the day. But, first, they insisted they wanted her portrait done.

The thirty-year old blond-haired photographer came back into the room. She looked into the lens as he snapped the camera several times. Then he instructed her to change poses. As she moved from pose to pose, she wondered if blue was really her color. Maybe she should take up green.

The session ended and she noticed that he was wearing a green tie and had green eyes to go with it. He smiled a very nice smile and winked at her. It had been a while since she had been with a man. Perhaps a younger man was what she needed. And this guy had a head full of blond curls she suddenly wanted to run her fingers through. She winked back.

The boys left her behind in the studio to gather up her things. The blond approached her.

“This was a good session,” he said. “I’ll have the photographs ready for you to choose from in two days. Would you like to go out sometime?”

After thinking about his question for a minute, she leaned over and lightly brushed her lips against his. Then she whispered in his ear, “I’m not interested. Blue is my color.”