Story fragment

A dear friend of mine and I used to meet irregularly to do writing exercises, just for the proverbial shits and giggles.  Below is a fragment of a story I wrote based on an exercise from "The 3 a.m. Epiphany" in which a normal group of people meets and decides to kill someone.  Terribly fun.

WE ARE LEGION

 

American Legion Post 145 in Vienna, Minnesota is typically closed on Sundays, but on this particular Sunday, three cars sat in its parking lot, one of them still occupied by its driver.  A tan, late model Buick Century idled in park as the driver, Millie Freeman, absently opened and closed the glove compartment, lost in thought.

 

“I just don’t know about this,” muttered Millie.  Millie muttered this a lot.  In fact Gene, her husband of 37 years, had often threatened to have the phrase carved on her tombstone when she died.  Millie thought of her husband and of tombstones and muttered again “I really just don’t know…” The rest of the phrase was silenced by a shudder that passed through her and the startling sound of a stubby finger tapping on the driver’s side window.  Millie, who had an aggravated startle response, nearly choked on her own saliva at the sudden tapping.  When her heart resumed its normal pace, she looked out of her car to see that the tapping finger belonged to Verle Saari.  Verle crooked his tapping finger at her to coax her out of the car and shouted “GET A MOVE ON, MILLIE!  WE BEEN WAITING!”  Satisfied that he had done his job, Verle wheeled himself toward the ramp at the front of the building.  Like every day, Verle wore his American Legion cap cocked jauntily to the side.  Legionnaires were only supposed to wear them at official Legion meetings or events, but Verle didn’t care.  “I pay my goddamn dues!  I’m in a goddamn wheelchair, goddamn it!”  Verle never shied at playing the handicapped card.  The fact that he was paralyzed due to a drunk driving accident while stationed in Germany was never discussed by anyone who didn’t want a punch in the crotch from an angry Verle.

 

Millie followed Verle up the ramp and into the Legion bar which still smelled of Saturday night’s beer, cigarettes and meat raffle.  Verle wheeled over to a table, passing by Jan and Del Fiskesson, who perched on stools with their back to the bar as if waiting to be told what to do next.  Seeing this, Verle told them what to do next.  “Get off those stools, goddamn it, and come sit at a table so I don’t have to crane my goddamn neck to see you.”  Jan and Del complied.

 

“As head of the Ladies Auxiliary, I call this meeting to order,” said Millie in a high, reedy voice that she reserved for official business.

 

“The hell you will, you goddamn idiot!  This ain’t official business.  I doubt the goddamn American Legion high command would approve.  You ain’t the head of anything here.”  Verle stretched his arms out above his head and in the silent room, they could hear his ancient shoulder joints pop and strain.

 

“Okay, then.  So.  Well.  What are we going to do about Sid?”

 

Sid Hoffmann was the branch president and had been for the last forty years.  The forty years of his rule was largely smooth and full of much prosperity at the Legion.  In fact, under his authority, the new Legion building (it was now ten years old, but still new to the Legionnaires, who just appreciated not having to meet in a basement with mold issues and exposed wiring anymore) had been fundraised for and built.  At the ribbon cutting ceremony, everyone patted Sid on the back.  He was admired, he was well-liked and he was a generally good man.  Until about three months ago.

 

Sometime around the completion of the new Legion building, in a swell of good feeling toward Sid and under pressure from the town’s mayor, the Legionnaires passed a bylaw, making Sid president for life.  It seemed like a safe bet at the time.  Sid was 88 and looked like a sickly prawn.  They gave him another year, tops.  Sid fooled them, though, and clung to life with his gnarled hands.  In the last three months, though, Sid’s grasp of reality had begun to slip a little.  People overlooked the mismanaged funds and missing liquor, but after a particularly memorable bake sale in which Sid appropriated one of the parade salute rifles and fired it directly at the larger members of the Ladies Auxiliary  while removing articles of his clothing and shouting “Mooooo, cow, moooo!,” it was determined that something had to be done.  And that something had to happen soon as the annual Fourth of July barbecue and craft sale was approaching quickly.

 

Del cleared his throat and looked to Jan for encouragement.  Finding none, he spoke anyway.  “Well, it’s this president for life thing.  We just can’t get around it.”

 

“No shit.”  Surprisingly, this epithet came not from Verle, but from Millie, who was no longer using her high voice.