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...taking a hot rhubarb pie out of the oven and putting it on the window sill to cool. It is early evening. I am at the kitchen table, doing my lessons for the day, and munching happily on an apple I picked this very morning from Farmer Bill's orchard. I can see Muffin, my childhood dog, chasing a ball out in the backyard, and the clothes hung on the line, drying in the warm, perfumed spring breezes.
Wait--what's this? A surly looking hobo fellow has crept into the yard and is stealing mother's pie! No! No, you scoundrel! I spring from my seat in a thrice, grabbing a carving knife as I head out the door.
"Billy!" me sainted mum cries, "Where you takin' that knife, son?"
"Leave it, old lady!" I snarl. "This isn't woman's business."
Heart pumping, I chase the wretched scoundrel from the yard and into the street. Muffin, sensing the excitement, follows me, yelping and nipping at my heels, as if in warning.
"Back off, mangey cur," I roar, striking his nose hard with the butt of the knife, "this isn't canine business."
I reach the bastard pie-thief by the Old Whitey Place, tackling him by the legs but careful to catch the rhubarb pie before it can splatter on the dirt road. Grabbing the wretch by the shoulder, I turn him over roughly, my knife at his throat.
"Me sainted mother made this pie with 'er own two hands what God gave 'er!" I cry. "And you'd steal food from the mouths of babes, would ye?"
"Honest, son, I meant no harm!" he gasps, his eyes wide with fear. "Irish is ye? My people's from Dublin, sure as sure. I ain't et for three days, is all. An' I seen that pie a-sittin' there, all perfumey in the warm spring breezes--"
"That was the laundry," I grin, "and it's a damn sight better smellin' than you are. You're a thievin' bastard. And I ain't Irish, I'm Dutch. But I ain't yer Dutch uncle today, son." And I plunge the knife, again and again, into his neck and chest. The blood spurts and sprays over me like a geyser. It is perfumey in the warm spring breezes.
Just then, Muffin, still barking, dancing a frantic, mindless animal dance, waltzes oblivious into the path of Old Mr. Whitey's old Packard as it barrels down the dirt road. Mr. Whitey, drunk again. My dog is hit and hurled into the air. Gore-soaked, I crawl to him, and I cradle his lifeless head in my arms. I weep for a while, but then the tears end. And I smile. Muffin is no more. But at least I still got pie!
PS: If anyone can tell me why I just spent 15 minutes writing this nonsense, I will send you a cashier's check for what I was going to pay my shrink next week.)
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