Eustace Feetbeer v. Lil' Max Meatboots

 

Untitled. Photo by Joe

Remember when no one asked me about hobo romance, but I ANSWERED ANYWAY? Wasn't that sweet? Well dig this - lately no one is constantly asking me about hobo breakups. Enough, already! I'll tell you. You see, a lot of people don't know (or understand, or accept) this, but hoboes were people, and as people, they did most of the same people-y things that people do*. That includes divorce. They divorced at a lower rate than the general population, but that is mainly due to the facts that A) they had very little access to courts or legal representation, and B) to a lot of hoboes, "divorce" was defined as "push off a trestle."

In the matter of Eustace Feetbeer v. Lil' Max Meatboots, the divorce decree was read by Judge Roughneck.

"In the matter of Eustace Feetbeer versus Lil' Max Meatboots, this court finds in favor of the plaintiff, and does hereby decree that plaintiff's marriage to the defendant is dissolved, and all of plaintiff's claims are hereby awarded..."

"'AMEN,' said the church!" Eustace exclaimed, stomping a yeasty foot and raising both hands heavenward.

The judge struck his sound block with its matching gavel. "Order, please."

"Sorry, your honor."

"Defendant is hereby ordered to immediately relinquish full and complete custody of all of the marital progeny produced by this union..."

"Fine," Lil' Max Meatboots sneered. "Take 'em, and here's to good riddance. Have you seen the price of mealworms, lately?"

We love Mommy and Daddy equally. Just feed us. Photo by Joe

Another smack of the gavel, a little harder this time. "Order, Mr. Meatboots. Both parties will observe silence while the judgement is read."

"Will we, though?" Max wondered aloud.

"You will."

Eustace raised her hand, and when the judge returned his attention to the document before him, pointedly ignoring her, she said, "Wait. I don't really want the lizards..."

"Iguanas," Max corrected.

"Whatever. Shut up. If you did other things as well as you correct me, maybe we wouldn't be here! Anyway, I don't want a bunch of iguanas. I'm a hobo; they'll be nothing but a hindrance."

Additional gavel strikes. "Order, both of you! Please let me finish. You're welcome to go argue your little divorced heads off - outside, after we adjourn. Understood?"

"Yes, your honor," they chorused.

"Mr. Meatboots, you are hereby prohibited from sharing, in public or in private, the story of Ms. Feetbeer's parents' untimely demise, no matter how funny you may think it is."

"Oh come on, Judge!" Max protested. "Sharing a romantic smooch in the city fountain, only to be eaten by carnivorous whelks?** That, my friend, is funny."

Even SNAILS?? Harsh... Photo by Joe

"Order. I'm begging you..." 

"But she's allowed to share my stories? That's not fair!"

"It's as fair as you breaking your solemn vow, and canoodling all over the Union Pacific with Ol' Barb Stab-You Quick," Eustace said flatly.

"For the hundredth time, that was not canoodling. I was at knifepoint. She was going to stab me..."

"Whatever you say, mister. I now have the court-ordered right to tell everyone about how your folks met their fates - your dad with the nickel overdose, and your mother asphyxiating, face-down in a giant mixing bowl full of proofing pizza dough. I can't wait for the next fellowship dinner..."

"Mean," Lil' Max said with a pout.

"Order! Just let me get through this, please. There's not much more."

"Yes, sir."

"Defendant is prohibited from describing Plaintiff's feet and their hoppy, intoxicating aroma..."

"Ha!" Eustace gloated. 

Judge Roughneck was undeterred. "Plaintiff is likewise forbidden to discuss Defendant's rancid gamey footwear, or its disgusting, unholy origin."

"Ha!" Max shouted.

"Boooooo," Eustace booed.

"Finally, on the desperately-contested matter of the custody of the icicles..."

"Mine!" they chorused, glaring at each other.

We don't like red thermometers. Photo by Joe

"Custody is hereby awarded to the earth," the judge deadpanned.

"What?" Max asked. "What does that mean?"

"They were icicles, sir. They are no longer icicles, having long ago melted. You're not very bright, are you?"

"YOU'RE not very bright!" Max countered.

"Okay," said the judge. He banged his gavel one last time, rose from his chair and headed for his chambers, declaring "Adjourned!" over his shoulder.

Eustace laughed. "You tell him, Max. You still don't take no guff, do you?"

"Thanks," Max said, "I do not."

Eustace thought for a moment. "Say, crazy idea," she said, "Shot in the dark. You wanna go get a drink or something - for old time's sake?"

"Love to, Eun. Love to."

*You are not going to find many bloggers willing to put that many people (FIVE!) in a single sentence.

**"Carnivorous whelks" courtesy of [Maris] - all rights reserved.

Sully Straightjacket's Third Mini Freakout

...than a pile of iguana.

"Do I exist?" Sully Not-yet-called-Straightjacket asked. 

His traveling companion, Plastic-Moustache Mortimer Tall, shook his head, as if trying to free swimming hole water from his ear. "What?"

"Just - just tell me I exist," Sully No-Nickname-Yet said, as the two of them shuffled along the rails from east to west down the old Santa Fe mainline on the outskirts of Topeka, one chilly April morning in 1935, rousing tiny clouds of frosty brown dust as they trudged.

Plastic-Moustache Mortimer Tall needed a moment to formulate a response - one that would clearly demonstrate that of course he was listening to Sully, but at the same time would fall short of full engagement. As per usual, this delicate balancing act manifested itself as a second "What?"

Sully stopped and turned to Mortimer with a look of profoundly lost helplessness. "Do I exist? Am I even here? Just tell me I'm real."

"Oh, Lord," Mortimer groaned. "You're real, you're real. You're as real as my moustache. Simmer down."

"Gasp!" Sully gasped. He had an annoying habit of saying the sound he needed to emit. "Your moustache is as fake as the New Deal! Look at it - it's plastic! Oh, surely I am not here. I'm but a vapor. A thought passing through your head, without a place to be or an ounce of realness. Oh, this is bad."

Mortimer took Sully by his ratty hobo shoulders. "What's this about, buddy? Look at me. What's eating you?"

Sully looked his friend in the eye for a nanosecond, then turned his attention to the ground, then the sky, then the ground again. "I just... don't feel real, is all. Since the world went to hell, I ain't hardly seen another living soul, apart from you and the occasional cop - chasing us across this wasteland of jobless, homeless depression. Nothing else. Just us and some tormentors. I kinda feel like maybe I ain't real, no more. Like, I ain't even here. Maybe like a ghost or something..."

"Oh, for Pete's sake - you're here and you exist and all that. We just left Topeka. We had an honest-to-God meal, last night at St. Thomas Church. Remember that? Gravy all over top of the whole dish?"

Sully licked his lips. "That was something. Still. Could've been a dream - some kind of phantasm that a ghost would remember..."

"You're not a ghost. You're not dead. You're real," Mortimer grumbled, trying not to lecture his anxious hobo friend. "We're hoboes, Sul. Have been since November '29, when you lost your job at the Ford plant and I quit for insubordination at Sears & Roebuck. That was a half-decade ago, and since then we've stolen train rides and walked and run I'd say ten thousand miles or more - from town to town and job to job, just keeping to ourselves and surviving."

Sully moped. "I'm a ghost," he sighed.

"You're NOT a ghost! But you keep this up, and you're gonna be!"

"Oh don't get sore, Mort. I'm just having a hard time, again. When we started out on the road, I knew the world was gonna end for a while, but I kinda thought, you know, maybe a few months. Next thing I know, it's a year, then two. The world's still done for. I walk through it with you like a feeble little dust bunny..."

"Dust bunny?"

"Yeah. Like a ghost made of dirt." Sully looked at Mortimer, who appeared to be stifling a laugh. "What?"

"You were nuts before this started, weren't you?"

"Oh, and how! I was loonier than a pile of green iguanas."

Mortimer, his laughter now successfully stifled, blinked slowly at Sully, as he once again searched for the appropriate response. "How loony is a pile of green iguanas, pal?"

"You don't want to know. Boy howdy, they can get up to some shenanigans."

"You don't say. So, for the uninitiated, like me - what kind of shenanigans can a loony pile of green iguanas get up to?"

A wry smile slowly worked its way across Sully Soon-To-Be-Nicknamed-Straightjacket's face. "Well, for starters, they rigged the election in favor of Hoover. Then, they invented Prohibition, and Fascism, and Suffrage, and automobiles - all on dares - just for fun. They're bonkers, I tell you."

"Ah. I see. And you are loonier than they are?" Mortimer said.

"Yep."

"Yeah, okay. You exist, Sully Straightjacket. You're the realest fella I know."

Sully signed contentedly, and resumed walking westward. "Good. Thanks, pal."