Short Story Weekly: Elmer

For this week, I have for you something estranged, as if a parody of H.P. Lovecraft was done in a stereotypical Louisiana, during the late 90’s. I hope those from Louisiana do not take offense, as I absolutely love the state, and find it’s culture beautiful. Elmer is a piece that most of you will find hilarious, weird, and stupid. The others will find it absolutely terrifying. Here is Elmer: Elmer was a fun-loving southern boy with a gun-totting wife, and a morbidly obese daughter named Elvira, a blatant lesbian who enjoyed a ding-dong with her ho-ho. Elmer’s wife, Marge was portly in size as well, but almost anemic from the iron deficiency that came from living near the salt mines. They all lived on a shady plot off the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, and wallowed in the florescent illumination of the radiation off the oil-slick waters. They were an imbecilic bunch, but in that hazy glaze of stupidity, was genuine happiness. Elmer was a staunch man, eccentric in the absurdity of stupidity, but he was callous towards the most undeserving of stately men to ever attempt to buy the prime real estate his family had for generations on that shark-infested landlocked shack, destined to be turned into luxury condominiums. Elmer wasn’t a curmudgeonly hermit wanting only to proceed in life, he was a rather loyal nitwit that wanted nothing better than to chew tobacco like cud, and fish for some oily striped sea bass, which lit up like a fume-covered rag towel on the open barbeque. With a crow-like yellow eye, he’d spot a snapper jumping off the coast, deformed from the thirtieth oil spill that season, and reeled in the bastard with a fight and slipperiness that comes from a mutated fiend. He was a happy camper though, when he rustled in that monster, and old Elvira would use her bulking biceps and hairy arms to wrangle the slippery fish down into the fire pit, dinosaur farts bursting like miniature atomic bombs. Marge would do her wifely duties at setting the table, which was a log halved and placed on two hunks of metal siding, which sat dead-center of the lowly shack, but it was as good a dining table as any fancy socialite teak, or cherry wood finish. Elmer was a simple man, liked his fishing, his fucking, and his Sunday churchgoers, especially egging them in their fancy outfits, and “purty” dresses. Yet, he felt like something was missing from his mundane existence. He worked at the local factory, but due to layoffs, he barely got in twenty hours a week. He made most his income from selling bait worms, and hawking loogies at passersby who paid him to stop. One day, Elmer received a package in the mail. It was from his old cousin Reject, a family name passed down by a mighty proud generation of lunatics that laid claim to the swamplands on the edge of Georgia. The package was small, but conveniently heavy, so-much-so, he needed Elvira to bring it in, and it nearly broke the built-up wax coating on the log dining table. “W’sr y’got?” asked the transcendentalist-minded Marge, always querying with the wittiest wit of any girl Elmer knew, that’s why he made her his wife. “I’s aint g’ts no clue, Margie Parge! Ol’ Cussin’ R’ejcek dun sin’t it from yonder! Mus’ be sum fancee doo-dad from up North!” Elmer was ecstatic to feel the weight of the package. If it wasn’t something vital, perhaps it could fetch a pretty penny, or a good trade in possum hides on the open market. He was also hankering for a new wooden lures, you just couldn’t get the right reflex on those new polyurethane messes like you could on those old-fashioned, hand-painted lures. The anticipation of something shiny and new that could be broken and muddled in a matter of moments was all-too-much for him to bear, and with exuberant charisma, likening Marge to take up something of a fancy in her groin region where she’d not felt even an egg drop in ten years, had Elmer tearing through the cardboard like a wolf through deer tendons. The box was surprisingly deep, despite only being the size of a first-edition hardcover, you know, the ones that near the thirty dollar range, than more the typical twenty-five, so say about six-hundred pages in-length. Anyhow, the box was opened with the might of Thor, and the enthusiasm for Loki, as Elmer careened forward with child-like eyes, an object of great importance awaited his peepers. “Wha’ is it?” asked a far-greater educated Elmira, who was absentmindedly allowed to finish third grade, accidentally, of course. Apparently Elmer forgot to expunge her from the next semester, and instead enrolled Elmira into the advanced course. Now he had to struggle with an elitist lesbian daughter who always condescended her parents. Elmer always said: “If yer fixin to t’ink yer better th’n der rist of us wi’ yer fancy di’rd gr’de id’u’kay’ion, yer best be steppin’ now, ‘cause wees here r a Christian people, and we dun’ put some fancee book lernin a head ove famlee!” Elmira was a worldly woman indeed, but she never sought to abject her dear parents from their humble first-grade education, a proud education, in-which she too was supposed to have, as family legacies go. Still, she was the black sheep of the family, having had the tragic lesson of simple chemistry, and the other side of the map, she was an alien in her own home. Elmer gazed in the box, and began to shuffle is burdened hands into the cardboard transport, shaking like a nomadic herder embracing a mechanical lamb. The feel of the object was alien, almost like being confronted with a demigod. “e‘h?” pondered Marge. “I’ d’t kn’o! Cuzin ‘Eject ‘ikes iz teknoligee.” Lifting the heavy machinery of a modern land from out its cardboard carapace, Elmer stared at the malignant tumor of wires and metal casings; a polyurethane glass screen, holding inside worlds of pixels and digital malarkey. Elmer feared what was in that box, but never did he believe to see something as terrifying as the demonic electronic almalgamation staring back at him. The laptop was black as the center of a dark sun, an epitaph of the old world, showcased in marketed applause. The world cheered, but Elmer was not so foolish. This was truly the end of times; the end of the old ways. This was the beginning of man’s destruction, in a twelve-by-ten box. “whatcha gots theres Da’?” inquired the far-too-intelligent, greater grey matter for her own good, Elmira. She once had the luxury of seeing such a device in the computer labs from a slightly ajar door. This made her a resident expert on all technology in the household. Of course, the ones’ she saw from a trans lateral distance, out of the glimmer spying of her halved pupil, even with her limited knowledge; she knew that this was far more superior technology than what was showcased at her grammar school all those years ago. Of course, the debate grew intense in a household full of individuals of different political influences and levels of intelligence. Elmira was always hassled for never getting married to her long-time babe, Appaloosa, the only other lesbian her side of the swamp. “’Puter” Elmer stated with an intense disdain, a fear no man of his lifestyle should ever come face-to-face with in his time. He understood he was but a small mind in a world full of miscreant geniuses, but he never shamed anyone for building the wheel, he just didn’t want one rolled down into his niche. This was the mother of all wheels, and it just rolled right on in, and caused the mass of destruction to his otherwise perfect existence. “’Uter?” chimed in Marge, a bit disgruntled b the word, leaving a film coating of grammatical indifference upon her chiseled li[s. She was not a fan of the contraptions of the modern world, noting beat a good, old-fashioned plowshare, or the technological ingenuity of a noodling set-up. Either way, she was discerned by the downfall of the current generations folly towards all things electronic. She shuddered at false screens like the Good Book warned of False Idols. However, she understood the inevitable changes, when she was a child her mother would harp of witchcraft over the telephone, saying disembodied voices were the devil’s betrayal. “Whut ya git on de ‘ther ‘nd ain’t de same.” Marge’s mother had made it to an astonishing milestone of completing the fifth grade before having to drop out for having to give birth to Marge’s oldest brother, Trench. He died at the tender age of sixteen in dire warfare, fathoms below on a submarine. Marge was excitedly horrified b the notion of having to look over this monstrous machine that surely would’ve given her mother the coronary that sent her to the Good Lord Above some years earlier when rap music was invented. Marge was far more understanding far-greater liberal minded woman, not to be her mother, but she did not get passed the third grade, much like Elmer. Still, she secretly kept on reading illustrated books, but she developed the intellect of a sea snail, but a rather quirky sea snail, whereas Elmer was as imbecilic as her eldest generation, just as God intended Man to be! “!” Marge exclaimed as the laptop was placed on the table. Elmer shook his head at his beloved wife, and Elvira pressed the button; terrified by the resounding ummm noise that came forth. They all watched as the darkened screen turned a bright white. It went on to boot-up completely, as a spinning rainbow pinwheel of Doom came up, things began to pop up like magic onto the digital screen. Marge jumped back in cowardice, hiding behind Elmer’s rocking chair. Elmer cackled, Elmira just stood in awe of the machinery. Cousin Reject sent a card along in the box. Elmira was the only one furthest along in education to actually read one of Cousin Reject’s messages. Reject had the audacity to make it to eighth-grade, and even more audacity to get his GED, AND do a year at community college. Elmer knew Reject was an Einstein, but to send some space-age monstrosity to his door, with the Devil’s rainbow pinwheel; well, that was blasphemy! “wh’ts it do’in, ‘Lmer?” “It’s boot-in’ up mom’a! Ain’t it purty?” Elmira explained with a confident eloquence. “I’ts t’e D’evil! ‘Eject dun gon ‘nd seent Sa’tin rig’t to o’ur d’oor!” Cousin Reject knew deep down that Elmer and company were not of the most affluent bunch of forward-thinking troops. Yet, he knew that a laptop for Elmira t discover would be enough to at least keep some neurons sparking in her atrophying brain. Of course Elmer would disapprove of such a machine, and being the patriarch of the household, surely would have strong ill feelings towards the technology. Cousin Reject wasn’t going to be undermine his cousins, he wasn’t going to make them feel ashamed for not understanding the fundamentals of the modern world, but he’d be damned if he just sat back, and let Elmira continue the chain of ignorance. He had seen something in his youngest cousin, something adequate, nominal, and marginally intelligent. The laptop would open up a world of change, and he knew Elmer would see that as the end of a 6,000-year reign of earth. “N’t i’n m’ah ‘ouse!” Elmer seemed very assured that this was going to be the end of his perfect life. He refused to let his little girl be influenced by logic, and fancy screens, and pointy arrows that moved across the screen with a mouse. It was the devil’s doing! “B’t Pa!” exclaimed Elvira. “E!” retorted Marge. “N’ b’ts!” rebuttals Elmer. With a struggle, the laptop flashed asunder with bright lights and sounds, disembodied voices exclaim mail has been gotten, and triumphant trumpets ringing in the devil’s reign. Elmira was fascinated by the machine, she yearned to learn Shakespeare, and why the sky was blue, and why life was ever-so-meaningless as time progressed. She, for once in her sad existence, saw opportunity, and so-badly wanted to know just wh this existence she had was so god-dammed special? She grabbed for the computer, possessed by its worldly treasure hidden behind search engines and loaded software. Elmer grabbed first, and a true battle of girth ensued. Elmer knew the dangers of knowledge, it could repeal generations of ignorance that has kept his family vibrant. Elmira knew she had more to give than be the daughter of a crawfish catcher, and wanted to discover what was beyond her walls of isolation and stupidity. This struggle became hopeless as Marge, still coming to terms of what was happening, and still not quite sure why her massive figners were fighting against her own daughter’s monstrous hand for a piece of polyurethane plastic, pulled on the machine. The struggle was dire, a hindrance of progress on the part of Elmer to stifle her daughter for her own safety. Then, with a defiant jerk, the laptop flew from the small shack, and landed in the bog just outside the home. Elmira watched in terror as her only means to escape the cruelty of er life sank to the bottom of the thickest mud, and she wept and wept, for what continued for days. Elmer sighed, patted her on the shoulder, and retired t his boat ramp, to fix up the craw-daddy nets he neglected earlier. He had a long day ahead of him. Marge went back to standing in the corner that housed her whole concentration when Elmer wasn’t present at the given time. Elmira simply wept in her room, and never cared for more than a minute as to why her asshole cousin could send her such hope, knowing the madness that possessed her father about anything outside of the thirty square feet of his home. And so, Elmira went back to her mundane existence, her brain atrophying a few years after that chance encounter with something of greatness. HSe was left catatonic in her hammock. Elmer regret ed is arrogance, having preserved his family’s legacy from the horrors of