The Meeting

The Meeting

“Hello, my name is Ray, I’m an alcoholic.” He began.

The group rose like marionettes. “Hello Ray, welcome.” They chanted.

“I’ve been an alcoholic for some time now,” Ray continued, “before this whole business started, I was mostly a confused nobody. A brainless moron since I was born; I believed it so much that I never tried to do anything with my life, just hanging around day in and day out. Then, along came that whiny little girl and her dog; before you know it, she was filling my head with all kinds of crazy ideas. ‘You can go with me to the big city,’ she said, ‘I’m sure the wonderful Mayor there can help you too!’”

The group listened intently, nodding their heads knowingly.

“So,” Ray sighed, “she helped me down, we packed up extra straw and patching material and we headed off down that crazy yellow road, leaving behind everything I had ever known. Never realizing what just might lay in store for us. I still can’t believe how good of a con artist that girl was."

Shaking his head, Ray laughed. “I got to tell you, I was getting a bit footsore after awhile and looking off for a nice shady spot to take a break when I spotted this rusty old statue thing standing behind a tree. I should never have pointed it out to Dorothy, but I was looking to take a break and as soon as she saw it, nothing would do, but she had to go take a look. Like I said before, she was not only whiny, but as nosy as that fool dog was! It turns out that it wasn’t a statue at all, but some sort of a tin woodsman that had rusted out there in a sudden summer storm. Well, after nosing around a bit, the girl found an oil can and proceeded to oil the old fella up. After the oiling and greasing he seemed to be okay, he said his name was Jack. Of course he had a tale to tell, how he was so lonely out there and in no time at all she convinced the stiff-necked fool to abandon his job and come along with us.

"By nightfall we had come to a National Park. I had been counting on finding a comfortable roadside motel to spend the night, but wouldn’t you know it, she decided that it was a good place to camp out! Of course that damn nosy dog had to go poking around and in no time it was lost, forcing us to go looking for it. I didn’t want to, heck we didn’t have a flashlight and I wasn’t about to let her light a torch like she wanted. Pretty soon we heard the little bugger barking it’s fool head off and before I knew it, that silly girl went bounding into the darkness. They call me dumb! Right away, we heard the most God-awful growling and caterwauling. I’m not ashamed to admit I was some scared, but not that dumb girl, no sir! Well, the next thing you know she came face to face with a lion!”

The listening group gave a horrified gasp, straightening up in their chairs.

“Yes sir,” Ray laughed again, “a real bonafide lion! Big fat sucker it was! Funny thing though, as soon as it saw us, it backed up real quick. Then the darn dog must have gotten brave with us there, because it tried to go after the lion! Yapping and would you believe the little bastard was trying to bite the thing. Well, that lion looked down at the little yappy beast and made a swipe at it with it’s big paw. Of course that fool girl didn’t like that and she grabbed up the little dog and smacked that lion right on its nose! God must have been a little lax when it came to handing out brains to that girl! I figured we were done for for sure, but ya know what? That big ole lion went to crying and bawling something fierce and went and hid behind a bush. You coulda knocked me over with a feather!”

A roar of laughter came from the listening group, with a few knee slaps and “Good Lords!” muttered.

“Well, of course that silly girl couldn’t leave well enough alone,” Ray continued, “she had to go tell that lion she was sorry for smacking it and see if it was hurt. Before you know it, she had coaxed it out from behind that bush, turns out the big ole thing was just a cowardly sissy! Wasn’t no time before she convinced that cowardly fool, Bert his name was, that he should come along with us. I really believe he was too much of a coward to just say no.”

The group nodded their heads in sage agreement that it was probably true.

It was a good thing that we didn’t run into anyone else, or I’m sure she would have raised an army. It might have been nice to have an army actually, but there were just the four of us; five, if you count the mutt.”

The group nodded agreement, an army probably SHOULD have been raised.

“Yeah,” Ray sighed heavily, “an army would have been good, especially with all the trouble we ran into along the way. Damn flying monkey kamikazes, a Drug Cartel with a booby-trapped Poppy field, not to mention the crazy-ass apple growers, but the absolute worst was that ‘Western’ broad and her balls of fire. I still have nightmares about that!”

The horrified group gasped.

“Anyway,’ Ray continued, “we got to the city alright, eventually. It seems the all mighty mayor wasn’t a complete fool though, like SOME people. He knew the ‘Western’ broad would make big trouble, so he made a condition. Before he would help us, we had to infiltrate her gang, and take her out. Of course, we had to bring back proof of some kind. Yeah sure, he was some Wizard alright!”

“As it turned out, infiltrating her gang wasn’t as hard as you might think. Hell, we barely got down the road when the kamikazes surrounded us; carrying off the little brat and her frigging dog. Bert was all for leaving her; even had me convinced, but no, that damn stiff-necked woodsman wouldn’t listen to reason. He actually called us stupid and cowardly! HE was fire-proof, AND... HE had an AXE! Well, all I can say was we got lucky; damn lucky, I almost lost my life in that battle.”

Another horrified gasp rose from the group.

“So, we got inside the old witch’s headquarters and like I said, we got lucky; found the girl and her dog right away. Before we could make our escape though, here come that whacked out old 'Western' broad, slinging balls of fire! I got blasted with one and I thought sure I was a goner, but Dorothy grabbed up a bucket of water and threw it on me putting the fire out. It must have been some sort of magic water; or else the old broad was allergic or something though, because when some of it splashed on her she just shriveled right up and died!”

The listening crowd let up a cheer, applauding loudly.

“Well, we had killed the old broad!” Ray smiled. “I figured sure her army would fall on us right then, but ya know what? They were just as glad to be rid of the old bat themselves and proclaimed us liberators! They had no problem letting us bring back the proof of the old broad’s demise; turns out all we needed was her broomstick."

The group gave another spirited round of applause, smiling with relief.

"When we got back to the city the mayor was some surprised; but happy as hell. He gave us all a bunch of fancy gee-gaws, to tell the truth I wasn’t all that impressed. The grateful townspeople gave us a parade though. Then, things got a lot more complicated. It seems the mayor was looking for a way out of there himself, so he decided to enlist a scapegoat to take the fall for his crooked political deals. Guess what dummy fit that bill? That’s when I turned to the booze, just trying to keep my brain straight! I can’t believe that I stood in that cornfield all that time and didn’t realize what could be made out of that stuff.”

Author's note***This is a companion piece to

In Therapy  (18+) A conversation with a therapist, companion piece to The Meeting #1379574 by E E Coder