The second Welsh Losser, the other Welsh Losser, the usurping brother, sits with The Ferret in a bar. Things happen…
It is nighttime in Kyiv, just before the New Year 2016, and every word I am about to tell you is true.
The Seattle Welsh Losser, the brother of the Welsh Losser who is no longer here, is sitting at a table with The Ferret in a bar.
How they got together, under what circumstances – none of these things are known, nor, more importantly, do they matter. What matters is that at this very moment they are together, and in this bar – except for the barman and waiter, whose murmuring forms are blurred together in the uncertain distance – they are alone.
And so Welsh Losser says to The Ferret:
“Please, don’t pull away from me like that.”
He places his large hand on The Ferret’s humped shoulder and moves it down over his claw.
“Don’t touch me – heh…” Again, The Ferret pulls away.
“Why – don’t you like that?”
“Heh – no, yeah, no, I don’t know. No, no, I don’t like that. Heh-heh-heh.”
“But why? Don’t you like me?”
“Heh – I don’t like you, I don’t like you. Yeah, yeah, heh-heh.”
“But you liked my brother, who’s in every way inferior to me, so it doesn’t make any sense. This treatment of me therefore really hurts. It’s completely unreasonable and unfair.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t like your brother either – not that way. You’ve got the wrong idea. And so did he. We were just friends, that’s all. Heh-heh-heh. And if I didn’t like him, that way, I don’t like you even more. You’ve got serious issues. I suggest you seek professional help. Stay away from me. Heh-heh.”
“But I’m already here, at this table.”
“There’s nothing I can do about that. Heh.”
“Well, does that mean you like me in perhaps some other way? If you were ‘friends’ with my brother, and if I’m better than him, then maybe we can be ‘friends’ too. I mean, under the circumstances, and given the obvious comparisons and differences, I really don’t see why that’s something that simply can’t be.”
“Heh-heh, dude, I’m warning you, you better leave me alone. I’ll really fuck you up – I’m not kidding. I told you already, I’ll fuck you up.”
“No, no, that just won’t do. What can I do to make you like me?”
“Heh, dude, I already told you. I’ll seriously fuck you up. You’re really pushing it too far. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Well, then, my little one, do you know this…?”
The music from another age swells within the bar’s interior. As the place is free of other clients and the floor around them is clear, the superior Welsh Losser has gotten up to dance.
As Welsh Losser dances, you see that the balletic Fred Astaire-like moves, though on a far simpler scale, had been painstakingly learned and meticulously polished to a sort of rough and jagged perfection. You can see his heart go in, and his heartfelt sincerity, and his soul.
You can see that this man, Welsh Losser from Seattle, has no natural talent for dance, but rather, that the steps and the moves, the way he places his feet on the floor, and points the toes, and the way he holds his arms out for balance and for that touch of art and finesse, have all been come by with a great deal of sweat and repetition and practice and toil.
You can see that the man had made a careful study of his body and his physical shortcomings and his imperfections and then made every conceivable tortuous self-sacrificing effort to compensate for these and overcome them – until he captured grace in his movements and, in the end, danced, and danced beautifully, in his own special way, a dance all his own, which made the man, though outwardly unattractive and lumbering and awkward, beautiful in his dance.
The music ends.
Next scene –
Same scene in the bar at the table. The Ferret is tied up and gagged. He is tied by his no-neck to a table leg. With one foot on The Ferret, The Seattle Welsh Losser, the brother of the Welsh Losser who is no longer here, drinks his drink. The Ferret is struggling and going, “M-m-mmm…”
Next scene –
Same scene in the bar at the table. The Seattle Welsh Losser, the brother of the Welsh Losser who is no longer here, is sitting at the table with The Ferret.
The Ferret says:
“Heh, I know about the priest. I know what you did.”
“Well, what did I do? Did you see it?”
“No need going into senseless details, heh.”
There is silence between them as they both drink their drinks, and then The Ferret says:
“Heh, I have to go out to sell a highly addictive Viagra-based drug to some children.”
“Oh-ah, well, you will come back, won’t you?”
“Yeah, yeah, ah, I will. Heh-heh-heh…”
The Ferret leaves.
Next scene –
Same scene in the bar at the table. The Seattle Welsh Losser, the brother of the Welsh Losser who is no longer here, is tied up and gagged. With his neck tied to a table leg, he is struggling and going, “M-m-mmm…”as The Ferret drinks his drink. Since he is so puny and short, his legs don’t reach down far enough from the chair to allow him to victoriously place one of his orthopedic cloven-hoofed shoes on top of Losser.
The Ferret says:
“Heh, two can play that game…”
Next scene –
Same scene in the bar at the table. The Seattle Welsh Losser, the brother of the Welsh Losser who is no longer here, is still tied up, with his neck tied to a table leg, but he’s no longer gagged. The Ferret’s not there.
Losser hears the door to the bar open and sees the small brown-suited torso and legs of what appears to be a child walk in.
As the figure draws closer and stops to stand over the body of Losser, Losser shakes his head and blinks his eyes in disbelief. The figure is indeed that of a boy – a strawberry-haired boy Losser had been in love with when they had both been just boys, going to a public school in Seattle in the fourth and fifth grades, before the boy moved away, breaking Losser’s heart. For some reason, the boy’s mother had always dressed him in a brown tweed suit. And now here he was.
“Randy?! Is that really you?!?”
“The Ferret was not a boy,” The boy called Randy says. His voice had always been a little froglike and scratchy, and there it was again, its same sweet music back in Losser’s ear.
“But, but how is it… you haven’t… haven’t grown? Randy? What was that you said? The Ferret? The Ferret?”
“The Ferret was never a boy.”
The strawberry-haired boy in the brown tweed suit turns away from Losser and walks back toward the door.
“But wait, Randy, don’t go, Randy, Randy… What does that mean, about The Ferret? What does that mean? He was never a boy? He was never… what… what… Randy! Don’t go, Randy! Wait… wait… Randy!!!”
But the door opens and closes. The boy is gone.
Next scene –
Same scene in the bar at the table. The Seattle Welsh Losser, the brother of the Welsh Losser who is no longer here, is still tied up, with his neck tied to a table leg, and he is gagged again. The Ferret’s not there.
A bear with his neck manacled and trailing a long chain stands and jumps up and down aggressively over Losser. The bear is not a cub, but neither is it a full-sized bear and in fact looks like a small man dancing about in a very realistic bear suit. Nevertheless, man or beast, the bear bares its lethal fangs and claws. Back toward the bar, the forms of the barman and waiter are blurred together in the uncertain distance, their bodies lying on the floor next to each other, a pool of blood spreading and spreading toward Losser.
The bear jumps up and down over Losser. The bear growls and growls.
As Losser looks up at the bear, going, “M-m-mmm…,” from behind his taped-over mouth, he grows more and more excited. The bear stops jumping and growling as he notices the change in contour of Losser’s pants.
From somewhere – though not from inside the bear – Losser hears the voice of The Ferret.
The voice says:
“And understand this once and for all, heh. I’m –”
But the scene fades suddenly and the frame snaps. We do not hear the rest.
Filed by Mr. Bob “The Rhino” Bubabibotsky, Non-Commissioned Freelance Specialist, December 31, 2015