Gerald

It was July the 22nd, and it was a day I'll never forget. As we sat around the campfire, we watched as the camp counselor floated out of his adobe hut. He hovered over the campfire and rapidly swung his left arm around clockwise two or three times, like a rock star playing guitar, or maybe like the clock of time itself whirling into the future. From his fore-emptied palm, he produced a small shiny tin of some sort. He peeled his right lower-lip back with a grin, reached into the tin, and with two boney fingers, he exhumed a mass of black weed. He licked the wad from his fingers with his tongue, played hide-and-go-seek with it, first showing it to us on his tongue, then sticking his tongue back in his mouth, sticking it out again, slowly for what must have been a full two minutes. He seemed hostile toward us, like he was taunting us as he grinned, playing his sick little game. Then he rested the glob in his cheek, rolled his eyes back, as if he were in heaven, and suddenly opened his eyes, as if they were going to burst out of his skull cavity. He looked at us with a crazed stare. Then he spit onto the campfire, as he spoke. "Boys, my name is Gerald, and this is where the trouble begins, and this is where the trouble ends." With that, he scratched his two-day shadow on his chin, as if contemplating something. "You...piggy boy..", he said, pointing at the obese child in the rain slicker, "Get yer fat ass up 'ere and lick my shoes!" "Yes sir.", the swiney child replied. "Ho! Wait a second.", the man known as Gerald screamed. He slowly rotated his head around the camp area, as if it were on a pivot capable of moving only left or right. I think he had an ability to scan his surroundings even in the dark. Suddenly, his head stopped. He squinted his eyes, then emitted a sly grin. "Whoopdie Doo!", he squealed as he hovered toward a tall pine tree about ten feet from the campfire.