Human Fish

An American Dream



I'm driving on the freeway when I decide to take my hands off the wheel. The car begins moving into the other lanes and I try to grab at the wheel before I drift into another car. But, it's no use, not really the arms hanging off my torso don’t work. The car begins spinning and I close my eyes and try to summon the strength to grab the wheel. It's no use. The car spins faster and I realize I'm dreaming. I wake up in a car dealership and a salesperson whispers to me "Free bacon with the purchase of every tenth Honda or Acura." "What kind of bacon?" I ask. "Smoked." He says and presses his hand into mine. I give it a pump and the hand turns into a hose and I'm watering a Japanese garden. A Geisha woman riding a bike smacks into a cement wall and falls into a mess with the bike. I can't tell her limbs from the flesh colored spokes of the bike. Is that her head or the seat? I sit down hard into what becomes theater seating. Chewbacca is seated in a red arm chair next to a woman in a chaise lounge. She's explaining that she was beaten by her grocery clerk and that she's never recovered and dreams of dying by syphilis. Chewbacca grunts his understanding and then barks wildly. She seems to understand whatever he is saying and I realize I do too. He's giving her some form of Nancy Reagan tough love. Her skin begins to crackle and I realize she's burning up from the inside out. Chewbacca takes the flaming husk and throws it into the audience. Small packets of flame land on my lap and I begin burning up. Just before the flames can reach my torso a fireman puts me out and he assures me "We'll save you. No money down." I'm in a bank and the teller is telling me that she's told everyone the same thing she's telling me: "You cannot cash that check without an account." I offer a small fee and she opens her mouth to reveal fangs. My eyes magnify them and they are ivory tusks spiraled with barbed wire. Further in, her throat is a moat surrounding the Pentagon. Boats float around what is now some dormitory for demons. I can see them walking the halls and giggling at each other. They're all blue. Everything is blue. The Pentagon falls away like chalk dust and I'm in a dentist's chair. He puts a plate of brie and crackers before me and barks "It puts me in a bad mood!" He's old enough to be my sister. He's rubbing his head and his look of worry makes me worry. "What's wrong with the dentist's office?" I ask him. He just rubs his head and starts making a high pitched noise from closed lips. Paris Hilton walks in and a nurse follows her, throwing bacon like roses behind her. She's smiling like only she can, but there's something wrong with her. She looks lost, like she's not supposed to be in this dentist's office. There's bacon everywhere. The dentist shouts at her "Go away!" And she replies "I can't. I'm under contract." The nurse smiles at me and then reveals the fangs from before. Paris trips up on her high heels and her leg shatters, taking the rest of her body down into the bacon. Her final words are "I'm helpless. Help me." I reach towards her and the brie and crackers fall to the floor. The nurse looks at me and hisses "Now it's a meal." The hiss turns into the sound of air escaping from a balloon. It's in George Bush's mouth. He's taking hits off the balloon to make his voice sound wacky. "2000 dead bodies was our last count." He starts laughing and pulls out a novelty hat with an arrow through it. He puts it on and walks bow legged away from me, comically exclaiming "Fool me once and I'll fucking kill you!" He sounds like a cross between a child and Moe. I look around and I'm in the middle of a path. Bush is walking away from me towards a large lighthouse in the distance. Red light is coming from it and when the light flashes out of view the tower emits a shriek like an ambulance. There's an emergency somewhere. It's gonna be alright though, because I have a 401K plan. I'm looking at it now and I may be the richest man in the world. According to T. Rowe Price I own 900 Bolivians, 1298 Ethiopians, and several hundred hillbillies in the backwaters of the Appalachians. I'm blessed. I look at how much my soul is worth and find a crying baby icon. I don't know what this means, but when I check the index, I find that against my net worth it doesn't matter. The drop downs on the site start dropping red pellets down into my share holdings. I start firing my account information into the red blobs and they explode on the screen. Each time I hit one, my net worth goes up by 300 homeless people. If I can get to the next level, I have a chance at displacing a large forest and the last tribe of true humans. I'm in it to win it. I keep firing and the baby keeps crying harder. I ascend to the next level and the main boss is Arnold Schwarzenegger's hairdresser. He's trying to kill me with flamboyancy. And he's doing a good job. Just as I'm about to give in, I reach for a rum and coke and begin discussing the war with this young soldier in a fire fight. He seems annoyed that I have the nerve to interrogate him as he's trying to lay down some cover fire for his platoon, or whatever. I don't really care, seeing as I'm drunk and he's the only one to talk to. "How many do you think you could kill if you were the size of King Kong?" I ask him. He mutters something about me being a jackass and I'm hit in the shoulder by a bullet. I look at the wound and there's all these very small contestants from American Idol escaping my shoulder and repelling down my arm. "Where are you guys going?" They reply "Solid gold fame, where else?" I gasp "God bless you." The soldier begins blowing flames out of his mouth and with no surprise to me, he becomes a dragon and flies out toward the Iraqis, Germans, or whoever it is he's fighting. When one of the American Idols tells me it's Eskimos, I'm not surprised. Suddenly, I get this dread, like I'm going to die. So, I start grabbing the American Idol contestants in handfuls and shoving them back into my shoulder. I feel like a brand new man. And I am. I'm a center for a basketball team and it's my life long goal to play for the Knicks. And I do. And I'm awesome and I get all this money and these models and these cars and I'm just a baby crying.