That’s Quite an Amazing Tentacle You Have There

I arrived in the lobby of New York’s newest and most prestigious French restaurant, Bâtards Prétentieux, where the maître d’ barred me with a wall of attitude I doubt he could back up if he came out from behind that podium.

Do you have a reservation? he asked, peering down at me over his Bob Hope nose.

“Yes. Bush, George W. Ex-president of the U.S. of A. Bombed Iraq and Afghanistan. Ring a bell?”

The chump continued pretending not to know who I was as he consulted his list. Then with a small gesture he had one of his tuxedo’d minions usher me to a table. I sat alone and ordered the fish. I always ordered fish on days when I felt the urge. When it arrived—who knows how long it took—and what’s the point in asking, really—I had nowhere else to be except back at the smelly and boring ranch—I figured I could be doing worse things than waiting for fish—like enduring endless chatter of mother’s toe corn—it came sprinkled with fennel and aioli (the fish, not mother’s corn). Fennel must irritate fish because my dinner sneezed. I called my waiter over: a thin man with a thin mustache, a thin blue bowtie and thin on personality.

“This fish isn’t cooked,” I said. The fish wriggled in confirmation.

“Sir, we pride ourselves on the freshness of our entrees.”

“Couldn’t you at least whack it upside the head? God knows your people had plenty of time back there.”

“I’m sure the fish is quite dead, sir, we wouldn’t put a live fish on a blue plate.”

“Its dorsal fin just moved. You saw that, right?” I asked. “I think it was using semaphore.”

“No, sir, it didn’t. Fish don’t possess complex communication skills and that’s its pectoral fin,” he said.

“It sneezed earlier,” I said, “before you got here it chuffed quite loudly.”

“Fish don’t sneeze,” he said, with finality, from his tight, thin mouth, reminding me of my sixth grade teacher, Mrs. Bloombottom, who always pinched her face tight like that when she sent me to the principal’s office for throwing rocks in English class.

I was beginning to hate this waiter. Like the fish, I wanted a different one. I poked the fish and its eye popped open. “This damned fish is most definitely still among the living,” I said. “Could you take it back and tell the cooks to get it nearer the stove this time?”

“Fine, sir, I will have them ruin it by cooking it more.” His annoyingly thin, manicured fingers twitched as he snatched up the plate, and without another word he darted off to the kitchen.

I peered around the place, curious how the other patrons were faring, and there, under a giant chandelier that sparkled and twinkled like the Christmas tree they always put in the Blue Room at the Whitehouse, I spotted no other than that scoundrel, President Trump. He didn’t so much as sit, as occupy the space above and around his chair—his arms flailing about in one direction, that orange hair off in another. Across from him sat a girl with Norwegian hair and skin pampered by undulant hands using the best crèmes. She sure was something, the kind of gal where you can’t blink when looking at her. Laura doesn’t need to know I said that.

There was no sign of Melania in the restaurant (what kind of name is that anyway? It sounds like skin cancer). I watched in amazement as Trump schmoozed over her like a cat with a fresh can of tuna. That was when the cow walked in, led by a cook wearing a bloody apron and a belt full of knives. The pleasantly unsuspecting Holstein followed at the end of a silver chain right up to Trump, who examined his proto-steak with eagerness. Trump reached down and pulled on an udder teat while winking at his date, suggesting he would be doing the same to her later.

The cook pulled a black pistol from his pocket, racked the slide and handed it to Trump. The cook then marked a big X on the Jersey cow with a sharpie (I was wrong earlier, it wasn’t a Holstein, and don’t get all judgmental because I own a ranch and should know the difference). He marked the cow right behind its left eye and pointed to it as he held a metal cooking sheet on the other side to catch the bullet. A couple at a table right behind moved aside nervously. Trump waved him off then drew a big square right behind the unsuspecting ruminant’s shoulder. I knew Trump wouldn’t shoot the cow; he’s the kind of guy who has others do his killing for him. The cook led Trump’s meal away through double metal doors.

Trump waved at two senators I recognized at another table, and they ran to him like faithful Bluetick hounds. The two politi-scum newcomers were from a southern state where the approved literature in their constituents’ schools consists of the Bible and a copy of a book full of laments on the loss of the Jim Crowe laws, with a foreword by Henry Billings Brown (remember Plessy vs. Ferguson? Exactly). Trump introduced them to Scandi-girl, or should I say scantily-clad-girl, the v-cut of her blouse went to her bellybutton. Her bared teeth were perfect and I wanted her to lean over and bite all three of them right in the face. But she didn’t, probably fearing she would catch something contagious, leading to a slow, agonizing death.

I heard a gunshot from the kitchen and soon my fish appeared in front of me again. Sadly, there weren’t any bullet holes in it so I assumed the cow was now being divided into delicious slabs of carnal delights. I didn’t want fish now, but there it was in front of me looking like it would lunge if a fly buzzed by and caught its attention. I waved over at Trump, but my waiter came back instead.

“Sir, is the fish more to your liking now?”

I could tell he didn’t care—he walked away as he said it.

And I barely heard him. Trump was gesturing across his table, pointing out his date’s best features for the two grey senators, who perched on the ends of their seats, smiling like hungry lions. The porcelain-skinned girl smiled back like she would if Jabba the Hutt waited across from her, drooling his slimy toad-tongue out from a cavernous maw over yellow fangs. I could see the terror in her face, realizing she had nowhere to run and was next on the menu.

Trump got up abruptly and I followed him. He patted people on the backs and shoulders as he walked by then stepped into the men’s room. When I entered a moment later he was unzipping at a urinal. I straddled the one next to his; I started but I didn’t hear anything from Trump so I peaked over. All men are curious this way; it’s not a sexual thing, we just want to see what the competition looks like. Trump caught me looking and pointed down at his huge member.

“See, I was telling the truth about the size, right? It’s massive, very very massive. Go ahead, get a good look,” he said, obviously proud.

“It’s amazing,” I replied. And it was, but what he had sticking out of his trousers was a long, thick tentacle hugging and devouring a blue urinal cake. How odd I thought, he’s at a five star restaurant and prefers pissed-on deodorizer pucks? He must have ordered the fish.

“Are you actually human?” I asked. “That thing looks like original equipment.”

“Or course I’m human, Georgie! Very human. You sound like a deranged whacko saying things like that, I mean c’mon,” he said, and slapped me on the shoulder. “I had this attached a few years ago by a urologist in Brazil. He was brilliant, just brilliant. I selected it from a whole tank full options. I coulda had an elephant trunk if I wanted, but I’d have had to wear clown pants, so I chose this. It wasn’t the largest option, but it’s amazingly flexible. It can do amazing things. Amazing. Watch.”

And it could too; it demonstrated this by flinging the urinal cake high into the air, bouncing it off the mirror then smack into the middle sink. Stephen Curry would have been impressed.

“I can ball it up at the end, the ladies love that,” he said. The tentacle made a fist and slammed against the side of the urinal a couple of times making a meaty slap like raw liver shot out of a canon into the side of a Winnebago.

“The girlies don’t freak out when they see that thing?” I asked.

“Many have fainted, many, but I take that as a compliment, it’s much better than a regular penis, trust me, much, much better. Do you want to know what’s truly amazing about my tentacle-penis?”

“What?”

“I can stand next to a beautiful woman, grab her in her female junk, then yank it back way too fast for a human eye to see.”

“Aha! You said that like an alien would. You’re some kind of dude from another planet,” I said. “I’ll tell the media, CNN is gonna love this.”

Trump whacked my shoulder again and winked with his inner eyelid. When he did this, for a moment, his inner eye pulsated red. He said, “Go ahead and tell them. Heck, call all those biased media fuckers. After all the crazy stuff I’ve done and said and got away with do you think this will hurt me? I’m Teflon, baby, slippery like an eel. I can say and do anything I want. Anything.” Trump shot his tentacle-penis out of his pants, into the sink, flicked a piece of broken urinal cake up high into the air, and caught it perfectly on the center of his forked tongue.

By Karl Van Lear