Greatest Story Never Told

“I’m dying of some new virus called Aids kid and I don’t have a bucket of shit to leave you since I blew all my money on the track and on my cousin’s whiskey distillery, which was stupid to invest in because the master distiller turned out to be allergic to corn for Christ’s sake. I know in the eighties it seems like boom times for everybody but not for your old man.”

Son says, “Don’t talk that way Dad. I never loved you for being a wannabe bootlegger turned porn magazine mogul like Lary Flynt in the making. You taught me how to fish, play the slide guitar like Duane Alman did, make my own wine, grow my own green, play good enough ball to get a basketball scholarship at Western Kentucky and to smoke brisket like a true pit master maestro in the making, because a country boy can survive.”

“That’s nice of you to say son, but I’ll be lucky to live past the Kentucky, Duke game this Sunday and I got nothing of value to leave my only son, my gorgeous, gargantuan, 6-foot 9 boy, but the greatest story never told. Hopefully, you’ll have more success getting laid with this story than your great, great, great, grandfather ever did. I wanted to wait until your graduation from college to tell you this gem of a yarn, because you’re the only one in the Grease family to ever attend college, but the story is too good to take with me toward the great beyond under.”

“Picture Knob Creek in 1836, a young Abe Lincoln is playing cowboys and Indians with his best pal, your great, great, great grandfather Austin Gallher. Abe normally played the Indian, Trips on Logs, and today was no different. Although this time, they lost track of time, so Abe was acting more flustered frenetic than normal, insisting on dashing across a log along Knob Creek or else he’d miss out on mama’s specialty that she made on his birthday only, a batch of racoon ragoon soup, a Daniel Boone secret recipe allegedly from back in the day. Well Abe slipped off the log as expected, being in character as Trips on Logs or not. Mr. Cat In the Hat went splat and screamed for help like he just got bit in the ass by a frisky, fangy bat. Well, Abe didn’t know how to swim, so your great, great, great Grandfather had to save his favorite bed sharing partner from drowning. Austin rips off a gigantic size branch and helps pull Abe out on the grassy knoll off Knob Creek, feeling pretty good about the saving his dear friend from drowning to death. But Austin couldn’t enjoy the post saver high from saving his bedsharing pal Abe, after Trips on Logs started sharing a vision he had during his near-death experience. Abe says, “Austin, I had a vision in Knob Creek about me helping emancipate the negros from slavery one day, but throughout your lifetime, you have to promise me that you’ll never tell another living soul, that you saved me from drowning, because the negro will never look up to me as a new age Moses liberator of slaves if they ever knew I was a worst swimmer than they.”

Son laughs for five minutes straight and says, “At the same time pops, there’s plenty of southern folk who don’t think Abe was the perfect saint he’s portrayed to be. He had newspaper publishers arrested, suspended Habeus Corpus, talked about deporting all the negros in our country to fucking Brazil in South America. Plus, 650,000 died during the Civil War, he also held the equivalent of concentration camps for southern prisoners when 95 percent of us southerners didn’t’ even own slaves. Those Yankee motherfuckers wanted to tax us to death and tell us how the fuck to run our own land and had less respect for state rights,than Thomas Jefferson had for Hank Williams Junior homemade wine.”

Dad says, “I hear you son. Most Civil Wars of this magnitude weren’t necessary to free slaves. Plus, the Emancipation Proclamation at first only freed slaves in certain territories so Lincoln could recruit fighters tougher than east coast banker kids like Denzel Washington in Glory. But most would agree that Austin Galler saving Abe Lincoln will go down as the greatest presidential save since JFK kept Marilyn warm for Bobby.”

Son laughs for 10 minutes straight this time, shaking all the empty Jefferson Reserve whisky bottles on the mantle piece and says, “You’re a funny man pa. I’m sorry it wasn’t enough for Ma to stick around with us till the end.”

Pops says, “She could take me back in Heaven. But I don’t know if my kind are welcome past the pearly gates for the priveledge of your late mother calling me a crazy, faggot loser in the afterlife for all eternity either.”

Pop’s only son hugs his dear pa with all his might and says, “Fuck that bitch. I always loved you more anyway.”

The End

Michael Kornbluth