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lands in a vat of plaster (for those who even remember the Three Stooges.) “Oh, Mike, Mike! I’m so confused!” and then she hugged him with all her might.

“You remember now—good. Where have you been? Archie thought you might’ve been abducted. You weren’t abducted, were you?”

She shivered in his embrace. “All I remember…is leaving the store one night after Archie said you’d already left. I was so jealous. I had it in my head that you were cheating on me with the Greeter…”

Mike drew on a difficult pause. “But you disappeared days ago.”

“What day is today?”

“It’s Christmas, Veronica.”

Veronica’s brain churned now, like a gearbox. “My God. This had to be the 21st or 22nd…” Her gaze snapped to his face. “Are you getting it on with the Greeter—and…what is her name, by the way?”

Mike flapped a hand of disregard. “Shit, I don’t know—”

“But you hired her. How can you not know her name?”

Mike hemmed and hawwed but could summon no reply.

“You are getting it on with her, aren’t you?” she demanded.

Mike sighed. “Yes, Veronica. I was going to tell you after Christmas. You and me? We just weren’t clicking the way I need things to click.”

All at once, and as quickly as her awareness had returned, Veronica’s world collapsed. “But-but…I love you! I want to marry you!”

“No can do, baby. Look, let me take you home—”

“No!” and then her hand soared to his crotch. “Let me suck your dick!”

Mike winced. “Veronica, please…”

“Get it out! Let me suck it!”

“You don’t want to suck my dick—trust me.”

“Yes, I do!”

“No you don’t. And I won’t even tell you why…”

“Why!”

Mike shrugged. “All right, you asked for it. An hour ago I was at the Greeters apartment…fucking her in the ass. There. Now you have it.”

She squeezed his crotch with urgency and adoration. “Let me suck it! Then you’ll love me!”

Mike stifled a chuckle. “Veronica, do you really want to suck a dick that’s been up another girl’s ass only an hour ago?”

“Yes!” and she began to unbuckle his pants.

Mike squirmed. “But I haven’t taken a shower yet! My dick smells like butt!”

“I don’t care! Take it out!”

“And the truth is,” he continued with even more reluctance, “you give lousy head.”

Veronica froze.

“Hey, sorry, but I’m just telling you like it is,” he explained. “I never told you because I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”

“Lousy…”

“Not just lousy, Veronica, but terrible.” He looked right into her eyes. “In fact, you give the worst head in the world.”

Veronica locked up for a moment as if encased in cement, but after this momentary self-reflection, an angst like she’d never known consumed her.

“Oh, yeah!” she snapped. “We’ll see about that!” and then she opened his pants, yanked them down, and began to fellate him. The fact that his penis still reeked from another woman’s bowel did not circumvent her resolve in any way, shape, or form.

Mike sat back, eyes wide in shock. “Oh-oh…wow, Veronica. Mmm, oh, holy shit… That’s-that’s-that’s…great!”

“Um-hmm,” she moaned as her mouth moved.

He was panting, breathing heavy, hips tensing. “Where did you…pick up this…new technique?”

Veronica didn’t answer, for two reasons. One, she didn’t know, and two, her vocal abilities were currently preoccupied.

In only moments, Mike’s face twisted up like Shemp’s (for those who even remember Shemp) and then he experienced—at the expense of Veronica’s mouth…

The best orgasm of his life.

“Holy motherfuckin’ shit, Veronica,” he wheezed after the fact. He stared at her. He took her hand. Then he said, “Marry me!”

And this Veronica consented to do quite expeditiously, and to make the conclusion of a long subplot short, she and Mike would get married, Veronica would indeed inherit all that money from her uncle, she would have children and become the great mother she knew she was destined to be, and, due to a mental affliction known as “temporal-lobe retrograde amnesia,” she would never remember anything that had happened during the days of her disappearance.

Indubitably, she and Mike would live…happily ever after…

— | — | —

Epilogue

Chief Malone awoke in his dilapidated bed at precisely six in the morning, via his radio alarm which blared, “Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way! Oh what fun it is to…”

Fuck, he thought and snapped the alarm off. He rose, groaning, and into his mouth he immediately packed a good-sized wad of Red Man. He scratched his burgeoning belly through the holey t-shirt, scratched his buttocks through the just as holey boxer shorts, and lumbered muttering to the unkempt kitchen to start a pot of coffee.

No messages blinked on his answering machine.

The most fucked up Christmas of my whole dang life…

A pounding at the door caused him to scowl quite Scrooge-like. “Who the fuck’s poundin’ on my dang door on Christmas!” he grated. “It better not be no folks singing Christmas carols ’cos I just ain’t in the fuckin’ mood fer no Christmas carols.” He considered something. “Why the hail they call ’em carols anyway? Some gal named Carol invent ’em?” He hobbled toward the front door, one-hundred-percent bereft of Christmas spirit.

His plan had failed. The puppy killer was obviously still at large. Otherwise, someone from the station most assuredly would’ve called.

Grimacing, Malone opened the front door.

“Howdy, Chief. Merry Christmas,” Boover said, standing in his crisp uniform.