(Inspired by the case number assigned to Lacambra vs Shea Properties et al – 07CC10666 – the mark of the devil).
It was late one evening as I was walking home when I was halted by a whispering call from the hedgerow – "PSSSSST! Come here!" I turned to the direction of the person calling me. Concealed by all the shrubbery and wearing face paint with matching camouflage was the lady I met at the bus stop - Mo’s mother.
“Be quiet and listen to me. Meet me here at midnight in three days”, she said as she handed me a map with a big red X to mark the spot. “You must come alone and be sure to wear black clothes. There is no time to explain except to say my son is going out on a date with the two ugly sisters of Cinderella. Just be there”, she commanded. Then, with the surprising dexterity of a gymnast she tumbled over the hedgerow, crawled and disappeared into the dark night.
Three days came by in a flash. My mind had been the subject of the most horrendous kind of mental contortions. To begin with, I had no idea what I was getting into and had been worried about the unlawful quality of the adventure.
The day started off windy and raining and it continued through the night. There was a sinister quality to that evening, however. All the lights in the city were out. There was an electrical blackout in effect. The rain was warm and thunderous lightning illuminated the skies over the horizon. Judging by the increasing loudness, I could tell that the thunderstorm was coming in our direction.
“Where is she?”, I kept asking myself, looking side to side in unison with the sounds of crickets. With a great sense of timing, seemingly calibrated to the lightning, she appeared in front of me as the lightning flashed. It was the proverbial now you don’t see her, now you do routine. Decked in a full frogman outfit reminiscent of the old school UDT Teams that cleared mines for landing troops, she was wearing a full wet-suit and the round goggle that was the rage during WWII. She had her fins attached to her hips and the full weight of the scuba tanks still on her back. “What’s with the Navy Seal regalia?", I questioned. “You’ll see soon enough”, she said.
“Be quiet and follow me. I will brief you on the situation as we hump to our target location. Now, are you alone? Did anyone follow you?”, she asked. To which I replied “No”. “Good”, she said. Then she went on with her briefing. “These two sisters are so ugly my son can only take them out at night. Preferably, when there is citywide blackout. Every time he wants to take the sisters out he would sabotage the power grid by knocking out a transformer. Since they could not go to the beach, again on the account that they are so ugly, they go on clandestine swimming excursions during a storm when no one can see them”.
It took another few minutes before we got to the edge of a swimming pool and we immediately hid between clusters of shrubbery. Looking at her military style watch, she told me that they should be entering our view in the next few minutes.
There was a long period of quiet until - “Bingo!, there they are", she said. I observed three silhouettes walking in the direction of the pool. My heart started pumping like it was coming out of my chest making me close to passing out.
There was a huge flash in the sky. Then, a long sustained string of lightning bright enough to let me observe the most bewildering sight in recent memory: All three were standing with their toes on the very edge of the pool. All were wearing black bathing suits – him a tight Speedo and the ladies wearing two-piece suits that were about a few sizes too small. They had positioned themselves right beside each other as if to begin a synchronized swimming routine. Then, there was a loud boom and flash that seared the image in my mind forever. With their arms outstretched and sporting bulging bellies, they had replicated what I have come to know as the mark of the devil – the numbers 666. As this happened, a warm gust of wind enveloped the area. Leaves, dust and pieces of trash swirled about as if to commemorate the sinister coming.
Then, with a yelp from Mo, they all jumped into the water in unison. A few seconds elapsed until loud exchanges of screams were all we heard – screams of pain and the disturbing vocal expressions of horror. It was like the moment when you were a child and a doctor is about to stick a needle in your butt. Magnify that by the power of three bloody and screaming adults.
A multiple flash of lightning had enough wattage to illuminate the pool to once again reveal the carnage - three adults and three bloody heads – the result of them diving into the shallow end of the pool. It turns out that under the shroud of darkness and equipped with tools from the venerable Underwater Demolition Teams, Mo’s Mom had switched the depth tiles at each side of the pool. When the three bloody gore of Mo and his dates thought that they had jumped into the deep end of the pool, they had actually jumped head first into the shallow end.
Mo’s Mom had gotten her son once again. But more importantly Mo hadn’t the notion that his own mother had done it to him – the result of a well-executed operation protected by the doctrine of plausible deniability.
And so there she sat, wedged between the shrubs that by now where quivering along to her rapturous laughter and glee. She turned to me and said, “these three kids do not know what they have gotten themselves into. I will break their mind”.
Her assessment was very close. Their heads were already in need of medical attention.
