Floyd Kelly

The portal snapped shut, instantly silencing the roar of the fiery dimension he’d just escaped. For a beat, an unnatural vacuum of silence hung in the air. Then Louisiana rushed in to fill the void—a wall of thick, humid air and the chirping symphony of a thousand insects. A moment later, the sky deposited a ‘97 Aerostar. It wasn’t a graceful arrival. The van, a rolling testament to faded paint and the collected ghosts of a thousand drive-throughs, materialized about fifteen feet up and dropped with a heavy, metallic thud into a sugarcane field. The impact drew a fresh crack across the windshield like a bolt of lightning and, with a sad, deflating sigh, blew out one of the tires.

Inside, Rumpelstiltskin rode the jolt against his seatbelt, a chaotic rumble of bobbleheads and burlap. He gave his head a shake, the artful mess of his hair now just an actual mess, and a slow, magnificent grin bloomed on his face. He was here. He’d made it!

His phone, cracked but blessedly alive, confirmed his location with a pulsing blue dot: LaPlace. A stone’s throw from Kenner. A whoop escaped his lips, loud enough to send a nearby egret flapping away.

“BEEBERS! I’M COMING FOR YOU!” he roared at the sugarcane, his voice thick with joy.

His fingers flew across Messenger, typing out a frantic, all-caps message. “SKIDMARK! I MADE IT! I’M IN LAPLACE! BUT I CAN’T GO ANYWHERE! ONE TIRE IS A MELTED MESS, ANOTHER JUST BLEW ON THE LANDING, AND I GOT A CRACKED WINDOW! NOW I STUCK MY FINGER WITH A NEEDLE. UGH.”

He watched the three little dots of the reply dance on his screen, a brief, agonizing dance of dots before the message appeared. “Dude. Stay where you are. Don’t move,” Skidmark had written. “The whole diner is on lockdown. Cops. Fire department. The works. Wait till I call you back. It’s a whole thing.”

Rumpelstiltskin stared at the screen. Lockdown? What? So close, yet thwarted by bad tires. For once, it seemed, waiting was the only card left in the deck.

Miles away, the parking lot of Aunt Hilda’s Diner was a frantic swirl of red and blue. Standing in the middle of it all, a fixed point in the chaos, was Aunt Hilda. You don’t just see a woman like her; you experience her. At six-foot-five, crowned with a beehive hairdo the defiant, fiery red of a stop sign, she was less a person and more a geographical feature. When Hilda walked, the floorboards knew it, and the ice in your sweet tea rattled a nervous little rhythm against the glass.

“So,” she began, her voice a low rumble that could calm a stampede, “you’re telling me this entire building was evacuated… because of a smell? That wasn’t my pot roast, just to be clear.”

An unknown voice, “We opened all the windows to air out the place.”

The fire captain, a man who clearly thought he’d seen it all until today, had the good grace to look shy. “Ma’am, three separate 911 calls. The odors have been… shall I say, extremely nostril twitching? The poor hairs in my nose.”

Two firefighters gave a thumbs-up from the diner’s wide-open doorway. The all-clear. As the emergency crews packed up, Hilda turned, ducking her head to clear the doorframe she’d long since memorized, and disappeared back into her diner.

A moment later, Uncle Skidmark sauntered out of the diner. Adjusting his usual red flannel shirt, heavily stained jeans and t-shirt, he paused in the middle of the parking lot, a look of profound concentration on his face. He glanced around as if anticipating a great performance, then hiked up his right hip. A super-duper-very-long, impossibly resonant fart echoed through the humid air. Skidmark let out a sigh of pure relief, a huge grin spreading across his face. “Ahh! Better!” he declared to no one in particular. Beaming, he continued his way to the beat-up pickup. He climbed inside, and in the passenger seat, panting, was Beebers.

Skidmark pulled out his phone and typed a quick message. “All clear. I’m on my way to you. Got someone who wants to see ya.”

Leaning against his disabled van, Rumpelstiltskin did his best to make himself presentable. He found his last, lonely antiseptic wipe in the glove compartment. He gave his face a quick pass, then his neck, then his armpits, but the single towelette was no match for the accumulated grime of interdimensional travel. It was a futile gesture. As he waited, he saw a familiar, beat-up pickup truck appear as a dot on the horizon.

About a quarter-mile out, a strange scent reached Rumpelstiltskin on the breeze. He wrinkled his nose, sniffing the air. It was a powerful, musky odor like skunk maybe, that cut right through the smell of the swamp. “That ain’t swamp,” he muttered to himself. “What is that funky smell?”

A few moments later, Uncle Skidmark pulled up to the Aerostar. As he got out of the truck, the full force of the scent hit Rumpelstiltskin. “Oh, that’s why.” The funk was a complex mix of sweat, fryer grease, and the faint, musky afterglow of what could only be described as the usual.

“Beebers!” The reunion wasn’t a symphony; it was a glorious, full-contact explosion of joy. Beebers launched from the truck like a furry, four-legged missile and slammed into Rumpelstiltskin, sending them both tumbling to the ground in a heap of purple blazer, wagging tail, and happy whimpers. Two years of aching loneliness vanished under an avalanche of sloppy, wet dog kisses. Then they both rolled around on the dirt, a tender moment of pure, playful bliss.

After the initial ecstasy subsided, they surveyed the damage to the Aerostar. Skidmark kicked at the good tire, then pointed at the others. One was shredded from the landing. The other was a blackened, warped puddle of rubber, fused to the rim from its time on the hot rock of the hellscape.

“Dude,” Skidmark said, stating the obvious with his slow drawl. “She ain’t goin’ nowhere. Not without a tow.”

“Details, details,” Rumpelstiltskin said, not taking his eyes off Beebers. He pulled out his phone and, after a quick search, arranged for a local tow company to retrieve the van from the field and haul it to the nearest full-service garage. “I’ll deal with that tomorrow. Right now, I need a shower and a real bed.”

He grabbed his sack and duffel bag of clothes and they left the beat-up Aerostar to its fate in the sugarcane. Rumpelstiltskin and Beebers piled into Skidmark’s truck, and he dropped them off at a Motel 6 on the edge of town. The van would be dealt with, but for now, Beebers needed a few days of solid, uninterrupted ear scratches and training walks on the leash.

A few days later, in the kitchen of the diner, Aunt Hilda was pulling a beautiful, golden-crusted apple pie from the oven. The sweet smell of cinnamon and baked apples filled the air, but it was immediately corrupted by another, more pungent aroma. Hilda stopped, her nose twitching. She leaned down and sniffed the pie.

“That’s not supposed to smell like that,” she murmured, a frown creasing her brow. She sniffed the air again, her eyes widening in grim recognition. “Oh, darn,” she sighed, placing the pie on the cooling rack with a thump. “Skidmark is nearby.”

Skidmark nonchalantly walked into the diner. Hilda was waiting for him at the counter, standing with a stout and imposing posture, her fists at her hips and her big red beehive hairdo almost touching the ceiling. As soon as he entered the door, she said, “If you’re going to work here buddy, turn around right now and go take a shower and change your clothes. And change your skivvies!”

Uncle Skidmark immediately made a U-turn without a pause and walked out, mouthing a silent “Yikes!” right before he pushed the door.

The next week, Rumpelstiltskin walked into the diner. The bell chimed. He saw Aunt Hilda behind the bar, a giantess in a floral apron, hiding bottles of alcoholic fun. He slid onto a stool.

Catching her off guard, he said, “Heard you had some excitement.”

Looking up from a bottle of gin, Hilda’s face cracked into a rare, beautiful smile. She dropped the bottle and enveloped him in a hug that smelled of cinnamon and home. “Rumpel,” she rumbled. “Too long. I was so worried about you.”

“Hard to keep down,” he grinned, settling into one of the vinyl-covered barstools.

She gave him a tall glass of cold iced tea and touched his hand as a friendly gesture, then her smile evaporated. She leaned in, her voice dropping to a whisper that made the air feel sad. “We need to talk. It’s bad, Rumpel. Real bad.”

His own grin faltered. “Money? Are you in trouble? I can help with that, ya know.”

Hilda shook her head, her expression grim. “No. Worse. It’s a plague. A blight. It’s driving them away, the customers. They flee, Rumpel. Mid-gumbo. Business is in the tank. If this keeps up…” She stared past him, as if imagining the end of all things.

A concerned look crossed his face. “What is it? What’s happening?”

Aunt Hilda took a deep, shuddering breath and looked him dead in the eye.

“It’s the stench, Rumpel,” she said, her voice cracking with the weight of it all. “It’s Uncle Skidmark.”

Rumpelstiltskin just blinked. Of all the horrible things he’d braced for, this was so much more beautifully mundane. A laugh burst out of him, sharp and surprised.

“Oh, that’s a relief!” he exclaimed. “I thought it was serious.” He looked at Hilda, his eyes full of a sudden, deep warmth. “Honestly? I can’t even worry about that right now. I just got Beebers back. After two years… having my friend with me again? The rest is just noise.”

Hilda’s stern face softened. She patted his hand. “I know, honey. I’m glad.” She paused, her voice approaching a tear. “It’s just so sad. I’ve run this joint for 26 years now. People, friends, longtime customers just simply get up mid-meal and leave, horrified, and they’re not coming back. The Drive-Thru window keeps the place just barely hanging on. What am I going to do?”

“Don’t you worry, there is a solution to everything!” he said with a bit of cheer, then added quietly, “Oh, uhh … I got a gold nugget.” He turned his head away, his eyes rolling as if embarrassed.

“You what?” Hilda stood up immediately. “You know they will come for you… Big Eyes…”

“I know,” he admitted. “It’s already happened, yet again.”

“You need to get rid of it, and I mean, fast! I don’t want Big Eyes here, although it might raise some money.” she said with concern then a giggle.

“You know me. It’s mine! I can’t bear to part with it.” His face turned to one with a forced pouted lower lip.

Hilda leaned on the counter, her voice low. “Well, you know what to do. How much gold is in your stash now?”

He scrunched his face in concentration. “I think … mmm, maybe about 5 gigatons now.”

She put her hand to her mouth then to her chest. “Oh dear. That’s a lot!” She fanned herself and adjusted her hairdo. “So, to change the subject, there’s Aunt Jezzie. I need you to do me a favor.” She continued, “Since you’re traveling anyway, you could do something for me. For … family.”

“Name it,” Rumpel replied with a wink.

“Go see your Aunt Jezzie, please,” she said, her voice soft with real concern. “Winkelman, Arizona. It’s a haul, I know. But she’s alone out there. She calls, tells me her wild stories, but I hear it in her voice. She’s lonely.”

Arizona. That is exactly the right direction. A new road. A new flavor of experience.

“You’re right,” he said, a glint in his eye. “A road trip is exactly what we need.”

He pulled out his phone and tapped out a new message. “Aunt Jezzie! It’s your favorite gold digger! Guess who’s got four wheels and a full tank of gas? Pack up the conspiracy theories, I’m on my way!”

He showed the screen to Hilda. She gave a slow, satisfied nod. He hopped off the stool, gave her a hug, and walked out the door, the bell chiming his departure. The Great Stench of Skidmark would have to wait.

The next day, the Aerostar, gleaming with a new windshield, pulled out of the Motel 6. Beebers sat shotgun, head out the window, ears flapping in the breeze. Rumpelstiltskin cranked up Cosmic Energy, tapped the dash-bobblehead three times for luck, and pointed the van west. The great, weird, wonderful American road was calling.

Rumpelstiltskin and Beebers had a great time traveling the road to Shreveport. A lot of one-sided talks with Beebers just staring and wondering. Driving along at night, he pulled over to a rest stop off the 20. 

After a few minutes of just sitting and pondering. He reached into the burlap sack and grabbed the big chocolate chip cookie he took from the UFO, next to the bag of The Marbles of Minor Chaos, which caused one of them to glow and snapped the marble into his hand.  He then placed the gold nugget in his blazer, and lastly, the glistening paper towel roll. Looking around to ensure nobody saw him, he placed the marble into the paper towel roll, sealed the ends with his palms, and tilted the roll back and forth at eye level. He could hear and feel the marble rolling within. He then balanced it perfectly in the center and said, “Beholden, Be Golden, Life is a Twist!”

Instantaneously, a bright gold flash. The space outside the van crystallized and fell away fast to reveal a large dimly lit manmade cavern, the van now facing a door designed like an apartment entrance door. He, Beebers, and the van were now sitting there, staring at a door that unlocks five gigatons of gold. How about a rub of that familiar gold button on the blazer?