After the Inauguration (standard:humor, 2083 words)
Author: hvysmker	Added: Jan 27 2009	Views/Reads: 3154/2003	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Oscar Rat and his buddies, Georgie and Dickie, head for a bar.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

He waved the gun around, causing even me to duck.  I don't know how he'd
shoot himself, but trust he'd find a way, so I ducked. 

"They wouldn't dare," Georgie said, coming down from the clouds. "And if
they do, I know a lot of judges.  I appointed them, and they owe me." 

When we go into the girlie bar, we have to pay a two drink minimum fee. 

"Uh," Georgie said, "Dick.  You happen to have any of that green paper
stuff on you?  I never carry it." 

Dickie didn't.  He never used it either.  Christ, but I realized I had
to pay. 

"I have a credit card," I admitted, shoving it out to the receptionist
or whatever they call them. 

She did something on a machine and we were let inside.  We were lucky. 
That particular bar allowed rats in.  Some of them don't, which makes 
it hard for us guys to get a drink while slumming in your part of town. 


You might remember all the trouble we had a while back.  The Ratoski
family reserved a spot in a human Wendy's for a birthday party.  They 
were lucky to get away with their lives, when little Suzy went to the 
counter to get extra ketchup.  Suzy had her picture in all the 
newspapers.  The poor little ratlet was frightened out of her wits.  
And they even had reservations. 

Since we didn't want to be recognized and mobbed by fans we took a table
in a back corner, even though Georgie preferred being close to the 
strippers.  There are drawbacks to living and working in the same 
building, even if it's a large one.  Between guards and wife, it's hard 
to have any quality time to yourself.  Condi helped some, but she was 
always flying away someplace or other.  And he's been finding a lot of 
former buddies melting into the woodwork. 

At least, in the dark booth, I could get out of that darned pocket and
sit on the table.  You guys, being so large and dumb, can't imagine how 
hard it is for us guys to drink in a bar.  First of all, I need a 
saucer or something, then someone to pour booze into it from that 
glass, which is sometimes taller than I am. 

It didn't take long for girls to find us.  Two well-dressed customers in
a back booth attract female spiders do with especially juicy flies.  
Before our drinks even arrived, two human women joined us. 

"Buy me drink, sailor," one said, jumping on Georgie's lap.  He, almost
immediately, smiled and went from playing pilot to impersonating a 
submarine captain evading depth-charges.  Occasionally, he came up for 
air.  I found out why they're called "hooters" as Georgie placed one 
hand on her breast and went, "Hoot, hoot." 

As for Dickie, he had a little trouble as his girl sat on the barrel of
the shotgun extending up between his legs. 

"Ohhhh! Baby, but you're quick on the trigger," she squealed, not
realizing how lucky SHE was that HE wasn't. 

"Don't you have a girl for Oscar, here?" Georgie asked, embarrassing me.


What were the chances, I thought. 

"We ain't got no rats here. The board of health won't let us," one girl
said. 

"Hey, Gloria.  What about Sonya in the laundry.  She's been wanting to
break into the rack...." the other girl said. 

"She ain't a rat, stupid.  Sonya's a skunk." 

"I get that stuff mixed up."  She smiled down at me, one false eyelash
drooping and threatening to jump into my drink. 

Now don't think I'm against my own species, but female skunks are my
favorite.  If you don't believe me, ask my wife, the former Malodor 
Skunk. 

"Bring her on," I said, jumping to my feet, whiskey dripping from soaked
whiskers. 

"You'll be soooorrry, Oscar.  Laundry women aren't known for their
beauty, you know?"  Dickie giggled. 

"He let himself in for it, Dick," Georgie said. "Don't blame us, old
buddy." 

They were wrong.  Although married, Sonya was a looker, even more
beautiful as the evening wore on and she saw me using my credit card 
for the drinks.  Funny, though, that nobody recognized my companions or 
myself.  After all, I'm a famous rat writer, you know. 

Later on in the evening, when Dickie threatened to shoot up the ceiling
to show the girls how his gun worked, the management took it away and 
put it under the bar with their own shotgun and rocket launcher.  
"You'se kin getter back when you done goes," the nattily-dressed 
Italian manager told him.  It pissed me off, since he debited my card 
for storage charges, plus tax. 

We were doing fine, me making promises of cash compensation to
Sonya--that I had no intent on  completing.  Since she was a laundry 
worker, Sonya knew nothing about hooker tricks ... while, he, he, I 
knew them all.  A couple of times during the evening, I signed I.O.U.s 
to her--in the name of another rat, named Rumsfeld--and witnessed by 
the ex-President of the United States, who simply snored away while I 
moved his fingers.  Then, I'd wrap her long striped tail around my neck 
and we'd dip under the table for a while.  She never did catch on. 

We were having a wonderful time, lost in a Wonderland of Texas
music--paid for with, jeeze, my credit card. 

It ended when a burly human in a gray suit came in to talk to the
bartender. I nudged Dickie, who was happily accompanying the music by 
strumming his strumpet and whistling the theme from that Batman movie. 

"Dickie.  Hey, man.  You know that guy?" 

"It's Agent Gregory, you know, Secret something or other."  It sinking
in, he snapped up straight, his bubbly-butted musical instrument 
bouncing, her own strings unfurled.  "The Secret Service.  How did they 
find us?"  Dickie crouched down in his seat, reaching for the shotgun 
that wasn't there. 

"It might have been," I whispered, "the fact that you parked illegally
outside the bar." 

"Wake up George.  We gotta get out'a here," he said as Agent Gregory
turned and left. 

I bit Georgie on the nose, waking him in mid-dream. 

"Why you do that, Oscar, old bean?" he admonished me.  "I was ruler of
the world, a fundamentalist Christian world, yet.  As I woke, my forces 
of the Lord were invading the evil Vatican. We'd have got that sucker, 
too." 

"Come on, Georgie.  They're on to us and we have to find another place
to drink." 

Holding on to each other's shoulders, my human companions staggered to
the bar, where Dickie retrieved his shotgun.  We almost made it, the 
manager stopping us at the back door.  We had to pass his office to get 
out. 

"Hold up, there," he ordered. "Did you pay your tab?" 

"We must have, you just about wore the surface off my card," I told him.
He didn't believe us, and left for the front of the bar. 

"I gotta check." 

He came back in a few minutes.  "You owe us for telling that cop we
haven't seen you.  Let me see that card."  Again with the poor card.  I 
may have been drunk, or crazy but, when he gave it back it actually 
felt lighter. 

Going out the back door, we were in a dark alley. 

"What we gonna do now?" Georgie asked. 

"Look," I told them, from Dickie's pocket, "this part of town will be
crawling with cops.  And we don't have a car.  There's a small hotel 
over there. Why don't we get a room and send for a bottle?" 

So that's what we did. We must have looked a sight, hardly Presidential
material but, then, many people have said that all along.  Anyway, 
Dickie and Georgie had no trouble getting in.  That guy, Obama, was on 
the tv and nobody noticed us. 

We got a room on my card, and a bum there was happy to sell us a couple
bottles of cheap wine. 

"What this stuff? Georgie asked. "It purty gooder," 

"Thunderbird," the bum told him. "They was out'a Ripple." 

We went up and finished our drunk.  Dickie wanted more girls, and they
were all over that lobby, like ra.... like humans. But the wine and 
room had maxed my card out. 

Now it's time to go home to my wife.  It was a fitting finish to eight
years of fun. With all the hidden bank accounts and their large 
holdings of "Al Qaeda" stock--after all, they made it what it is 
today--those two are set for life. Me, I have a maxed-out Visa card and 
worthless I.O.U.s.  It was a nice evening, but I can't expect those two 
to ever pay me back. 

Oscar Rat


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