Searching for Truffles

By Rick Hartford

Every night at midnight, the purple clouds came out to dance with the blushing sky.

Romantic.

Erotic.

Liberating.

The Deep State decided that they had to go.

Air Force jets flew through the sky, seeding the clouds in order to make it rain.

To no avail.

Patrol cars with bull horns roamed the neighborhoods, warning people to remain inside.

And to close their shades.

The Talking Heads urged the television audience to remain calm.

And to keep watching for further updates.

But there was nothing to worry about.

Unless you stared at it.

Once you stared at it, it had you.

A televangelist suggested that the earth was being bombarded by sex rays.

Pseudo Scientists on the Deep State payroll suggested the rays were cancer causing.

They both said the Russians were behind it.

There was a curfew, which was ignored altogether.

People came out to gawk at the sky. It was a carnival atmosphere. In fact, as an example of life imitating art, (or as it the other way round?) there was an actual carnival at the town fairgrounds.

The show had to go on.

Children ran around smacking each other with plastic light sabers sold by a man dressed in a Darth Vader costume.

The Jimi Hendrix tribute band played Purple Haze.

“Purple haze all in my brain

Lately things just don’t seem the same

Acting funny but I don’t know why

“'Scuse me while I kiss the sky.”

Zany and I lay on the golf course, holding hands and eating cotton candy while we looked at the sky. The pink threads of the cotton candy were sticking to our fingers like spider webs. I leaned over to kiss her and tasted the sweetness and thought, so this is what sex tastes like.

We made love on the putting green as some Republikans nosed along a few feet away, searching for truffles.

Republikans, with no eyes and no ears, navigate by smell. You would think that they would be clumsy, not having eyes, but they are quite nimble.

Zany and I left our clothes where we had dropped them and went back to the cotton candy booth, but it was shuttered. Most of the carnival rides had also been closed down, but the Ferris wheel was still accepting late riders and the gypsy attendant ushered us on for free because we, being naked, had no money.

It was a warm night and the car gently rocked as we climbed up and up until we were suspended at the top. Someone had left a pack of Old Golds and matches behind so we both had a cigarette, Zany making three perfect smoke circles, each new one scoring a bulls eye through the last. We looked down from our car upon the field beneath us where the Republikans sniffed in our direction, as if waiting for instructions.

We gradually made it down to earth as the other riders disembarked. Two girls holding hands skipped into a thick fog, their laughter tinkling like ice cubes in a crystal glass.

A magician was working the crowd. Wearing a top hat and tails, he removed his head and swapped it with his female

assistant’s. There was a burst of laughter. Someone fainted.

The magician and his assistant bowed and strolled away, holding each other’s head under their arms.

Somebody in the crowd called out: “Mirrors! It’s done by mirrors!”

Just then, a clown ran by crying, his makeup running, his shoes sounding like mouse traps snapping as his toes hit the ground. He pointed at the sky. “They shouldn’t be doing this in front of the children!”

A conga line of Republikans moved past us, making their way through the sand trap and past the starter’s shack into the moonless night.

Zany and I followed them at a distance until they dissolved. We walked slowly back to the golf course. The manicured grass felt like a velvet bed. Our clothes were missing.

We laid down and pressed our bodies together as the purple clouds above us made love with the sky.

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