Gag Reflex

“Hey, Lindsay, I make a pretty good Frankenstein, don’t I?” asked Mikey proudly.

“You’re not Frankenstein; you’re Frankenstein’s Monster,” corrected Lindsay, keeping her eyes on the road.  She wore a brown robe with a hood which, when pulled forward, obscured most of her face.  Under this drab robe, though, she was dressed much more colorfully; a small tight flimsy blue dress with gossamer wings attached, while in one pocket was a butterfly mask which she would use to complete this second costume.  She normally despised looking so frilly, but it was necessary for the caper that she and her partner were planning that Halloween night.

“Frankenstein was the name of the doctor who created the monster; it wasn’t the monster’s name, despite the fact that that’s what most people call him,” she explained, turning the Mustang (which she had appropriated when the owner had thoughtfully left it parked with the keys dangling invitingly in the ignition) around a corner.

“Oh, what was the monster’s name?” asked Mikey, curious.  His face and all of his exposed skin had been painted dark green and he had a couple of costume bolts glued to his neck.  He wore frayed, worn-out, too-small clothing and a pair of mismatched boots, and looked exactly the way the creature is usually portrayed.

“Mary Shelley never gave him one,” replied Lindsay.

“I wonder why not,” mused Mikey.  “Probably she couldn’t think of a good one, so she just skipped that.”

“And there wasn’t any Igor, or anyone like him in the book, either,” continued Lindsay.

“Hey, Lindsay, I just had a thought!” exclaimed Mikey.

“I thought I told you to stop having those,” she snapped in reply.  “Whenever you start thinking, things end up going wrong.”

“No, but listen, Lindsay, this Dr. Frankenstein, he created that monster, right?  So that means you could say he was, um, what’s the word, metamorphically the monster’s father.  So that means the monster’s name should be Frankenstein, too.  So it’s okay for you to call me Frankenstein.”

“I won’t, but you can call yourself whatever you like, just so long as you stick to the plan.”  Lindsay drove into the spacious grounds of the palatial Tydalotte estate.  “Remember what happened last Halloween?”

“Er, yes,” said Mikey, shifting nervously in his seat.  His mind went back to the disastrous events which had occurred exactly one year earlier…

___
“Help, help!” shouted Hilary Tydalotte.  The glamorous socialite was still wearing her demoness Halloween costume, a red leotard with black wings attached and a bat mask over her upper face.  Her legs had been tied together and her arms tied behind her back with thin white rope, while thicker ropes around her torso kept her bound to a wooden chair with a cushion seat.  “Help, somebody, help me!”

“Please don’t shout like that,” said Mikey, walking into the room, carrying a couple of glasses of soda.  He also was still wearing his Halloween costume, which, that year, was a Wolfman outfit, only the heavy furry mask was so hot that he had removed it, forgetting that Lindsay had clearly told him he had to keep his face hidden at all times.

“I un-gagged you,” he explained to Hilary, “because we’re out in the middle of nowhere, and no one can possibly hear you.  So there’s no use in calling for help, since it won’t accomplish anything except to make me decide to gag you again.”

“You big jerk!” yelled Hilary furiously, struggling against the ropes.  “You must have gristle in your skull instead of brains, kidnapping me.  Don’t you know that my Daddy has his own private security force to deal with muscle-bound morons like you, you oversized gorilla?”

“That’s not very nice, calling me names like that.”  Mikey set one of the drinks on the small table next to his captive, and then placed a long plastic straw in it so Hilary could drink.  “Just because I’m a kidnapper that doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings.”

“What’s this?” asked Hilary, looking askance at the glass.

“It’s lime cola,” explained Mikey, taking a sip from his own glass.  “I thought you might be thirsty after being gagged during the trip over here, so I poured some out for you.”

“That’s… surprisingly thoughtful of you.”  Hilary settled down from her struggles.  “I’m sorry I called you names.”

“That’s okay; I understand you just said that because of the situation.”

“And it really was very sweet of you to bring me something to drink, Mr. um…?”

“Mikey!” he answered, and then quickly added, “Only that’s not my real name; it’s my alias.  But you can call me that!”

“But, Mikey, I don’t really care much for lime cola.  Do you think you could bring me a cherry cola, instead?”

“Sure, Hilary,” agreed Mikey.  “We’ve got that too in the fridge.”

“Oh, and Mikey,” she called out as he started to open the door, “I’d like a lemon wedge with it.  Oh, and please don’t add quite so much ice this time, because then it dilutes the flavor, okay?”

“Okay, okay!”  He darted into the kitchen.  “I’d better hurry before she thinks up anything else,” he told himself.  He tossed a few ice cubes into a new glass, and poured it nearly full with cherry cola from a two-liter plastic bottle.  He sliced open a lemon and cut a large chunk which he slipped onto the rim of the glass.

“Here you go; it’s just the way you asked for it,” he announced when he returned a moment later.  “With lots of lemon for you!”

“Thank you, Mikey,” said Hilary, looking at her drink.  “Only, we’ve got a teensy little problem here.”

“What is it?” he asked anxiously.

“Well, the juice from this lemon isn’t going to get into my drink all by itself,” she explained, “and since there’s only one of us here whose arms aren’t tied up…”

“Oh, I’m sorry, Hilary.”  Mikey sprang to her side, squeezed the wedge, and then tossed the empty rind on the table.

Hilary leaned over and took a sip from the long straw.  “Is this a store brand?” she demanded, frowning.

“Um, yeah, you can save a lot of money buying that,” explained Mikey.  “Although I guess you don’t normally worry about that.”

“You’d better believe it,” she informed him.

“It is okay, though, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it’s fine!”  Hilary gave a loud sigh.  “Hey, where’s your partner?  You know, that girl with the same costume as mine, the one back at the party who lured me into the library and then tied me up.”

“Oh, you mean Lindsay?” asked Mikey.  “Um, that’s her alias, too, by the way.”

“I’m sure it is,” agreed Hilary.  “I wonder how she knew exactly which costume I would be wearing, and how my hair would be colored and styled.”

The truth was that Lindsay had determined this by paying Hilary Tydalotte’s personal maid for that information, but as Mikey was unaware of that he merely shrugged his shoulders and said, “I dunno.”

“Anyhow, where is she?”

“She’s still at the party,” explained Mikey.  “That was part of the plan, you see, that people would think she was you, so that the police wouldn’t realize afterwards that you’d been snatched as early on as you had been.  You know, they’d be all thrown off track.  But she’ll be here later.”

“You know, Mikey, you seem like a pretty nice guy,” said Hilary.  “Why don’t you just let me go?”

“Now, you know I can’t do that, Hilary.”

“Oh, come on, Mikey, if you let me go now then I promise I won’t tell anyone that I saw your face.”

Mikey gave a guilty start, suddenly realizing his mistake.  But, then, recognizing it was too late to do anything about it now, shrugged.  “I knew you would try to convince me to let you go,” he told her.  “In fact, I thought you would have tried it right off.  So I was ready for you to try something like this.”

“But Mikey, I promise that I won’t tell that you took your mask off.  I promise!  But if you don’t let me go then afterwards I’ll have to tell the police that I did see your face and describe it to them.”

“Well, I think a lot of guys look like me,” said Mikey.  “So I’ll take my chances.  And besides, I don’t see why you’re so eager for me to untie you; it’s not like you’ll be kept tied up for long; just as soon as your father pays your ransom you’ll be set free.  So you shouldn’t have too long a wait.”

“Yes, but, what if Daddy doesn’t pay my ransom.  What will you do then?”

“Now, don’t worry, he will.”

Hilary took a long drink from her soda.  “But that’s just the problem; he won’t,” she finally said.  “You see, recently I maxed out all my credit cards, and then, needing some more money, I got the idea of staging my own kidnapping, only Daddy figured it out afterwards, and then he got really mad and told me that the next time I got kidnapped he wasn’t going to pay any ransom!”

“He didn’t really mean it; he was just mad at you,” explained Mikey anxiously.  “Lindsay will be able to convince him we mean business, and then he’ll pay up, no problem.”

“You don’t know Daddy,” replied Hilary.  “He’s always worried about his yucky old money.  It’s the most important thing to him.  He never has any time for me.”

“I’m sure it’s not really like that,” protested Mikey.  “He’s only busy making money so he’ll have plenty of it that he can spend on you so that you’ll be able to have a good life.”

“I guess you’re right, Mikey,” agreed Hilary.  “In fact, now that you said that I just remembered something.  Daddy has this special account set up that he uses to pay reward money to people who rescue me!”

“There, you see, he does care about you more than his money!”

“You know, Mikey, when I said that thing about you setting me free, I didn’t mean that you would just set me free; you would also receive some of that reward money I just told you about!”

“I don’t need the reward money, because we’re going to get a big ransom from you father.”

“But Mikey, I just explained to you that Daddy isn’t going to pay any ransom, so at least you’ll get some money this way!”

“But I don’t understand.  That reward money is only for someone who rescues you,” objected Mikey.

“We’ll tell them you rescued me.  We’ll think up a story about what happened while you’re driving me back home.  But first you need to untie me…”

“Well, that does sound like a good plan,” agreed Mikey, “and I really want to go along with it…”

“That’s the spirit!” encourage Hilary happily.  “So, if you’ll just untie me…“

“…only I’d better wait before I do anything until Lindsay gets back,” Mikey concluded.

“You don’t want to wait until she gets back!” said Hilary, looking alarmed.

“Why not?” asked Mikey.  “She’s the brains of the operation.  I never do anything without her saying it’s okay.”

“Well, Mikey, I’m just guessing here, but I’m pretty sure she told you not to un-gag me, but you went ahead and did that, right?”

“Well, yes, she did tell me to keep you gagged,” admitted Mikey, looking surprised, “but I didn’t see why I needed to, so I took it off.”

“And she certainly didn’t tell you to be so nice as to bring me drinks of soda and squeeze lemons into them, right?”

“Well, it’s like I said, I was sure you had to be thirsty after being gagged like that.”

“So, you see, Mikey, you can make your own decisions!  So, about this plan we came up with, where you untie me and collect the ransom money…”

“Yes, we’ll do that!” agreed Mikey enthusiastically.  “Just as soon as Lindsay gets home, and agrees to it.”

“But Mikey, I thought we just established that you don’t need Lindsay’s approval to make a decision like this!”

“Well, the way I see it,” said Mikey slowly, “is that, if it really is a good plan like you say it is, then Lindsay will agree with it, so there’s no harm in waiting for her.”

“But Mikey, maybe Lindsay won’t understand why this is such a good plan!” exclaimed Hilary in desperation.  “That’s why we need to do it now!”

“No, I’d better wait for Lindsay,” decided Mikey.  “But you don’t have to worry.  She’s really smart, so I’m sure she’ll understand your plan, no problem!”

Hilary leaned over slightly and took another drink while she took a moment to consider her next maneuver.  “Mikey, I need to, um, you know, pee now,” she said.  “I really need to go!”

“That’s from drinking all that pop,” he told her.  “You’ll just have to hold it until Lindsay gets here.  She’ll take care of you using the bathroom.”

“But Mikey, I need to go now!”

“You won’t have long to wait.”  Mikey walked to a window and drew back one of the heavy drapes.  “She should be back any minute now.  She’ll have to drive one of your cars to get here, but don’t worry; she won’t get a scratch on it or nothing.”

“You know something else, Mikey?  When I do tell everyone about how you rescued me, not only will you get the reward money, but they’ll all think you’re a hero, too!”

“Wow!  Me a hero!  I like that!” enthused Mikey.  “I really hope Lindsay agrees to your plan, because…”

“When Superman rescues Lois Lane,” interrupted Hilary, “does he stop to ask someone’s permission first?”

“Well, no,” admitted Mikey, “but…”

“And does Batman when he rescues Catwoman?”

“Of course not!”

“Then why,” inquired Hilary, “do you need to ask Lindsay’s permission in order to rescue me?”

“Yes, why do I need her permission?” demanded Mikey.  “Okay, Hilary, I’ll untie you and get you back home, just after you use the bathroom, that is.”

“Oh, it turns out I don’t need to go after all,” she told him, standing up after he had loosened her knots.  Come on, let’s hurry up and go before… let’s just hurry up!”

A short while later Mikey dropped Hilary off at her home, with promises of fame and fortune soon to come.  His enthusiasm evaporated, however, when he returned to the country cabin, where he discovered Lindsay, frowning at him as if she truly were a demoness.  Somehow the explanation for why he let the heiress go free didn’t sound quite so good to him anymore, and it sounded even worse when a few days later he discovered a small note stuck in the door of the cabin:

Dear Mikey:  Thank you very much for setting me free the other day.  The good news is that, like I promised, I didn’t tell anyone that I knew who you were, since you were so kind and considerate to me.  The bad news is that I just made up that bit about the reward money, so you won’t be getting anything there, except the satisfaction of knowing you did the right thing!  Love, Hilary Tydalotte  xoxo

___
The ballroom of the Tydalotte mansion was festively decorated with orange and black streamers and balloons.  Cutely macabre images of ghosts and goblins and other creatures of the night adorned the walls, and elaborately carved jack-o’-lanterns grotesquely grinned and leered at the guests.  On the floor costumed couples twirled around as they danced to live music provided by a soft-rock band.

“Now this year make sure you stick to the plan!” Lindsay ordered angrily as she and Mikey made their entrance.  “And put your mask on!” she added, handing him a small black eye mask.

“Frankenstein doesn’t wear a mask,” he replied stubbornly.

“I told you before, you’re not Frankenstein; you’re Frankenstein’s Monster!” she hissed.  “And he does so wear a mask.  Everybody knows it.  So put it on!”

She watched as he reluctantly slipped the disguise over his face.  “Now go mingle,” she ordered him.  “I’ll come back when I’ve got that damsel all tied up.  And don’t set her free this time!”

“Don’t worry, I won’t,” he promised.  “I still can’t believe the way she lied to me.”  But Lindsay had melted away, and he spoke to himself.

“I hate these fancy parties,” he mused.  “I never know what to do.”  He idly reached for a canapé from a passing waiter, who, in keeping with the Halloween theme, was costumed in Eighteenth-Century livery and a white powdered wig.

“Blech!” said Mikey, making a face.

“Confidentially, I quite sympathize, sir,” whispered the waiter, leaning over.  “I hardly thought the Tydalotte family would be so uncivilized as to serve domestic caviar at one of their soirées!  It’s simply disgraceful!”

“Yeah, the nerve of some people,” agreed Mikey.  “Hey, pal, do you think maybe you could scare me up a hot dog?”

“A what, sir?”

“A hot dog,” repeated Mikey.

“A… hot dog, sir?”

“What, is there an echo in here?  Yes, a hot dog, with ketchup and mustard and relish and lots of onions, okay?”

“I’m very sorry, sir,” said the waiter, giving Mikey his frostiest look, “but I am unable to accede to sir’s request that I supply sir,” and here he practically spat out the last few words, “with a hot dog!”

“Well, you don’t have to act so snooty about it,” grumbled Mikey.  “If you’ve run out of hot dogs already you can just say so.”

“Hey, Frankenstein!”

“Hi, Blue Fairy,” he replied abstractedly, still dwelling on the hot dog incident.  “Oh, hey Lindsay, you just called me Frankenstein!”

“Of course I did, you big silly!”

“You know, Lindsay, you look really pretty like this.”

“Why, thank you, Mikey.  That’s very sweet of you to say!”

“So is Hilary all tied up yet?”

“Why yes, right in the library, in the same place I was last… I mean, where she was last year.  Why don’t you go there now, and do whatever it is that we planned to do with her?”

“Yes I will!” he agreed.  “And she’s not going to trick me this time, either!”

“Well, he’s definitely not the brightest,” sighed Hilary Tydalotte as she watched Mikey march off.  “Although if this Lindsay is really so smart, you’d think she’d realize that after last year I’d be on the lookout for someone who came in wearing something bulky that could be hiding another costume underneath!”

“Mpfff!” said Lindsay furiously where she lay in the library on top of a large antique wooden desk.  The voluminous brown robe was gone, revealing her Blue Fairy costume, nearly identical to Hilary’s, including the butterfly mask over the top half of her face.  Numerous strips of tape on the lower half of her face kept her mouth shut, while several coils of rope bound her legs and arms.

“That wasn’t very nice of you, what you did last Halloween, Hilary,” accused Mikey, folding his arms as he looked down at her.  “It’s not right to tell lies!”

“I’m not Hilary you big idiot; I’m Lindsay!  Now untie me this instant!” Lindsay attempted to say, but, with her mouth full of packing and her mouth taped all that came out was, “Mpfff, mpfff!”

“I’m not going to un-gag you this time,” he announced as he lifted her up.

“Put me down!” screamed Lindsay as clearly as she could, which was not clearly at all, as she squirmed wildly in his arms.

“Yeah, it’s kind of hard to play your tricks on me with that gag on, isn’t it?” observed Mikey as he carried her out through one of the large windows and towards the parking area.  “I’m going to make sure you’re kept tied-up good and tight at the new hide-out, and that’s how you’re going to remain until Lindsay gets back…”

“Mpfff!  MPFFF!”

“…no matter how long that takes!” he concluded.