I had decided to try to write a story using practically nothing but cliches. I'm really not looking for critiques or corrections on it, I just thought it would be amusing to post.
P.S. Yes, it's supposed to be an annoying read. Enjoy.
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Albert hadn’t seen the handwriting on the wall soon enough. He had fallen for it, hook, line, and sinker. It being, in no uncertain terms, a few well-chosen words from a daughter whom he thought to be penny wise and yet pound foolish. How they had minced words that fateful night and not even a month of Sundays would fix his broken heart. There he sat, drunk as a skunk, drowning his sorrows in the Fine and Dandy establishment. At this point in time, it goes without saying, Albert had bid a fond farewell to the apple of his eye and now felt doomed to disappointment.
“You’re lookin’ mighty down in the dumps,” Ralph the bartender of the Fine and Dandy commented to Albert. “A penny for your thoughts, friend.”
Ralph was as mad as a hatter having come by leaps and bounds out of a family who were their own worst enemy. His face was as flat as a flounder and his eyes as gentle as a lamb’s and yet, he was none the worse for wear and was practically generous to a fault. He seemed on cloud nine that night and tried to lend Albert a helping hand.
“It never rains but it pours,” Albert told Ralph in a voice as quiet as a mouse’s. “You bend over backward for them, Ralph, and yet they still think the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.”
“I hear ya,” Ralph sympathized, appearing as wise as an owl. He sniggered. “My son, such a chip off the old block he is, a budding genius I must say. Practically born with a silver spoon in his mouth!
“Caught red-handed, he was,” Ralph went on, grinning like a Cheshire cat. “Seemed he had barked up the wrong tree stealin’ the way he did.” He shook his head, washing his hands of the situation. “Boggles the mind, I tell ya.”
Albert became limp as a dishrag and slumped heavily onto the bar, overcome by emotion. Bathed in tears, Albert seemed to have missing the boat that was sailing on to the moot point of Ralph the bartender’s story.
“Where does one draw the line?” Albert sobbed. “She was the bosom of the family, my little labor of love . . .”
Albert spilled his gin and tonic across the bar as he stiffed up a hornet’s nest in his aching mind. Ralph just thought this was too funny for words. He made no bones about it, just dabbed up the spill with his rag, being the perfect gentleman that he was.
“Pure as driven snow!” Albert went on, wailing. Then his eyes turned sour grapes and he suddenly threw caution to the wind. “Until she met him.”
Ralph viewed with alarm this broken man, as Albert sung like a bird his tale of the albatross around his neck that made him as mad as a wet hen. It seemed a fate worse than death, having thrown too many irons into the fire. He was a hapless victim who just wouldn’t let well enough alone. Ralph thought this a sight to behold and leaned over the bar to listen more closely. He thought this man couldn’t see the forest for the trees but didn’t have any intention of starting the ball rolling on that subject.
“I’ve been racking my brains all week over this problem,” Albert told Ralph, “and I can’t seem to understand why my little girl would want to drag me over hot coals.”
“She was head over heels in love?” Ralph asked, jumping from the frying pan and into the fire. He knew the answer and yet he still managed to stick his foot into his mouth.
“Hit the nail on the head,” Albert replied, motioning for Ralph to get him another gin and tonic to replace the one he spilled. “Far be it from me to question the heart of a fickle teen.”
Ralph fixed the new drink, knowing that these drinks that caused irreparable damage to the liver was what brought home the bacon for him. They sold like hotcakes in the Fine and Dandy and one should shout from the rooftops that they were second to none and it would be nothing new under the sun. The money they were raking in was nothing to be sneezed at and Ralph continued to keep tight on his lid of secrecy.
He handed the drink to the man who suddenly took on a lean and hungry look. Like a house afire, Albert bolted up from his barstool, becoming a seething mass. Flying off the handle, he began to tell a graphic account of what used to be his land of milk and honey, which abruptly ground to a halt one afternoon, once again spilling his drink as he ranted and raved.
“He sure pulled the wool over my eyes,” Albert fumed to Ralph who just stared, knowing this man carried a chip on his shoulder. “A wolf in sheep’s clothing, I tell you! Happy as a lark they were,” he spat, swinging his now empty glass fast a loose about in the air. “In seventh heaven!”
“It is interesting to note, to wax poetic,” Ralph piped in, “that it takes all kinds to make a world.”
Albert glared, taking a dim view of Ralph’s comment. “That’s what separates the men from the boys,” he bellowed, slamming his empty glass down onto the bar, acting as though he were bigger than all outdoors.
“To cut a long story short,” Ralph added, pouring yet another refreshment, “I hate to add insult to injury, Al, bit as long as we agree to disagree, perhaps we can get together, take the bull by the horns, and pull you up from the depths of despair.”
“On the other hand,” Albert replied, obviously intending to rub Ralph the wrong way, “let’s render a decision.”
“Without further ado,” Ralph said.
“I have a foot in the door knowing where this pet peeve of mine has taken my daughter,” Albert told him slyly, giving the empty bar a grand and glorious, yet drunk, side-glance. “Let burn the midnight oil together at this point in time to devise a plan which, in one fell swoop, would tip the scales in my favor.”
“You’re traveling into uncharted seas,” Ralph cautioned. When you come right down to it, Ralph couldn’t help but see the green-eyed monster clearly in the eyes of this pillar of society. By the same token, in this day and age, there comes a time in one’s life where just a shot in the arm might become a necessary evil.
“Opportunity knocks,” Albert told Ralph the bartender of the Fine and Dandy, leaning closer to him. Ralph could see Albert was as high as a kite now. Having spilled almost all of his drinks, Ralph thought he should be high and dry instead.
“I’m going to make him eat his hat,” Albert said, downing the rest of his last drink. He wiped his mouth and knocked on wood. His glazed eyes gave Ralph the impression that Albert wasn’t quite on the ball.
“On the other hand,” Ralph told Albert, “you could play it by ear. Once in a blue moon a teen will have a psychological moment and turn over a new leaf. I hate to play the devil’s advocate, but you’re trying to make bricks out of straw. The fat’s in the fire, deal with it.”
Albert stared at Ralph the bartender, seeming to take this in as though it were food for thought. Tired as a dog, Albert slurred: “You’re as clear as mud.”
“Beat a hasty retreat back to your home,” Ralph told Albert, “and fiddle while Rome burns instead. It will be a far cry from working yourself into a lather over it. You’ll feel better in the long run.”
Albert, in his final analysis, nodded. He was sick and tired of trying to fight like a tiger.
“It’s six of one and half dozen of the other,” Albert finally said, feeling strong enough (or was it drunk enough?) to brave the elements. “I’ve gone beyond the call of duty for that girl. It stands to reason that I leave her in the lurch.”
Ralph heaved a sigh of relief. “Stick to your guns,” he told the drunk, down trodden man. “That is to say, things are more easily said than done. The naked truth is all you needed to lick you into shape.”
“You’re never at a loss for words, are you Ralph?” Albert said drunkenly. “I’m glad my words didn’t fall on deaf ears.”
Albert, sadder but wiser, beat a path suddenly to the bathroom. As luck would have it, Albert was feeling a bit under the weather and began to worship the porcelain bowl. Ralph listened to this, knowing that it was practically too little, too late. It was too small a world for a man to wear two hats and try to be poor but honest in his lifetime.
Ralph returned to his place behind the bar and began to put things back into apple-pie order. They had talked into the wee hours. He had the best of all possible worlds and he played them to his advantage often. He knew he would wait with baited breath for the next down in the mouth drunk to stagger in with his dander up.
When all was said and done, Ralph shelved many skeletons in his closet, all of them not his own. He helped to clear out people’s bag and baggage, telling them they are all in the same boat and to bite the bullet. Ralph the bartender of the Fine and Dandy establishment walked the straight and narrow with his friends; that is to say, his comments rung true in many ears. He just wished they would tell someone who cared.
And a good time was had by all.
