FICTITIOUS RHINO

"It's kind of a far drive, nothing a fifth of Tanqueray can't accommodate," the sullen shadow of the flask hid itself within the center console. "Abrasive," Tyler grabbed the swigger within a second of landing his lanky neck inside the van and continued to ramble, "No time to catch up mate, I'm afraid a matter has come to rise."

"Oh well hey, spill the beans."

"Seems to me there's a chance to eradicate ourselves from the states."

“Yeah, well I am actually-"

"Sip this," Tyler demanded while poking Morton in the ribs.

"We're driving!"

"It's Vermont mate, not much you can’t do in the hills. Plus, it’s stick season, ain’t much going on. Check this out though, my partner, my boy David from the internship team, needs to kill a Rhino!"

"What?"

"Get this, had a dream one night and apparently got killed by a rhino. Mother slaughtered him and now he thinks his life agenda is to kill the son of a bitch," Tyler gave Morton the big grin with the eye wrinkle squint included at no extra charge, "Says he needs to go to Africa, walk around the scorched earth and get this pal, shoot a rhinoceros with a gun!"

"Wow, that's really weird, why would-"

"This isn't shooting squirrels with a bb-gun, kid wants to shoot a rhino!"

Morton reluctantly took a sip from Tyler's green glass flask. Morton held up the slim container. Is this hand blow glass? Who drinks straight gin in the afternoon? An old man. Morton replied, "It seems quite irrational to have a vendetta against a fictitious rhino."

It is important to note that as the Kobich Mobile meandered down the side of Sugarbush Mountain, it occasionally scrapped the ground sending sparks flying like the 4th of July. Tyler, oblivious to this fact, kept rambling as he hand rolled his window down.

"F-ing nuts, kill a rhino? That’s the closest thing we got to a dinosaur isn’t it?" He pressed his hand in the shape of a gun and shot wildly at the medallions that swung from the rear view mirror.

"That's crazy, but have you noticed that we keep bottoming out? Maybe you should slow down."

"I know mate, these are the original struts. They wanted eight-hundred dollars, can you believe that? I wouldn't put eight-hundred monopoly dollars in this baby, yet alone, real money."

"Why don't you take some of this stuff out of the van?"

"I need that stuff for work," Tyler defended his pile of garbage in the back of the van. Morton turned his head and re-evaluated the clutter. He decided it was best to not start an argument.

He gulped another brisk naked cocktail and tried to speak again, "So, my news is I am-"

"Ahhhh, F-ing rhino!!" Tyler blurted in again with an exaggerated squint, "Guy wants to go to A-F-R-I-C-A," pronounced brightly and elongated like a rainbow, "And shoot a rhino with a gun!"

"Yeah, I get it! But I'm going to Europe in a few days."

"Really, fuck all!"

"What?"

"That's what they say up there on those north coasts."

"Fuck, all?" Morton asked.

"Yeah, it means, well I'm not sure what it means, but trust me (gulp gulp), my Irish hostile buddy from Peru taught me that one. Damn, could that filthy leprechaun drink whiskey. Everything was 'fuck all' this and 'fuck all' that. After a while I just picked it up. Killer colloquial - I'm not sure what it means, but its a hoot to say! What did you say about Europe?" Morton rolled his eyes, grabbed the flask, took a deep breath and counted to three.

Meanwhile, Tyler, driving erratically as usual, was about to miss his turn onto Port Street. He slammed on the breaks of the box van. When they arrived at the house of Mary and Bud, the first thing offered to Morton were paper towels to soak the blood that gushed from his nose where it had slammed into the glove box of the Kobich Mobile.



"It seems quite irrational to have a vendetta against a fictitious rhino"