Three Twisted Stories (14 page)

Dear Robert:

I can’t say I was happy to see Rebekkah taken out of my cell. She’s become quite a confidante over the last few days. Thankfully, it was after Shabbat. Did I tell you she’s been teaching me the Kiddush? Anyway, it’s only a week in solitary. I’m sure it’ll go by fast.

As you now know from the attachment in my previous email, Mr. Rothstein’s tongue was nowhere near the 3.9″ needed to meet the standard for World’s Longest Tongue. In fact, even the width was barely more than the 2.1″ average. I couldn’t fucking believe it. Three days in that hellhole of a swamp! Four nights of being shocked out of my sleep by some pervy freak leaning over my bed. Days of nonstop sweating. Untold numbers of peanuts shoved up my tailpipe and the fucker had lied the entire time.

I’m sorry for my language, Robert, but prison makes you hard.

And, I have to say, I let Remmy’s lies get to me. I know Potential World Record Holders lie all the time. I know they fake photos and try to get one over on us. I know it’s the Adjudicator’s job to just simply say, “Thank you for trying,” as they head out of town, but I screamed the biggest “WHAT THE FUCK?” ever heard in that swamp. We’re talking Silbo Gomero
¹
loud. I’m surprised you didn’t hear it all the way up in New York (though I’m sure you were busy watching Diane
Sawyer interview Kaitlyn about the Most Dogs in Fancy Dress
²
record. Really, Ms. Sawyer? You came out of retirement for a bunch of tuxedoed schnauzers?).

But—Remmy. Poor Remmy of the average tongue. He was crestfallen, though surely he knew when he Photoshopped those pictures that there was no way his tongue was long enough. Did he think we’d just give it to him? Did he think that a record as important as the Longest Tongue in the World was something we would just rubber-stamp through the Assessors’ Office? There are standards and practices. There are ethics. What was I supposed to do—give him the second-longest tongue? There’s a girl in California
³
who might have a word or two to say about that!

I remember my first day of Adjudicator Academy, when we were told that our integrity was on the line every day, that people depended on us to report the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We’re certifying World Records! We’re telling one individual that he or she, above anyone else, is the best, the brightest, the gnarliest, the most pierced, the fattest, the oldest, the fartiest, the most reckless—of any other human being in the world. Our motto isn’t just on our badges; it’s written on our hearts. This is what the Adjudicator takes on the road with him or her every single day: “For every record you give someone, there’s another person who loses a record.” Could I take away what might be Ms. Tapper’s biggest claim to fame for the sake of a downtrodden Cajun Jew living in a South Georgia swamp?

Could I do that? COULD I?!?!

No, really—I’m asking, because he keeps calling me every day.

Dear Robert:

Sorry. Lights out really does mean lights out here, and my lawyer says after the stabbing (long story) I need to be on my best behavior.

Re: our last—

I know what you’re thinking. It’s not the tongue, stupid. It’s the integrity of the organization. It’s honoring the Adjudicators before me, the ones after me. It’s about the truth.

I believe this. I really do. Which is why I had to be honest with Remmy standing there in that swamp.

“It’s not long enough.”

That’s all I said. It was like watching the air leave a balloon. His shoulders slumped. His head dropped. Even the hair on his arms lost some of its bouffantness. I have seen many a grown man cry, but never have I seen one so broken. My heart felt as if it was crumbling in my chest. I could practically feel his desolation, his loneliness. What did this man have other than his awful mother and freakish older brother? Sure, he was her pride and joy, but that’s like being Hitler’s favorite dog. At the end of the day, what does it really mean? What lasting impression has Remmy Rothstein left on the world other than the strands of hair he leaves in his wake?

I looked at Buell. I could tell he was thinking what I was thinking. He shook his head, but I couldn’t heed his warning. Tentatively, I asked, “Mr. Rothstein, is there another record you might be interested in?”

Remmy was too devastated to understand the question. His voice cracked as he said, “No, cher. I got nothin’.”

Was there ever a bigger elephant in the room?

I looked at Buell again, thinking surely he would call attention to the fact that Remmy’s back looked like a wall in Elvis’s music room. Then I looked at Rebekkah, but she only sneered at me in the threatening way she’d sneered at Buell.

And I know what you’re thinking—a good Adjudicator finds a Record no matter what—but you tell me this, Robert Putrovnik: how do you say to a guy, “No, your tongue isn’t long enough, but Jesus Christ, let me smack a ruler against that nipple hair”? I was really at a loss standing there on that peat mound. There’s nothing in the Adjudicator’s Manual of Conduct on the Road (rev. or otherwise) that tells you how to politely suggest that there might be another record to be had.

Because no one seemed to be even close to suggesting that 93% of Remmy Rothstein’s body is covered with hair.

So I said what I could, which was, “I’m so sorry, Mr. Rothstein. Perhaps another time.”

Rebekkah hissed at me. I’m not going to lie—she’s kind of scary when she wants to be, and those thighs could strangle a python (trust me; if there was more time I’d tell you that story).

Buell was the only one who didn’t seem bothered by this. As I said, he’d been silent at first, but maybe it took some time for him to process exactly what had happened. Remmy had lost. He’d lost big. And something told me that Buell saw Remmy’s loss as his own gain.

A huge grin spread across Buell’s face as this realization dawned. He spat on the ground and said, clear as a bell, “Shyster.”

Now, I told you Rebekkah was old, but that doesn’t mean she wasn’t fast.

She said, “That’s it,” and grabbed an ax off the woodpile.

She bolted after Buell so quickly I could barely process what was happening. Buell saw it coming before I did. He took off, pegging his way across the peat, dropping into the shallow water like a lemming, then popping back up on another mound of peat. Rebekkah kept up fairly easily, dodging the sticks and mounds of dirt he threw back at her. I stood there speechless as I watched her catch up with him. She grabbed him by the back of the shirt and rolled him into the water like a hungry gator.

They both disappeared under the churning water. The last I saw of Buell was his stump sticking up in the air. It really was a stool leg. Some duct tape was still attached to the end. It waved like a flag in the wind.

Robert—

Sorry about leaving you hanging like that. I had to get up in a bitch’s grill.

So—!!!

As Rebekkah and Buell disappeared under the water again and again, I looked at Remmy and screamed, “Oh my God, she’s murdering him!”

He just shrugged and said, “She ain’t never forgive him for being born with six toes.”

???

Remmy shrugged. “Ain’t no record,” he told me, as if it wasn’t common knowledge that you can’t throw a rock without hitting a polydactyl.

“Six toes?!” I repeated. “That’s why she hates him?”

“On each foot.” He shook his head sadly. “My three nipples, she ain’t got a problem with, but she been kvetchin’ about them toes long as I ’member.” Remmy gave me a knowing look. “Took off that one foot when he was nine. Been gunnin’ for them others ever since.” He stared out into the thrashing water. “Cain’t pretend like this day ain’t been a long time comin’.”

My mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping on the shore.

THIS was what upset her? Not that her oldest son was an albino of indeterminate ethnic origin? Not that her youngest son had sprouted enough hair to cover at least two standard poodles? She lived in a swamp shack with no running water or electricity and, if I was guessing correctly, did her bathroom duty in a metal bucket whose contents, judging by the trail to the water, were dumped into the swamp every day.

SIX TOES CROSSED THE LINE?

But none of this seemed to matter to Remmy. He was obviously still focused on his World Record loss and not the sound of his mother drowning his brother in the tannin waters of the Okefenokee.

I said, “Shouldn’t we—”

“It’s the way of the swamp, cher.” He shrugged one of his shoulders. The hair stirred in a sudden wind, sending strands into his mouth. He delicately pulled them out between his thumb and finger. His nails were greasy black, like a car mechanic who works nights in a coal mine.

He said, “I’m sorry I brought you all this way, cher. I thought I had a chance.” Tears rolled down his soft cheeks, slid down his chest, then trickled along his happy trail
¹
like water off a duck’s back.

I couldn’t help it, Robert. I told him, “There are probably other records you can break.”

Only, I was talking about the hair and he thought I was talking about something else. Or maybe I
was
talking about something else. Who the hell knows? It was so
damn hot. I hadn’t slept in days. The exhaust from the boat was still in my lungs. The peanut smell from my car was clinging to me like a spicy Thai roll.

But here’s the other thing, Robert—just to let you know, female Adjudicators have a special kind of hell we go through on the road. I’ll admit it—I get lonely. Sometimes I’ll hook up with a guy at the bar or in a gas station Arby’s or, if I’m really lucky, a Chili’s will have a Ladies’ Night. I’m human, all right? But I never tell them what I do for a living, because it invites the inevitable joke: “Bet I just broke some records, darlin’.”

No, they did not. Most of the time, they couldn’t break a two-year-old goat’s hymen (though trust me, I’m sure some of them have tried).

But Remmy … oh, Remmy.

Why was I attracted to this man? He was filthy. Hairy. A genetic anomaly. Going by his Application Packet, he was functionally illiterate.

And yet …

I was drawn to him like a bucket to a well. I dropped down and down and down that dark wet shaft as I took him in—this cool drink of Cajun Jew water.

It’s true (as you well know) that I’ve always had a thing for pathetic, broken men, but there was something more to it than that. When Remmy took off his pants, the coarse burlap sliding over his wavy hips, the hair on his legs parting across thick muscle …

My God, my God. You would not believe this man.

Actually, I’ve attached a photo so you can see for yourself. Let me tell you there are women in here who have paid up to FIFTEEN CIGARETTES to see this image, so consider this my early Christmas gift. And a final explanation as to why I’ve finally moved on from that night we adjudicated Most Modeling Balloon Sculptures Made in One Minute.
²
You told me to get over it, Robert. Well, here’s your proof that I have certainly gotten over—and under, and round and round like a merry-go-round.

Next thing I knew, Remmy scooped me up like a fireman rescuing a person who is in a burning building and needs to be rescued. My fingers dug into the fur on his back, got caught in the curly ringlets growing like Spanish AstroTurf on his ass. I would say the earth moved, but it was the Okefenokee; the earth always moves. I’ve never loved a man so wildly, so passionately, so … frenziedly. My fingers ran madly through his hair. All of his hair. And sometimes my hair. I don’t know where his started and mine began. It was like going to a different planet. A planet of love, or maybe this is what those furry
³
people feel like, because my God, I rocked that hairy man. I loved every inch of him. And he loved me. He even said it—

“I love you, cher,” Remmy moaned—over and over. “I love you! I love you!” All the while pounding into me like an extended clip banging home into the butt of a nine-millimeter.

I tell you this with all my heart, Robert:

Remmy was fully loaded, but when he pulled that trigger, I was the one who exploded.

(attachment: Rothstein-GIGANTOR.jpg)

Sorry, Robert. Had to tape the sheet up in front of the bars and take some me-time. By now you’ll have downloaded that picture and understand why. Oh, Remmy. You bastard. You machine. I keep going back and forth between hating him and loving him and hating him all over again. I can’t describe my mood, except to say I’m in the right place for it. Half of these bitches are on Prozac and the others stay doped up on lithium most of the time. Maybe I should just choose one? I don’t know. Decision for another day. Anyway, I have a story to tell:

After making love (four times), Remmy and I emerged from the shack. I was surprised to find that it was still daylight. And that I could walk (you looked at the picture, right?). I knew I needed to get back to the hotel room to file my report (though, as I said, you were the last thing on my mind).

Buell was nowhere to be found and Rebekkah was sitting off in the woods with that small cherry box in her lap (the case is all over the Atlanta news, but I wonder if it’s made it to New York yet? If not, Google “ax” + “six toes” + “Mother”). I waved goodbye to Rebekkah, but I’m pretty sure she didn’t see me. She didn’t seem to see anything. You’d think she was a leprechaun with a pot of gold, the way she was clutching onto that box.

Remmy took me back to my truck in the airboat. He gently kissed my hand, then helped me up to the dock and then steadied me as I got used to firmer ground. He promised me that he would call. He promised me that we would see each other again. He made lots of promises, but I knew nothing would ever come of it. He
wanted me for my Adjudication. I see that now. All the phone calls. All the letters. They’re always about that damn World Record.

Tongue! Of all things, why did he pick the tongue? He could walk into any World Hair Record, easy-peasy. His ears alone are riddled with pokey, curly strands like pubic hair. And as for his pubic hair—hello, New Category! Trust me, I’m still pulling long hairs from places you don’t even want to know about. That man is a shedder. And he could have ten World Records if he would just admit—

But no, it’ll never happen. The only record Remmy Rothstein’s tongue could break (at least one we could write about) is Most Lies Told in a Three-Hour Period. He lied about the length of his tongue. He lied about the width. He lied to get me out to the swamp and then he lied about loving me.

I tell you this with a heavy heart, Robert, though perhaps you’ve already surmised from the Gigantor photograph: The bastard isn’t even Jewish.