Volunteer Deputy Taylor
By Chris Sharp


There was something so chunky and nice about the mayor’s jowls that it took all of Volunteer Deputy Taylor’s will power and frowning to resist pulling them out further with his fingernails.

“You see, Mayor, these boys are my boys,” said the mayor to Elk City’s previous mayor. Everyone was celebrating and smiling over the city’s new building. Volunteer Deputy Taylor was chosen to stand to the immediate left of the mayor, an honor he held over three younger volunteer deputies.

After some minutes of handshaking and political groveling, Volunteer Deputy Taylor felt he had done all he could to stifle the impulse to pull out the mayor’s left jowl. He finally rerouted these rebel instincts with a statement that simply said the rebel words “yada, yada, yada.”

The mayor took the rebuke in stride. “Yes sir, it’s a fine day. A fine day for everyone in Elk City.”

As soon as the ceremony ended, Volunteer Deputy Taylor jumped onto his little Honda motorcycle and flew to the restaurant named Group Therapy.

The place had been founded by a former psychologist who had at one time let his license be taken away and had even allowed himself to be clamped into a year of prison.

These days, the former psychologist led his lunches and dinners as a master of an entertainment known as “group therapy.”

“Once again, we are happy to have Volunteer Deputy Taylor among us,” said the ex-psychologist. The motorcycle helmet and the boots brought the usual hand-clapping. “Volunteer Deputy Taylor, what is the latest on Tourette syndrome?”

“Sir, I had a strong direction today to pull off the left side of the mayor’s face, but I redirected it to just saying ‘yada, yada, yada.’”

After the lunch, Volunteer Deputy Taylor zoomed his motorcycle to the high school where he was volunteer for the rest of the day.

“Volunteer Deputy Taylor, it’s great to have you with us in the afternoon. No one understands our perennial troublemakers like you.”

The principle was so totally tucked in that Volunteer Deputy Taylor had to fight the urge to reach out and pull out his shirt on every side. Again he redirected his urge to saying “yada, yada, yada.”

“Yes, it’s basically another ‘yada, yada, yada’ day,” said the principal to Volunteer Deputy Tayor.

At Volunteer Deputy Taylor’s house, his wife greeted him with the words “No dinner tonight – too sad.” – written backwards on her forehead with the charcoal she sometimes used in her job as a house painter. He circumvented her by making his own dinner.

When he went into the bedroom she asked him to lie on the floor.

“There are demons under the bed doing all this stuff to mess up our heads. Not just our heads, but the mental state of every painter and peace officer in these United States. Could you just look for them, Dan?”

“Again, Danielle?”

“Please. At least until they get tired of us decent-living Americans and go away, go away and let us alone at last.”

He went low on the floor to find demons – any demons – under the bed. But again, the demons were brilliantly hidden. “Brilliantly,” Volunteer Deputy Taylor said to himself.

He had to close his eyes to rest up and just hope the demons would be satisfied in his nightmares where they were supposed to be, where they would never again keep his poor Danielle up so late into the nights.


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Chris Sharp has had short fiction in Aphelion@webzine.com, Kalkion.com, West
Ranch Beacon.com and DailyLove.net (Oct. 24, 2010). He is a 1997 Fresno
State graduate and winner of the 2003 West 35st Street Award for best new
American private-investigator short fiction.