SLEEPING CLUB- Hundred Dollars

A young man, rail thin, maybe thirty, and oddly toothless, sat in the shade of his front porch. His wife, fat and sweaty, stood in the doorway leaning against the door jam and staring out over the shimmering, sun-drenched fields that stretched away toward the woods which appeared as a black line on the distant horizon. An assortment of canes and walking sticks, each with a hand-carved, wooden handle, leaned against the wall between them. Wood shavings littered the porch around the man’s feet.

I put one foot on the second step leading up to the porch and leaned forward, resting my forearms on the elevated knee, waiting for an answer.

The summer sun beat down mercilessly on the dooryard. Sweat-darkened splotches spread out from under my arms and across the small of my back.

After a long silence the man finally spoke in a sloppy, toothless voice, “The woods are full of demons.”

“Uh-huh,” seconded the wife in agreement.

“Demons?” I said. “What do you mean, demons?”

They both just sat and stared soberly toward the distant line of trees.

“Well? What do you mean?” I asked again.

The man giggled unnaturally, but offered no explanation. The wife smiled broadly revealing teeth like crowded kernels of corn but likewise declined to offer an explanation. I couldn't be sure what exactly had struck them as funny, but something in their demeanor made me feel that I was the punch line.

"These two are unhinged," I thought to myself.

Interrupting the man, who was still giggling, I said, “Well, lets get down to brass tacks, will you help me or not?”

The man looked up at his wife, but she continued to stare straight ahead, ignoring him.

He shook his head in mock frustration then returning his attention to me said, “Maybe, a hundred dollars?”

The wife shrugged as if to wash her hands of the whole thing and went back inside the house.

“Hundred dollars,” I agreed.