After a short hiatus, I’m back with another installment of the flash fiction serial story Taco Hut. In this story, ChatGPT and I take turns writing a piece (a couple of paragraphs at a time) until we arrive at the foregone conclusion (whatever that is). When the story is done, we’ll know. And when we know, we’ll abandon the project. Until then, get caught up by reading the previous chapters:
Now, let’s see how this story develops.
Taco Hut, Chapter 5
Sister Doris insisted on a kazoo choir. “He would have wanted it,” she sniffed, even though no one could remember Barry ever mentioning kazoos, choirs, or desires of any kind beyond a recurring craving for pickled marshmallows. Mayor Crumbwell, meanwhile, pushed for a formal affair, complete with a velvet drapery over the casket and a eulogy delivered via hot air balloon, which was how most city ordinances were passed in Vanilla Spectacle anyway.
The town council convened outside the bowling alley, mainly because the inside had been declared a zone of “emotional instability” after the league semi-finals ended in a gravy fight. Arguments broke out immediately: Kenny lobbied for interpretive clog dancing, while Nurse McGonagall suggested they embalm Barry in glitter to “really capture his sparkle.”
Pastor Bruce prayed aloud over a plate of fish sticks, then blinked twice and declared the funeral shall commence at sunrise—on a day yet to be determined.
Imagine everyone’s surprise when a colorful cockatoo named Chartreuse flew in and announced, “I’m Barry’s ex-wife and I demand an explanation!”
First, it was a cockatoo. And second, no one knew Barry had an ex-wife. Besides, she didn’t seem to be Barry’s type, so proclaimed Sister Doris.
“How would you know his type?” asked Chartreuse, spitting out a mouthful of gummi worms.
“Because no self-respecting lemur of Barry’s variety would be caught within twenty yards of a sweet-smelling pop tart like you, and I have it on good authority that he didn’t like fowl-ish odors.”
“Now, now, Doris,” interrupted Pastor Bruce. “Let’s not start trouble.”
About that time, Mayor Crumbwell pranced through, passing out free parking tickets to the All-Night Water Buffalo Festival, which he’d planned personally all by himself because no one else was interested.
Sister Doris snatched a ticket, eyed it suspiciously, and whispered to Pastor Bruce, “Didn’t we cancel the Water Buffalo Festival after the pudding incident?”
Pastor Bruce nodded solemnly, but said nothing. The town was still recovering emotionally, and structurally, from last year’s inflatable bison stampede.
Meanwhile, Chartreuse the cockatoo had perched herself atop the soda machine and begun recounting the tale of her whirlwind marriage to Barry in a Taco Bell chapel off Route 9. “It was all feathers and fireworks,” she cooed. “Until he ran off with a jar of beet juice and a dream.”
The kazoo choir stopped practicing and gathered to listen. Kenny began sketching a courtroom drama based on the unfolding scene, assigning roles to nearby squirrels. Nurse McGonagall offered Chartreuse a mood stabilizer in the form of a chamomile-scented lint roller.
No one knew what would happen next, but Sister Doris cracked her knuckles. “This funeral,” she said, “just got complicated.”
“I want to know where’s the will and who’s in it,” Chartreuse screamed, flying between the pillars of the mall’s dilapidated indoor lacrosse field, made entirely of artificial butternut turf. “I have it on good authority that I’ve been left out.”
Mayor Crumbwell harrumphed, proving he was tired of the cockatoo’s good authority and wasn’t going to have it. Meanwhile, Sister Doris clamped her lips shut with a bobby pin and hummed “This Land Is Your Land” to keep herself from doing something Chartreuse would regret. Kenny joined in on the third verse but forgot the lyrics and gurgled his spittle with a half rest and a hambone on every fifth beat.
Pastor Bruce excused himself and made haste to the men’s room, scrunching his butt cheeks to prevent an accident.
Chartreuse swooped low, knocking over a tray of souvenir urns someone had set up as a pop-up boutique for the funeral. "I demand justice!" she shrieked, “Barry may have been a lemur of mystery, but he was still my mystery!”
From the fountain near the churro kiosk, a voice croaked, “Barry left a will all right. But it’s written in invisible ink… on the inside of a pancake.”
Gasps rippled through the crowd like an overbaked flan. It was Old Man Murgatroyd, former short-order chef and current conspiracy theorist, known for his flapjack prophecies and maple-glazed monologues. He pointed a syrup-stained finger toward the defunct food court. “It’s still there—buried beneath the Waffle Whirl.”
Mayor Crumbwell’s eyes gleamed with bureaucratic glee. “Then we dig at dawn!”
“No,” whispered Sister Doris, finally unclipping her lips, “We dig now.” And with that, she grabbed a pruning fork and charged toward destiny.
Do us both a favor and follow me. Reblog. And, while you’re at it, give it a good old-fashioned like by clicking that upvote button.
First published at Substack. Image by ChatGPT
Posted Using INLEO