Chapter 8
A full day and night passed. A shirtless, well-tanned Smegma held his cell phone into the air. “Blast! I can’t get a single bar!”
The agent tucked the device into his pocket. “Ah, what does it matter? It barely has any battery life left in it anyway.”
Attorney Bonanza walked out of the jungle with a coconut in each hand. She’d lost her formal look, opting to cut her business pants off at the knees. She’d lost her blazer entirely and had gone for a bare midriff look, having tied the ends of her white shirt into a knot. She’d placed a white flower in her hair.
“There you are, my love,” Bonanza said as she held up the coconuts. “Look, I found these!”
“Gold star, darling,” Smegma said.
Bonanza dropped the coconuts and hugged the spy, wrapping her arms around the hunk tightly as she rested her head against his muscular chest. “Oh, Dirk, I hope we never get rescued.”
Smegma allowed the hug to go on for twenty seconds before he pulled away. “Yes, well, that makes one of us, darling. Some of us have a world to save.”
Bonanza wasn’t quite able to put her finger on it. Something about being marooned on a deserted island with one of the sexiest men alive caused her hormones to work overtime.
“I suppose you’re right, dearest,” Bonanza said. “We’ll have to leave this tropical paradise behind and return to civilization one day.”
“Uh huh.”
Smegma picked up the coconuts and added them to an array that had been used to spell out the word, “HELP” in huge letters across the beach.
Smegma sat down in the sand and stared mindlessly at the crashing waves. Bonanza joined him, resting her head on his shoulder. “Make love to me, Dirk.”
“Ugh,” Smegma said. “I already have, darling. Fourteen times already. Save some Dirk juice for tomorrow, will you?”
“Dirk, I’ve been thinking…”
“What a deplorable habit.”
“I don’t want to rush things,” Bonanza said. “But I don’t want to wait forever, either. Do you think a year will be sufficient to plan the wedding?”
Smegma offered no answer.
“Dirk!”
“Huh?”
“Do you think a year will be long enough to plan…”
“Sure, darling. A year is fine. Plenty of time.”
Bonanza giggled. “Ooo! I can’t believe it. By this time next year, I’ll be Mrs. Cooter Smegma!”
Suddenly, the spy snapped back into reality. “Mrs. Who?”
“Oh, I know,” Bonanza said. “It goes against all my feminist values but really, what am I going to do? Put ‘Attorney Cooter Bonanza-Smegma’ on all of my business cards? I think not.”
The lady laid back on the beach. Smegma joined her. Bonanza’s face was one of pure joy. Meanwhile, Smegma watched as a seagull dropped a clam from the sky in the hopes that its inner meat would be released upon crashing into a rock below.
In that moment, Smegma wished he was that clam.
“Darling. Let’s not rush into things. If you want to take two years…”
“Oh no,” Bonanza said. “By then, I’ll be thirty and…”
“Ugh. You’re almost thirty?”
Bonanza perked up. “I know it’s crazy, right? Time sure does fly. Wait, did you just say, ‘ugh?’”
Smegma rubbed his chest. “Yes. Sorry. I think I have a bit of indigestion from all that crab meat I ate this morning.”
“Oh,” Bonanza said. “Anyway, if we tie the knot next year, then you could put a bun in me by thirty and then that will shut my mother up and oh, the look on my sister’s face when she sees you. She thinks she’s so special because she landed a doctor but when…”
Smegma reached out and took Bonanza’s hand. “Darling…”
“Yes?”
“I think the sun is getting to you,” Smegma said. “You’re abandoning all of your isms.”
“My isms?”
“Indeed,” Smegma said. “Your feminism. Your liberalism. Your PC-ism.”
“True,” Bonanza said. “I mean, truthfully, no woman actually NEEDS a man per se, but still, I’m so glad I found you that…”
“Yes,” Smegma said. “But as Madame Olga informed us, future you will not be pleased with any of this.”
Bonanza lifted up Smegma’s arm and cuddled herself up to the beefcake. “Oh, screw that old bitch. We’ve got forty whole years before we have to deal with her.”
“Right,” Smegma said. “But that time will go by before you know it and…”
“Oh Dirk,” Bonanza said. “Just think. Soon we’ll be married, living in a house in the suburbs. We’ll have three children and we’ll all pose in matching sweaters for our annual Christmas cards. Won’t that be wonderful.”
Smegma threw his head back and winced. “Smashing.”
“I could put my career on hold…”
Smegma perked up. “Oh no, darling! Not that! Anything but that! I’m sorry, Cooter, but I’m putting my foot down on this one. I refuse to allow you to give up your promising career as a CIA attorney just to marry me.”
“Relax,” Bonanza said. “I’ll only take a few years off to raise the children. Then I’ll go into private practice. And you…”
“Yes!” Smegma said. “Me! Why, I’ll be gallavanting all over the world, taking down criminal enterprises. I’d be a horrid life partner, darling. Absolutely horrid. Surely, you’d be better off finding someone else, someone more with more time on his hands. Someone more…deserving.”
“Don’t be silly,” Bonanza said. “You can just quit the CIA.”
“Quit?”
“Sure,” Bonanza said. “Honestly Dirk, how will you have any time for me and the children while you’re out saving the world?”
“I…I have no idea.”
“Don’t worry,” Bonanza said. “I’m sure you could find work as a mattress store manager or as an insurance salesman or…”
“Yes,” Smegma said with a defeated expression on his face. “That sounds lovely.”
“Doesn’t it?” Bonanza asked as she squeezed Smegma tight. “And don’t you dare so much as think about schtupping one of those villain’s molls ever again.”
Smegma felt his soul crack in half. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Oh Dirk,” Bonanza said. “I want to go shopping for window shade treatments the second we hit the mainland.”
Smegma looked up into the sky and whispered under his breath. “Save me.”
Bonanza prattled on. “Oh, we’ll need so many things for our new home. Doilies, tea cozies, a nice, fluffy duvet. Do you think we’ll do a lot of entertaining? Yes! We could invite the neighbors over for weekly game nights. Ooo! I’ll need a serving tray, one where you can assemble the crackers around a little dish that holds the dip. I wish I had a paper and pen. I could write this all down.
Smegma whispered to the sky again. “Please. Save me.”
“I’ll have to trade my coupe in for a mini-van. You’ll need to get a mini-van too. I know that sounds silly, but if we’re going to have multiple kids, then we’ll have to take turns driving them to little league games and ballet practice and we’ll probably be expected to participate in carpools, which means we’ll both need cars that can fit a lot of kids, so…”
Whir, whir, whir.
Smegma felt a breeze shoot down over his face. He looked up to see the rotating blades of two incoming helicopters. He snapped to his feet. “Look!”
Bonanza jumped up. Her bosoms jiggled as she bounced up and down. “Hooray! We’re saved!”
The spy waved his arms to and fro. “Down here!”
Seconds later, the choppers were on the ground. Out from the first helicopter stepped Kendra in the flesh. Her skin was flawless, the color of creamy caramel. Her hair was long and curly. Her eyes were hidden away behind a pair of red tortoise shell specs. She wasn’t too tall or too short, but somewhere in the middle. She wore a tank top and jeans over a body that looked like it was used to regular exercise.
Once she cleared the buzzing blades, she walked towards her asset. “Agent Smegma.
“Agent McKenna,” Smegma replied.
Bonanza rushed over and grasped the stud-muffin. “Dirk! Are they here to rescue us?”
Kendra stifled a laugh, having immediately figured out that Smegma had bitten off more than he could chew with Attorney Bonanza.
“Oh, right,” Smegma said. “Kendra, this is Miss…”
Bonanza extended her hand and corrected Smegma. “Mrs. The future Mrs. Cooter Smegma, or possibly Cooter Bonanza-Smegma. We haven’t worked out all the details.”
It was all Kendra could do to keep a straight face as she shook Bonanza’s hand. “Mrs.? When’s the wedding?”
“Oh, you know,” Smegma said. “We’re keeping it loose, probably some day far, far in the…”
“June 2020,” Bonanza said. “Will you come? Dirk was up all-night last night talking about you, how he just knew you’d save us.”
Kendra looked at Smegma. “Is that so? Well, it might have been easier if he’d stop throwing away the tracking devices I keep giving him.”
“You know me,” Smegma said. “I don’t like to have tabs kept on me.”
Bonanza kissed Smegma on the cheek. “Well, you’ll just have to get used to it because I’m not letting you out of my sight, my sweet, sexy man.”
Kendra’s eyes widened. “Right. Luckily, we were able to determine the approximate location of where your plane went down. I’m glad to see you’re both alive. I must say, I feared the worst.”
“No worries,” Bonanza said. “We’re alive and ready to spend the rest of our lives together.”
Smegma emitted a half-hearted, barely audible, “Hooray.”
“We need to go,” Kendra said. “These birds are on loan from the Navy, attached to the U.S.S. Truman so we can’t keep them forever.”
Smegma nodded. “Lead the way.”
As Kendra and Bonanza walked toward the first chopper, Smegma made his way to the second. He found the pilot, chatted him up, exchanged a handshake, then returned to the ladies.
“Cooter, darling, so sorry to ask you this, but would you mind riding with Captain Abernathy over there?”
Bonanza looked hurt. “Why?”
“Oh, you know,” Smegma said. “Time is of the essence and Kendra needs to debrief me.”
“But we don’t have any secrets,” Bonanza said. “Do we?”
“We don’t,” Smegma said. “But the CIA does and well, I’d share them with you but then I’d be committing treason so go on now, off you go.”
Bonanza stood her ground. “But I want to ride with you.”
“Darling,” Smegma said. “Please. This is a matter of national security. Besides, how far is it to the Truman? Twenty, thirty minutes, tops?”
Kendra nodded. “If that.”
“You’ll be fine,” Smegma said.
“Give me your number.”
“What?”
“We might get separated,” Bonanza said. “I want your number.”
“We will not get separated,” Smegma said. “And besides, it’s not even charged.”
“On the off chance we get separated,” Bonanza said. “I want your number so I can call you when you charge your phone, Dirk. Why is this so hard?”
“It’s not,” Dirk said. “Kendra, do you…”
Kendra pulled a small notepad and a pen from her pocket. Dirk accepted both, scribbled a number down, tore off the sheet and handed it to the blonde. “Happy?”
“Yes,” Bonanza said as she kissed Smegma. “See you soon.”
Bookshelf Battle 