THE BUBBLEGUM BANDITS
by BRADLEY MASON HAMLIN

“We’ll be twelve next year,” he said.

“Yeah, so?”

“You wanna live forever?” he asked.

“Guess not.”

We hid behind the summer bushes as the ugly cars sped up and down the hills of Highland Road.  The common wacky fun thing to do was to nail a hubcap with a rock.  Ping! That made the loudest noise, but I preferred the bubblegum wad at the windshield bit.

Jim Hitler pulled a sack of Dubble Bubble chewing gum out of his dark backpack.  We crammed our mouths full, chewed, and waited.

“A classic …” I said.

Jim chuckled.  “I know,” he said.  “I’m gonna gum somebody in the ear.”

“No.  That’s not what I meant.  The gum,” I said.

Hitler creased his eyebrows and frowned.  “Huh?  You chickening out?”

“No.  I meant the gum, the gum’s a classic.”

“Better than rocks,” he said, “but rocks are swell, too.”

“You’re a dumb-ass.  This gum, dude, it’s the American original!”

“I thought Bazooka was the original.”

“Nah, that came later, a rip-off, like Pepsi ripped-off Coke.  Dubble Bubble, the first ‘bubble’ gum was invented by Walter Deimer in 1928.”

Jim laughed.  “How the hell do you know that?” 

“We’re magicians, right?”

“Right.”  The one thing we always agreed on.  “But lately,” he said, “I’ve been leaning towards rocket science.”

I smiled.  “Well magicians are supposed to know things, gives ya the edge.  I read that in a book of spells.  But really I know about the gum thing because my great-great-great grandfather, Thomas Adams, invented chewing gum in 1845.”

“You just said a guy named Wally invented gum in the 1920s!”

“No I didn’t.  I said ‘bubble’ gum, the stuff you can blow bubbles with.  Walter Deimer invented,” (I pulled the wad out of my mouth), “this,” I said.  I held the gooey pink ball in front of Jim’s face.

“Yuck!  You better get rid of that thing and quit trying to be an smacky egghead, man.”

I balled the gum up between my palms, peeked over the top of the bush, and let it fly, Dodger baseball style …

“Damn, missed!”

“Rookie.  Lemme show you how it’s done.”  Jim balled his gum, set his sights on a Buick—let her fly.

SPLAT!

A direct hit on the driver-side window.  You could really hear the man screaming, bellowing after rolling down the window (only part way so as not to gum-up the door).  “Who the fuck did that?  Goddamn kids!”

We laughed so hard I almost swallowed my new piece of Bubble.  Good to laugh like that, your body vibrating with the uncontrollable hilarity, your stomach tightening up and hard to catch your breath.

My turn again.

Old lady at 3 o’ clock.

Slow-rolling Rambler.

Window down.

Too perfect.

I doubled my wad for extra weight, took aim, fired …

Her hair … it stuck in her hair. 

She screamed.

Hit the squeaky brakes.

Then the car behind her rammed into her rear bumper.

“Holy shit!” said Jim Hitler.

I couldn’t say anything.  Frozen in panic.

The man who ran into the Rambler drove a big square Lincoln.  He opened the door and got out.  Seemed to take a while for him to reach his full height.  He loomed above his car and I could hear him growling.

He looked in on the grandma.

She was okay, just freaking out about the pink gum stuck in her gray hair.

He turned, looked straight ahead at our secret shrubs, and walked towards us.

“Fuck a duck!” said Jim.  “He’s gonna catch us for sure!  We gotta make a break!”

Breathing too hard, not sure if to run, or stay put and hope he didn’t actually look behind the bushes …

Close now …

“Come on out, goddamnit!”

We both made a sound like: “AHHHH!”

Jim was faster than I and almost to a nearby fence.  I looked back and the man-giant’s hand reached out to grab me.

I tried to keep running.

But the man yelled, “Stop!” as his cop-like grip pinched down on my right shoulder blade.  It was as if a crazed Mr. Spock had suddenly materialized to put my evil at an end.

Jim hit the fence, went up, gave me one last look of pity, and melted over the other side to freedom.

The man’s hand spun me around.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Uh, don’t know …”

“You could have killed somebody—throwing rocks at cars!

“It, it wasn’t a rock.”

“What?”

“We threw gum, Dubble Bubble.”

“You threw gum at my mother?”

“Mother?”

 “That’s goddamn right!  You just threw a goddamn piece of spit-gum at my mother and caused a baldheaded accident!”

His hand hurt my shoulder.

His fierce eyes reminded me of the cholos that followed us after school.

He looked back toward the traffic jam.

A crowd gathered.

He needed to get back to his mother.

“What’s your name?”

“Alex,” I said, surprised I said my real name, but scared and couldn’t think of anything else.

“What’s your last name?”

"A … (almost said my last name, too) Thompson,” I said.

 “Thompson?”

“Yes.”

“Alex Thompson?”
“Yes.”

“Spell it.”

I felt like crying when he said that.  Was there an “h” in Thompson or no h?

 “T …”

“What’s your mother’s name?”
 “Uh, Samantha,” I said.  Again, giving the correct name.  Dummy, I thought, fuckin dummy.

The man looked ready to explode, his face bright red like the big Kool-Aid punch man.  
“What’s her last name?”

“Thompson,” I said.  “T …”

“I’m gonna call your mother!  Your number in the phone book?”

“Yes,” I said.

“You’re gonna be in a lot of trouble for this!”

“Yes,” I said.  “Sorry.”

He looked at me.  I imagined he struggled between dragging me with him, beating me, or killing me on the spot, but he turned and walked away.

Jim’s head popped back up over the fence.

“You idiot,” he said.  “Don’t ya know how to Speedy Gonzalez?”

“Well, Hitler,” I said, “at least you didn’t have to tell him your last name.”

We both laughed at that.

Between the two of us we had about sixty-five cents. Trading cards cost twenty-five cents a pack.  Just enough for one package of Creature Feature cards for me and one pack of Wacky Packages for Jim—with just enough left over for some extra Dubble Bubble.

I blew a bubble almost the size of my head, let it pop, and sucked it back inside.  I checked my Levis to see if I had pissed my blue jeans when the giant grabbed me.  Nope.  Everything cool.

“Come on,” said Jim, “Bobby Wong’s liquor store waits just up the street.

“All right,” I said.  “I’ll keep Bobby busy, talking to him while I buy the cards.  You do that magic trick of making comic books materialize inside your backpack.”

“You want Spider-Man?”

“Marvel Team-Up where Spidey hooks up with other heroes—and Justice League of America.  That’s my favorite.”

“Hey,” he said, “you really nailed that grandma.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Must have scared the shit out of her.”

“Yeah.”

“Your great-great-great grandfather really invent gum?”

“Chewing gum, yeah,” I said.

“Well hell, then it’s really his fault, isn’t it?”

I thought about it.

“Yeah … guess you’re right.”

We let the nervous laughter out again and allowed ourselves to laugh until we felt empty.  “Man,” said Jim, “that big freak almost killed you.  I saw the whole thing from the hole in the fence.  He wanted to cook your ass for dinner.  Oh man, glad it wasn’t me.”

“What’s-a-matter?” I asked him.  “You wanna live forever?”

THE END

Bradley Mason Hamlin

-brad@retrocrush.com

CLICK HERE FOR MORE GREAT WRITING BY BRAD
AT MYSTERY ISLAND!