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Short Fiction · Chiron Review

Jonathan Leamington

Maggie DuVal

Jonathan Leamington was the son of a sheep farmer. He was also, strangely enough, the son of his mother. Jon was a fine lad. So fine, in fact, that his Dadda beat him with a dried birch tree every evening around five o’clock. But he only did this if the chores were done on time. Dadda, being such a fine man o’ God such as there ever weren’t one, out o’ the kindness of his heart, beat Jon anyway. Now Mum would throw herself across Jon lad, and beg Dadda Leamington not to beat Jon (’im being a bad boy, or so she said), but that Dadda should beat her instead as she was more a’God fearin’ than Jon laddie. So the family would break into great peals of hyena-like laughter and beat the cat against the wall instead.

One day-o Jon set off to seek his fortune in the famous town of North CMEX, which was just outside of London, Ohio. He was seeking a life which would offer him more than sheep farming, with less money and lots of humility — so he decided to become President of the United States of Outer Mongolia in Southern England. It was the year 1314. Which was a good year for the plague, and a great year for seeing the famed rude objects of Yorkshire fly through the air with barely any speed at all — only enough to land on buxom ducks. Anyway, Jon couldn’t raise enough shekels to run for the desired presidency, so instead he became a welcome mat to a family of well-to-do aristocratic piggies. Jon was overjoyed at the chance to really “come-up” in the world. It joooost made ’is lit’l heart cough at the thought o’ it!

Then one day during some year that I forgot, Jon lost his virginity to a roaming band of Mexican lowriders who stapled his nostrils together and made Jon eat Twinkies and Ding Dongs and Fruit Pies while they laughed at him and made sarcastic jokes about a Latin wench they met killing dead flies named Dollius Partonus whom (so they said) had extremely large nosehairs. They thought themselves extremely funny and said so. Then they cast Jon laddie aside like a worn-out jock-strap and went on their way.

Well, that episode really quite discouraged the hell out of Jon laddie. He decided to go home to his parents, but when he arrived, he found out to his horror, that his father was married to his mother. So Jon went on his sobbing lit’l way and was struck down and killed by a whirring disgusting-looking biscuit that wheezed when it moved. A passing fancy arrived just in time to bury Jon laddie before he began to smell. He was thrown in an empty well and a memorial was put on the spot where Richard III was killed in the battle of Bosworth.

THE END

From the pages of Chiron Review. © Maggie DuVal; reproduced with permission. · All short fiction · Short Fiction page

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