Crazy as a Junebug

"What are you gonna do to preserve our right to defend ourselves in our home from meth-brained crackheads coming to rape and rob us?"

"Well, sir," began Wince, a primary candidate for the Virginia legislature, "I don't believe that right is in imminent danger."  There were gasps from the campaign rally crowd, and the former Supreme Court clerk looked nervously at his fiancée (Bridezilla).  "Of course, I will be vigilant in safeguarding the gun rights you already have--"

"It's in the Constitution!" somebody shouted. 

"Yes, sir," agreed Wince.

"What about those cops showing up at people's doors and blowin' 'em away?  We got a right to shoot them, too!"

"Well, of course, it depends on the circumstances--"  (Bridezilla cleared her throat.)  "--but, naturally, you have a right to defend yourselves if the officer is acting outside of the legally permitted use of force."

Bridezilla, was dying to get out her phone and text Paul again, but she knew Wince was looking at her half the time.  His fundraising had gone pretty well, but these public rallies were like watching a law librarian try to get a NASCAR crowd revved up.  She just didn't understand it.  He looked great in a suit, but none of his personal charisma came through when he talked to the crowds.

And that's when the June bug dived straight into Wince's face, and he started swatting at it in what would be called, a few minutes later on social media, the "Elect-a-Spazz" dance.  

Of course, that wouldn't be the craziest thing to happen in the Virginia primaries, where Republicans were willing to vote for a man named "Brat" and Libertarians were willing to vote for a man named "Loser".  It wouldn't even be the craziest thing to happen during Wince's campaign, which had a few days earlier been ambushed by gasoline-filled balloons tossed by climate change activists walking with a pot-bellied pig sporting a crown with the words "Petro Pig" written in red crayon on it.

But primaries were all about name recognition and voter turnout, and Wince's new viral video was only going to help with half of that equation. 

Back in D.C., triple agent Charles Wu was having a rough week.  Even his good (spy) pal "The Condor" had insisted on meeting at Le Pain Quotidien so that they could sit nonchalantly at the communal table and pretend they didn't know each other.  Wu was wearing a British seersucker suit which, rather than emphasize the English half of his Hong Kong heritage, made him stand out in the crowd in a way that greatly displeased The Condor.  Wu reached for the hazelnut praline spread and discreetly removed the computer chip The Condor had stuck to the jar.  "This stuff's like frosting," said Wu quietly, spreading it sparsely on his raisin bread, but The Condor turned away to wink at a redhead at the far end of the table.  

It was a lonely time to be a Chinese spy in Washington.  After assuring the State Department's Assistant Deputy Administrator for Hope that he would find out who had authorized the Chinese hack of the U.S. federal worker data files, he was no closer to having a scapegoat to hand them, and no closer to getting his phone calls returned...by anyone.  He knew all about the hack, of course, which he had discouraged, but he couldn't give up that information.  He had to come up with something (somebody) else to win back the Americans' trust.  And they were still pissed off about that man-made island, which they said he should have warned them about!  He lifted the raisin bread to take a bite, only to see a Junebug dive right into it.  Then a pretty blond laughed and smiled at him, and he started to feel better.

Up in Cleveland Park, Cedric was on day leave from the Arlington group home for the mentally challenged to visit Wu's governess, Mrs. Prudence Higgety-Cheshire.  "Your boss just hacked the U.S. government!" he exclaimed, while she handed him a scone.  "You need to get away from him!"

"I'm very grateful for your concern, Cedric, and my late husband would also be grateful for your concern, but as I told you, Charles is from Hong Kong.  He's a British spy."

"When it suits him!" retorted Cedric.  "And it hasn't suited him very much since he found out the British were responsible for the death of Buffy Cordelia's mother!"

"What?!  I never heard this about Delia's mother!"

"Slow down!" exclaimed Cedric to the ghost of Henry Samuelson (deceased CIA agent), who was whispering a lot of information into Cedric's ear.

"Slow down?"

"Not you!" said Cedric to Mrs. H-C.  "Never mind that.  Listen:  Delia's mother was a spy, too, and the British accidentally got her killed, and Wu's been angry about it ever since he found out."

"Well, I suppose that would be a good reason to be angry at certain agents, but he's a professional!  He would hardly take it out on the entire country!  He still has family there, you know.  And, really, why would that turn him against the United States?  He's very pro-American."

"Wake up and smell the jasmine tea!" Cedric cried.  "He's dangerous!  He might be the most dangerous spy in Washington!"

"My dear, I have it on very good authority that he's quite a noble fellow at heart.  I trust him completely."  (Mrs. H.-C was referring obliquely to the fact that Wu's bodyguard, Angela de la Paz, often received psychic visions about protecting people, including Wu; thus, Mrs. H-C was quite certain that Wu had "friends upstairs".)

Cedric sank into the couch cushion, dejected, and stuck his fingers into his ears to stop hearing anything more from Ghost Henry.  

Back downtown, the brain-damaged amnesiac "John Doe" was having a temporal lobe epileptic seizure in the lobby of The Washington Post, after having failed to convince anybody that his visions about future Metro accidents were more important than anything the newspaper's reporters had uncovered about current safety inspections.  His helping dog, Lucky Charm, commenced licking his hand to bring him back to full consciousness.  "Chewing gum," he muttered repeatedly for a good ten minutes.  His eyes were open by the time the ambulance arrived.  "It will start with the chewing gum," he said to the EMTs approaching him.  "I'm an autistic-mystic-shaman, so that's how I know."

"Okay, sir."

Out in the river, Ardua of the Potomac laughed with pleasure at another nightmare planted successfully into a weakling's brain.  Then she slithered off to make another kill.

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COMING UP:  West Side Story!