WOLF-ED: The Prose Musical

“Ready?”

Rick looked grimly at a point somewhere between me and the small, deceptively “cozy” cottage. Well, hut might’ve been a more accurate description of the dump – Mort Schwein notoriously wasn’t the brains of the family -- but to The Law, it might as well have been, to put it in a context you might understand, The Batcave as rehabbed by Elon Musk. I’d almost think Mort was taunting us, if he wasn’t the Schwein Brothers’ weak sister.

Fenrick Lupous was a lone wolf, metaphorically, of course, and he simply grunted as he rose to his haunches and made his way to the House of Straw and Shrooms, if my CI was right or wasn’t just pulling the wool over our eyes. Metaphorically, of course, though he knew we’d make lamb shanks out of him if this turned out to be a foul tip.

See, my guy had a habit of straying from his old lady, Mary, and because the woods ain’t just for bears, he was attending to his personal business one day when Mort wandered into the communal crapper and took rather than left a heavy load. Truffles, that is. Black gold, at least to the foodies beyond Hundred Acre Wood U.S. LLC – the wholly-owned subsidiary of the Sussex-area enterprise that had expanded from honey into truffle and truffle honey after the owner had handed the reigns to an old friend with a nose for fungus.

“Mortadella Schwein,” Rick called, rapping pretty uselessly on the thatched door. “This is Deputy Alpha Lupous. We have a non-predatory warrant to search these premises. Open up.”

We could hear him rustling inside — it’s nearly impossible NOT to rustle when your crib is a glorified haystack. Finally, inevitably, the little piggy sneezed violently.

“Hey, Schwein, cut the hogshit! OPEN UP!” Rick bellowed loud enough to rattle the lawn gnomes. Who scattered for the hills.

“Not by the hair of my ginormous pink ass!” Mort finally called, unconvincingly. I could smell fear, along with the usual.

Rick was calm for a moment, though the fur on his spine told a different tale. “‘He commanded, and a mighty wind began to blow and stirred up the waves.The ships were lifted high in the air and plunged down into the depths.’”

“Now you done it,” I chuckled. If Rick had watched Pulp Fiction three or 50 times too many times, I probably was a little too fond of Lethal Weapon 3. Pesci was a national treasure.

“What?” Mort had never seen Pulp Fiction, and was a pagan porker.

“Jeez!” Rick exhaled. Then his lungs filled, ribs swelled against his barreled chest, and he bared the fangs 4 out of 5 dentists agreed made them soil their khakis.

And my partner cut loose.

**

“Not a shroom in the room,” I sighed, settling into the quilt. Granny stroked my gray fur, scratched my exposed tummy, and cooed what a good boy I was. What I needed after triggering threats of a lawsuit and neighborhood allergies. The Alpha had chewed us like a steaming deer carcass (in the excitement, I’d missed supper), and my old lady was just what I needed.

Metaphorically — my “old lady” was only about 45 in HYs, which I guess, yeah means old lady. “Honey,” she murmured, “Everything’s all right, Baby, yes it is. Maybe somebody squealed to the Schweins. Or bleated. Maybe it even came from inside the pack.”

I growled defensively, then licked her cheek in apology. “It was a dumb move from the beginning. Rick just figured Mort’s grass shack was the least likely hiding place for the poached truffles.” Granny, who watched too much Tastemade, looked confused. “Stolen truffles. Sal Schwein is the family counsel and legit front for their operations, and the head cheese is not going to risk endangering himself.”

“Granny’d” always been a self-starter. After her spunky little daughter, a WWE Woman of Distinction, had left one too many buds holding her beer, Gran took her orphaned grandkid in.

“FUCK!” And there she was. Whether it was her standard homecoming greeting or simply a briefing on the evening’s activities, Grandma scrambled for her Betteny Frankel robe.

Red was no curds-and-whey kind of girl — if anything, she was the spider.

The hoodie seemed sort of a giveaway, but that might just be the cynical cop in me. There were some tricks in that basket of Red’s, but Granny wasn’t about to hear it, and as long as we were on the down low, I wasn’t about to sniff around for whatever (or possibly whoever) Red had buried.

As I slunk out the ground-floor window. I could hear the beginning of a heartwarming ritual.

“WHY DON’T YOU GET THAT HUGE NOSE OF YOURS OUT OF MY FUCKING BUSINESS?! I CAN SEE THOSE FREAKISH BIG EYES OF YOURS BULGING! I BROUGHT A FRIEND HOME, SO JUST GO BACK TO BED AND STICK YOUR PLUGS IN THOSE MONSTER TROLL EARS OF YOURS!”

I should mention that Granny has a really, really great personality…

**

Hundred Acre Woods’ honcho himself showed up the next morning, and The Alpha was licking his jowls not at the single-serving talking ham that had presented himself at the squadroom but at the added pressure Lord Piglet would bring to bear.

“Archduke Gordon Ramsey’s been on my ass about the black truffle market, er, the black market black truffle market, and my good chum Eeyore can’t tolerate much more.” Despite the implied fury in his voice, Piglet’s words came out, well, there’s no other way to put it, adorable AF. “What are you people doing to bring these horrible trifling Schwein to justice? We installed top-of-the-line picket fencing at The Woods, and somehow, we’re still bleeding fungus.”

“We have launched an all-out Schwein hunt,” The leader of the pack stammered. “We suspect the brothers have been pulling a major truffle shuffle, moving the goods from location to location. But we have a secret weapon. Deputy Lupous?”

Rick stepped forward, eyeing the dapper pig like so much Spam. I’d heard Piglet’s old partner had been more than a little overbearing, and he stood his ground, his beady little eyes challenging. The rich little piggie had shown some real rind, and my partner grinned with newfound respect. “Thanks to ‘predator’ suddenly being some kinda dirty word, we’ve had our fangs pulled—“

“Metaphorically,” I hastened. Unlike Rick, I didn’t get all my views from Fox – that is, Reynard Fox, the local cable anchor who advocated henhouse deregulation and removal of Aesop’s Fables and Joel Chandler Harris from all school libraries (and pack and pride and herd and flock and swarm ones, too). 

“—and excessive force against the herbies – sorry, herbivores is strictly prohibited. Canines and claws, that is, though we fought tooth and nail against it. But we found a loophole – well, a lupine hole. I used to run with a pretty fast crowd, and as a result, I have developed a very specific skill set. Well, one specific skill. I blow.”

“Well, I do find you a tad narcissistic,” Lord Piglet admitted.

 “Rick can flatten a hut, a hutch, a warren, a coop, a pup tent, a teepee, or sunglass kiosk,” The Alpha clarified. “Deputy Lupous blows big-time, ask anybody.”

I nodded.

“So what is your next move?” Piglet murmured.

“We’re heading to the sticks,” Rick said, even more grimly.

“I wouldn’t exactly call this a teeming metropolis,” Piglet suggested.

“The Sticks,” I explained. “Sal Schwein’s digs on the east side, one of the largest single-dwelling limb-and-branch structures this side of the Columbia. We now think Mort’s little grass shack was a decoy, a plant by our informant, who’s got a bucket of mint jelly with his name on it if we catch up to him. We plan on hitting the place early tomorrow morning. You’re welcome to join our little wolf gang. You wanna meet at the Denny’s downtown before we head out?”

Piglet blushed, or I think he blushed. “I’m not really a breakfast guy. I hope you can understand…”

**

The Sticks ironically was on the gentrified East Side, between two Starbucks. They’d taken down the non-food-grade gingerbread and gumdrops and the old copper wiring that had cost many a confused tourist some dental work, and, following an extensive beaver hunt, Sal had hired an elite Oregon architectural crew to meld maple, birch, alder, and Baobob branches as well, it was rumored, as limbs from the shuttered Geppetto’s Home For Recalcitrant Orphans. It was tightly constructed, and the “legit” Schwein bragged it was virtually invulnerable to nearly everything aside from fire, prolonged precipitation, mold, emerald ash borer, termites, and gale-force winds.

I gotta confess, my mind wasn’t entirely on the job as we pulled up. Granny had taken a fall overnight raiding the fridge, slipping on the tile floor and banging her skull on the inside of the cavernous oven she’d scored from a nice old couple’s estate sale, accidentally triggering the gas pilot. I couldn’t put my thumb on it, but something seemed off. Red told the hospital she’d been at an all-night pop-up rave doing Molly, and Molly verified her story, along with the party coordinators, seven little dudes who were threatened with charges of serving alcohol to miners. The neighborhood bread delivery route guy, Hansel something, told the investigating officer he’d seen nobody enter or leave Granny’s house. But something smelled a little funny, and it wasn’t just my old lady’s stove.

“Sal Schwein!” Rick’s bellow roused me. “Deputy Lupous – gotta non-predatory warrant, bla-bla-bla. You know the drill. You got 30 seconds!”

This time, Sal responded. “Not by the hair of my wife’s chinny-chin-chin!”

After the Mortadella snafu, I didn’t want the warrant to go sour. “Then, in accordance with the 2022 Wolf At The Door Act, we will commence huffing, and if by the conclusion of huffing, you fail to comply, my partner will be forced to initiate puffing.”

“AND THEN I’LL BLOW THIS FUCKING PILE OF KINDLING DOWN!” Rick roared before inflating his lungs like a couple of the jumbo $2.50 Dollar General Mylar quinceanera balloons. Raymond Chandler, I’m not.

Sal shifted to a more litigatory objection, but before he could get to G. Lockes v. Bears et al, Rick concluded the huffing portion of the show and went in hot on the puffing. Within seconds, the pack moved in, trailed by a Poohed-off Lord Piglet and, after the sawdust had cleared, the Tweezer Squad for the extraction. Well, extractions…

**

Piglet was fit to be fried, as was The Alpha and the folks at The Arboretum behind Sal’s house, which already had had to deal with a gopher infestation since Schwein’s swanky planky home went up and now looked like a free-range toothpick ranch.

“A bad hunch?!” the Truffle King shrilled. “You tell Jamie Oliver and Martha Stewart and the Barefoot Contessa – barefoot, no less! – that you had a ‘bad hunch’ when they find their cupboards bare before the winter entertaining season!”

“Look, Honey-Baked,” Rick snapped. “Before you go into a spiral, think about this. We’ve got the Schweins by the short bristlies – with Mort and Sal out of commission, there’s only one real center of operations left – Hamilton Schwein’s compound. Ham’ll have to move those truffles quick. I’m thinking surprise raid.”

“There’s just one complication,” I warned. “The Hormel and Smithfield families have tried to move on the Big Schwein a dozen times, and he’s built a virtual fortress.”

“It’s a brick house,” The Alpha stated, grimly.

“Good gawd almighty,” Piglet said.

**

“Molly?”

She didn’t turn immediately, and I knew I’d got it in one. I called again, and she put down the unicorn brush.

“Yeah?” she demanded brusquely. I’d got her name from the rave DJ Dopey (no offense intended; somebody’d really had a hard labor, or maybe he was just the seventh), and tracked her down at My Little Horny Pony Riding Stables.

“Gee, Molly, what’s eating you?” I smiled. She didn’t. “Or should I say, Gretel? My girlfriend had an unfortunate date with an industrial-scale oven last night, and I got to thinking, where had I heard that MO before? Then, I remembered a double homicide a couple years back – senior got baked, and not the good way.

“Neighbors said she’d taken in a couple of kids, but after the funeral, the two skipped, and all the cops found was a missing 52-inch flatscreen and a recipe card with the names Hansel and Gretel and the makings for a decadent buerre blanc sauce. Then I’m looking at my old lady’s accident report, and, what do you know, the chief witness is named Hansel. And suddenly, I realize where Granny – or more likely Red – bought that stove. 

“You met her at the estate sale, and found romance and a way to dispose of the murder weapon in one fell swoop. Red decides to take care of Granny and inherit a lovely little love nest, but knows she’d be the top suspect. So she recruits you as her alibi, with Hansel assigned to put one in the oven and then make it look like involuntary braising. Except now, it’s you two who are gonna fry.” I felt like Mel Gibson, pre-Sugar Tits/Expendables Mel. “Unless you want to spill the tea. Metaphorically.”

**

She stumbled into the bedroom that night, dropping the red cloak and nearly falling on her tuffet. Red pulled a red ribbon from her chemically-induced blonde locks, snapped it taut between her delicate fingers, and approached her granny.

“Why, Grandma, what big ears you have? And what a thick skull—“

I had to get up on the bright for the Schwein op, so I cut the schtick short, nearly tripping over the nightgown in the process. Luckily, Little Red had already self-marinated, so I was able to get everything in order well before Granny got back from the 9 o’clock show of Wicked at the Cineplex. Just as well: I’d never really cared for biopics.

**

“Hey, it’s Lupous!” Rick bellowed at the huge brick mansion. I sensed he was getting a little bored with all this. “Haul it out here!”

“Pardon me?” The Ring cam next to the thick oak door crackled. “You the guy from GrubHub?”

“Yeah,” Rick sneered. “We got one Ham to go, with an extra order of whoopass.” Danny Glover was, or I guess someday, would be rolling in his grave.

The device was silent for a second, save a slight porcine wheeze. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that? My brothers just got evicted by some blowhard cop, and they could use a chuckle.”

“Just, just open the damned door and hand over the truffles,” Rick fumed. “Or I’ll—”    

“Yeah, huff and puff and blow my house down,” Hamilton Schwein sighed. “Just let me know when you’re done, so I can remember to quake in my boots.”

It took 47 minutes before Rick tossed in the towel – and in the bushes as well. “I…got…a…new…plan,” he puffed through the huffing and hurling. “I’m gonna kick some ass, Santa-style.”

**

“You gotta stop him,” I told The Alpha, who looked at me like I was a coyote rooting through the IHOP dumpster. “It’s a trap! The pigs baited Rick, dogged him until he just blew. And blew and blew. But they left us a major opening, a weakness Ham Schwein has to know Rick eventually would have spotted. Well, more eventually than they might have expected. If they’re that confident and are planning what I think, they must know we won’t let it go. Which means they have an escape strategy.”

“Huh?” That’s why he was the alpha, if human and lupine history and the Grimm Bros have told us anything.

“The gophers,” I begged. “The Arboretum didn’t start having gopher problems until Schwein moved in. What’s the first thing you think of when you think about gophers?”

“Little gristly but delicious.”

“Ah, I was thinking less about motivation and more about logistics. I don’t think the truffles were anywhere on the Schwein property. You really need to order Rick down.”

“I hear some editorial italics in there,” Alpha muttered. “If the shrooms aren’t on the property, where are they?”

Lord Piglet gasped. “Underground.”

The Alpha whipped around. “No shit, Sherloin!”

“Burrows,” the rich little pig sighed. “Gopher burrows no doubt under and between the Schwein residences. I imagine you’ll find my truffles there!”

I glanced nervously up at my partner, perched on the chimney top. “Why’s Rick’s fur matted? We don’t sweat. Oh great Wolfen Mother Diety, THAT’S NOT SMOKE!”

“STAND DOWN!” The Alpha screamed.

Rick glanced down with— what else? — a wolfish grin. Or I guess just a grin.

And as we watched him exclaim as he dropped down the flue, Rick’s face said it all — a lupine “Fuck you!”

**

“You know the rest,” I shrugged. “We gave my pal a hero’s funeral — what was left of him after getting lobstered by the Schweins — and since half the work was already done, the village taxidermist stuffed and mounted him for free. You can still see him on the second floor of the Dick’s Sporting Goods, doing what he loved -- snarling stoically.

“Lord Piglet helped us sniff out the truffle cache, just in time for the artisan mac’n’cheese season. The Schweins turned up under the festival grounds during the Village Spring Luau. They were stuffed in that tunnel like a Hillshire Farms gift basket. Best luau ever. And after Red blew town, Granny and I got hitched in a Methodist/Mammalist service. What?”

“Um,” the guy from Paramount drawled. “You already included the whole Eating Miss Riding Hood spiel in your pitch.” What I hate about first-person. “I think I like the skipping town hook better — we’re going for a PG-13. But, lemme ask. I know she was a psycho witch, but does it ever bother you?”

I belched. Maybe a little. Or it might have just been some bad pork.