Terrence G. Private Dick 2

There are two things I would have rather been doing right now: the first involves a piranha, a paddling pool and a man's g-string, and the other is waxing my kitchen floor.  I was at a funeral.

My good buddy Richie had died.  He had had choked on a piece of squid at that fancy Japanese restaurant behind the dry-cleaners.  The priest was recounting Richie's life like a five-year old would: the narrative was full of lies and exaggerations, and it sounded like his mouth was full of paste.  I was standing beside Richie's ex-wife, who happened to be a widow.  She looked like a day in July: she was hot and sticky.  She was dripping like a cherry Popsicle.  "Terrence," she said, "I think Richie was murdered."

"You want me to bring the squid in for questioning?" I asked.

"I want you," she said, putting her hand down my pants, "to go check out the Kuruteiru Restaurant."

"Honey, your hands are cold and your husband is still warm."  I removed her hand.  "I'll do it," I said, "but only because I still owed Richie a pair of hedge-clippers when he died."

I left the funeral and went downtown to the restaurant.  The woman who seated me reminded me of spaghetti: she was tall and thin, and I felt like her gaze was throwing me onto the ceiling, checking me out.

"Menu?" she asked in her pretty, hamster-like voice.

I took it from her hands, and she bowed before leaving me to it.  Something in her face yelled 'Menu is the only English word I know', only in Japanese, obviously.  I decided to leave that for a minute, and check out the food.  I opened the menu, and a piece of paper fell onto my placemat. 'I'm not dead.  Check in the fridge in the back. -Richie' read the paper.  I threw the table to the side dramatically and rushed the kitchen.

Inside, like I thought there would be, there were 3 ninjas, waiting to overpower me.  I reached for my gun, but it was missing, like the two front teeth of Joey, the boxer I had bet on the night before.  The menu-girl was behind the ninjas, taunting me with my own gun.

The ninjas charged.  They didn’t count on me having been bullied every day in third grade by Cid, a boy who resembled a woodchuck: large teeth, furry back and a tendency to eat pencils.  I had researched over 400 types of fighting styles to rid me of Cid.  It only took me a few well-placed headbutts to dispatch of the men.

It still left the girl, though.

She had aimed the gun at me, her hands shaking like a crack addict’s on a rollercoaster during an earthquake.  I walked towards her, grabbed the gun in one glamorous swoop and took her into my arms. "Aishiteru." She said softly before I kissed her, making her believe in hell and heaven all at the same time.  Only in Japanese, obviously.  I let her go, and she looked at me with adoring eyes before I knocked her out with the butt of my gun.  She dropped elegantly to the ground.  Asian women have a way of doing that.

I opened the fridge door as fast as a squirrel climbs a tree when it’s being chased by a boy with a stick, and sighed.  I was too late.  Richie was standing there, as stiff as a stiff.  He was really dead, this time.  The note must have been written before the night shift cooled the food for the night.

I tipped my hat to him, closed the door and promised never to eat in a Japanese restaurant again.