| ZYGOTE IN MY COFFEE.COM |
| ***BIO*** Jason Jordan is a writer from New Albany, Indiana, who always says he's from Louisville, Kentucky, because people actually know where that is. His fiction has appeared in The2ndHand, Pindeldyboz, VerbSap, and many other publications. Jordan is also Editor-in-Chief of the literary magazine decomP. He is currently in the MFA program at Chatham University, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he is working on his first novel. |
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| © 2008 zygoteinmycoffee Ink. |
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| Duel |
| by Jason Jordan |
| -Hi, I’m Alexander Hamilton. Welcome to Historical
Jackass.- That’s what I said into the camera before walking over to take my place: back-to-back with my friend Aaron, who was going to shoot me. My name actually is Alex, and the more we thought about it, the more it made sense for the first Historical Jackass skit to feature the duel that everyone’s heard of. Earlier we had mapped it out, or at least how we hoped it would go.
+ + + The four of us – Tom, George, Aaron, and me – decided to swipe George’s dad’s expensive video camera, and mess around with it since it was summer, we were out of school, and bored. Then we thought about doing some stuff from Jackass, but there were already videos on the Internet with people doing low budget rip-offs, plus MAD TV had done that parody called Kenny Rogers’ Jackass, which was cool, except for the fact that the prop bats broke after only one hit, so it wasn’t realistic. -So why don’t we do somethin’ different?- Tom asked. I wasn’t sure whether he was asking a rhetorical question or not. -Whaddaya mean?- I asked. -Let’s do this Jackass thing, but make it, like, a historical thing so that people can’t write it off immediately.- he said. -Yeah,- George said, -we could base the skits on historical events and stuff. We can include real people and exact dates. I mean, the reason people, or parents I guess, were so against Jackass was that it was gross and didn’t have any value. It was funny, sure, but it didn’t teach anybody anything. This would be educational.- -So what you’re sayin’,- I said, -is that we make the show like a history lesson with stunts.- -Exactly,- Tom said. -I think it’ll work,- George said. -Plus, it’ll be fun.- -Hey,- said Tom, -since we have an Alex and Aaron, why don’t we have the duel as our first stunt?- -That’s a great idea!- said George, whose face lit up with enthusiasm. -Yeah,- I said, -it’s a great idea. I’m the one who gets killed.- -I’ll do it,- Aaron said. -Well, if he will, I guess I will, too,- I said. -That’s more like it, Alex,- Tom said. + + + The day of filming quickly approached, and all of us kept in touch with George about how things were going. He’d grabbed a couple Derringers from his dad’s gun collection, and somehow – it was probably more sophisticated than the rubber band thing he’d originally talked about – modified the plastic pistols, with a Derringer in each, to where they would actually shoot. Or so he claimed. Afterwards, we donned our Revolutionary War costumes we’d picked up at Herman’s Novelty, a costume shop. We decided to film in the early afternoon when all our parents, and most people for that matter, were at work. It was a sunny day without a cloud in the sky, so we walked to a secluded area of the park with a woodsy backdrop. George, Aaron, and me were in our costumes. George was presiding, or refereeing, or whatever, over the whole thing, while Tom was filming with the handheld and would also be the one to narrate. I said my lines into the camera, and returned to my position. George would later edit it so that the Jackass title screen, with the music, would play right afterwards. We were gonna add Historical above Jackass, though. And then, when we finished it, we were gonna send it to a site like Break.com – a site that’d pay a few hundred dollars for a video if they liked it enough to post it. We were confident our video would make it on there, but, if not, we’d just post it on YouTube or GoogleVideo ourselves. It’d get popular, and then we’d get famous. Hopefully rich, too, or at least get more money than we had at the time. Tom began reciting his lines, which he memorized, while filming me and Aaron back-to-back with George facing us from behind. -On July 11th, 1804, Alexander Hamilton, the Secretary of the Treasury, and Aaron Burr, the Vice President of the United States, met to settle an ongoing feud, which stemmed from political as well as personal matters. Constantly at odds with one another, the two decided to duel, and though Burr would be victorious, Hamilton would not die until the following day – July 12th, 1804.- -Gentlemen,- George said, -walk 10 paces, and on the count of 10, turn and fire!- I was sweating. I didn’t know if it was because the costume was so hot, or if I was nervous. Probably both. Still, I started walking while George counted aloud. I wonder if Aaron’s really gonna shoot me? I thought. I hoped he wouldn’t. We reached 10, and at once I turned around. I heard a loud bang, and saw smoke wafting up from the plastic pistol, which, due to the Derringer’s force, had mostly shattered. I felt numb. I looked down and saw blood seeping through my shirt. Aaron had shot me in the stomach. -You shot me.- I said, unintentionally repeating the exact line Alexander Hamilton had uttered when he was shot. I dropped my gun, and, feeling weightless, fell backwards, hitting the ground hard. My view was no longer of Aaron Burr, but of the blue, blue sky overhead. I heard yells of -Oh shit! Oh shit! Oh fuck!- so many times, but assumed George, Tom, or Aaron, or even all of them were on their cell phones calling 9-1-1. I was cold suddenly, and shivering in an attempt to get warm. We had already gotten ideas about the next skit, though. I didn’t want to miss it. Tom, or Thomas as he’d be called in the video, was going to make a sex tape with his slaves. All we needed to find were some black girls who didn’t mind getting filmed naked. I was too tired to think about planning all that, though, so I closed my eyes. I was tired. I was going to try to sleep. |
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| Mar. 2008 |
| 104 |