Dinky Dellabella Fiction

Dinky Dellabella walked back into the Laundry Providence Laundromat, threw donw his bag of laundry and said; "All right you bastards, which one of you did this?

Dinky grabbed up his laundry bag from off of the floor, loosened its top and emptied its contents back onto the floor. Everyone in the laundromat (about ten or fifteen launderers) loitered about and ignored Dinky.

"All of my clothes, as I'm sure you are all aware," shouted Dinky, "are frigging GREEN!"

The launderers continued to ignore Dinky Dellabella and his obviously green laundry.

"Nobody has got anything to say to me?" asked Dinky.

"Excuse me, sonny," a small, elderly female launderer said to Dinky (her name was Mrs. Sanders but Dinky did not know this).

"WHAT?" shouted Dinky, without even turning to face her.

"You're going to get your nice, clean, green laundry all dirty again." As Mrs. Sanders said this a slight chuckle was chortling in the back of her throat and the look on Dinky Dellabella's face as he turned to face her, caused her to erupt with laughter, as it did with the rest of the launderers. Laundry Providence shook with the laughter of launderers and Mr. Kabob (who Dinky had never been introduced) slapped his knee with delight.

Everyone was always playing tricks on Dinky, especially people he did not know. His parents and friends (and he did have a few friends) had since grown tired of the continuous gags and public humiliations, but to strangers Dinky always presented a challenge.

"Okay," said Dinky, bending over and gathering up his clothes. "You win. The joke is on Dinky Dellabella once again, ladies and gentlemen:

Old Dinky Dellabella
He's a sucker, but what a fellah

The laughter in the laundromat died down a little (although not completely) and a young college girl named Carol Ahern, who unbeknownst to Dinky was a third year biology major at a local university) felt a twinge of guilt for having laughed at Dinky. She thought of the expression on Dinky's face as he stormed in with his green laundry and she immediately felt better.

"Sucker," she thought.

Dinky at one time thought that perhaps his subjectivity and susceptibility to such savage and sometimes subtle practical jokes was due to some physical ailment. He consulted several physicians, experts in their fields, to see if they could diagnose any particular problem. One doctor told him it was because he had a mild case of athlete's foot, which could be cured with a bottle of Tinactin and seventy dollars. Another physician told him that it was really nothing physical, that as far as he could tell Dinky was just an idiot. The third doctor Dinky visited gave him quite a shock. He informed Dinky that he had a small, cancerous tumor on his Dinkywinky-dellabellum, and that, if he was lucky, he had only fifteen minutes to live. Dinky awoke several hours later in the waiting room of the clinic to the chuckles and giggles of waiting patients. A nurse brought him out his clothes and told him; "Mr. Dellabella, you really should try not to be such an idiot."

Dinky had finished gathering up his clothes and was about to storm out of Laundry Providence, but he stopped and addressed the launderers again.

"I have just one question for you heartless swine," said Dinky. "Why me? Seriously, just answer my question, please. What is it about me that makes you want to do this to me?"

The laundromat was filled now with a deathly silence and the weight of Dinky's question hung ominously in the air. The launderers (about ten or fifteen of them) looked down at their feet or stacked their undergarments into neat, little piles.

"Get lost butthead," said John Bruce, a 31 year old bachelor who had never really said anyting bad to, or about anyone in his life.

"No," said Dinky. "I will not get lost. I have been taking these humorless little impractical jokes for forty-two years and I will not get lost. Would any one of you unfeeling rodents like to hear a story?"

"No," replied the launderers.

"It's a sad story and if any one of you have a heart, which I doubt sincerely, it will break when you hear it. It's a story about a young man. Yes, I can tell you are wondering, that young man was me." Dinky dragged his laundry bag across the floor and propped himself up against a double-loader washing machine.

"When I was a young man," continued Dinky, "I fell in love. No, I did not want to fall in love, but as I said, I was a young man . . . a young and very foolish, very foolish man."

"Gee, that's hard to believe," Mrs. Juarez said to Mrs. Parsells, as the both chuckled.

"She was an angel, a truly beauteous creature. I courted her for several months and finally, on a warm March day, she was betrothed to me. We were to be married that May, on the 32nd I believe she said, but I told her, no. I could not wait until the 32nd of May for her to be my eternal lover. It must be now, within the week, and she agreed.

Mr. Queque was snoring rather loudly toward the rear of the laundromat, not rudely either, because he wasn't aware he was doing it.

"I told my family and friends about Michelle and they could not believe it. I assured them that my good fortune was indeed true and they called me a liar. 'Dinky,' my dearest mother said to me, 'you're of shit.'"

"My parents refused to believe that I had met such a precious gem as Michelle and therefore refused to fund the wedding. Michelle's parents would have paid for the nuptials, as is the custom, but Michelle told me that they had invested heavily in the sawdust market and were a little financially unstable at the present. I offered to pay for the entire ceremony. Michelle, the sweetheart, said no, it would be better to wait for a comeback in the sawdust market. She was worried about my financial situation. 'No, my love,' I said, we must wed at once.'"

Mr. Rasnick excused himself, saying that his laundry was done, and his dog was probably wondering where diner was, and that he would rather eat a bowl of broken glass than listen to an idiot like Dinky Dellabella anyway.

"Our wedding was planned for April 2nd. Michelle had to change of heart suddenly and wanted our wedding day pushed up to the first of April. I laughed at her as I took her into my arms and said, 'Foolish girl, you can wait another day can't you?' April 2nd was to be the day. The church looked beautiful, everything was perfect. All my family and friends were there. Michelle told me that her family and friends couldn't make it because they had flat tires and not a spare between them, but they sent their love.

The priest who was to wed us was a long time friend of the family. He was the same sweet man who baptized me as a baby and made that clever quip to the congregation; 'Oh no, young Dinky's mother accidentally diapered his face.' He was a good man. 'Do you, Stinky Dellabella,' he said on our wedding day--even I had to chuckle at that) 'take that exquisitely beautiful and undeserving woman, to be your lawfully wedded wife?' 'I do, I do' I said. 'And do you Michelle Phakename take this...man, to be your lawfully wedded husband?'

The church was very quiet, about as quiet as this laundromat is right now, and that's when Michelle Phakename broke my heart, when she said, 'What do I look like, a Dinky Dellabella?' My parents got a real laugh out of that. I think they still send her Christmas cards."

Dinky suddenly noticed that he was the only one left in Laundry Providence. He hadn't noticed anyone had left. "They must have snuck out," he thought. There was a note pinned to one of the Big Boy dryers that read; "Dinky, we hated your stupid story, so why don't you shut up." It was signed by about ten or fifteen launderers. Dinky tore up the note, grabbed his laundry bag and stormed out of the laundromat.

As Dinky headed for his garden apartment on Elm Street he thought about his life and the significance of it. He thought about his clumsy childhood. He thought about Michelle Phakename. He thought about the green laundry he was carrying. Dinky realized something, his life lacked the presence of a changed and fixed character. There was an absence of observation of the human condition as well. It seemed to him that his entire existence was only played for broad satire which always missed the point. In short, it had no point. "You know, Dinky," he said out loud to himself, "you are kind of an idiot, but it's really not your fault."

Dinky laughed at this as he fumbled for his keys to the front door of his garden apartment. He did not realize at that point that he had locked them inside before he left.