The Last Clown in Town
I shall tell you of Bollow the Blue Clown:
Bollo had a full set of blue hair.
He dyed it daily.
Because you see...
Bollo was a clown!
And a successful one!
Back in the 90s, that was Bollo's heyday, the clown was generally well liked, he had plenty of friends and fans and Bollo would rock up to parties on his one-wheeled unicycle, juggling his clubs and pins and tickling people with his jokes.
So people young and old thought he was great and Bollo was having a generally good time of it - until the winter of 2002. It was in that year Bollo met and eventually married a strange witch-like women. Many believed she had woven some kind of cruel spell over the clown, but after the marriage Bollo was never the same man again...
Never again...
Bollo the blue clown was literally gone - the laughter, the joker, all a memory...
Poor Bollo.
After nine years his strange witch-like wife divorced Bollo clean. She took his house and all of his money. She took away his beloved unicycle threw it out to the trash - hell! She even took his dignity.
And that should of been that for Bollo - BUT the Blue clown kept trucking on like a true hero - but his reputation as a fun loving soul was in the dirt... That marriage had broken him!
These days the clown could still be found performing tricks, but time and age had found a way to steal most of Bollo's clownish charm that had made him popular back in the 90s... People in town grew to dislike Bollo very deeply - some even started to consider him a menace.
Bollo hung around pubs, you see. He lived on the streets where he begged for drinks, waiting and hoping for some charitable soul to take him in and give him a roof for a night or two.
Bollo grew a reputation as a dirty drunk, some would say Bollo was an outright degenerate, and Bollo had adopted a very annoying habit of spraying water on people and later apologising about it saying he had confused them for a window. Those kind of old-school tricks might have worked well with the kids during a birthday party back in the day but fully grown professional adults did not appreciate being randomly sprayed with water in the streets. One man, who was actually the exchequer for the local council, was so angry at being sprayed in the face with water that he had Bollo arrested and Bollo spent a full solid week in prison.
When Bollo was released from prison he was utterly spent.
And that was when he met Jon Kent.
Kent found Bollo sitting outside the local drinking house - the Short Tailed Fox. The clown was sitting near a table, one foot up on a stool, a dirty stinking smoke hanging out over his blue lips and beside him tin of a beer gripped by a quivering nervous hand.
Yes! That was him. That was the clown.
Bollo was a man who was fully broken and yet somehow he was better for it. He was a man who accepted his own defeat. He didn't fight it. He just knew what he was... or more precisely what he wasn't. And Kent saw this right away and respected the clown for it.
Kent introduced himself right away, throwing his name out and after that his hand. The two men shook and sat and ordered drinks. Bollo offered Kent a smoke, and Kent accepted - he slipped one out and started puffing on it with the eagerness of a cat with a tin of cream.
'It is good to see you alive and well, Bollo,' said Kent puffing out a full sized cloud of grey smoke and blowing it over in the direction of the broken and derelict clown. 'I remember watching you as a kid back in the day, with all those tricks you used to do! I used to love watching you. Especially when you started spraying us with all that water and then apologising afterwards, telling us you thought we were a bunch of dirty windows!'
'That is my favourite trick,' Bollo replied, and then the clown fell solemn. 'But people these days are so serious... They don't enjoy my tricks not anymore. I sprayed a man in the face the other week. It was only water. I explained I thought he was a window in need of a good darn cleaning - that I was just doing my duty as a citizen of the town keeping the place tidy and all that. Well this man had been locked up for a whole week!'
'Damn! That's rough! So you actually went to prison?'
'Yep! Locked up with the lads! They gave me a hell of a time inside there. This one lad told me I used to bully him at school, though I can't remember it I told him he had confused me with another clown...'
'O! Maybe it was Billy the Green Clown?' said Kent.
'That's the one I am sure,' Bollo returned. 'I said to this lad, I told him, it was Billy the Green Clown who used to bully him. But this lad wouldn't listen to me no sir. Instead he flushed my head down a toilet. And then after that he tied me up by my legs and beat me freely.'
'Damn you have had it rough! It ain't right, Bollo. You are a good man! You deserve a break.'
'All I wanted was to have some fun in my life,' Bollo replied weakly. 'I just like spraying people with water! What's wrong with that?'
'Nothing wrong with it at all, my son,' said Kent. 'You should be allowed to do what you do.'
Bollo lit another dirty smoke... 'At the end of the day I am not bothering people. I just like cleaning windows! Ah wait! There is another window over there. Better get to work...'
A very posh looking business lady holding a briefcase was walking down the road. She was returning home from work. As Soon as Bollo saw her he jumped up and ran right over. When he finally got within range of the women the clown started spraying her with water. The business lady responded by kicking Bollo fully in the crotch before stalking away raising her phone to her ear possibly making a little tinkle to the police.
It would take twenty minutes for Bollo to recover from this incident.
Kent had to help the clown climb back into his chair.
'You see that? You see what she did to me? This is what I am talking about. I try to do a good deed and that is how I get repaid,' said Bollo sadly. 'Why can't I be left to clean windows in peace?'
'I don't have an answer for that, Bollo I am sorry. I wish I could be more helpful to you,' said Kent. 'But ah well, such is life... Life is tough sometimes, yep. Life can be tough as old shoes!'
'Or old socks,' said the clown.
Kent heard this and chuckled.
'Everything started to go bad for me twenty years ago,' Bollo went on. 'I used to be this really popular character in town back in the day and then BOOM! Everything just started to go wrong - like dominos falling down you know what I mean? It was like I had stepped from one universe into another. Nothing made sense to me anymore. I married this strange witch-like woman. She brought me down good and proper. She took everything I had as well. I think she put a spell on me you know?'
'Sounds bad! At least these days you are free from that nonsense, right?'
'Right. Since she divorced me and left on on the streets I started writing all these songs,' said Bollo. 'Do you want to hear one of my songs, Kent? Let me sing you the best song I have ever written.'
'Go for it! I am all ears!' said Kent.
So Bollo sang his song. It went like this:
I don't trust dogs...
DU DU DU DU DU
I don't trust dogs!
DU DU DU DU DU
O no! I don't trust dogs!
DU DU DU DU DU
I say I don't trust dogs...
DU DU DU DU DU
O no sir I don't trust dogs
(But I trust badgers)
DU DU DU DU DU
I just don't trust dogs,
Dong trust dogs,
No sir I don't trust dogs!
DU DU DU DU DU
'What a brilliant song!' said Kent clapping his hands. 'What is the song called?'
'Have a guess!'
'I can't imagine!'
And so Bollo told him, 'I call that song: A swift walk among the wild ways of the road on a summer day - o! With a summer breeze flowing with ease in my hair, & with the soft grassy ground of the fields beneath my feet O please summer breeze please! Ease the heaviness in my old heart and lift the lightness the light that sparkles in every corner every memory every scar woven into my soul lift it with ease so that my heaviness might float away with the breeze.'
'That's a great name for a song,' said Kent. 'It gives the listener a good idea about what they are getting into when they attempt to embrace your wonderful and refined music.'
'I agree,' Bollo replied. 'My music is all that I have since the divorce, since my old witch-like wife took my beloved unicycle away from me. I loved that unicycle you know? Sometimes I think I should have just married the unicycle instead. At least the damn thing kept quiet.'
'You've had it hard, Bollo mate. That divorce sounds truly rough. But there is a silver lining to all of it at the end,' said Kent.
'O really? Enlighten me?' said Bollo.
'You discovered your passion,' Kent returned softly. 'You have discovered what you are really all about in life - you are a song writer with a golden tongue!'
'Thanks a lot Kent! You are a true mate! I have enjoyed today. Hey! Let me make you a brew. A nice hot cup of tea? What do you say?' said Bollo.
'I would love that,' said Kent. 'Bring it on! Bring on that cup of tea!'
'Okay! This is going to be a very rich cup of tea. The sort of tea that only a clown can make,' said Bollo.
'I am looking forward to it,' said Kent.
Bollo left for a few minutes and returned holding a large and full cup of tea. He starts to hand the cup over to Kent, but in the last second pulls the cup back. What was this? Some kind of clown's trick?
'O wait!' said Bollo. 'There is something I forgot to do before I serve you!'
And that was when Bollo took off his shoe and dunked his dirty greasy sock right into the cup of tea. 'There you go, Kent my friend! You can drink it now!'
Kent thought Bollo was joking, clowning around as it were, and returned with a laugh. 'I am not drinking that,' he said. 'It's got a dirty old sock in it!'
'That is my special sock that is,' said Bollo. 'I haven't washed it in twenty years!'
'And that is why I am not drinking that cup of tea,' said Kent.
'You will drink that tea or I will take offence to you!' Bollo bellowed.
The clown sounded serious...
'Please tell me this is a joke?' said Kent with a quiver of fear in his voice.
'I never joke about socks and tea! Now drink!' said Bollo. It really sounded like he was trying to intimidate Kent. 'I want every drop of this richly refined grease tea down your throat by the end of the day! Do you hear? Drink! DRINK!' Bollo started to lose his temper and he screamed once again out loud for ALL to hear: DRINK!
'I can't drink this tea, Bollo. It has got a twenty year old unwashed sock in it. I will end up killing myself if I drink this!' said Kent.
'If you do not drink the tea of your own free will then I will have to grab you and force the tea into your guts!' cried Bollo. 'Now drink it up! I want to see you enjoy it! Do you hear me boy? I want you to ENJOY this tea!'
'Don't do this to me Bollo! I beg you! I thought we were friends!'
'I thought you were a friend as well, until you freely rejected this special cup of grease enriched tea I have tenderly prepared for you!' the clown roared on and now Bollo was really starting to sound like a pure and true lunatic!
Kent was in a fix and he needed an escape route, fast. The clown was clearly going out of his mind and Kent couldn't cope with all this nonsense about tea and socks. Kent had a life to lead. He had work to attend in the morning. He couldn't get himself ill drinking sock enriched tea! NO! He started looking left and right: "There has got to be a way for me to get out of this!"
'I can see that you are planning to make a run for it,' said Bollo to Kent. 'It won't do you no good, lad. I will just follow you. No matter where you go, I will be there, an inch or so away, or in fact in the way of your shadow. So let's end this business between us now and drink up your tea!'
'Please don't make me do this, Bollo! I can't cope! I am begging you as a fellow human being don't do this!' said Kent.
Kent couldn't handle it no more. He sprang up and started to make a run for it!
RUN RUN! Run as fast as you can! From a distance you might have confused Kent for the gingerbread man!
But it was no good. No matter how fast his feet carried him the clown Bollo was still only still feet away - the clown always seemed to just keep within a good distance of Kent, like Kent just couldn't shake the crazy clown off.
But Kent kept going, turning this way and that. But every time he looked back there was the clown holding a cup of tea with a sock in it chasing him!
Kent could not escape that clown!
Kent was not a fighting man no. Kent was more of a lover than a fighter. But he knew in that moment that he had to stand his ground against the clown. And so he did. He managed to grab the clown, being the younger larger stronger guy he was able to tip the clown over off of his feet. Then Kent grabbed the tea cup and emptied it onto the street and he threw the cup and the sock as well into the nearest bin.
Then Kent ran for it again.
This time Kent succeeded in escaping the clown...
Kent had nightmares that night. He kept on seeing the clown in his dreams chasing him with socks in his tea cup!
It was awful.
But at least it was over...
Right?
No more clown business!
'I shall not be speaking to random clowns ever again,' said Kent as he got ready to start the morning.
He heard a sound downstairs somebody had put something through his letter box so he went down to have a look at what it was...
And to his horror he saw a soggy socks on the floor! On one of the socks there were these words written with red paint: I HAVEN'T FORGOTTEN!
Kent had to sneak out of the back door in case Bollo was waiting for him in the front yard.
Kent didn't know what to do.
The clown called Bollo was homeless and knew every street. He could be watching from any corner, any nook and any shadow...
In a state of horrible anxiety Kent finally sought the help of the police.
Constable Maddox was happy to hear Kent's story in his office.
'You said you wanted to speak to me about a certain clown with blue hair?' said Constable Maddox.
'Yes! It's Bollo the blue clown,' said Kent.
'Ah yes! Him... He's he been up to mischief again, right? That old clown is such a fool! I arrested him last week. I thought a stint in jail might have straightened the freak out, but not so it seems. So what has he been up to this time? Washing you like a window I guess?'
'No sir,' said Kent. 'It's worse than that. He has been trying to force me to drink a cup of tea with a sock in it! This morning a sock was put through my letter box! I have never been so scared!'
'Yes. This sounds really bad. I am sorry for you,' said Maddox calmly and he started to brush his chin - the man looked like he was in deep thought. 'We dealt with a case like this before a few years ago,' Maddox returned. 'This isn't the first time Bollo has needlessly harassed a member of the public with a pair of socks...'
'Is there nothing you can do about the man?'
'Bollo is a tricky fish to deal with,' Maddox replied. 'You see he is clever in a mad sort of way. He knows how to sail just above the wide curtain of the law - he knows what kind of crimes he can commit and get away with. He might not seem to be very sharp, our boy Bollo, but he knows what he is doing. The last time I got him it was because he assaulted the exchequer of the council. You see that is how it is. Bollo needs to attack someone official. That is the only way I can reel him in. It's a sad business, but there is nothing I can do to help you right now!'
'Are you being serious? Are you really trying to tell me that I am going to be harassed by a clown and his dirty socks forever?'
'Listen son. There is only one option left for you as far as I can see,' Maddox continued calmly. 'You are going to have to leave the country. There is a train leaving this afternoon for the UK. I will pay and you can get out. What say you? Different country? Fresh start? No clowns following you? Sounds good to me. I know I would take up my offer - especially if I was in your shoes.'
'Fine then! If you are paying then I will get that train. Thank you Constable. I do have relatives in UK so I will stay with them for a while until I get things sorted out.'
'Good man!' said Constable Maddox. 'Now then, before you leave do you fancy a cup of tea?'
'That's not funny Constable!' Kent returned coldly.
The very thought of tea just made Kent shudder - which is really sad because Kent did used to love tea so much!
Constable Maddox slapped Kent on the shoulder and started to chuckle. 'Alright son! Let's get that train and see to getting you out of this country!'
Kent was on the first train out of town...
He finally felt safe.
He was free of the clown!
Kent was looking out of the window watching the rocking mellow green countryside go sliding by:
New life and new home at the end of these wheels. Go wheels! Go wheels! Take me home!
Perfect!
Kent closed his eyes.
It was time for a nap he had a lot of sleep to catch up on.
Kent was about to drift off when he heard a mad little voice crackling in his ear...
And the voice said:
Fancy a cup of tea with a sock in it boy!
THE END
(Remember! All spelling errors and grammatical mistakes are intentional - the author 😆)
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