Coal Black

Coal Black and the thirteen dwarves move to Middleville. Coal Black plays electric guitar and sings in a band called Poison Apple. The thirteen dwarves are boyfriends/roadies, as interchangeable as Legos. She doesn't really need roadies, since the furthest the band ever travels is to Sludge Lake to play Bob's Grocery and Fairgrounds. The "fairgrounds" are a scrubby field with a broken tilt-a-whirl sitting in it. The cars have had an accident, they all sag to one side in a tangle, because the tilt-a-whirl isn't level. However, it inspired Coal Black to write "Smoking Pile-Up Of Love." It goes like this:

yeah baby, I'm fucked up behind your wheel
one hand over my eye
we're all gonna die
pretty soon we'll be together in the twisted steel
yeah baby
dig it

It does not chart. At any given time, there are two or three of the elves strewn about Coal Black's place. One crashed on her couch, with an exposed spring leaving a dent in his cheek, one playing Mutant Rage 12 on the Playstation, and eating Taco Bell for breakfast, and another standing in the pastel green kitchen, saying, "Wow baby, you don't look as fat lately. Can I borrow some money?"

This inspires Coal Black to write "(Men Are The) Toxic Sludge Of Love", which goes like this:

yeah baby, we're fucked up in love's glow
our love will soon be dead
I'm growin' another head
pretty soon we'll be together and I'll be your ho
yeah baby
dig it

This one does not chart, either, but gains a cult following among rad-core kids. They wear civil defense sign tee shirts and use make up to turn their faces green and melted. When they go in Bob's Grocery, the normals stare. The rad-core kids object to this, and say "What are you looking at?", but because of all the junk on their faces, it comes out as gibberish and they have an unfortunate tendency to drool. They complain in a amateur video interview that no one takes them seriously.

Meanwhile, Coal Black has used the proceeds from "Toxic Sludge Of Love" to buy a new ankh. She kicks out the elves and takes up with a waitress from The Egg Explodes, a diner run by old hippies from California. Everything they serve includes avocados. They are a meatless, dairyless, cruelty-free enterprise. They do a surprisingly good business, and use the profits to support eco-candidates, but their only electee so far is Myrus Bump, who is supposed to catch dogs and drives a little truck with wire mesh cages in the back. Once, he put a Republican opponent inside one of them, the only time it had ever been used. He doesn't know it, but now the opponent suffers from a debilitating restraint fetish. However, when he asks his wife to lash him to the pew at First Baptist, there is a scandal and his career is ruined.

While all of this excitement is going on, the waitress has had a salutary effect on Coal Black. She has given up heroin and contents herself with Hershey's Special Dark syrup, straight from the container. She pronounces it "primo stuff" before sinking back on the springs of the sofa with an elaborate and truly sensuous sigh. The waitress strokes her hair and idly watches tv. When she recovers her senses, Coal Black writes one more song. it goes:

yeah baby, I'm messed up on your kisses and stuff
you're so incredibly semi-sweet
all I wanna do is rinse and repeat
and if I couldn't eatcha, I'd find a way to huff
yeah baby
dig it

The song rockets to #1. Coal Black gets out of bed and poses in front of the mirror, which has been on the floor for at least six months. She asks the waitress, whose name is Cindi, "is my ass not spectacular?" Cindi says, around a mouthful of apple, "You are a true Goddess, baby."

They live happily ever after.
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for magpie 37