The walls were closing in. Huge granite walls engrained with grit and guilt, suffocating his soul.
The Mattwhitaker had been doing just fine, thank you very much, sailing along, announcing criminal charges against some large Telecommunicus dinos from Chopstickchowmein. Then a young, brash Mediacircustops with a Jaketapperean gleam in his eye had asked about the Muellersavus investigation.
The Mattwhitaker simply couldn’t contain himself. Or his sweat glands. The words poured out like the perspiration streaming down his face.
“I’ve been fully briefed on the investigation and uh, y’know … I look forward to uh, the Muellersavus, um … delivering the final report and I, uh … really am not going to talk, uh … about an open and ongoing investigation otherwise but, y’know, sort of … the statements that I have made were as a puh-puh … um, private dino and only with publicly available information, like public, like where any dino can get it, right? Um … and y’know … I am comfortable that, um … the decisions that were made by, um, whoever, I guess … are going to be, um, reviewed … uh, y’know … looked at anyway, uh … either through the various means we have, which are several, I believe … but right now you know the investigation is, uh, I think, uh … close to being completed, uh, kind of close … and I hope that we can get the report from the Molar, I mean, Muellersavus, as soon as we … as possible.”
He sputtered finally, thankfully, to a stop. His bald head and face were bathed in sweat.
“Are you okay?” asked one Mediacircustops. “You look like you’re having a heart attack.”
“Uh, no. Not at all. While we’re talking …” Oh no, he was going to spill the beans again!
The Wilburross and Christopherwray flanked him on either side. The Tyrumposaurus had told him the two high-ranking dinos were only there to give his announcement some much-needed integrity and respect. Hah! He’d show them. The acting attorney general dino had no idea where he was going. The wise, old Wilburross saw his chance, stepped forward and wheezed into his ear.
“You’ve said enough, sonny. You’re not tryin’ to get us all fired, are ya?”
But the Mattwhitaker was in full, flopsweat mode. He struggled onward. This face time was s-o-o-o-o addictive. Like the leaves from the Krazyglue tree.
“Hey, ha-ha … did you hear about the T-Rump telling all his Langleyops dinos that they should go back to school?”
The Christopherwray stepped behind him and gave him a swift kick in the rear. The Mattwhitaker didn’t even feel it, he was so lost in the moment.
“School! Yeah, can you believe it? Geez, I was only with the Sessionsopossum for what, a year? Maybe, uh … maybe I should be the dino going back to school. A show of hands maybe?”
The Mediacircusstops squatting before him were stunned. Not one short arm budged. The Mattwhitaker’s shame-faced honesty had consumed him. It was torture and bliss at the same time. Incredibly, to add to the sweat glistening upon his face, he began crying. Crazy tears for Crazytown.
“And what about the T-Rump Jr. calling out before and after the meeting with those damn Russodinos? Business associates? No. No way.” There came a hitching sob. “Why didn’t he just say so months ago? He’s hiding something, isn’t he? Why all the mystery? Will somebody please talk to me?” More sobbing.
The Wilburross smacked the quaking lunatic upside the head.
“Stop it, sonny! Just stop it! There’s no crying in politics!”
“I’m sorry. I forgot I’m the boss.” He calmed somewhat, drawing himself together. “Okay, maybe, maybe I’ll look into that next.”
He blew his nose into his armpit and promptly forgot. His attention span was markedly shorter than the T-Rump’s. The Mattwhitaker looked out at the Mediacircustops and quickly returned to a world where sweet demons flew around inside his head, demons flashing wide smiles of teeth yellowed from gnawing on ears of Iowan corn cobs.
“Then there’s the Donbeyer and the Tedlieu trying to revoke the Kushneratops security clearance. Where, I ask you, do they get off doing that? I mean, so what if the Carlkline over-rode recommendations against security clearances for 30 other dinos. Only 30? Who cares? Not me!”
The Christopherwray pounced, wrapping both hands around the Mattwhitaker’s neck, trying in vain to put an end to oxygen reaching the dino’s brain. It was no use. The thick-necked dino blinked his wild eyes.
“Speaking of the Kushnerstops, don’t you find it kind of interesting that the T-Rump and the Rudygiuliani threatened the Michaelcohen’s father-in-law … then the Chrischristie reminds us all of the disgusting crime the Kushneratops’ own pop committed? Give me a minute to catch my breath on that. I might call that criminal.”
“WHITAKER!”
Uh-oh. It was the T-Rump. The leader of the dino nation rumbled into the gathering.
The Mattwhitaker’s mouth had finally stopped moving. The once-glistening sweat froze to his face. But the Mediacircustops scarcely took notice. They had the T-Rump before them. A rare site indeed.
“T-Rump,” a Mediacircustops bellowed from the back. “Are you on the same page as him too?”
“Of course not,” the Mattwhitaker blurted out. “He doesn’t even read.”
David Belisle 