Thursday, May 25, 2023: Eric Lawson's "Ultimate Bingo"

 

Eric Lawson is an award-winning writer and filmmaker. He is the author of the story collection Circus Head (2023, Sybaritic Press) and the poetry collection Backseat Emperor (2023, 2nd Avenue Press). His work has recently appeared in Ashes to Stardust: A David Bowie Tribute Anthology as well as Dark Onus Lit and Maudlin House. He is the writer and director of the short films The Socially Distant Murder Mystery and A Scardouche!!! Thanksgiving and hosts the video podcast Make Your Own Fun on YouTube.

Granny Grumbly was a bonafide gunslinger when it came to bingo. With her hot pink 

track suit, blue-tinged curly wig, dark sunglasses, and plastic visor embossed with the phrase 

‘Read ‘Em And Weep’—she was a sight to behold. A haunted vibe, some said.

She always sat at table three, chair five. The last person who mistakenly sat in her seat 

was elbowed in the throat and shoved onto the floor before the poor sap even knew what hit him. 

Her Big Gulp cup from 7-Eleven was usually filled with an Amaretto and cream concoction and 

towered over the other drinks at the table. Woe be to anyone who didn’t refill her cup to the brim 

when she snapped her fingers or—heaven forbid—knocked her lidless cup over. 

Her stuffed Siamese cat, Milo, sat half in, half out of her enormous denim purse. Milo 

had a permanently shocked expression on his face. Many an onlooker had ventured a guess as to 

why the cat had that expression. The prevailing rumor was that she once went an entire night 

without winning, and then she had briefly removed her glasses and the look of her dead, glaring 

eyes had simply scared poor Milo to death.

Granny Grumbly was said to have a few loose screws and still heard Milo purring and 

meowing. Whenever she had a particularly bad run of games, she was known to violently grab 

her purse and drunkenly yell directly into the dead cat’s face: “You just hush your butt, Milo!”

To put in bluntly, when Death came for her, he really had his hands full.

He sat across from her with his bingo card and chips and waited for her to notice him. 

She didn’t.

Finally, after two entire games, he’d had enough. “I’ve come for you, Granny 

Grumbly…” he said and pointed one boney finger at her.

“Meh… Get in line, buster,” she grumbled.

Death was undeterred. “The game is over. It’s your time.”

“Correction, creep,” she said and loudly sipped her Big Gulp. “It’s bingo time.”

Death grew impatient. “Fine. Uh, you’ve already won, you see? You’ve won…the 

ultimate bingo.”

“Oh, really?” Granny Grumbly said incredulously. “Says who?” She removed her 

sunglasses and eyed him warily.

“Whoa,” Death recoiled. “That’s some hideous glare you have there, lady.”

She smiled and crossed her arms. “That’s right. You don’t mess with the maestro. Now, 

what’s this ultimate bingo you’re blabbering about, sonny?” She was now standing and tapping 

her foot, no doubt itching to unleash a beat down. “You’re holding up the game. Which means 

you’re standing between me and my money, Goth boy. You want make things interesting and 

step outside?” She cracked her knuckles and made a fist.

Death actually felt intimidated for the first time in eons. “You’re not going to make this 

easy for me, are you?” He sighed and briefly tried to explain it. “It’s the great beyond. It’s the 

answer to the greatest mystery—aw, to hell with it!” 

He raised his scythe and a beam of light came from above and shone onto only Granny 

Grumbly.

Her eyes fluttered drunkenly as she was lifted off the ground. “They don’t serve prune 

juice on this flight, do they, sonny? It gives me the runs awful bad…” The light carried her 

across the room. She flailed her arms and legs wildly, knocking over tables and chairs and drinks 

and people as she went. Eventually, she was carried out the front doors of the bingo hall and into 

the dark night beyond.

Sparky, the old man who called out the numbers for the games, looked on worriedly as 

Death passed him by. He breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Suddenly, Death reappeared in front of him and snapped his fingers, remembering 

something. “Oh, hey,” he muttered. “I almost forgot.” He produced a worn out Spice Girls wallet 

from beneath his robe. He dropped a few twenty dollar bills onto Sparky’s podium. “Sorry about 

the mess. She was really…something else, wasn’t she?”

Sparky nodded and dared not to utter a word.

“Well, all’s well that ends well and all that rubbish.” Something distracted him 

momentarily and then he looked back at Sparkly. “But before I go, old chum, I just really have to ask you; what in God’s name is wrong with that blasted cat?”

Sparky turned to look at Milo, who was still tucked half inside of Granny Grumbly’s 

denim purse, looking just as shocked as ever.

He turned back to meekly face Death again, but he was already gone.

© 2023 Eric Lawson