German Invasion, Army of Steve

"Hey Steve, how 'bout buy one
get one free?"

By Steve Siciliano

I was knocking out pieces of the store’s shattered plate-glass windows with the butt of my M1 rifle when it really started raining. I ducked when I heard another explosion and when I rose back up two German Tiger 1 tanks were rumbling east down the middle of Lake Michigan Drive. Doug ran out, crouched behind a smoldering car in the parking lot, and began lobbing bottles of peach schnapps at each tank. The bottles bounced off the tanks' four-inch armor plates and exploded in bright orange flashes in the street.

A steel-helmeted Greg was perched atop a telephone pole pelting the Tigers with one pound bags of grain that Katie and John were shooting up to him with a giant sling shot. The tanks stopped at the edge of the parking lot, aimed their 88-mm cannons at the store, and when the guns fired, huge soap bubbles blew out from the muzzles. I heard something behind me and turning saw Joseph Stalin standing on the counter holding an open bottle of Popov and screaming obscenities. Meanwhile Winston Churchill was in the walk-in humidor filling the pockets of his suit coat with cigars. When the telephone began ringing Stalin motioned towards it with the half empty bottle of vodka. “Answer it, comrade” he said.

“Hello,” I said.

“Sorry to bother you but I.. .”

“Who is this?”

“Sarah."

"Who?"

"Sarah. I work for you, remember? I need to know how many…”

“You tell Churchill to pay for those cigars!”

‘What?”

“And tell that commie bastard Stalin to get his ass off the counter.”

“Steve, what the hell are you talking about?”

I noticed suddenly that a hard rain was driving in through the den’s open windows. There was a flash of lightning and an echoing rumble of thunder. I glanced at the television and saw a column of jack-booted Nazis goose-stepping under the Arch de Triumph.

“Have you been drinking?” Sarah asked me.

I got up from the recliner to close the windows. “No,” I growled. “But you did wake me up from a nap.”