Written by Czar Fruitcake
SUMMARY: A multifaceted THWACK in response to the episode entitled “Peer Pressure.” Down with re-runs!
Ruthie Camden suddenly awoke with a start. She had been bedridden for several days due to intense bruising and swelling on her THWACKing hand. She slid out of bed and stood up, and she had to grab the bedpost to keep her balance when everything suddenly went black.
“Oh, Ruthie,” a monotonous voice spoke from the doorway.
“Yasmin!” Ruthie exclaimed in surprise. “What are you doing here?!”
“What-do-you-think-Ruthie?” Yasmin asked. “I-am-the-little-voice-in-your-head-that-warns-you-to-be-good.”
“No offense, Yasmin, but I’m just about the last person in this family that needs a voice in my head telling me what to do. I’m the voice of reason.”
“I’m-sorry-Ruthie-but-I-feel-it-is-my-Muslim-duty-to-lecture-you-on-right-and-wrong-while-waiting-for-the-day-I-can-seek-out-a-husband.”
“Your Muslim duty? Since when is that part of Islam?!”
“Well, actually it’s not,” Yasmin told her, temporarily breaking out of automaton-mode. “But I’m not really Muslim. The plot bunnies stuck me on the show to do a thoughtful piece on the effects of September 11, and now they bring me back from time to time as your token ethnic friend. Never mind that I’m a robot who can’t act. When I wear this head covering, everyone respects me.”
“Yes, master,” Ruthie responded, heading over to Lucy’s makeup, anticipating a pity get-well visit from what’s-his-face that she was dating this week.
“You-can’t-wear-makeup,” the automaton’s voice returned. “You-must-embrace-your-natural-beauty.”
“Well, Lucy uses it all the time. And she got that square-jaw cop who graces the garage bedroom with greased-up half naked workouts. And dear ol’ Chipmunk face looks hideous without makeup. I’m pretty to begin with, so imagine the guys I could pick up.”
“Wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong…” robot-Yasmin called out.
Ruthie reached out to THWACK her, but her hand went right through Yasmin’s head.
“AAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!” Ruthie shrieked, fleeing her room and locking Yasmin in behind her.
Sprinting full speed towards the stairs, she ran right into Robbie, who was dressed in a huge overcoat, a top hat, and oversized sunglasses and appeared to be muttering to himself.
“Robbie?!” she exclaimed, completely confused. “What are you doing here? And why are you dressed like that?”
“No reason, Ruthie,” he said in an exaggerated whisper, looking stealthily around a corner. Apparently convinced it was safe, he began to head downstairs, not walking upright, but slithering around on his stomach.
Ruthie shrugged it off, blinking a couple of times to be sure her eyes weren’t fooling her. She wandered into the kitchen, where she found her father in a heated debate with Rabbi Glass. “Where did you come from?” she blurted out. “Er, sorry Rabbi.”
“No problem, dear Ruthie. I’m here discussing my sermon from yesterday. Apparently, the church thought…”
“Hold on there, Skippy,” Ruthie interrupted. “Last I checked you were a rabbi. As in, a leader in the jewish faith. Why are you giving sermons at a church?!” She reached out to THWACK him but ended up hitting the kitchen cabinet when her hand went right through his head. She gaped at her hand, baffled.
“Yes, Ruthie, I am a devout Jew. However, your father needed someone to take over for a few weeks while he’s recuperating from his surgery. And since Morgan is too frightened of Eric after that whole shoving-into-the-closet incident, Eric thought I’d be the best for the job. We were just discussing which aspects of Jesus I should bring up next time.”
“You can’t give a sermon on Jesus! You don’t believe in Jesus!” Ruthie screamed, exasperated.
Eric and Rabbi Glass both looked at her as though she had just suggested that Lucy was sane. “That’s nice, honey,” Eric said gently. “But now Rabbi Glass has to drive me to the church, to, uh, pick up some stuff I left there.”
At that moment, the slithering Robbie entered the kitchen, crawling right between Reverend Camden and Rabbi Glass.
“Uh, Robbie…what exactly are you doing?” Eric asked.
“Nothing!” Robbie hissed in an urgent tone, muttering something else incoherent and slithering right out the back door.
Ruthie headed for the living room, but ran into Roxanne, Kevin, and Lucy on the way. Knowing that the situation could not possibly be pleasant, she tried to sneak around them but Lucy blocked her path.
Roxanne was leering at Lucy. “Luuuuuuuucccccyyyyy…did you know that Kevin doesn’t like board games?”
“You don’t?” Lucy looked at Kevin, confused.
“Don’t listen to her, Lucy. She’s just a little crazy right now. I love board games, but the only one I want to play them with is you.”
Ruthie didn’t even bother to THWACK him; she sensed that inevitably her hand would go right through.
Roxanne started dancing in a circle around Lucy, waving her arms and chanting, “booooooooard games! Booooooard games! Boooooooooard games! Boooooooooard games!”
Lucy looked annoyed at first and then a spark of anger appeared in her eyes. She lunged at Kevin, tackling him to the ground. “You played board games with that trampy ho, didn’t you?!” she shrieked in a high-pitched voice. “What did you play with her?! Monopoly? Clue? Chutes & Ladders?” she gasped. “Not…CANDYLAND?!”
“No, not Candyland,” Kevin grunted, shoving Lucy off of him. “I was never too fond of Princess Lolly. We played cards once while we were bored at the station.”
Lucy slapped him hard across the face.
“Hey!” Ruthie exclaimed. “How come you can smack people?! And what do you mean, ‘almost-engaged’? Are we in rerun-land or something?!”
Everyone ignored her. “I can’t believe that you would do that to me even when we’re almost-engaged!” Lucy screamed. “That’s the equivalent of having sex with her, you know! That’s it, you’re not spending any more time alone with her. Ruthie, you need to stay here and watch the twins – I’m going in the squad car.” She glared at both Roxanne and Kevin, daring them to say otherwise.
The moment the three of them went out the front door, Samvid wandered into the room. “Hey, Ruthie,” the taller, smarter head said cheerfully. “We’ve been working on a new trained-seal trick all day. Would you like to see it?”
“Sure, Samvid.”
“Oh Ruthie, I do wish you would stop referring to us as Samvid. Is it really that hard to distinguish us as individuals when I’m so obviously smarter and more coherent?!”
“Sorry, Samvid, I’ll try harder.”
The tall head rolled his eyes in exasperation. “It’s no use is it? We’re four years old and will forever be known as a two headed entity of equal stupidity. Well, here’s the dumb trick it took me four hours to teach my lesser half. Hope you’re amused.” He turned to the shorter head, and said in a baby-voice, “I’m SAM.” He then hit the other head softly.
“I’m DAVID!” the dumb head chirped.
“Wow!” exclaimed Ruthie. “That’s a really neat trick, Samvid!”
“Yeah,” the smart head grumbled. “It’s oh-so-amazing that a four year old is able to utter his own name. God knows why they gave that head the two syllable name. So Ruthie, do you think we could possibly get a snack now?”
Ruthie smiled down at Samvid.
“Me want…COOKIE!” the dumb head uttered.
“Oh, you’re hungry, Samvid? I’ll get you a snack as soon as I let my boyfriend in.”
An hour later, Annie found Samvid sitting in the kitchen in a big pile of cookie crumbs. “Where’s Ruthie?!” she asked. “That girl is dead!”
“Well, she’s slow-dancing in the living room with her boyfriend. I figured that we might as well go get the cookies ourselves and make a mess or something,” the smart head of Samvid said. “It’s not like we’ll get in trouble or anything. Despite the fact that we’re four, everyone seems to think we are incapable of having any sort of idea that stealing cookies and making messes is bad.”
“Dancing!” echoed the dumb head.
“Dancing?” Annie exclaimed, running into the living room to yell at Ruthie.
After Annie kicked the token boyfriend out of the house, she drove Ruthie to the church so that Eric could deal with her (for no particular reason) and forgot about the twins once again.
Ruthie wandered into Eric’s office in the back of the church, but stopped short in the doorway when she caught a glimpse of the scene in front of her.
Eric was dressed in a floral-print dress, high heels, and a straw hat placed strategically over a curly blonde wig.
“Hi there,” he said to Chandler. “Who are YOU? Where is Reverend Camden?”
“Eric? What are you doing?” Chandler asked.
“I’m not Eric. My name is ERICA and I have a problem I’d like to discuss with the Reverend.”
“Okay, ERICA,” Chandler said in a mock-serious tone. “Eric is away right now, but I’m going to be filling in for him, so why don’t you tell me about your problem?”
“You’re a mighty attractive man,” Eric cooed in his girly voice. “Aren’t you a little young to be a minister?”
“I’m an associate pastor. And Eric, if this is your way of getting out your homosexual urges or something…”
“Why, Chandler!” Eric exclaimed with a giggle.
“ERIC!!!” Rabbi Glass shrieked, suddenly running into the room clutching his chest.
“My name is ERICA,” Eric announced, not looking happy to see him.
“Oh, can it, Eric!” Rabbi Glass yelled, pulling off the blonde wig. “I’m having a heart attack here – I need you to drive me to the hospital!”
He ran out of the room, dragging Eric with him and shrieking, “this is God’s punishment for my driving Eric to church!”
“Yes, Rabbi, it’s the fact that you drove Eric to church. That’s WAY more blasphemous to your religion that giving a sermon on Jesus.”
“Ruthie! What are you doing here?” Chandler asked.
“Who knows? Can you give me a ride home?”
Entering the Camden kitchen, Ruthie and Chandler found Eric and Rabbi Glass sitting at the table eating peanut-butter sandwiches.
“How was that heart attack, Rabbi Glass?” Ruthie inquired.
“No heart attack,” Eric told her. “Just a little gas.”
"Silly Rabbi," said Rabbi Glass, hitting his forehead. "Trix are for kids."
Robbie wandered in carrying several pineapples. In the silence that followed when everyone stared at him, Ruthie made out a barely perceptible “that’s him!” Squinting, she saw a tiny Matt sitting on Robbie’s left shoulder.
“That’s Chandler!” announced the little Mary on his right shoulder. “Tell him to pack his bags and leave town!”
“Stop it! You guys are driving me crazy!” Robbie hissed under his breath.
“I can’t help it, Robbie, you drive me crazy as well…” Mary whispered in a suggestive tone. She then leaned over and began caressing Robbie’s neck with her tongue. “You know you want me…”
“I need to go back to bed…” Ruthie mumbled. “I’ll wake up when re-runs are over.” There was just no use in being awake in Glen Oak without the ability to THWACK.
On her way back upstairs, Ruthie nearly tripped over the homeless clown and Vietnamese mime, who had somehow made their way inside and were playing Candyland on the hall floor.