Who's afraid of Cletus Bedford?

Cletus Bedford is 53 years old and lives with his parents, who are cousins, and not distant cousins.

His neighbors of Patagonia, Arizona, see him passing by every sunny morning -which in Arizona are all-: Cletus Bedford goes to the bakery in shorts every morning, wearing a cape he goes.

Yes, a cape, what's so strange? Didn't Elvis wear a cape? 
I wear a cape every now and then.

And Cletus, with that morning rictus of swollen face and terrible breath that smells like wet carton enunciates his routinary but precise speech:

-"4 baguettes, 6 churros, 6 pandeleches, 6 bolas de fraile".

Because the bakery also sells foreign pastry, and the mother of Cletus, Virginia Rajoy, is Basque, or Belgian.

Some neighbors see him pass by the yellow sidewalk behind the anonymity of their yellow windows, or from their yellow gardens... the yellow cape of Cletus shines under the yellow sun, his Shazam! cape, weekly ironed by his mother, and despite this abnormal human apparition was born and lived all his life in Patagonia, Arizona, he still represents a puzzle for the inhabitants of the town -who aren't too brilliant themselves either way-.


But besides Cletus Bedford has a secret hobby that everybody knows: since his childhood he wanted to become a human cannonball, a human cannonball like a guy he once saw on TV: Sandor, the Paraguayan Fly Man, an infamous or famous human cannonball popular in the 60s, who had his 15 minutes of fame appearing on bad TV shows disguised as a black fly, with plastic wings and a mask that simulated the eyes of a dipterous insect.

Cletus got nuts when he saw Sandor, the Paraguayan Fly Man for the first time in 1968, on a local TV show: "The Toddy Ragovoy Show", an insupportable bêtise where any sort of sub-normal phenomena and atrocious freaks were presented in black & white.

Back then Cletus Bedford was 8 years old, and he already went to the bakery sent by his mother:

-"4 baguettes, 6 churros, 6 pandeleches, 6 bolas de fraile".



Bedford could buy a cannon in 1985, a specially designed cannon that uses compressed air to eject human, he painted it in silver, and named it Sandor, writing the name on the metallic shaft with artistry and thin paintbrush, and he's got this impressive machine at the patio, pointing to the sky like a blinding telescope: the next door neighbors fear him, but... who's afraid of Cletus Bedford?

All his attempts till the day of today have failed, Cletus Bedford never could be ejected, not properly at least.
In 1990, with the assistance of his mother, he was launched, but the distance reached in his flight was miserable, 1,22 metre; it was his greatest flight, let alone the frequent opportunities when the compressed shot explodes in his arse, with painful consequences and no profit.

If he just could adjust the gravity regulator correctly, the feat would come true, he knows, he knows, it's just a matter of ejecting inertia.


Bedford is decided, he will adjust the cannon properly, charge it with a more powerful system to liberate the compressed air, and transport it to the near Santa Rita Mountains, from which he will be felicitously catapulted, falling triumphant with parachute in the middle of his town, breaking, pulverizing the world record... because Cletus Bedford is obsessed with this, and every night he observes the blue slopes of the Santa Rita Mountains from his window: 
morbid modulations come from La Sierra as he falls asleep.




The day came finally, because he lost too many decades in vain efforts: the 16 of September of 2012, Cletus Bedford rented a Citroen van aka "Citroneta" and took the cannon to the mountains, observed by his astonished neighbors behind the anonymity of their yellow windows, or from their yellow gardens, his next door neighbor especially, an old and decrepit woman, she was terrified but... who's afraid of Cletus Bedford?

Aaaah but he knew that this time around he would be catapulted like a Gabriel Archangel under a sky full of the violence of God, and he knew it because the day before Cletus Bedford, he, himself, tested the cannon ejecting a massive cabbage tied with a rope: 
the vegetable fell exactly on the planned place, at the feet of the mountain range: successful landing


excited, almost insane Cletus Bedford -whose mind was not very sound- saw how finally his golden dream was about to come true:

once the cannon was settled on its platform, Bedford introduced his body into the metallic machine, wearing his yellow cape and a helmet
his mother was with him, ready to push the "ejection" button of the cannon, a big and red button with the ejection word in capital letters

during the brief countdown Bedford didn't swallow saliva: 5, 4, 3, 2... 

Already the arthritic finger of his mother is on the ejection button, already, ejection, already, ejection, ejection!


A huge, dry and white explosion at the Santa Rita Mountains was seen from the windows of Patagonia, Arizona, something never heard or seen before from the pacific town: 

immediately, a yellow-ish thing was visualized in the blue sky, like a missile or an UFO, "what the feck happens and what the feck is that?"

-a neighbor said-


it was Cletus Bedford, the idiotic Icarus, resplendent like a bullet cutting the blue spectrum of the Arizona's sky, traveling at a jaw-dropping speed of 455 km/h (chronometrically proven by means of a velocimeter plugged to a Commodore Amiga 500)

suddenly a white parachute was opened, like a seminal discharge, the neighborhood was atónito


slowly, everybody sees Cletus Bedford landing softly in the middle of the town, like a parachutist of the Vietnam War or an intergalactic daredevil, with a smile of triumph in his lips but... his glutei? Did Cletus Bedford lose his glutei?

Cletus just realizes that the energy released by the colossal outburst of compressed air blew his buttocks completely, in their intact entirety, like the toppings of two flans snatched by a spoon

it was surely the price to pay for the glory, same as Sandor, the Paraguayan Fly Man, who lost his testicles and thighs during one of his hardest feats, so that his calves had to be surgically adhered to his pubes, and his family jewels had to be substituted with 2 balls of tin, but... who's afraid of losing the butt when the reward is the eternal and golden fame?


Cletus Bedford still goes to the bakery, with his cape, without glutei, but with a new pride, because the neighbors see him differently now, and even the mayor of Patagonia, Kay Galifi, suggested the erection of a Cletus Bedford memorial, this is why, dear reader, being famous it's important as fuck


-"4 baguettes, 6 churros, 6 pandeleches, 6 bolas de fraile".