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This writing was accepted for publication in the 84 page perfect-bound issue of cc&d (v226) (the November 2011 Issue, You can also order this 5.5" x 8.5" issue as an ISSN# paperback book:						This is also in this 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback “No Return” Order this 6" x 9" ISBN# book:

Order this writing in the book Fragments (a cc&d collection book)		get the 322 page September-December 2011 cc&d magazine issue collection 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

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Jack-O Sock

J. Kent Allred

    I’ll usually start with my best ‘80s moon-walk across the kitchen floor, the tile cold and smooth against my thin dress-socks, the lack of traction makes the illusion more believable. I am a large, Caucasian male and not the least bit elegant. I coax my 6 and 4 year-olds to come to me in my best mezzo-soprano, “Hey, kids, come see Neverland Ranch.”
    “No way? Not Neverland,” they cry out in stereo.
    I have a black top hat, collapsed on one corner with a bald spot in the felt that I bought at thrift, strictly for this purpose. A single hand, adorned with a white athletic sock, lures my children closer to me, “There’s lots of goodies at my ranch, kiddies.” My children could care less that my impersonation sounds nothing like Michael Jackson; they have no idea who he is. Instead my voice sounds more like Mrs. Doubtfire, yet nasally, because of the white Kleenex I have shoved up both nostrils, the tail of the tissue rolled back up over my nose and tucked under my eyeglasses.
    “Are you going to make s’mores out of us when you get us to your lair, Jack-o?” my son asks. They continue to follow me into my bedroom.
    “I would never do anything to hurt little children,” I reply. Once they are safely in my bedroom I slam the door behind them. The lights go out and I whisper, “Jack-o, Jack-o, Jack-o, Jack-o,” each whisper quieter and quieter as it dies out, reminiscent of an old horror flick. “Jack-o, Jack-o, Jack-o, Jack-o.”
    “Jack-o!” both kids scream in unison.
    “He tricked us again,” my daughter laughs, trying her best to pretend she’s actually scared.
    My voice drops to a deep-finky tone, “Now welcome to my lair, where nobody gets out alive.” I turn the light back on and chase my son, trapping him in the corner of the room.
    “Don’t baby dangle me, Jack-o!” I wrap my arms around him and lift his small body perpendicular to my bed until his hands and feet are pressed against the roof. He is laughing again and trying his best to play the role of terrified child, “Don’t baby dangle me, Jack-o, please don’t...” I release him from the ceiling and his body drops the six feet to meet the mattress, where I have a bevy of pillows to ease his fall.
    The kids take turns allowing me to chase them through the house in my makeshift costume as they deliver horrific screams, but allow me to catch them over and over to drag them back to my lair and baby-dangle them again.
    After fifteen or twenty minutes, out of exhaustion, one of them will usually retrieve a drink from the kitchen, bait me into catching them and spew water upon me. “Ahhhh,” I scream bloody murder as I cover my face and flail uncontrollably. “I’m melting, I’m melting... Oh, God, call aunt Liz and tell her to alert the cryogenics lab!”
    I can hear my wife laughing from the kitchen as my children giggle uncontrollably with a deep sense of satisfaction for defeating Jack-o again.
    I would choose a dirty white sock, old musty hat, and a Kleenex over a Nintendo “Wii” or cable television any day. Nothing gets the imagination flowing like cheap entertainment, Jackson-style.

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