History Comes Alive

Paw-paw gave Jonny a dollar for his birthday. Paw-paw always gave Jonny a dollar for his birthday. “Don’t spend it all in one place,” he’d say, then cackle like an idiot. “Ah, kid. You know I’m just messing with you.”
Yeah, Jonny knew that. Jonny wasn’t stupid. He liked his Paw-paw. Who always made a point of saying, “I know this is chickenfeed kid. I put some real money in your college fund like I always do. I hear you bitching about it, I’ll stop.”
Jonny didn’t bitch about it. Even when Paw-paw gave the same advice every year.
“Keep the stupid piece of paper, OK? It’s symbolic. Pin it to the wall in your bedroom. You might see what I’m talking about one day—though I hope to holy hell you don’t.”
So Jonny did exactly that.
On Jonny’s 11th birthday, he push-pinned his 11th dollar to the wall. But he accidentally pinned it back-to-front. And noticed something. He immediately pointed it out to Paw-paw.
“Hey, Paw-paw.”
“Huh.”
“The dollar bill … the one you just …”
“Spit it out, kid.”
“Well, uh … that pyramid on the back thing? Well … its kind of missing the floating eye on top.”
“Aw, fuck,” said Paw-paw.
“You know what that means, Paw-paw?”
Paw-paw did. 
“Look, I’ll tell ya, kid. But you’ll need to keep it to yourself. Can you do that?”
Jonny nodded.
“OK, it’s like this, kid.”
Paw-paw explained that, before the Masons started wearing those stupid hats and driving funny cars and whatnot, well, they were into some serious shit.
“Serious how?”
“Serious magic. That’s how.”
According to Paw-paw, the United States Constitution (which was written by the real Masons who didn’t fuck around) sorta had …
“You one of the real Masons, Paw-paw?”
“What do you think, dumbass? Don’t interrupt me.”
“Sorry, Paw-paw.”
After brief reflection, Paw-paw reboarded his sidetracked train of thought. Concerning the amendment we don’t talk about. (We call it the Zeroth amendment … but that’s a joke, kid. You’ll get it when you get older.) Anyhow, should circumstances arise where some tinplate dictator or demagogue fucks with the Constitution, (the chief asshole in charge and the assholes that run with him, I mean to say) well, that’s when the secret amendment kicks in. And it ain’t pretty. 
“What happens?”
According to Paw-paw, it’s pretty much what you’d expect. The Founding Fathers would instantly come back to life (for a limited period of time), claw their way out of their particular graves, track down these miscreants, and rip them each a new one.
“How would they know?”
“Well, the Eye, of course. The Eye sees everything.”
“But it’s gone.”
“Shit, that’s just the eye on the money. That’s paper! Symbolic, remember? That ain’t the real Eye, kid.”
“So … what’s it mean when the eye on the money is gone?”
“Well, kid. That’s how us real Masons know the shit’s hit the historical fan. Best stay inside the next few hours, y’know?”
They lived in a normally quiet suburb of Washington DC.
But now there was screaming outside.
Jonny thought about asking Paw-paw if they should maybe wake Mom and Dad. But he knew it was a really, really stupid question. Mom and Dad would sleep through hell on earth. It seemed like the best idea, under the circumstances.
The bigass flat screen TV was nothing but static on all channels. So Paw-paw got out the Backgammon board. 
“I’m gonna kick your ass, kid.”
“We’ll see,” said Jonny. 
But he was snoring like a buzzsaw ten minutes later.
Paw-paw smiled, tousled his hair, and made an ancient Masonic sign.
The kid definitely had potential.

© 2018, Marty Fugate, all rights reserved