Book of Jim: Agnostic Parables and Dick Jokes From Lucifer's Paradise by Adam Spielman Page A

for it.”
    So Jim considered the games.  He was adept at Connect Four, but it lacked the element of chance.  Hungry Hungry Hippos was a silly game, and he doubted he could beat Humphrey Bogart at the Game of Life.
    Then he remembered the glossy red dice from the other side of the wall at the edge of paradise.   He took them out of his pocket and set them on the table.  “I’ve got a better game,” he said.  “One roll, high roll wins.”
    “Short and sweet.  I like the kid.”  Humphrey took up a die and he winked at Cleopatra.  “But I have to warn you, Jim, the last time I rolled dice it was for eight thousand dinars, and the other guy died in the war.”
    “What the hell does that even mean?”
    “It means I’ve been here before.”
    Humphrey rolled the glossy red die.  It clattered across the table and came up two.  Jim rolled his glossy red die.  It clattered across the table and came up three.
    “Ha!”  Jim stood.  “Eat shit, Bogart!  The queen is mine!”
    But Humphrey was cool.  “Reel it in, cod-slayer.  I’d say you should play it closer to the vest, but you wouldn’t know how to wear one.  And don’t be a racist, the lady’s a Pharaoh.”
    The Pharaoh belched.  Humphrey stood and shook Jim’s hand.  Then he pulled Jim aside and spoke out of the Pharaoh’s hearing.
    “Between you and me, I’m just putting in an appearance here.  It’s for the papers.  The gams on Cloud Nine suit me just fine.  I’m happy for you.  Really, I am.  You’re a good kid.  Not too clever, but not too sweet either.  It’s a noble combination.  That’s why I didn’t want to embarrass you in front of the lady.”
    “Embarrass me?”
    “Joe Louis is taking a dive.”
    “What?”
    “The Unknown Soldier, he’s going for a walk.”
    “That isn’t better.”
    “Your fly is down, kid.  You’re flopping around like a pygmy.”
    Jim flushed and he checked his fly.  But his fly was not down.  And in the time it took him to recover from his confusion, Humphrey hoisted the Pharaoh over his shoulder and kicked open a window.
    “What the hell, man.  You lost!”
    Humphrey gave him a dramatic profile.  “You had a good run, kid.  It just wasn’t meant to be.”  And he fired off a grappling gun and carried the Pharaoh away.
    Jim ran to the window.  Cleopatra waved.  “Better luck next time, Jim!” she said.  She jumped into Humphrey’s Packard Super-Eight.  Humphrey took her away, down the road that curved around the sea.
    “But I won,” Jim said. 
    He took out the jeweled egg and opened it.  Inside there was voucher addressed to the runner-up in the Annual Cleopatra Lottery.  Jim thought, How did she know?  Then he thought, Oh, that bitch.
    The voucher was for eighteen holes of golf with Adolf Hitler.

 
    VII
    1
    “Fore!” Jim yelled.  Even in paradise he hooked the damn ball.  The ball sailed left over the fairway and past the bunker.  It thwunked a tree.
    “Ha!”  Hitler pulled out his driver.  “At least you’re not trapped in the bunker.  Get it?”
    “Yeah, I get it.”
    Hitler teed up and took one practice swing.  The swing was creamy smooth.   When he struck the ball it went straight down the middle of the fairway.  He said, “It was a suicide joke.”
    And Jim thought, Bogart is balls deep in the flesh of Isis, and I get hooks and Hitler jokes.
    “You seem a little tense,” Hitler said.  “Perhaps you’re unhappy with the lottery result.”  He replaced his driver and put an arm around Jim’s shoulder.  “Cleopatra and the Fuhrer have much in common.  We will have a good time.  And eighteen holes is more than she would have given you.  Ha!”
    “I get it.”
    “A sex joke!”
    Jim climbed into the chariot with the Fuhrer.  The chariot was drawn up the fairway by two hipsters , for their names were Larry Goldstein and Gary Steinberg.
    “I’ll bite,” said Jim.  “What could you possibly have in common with