Action Men with Duct Tape, Part 3 (Mystery Comedy Serial)

With links to previous episodes

Photo by Asael Peña on Unsplash

As Bronwyn and I walked over to join the end of the line at Starbucks, I couldn’t help feeling that the eyes of the superfan we’d just met were still following our every move. I resisted the urge to turn around and confirm my suspicions. Besides, if I was wrong, wouldn’t I be the one being the creepy creeper dude by staring at him?

(Ahem.) We interrupt this programming to say that, if you missed parts 1 and 2 of this series, it’s very understandable. The flow of this series was interrupted for a long time. You can find Part 2 here and Part 1 here. You should “start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.”

“So, should I get you one of those Pokemon Go frappuccinos?” I asked Bronwyn.

“I want a mocha frappuccino,” said Bronwyn.

“Aren’t you too young for coffee?”

“It’s a frappuccino. It’s practically a milkshake. Uncle Jack lets me have coffee flavored ice cream.”

“Ye-ah,” I said, my voice sliding from a high to low note. “But actual coffee has too much caffeine. It’s my duty as your uncle by proxy to protect you from drugs.”

“Drugs?” said Bronwyn. “It’s caffeine, not crack.”

At the mention of crack, my protective instincts turned up a notch … or twenty. “Crack? Who’s been talking to you about crack?” I asked.

“The police.”

“The police!”

Bronwyn rolled her blue eyes at me. “I’m in the D.A.R.E. program … you know where they teach about drug prevention.”

“Right,” I said.

“Plus,” she said. “I watch TV. I don’t live in a cave.”

“Right,” I said. “Well, caffeine is still a drug … albeit a socially acceptable one.”

In the process of this whole, interesting discussion on drugs, we had worked our way to the front of the line.

“Hi,” I told the barista. “I’d like a cold brew for myself, and she’d like a …”

“I want a mocha …” Bronwyn put in.

At this point, I took Bronwyn into a loving chokehold. Let me rephrase that. I gave Bronwyn a sideways hug that strongly resembled a chokehold. “She’d like one of those unicorn drinks or whatever you have that’s pink and girly and non-caffeinated,” I said. “With a big smiley face on the cup, please.” I myself don’t know why I felt the need to add the last part.

“Okay,” said the barista. “I could do a cotton candy frappuccino. That’s pink. The unicorn one is more colorful.”

I shrugged a shoulder. “I leave it to you.”

“What’s the name?”

“Andy.”

“Her name?”

“Bronwyn.”

“Donna-Lynn?”

“Bronwyn.”

“Brooklyn?”

“Bronwyn.”

Finally, she nodded, and I paid for our drinks. I was pleased with our results. Mine was dark and beautiful, though I almost questioned my adults-only gateway-to-crack choice of beverage, by way of example. Bronwyn’s was bright purple-pink with swirls of blue and a fairy dusting of pink and blue sugar on top of the whipped cream. The barista had indulged my stupidity with a huge smiley face on the cup right next to the name, “Brooklyn.” I tossed a tip in the tip jar.

Photo by Michelle Oshen on Flickr

We meandered over to a table in the food court then, and I still had this eerie feeling that Mr. Superfan was looking our way. When was I going to let that go? “I suppose I should text Uncle Jack to tell him and Dec to meet us here,” I said. Just as I said that, I spotted Jack and Declan coming through the food court entrance, carrying bags from Best Buy. It was as if Jack and I were so close we could communicate by telepathy, either that or the smell of Cinnabon was like the call of sirens to Ulysses.

I waved them over, and they joined us at a table. Best Buy bags mingled with pastel bags from Forever 13 (or wherever it was) on a spare chair.

“Don’t look now,” I said, “but we met this guy in the food court earlier who’s a mega-fan of our Blaze comic series. He strikes me a bit creepy, but he’s sitting there in the corner. Blondish-brown hair, receding hairline, rectangular-framed glasses …”

“Don’t look now” had the same effect as saying, “Don’t think about zebras in bikinis.” Do you see what I mean? What image just popped into your head? Jack looked to the corner.

“I see him,” Jack said.

“Is he staring at us?”

“I’m staring at him,” said Jack. “Oh, now, he’s looking.”

“Look away,” I said.

Jack did. I thought that our guy might walk over to chat with Jack, now that he had joined us. It wouldn’t be too unreasonable considering our earlier business discussion, but I now had mixed and strange feelings about it.

I fished in my shirt pocket and pulled out the pen he’d given us earlier. “He gave us a pen,” I said. “Apparently, he runs a comic book store and suggested we could go there for a signing some time.”

Photo by Joe Ciciarelli on Unsplash

“Not a bad idea,” said Jack. He looked hard at the pen, at the business name on the side, at first. Then, he began to twist and turn the pen in different angles and stare at it some more. He was so mesmerized you’d think it was one with spinning lighted fiber optics (one of our own products.) I was mostly accustomed to Jack’s quirks by now, the way he would study ordinary things from an engineer’s perspective, but this was seeming ridiculous. It seemed like a pretty run-of-the-mill pen to me.

“Is there something special about that pen?” I asked.

“Maybe not,” said Jack. “It just seemed … well, never mind …” He set it down on the table. “Going to his store for a signing might not be a bad idea, for our writer and artist.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I think he wants you … the big brains, the concept guy. The superfan’s as fruity as a pebble, if you ask me.”

“As fruity as a pebble?” Jack raised his eyebrows. “Pebbles aren’t generally fruity.”

“Some of them are, when they come in boxes labelled Fruity Pebbles.”

Photo by Haley Owens on Unsplash, This is not exactly Fruity Pebbles but was the best stock photo I could find. It has the right idea perhaps.

“The breakfast cereal isn’t made of literal pebbles,” said Jack.

“I’ve known that since I was five,” I said. I sighed. “Don’t be so literal when I am trying to be clever.” I paused. “Is he still there?”

Jack glanced back in the direction of the corner. “No, he’s gone now.”

© Susan Joy Clark 2021

To be continued …

Action Men with Duct Tape, Mystery Serial, 1

mystery serial title header showing two silhouettes of men and duct tape

This is a Jack Donegal Mystery Serial, in the same series with Action Men with Silly Putty and Action Men and the Great Zarelda.

It’s a mystery serial as opposed to a mystery cereal. (A mystery cereal sounds like something with fiber in the name trying to disguise itself, although there was a limited edition Volcano Mystery Crunch … with Pop Rocks.)

This post features a couple of different Amazon affiliate links, so, if you are inspired by the fashion of the fictional Bronwyn, click away.

Action Men with Duct Tape, Mystery Serial, Part 1

Image by Pixabay


“So, what do you think, Uncle Andy?” Bronwyn Byrne, my “niece” only by my close brotherly association with her actual Uncle Jack, stepped out of the dressing room, held her arms out and twirled around.  

I sighed, expressing relief. “Ah. It’s fine.” I’d seen plenty of “Nos” on this shopping trip – the skintight leggings, the too-short skirts, some darkly themed band T-shirts of questionable taste. The outfit she was wearing with the pink shirt bedecked with cupcakes and sprinkles was something to which I could say. “Yes.” This was how little girls should look, all pink with cotton candy and unicorns and glitter.

“It’s fine? Just fine?” She drooped her arms down to her sides.

  Somehow, the girl had translated “fine” as “barely passable.” “Yeah … right. I mean it’s … cute.”   “It’s cute?” She groaned. “In other words, I look like I’m seven.”  

“Nah. Nah. You look your age. You look like a cute …” I was not good at this. I’ve never been a dad, and here I was acting in the role of one. I was out of my element, standing there with my arms loaded with pastel-colored shopping bags, not to mention Bronwyn’s little purse, covered in emojis, dangling from my elbow … not exactly the manliest of accessories.

“Where’s Uncle Jack?”  

That was a very good question. Why couldn’t Jack be here to handle these delicate girly issues with his own niece? “He got an important phone call on his cell about the event tomorrow, so he went to look for a quiet place to talk. When he’s done there, he’ll probably check on your brother at the Best Buy.”  

I turned myself around, Bronwyn’s little purse swinging like a flag in tribute to my manliness.

I spotted a boy, around 12, skulking in a corner behind a clothes rack with his Nintendo DS, probably the unfortunate brother of a shopper in this girly store.

Image from Pixabay

“Hey kid,” I said. “Come here.”   He looked up and lifted an eyebrow.   “I need a man’s opinion.” This seemed to get his attention. I hoped Bronwyn would appreciate the opinion of a boy her age. She was already starting to notice members of the opposite sex.

mystery serial graphic showing girl shopping for clothes and a mall cop

When the kid approached, I put my hands on his shoulders and pointed him in Bronwyn’s direction. “See there? That’s my niece. Her outfit shows good taste, right? It’s cool, hip, da bomb … Is da bomb still a phrase?”  

“Uh … That would be a no,” said the kid. I noticed he refrained from rolling his eyes at me … unlike Bronwyn.  

“Well,” I said. “The outfit. She needs some affirmation. She looks good, right?”  

The kid was now giving me a nervous side eye. “Uh … yes?” The boy either had a young person’s habit of ending every phrase as a question or he was terrified of disagreeing with me or maybe afraid of agreeing with me a little too much.

Image from Pixabay

He shrugged a single shoulder. “Sure. Whatevs. It’s cool … for her.” He said this as if he wanted me to be sure he wouldn’t wear it himself.

A little while later, I met Bronwyn in her regular clothes, the trial outfit draped over her arm. She spoke to me through her teeth. “Can you get any more embarrassing?”  

“Uh … do you really want to know the answer to that question?”  

“Probably not.” Her comment was accompanied by another eye roll.  

“So, you’re not taking it?” I asked, pointing to the pile on her arm.  

“No, I’m taking it,” she said.  

Moments later, we were hitting the halls of the mall, and I was relieved of half of the baggage. Walking along the halls and the crowd, a thought came to me.

Maybe the thought came to me out of boredom from shopping at Girly Outfitters and Forever 13 or maybe my blood sugar was dropping and addled my brain.

My nose was picking up aromas of Cinnabon and freshly baked cookies, but, up to this moment, I had refrained from indulging. I decided this was a good time to hone her self defense skills.  

Image from Pixabay

I steered Bronwyn away from the main mall traffic. “Hey,” I said. “Check out the mannequins.” I directed her towards a side entryway, sandwiched between Old Navy and another tween girl’s paradise. The mannequins in the window display looked like they belonged on a teen pop star’s stage and were set up like a step by step dance tutorial.

I was beginning to think like Jack, imagining photos from the line-up, left to right, put together into an action flipbook.   Bronwyn stood mesmerized. It didn’t hurt that the outfits were loud and crazy like a mashup between a Harajuku kawaii frillfest and Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory. If the cutesie didn’t make you sick, the edible suggestions of ice cream cone earrings with gumball-spattered skirts might. Then came the sneak attack.

Image by Pixabay
So, not exactly like a dance tutorial nor too wild and crazy here … but you get the idea. 🙂

I slinked up behind her and seized her around the middle, pinning her arms. “Now, suppose I’m a bad guy,” I said, “what do you do now?” We’d gone through this exercise a few times back at our apartment. This was the first time I’d attempted it in public.

Trouble with the Mall Cop

Looking to my left and spying a mall cop giving me the stare down, I surmised it was probably my last time doing this in public.   Mr. Mall Cop Guy was glaring at me as if I were Ted Bundy.

“I’m her uncle,” I said, loosening my grip on Bronwyn’s waist. Biologically speaking, this wasn’t the strict truth, but, emotionally speaking, it was. “I was impersonating a bad guy and – apparently – doing too good a job of it.”   Mr. Mall Cop Guy looked from me to Bronwyn and back again, perhaps looking for a sign that she was okay or that I was telling the truth. I pointed to him. “You, Sir, are doing an excellent job of protecting young girls from creeps like me … well, no, not literally creeps like me … creeps like the bad guy I was impersonating. I, for one, salute you.”  

Image from Pixabay

I put out my arm for a fist bump, and he took a couple of steps back.   “Aw, c’mon. I didn’t swing at you. If I wanted to swing at you, I’d do a better job than that.” This was my day to stick my foot in my mouth over and over again.

I was going to have to head over to Starbucks for one of those frappuccino things to wash out the taste of foot.

“Not that I’m in the habit of taking a swing at fine upstanding security personnel.”  

Image from Pixabay

Bronwyn reached over and gave me a squeeze around the middle. “Uncle Andy is completely harmless,” she told Mr. Mall Cop Guy.   “I am not completely harmless …”

Just like Bronwyn had understood “cute” as babyish, I understood “harmless” as milquetoast.

Then, I looked at Mr. Mall Cop Guy and thought I’d better change my phraseology. “Except to kids. I’m harmless to kids.” I gave Bronwyn a firm pat between the shoulder blades and rubbed my knuckles into her scalp.  

Mr. Mall Cop Guy shrugged and shook his head in a way that made me think he was still assured that I was a weirdo but just of the “harmless” variety.

To Be Continued …

© 2018 Susan Joy Clark

Did you enjoy this first mystery serial episode? Did you enjoy the character of Andy Westin? Let me know in the comments.

You can read more adventures with Andy and his buddy Jack Donegal in Jack Donegal Mysteries books. You can also download Part 1 of the prequel to the series, Action Men with Fuzzy Dice, when you subscribe to this site.

Stay tuned for more mystery serial adventures.