Parasites

A short story

Tony Molo sat at his office desk and smiled. He had just posted a story about a prominent senator's dalliance with a topless dancer, which will destroy his career and make Molo wealthier.

"Life is good when you're the hunter," the gossip magazine editor said to himself.

As he continued to gloat about his rag's most recent expose, his secretary, Mildred Murphy, knocked on his office door. He told her come in.

"I have an envelope for you, Sir," the fiftyish woman said as she limped toward her boss's desk.

"What's wrong with your leg, Mildred," Molo asked.

"Just getting old, Sir," the weary secretary replied as she handed the envelope to her boss.

Molo looked at the letter and noticed it had no return address. Mildred headed out of the office and closed to door behind her. The gossip monger opened the letter and let out a slight gasp as he read the two-word letter.

YOUR NEXT.

Molo examined the letter and saw that it was postmarked in New York City, which meant it was sent locally. He grabbed his coat and headed out of the office.

There was a time when Tony Molo was a respected journalist whose articles inspired and induced intelligent conversation, but five years ago he discovered what people really wanted, so he joined the National Tattler, the most ruthless and disreputable gossip magazine on the market. After putting his journalistic ethics aside, Molo was able to buy a nice townhouse in Manhattan, and indulge his wife and two children with frivolous things that made him feel like a good father. He's mortified many a celebrity and destroyed many careers on his way to the top of rag world.

Now, someone wanted payback.

He went home and found his wife and two young children glued to the television, which was airing a story about his supposed affairs with various young women half his age.

"What are you watching," he asked his wife, Jean.

"Is it true," she asked him.

'What?"

'Did you have an affair with a high school cheerleader from a prep school," Jean asked.

"No!"

"Or the cocktail waitress in Connecticut?"

No, this is madness!"

"Or the stripper from Staten Island?"

"Jean, this is all lies! Whoever is doing this is trying to destroy my reputation," Molo pleaded.

"They why are there pictures of you with these women!"

"Because I was probably interviewing them for stories. The cheerleader was giving me information on the son of a councilman involved with drugs. The cocktail waitress claimed to have knowledge of an affair that a well-known evangelist was having with another waitress, and the stripper said she saw Biff Bonner, cavorting with a prostitute," Molo rattled off.

"Isn't Biff Bonner a soap opera star," Molo's youngest daughter asked.

"Yes, now you two get in your rooms," Molo ordered.

'What did we do, Daddy," his son asked.

"Just get in your rooms!"

The two children scurried off, which angered Jean.

"How dare you blame them for your nonsense," she seethed.

"I'm innocent!"

"Then why were you walking with that stripper into a hotel," Jean hollered back.

"What?"

"Yeah, and they say they're pictures of you in bed with the cheerleader!"

"No, this isn't happening," the suddenly hapless rag editor blurted out.

"You pig, I hope you rot in hell," his wife bellowed before walking away.

Two day later, Tony Molo was fired as investigators questioned the cheerleader who was only fifteen. Jean and the kids moved back to Massachusetts, to stay with her parents. The cocktail waitress who was jail on drug charges, claimed that nothing happened between her and Molo, but without any credibility to her name, no one believed her. The stripper died a few weeks back from a drug overdose, which fueled speculation that he was also a murderer.

The next day, Tony Molo took his own life by stepping in front of a trash truck.

Six months after her husbands demise, Jean thanked Mildred Murphy and gave her fifty thousand dollars for her efforts.

"I couldn't have done it without you, Mildred. The sale of the townhouse has allowed me to go back to school and start a new life far away from New York City," Jean said.

"And this fifty grand will give me the opportunity to find me a young and dumb one who I can order around until I get sick of him," the secretary said with a smile.

You can alter pictures, make up lies, and write salicious gossip about people because even if it's all made up, people will make it real.