The illusion of greatness

They had been on the way to his little league game. Grandad drove his big old Caddy. Joe always loved the crazy big dashboard buttons, the funky tail fins. He remembered Grandad cussing loudly, leaning on the horn, and then the car slipped sideways. After that: darkness. Until

they both came to in the Cadillac. It sat at the side of a dirt road, the front right wheel hanging over a ditch. They had been driving down a busy suburban road, with strip malls on both sides. Now they were surrounded by farmland.

Close to the horizon sat a farmhouse. With no other source of help in sight, they spent the day walking towards it. The setting sun was painting the sky tangerine when a stout farmer & his lithe daughter came out of the shadowy house to meet them. "Car problems, boys?" he drawled

with a Southern accent. “Well my car done did broken down again!” One of the visitors replied. “Well I’ll see what I can do with that. Just gimme a sec.” They set up camp and waited for a while. “Say, your daughter, is she of the marrying age?”

“Why yes, she is! And she’s yours for fifty pieces of silver!” “Silver? I ain’t got silver! Whaddaya think this is, the 1800s?” “Alright she’s yours for fifty bucks!” “Sold!” He handed over fifty dollars in exchange for his daughter’s hand in marriage. They went in the car.

As the door closed, the illusionist smirked at his new son-in-law. “No refunds or exchanges,” he cried as he sprinted away. Soon the car filled up with icky green smoke as his daughter changed into her true form, a gaseous, smelly bag of garbage. Best gag ever!