the creepy bargain

Intermission. A hemi-demi lit theatre. Audience members shuffling in, shuffling out, bunching together here, wandering loosely there. Schmutzie and Palinode are already seated. Schmutzie leans over and gives Palinode's ear a kiss.

Palinode: Now my ear's wet.

Schmutzie: That's too bad.

P: Do you have a sponge tongue or something?

S: Something more absorbent?

P: Yeah, that way you could kiss my ear then bring out the sponge tongue.

S: An interchangeable tongue? That's really gross.

P: But necessary.

S: It's like that fish they found with the parasite tongue.

P: That'd be so cool to bring a fish home with another fish* inside it posing as its tongue.

S: What? That'd be digusting.

P: It would be a bargain. Two fishes for the price of one.

S: No. Not a bargain. It would just be creepy.

P: A creepy bargain.

S: No.

P: Sure. It would be like getting some pork chops with a severed hand in the package. A creepy bargain.

S: It wouldn't be like that at all.

P: Yes it would.

S: You can't just make up a good thing and a bad thing, put them together, and then say "Oooh, that's a creepy bargain". That doesn't work.

P: Works fine. As long as you're not paying for both.

S: I could say "a box of chocolates with a spleen at the bottom" but that doesn't make it a bargain of any kind. It doesn't work.

P: Somebody would be looking for their spleen, it's true. But that's a free spleen for you.

S: It doesn't work!

P: I wouldn't pay for a spleen on its own, but if you throw one in for free, I'm there.

*The creature that devours a fish's tongue and then attaches itself to the tongue's stub is not a fish but a kind of bug. I didn't know this at the time of the conversation. Mea maxima culpa.