Mr. Monk Goes to Germany by Lee Goldberg (general ebook reader .TXT) 📕

“So will you take me to his house now?”

“No,” I said.

“Fine,” Monk said. “I’ll just have him arrested.”

“On what charge?”

“Abandonment,” Monk said.

“That’s not a crime,” I said.

“It is when you go off on a vacation and leave your children home alone unattended and unsupervised,” Monk said.

“You aren’t his child. You’re his patient.”

“Same thing,” Monk said.

“You’re an adult,” I said.

“That’s open to debate,” Monk said.

I couldn’t argue with him there. Monk started to make a strange mewling noise.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m weeping,” Monk said. “Can’t you see that?”

“There aren’t any tears,” I said.

“I’m tearless weeping,” Monk said.

“You can’t weep without tears,” I said.

“Then what am I doing?”

“I have no idea,” I said.

“Dr. Kroger would know,” Monk said.

I took Monk to his apartment. He told me he was too depressed to work, not that we had any cases anyway, and he sent me home. I watched him creep in the back way to avoid the cannibals, and then I drove away.

I made pork chops and Caesar salad for dinner. But when I set the plates down on the kitchen table, Julie rolled her eyes theatrically and groaned. I don’t know where the audience was that she was playing to, but the performance wasn’t entertaining me.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“We always have the same things for dinner,” she said.

“Last night we had spaghetti.”

“With salad,” she said. “And we had chicken the day before.”

“Chicken isn’t pork,” I said.

“It’s meat,” she said. “With a salad.”

“You don’t like meat and salad?”

“It’s boring,” she said.

“What do you want instead?”

“I don’t know,” she said. That’s what she always said. I was expected to read her mind.

“You always have complaints, but never any suggestions. How am I supposed to know what you want to eat? I don’t have a crystal ball.”

No sooner did I say that than I cringed. My mom used to say the same thing to me. Is it inevitable that we all eventually become our parents? Would Julie be saying that to her daughter in fifteen years?

“We could go out,” she said.

That’s all she ever wanted to do. Food wasn’t good unless you ordered it off a menu.

“We’re eating at home. This is what is being served. If you don’t like it, there’s cereal in the pantry.”

I started to eat. It was tasty, if I do say so myself.

She glared at me. “Cereal is breakfast food. You don’t eat breakfast food for dinner.”

“Now you sound like Mr. Monk,” I said.

Julie gave me a withering look, with all the wither a teenager can muster.

“You always have to blow everything out of proportion. I don’t like the culinary monotony in this house, so you compare me to a crazy person. That’s really mature.”

“Culinary monotony?” I said. “Where do you get this stuff?”

“I read, Mom.”

“I can’t remember the last time I saw you open a book or a newspaper.”

“I don’t read cave drawings either,” she said. “There’s this new thing called the Web—maybe you’ve heard of it.”

“When did you become so snotty?”

She was talking her way right into being grounded when my phone rang, sparing her. I answered it.

“Help,” Monk croaked.

“What is it, Mr. Monk?” I glanced at Julie, who poked at her food with her fork like she was preparing to dissect a frog.

“He’s up there,” he said. “I can hear him hopping around on one foot.”

“Good,” I said. “You should feel secure knowing exactly where he is.”

“It’s the incessant beat of imminent death,” Monk said. “Hop. Hop. Hop.”

“I’m sure it’s not that bad,” I said.

“Hop. Hop. Hop.”

“Try earplugs,” I said. “Or cotton balls.”

“Hop. Hop. Hop.”

“Put a pillow over your head,” I said.

“Hop. Hop. Hop.”

“I get the point, Mr. Monk. I’m sure he’ll sit down soon for dinner.”

“That’s what I am afraid of,” Monk said.

“Good-bye, Mr. Monk.” I hung up and looked at Julie, who was eating her food with an overly dramatic show of joylessness.

“It could be worse,” I said. “You could be eating your toes.”

She looked at me as if I was losing my mind. I wasn’t. Yet. That was still a couple of hours away.

The first call came at about one a.m. I clawed my way out of a deep sleep and reached blindly towards my nightstand for the phone. I knocked it off the table and almost fell out of bed searching for it on the floor in the darkness.

I was dangling out of my bed, my head nearly touching the floor, when I found the phone and answered it.

“Yes?” I said.

“He’s stopped moving,” Monk said.

“Isn’t that what you wanted?” I said. “Go to sleep.”

“How can I sleep not knowing where he is?” Monk said.

“Get a grip, Mr. Monk.” I am not very sympathetic when I am rudely awakened and I’m nearly upside down, with all the blood rushing into my groggy head.

“He could be outside my door right now, licking his lips and sharpening his pickax.”

“Relax,” I said. “He’s never eaten anyone’s flesh but his own.”

“Maybe he wants to broaden his palate,” Monk said. “And break the culinary monotony.”

Culinary monotony? Again? I struggled up into a sitting position in bed.

“Have you and Julie been talking?”

“No,” Monk said. “But do