JENNIFER looked in horror as she saw Marty getting ready to pick up the rapier that one of Tannenio’s men had dropped for him. She felt the tug as out of the corner of her eye she saw her captor reaching out for his sword. Then, she remembered something. Somehow, hearing Marty being intimidated into the swordfight to come by being called a coward had triggered something in her memory.
It was their trip to 1978
Jennifer was aware of Marty's concern for Jan so she asked "Marty, what are you doing?"
"I'm gonna try to talk her into leaving that asshole." said Marty.
"Marty." whispered Jennifer, "You can't. This is 1978. That's the Jan of eight years ago. Remember what Doctor Brown said about interacting with people in the past."
"I know, Jen." said Marty, "Anything I do right now could have a profound effect on future events. But I can't help it now." Turning to Jan, he said "Listen, get away from that son of a bitch. He's bad news."
"Marty." said Jennifer, tapping him on the shoulder.
"He's a bastard." Marty went onto to say to Jan.
"Marty." insisted Jennifer.
"He's trash." he continued to say.
"Marty!" said Jennifer.
Marty turned to Jennifer asking "What Jen?" Out of the corner of his eye he noticed Jandick stand alongside of him. Turning back to Jan, he said "He's right behind me. Right?" Jan nodded affirmatively. "And I'm about to be shit." Marty said with doom in his voice.
"You'd better believe it." said Jandick.
"I think I'd better leave." said Marty as he wiggled past Jandick to get Jennifer and leave.
"You'd better leave." said Jandick, "You chicken!"
Marty was halfway to the door with Jennifer when he heard that. Turning to Jandick he asked "What did you call me?"
"Chicken, jerk!" repeated Jandic.
It's been a year since he avoided the accident with the Rolls-Royce by ignoring Needles' "chicken" remark. There were times when he couldn't control himself, but the resentment over being called a chicken was in full force.
"Nobody calls me chicken." he said.
"Oh, so I hit a nerve." said Jandick.
Jennifer restrained Marty saying "Marty, let's go. Just ignore him."
"Not without Jan." said Marty.
At once, he reached Jan's arm and dragged her out of the cafe with Jandick
following them.
That’s how it happened. Jennifer said to herself, He wasn’t thinking about Jan, he was thinking about himself and…oh my God! She remembered the dream she had this morning and the sudden change in her memory. If Marty survives this and returns to the future with me, he’s liable to be called a chicken unless he participates in some road race that’ll result in him crashing into Jan’s gallery and sending both lives into a tailspin.
Then, she looked at Marty again. She saw him hesitate. Then, he decided to approach Jennifer and grab him from her.
The crowd was angry over this so Marty turned around and said “Mellow out will you .”
The crowd was startled by this. “Mellow out?” they asked each other, “What does mellow out mean?”
Marty didn’t answer. He just went onto say “The count’s an asshole!”
That brought out another question from the crowd. “What’s an asshole?” they asked each other.
What is Marty doing? Jennifer asked herself, It’s as if he can’t make up his mind what to do now.
But Marty went on saying “I don’t care what he says. And I don’t care what any of you say. If he thinks that I’m a coward because I just want to grab this girl from him instead of fighting over her, that’s his problem. And if any of you think that I’m a coward because I just want to grab her from him instead of fighting over her that’s your problem.” Then, turning to the woman who said that no woman would desire him because he was a coward and said “And if you think that no woman will ever want me because I’m a coward, get a life!” Turning to the rest of the crowd he said “There’s more in life than proving that you have courage. I mean you all are victims of disorganized thinking. You are all under the under the unfortunate delusion that simply when you see someone run away from danger, that person has no courage. You’re all confusing courage with wisdom.”
“The Wizard of Oz” Jennifer said to herself, He’s getting that part of the speech from that movie.
“Where I come from,” Marty went onto say, “we’ve got men who are heroes. Once a year they take their fortitude out of mothballs and parade it down the main street of the city and they have no more courage than you think I have.”
The crowd was growing indignant over this speech and Marty’s sudden lack of indecision. “Fight, you coward.” they said.
“And another thing.” Marty went onto say, “I’m sick and tired of proving that I’m not a coward. I mean I’ve been tagged with that label ever since I was a kid and every time I lose self control and tell everyone that nobody calls me a coward. There were times that I even have to prove it.
“Then, one day I learned that a distant relative of mine used to get upset when someone called him a coward and had to prove it too. That’s how he got killed when he got a stab in the belly in a knife fight with someone. So I started to learn not to get upset when someone called me a coward or prove that I’m not one. It was a good idea, too. Because before I knew it someone challenged me to a drag race which I refused at first.”
Upon hearing this, the crowd asked each other “What’s a drag race?”
But Marty went on. “When I refused,” he said, “he asked me if I was too much of a coward to race him.”
That drag race with Needles. Jennifer said to herself, He’s talking about that drag race.
“So we powered up our motors.” said Marty.
“What are motors?” asked some of the Florentines.
“And when the light changed green.” Marty went onto say.
“How does a light turn green.” the Florentines asked each other, “And what does a green light have to do with racing?”
“The guy took off in his truck while I backed away from mine.”
“What’s a truck?”
“And guess what?” said Marty “I learned that if I raced him, I would’ve hit a Rolls-Royce.”
“What’s a Rolls-Royce?” asked everyone.
“Listen.” said Tannenio, “My lust for this woman is on fire. Now, are you going to fight me over her, grab her from me, or are you going to keep talking?”
Marty turned to him saying “Don’t get your desires in an uproar. This is educational.”
For the first time that she learned that the prince was using her for information, she started to laugh despite the fact that she was being held by someone about to rape her.
Turning back to the crowd, Marty said “Anyway. If I had gotten into that accident, my life would’ve gone into a tailspin. The owner over Rolls-Royce would’ve pressed charges, I would’ve broken my wrist and wouldn’t been able to play music again. And I still would’ve been trying to prove that I wasn’t a coward even if it cost me my job.
“Well, I thought I learned my lesson from all of that, but there were times when I couldn’t help myself in proving I wasn’t a coward and one time it nearly destroyed my relationship with the woman that Tannenio has in his arms.”
He paused for a minute. Then, to the angered dismay of the throng he told a story.
“Once upon a time,” he said, “there was this little boy and this little girl. The little girl was from a middle class family in the Catskills.”
“She‘s from a family that kills cats?” exclaimed one of the Florentines.
“Will you just listen?” asked Marty. Then, he said “Now pay attention. I don’t want to repeat this story. Anyway the little boy was from a rich family that controlled everything and as time went by, the little boy and girl grew up and they started to fall in love. However, as this girl was maturing into womanhood, she learned that this boy who was supposed to mature into manhood had a mean streak.”
The Jandicks! Jennifer said to herself, He’s talking about the Jandicks.
“One day I came across these people and tried to convince the girl-turned-woman to get away from the boy-turned-man. The man told me to get lost and so I decided to follow his suggestion and I would’ve hadn’t he called me a coward.
“All of a sudden, I forgot all about what happened to my distant relative
when he was called a coward and my near accident with the Rolls-Royce. So I
grabbed the woman and made off with her. The man followed us down the street in
his car…”
“What’s a car?” asked the Florentines.
“…and tried to run the both of us over. But I outsmarted him. We were on
this skateboard see…”
“What’s a skateboard?” asked another Florentine.
“And when he tried to mow us down with his car, I took his girl, jumped over the hood and landed back on the skateboard as his car head straight to a row of motorcycles.”
“What are motorcycles?”
“The motorcycles turned out to be owned by a bunch of Hell’s Angels.”
“You mean devils.”
“No.” said Marty, “I mean Hell’s Angels. And you haven’t heard of them yet. Anyway, he was beaten up for knocking over those motorcycles and ever since then, he learned that it wasn’t nice to get violent when someone makes off with his girlfriend or anything that would upset him. Ever since then, he became a nice man and this man and this woman had a healthy life and lived happily ever after.
“There was one problem however: Years later this woman had a gallery and became a successful business woman, and one day this loving girlfriend of mine saw me talk to her and got jealous. She didn’t want to talk to me again so she broke it off with me.”
Then, Jennifer remembered the face slap she inflicted on Marty. I did that out of jealousy. she said to herself, And before we came back to 1978, Jim used to hit Jan out of jealousy too. My God, by doing that to Marty, I only became just as bad as Jim was before Marty pulled that stunt with his girlfriend.
She continued to listen to Marty. “Five days later,” he said, “A mutual friend of ours decided to get us back together by taking us on a trip and leaving us here for a week in hopes that me and that girl will come back together.”
He turned to Jennifer saying “This is the girl I loved. But she didn’t care. As far as she was concerned, I was history. The next thing I knew, she was engaged to the prince and I only had myself to blame and began wonder why I had to make off with that woman and lead her lover on a merry chase.
“And then today, Simonetta, you know that there are two of them this week, and the Simonetta who’s married to Marco Vespucci told me that she used to have a boyfriend who used to get upset when someone called him a coward. Tannenio learned that and called him one. The guy got pissed off and charged the man only to have the man put the half nelson on him and dunk his head into the canal that Venice had.
“When I learned that, I realized what got me to make off with that woman I was talking about earlier. It wasn’t what the man was doing to her that got me to make off with her, it was what he called me.
“So the moral of the story is: if someone calls you a coward, don’t keep proving it. One day it might hurt a relationship.
“As for fighting over this girl, the best way to fight is not to be there. ‘He will triumph who knows when to fight and when not to fight.’
“That’s all I have to say and after telling you all of this, if anyone still think that I won’t fight Tannenio because I’m a coward, bite the big one.
Jennifer noticed Marty grasping his arm when he made that last sentence and said to herself Bite the big one? I have a feeling that it wasn’t said to insult anyone. It’s a signal for me to take car of Tannenio myself and how to do it.
She looked down at Tannenio’s arm as she heard someone ask Marty “What’s bite the big one?”
Jennifer decided to give a demonstration. She cocked her head down and bit Tannenio’s arm. The count cried out in pain as his captor put her elbow into his stomach and broke away. Then, she gave him a judo flip causing something to fall out of his sleeve. It was knife.
Realizing that the reason why Marty had hesitated in his decision because he saw something up the count’s sleeve, she said “You beast. You were going to kill him no matter what decision he made. Why you…” And she started to take some shots at him punching him around.
With his back to the wall, she opened the sheet she wrapped herself with and said “Hey count. Take a look at this.” The count did and Jennifer picked up her knees and hit him in the groin.
With the count crouching down in pain and grabbing where she hit him, Jennifer closed her sheet and turned to the crowd pointing at the count saying very laughingly “He said his lustful desire for me. Looking where he’s grabbing himself.”
Tannenio didn’t like that. He gingerly got up and tried for his sword that was still leaned up against the wall but Jennifer beat him to it asking “Oh is this your sword?” She took it over her knees and broke it in two.
“My rapier.” said the count with his voice two octaves higher. Then he saw her kick the knife in the sewer.
“Nice going, Jennifer.” said Marty as he sprung into action and started to throw some punches at the count.
He was punching the count around until he had him back up to a manure cart. Then, Marty said “Do you want to know why I waited until she broke your sword and knocked you knife into the sewer?”
The count was startled but seemed interested in the answer.
“It’ because..” said Marty. “I…don’t…play…with…knives.”
With each word, he threw a punch at the count until the last one turned him around and felled him face first into the manure.
A big cheer came from the crowd as Jennifer approached Marty and gave him a big kiss.
“Does this mean that you’ve fallen back in love with me?” asked Marty.
Before she could answer, there was another commotion.
++++++
After Dumas landed the count into the manure, the first man who wanted Simonetta said “You’re mine woman to sleep with.”
“No way.” said the second tugging her away from him, “There were no swords involved. She’s mine.”
Then, one of them felt the point of a rapier. It was her husband Marco.
“No.” he said, “She’s mine.”
Both men released her as she put her arms around her husband.
++++++
Then came more commotion in the form of horse hooves. It was the two princes and their soldiers. Larry, Moe and Curly looked at each other.
“Hey Moe.” said Curly, “Do you know what I think.”
“Yeah.” said Moe, “And I don’t like it.”
“And that is…” said Larry.
“That Tannenio is about to go to jail.” said Moe.
All three turned to flee only to run into more of Prince Lorenzo’s men.
++++++
Jennifer turned to see that Botticelli, his two models and the broom lady had returned with her prince and his soldiers. It seems that he also brought some African Americans with them.
The prince dismounted his horse and approached her asking “My love are you
alright?”
“Yes I am.” said Jennifer as they both kissed.
++++++
Marty looked on as the two kissed. Today was the day that they were to go back to the future providing that they both fell in love. And now that chance was about to go out the door.