The American Jerk: The Blair Jerk Project

"In the 1700’s," Heather intoned, looking somberly into the black and white 16-millimeter camera; "A woman named Elly Kedward was declared a witch by the townspeople of Burkittsville, Maryland, then called Blair. She was banished from the town in the deepest heart of winter.

"Lightly battered, fricasseed up nice," Paul said. "The Blair Witch is actually Hannibal Lecter. Anthony Perkins - "

"Hopkins," Rob said, weaving slightly and punctuating his remarks by shaking the bottle of Jack Daniel’s. "Perkins played that transhex-… transsexual in Psycho."

"Wha’?" Paul said, befuddled by drink, "I thought that was Vic… Vince… that motherfucker from Swingers!"

"Not the remake!" Rob shouted, indignant, "That fucking abomination should never have been laid on film! A pox on that douchebag Van Sant!"

"Guys," Heather said, her face in her hands, "Can you please be quiet? I have to do this narration."

"Paul," Heather said, "Get this on the DAT."

"The what?"

"The DAT! Digital Audio Tape, DAT!"

"Oh, that," Paul said, "I left that heavy-assed motherfucker back in the car."

"No problem," Paul said, laying down the camera, "We gotta make a liquor run, anyway." Rob and Paul turned and began to stagger away.

"Okay guys, lock the car, put your packs on, and let’s get up the trail. I want to do the six miles to the cemetery before it gets dark," Heather said.

Rob and Paul hauled themselves out of the Dodge... Rob by grabbing handfuls of the earth and pulling himself facedown across the ground. As Paul put on his backpack, he smoothly kicked Rob twice in the kidneys. "Get up, you fucking slacker!"

Heather sighed, "I meant, are you sure we’re going in the right direction? To get to the cemetery? I need those scenery shots for the documentary, and - "

"There’s no cemetery," Rob growled, "And that’s no movie camera! That’s a gun! This is a fucking ambush! You both want to kill me, drop me in a shallow grave, and collect my inheritance!"

"I don’t even really know you," Heather muttered, "but right now it sounds like a good - "

Please call this number if you also have any information on the whereabouts of Ken MacDonald.

Paul strode confidently forward and bashed Rob in the mouth, knocking him down. "You don’t own anything! Fuck your inheritance!"

The tent was pitch black, when a soft rustling sound could be heard coming from no particular direction. "What the hell is that?" Heather whispered, frightened.

Again, blackness, and the sounds of a myriad of footsteps were everywhere outside. Heather turned on the video camera’s shooting light, unzipping the tent flap. "Hello!?" She said loudly. "Do you hear that?" she asked.

"Oh, that," Paul said, "I left that heavy-assed motherfucker back in the car."

"But… but we need that! How are we gonna get this clearly without the DAT!? Why did you do that?"

The footsteps seemed to get closer, and somehow more menacing. "Oh my God… what is it?" Heather whispered, horrified.

The sound and flash of seven quick gunshots sent Heather screeching, face down onto the tent floor. The ricochets echoed into silence.

"I said, shut up, Mom!" Rob muttered gutturally, waving the pistol, still sleeping.

"Don’t worry about it," Paul advised. "He’s always doing shit like this. He’s probably hunting. He said the only reason he agreed to do this was he though he might get the chance to whack a baby seal with that hand cannon of his."

"Baby seals?" Heather asked, in shock, "There aren’t any baby seals in Maryland."

"What am I, a botanist?" Paul asked, drinking whiskey. "He’ll be back. I think the best thing we can do is wait here, get back in the tent, and have some sex."

"A little," Paul admitted, "But I’ve never heard him make that kind of noise outside of the bathroom at the Black Crowes show. Funny story: he took a napkin and strained out some Sterno - "

"ROB!" Heather shrieked, near tears. "WHERE ARE YOU?!" She stumbled forward, through the underbrush. "Look! There’s a house! Maybe he’s in there!"

"Probably not. He likes pissing outside. When I lived with him in this house after college, he killed this hundred-year-old shrubbery. Took him a year, but-"

"Don’t bother," Rob said, pistol in one hand, whiskey in the other. "I got the fucker."

"You’re all right!" Heather said, short of breath, "But what happened to you?"

"I heard gunshots last night, woke up and heard some weird sounds. I wandered around the tent and found this bastard creeping around, dressed in black and making a lot of noise."

There were dried urine stains all over the man’s pants. "What happened, dude?" Paul asked, "You see a gun and piss yourself?"

Paul snapped open a six-inch Buck knife. "Who the fuck are you, buddy… Talk, or we offer up your needle dick as a sacrifice to the fucking witch."

"I’m…" The man began, swallowing mightily, "I’m a producer from Artisan Entertainment. I’m producing The Blair Witch Project. Heather’s the star. She was supposed to get a couple of brainless dupes to come along into the woods, I was gonna make scary sounds, and film the whole thing like it was real."

"Who you calling ‘brainless?’" Rob asked, menacing with the Colt, as Paul vomited against a tree, pants around his ankles, urinating at the same time.

"There is no Blair Witch. We were just gonna make a cheap little movie, pass it off like you all really disappeared, and try to trick America into believing the whole thing. We’d have made millions! And we would have gotten away with it too… if it wasn’t for you meddling kids!"

"Piss off, you hoax-starting, lie-dishemm… disseminating, Scooby-Doo-fake-assed-bad-guy wannabe motherfucker," Paul croaked. "Turn around; go stand in the corner."

"Oh God," Heather said, panicked. "You’re gonna kill me, aren’t you? You just don’t want him to watch!"

"Nahh," Rob said, "He just doesn’t like guys looking at him while he’s taking a dump… Jesus!" Rob waved his hand in front of his nose, sickened. "If there was a witch out here, she’s fucking dead now."