"Do-Wah-Do-Do" by Ellen Morris Prewitt
Ellen Morris Prewitt is an award-winning author who has lived all over, but not outside of, the American South. She was the Peter Taylor Fellow at The Kenyon Review’s Summer Writing Program and currently serves as Writer-in-Residence at 100 Men Hall, an iconic Mississippi Blues site. “Poached Peaches” is an excerpt from her memoir-in-progress, Loving My Hateful Ancestors. Other excerpts have been published in Salvation South, Mississippi Free Press, Exterminating Angel Press, Fourth Genre, and elsewhere Her first traditionally published novel, When We Were Murderous Time-Traveling Women, will be released by Literary Wanderlust in 2026.
Do-Wah-Do-Do
Sylvaine ducked, she swore she did. She wasn’t one of those oblivious Mardi Gras wilders who two weekends a year snatched off their librarian glasses and waggled their butts at passing floats. Those yahoos couldn’t even be bothered to fling a boa around their necks, but they’d act the fool for cheap-ass plastic beads. Plastic, for Christ’s sake. Mass-produced, gutter-clogging, plastic beads good for nothing but hanging on the spikes of your iron fence like rattler pelts, and Sylvaine didn’t have an iron fence. The Tucks plunger absolutely came out of the blue and hit her on the head. Then all hell broke loose.
Two guys in lawn chairs sprang into action. The dude dressed as Robo cop took one step, and his ankle twisted. He collapsed on the grass like an ant under a stomping foot. The lion-mane guy tripped over downed Robo Cop and chin-splatted beside him, barely missing the curb. No telling if the city, still staggering after Katrina, had insurance in place for the parade. Or if it covered parade kill.
The plunger rocked at Sylvaine’s feet, and she scooped it up. “Gotcha, you son of a bitch.”
She raised the green glitter plunger and shook it at the rumbling float. “You’re supposed to hand out heavy throws, you assholes!” She scanned for the lazy-ass rider who had thrown the plunger. Thrown it, for God’s sake. “It’s a missile, a deadly projectile! Take the plunger…” She held up the plunger shrunken like a voodoo head and gently transferred it from her left hand to her right. “Hand it to the revelers! We’re the customers here!” Then, for good measure, she yelled one last time, “Asshole!” because after all it was the hemorrhoid-worshiping Tucks parade.
The float sporting a giant outhouse lurched on down Napoleon Avenue, outhouse swaying like a sultan. Behind Sylvaine, Robo Cop groaned and crawled into the crowd. Lion Mane was rolling in the grass, clutching his calf. He was gonna stand up smelling like a Sunday morning basement after a frat party. That is, if he got up—the embarrassing collection of beads around his neck would probably pin him to the turf.
“Aw, come on.” Sylvaine offered Lion Mane a hand, and he accepted the assist. She was careful to keep the bejeweled plunger out of his reach. Signature throw, it was hers. She’d earned it with the bonk on the head.
Lion Mane struggled, creating air between his butt and the grass, then plopped back down. His lion’s mane was a shredded commode cover, one of those rag affairs. His big-nosed face poked through the hole he’d cut in the middle. Sylvaine appreciated the allegiance to theme. Plus, homemade scored extra points with her. She adjusted the top tier of toilet paper rolls she’d threaded with elastic to make a dress and glared at the man walking by in a floppy chef’s hat. Must be a shitty cook, only logical explanation.
“I’ll trade.” Lion Mane raised himself onto one elbow and held up a stuffed Tucks doll. He waggled the smiling friar, trying to entice her.
Sylvaine hid the plunger behind her back. Can’t trust Mardi Gras crazies for nothing. This parade was double-wack. “1001 Nights Without Electricity,” dominating the theme or, more informally, Shit Happens. Gaggles of drunks spoofing the blue tarps weighted across gaping roofs. Everyone pretending they weren’t marching past side-street houses leaning into destruction. Yay! Katrina can’t kill Mardi Gras!
His swap rejected, Lion Mane asked, “Can I just hold it?” He gazed puppy-dog forlorn at the withdrawn plunger. Behind him, a he-man in a one-shouldered spangled swimsuit with a plunger duct-taped to his bald head sauntered by, so proud of himself.
“No.” Not when she’d given up so much already. She pressed the plunger to her bosom.
“Gotcha.” He nodded, and the understanding in his eyes hooked Sylvaine’s heart.
“You had someone?” she asked.
“Yeah. You, too?”
Having to look at what happened made her furious all over again. Mieux Mieux, a million years old, should’ve crossed the rainbow bridge sprawled on her orange velvet pillow, not laid out on the attic floorboards, ribs heaving, pink tongue extended, panting for a sip of water when the whole fucking city was drowning in water. Or Toto, jerk copter pilot gonna save New Orleans but refused to rescue one small helpless dog. And Sylvaine too chickenshit to jump back Dorothy-style to swoop him into her arms so that every night she woke in a cold sweat imagining him eddying down the drain.
The loss tidal-waved her, and she heard herself saying, “I can loan it to you, you call and we do lunch.”
He cocked his lion head. “You bribing me for a date?”
She shrugged.
“Cool.” He stood and extended his hand. “Deal.”
She shook on it. “I’m Sylvaine.”
“Lionel.” He pulled on his mane.
“Awesome.” So much potential there.
Behind them, the noise of the crowd swelled into a roar, making Sylvaine turn to see what was going on. The float carrying the King of Tucks had arrived. Seated on a giant toilet, the king held a huge Golden Plunger aloft like a scepter while a thousand bubbles squirted from a “broken” pipe at the front of the float. The final float of the parade. It was almost done. Thrown toilet paper fluttered in the live oaks lining the street, ghost-like.
Sylvaine straightened the shoulder strap on her costume. If she could shove her way to the front of the crowd, she might catch a decorated toilet brush.
“Here. Watch it for me?” She held out the plunger—no way the riders would throw her a toilet brush if she already had a plunger.
“Sure.”
For a moment, Sylvaine questioned her sanity. Not only was it her prized throw. It was her only hold over the guy. But if he ran away with the plunger, had he ever truly been hers?
She lay the plunger in his waiting palm.
But before he could close his fingers around the wooden handle, a teenager in a kangaroo suit intercepted the handoff. The mangy animal tucked the coveted plunger in his pouch where a gap-toothed baby clinched the prize in its fat fists.
“Hey!” Sylvaine yelled. But the Kanga was tearing down the sidewalk, ears flattened to its fuzzy skull.
As Sylvaine and Lionel watched Kanga’s bumping, thieving tail disappear into the crowd, she asked, “What’s your jam, Lionel?”
“You seen those billboards on I-10? ‘Professional Funeral Services’? I’m Amateur Funeral Services.”
She had been wondering if he was trained in thief apprehension. National Guard, Coast Guard, 82nd Airborne, one of those types who washed into the city after the storm. But his funeral service declaration drug her attention back to him.
“Seriously? You’re not ‘lion-ing’ to me, are you?”
“Truth.” He knocked his fist against his heart. “YouTube trained. Pets only, no humans.”
She couldn’t decide if he was teasing her or an honest-to-God pet mortician, and which was hotter. “Yeah? What did they teach you?”
“Nestling mostly, how to fold proper corners in your blankets. And resist the peek.” He waggled his index finger. “Never look in the box.”
Sylvaine imagined a tussle over the box, Lionel urging the sobbing, snot-running family to comply. “Why would you do that, put yourself in that situation?”
He stared into the churning crowd that was disbursing as the King trundled by. “I don’t know, man. So many folks hit by the storm. First responders marking x’s, clipboards showing up to assess the damage. But our pets? No one gave a damn. Least I could do was say a few words. Get them in the ground safe.”
“What if there wasn’t a body?” Sylvaine asked, imprinted by the ghosts of her best friends.
He curved his fingers into the shape of a heart. Lowered the heart into an imaginary box. Carefully folded the blanket. Closed the lid.
Sylvaine stared at the invisible box. She opened the lid. Gently, one by one, laid down her two hearts. Re-sealed the box.
Reaching, she clasped his hand and raised it in triumph. The final band rolled, its Do-Wah-Do-Do banner sagging until the tuxedoed tuba player blatted the rhythm and the prancing chicks caught new life and lifted their banner high.
The toilet paper roll and the lion mane stepped behind, dancing a second line as the tuba player blew the world a big fat raspberry, New Orleans style.