Disclaimer: I do not own Pushing Daisies. Jim Dale is a great man, he's so awesome, he deserves his own fic.
It was October 8, 2008 at 9:37 PM when Jim Dale stepped into his trailer and let the door slam behind him with a resounding clang
It was October 8, 2008 at 9:37 PM when Jim Dale stepped into his trailer and let the door slam behind him with a resounding clang. He nearly tore off his grey smoking jacket and very nearly defenestrated his book of lines. By an act of charity, perhaps, it was at that moment that Jim received a phone call that saved his curtained glass windows from that terrible end.
"Hello?" He spoke into the receiver, having let it ring all but once. His ears clung to the silence, yearning to pull from its hollowness any sign of life on the other end of the line. Unfortunately Jim was left wanting, for no such sign materialized for him. He placed the phone gently back into its cradle which took an uncanny amount of self restraint on his part.
The facts were these, Jim Dale had just finished shooting a particularly difficult scene of Pushing Daisies. Lawrence Trilling, director of the hit new show on ABC, had made the cast and crew reshoot a scene seventeen times that day- which led to the general outcome of everyone feeling rather ill favored towards his person.
Jim rather wished he could throw a crate full of oranges right at his head. "Oh he vexes me so!" Jim squinted into the shadowy crevasses of his trailer, past the empty bottles of sherry and half used boxes of tissues next to his issues of Smexily British. He overlooked the beautifully carved face of Alan Rickman, which glared at him from the cover of the barely heard of magazine, and slumped himself down on his down blanket covered loveseat. It was there that Jim pondered.
"I think it best that I take rest of the night easy. Maybe I'll just see…" but his thoughts were interrupted by a musical knocking on his trailer door. The knocking was a light sound, femininity echoed with every rapping, and so Jim stood up to answer whomever was calling.
"A.D." came a troubled, twangy call from beyond the threshold.
Jim carefully opened the door so as not to hit his late guest, but when the door was opened to its fullest, he found the stoop to be completely devoid of life. Craning his neck, he peered from side to side, but all his eyes saw were darkness. There was an owl hooting in the distance, and he thought of happier evenings in his narrative career. "Nineteen years later, indeed." He cursed savagely, and shut the door once more.
Jim thought that he would be alone for the remainder of his evening, and therefore, you can imagine his surprise when he was greeted by the significantly decomposed, yet still recognizable face, of Alfred Hitchcock.
"By the queens spectacles," Jim swore, crossing himself promptly thereafter. "You're Alfred Hitchcock!"
Alfred regarded him with all the respect an exterminator would towards a cockroach. "Well spotted, old bean." He took a turn around the cramped living quarters and pulled a teacup from thin air.
"It is an honor, sir." Jim tried to humble himself, kneeling as though before royalty, before Alfred called him to stand straight.
"It's bad posture, that. And square your shoulders Dale, you are an ex RAF. Show some pride." He took a long sip from his teacup.
Jim watched as Alfred took his long sip, wondering inwardly why the man was here, and falling apart in front of his very eyes. "Sir, why are you here? Not to sound unappreciative, but I believe you've just dropped two bones from your ribcage right on my rug."
Alfred looked down and with a raucous burst of laughter, he chucked the teacup over his shoulder and let it fall. Jim's right eye twitched nervously and marched right up to the man. Living or no, he was not going to let this man ruin his arrangement.
"Now see here!" Jim said, poking Alfred firmly where his heart should have been. There was a flash of bluest light, and Alfred fell to the ground, dead once more. Forever.
Jim Dale had considered himself a sane man. Had considered himself proper. Because, in all of his years of narration, singing and acting, never once had he succumbed to modern day slang terms or derogatory statements. So it was, that he fell from his pedestal, and became a lesser man.
"WTF?" said he, and all around his trailer he heard cold, measured cacophonies of laughter ringing out. The windows shuddered and eventually cracked, as a rain of stone beat relentlessly on his trailer. There was a general hurricane of crows that flew over his twenty foot trailer, and a blizzard of feathers caked themselves to it's exterior, making it resemble a black twinkie. With all of the powers of Hades against him, Jim Dale knew that his time was up.
The next day, the Pie Maker prodded Jim Dale with his forefinger, yet there were no sparks for him. "There's always Alexander Scourby…" Lee spoke to unbridled laughter from the assembled cast.
The End!