Fight Club

assignment,” Tyler says. "We said, ‘Bring me the steaming testicles of his esteemed honor, Seattle Police Commissioner Whoever.’”
    I’m not dreaming.
    "Yes,” Tyler says, "you are.”
    We put together a team of fourteen space monkeys, and five of these space monkeys were police, and we were every person in the park where his honor walks his dog, tonight.
    "Don’t worry,” Tyler says, "the dog is alright.”
    The whole attack took three minutes less than our best run-through. We’d projected twelve minutes. Our best run-through was nine minutes.
    We have five space monkeys hold him down.
    Tyler’s telling me this, but somehow, I already know it.
    Three space monkeys were on lookout.
    One space monkey did the ether.
    One space monkey tugged down his esteemed sweatpants.
    The dog is a spaniel, and it’s just barking and barking.
    Barking and barking.
    Barking and barking.
    One space monkey wrapped the rubber band three times until it was tight around the top of his esteemed sack.
    "One monkey’s between his legs with the knife,” Tyler whispers with his punched-out face by my ear. "And I’m whispering in his most esteemed police commissioner’s ear that he better stop the fight club crackdown, or we’ll tell the world that his esteemed honor does not have any balls.”
    Tyler whispers, "How far do you think you’ll get, your honor?”
    The rubber band is cutting off any feeling down there.
    "How far do you think you’ll get in politics if the voters know you have no nuts?”
    By now, his honor has lost all feeling.
    Man, his nuts are ice cold.
    If even one fight club has to close, we’ll send his nuts east and west. One goes to the New York Times and one goes to the Los Angeles Times. One to each. Sort of press release style.
    The space monkey took the ether rag off his mouth, and the commissioner said, don’t.
    And Tyler said, "We have nothing to lose except fight club.”
    The commissioner, he had everything.
    All we were left was the shit and the trash of the world.
    Tyler nodded to the space monkey with the knife between the commissioner’s legs.
    Tyler asked, "Imagine the rest of your life with your bag flapping empty.”
    The commissioner said, no.
    And don’t.
    Stop.
    Please.
    Oh.
    God.
    Help.
    Me.
    Help.
    No.
    Me.
    God.
    Me.
    Stop.
    Them.
    And the space monkey slips the knife in and only cuts off the rubber band.
    Six minutes, total, and we were done.
    "Remember this,” Tyler said. "The people you’re trying to step on, we’re everyone you depend on. We’re the people who do your laundry and cook your food and serve your dinner. We make your bed. We guard you while you’re asleep. We drive the ambulances. We direct your call. We are cooks and taxi drivers and we know everything about you. We process your insurance claims and credit card charges. We control every part of your life.
    "We are the middle children of history, raised by television to believe that someday we’ll be millionaires and movie stars and rock stars, but we won’t. And we’re just learning this fact,” Tyler said. "So don’t fuck with us.”
    The space monkey had to press the ether down, hard on the commissioner sobbing and put him all the way out.
    Another team dressed him and took him and his dog home. After that, the secret was up to him to keep. And, no, we didn’t expect any more fight club crackdown.
    His esteemed honor went home scared but intact.
    "Every time we do these little homework assignments,” Tyler says, "these fight club men with nothing to lose are a little more invested in Project Mayhem.”
    Tyler kneeling next to my bed says, "Close your eyes and give me your hand.”
    I close my eyes, and Tyler takes my hand. I feel Tyler’s lips against the scar of his kiss.
    "I said that if you talked about me behind my back, you’d never see me again,” Tyler said. "We’re not two separate men. Long story short, when you’re awake, you have the control, and you can call yourself anything you want, but the second you fall asleep, I take over, and you become Tyler Durden.”
    But we fought, I say. The night we invented fight club.
    "You weren’t really fighting me,” Tyler says. "You said so yourself. You were fighting everything you hate in your life.”
    But I can see you.
    "You’re asleep.”
    But you’re renting a house. You held a job. Two jobs.
    Tyler says, "Order your canceled checks from the bank. I rented the house in your name. I think you’ll find the handwriting on the rent