Luyện nghe bài hát Tragic Events - Part II

Are you crying,

No... Well, yes.
I was just about Sandy.
And Bimba and Kimba.
I them, Evelyn.

I know,
I them too.
Especially time of year, Evelyn.

The is 1991,
Terminator 2 is the highest-grossing at the Box Office,
the first Super Nintendo System has just been released,
and after 70 years of Communist
the of Soviet Socialist Republics has collapsed.

And on a chicken ranch outside of Claxton, Georgia,
twin sisters are waiting for supper.

The farm is old and by Alfred McClock,
an eccentric man a fascination with Civil War weaponry.
McClock's farms produces over 140, 000 chickens a year
and ships wings, and legs all over the continental United States.

Despite the success of his business,
McClock leads a life,
never marrying and tending several of the houses himself.
A simple man with a not bad heart.
McClock never how to best take care of the young girls who came into his life shortly after their birth,
so he raised the only way he knew how -
in a two by two foot wire-mesh cage,
on a of mash, crumbles, pellets and egg booster.

One clear day,
during the twins year at the farm,
McClock does not at meal time.
Night falls and he doesn't appear.
The and the chickens cry out from hunger.

Days pass, and the chickens in neighboring cages to die.
The smell of poultry permeates the air of the hot, humid barn.

Finally,
desperate to find food and concerned the whereabouts of their guardian,
the twins break from their cage.
McClock's house is tight,
but the find the garden hose, which quenches their thirst.
half delirious with hunger,
they make way out to the road.

Little time passes before a dusty black Coupe DeVille drives by and pulls over.
A tall, man with a kindly face steps out of the vehicle.
He smiles at the
(Hello)
and presents them with the first candy they have ever tasted - a bar,
they share in silent, odd delight.
The girls do not feel at all when the man leads them gently into the dark, spacious trunk.

In the following the girls are transferred into the trunks of several other cars (Hello)
by other kindly, (Hello) candybar-offering men (Hello)
until reach their final destination at a lakeside lodge in Manitoba.

The underwood lodge is a collection of cozy, cabins with an attached trailer park along the shores of lake Winnipeg.
It is also the world headquarters of Flowers Entertainment,
specializing in the production and distribution of and VHS tapes for clientele with unique tastes.

The are welcomed by Mrs. Deborah Bulgar, the fifty-two-year-old podiatrist, (?)
(Well, hello, girls!)
a woman of proportions,
who lives with her own children in the main lodge of the underwood.

finding that the girls have no names she christens them Eva and Lynn,
names which neither she nor the twins are ever able to keep straight.

(Eva, Lynn.)

The twins' days at the are relatively comfortable,
they are cared for,
the is delicious,
and are many other girls their age.
a week, photo sessions take place,
convivial affairs that make-up,
a wide variety of up costumes
and new games.

Every few days Mrs. Bulgar the girls to one of their many uncles.
(Eva, Lynn, say to your uncle, Mark.)
(Heeey.)
uncles,
seemingly in number,
travel from all over the to visit their nieces.

The girls always like their new uncles,
but Mrs. Bulgar is quick to remind them
that 'family is and 'blood is thicker than water'.

The sisters are not popular amongst the other girls,
however, one gentle resident, a few years their senior, befriends them and takes them her wing.

(Hello, what's name?)

Her is Sandy.

(I'm Sandy.)

She has soft blonde hair reaches down to her knees.
Everyone says she like a mermaid.
Dressed daily by Mrs. Bulgar in fishnet stockings and vintage attire,
Sandy is by far the popular girl of the underwood.
She has so many
that the twins count.

Every after dinner and chores,
Sandy tucks the young sisters into bed and tells them stories
they fall peacefully to sleep.
(And after three long weeks at sea, John Luke (?) the sailor spotted land.)
But these happy do not last.
Shortly after the twins' third Christmas under Mrs. care,
disappears,
to return.

The twins remain in the underwood for the part of two long, miserable years.
Without to protect them,
are ostracized and abused by the other girls.
(What are YOU at, four-eyes?)
The sessions involve fewer fancy costumes,
and time their uncles become more peculiar.
(Did I ask you to talk?!)
The begin to notice a disturbing tendency
for girls, much like their dear Sandy,
to quietly disappear from the underwood around their or thirteenth birthday.
The brace themselves for something terrible.

One autumn, when the are eleven,
an old man, who speaks only Spanish, takes the twins into a large orange van and drives them to new home.

(Step right up, step right up, see amazing human oddities, freaks of nature! Be warned, people heart condition, children, women - We will accept no responsibility for fainting, reoccurring nightmares, or death.)

Dillard and Fullerton, and illogical traveling show
is the twelfth largest touring in North America.
Former insurance salesmen, and Fullerton,
their enterprise by procuring the most shocking specimen of the grotesque and unusual.
Their small administrative works tirelessly
to combat actions and public allegations of animal cruelty
and human trafficking.

in the circus is harder than their time at the underwood.
There is always to be done.
In addition to their of laundry and sweeping,
Mr. Dillard that the twins spend many hours each day practicing their act.

(What are you around for?)

The girls are of the clowns,
several of whom, by coincidence,
also happen to be uncles.
(Hello!)
(Hello!)
(Hello!)
But still, overall,
these early days at the are happy times for the twins.

Every night to the delight of across the country,
the girls in the center ring, singing and strumming a ukulele,
atop Bimba and Kimba - the world's known conjoined twin siamese elephants.

The twins feel they have found true soulmates in and Kimba,
who affectionately refer to as 'Elephant, Elephant'.
special bond reciprocates by the pachyderms,
who fondly nozzle the with their trunks
and seem to in giving them rides.

The twins and the are inseparable.

With the help of the the Arresting, the animal trainer,
(Like this!)
the twins to the elephants,
feeding and grooming daily.

But one August morning,
Bimba and Kimba to take their food.
Due to the conditions of their quarters
and an improper diet of popcorn and candy,
the elephants have contracted a form of elephantine diphtheria,
compounded by early Alzheimer's disease.

For the next two weeks the twins can stand by helplessly,
as their companions sicker and weaker
and begin displaying signs of memory loss.
The few days are almost unbearable.
Bimba and Kimba's confused, sad eyes
looking up at the with great anguish,
but no of recognition.

And on one September day
the sisters' sixteenth
Elephant dies.

The funeral is the same day,
a grisly affair at an trash compactor behind a Home Depot
in Dodge, Iowa.

The are devastated.
Without Bimba and Kimba is but a terrible and meaningless void.
They resign themselves to living out the rest of their hollow
in mourning.
The emotionally exausted sisters from favor within the circus.

No longer willing to sing and play ukulele,
the girls are dressed in a pink tutu and forced to on a giant red ball,
an impossible for the conjoined sisters.

(Get on damn ball!)

The audience roars with laughter time they awkwardly fall.
Their discomfort is increased by a pair of groups ,
who have an interest in the twins.
night in most major cities, protesters assemble,
nosily waving and chanting slogans in front of the Box Office.

The faction claims to represent an organization called 'FASSTEN' - the Foundation for Always Separating Siamese Twins Everywhere Now.

the bible, FASSTEN members vehemently believe
that it is the will of the Lord that all twins
be separated and to live individual lives.
Wielding symbolical surgical saws and blunt knives,
FASSTEN members chide the buyers for supporting the abomination of god.

The second group operates under the SPLIT - the Society for the Preservation of Linked Identical Twins.
A organization,
to discredit the claims of FASSTEN,
SPLIT believes that conjoined twins will play a critical role in the coming of Christ.

The twins are terrified by both groups - the knives and saws them very nervous,
and SPLIT members make to kidnap the girls
and take to where they will be kept safe in a place of darkness until the rapture.

One day before a Sunday matinee in Sacramento, a chaotic brawl between the two factions
and one member gets alarmingly close to the twins with a hacksaw.

(It's the of the Lord!)

Stricken fear,
the sisters decide that are no longer safe at the circus.
That night, they a resolution - to leave the Dillard and Fullerton traveling show
forever.