BEDBUG TORTURE

An EXTERMINATOR is speaking with a HOUSEWIFE.

HOUSEWIFE

I don't know how it happened, but we do indeed have bedbugs!

EXTERMINATOR

Could be anything. You might have gotten them on your clothes at a movie theater, or even maybe your husband got them at work. They're back.

HOUSEWIFE

Ugh, they're just so disgusting! I HATE them! I hate them so much.

EXTERMINATOR

Don't worry, Mrs. Sizer -- my process guarantees 100% satisfaction.

HOUSEWIFE

That means you guarantee you can get rid of them?

EXTERMINATOR

Well, no. They're very hard to get rid of. My guarantee is that the ones I do catch will suffer.

HOUSEWIFE

I'm not sure I understand.

EXTERMINATOR

I torture them. I hate bedbugs as much as you, probably more. They are digsuting on a visceral level. I believe they are the natural enemies of humans and therefore it is my moral right to inflict pain upon them.

HOUSEWIFE

So you kill them in a painful way?

EXTERMINATOR

Sometimes. But more often I round them up and bring them back to my lair. I tie each of them up to tiny  slabs of cement and then bind their hairy legs with tiny manacles. From there I'll starve them, or maybe try them with a magnifying glass. Sometimes I'll waterboard them.

HOUSEWIFE

But.. there's hundreds, maybe thousands of tem.

EXTERMINATOR

My home is a vast estate with hundreds of rooms, nearly all devoted to the torture of bedbugs. Plus I had a basement labryinth installed.

HOUSEWIFE

I just want the bugs gone from my house.

EXTERMINATOR

Every bug I catch I will remove from your premises, don't you worry. And then I'm make them sorry they came here. I'll separate bedbug children from their bedburg parents. I'll put a few bedbugs in a jar with limited food and watch them devour each other. I put them on masking tape and then strap that tape to a washing machine so they get their shit for-real freaked out.

HOUSEWIFE

Torturing animals is one of the most reliable signs of being a sociopath.

EXTERMINATOR

But I only tortue bedbugs, ma'am! Never dogs or cats or any mammals. Never any other insects! If I find a cockroach I carry it outside and set it free. But a bedbug I tie tiny anvils to its thorax and drop it in a fishtank.

HOUSEWIFE

How much do you charge?

EXTERMINATOR

One dollar.

HOUSEWIFE

Okay, give it a shot.

Yep!