Part I
Everyone liked him, treated him like their brother. It made me mad. My face got too warm, and my breath grew heavy and hard to swallow. When others showed up, I was immediately left out, like the kid who once puked in class and was now shunned by the other kids on the playground during recess.
I hated him most when anyone else showed up and wanted to play – the times when I had no choice but to sulk at the perimeter of the field or driveway or ditch or neighborhood store. I mean, I couldn’t just join them. That would be too needy. Besides, the kids who showed up and interfered with our time together didn’t even acknowledge me. Chuck didn’t either – never glanced my way, even knowing what he knew about me. Not even after those times we played husband and wife, when we stripped naked and crawled into his twin bed, lying there next to each other without moving because that’s what we thought married couples did. At least those moments ended in awkward laughter, in recognition that we were best friends just curious about being adults.
I wasn’t a loser. I could run fast, do tricks on my bike, hit the net. I had trophies for sports, mostly basketball. I had new clothes, the best tennis shoes. I lived in the biggest house on the block. My dad drove a Mercedes! And I could fight when I had to. Or, at least I could fight Chuck. We would fight each other to show off for the older kids in the neighborhood, punch each other until our faces were covered in blood and tears just to earn a few minutes of attention from the older guys in the neighborhood.
The main problem was, I was skinny with a bad haircut, and I usually didn’t want to draw attention to myself. Chuck was stocky, brown-haired, and clever. Not to mention that I always had to go to church on Wednesday nights at the crazy Nazarene place across the creek while Chuck stayed out late, shadowing the older kids before heading home to watch HBO.
That’s what sinners did, my mom said … they watched HBO. There was sex and violence and bad words on HBO. She didn’t know that I could see boobs on the snowy Lifetime channel at our house if I was willing to sit through an hour of adults talking about boring stuff and squint my eyes really hard when a woman began unbuttoning her shiny shirt.
But it didn’t really matter to Chuck if I broke the rules or not. When other kids came around to play, what I had done, or what I had, or how close Chuck and I had been earlier in the day just disappeared into thin air, and I was just some skinny-ass kid who didn’t get all the jokes or know anything about the best TV shows. It didn’t even matter that I had one of the first Ataris on the block.
Being left out made me embarrassed and angry. Whatever good thoughts I might have had disappeared as soon as I was rejected. Every time I was excluded, my anger grew, and I carried it inside me until I had Chuck to myself, and I could call him out for being an asshole.
There was one time that I’ll never forget. Chuck rode to my house after playing with one of his other friends from school. I was in the backyard playing on the Jungle Gym. He started bragging about seeing Star Wars and brought up the Jawas.
I said, “Oh, yeah, the Jawas. They’re bad.”
“No, they’re not,” Chuck fired back. “They’re friends with Luke Skywalker!”
“Yeah, but they captured R2-D2 and C-3PO,” I yelled in defense. “They were held hostage by the Jawas!”
“Then why did they give them back to Luke, you idiot!” Chuck retaliated, a smirk spreading across his face.
“I’m not an idiot,” I screamed, grabbing a rusty Jungle Gym cross bar that had long ago been dislodged and fallen to the ground. “Say it again. I dare you!” I challenged him. His smirk grew wider.
“Idiot.” He didn’t even blink when he said it.
I swung the bar and watched blood blossom over Chuck’s eyebrow as he swayed in place. Fear shot through me, and I wanted to run, but I just stood watching Chuck stagger in circles. Then it hit me. Watching Chuck stumble away, I realized how bad he was hurt, and I panicked. I didn’t know what to do, so I hid in a trashcan until I heard my mom yelling my name, trying to find me.
The next day, I was standing next to Chuck in the hospital, ashamed, watching him unwrap the Mr. Snowman Sno-Cone Maker my mom made me give him as an apology. The stiches in his forehead were the weirdest thing I’d ever seen.
I always remembered that fight whenever Chuck made fun of me. Like that time on the Ferris Wheel at the fair. It stopped to let on new riders when our cart was at the very top. We could see everything – the Tilt-a-Whirl, the Gravitron, all the tents with games, and the pavilions full of mud-caked pigs and cows. Chuck started swinging the cart back and forth and rocking it from side to side. I gripped the locked door with all my strength and pleaded with him to stop. He laughed and blurted out, “You look like a nervous secretary!”
“What are you talking about?! Why do I look like a secretary?”I demanded, struggling to come up with an equally embarrassing insult. Am I really that nervous, I wondered, replaying all the times I had been scared or intimidated in front of Chuck.
There were those times I wore his mom’s nightgown when we played husband and wife. That time my football pants dropped to my ankles when I was running for a touchdown during our one-on-one scrimmage in his backyard.
The worst was that time when I went to Walmart with Chuck and his mom, and I was too scared to ask anyone where the bathroom was. I couldn’t hold it any longer and let the warm piss stream down my leg as I walked figure-eights around the greeting card aisles to spread out the stream, hoping no one would notice the yellow trail as my jeans turned dark blue. Back in the car, Chuck’s mom sniffed the air dramatically and stared us down. “What in god’s name is that smell?” she yelled. I hung my head and tried to ignore the stickiness of the pee on my legs as it sank into the velour seats of the LTD.
Then there was the fight on the playground after Chuck mocked me during a football game. He made some joke about how skinny I was, a crowd favorite. The other kids would say things like how they couldn’t even fit their dick into one of the legs of my jeans. But it stung worse when Chuck insulted me, even if we were only friends in the neighborhood and not at school.
I yelled at Chuck to shut up. “What are you going to do about it?” he responded, all of the kids surrounding him and challenging me to say something else. So, I did what was expected. I stepped up and shouted, “I’ll make you shut up!” before giving him the biggest shove my skinny arms could muster.
The rest of it played out as usual. We shoved each other back and forth waiting for the other one to make the first move, just like we did when we staged fights for the older kids in our neighborhood. Then Chuck hit me with a surprise hook to the eye, and I was on my ass.
Ms. Judy, the playground supervisor, sprinted toward the football field, the short gray curls on her head bouncing in rhythm with the puffs of her leathery cheeks as she blasted her whistle to break up the fight. By the time she reached me, the sting in my cheek started to burn. Ms. Judy helped me to my feet, and I glared in Chuck’s direction, watching him bask in the laughter and praise of his admirers. The recess bell rang, and all the kids ran back to the school building, leaving me to my shame.
The fight was old news within a week or two, and we were back to roaming the neighborhood on our bikes, me pretending I was Officer Jon Baker and Chuck pretending he was Officer Frank “Ponch” Poncherello from the show CHiPs.
That was before he tried to stab me with a screwdriver, and the remaining memories of our friendship blurred into a fog.
Part II
Long, hot showers were an essential morning ritual, the only thing that distracted me from the petty frustrations that greeted me at daybreak … the dinging of disturbing news alerts on my phone, the dog chasing a rabbit down the alley when I let him out to pee, the constant shooshing sound the toilet made because I was too lazy to fix it.
I let the water cascade down my lanky frame, polishing and refining me, while I stood stone-still in the stream. If I could stand there forever and never work another day as a temp, I would gladly let the water shrivel me into a human prune. This was what it was like to be on the verge of 50 and still struggling to land a decent job.
Now that my anxiety had seeped through the shroud of water, I toweled off and stared in the mirror, trying to see beyond my pockmarked face and lazy eye to a time when I believed I could be anything I wanted. Back when I believed that I could simply shrug off a run for president and focus on winning a Grand Slam. Anything I wanted to be, huh? Not in this life. What I could be is divorced, barely employed, lonely, envious, and bitter.
If only I would have finished my goddamn dissertation, I would have been fine. Teaching freshman courses at a community college would have been better than this shit. Why couldn’t Hannah have waited to leave until I was finished? She could have spared me 12 years of failure.
My new temp job would start in 30 minutes, and here I was being sucked into the vortex of bad memories. If only she could see me now! A temporary executive assistant with Flathead’s Restaurants, Inc.! Pathetic.
I knew the gig wasn’t going to go well, but I didn’t give a shit. I wanted to get in and out as quickly as possible and get back to pushing papers at a small family business or nonprofit. Forcing fake smiles to overpaid executives named Chaz and Delaney was one of the worst punishments I could imagine.
Flathead’s wasn’t quite an Applebee’s or a Chili’s, but it was popular enough to draw a sizable number of teetotalling church groups, libidinous convention-goers, and awkward high-school first dates. All I really knew about the chain was that they built their reputation on drinks and food specials with quirky names and a carefully curated assemblage of American kitsch. Every restaurant was adorned with shiny chrome car parts, glossy pictures of muscle cars and pick-up trucks, bald eagles, American flags, logos from tool manufacturers, and pin-up calendars featuring wrench-wielding bleach-blonde bikini models sporting ‘80s bangs and strategically placed grease stains. The drinks had names like The Right Hook, Soiled Denim, and Rusty Screwdriver, while the desserts were labeled to sway the ladies: Spoon for Two, Silk Blouse, Cuddle Time. How they got away with such blatant, chauvinistic bullshit was beyond me.
I was 15 minutes early when I pulled into the far corner of the headquarters’ massive parking lot – a sea of mostly new luxury sedans and SUVs. I straightened my tie and tried to summon the delusional confidence I had when I posed for my senior high pictures in a double-breasted suit from Bachrach, looking like a sleezy divorce attorney.
Inside the massive glass lobby, I lumbered toward the front desk and was greeted by a beautiful receptionist. “Hi, Dave! I’m Sam. It’s great to have you on board!”
“Hey, uh, thanks. How did you know my name?”
“I have your profile right here.” She nodded at one of her three massive monitors. “I knew you would be arriving at any moment, so I wanted to give you a warm Flathead’s welcome!”
She pointed me to a seating area under a gigantic staff portrait depicting hundreds of happy, shiny people with gleaming teeth. “Sit tight,” she chirped, pivoting and entering an aquarium of offices across the lobby.
Sam, I repeated to myself, watching her walk down the hall, owning the space around her. The golden-brown hue of her complexion, her athletic figure, and her ebullient demeanor gave her the air of a celebrity. It was unfair how much style and grace beautiful young people have, I glowered, catching a glimpse of the bluish bags of skin melting away from my eyes in the reflection of my face in the retracting glass door.
A few minutes later, Sam bounced back into the lobby, holding the door open and extending her upturned hand into the suite of offices like the happiest maître d in the world. She maintained eye contact and a soothing smile while pointing me to the conference room at the end of the hall.
I started down the hall, eyes fixed firmly on the floor. I made it my habit to not make eye contact with anyone until I was formally introduced. First impressions seemed more equitable that way. If I caught a glimpse of someone giving me side-eye or a sneer before I met them face to face, I would distrust them from that point forward, which was a bad position to be in from the standpoint of office politics.
Glancing up as I crossed the conference room threshold, I went numb. Staring back at me from across the room was a shit-eating grin I hadn’t seen in over 30 years. It was Chuck.
“David!” he belted out, launching himself from his seat to shake my hand. “Jesus H. Christ, when was the last time I saw you?! Back at that bar not long after college, right?”
“Chuck,” I shot back, hesitantly. “Yeah, I believe so. You were with Doug, J.P., and Mike. You guys told me about your jobs in sales. It was a pretty quick conversation, really.”
Chuck stared straight through me like he was watching the memory reoccur right behind me.
“We got pretty damn shit-faced that night, so I’m not surprised I couldn’t carry on a conversation. It was a wild time. Fresh out of college, single, and making six figures. We partied hard almost every night. You remember how it was?”
“Ha, ha. No, not quite. I was broke and engaged, a bad combination.” I recounted my brief engagement, my time in grad school. Chuck nodded vigorously in response.
“As you can tell, my job situation hasn’t been all that great, so I’m really grateful for this opportunity. All of my professional connections have dried up. All I can find are temp jobs,” I explained.
“Well, my friend, I think your luck has finally changed. I’m glad to have you on my team. We’ll be sidekicks just like the good ol’ days,” Chuck reassured me, planting a loud thwack of his palm square in the middle of my back.
He eased onto the conference table and punched a button on the phone. Sam answered, and Chuck told her to hold the private room at the flagship restaurant down the street in 30 minutes.
“It’s a very special occasion,” he noted. “Oh, and Sam, will you please escort David there and give him a quick rundown of the business? The rest of us will catch up with you in a few minutes. We need to circle back with a couple of investors about the East Coast expansion.”
“Of course!” Sam snapped back. My god, even her voice was appealing!
Chuck grabbed my shoulder and squeezed a few times like a little league coach reassuring one of his players.
“It’s on the early side, but I like all of my new team members to get a taste of what Flathead’s is all about.” His eyes sparkled like a proud new father’s. “I’m sure you’ve been to one of the restaurants, and I know what you’re thinking – yes, the décor and names of our items are corny, but it’s been a wildly successful branding strategy. You’ll see for yourself soon enough. Make your way over to Sam, and we’ll join you two in a bit.”
Holy hell! I thought as I made my way back to the reception area. Does anyone know I used to lay naked in bed with the CEO of this company? Does anyone have a clue that their boss is the same kid who tried to stab me with a screwdriver when we were 12?
It suddenly occurred to me where all of the stupid names for food and drinks came from. Chuck had institutionalized his mockery of me and my most humiliating moments.
Sam smiled as I approached and guided me to a car idling outside the lobby.
“Soooo … how did it go?” she inquired. “Did you two get along okay?”
“Ha, ha, funny thing,” I muttered. “I had no idea Chuck was the CEO of this place. We’re actually childhood friends. We used to ride our bikes all over the neighborhood pretending we were Jon and Ponch from CHiPs.”
“No way!” Sam shot back. “You guys were friends as kids? How bizarre! What is CHiPs?”
I explained the TV show from the 70s and early 80s about motorcycle highway patrolmen in California. “I was Jon, the blonde one, and Chuck was Ponch, the brunette. Ponch was considered the sexy, suave one, always better with the ladies.”
“Yeah, I bet Chuck really identified with that,” Sam said with a bitter laugh. “By the looks of it, though, you’re no longer a blonde,” she added, nodding at my bald scalp.
“Everything is fleeing me these days,” I mused. “But it is definitely surprising to accidentally reconnect with Chuck after all these years.”
The hostess greeted us and led us to a private room in the back of the restaurant, past booths framed with ’57 Chevy bumpers and brawny hub caps from muscle cars – a veritable roadside attraction of kitsch reverberating to ’80s rock blaring from the speakers.
Chuck’s VPs were the first to arrive after we were seated. All 10 of them: Development, Operations, Marketing, Sales, Strategy, Innovation, Human Resources, Finance, Stakeholder Relations, and Diversity and Inclusion. Seating themselves without looking up, they face-planted themselves into their phones, scouring the day’s business communications.
Chuck appeared in the doorway a minute later, backlit in the glow of neon signs that boasted offensive mottos like “It’s Better Where It’s Wetter” and “If There’s Turf on the Field….” He immediately turned his attention to Sam.
“So, Sam, what have you shared with our newest employee?” Servers streamed in behind him and dispensed small plates stacked high with withered, rancid-looking salads.
“We didn’t have much time to talk before everyone else arrived,” Sam demurred in a tone that instantly undermined the beauty and confidence she projected when I first met her. “I told him about our generous medical leave plan and was just about to explain the Wet Pants policy.”
“Perfect!” Chuck replied. “The Wet Pants policy is one of my favorites. Does that sound familiar at all, David?” He stifled a laugh while scanning the room. “That time in Walmart?”
All eyes in the room were on me.
“I … uh … well, yeah. How could I forget?” The heat of the lights seemed to intensify, and my head practically ballooned with embarrassment.
“Are you guys going to fill us in or not?” a fiercely attractive blonde belted out before stuffing her mouth with the sad salad greens. I glanced at the menu and noticed the name: Greens with Envy. How appropriate?
“This guy,” Chip pointed in my direction, “should tell the story. He’s the inspiration behind the Wet Pants policy. You can tell by the look of him, can’t you?”
Everyone at the table gawked at me conspiratorially. Except Sam. Sam looked concerned. “What’s the Wet Pants policy?” I asked cautiously.
“We have a little incentive program here at Flathead’s. You see, I don’t like my employees taking excessive bathroom breaks during the day. It breaks their rhythm and hampers productivity. Fuck OSHA and their sanitation standards! If you can’t take care of your business before entering mine, you’re not fit for this company. And, David, it’s all in tribute to you.”
“I don’t understand. How does that relate to what I did in Walmart when we were kids? I pissed my pants because I was scared to ask for the bathroom. I had no options. You have plenty of options at your headquarters.”
The posture of everyone around the table straightened in unison as Chuck smiled to himself. He slowly made his way to a framed picture of various hand tools displayed taxonomically like an insect chart. He studied it carefully for a few minutes.
“I never told you what happened after we returned home from Walmart, did I?” Chuck’s sinister smile morphed into a glare. “Your humiliation was public, yes, but my humiliation was just beginning the second you jumped out of the car and ran home. My mother was enraged. She told me to stay in the car and not come out until she came to get me. It had to be like 100 degrees that day! Your piss soaked into the velour seats. The entire car smelled like a nursing home!
“You weren’t the only one who had to use the bathroom at Walmart, you know. But, unlike you, I held it. In the store and all the way home. I begged my mom to let me leave the car. I begged her to let me go to the bathroom, but she slammed the door on me, ignoring my gags from the hot, sour fumes. I swore then and there I would get back at you.”
“Is that why you stopped talking to me?” I stared at Chuck, confused. He scowled back. The VPs stopped eating their salads. Sam – poor Sam – looked desperate to escape.
“Oh, that wasn’t the end of it, David,” Chuck resumed. “After that, my mom put latches and combination locks on all the bathroom doors in our house and made me start doing Kegels three times a day. I was only allowed to use the bathroom once in the morning and once before bed. If I had to piss or shit any other time, she would hand me a rubber band or tell me to stick my thumb up my ass. That didn’t change until I graduated high school and left for college. By then, I could hold it with the best of them. So, maybe you and your tiny bladder did me a favor.”
I was dazed and speechless. Chuck smirked and glanced around the room. The VPs nodded admiringly. Sam lowered her head, clearly flustered. She stood suddenly and asked to be excused. She was out the door before Chuck could respond.
“It looks like someone didn’t understand the moral of the story,” Chuck quipped, settling his gaze back on me.
“I … I had no idea,” I managed through a cracked voice. “My god! Why didn’t you ever say anything? Is that why you tried to murder me with a tool?!”
“You mean this?” Chuck sneered, pulling a long, rusty screwdriver from the inside pocket of his suit jacket. He held it above his head and examined it in the light before placing it on the table in front of him. The VPs, still engrossed in our perverse scene, began tucking into their salads again.
“Is that the one? That can’t be the same one. Why the fuck are you carrying it around?!” I could feel sweat blooming in my armpits, my heart trying to beat its way out of my chest. “I don’t … I don’t understand the point of all this?” I mumbled. “Why didn’t you say anything? Why here? Why now?”
Sam stepped back into the room and froze at the sight of the screwdriver.
“Sam! So nice of you to return after your unexcused bathroom break,” Chuck bellowed. “You realize that HR will have to write you up for this?” He was hunched over the table, arms spread apart, palms down, the screwdriver in the middle, glancing at Sam, then me. The VPs were motionless.
“I’ve held on to this memento, David, because it symbolizes power. A judge uses a gavel to keep order. A king uses a scepter to control his kingdom. I used this screwdriver to build my business. And it reminds me that I have the power to take another life – namely yours. I probably would have done it that day if the older guys hadn’t intervened.
“You always got everything you wanted. Your big house, fancy cars, the beach vacations. I despised you for all of that. Or maybe I just realized how weak you were … you are.”
“You were my friend,” I pleaded. “We were friends! And I was the one who was jealous of you. People liked you. Girls liked you. You were better at football. Your mom let you stay up late, watch whatever TV shows you wanted, eat Oreos whenever you liked.”
The VPs were entranced. I glanced at Sam for a cue about what to do. Her face was rigid, locked in place with anger.
“Let’s play a little game to initiate your new role as my secretary here at Flathead’s. Have a seat.” He pulled out the chair in front of him and motioned to it. “I’ll be nestled right behind you, just like old time’s sake.”
I did a quick mental calculation of my bills and debt. I could knock out all of it in less than a year with what they would be paying me here. Or I could just walk away from this nightmare scenario and try to forget this ever happened.
I stepped forward, eyeing Chuck timidly, and reluctantly settled into the chair.
“Great!” Chuck cheered, clapping his hands together in a celebratory clasp. “Let’s play some pinfinger!”
Chuck reached down and gently placed my hand on the table, spreading my fingers like he would spread the legs of a lover.
“Just remember …” he snickered, slowly tapping the screwdriver between my fingers. “Don’t move.”
Building speed, he began to alternate between fingers, planting the screwdriver deep into the table with each swift stab. Outside thumb to outside middle back to inside thumb to inside ring. Inside ring to inside index. Inside index to outside pinky and all the way back to inside thumb.
The VPs huddled around one another on the opposite side of the table. Sam took a step back, away from the group, with an alarmed expression. The VPs began to cheer on Chuck as he stabbed at the spaces with a furious pace. I tracked the shaft of the screwdriver and imagined it boring a hole into the meaty part of my palm between by thumb and index finger, the “webspace.” I closed my eyes and envisioned my impaled hand dissolving into a spider’s web around the screwdriver.
A drop of sweat hit my neck, and I flinched, causing Chuck to nick the tip of my index finger with the screwdriver blade.
“Shit!” I cried in pain. A small flower of blood bloomed around a patch of flesh pinned down by the screwdriver. I shut my eyes and gritted my teeth, willing away the pain.
My eyes flashed open to find Sam screaming and lunging across the table. I turned to see Chuck’s raised arm, just beginning its descent, as Sam careened into my lap, throwing our combined weight into Chuck and toppling him backward. The screwdriver bounced off the table just as my head hit the floor and Sam rolled to my side.
Chuck was back on his feet in a split second, grabbing me by my collar and belt and flinging me onto the table, his fist suddenly in my line of vision. I felt the old, familiar thud in my eye socket, and everything went black, yells and shrieks dissolving into muted echoes.
When the light returned, I saw a blurry figure hovering over me, fists in the air. I gasped for breath.
Why couldn’t I move? Was I paralyzed? Something was on top of me, digging into my shoulders, pinning me to the floor. The smirk on Chuck’s face staring down at me came into focus just in time for me to see him crane his neck and the screwdriver sink into the base, just above the shoulder blade. A sucking, gurgling noise erupted from his throat, and a torrent of blackish-red liquid spilled from the wound into my eyes.
My eyelids sputtered spastically, desperate to blink out the sticky-hot substance, catching glimpses of Chuck flailing at the screwdriver. Blood spurted from the side of the object like a garden hose being crimped and released, crimped and released. The room was turning purple.
Chuck rolled to my side, and I gasped for air. His breath thick on my neck, the heat of it matching the pool of blood pooling beneath me. His eyes fluttered, and the screwdriver, lacquered with blood, sunk deep into his neck as he pressed himself into me. Chuck forced his eyes wide, and in a horrifying rasp, mouthed the words, “I have … always … loved you.”
I stared into his vacant eyes and felt his warm, wet arm drop across my chest and go limp.
Sam stared down at us, her face splattered and vengeful.
“That’s for raping me in your office, you motherfucker!” she screamed, shaking with rage. She staggered to a corner of the room and collapsed, a heap of anger and tears.
I crawled out from under Chuck’s arm and leaned against a wall as paramedics and police officers barged into the room. One dove toward Chuck and applied pressure to his neck. The other directed a bright light into my eyes, asking a flurry of questions I couldn’t fully register.
I looked up as Chuck was being lifted onto a gurney, his head plopping to the side with the screwdriver still protruding from his neck, blood flowing like lava from the cone of a volcano. We were eye to eye, but his dead gaze stared past me, the same way he had back in the conference room. What was he looking for? Even in death. Was it fate?
Glancing over my shoulder, I noticed a police officer handing Sam a towel. She dabbed at the blood, dazed by death.
“I’m afraid I’m going to have to place you under arrest, Miss,” were the only words I overheard as two officers lifted her to her feet. Sam didn’t blink as they cuffed her and escorted her away.
Another cop tossed me a towel. “You look like something out of Fangoria!” he jeered. I searched for my phone in my pocket, pulled it out, switched it to selfie mode, and saw what he meant. My entire face was caked with maroon blood from Chuck’s gushing wound. I looked like a beet with eyes.
“I’m going to tape this place off and get Forensics in here,” the officer informed me. “You just sit tight for a minute.” He shook his head, then added a tepid, “Sorry, buddy.”
Wiping the blood from my face, I focused on steadying my breathing, counting a cadence in time with the rhythmic movements of the emergency responders. The image of Chuck’s sputtering mouth started to sear its way into my memory.
A waiter hip-twisted his way through the doors, a silver-covered platter perched on his upturned palm. A diffuse fog of neon seeped in behind him.
“I’m not supposed to be in here,” he leaned in and whispered in my ear. “But Chuck had this specially made just for you. He told me to be sure you got it no matter what. It’s called Chuck’s Roast … Rare with Flare.”
He placed the dish in front of me, reached into his apron, pulled out a gold screwdriver, and with a quick flourish, removed the platter’s cover before leaving the room. There on the plate was a giant chunk of rare meat on a bed of mashed potatoes, all smothered in red-eye gravy. I gagged and spat a wad of bloody bile into the gelatinous mound.
I picked up the screwdriver and held it in front of me. Encircling the handle in dainty, cursive script was a message. It read, “To my one and only nervous secretary, try not to choke on my meat!”
Jesus! What a first day!
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