Nesbo isn’t dead. That was a ruse Detective Kline slipped in to throw me off, because Kline isn’t a cold-blooded killer. The next piece is simple: the shady detective also pulled a fast one on Sam and took all the drugs. Sam, being penniless, must have been the one who took the money from the register and the secret stash, since only he knew where it was.
I toss my shirt in the trash, the mission of cleaning it abandoned, and check my tank top to ensure no marinara has stained it. I finally end up taking that piss, and then I leave.* (I do wash my hands, if you really must know.)
“Hey Ellis, take a look at this,” I hear Taylor say.
In the office, Taylor is reading several pieces of paper. A manila folder is open on the desk. “What is it?”
“I think I figured out who stole your identity, man.” He turns the page around in his hands and gives me a look.
“That shady shit,” I say, both aloud and in my head.
“Someone’s been perpetratin’,” Chester says. “Are you sure Drewcifer isn’t behind this? It sounds like something he would do.”
“Wow. Thanks Chester. I hadn’t thought of that angle yet. You’re a genius for putting it all together,” I say in mock agreement.
“I’m just sayin’. I was trying to think outside the box.” Chester’s face has the look of a child scolded by a parent.
“Let’s just stay inside the box for a moment. Now listen, I think Sam is still alive.” I recount what I had deduced regarding his apparently faked death.
“We gotta find that fool. His days are fucking numbered, bro!” Chester’s voice rises loudly in the confined office.
“Settle down, Chester,” I say. “And all of our days are numbered if you think about it.”
“Yeah … so … but his numbers are like, waaaaaaaaaay smaller,” he says, nodding his head.
I let the air stand still. This is probably true. Sam is older and unhealthy, if that makes sense. But with this whole mob thing circling down upon us, I’m not too sure the math is working in our favor anymore.
As I stare at the papers, everything makes sense. The one person I had to give my social security number to used it for his own selfish means.* (Not to throw out another free plug, but this is why LifeLock is needed in today’s society, and at $10 a month, that’s a pretty good bargain for peace of mind.)
I guess it all boils down to: people are capable of almost anything. Hell, even my Uncle Ray insisted that he never once had an unclean thought. But in the end it was the browsing history on his laptop that told a different tale.
My body shivers in revulsion and I’m brought back to the moment at hand, far, far away from the rather disgusting images from my uncle’s computer. It’s good she divorced him; pancakes, power drills, Aborigines, zebras, and Buddhism are just too weird a combination for bedtime fantasies.
“Well, it’s nice to have another clue to the mystery solved,” I say. “But we’re still no closer to getting Tony’s money.” I feel like it takes me way too long to spit these words out, thanks to the freshness of Ray’s story still in my mind. I’ll probably have a fit of night terrors later.
“Looks like I might have to whore myself out again, and Chester’s body ain’t cheap.” Chester lifts his shirt, exposing his belly, and squishes the fat together. It looks like an angry Stay Puft man. Chester even gives it a voice as he vibrates his gut. “Nooooo, this sexy ass body ain’t cheap at all. Women pay by the pound for this high quality man meat.”
“You’re gross, bro,” Taylor says.
Chester stops, his shirt falling back into place. “That’s hurtful; I try so hard to lose weight. We can’t all be lucky like you, T.”
Taylor barks out a laugh. “Are you kidding me? You eat like shit.”
“It’s true,” I say. “As much as you sit around and all the junk food you pound away, I doubt you even burn a thousand calories a day.”
“You know I can’t work out,” Chester whines. “Remember, I busted my knee at that Nickelback concert. That’s why I started drinking milk.”
“Whole milk,” I huff and shake my head.
“Come on guys, you know I hate those crash diets. I don’t want to lose too much weight too fast and die early like the lead singer of Blues Traveler.”
Taylor looks at Chester in confusion. “He’s not dead.”
“Whaaaaaaaaat?” This one word is drawn out so long Chester’s mouth is gaping wide by the time he runs out of air. He looks ridiculous and I almost want to snap a picture.
“Yeah,” I agree. “He’s still alive.”
“Really? Wow, that just turns my universe upside down and shit.” Chester is clearly baffled by this news.
“Look, just let it go,” I say. “We need to get outta here. Taylor, grab that paperwork. I deposited the check Sam gave me yesterday, so it should clear by tomorrow. We’ll figure out how to get the rest of the cash then.”
20 Error Not in My Favor …
I actually manage to rouse shortly after 6 AM. Not because I’m changing the error of my ways, but because I’m scared stiff from the ramifications* of not paying Tony back. (Mainly death at this point.)
Now it’s around 7:30 in the morning and I’m very confused as I stare at my ATM printout. Take a wild guess as to who’s still broke? Wait. Strike that from the record. Guess who’s now sitting in the red?
For some reason, the money from the check I deposited yesterday didn’t go through, and it looks like I have incurred a fee for depositing a rubber check. I have a good mind to storm into the bank and demand recompense. Two things stop me. One, they can’t do anything, as it has now dawned on me that the not-dead sneaky Sam gave me a check he knew was going to bounce. And two, the bank doesn’t open for another hour and a half.
I’ve hit a wall and I don’t know what to do, but on instinct my phone is out and I’m calling my father. I confess everything: the drugs, the illegal tender I had taken and then Chester spent, the date-rape drug I used on Carla Swanson last summer.* (Again, everything I just said is a big lie, especially that Carla part. She was the one who tried slipping me the Rohypnol. Guys can be raped too, you know – even though the courts don’t want to believe it.)
Back to my discussion with my pop. I do what is expected. I tell a half-truth when he answers.
“DeAngelo residence.” My dad is so professional. God, I hope I can be like him when I grow up. If I get the chance to grow up, that is.
“Hey daddio, I’m in trouble.”
“Is it the identity theft thing again?” His voice is as calm as a warm breeze and just hearing it gives me a tad bit of peace.
“No, although that’s still an ongoing problem.”
“I know, Ellis, but I’ll help in any way I can.”
It’s good to hear him say that. “Well, I could use a bit of help. My check from The Sub Shop bounced today, and I’m not just broke, I owe the bank … ” I look at the ATM slip, “twelve dollars and seventeen cents.”
“The check from your job?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m going to head down there and have a word with your boss.”
Whoa, whoa, whoa. This is not what I need. “Dad, wait, calm down. It’s okay. I quit. Screw that guy, he was a scumbag. I’ll get a job somewhere else.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m positive, Dad. Don’t worry about it.”
“Alright. Well, how much do you need to weather the storm?”
I need $194.80 to pay back Tony. “Is two hundred too much?” I ask, expecting him to say no.
“I’ll put five hundred in your account.”
This is why I love my dad. For him, that money is hard to come by, but he’s willing to sacrifice to help out his children.
“It’s okay, I only need two. I’ll work something out in the meantime.”
“You’re a smart boy, and I know you’re working hard out there. It’s good to see I have a kid that isn’t completely throwing his life away with stupid decisions.”
Shees
h. God is teaching me a lesson right now, and it stings.
I check my online banking shortly after nine and true to his word, dad has put money in my account – three hundred, in fact – leaving me with a balance of $287.83.
Now all I have to do is withdraw the cash and wait for Tony’s leg-breaker to come back.
21 Proper F*cked
Every dollar and cent is accounted for. We count and recount it all. My thoughts the whole time are of me being fed to a wood chipper if the math comes out wrong. But there it is: $3,350.00. All we have to do is wait for Tony’s goon to show up and get him out of our life for good. Still, there’s something in my stomach that doesn’t sit right. It isn’t breakfast either, because I’ve been so sick with worry I couldn’t do much more than drink half a cup of coffee.
Finally, at about quarter after 3 PM the guy shows up with a rapping of knuckles on the door. Chester opens it and gets shoved aside as the goon comes through the entryway. He has a mongoloid look to him. We eventually find out his name is Charlie, and he isn’t into introductions when he arrives. So in my mind his name is Mongo. He slams the door and gets straight to business.
“So where’s the dough?”
With as much confidence as a man in my position could attempt, I get the wad of cash that’s rubber banded together and hold it out for Mongo.
He looks at my hand and then squarely into my eyes as if I might have some skin disease, or it’s really dirty nasty money. Not like laundered money, but money that comes directly from the G-string of a stripper in the shady part of town. On a Tuesday.
He gives a sarcastic huff of laughter before swatting the money to the ground. On instinct I withdraw my hand as if bitten by a wasp. Truth be told, the slap of his rings against my skin does send a painful sting through my fingers.
“Is dis’ some kind of joke? Where is da’ money?”
“That’s it. Every penny. Three thousand, three hundred and fifty bucks.”
“It seems maybe I didn’t make myself clear yesterday.”
“Dude, that’s all the money he gave me, I swear. I didn’t want it to begin with.”* (This is an absolute fact. Remember from earlier?)
Mongo’s hand shoots into an inside pocket of his jacket, and at the same moment, Chester screams, jumping over the couch to hide. “Run! He’s gonna kill us, Ellis!”
I won’t lie, my left gonad quivers uncontrollably in its sack and shoots up, seeking refuge somewhere behind my pancreas. My right nut seems to be ballsier – no pun intended – and stands its ground. Regarding my body as a whole, well, I flinch, and my eyes squeeze shut. In my mind I’m already running down the hallway, but in reality I’m still frozen where I stand. I even manage the fastest prayer of my life and end it with how much I love my parents and how much I’ll miss them.
Beep … beep … beep … beep!
It’s the most un-terrifying gun I’ve ever heard, and when I squint through my right eye, I see a very annoyed Mongo with a cellphone to his ear. Then he begins speaking in what I assume is Italian, since Chinese or Swahili just would not have made sense.
Also on the list of assumptions is that I figure he’s speaking to Tony. The fact that I can hear Tony’s voice yelling through the phone is another solid indication it’s him. Also, he sounds just a mite upset, and I have no idea why.
The sizeable mafia man hands me the phone, and for a moment I honestly don’t know what I should be saying. ‘Hey Tony, long time no see,’ or, ‘What’s up Tone Loc?’ As if I have some little nickname for him because we used to do business. Instead it’s just a strangled, “Heeee … Hello?”
I begin explaining to Tony how we spent a little of the cash but we got it all back. Then he responds that we’re just a little short. I wonder for a moment if maybe we’re wrong, and maybe Tony did keep a log of just how much money he gave me, until he says we’re $477,000 short.
My knees go slack, but somehow I remain standing. He begins speaking again and now it all becomes very clear. That thought I had earlier – the one that gnawed at my gut – was: why would a mafia guy really get so passionate about a measly three grand? And the answer is: he wouldn’t. A little perturbed, maybe, but not to the point of killing people, especially some college kids.
As it turns out, the four hundred and eighty grand I had delivered to him before wasn’t so much currency, as it was newspaper cut to dimensions of money. That’s when my blood boils but I refuse to let it show, just in case Mongo does have a gun after all. Sammy and Detective Kline set me up. They concocted a plan to make it seem like I had handed off fake money to Tony and kept all the real cash for myself.
I speak with Tony a few more minutes before giving the phone back to his henchman. Mongo exchanges some words with his boss, gives me a knowing nod that he’s been filled in, and leaves our dorm room.
Chester steps into the hallway to make sure Mongo is leaving for real, before coming back in and closing the door.
“So what did he say? Are we good?” he asks.
“We are most definitely not good,” I say.
Chester shakes his head. “Is that psycho coming back?”
“We have one week to get him his four hundred and eighty thousand.”
This is an impossible task, I know. From the look on both of my buddies’ faces they’re registering the same feeling. I can’t be 100% sure, but I think I feel the ulcer in my belly burst a little. Damn, I need a Klonopin and a long nap.
22 The Plan
“Man – shit, Ellis,” Chester says. “How are we gonna do that? I had to rub one out last night just to go to sleep, I was so stressed.”
“I know, I could hear you.”* (To be honest, I probably should have done the same too. I didn’t sleep a wink.)
Taylor steps in closer and crosses his arms. “So what’s the plan? And it can’t be illegal.”
I have to start spitballing ideas, so I just let them roll out. “We could sell your car. It’s paid off. We can’t ask your parents for the rest, though; they wouldn’t go for that. Ummm … we could even try selling all of Chester’s old Pokémon cards. They might be worth something.”
“Screw that, bro. I had to search for years for some of those,” Chester says, crossing his own chunky arms like a mirror image of Taylor.* (This is not true. Chester will never be a mirror image of Taylor.) “Sorry dudes, I’m dunzo with all this madness. Seriously. Bye Felicia!”
“So now we’re quoting Friday?” I ask.
“Hellz, yeah. It’s only the greatest adventure of ethnic proportions,” Chester says.
I let out a laugh. “Don’t you mean epic?”
“Nah. I keep things on the real when it comes to that –”
I shoot him a look and he shuts up.
“Wait a second. What about that property that’s in my name?” I ask Taylor.
“What about it?” He shrugs, not knowing where I’m going with this.
“Can’t I fill out some paperwork with the bank? Tell them I’m remodeling a bathroom – or better yet, a kitchen? I should be able to pull out some equity, right?”
“That would still take time. It would be more than a week to get funds. And it doesn’t work out quite like you think. They won’t just dump money into your bank account.”
“That’s it!” I say with shrill excitement. “A bank account! If Sammy pulled that identity scam on me, wouldn’t he open an account in my name to prove I had assets or even collateral?”
“Maybe. But he would also put himself on the account. Which means if you try to pull out a large sum, he would have to be there too.”
“I wonder if any of that info is in the paperwork we took from The Sub Shop.” I rush over and begin sifting through all the papers. “Statements. We’re gonna want to find a statement.”
Taylor and Chester start going through them as well.
“Chaaaaa-ching!” Chester says, handing a paper to Taylor. “Found one.”
“Wrong one,” Taylor says. “That’s just for the shop. We need one with Ell
is’s name on it.” He tosses it on the desk, away from the others.
“Hold on.” I stop and scan a piece of paper I just found. “I think we may have a lead.”
I mull things over. If Sam is alive, he’ll probably be hiding out and laying low. I try to put myself in his shoes, but it’s difficult, because I don’t like Crocs or Birkenstocks.
“What’s that?” Chester asks, interrupting my fashion dilemma.
“It’s an expired insurance card for one of Sam’s cars.”
“So?” he says. “How does that help?”
Spinning the card around, I show it to the guys, my finger tapping against the information I’m referring to. “An address. Wilmington, North Carolina, boys. We’re going to the beach.”
Chester’s eyes light up. “Awesome sauce. Road trip! I’ll pack my shit.”
Now let me tell you what’s going through my head at this point. First, I’m thinking that my idea is sheer genius, and if brilliance had a smell … well, I must be reeking strongly of it. Second, I wish Chester would stop using the term ‘awesome sauce’. He sounds like an imbecile.
We have a few last minute errands to take care of before we leave. Taylor says one of his law firm buddies knows a pretty good private investigator. Luckily he only needs a small retainer to start and gives guaranteed results, emphasis on ‘guaranteed’. We give him all the details and contact info and he says he’ll start immediately.
After that, we head for the coast.
23 The Sting
“Is this the place?” Taylor says while staring over the steering wheel.
“I think so.” But I check the map on my phone again. “Yeah, this is it. 209 Summer Glen Condos.”
“So you wanna just bust in?” says Chester from the back seat.
“Nah, let’s sit tight for a while and keep an eye on things.”
After three hours of waiting we’re all getting anxious, and the air in the car has grown funky. Chester got a case of the bubble guts and won’t stop farting.