Surprise!

The following is an excerpt from part one:

That provides him with a splendid chance, before I block him out entirely with the headphones, to inform me of his great wealth. He received a $120,000 insurance settlement. In four months, he pissed it away in support of his and the fiancée’s cocaine habit. To boast of that sort of frivolity as one’s claim to distinction simply withers me right down to the brain stem.

The fiancée, reportedly a buxom and beautiful black barfly, is the one who had birdbrain “arrested again” on some sort of sketchy domestic violence charge. The event occurred just hours before the harmonious couple were to enter into matrimony. As a result, he’s no longer sure if she is the best choice for him. Perhaps the Brazilian beauty who tends bar at his nightly hang-out of choice would be a more suitable life partner? She seems desirable considering the way “she was coming onto” him. Could it be that he was after the tits and she the tips?

I do not propose the question—I dread having to listen to the answer. Before I clamp the headphones on for good, he suggests that possibly we could “do something.” I magically go deaf. I have all I can handle to restrain regurgitation as it makes a massive charge at the back of my throat. Unfortunately, I cannot wear the headset to go to chow. I am vulnerable to attack. The robbery, for which he served five years in another state, is a real honey of a story. The heist occurred at a drive-up window. With a handwritten note, he demanded $5,000 from the teller. She handed over the cash and he drove off. He didn’t make it out of the parking lot. Surprise!