VINCE
November 14th, 2014
I knew from the first day we met that Sienna was different, but I had no real idea of how changing our level of commitment to each other would affect me. There was no doubt she was exactly what I had been missing in my life, and from what little she shared about her feelings, she felt exactly the same way about me. Her having changed how I felt about women was quite an accomplishment, but nothing or no one would ever change who I was.
After locking the door of my truck, I walked around the corner and studied the front of the house. Based on the size and the amount of windows, my guess was that there was one bedroom, one bathroom, a kitchen, and a small living room. The Sedgwick County property listing had it detailed as a residential one bedroom family dwelling, but accuracy by our state and county government was something that really didn’t exist.
One late model Nissan coupe sat in the driveway, seeming clearly out of place in the rundown neighborhood. Dressed in jeans, a loose-fitting long sleeved pullover, and my boots, I looked the part of someone the homeowner might trust enough to open the door.
I tugged at the bottom of my untucked shirt, making sure it covered the pistol hidden in the holster on my hip. After checking the side of the house for additional cars and seeing nothing, I stepped onto the porch and knocked on the door.
“It’s open,” he responded.
It wasn’t the greeting I anticipated, which led me to believe he was expecting someone; and there was no doubt in my mind the person he was expecting wasn’t me. I glanced over each shoulder, cleared the pistol from the holster, and held it behind my right thigh. As I turned to the right, exposing my left side to the door, I gripped the handle with my left hand and pushed the door open.
The floorplan was pretty much what I expected. After a wide-eyed and more than likely drug induced squeal, he jumped from his seat at the dining table and started to run toward the small kitchen. He was half-naked, obviously scared, and skinny, but he was fast.
I took aim and barked out my demand.
“Freeze, Motherfucker. I’ll drop you dead right where you stand,” I shouted as I kicked the door closed with the heel of my boot.
He stopped, turned toward me, and narrowed his gaze. His shoulder length hair didn’t look like it had been washed in a month. He was in his late twenties, obviously strung out on much more than weed, and may have tipped the scales at a hundred and fifty pounds if he was fully dressed and soaking wet. At my guess of six feet tall, he looked pretty fucking unhealthy. Barefoot, and dressed in jeans and nothing else, it was all I could do to look at his scab-covered malnourished body without offering him a much needed meal.
If I didn’t kill him first.
“Fuck, I uhh…”
“Save it,” I said. “I’ll make this easy for you. I’m here to collect the debt you owe Jimmy Weed. Thirteen grand. I’m not leaving without it. You got that much here?”
“Awwe, fuck, man. No. No, I got maybe five hundred,” he responded as he began to dig his fingernails into the side of his neck.
“Five hundred? You sure that’s all you got?” I asked.
“Uh huh,” he responded as he continued to scratch along his lower jaw.
“I’ll cuff your ass, stuff a sock in your fucking mouth, toss you in the tub, and tear this place apart,” I said as I held the pistol rock steady, pointed directly at his chest.
He stopped scratching and began to stammer. “I got maybe…I mean…yeah… maybe…uhhm…five…oh, fuck, Dude, don’t shoot me. Yeah…like five hundred maybe.”
“You’re sure?” I asked.
He started scratching again. “Yeah. Way sure.”
“Sit down,” I demanded.
“Where?” he asked as his eyes darted around the room.
“Right where you’re fucking standing,” I barked.
He dropped to the floor as if someone had kicked his legs out from underneath him.
“So how the fuck did you plan on paying this debt?” I asked as I pulled the vintage chrome legged chair away from the dining table.
“I uhhm…I was gonna…I…fuck, Dude, I dunno,” he said.
“You reached an agreement with Mr. Weed, and he honored his part. You, however, didn’t honor yours. Do you understand that?” I asked as I waved the pistol in his direction.
“Uh huh,” he said.
I glanced around the house. Spongebob Squarepants played on the flat-screen television that was sitting on the floor beside the only couch in the small living room. The place was a disaster, and smelled like a combination of piss and pizza.
I shifted my eyes from the living room to where he was sitting. “And you understand thirteen grand is a lot of money?”
“Uh huh,” he said.
“You also understand it really doesn’t matter if it’s thirteen grand or thirteen cents, you made a promise. And you broke it. You understand that?” I asked.
“Yeah, I guess. We were gonna…I mean I…”
“Shut up. Jesus fucking Christ. You understand you broke a promise, right?” I asked.
He scratched his face and stared blankly in my direction.
“You’re never going to make it if you don’t change the way you’re doing things, kid. Show respect, get respect. Understand?” I asked.
He nodded his head.
“Where’s your phone?” I asked.
He narrowed his eyes and wrinkled his brow. “Huh?”
“Your fucking phone, dipshit. Where’s your phone? You’re expecting someone, and I need to see who. Where is it?” I asked.
“Think I knocked it on the floor,” he said as he pointed underneath the table.
I glanced down at the floor. A phone sat a few inches from the chair I was sitting in. I leaned down, picked it up, and attempted unsuccessfully to unlock the screen. Growing increasingly frustrated, and wondering when and if his friend or friends were going to show up, I stood from my seat and walked in his direction.
As I stepped to his side, I pointed the pistol at his head and held the phone in front of his face.
“Reach up, unlock the screen, and do it slowly. If you reach for this piece, I’ll blow what little brains you have all over this fucked up green carpet. Understand?” I asked.
“Yeah, Dude,” he said as he reached for the phone. “How’d you…uhhm…how’d you, oh fuck man…”
After he pressed a series of buttons on the screen and nodded his head, I raised the phone and opened the text screen.
After a quick study of his text messages, it appeared Lamar was on his way. I glanced at my watch, realized it was definitely not three o’clock like it depicted, and glanced at the screen of the phone. If Lamar was going to be on time, and most drug dealers never were, he was five minutes late.
“Lamar carry a gun?” I asked.
He stopped scratching his neck and glanced in my direction. “Huh?” he murmured.
“Does Lamar carry a fucking gun?” I asked as I walked to the table.
“Uhhm. No, Dude,” he said.
“If he walks in here strapped, I’m going to shoot you first, and then I’m going to shoot his dumb ass. Does he carry a gun? I asked again.
He widened his eyes and shook his head from side-to-side. “No, Dude, I swear.”
“When he gets here, you’re going to tell him just what you told me, understand? No more, no less. ‘It’s open’ is all you’re going to say, understand?” I asked.
“Uh huh,” he responded.
Some of the people I encountered through my day-to-day activities were more intelligent than others. A good portion of them were simply people who got caught up in trouble, and were incapable of meeting their commitments. Others were questionable, and some were just plain stupid. A quick study of the text messages on the phone provided enough information for me to believe the scab covered fool on the floor was the biggest idiot I had ever had the experience of encountering. It seemed every drug deal he made was detailed in the form of a text message on his phone for all to see.
“You know the government can read these messages without a search warrant, right?” I asked.
“Huh?”
“Neverfuckingmind,” I said.
My level of respect for Jimmy Weed diminished slightly as I placed the phone on the table beside me. For anyone to trust such an idiot to return any amount of money did nothing in my opinion but clearly show their desperation of hope for another dollar earned. As the sound of a vehicle in the drive became apparent, I stood from the chair.
“Move your skinny ass over toward the couch and remember what I said,” I said as I waved the gun in his direction.
I walked to the hinge side of the front door and stood. Three sharp knocks were met by the scab covered fool’s authorization to enter.
“It’s open,” he said.
The door opened, and who appeared to be the walking skeleton’s brother entered holding a small cardboard box.
“Don’t move or I’ll blow your fucking brains all over the wall,” I said as I stepped from behind the door and pressed the pistol into his temple.
“Oh fuck, Dude. Don’t shoot me. You can have it all,” he said as he tried to hand the box to me.
“Put it on the floor,” I demanded.
He dropped the box at his feet. It hit the floor with a solid thud. I shifted my eyes to dumbass number one, and back to number two. They appeared to be twins.
“Brothers?” I asked.
“Twins,” dumbass number one responded.
Just what the world needs, two of these dumb fucks.
“Go stand by your brother,” I said. “Don’t reach in your pockets or do anything stupid, or I’ll shoot both of you, understand?
“Yeah…I uhhm. Fuck…Don’t shoot me. Yeah…I understand,” he murmured as he walked toward the couch.
I picked up the box, opened it, and looked inside. To describe it as being full of money would be an understatement.
“How much is in here?” I asked.
“Uhhm, money or meth?” Lamar asked.
“Money,” I responded as I peered into the cash filled box.
“It’s uhhm. It’s…there’s…there’s twenty-two grand…uhhm…in bills, and about thirty grand worth of…in there…uhhm, in meth,” he responded.
I shifted my eyes toward dumbass number one. “You dipshit. So you had enough to pay your debt and keep your word, and you didn’t?”
“Huh?” number two asked. “What debt?”
I shook my head in frustration as I alternated glances between the box and the two idiots. “Jimmy Weed.”
“You didn’t pay The Weed?” number one asked number two.
Number two shrugged his shoulders. “Dude, I was gonna pay him after we got the shit sold.”
I waved the pistol toward the kitchen. “Both of you just shut the fuck up. Go sit in the kitchen in the middle of the floor.”
Dumbass number one led the way, and number two followed close behind. After they were both sitting in the middle of the floor picking at their faces, I turned, locked the front door, and walked to my seat. I dumped the contents of the box in the middle of the table, and began to count the money, doing my best to stick with hundred dollar bills. The box was filled with every denomination of bill, including countless well-weathered one dollar bills. A few minutes later, I had two piles of cash.
One with thirteen thousand and one with three thousand nine hundred.
“We can do this one of two ways. You owe Mr. Weed thirteen grand. That’s not negotiable. My cut is thirty percent. So, I can take the thirteen, leave the rest, and you’ll be seeing Mr. Weed – or quite possibly me – again, for the thirty-nine hundred dollar fee I’m charging him, because that comes off the top of his thirteen grand. Or, you can pay the thirteen and pay me my cut now, and it’ll be the last you see of either of us. So, do you two want to discuss it?” I asked.
“Take all you want,” Lamar said.
“I want thirty-nine hundred, and not a cent more. Mr. Weed wants thirteen grand. I really don’t give a fuck if you pay me, or if he pays me. I’m just telling you a way to keep him, or me, from coming back. So what’ll it be?” I asked.
“Take it all now,” dip shit number one said. “The thirteen and the three grand.”
I shook my head. “Thirty-nine hundred.”
“Yeah, whatever. Take it. And you’re just gonna go? Like that’s it?” he asked.
I stood from my seat and shoved my gun in the holster. “Yep. That’s it.”
“And you’re leaving the dope and the rest of the money?” he asked.
I glared at him as if he was even more of an idiot than he actually was. “It ain’t mine, why the fuck would I take it?”
He shrugged his shoulders and widened his eyes. “Because you have the gun?”
“You dumb fuck. Having a gun doesn’t give a person the right to steal. A gun is a deterrent to crime and a means of protection, not a license to be a god damned thief. I fucking swear, that’s what’s wrong with society. No one keeps a promise, and people are too god damned quick to take what’s not rightfully theirs,” I said as I shoved the piles of money in my two front pockets.
“Good luck in your endeavors, Fellas,” I said as I unlocked the door.
I stepped onto the porch, pulled the door closed behind me, and started to walk away. After pausing for a long second, I pushed it open and peered inside. The two dipshits were still sitting on the kitchen floor scratching their faces.
“You two fuckers can get up now,” I said.
They both stood up and stared in my direction. I considered giving further instructions, but opted to simply pull the door closed and leave.
It bothered me that the criminal activities in the city were carried out by idiots like the two men I had just left behind. There is no honor among thieves was a saying I had always believed to be true. At least in my mind, a thief was the worst type of criminal to ever exist. A drug dealer, however, was nothing short of a businessman, choosing an illicit or illegal substance as his means of obtaining income.
Drug dealers weren’t inherently bad people, nor did I assume they were irresponsible simply based on their chosen profession. Furthermore, I didn’t believe all drugs were bad, or that they should all be illegal, yet I refused to enter in the debates regarding their legality. I did, however, believe that a man should always honor his word when he gave it, regardless of his means of obtaining income.
A promise was no different than a contract, and when a man gave his word, he needed to honor it at any or all costs. If he didn’t or wouldn’t, he was as worthless as the promise he had broken.
If my father taught me one thing before he died, it was to be honorable.
I walked to my truck a member of a motorcycle club, a one percenter, a criminal, and without a doubt a man who could be placed in prison for his actions and choices.
But everything I did, I did with honor.
And I never made a promise I wasn’t able to keep.