Moron Whisperer

Sometimes, one really is faced with the choice of the lesser of two evils. Mine was to be drug to an enormous corporate Christmas party (the other choice was endless whining). The amount of internal self-cursing on the state of my life while driving there cannot be overstated. We pulled up to one of those intimidating, unwelcoming office spectacles downtown meant to make the inferior feel more inferior. Worst part was I had a flashback to my many times passing by this same building in absolute despair while homeless. I'm sure that's a story I can share at the party.

Traveling up the elevator I felt as a condemned prisoner on the way to his execution: no way out. But while the elevator was rising the feeling in my stomach was sinking. We were not alone in there so I'm already feeling as ill-at-ease and out-of-place as I feared. I paused as the doors parted to the sea of people ready to mock the moron among them. I had to think someday someone would make a passion play of this ordeal.

My invite naturally went her own way since it was her corporate masters swilling the night away. I was left like chum in the water, my insides twisting in agony. I wished to cry out for help but (rightly) assumed that would only make matters worse. What was I going to say to anyone? They ask me how I am and I say, "Homeless and suicidal. And you?" Sounds like a real ender to me.

These are the people I very carefully avoid; office creatures, aliens of a bubbled world that rests on the backs of workers like me. People like me horrify them because we see them from underneath, where they can't hide, as we mop their floors and empty their wastebaskets. There are spies wherever you go.

My reeling mind tried to cling to the idea I had some sort of buffer between me and them before my fraudulence could be exposed. I even overheard some inane conversation that made me realize office workers are definitely not rocket scientists. But that was small comfort. For while their need to be self-oblivious provided me some protection, it takes only one pair of piercing eyes to unmask you and leave you hanging out to dry before all the world. It was for those eyes I desperately scanned the room.

In doing so I noticed many types of creatures. I saw the slick and oily, warring witches and sad sycophants, the supremely insulated, diabolical climbers, and other assorted trolls that made my blood run cold. A few did surprise me with their seeming humanness and I wondered how they kept that trait in this inhuman environment. But then I glanced upon a pair of eyes, as if I were prey spotted in the wild. Was only for an instant, a woman's, dark haired, no more. "Shit, hope that's only my imagination."

Regardless, I got rattled and I felt my nerve giving out. The screaming for help idea came back in play. I wondered how much of my misery and confusion was showing on my carefully posed face. At that exact moment there wasn't a single moment of my life above doubt. Let the good Lord take me now. And that's when a woman's voice whispered in my ear: "Don't be an impostor for love."

For a second I was frozen, mesmerized by the thought. Had my life been read? Was this a lifeline of love? It seemed like several minutes but it was only few seconds before I turned my head to see the identity of this whisperer. She slipped away too quickly, like an eel between the reeds. I caught the back of her neck and her stylish outfit. "Emily!" I couldn't resist indulging myself apparently.

The thought of her finding me, rescuing me, forgiving me, and actually not wanting me to die elated me to heaven. The fantasy of at last playing the winner, I felt myself rise above the room on a cloud of bliss, validated and redeemed. I noticed I started breathing. In the blink of an eye my entire life changed. Inside, I was kneeling with tears of joy. This too felt like several minutes but was only several seconds. Then I had to realize: how could that be Emily?

Everyone wants to believe they've drawn the winning ticket. God help me if Emily ever found out about this flashing fantasy. I'm sure I'd get an earful. Who knows? Maybe this woman was going around saying this to every loser she spotted in the room. Had I been singled out? Mulling the possibilities was driving me out of my mind. I cursed myself for yet another fatal hesitation, where if she'd spoken at a moment where I wasn't so weak I could have stopped her and found out what she meant. But it seems these things ONLY happen in a moment of weakness.

So I was left only with considering her words.

Maybe it wasn't just me. Maybe everyone in the room is an impostor for love. Maybe she was really speaking to someone near me and I overheard. Maybe, maybe, maybe. What I did know was I hated the message, like she was reading my mind. Yes, I was faking it. I'm always faking it. How else does one get by when living at the mercy of lunatics and monsters devoid of reason? And what benefit does it do me to reveal my crippled self to those who cannot help? Was she speaking of the here and now or relationships in general? I had to get out of the room.

I stayed down in the lobby dreaming up "Die Hard" sequences to pass the time. My blackmailer to this event rang my cell and chewed me out for my usual "negative" attitude. I did not bother trying to explain the whisper. All I wanted was back under my rock to contemplate those biting words in a safe place.

That night in bed I replayed it over and over. The Emily elation genuinely bothered me, like finding a lottery ticket with the right numbers but then finding it's for the wrong week. For a brief instance I was somebody once more. But my complaint when I had love was that I was an impostor. What's worse, I didn't have the nerve to find out, putting me on the run. A man once said, "You run, you die." And that's dearly proven out so far. Did hearing this advice mean I have another chance coming? How can that be?

And worst of all was my first knee-jerk response to the whisper, the one thing I'd been burying in dejected doubt from the very first: How else is anyone going to love me?

Mother Vampyre

Her world was forged in cold comfort. As her chained heart hollowed in the bitter hearth, burning in the rage of a trapped, wasted life, her steely hands gripped in anxious, ancient terror the overstuffed arms of the living room chair. Once again she faced the airless, stillborn void where no voice can be heard. With every session her heart fractured and faulted wider. She dare not cry to give her secret sorrow away. But the light was gone. Years of torment awaited her. On the wrong side of 50 she had no place to go, the entire world her prison. Her terror-infected soul collapsed into a black hole, pulling in even the most ordinary of things into its sphere of fear. Long ago she'd perfected the act, a life devoted to appearances, as she slowly died. God's anger encircled her in fire as she refused to leave her house of lovely lies. She earnestly prayed as a person of proclaimed faith not to let the singeing show but now she could she it is going to last the rest of her life, not even the smallest of relief permitted. Her mind sizzled in the encroaching heat, frying its shattered thoughts, unable to connect one moment with the next, her destiny a nursing home vegetable where none of her millions can buy a single coherent thought. Her hologram husband could give no refuge from her angry choice to never live alone in the face of adversarial life. Her stubborn neck stiffened with every passing year, now brittle and bristling at helpless criticism. The thinning lifeline to the children kept her awake at night. They were her precious secret weapons, feeding her, keeping her alive, transfusing animation into her mannequin body. "Be good and live for your mother." But in this too was no future to be found. Was a future even left to be found? Had her stubborn existence played her to be a fool for all eternity? Is this why so many people beg to come back and get it right? The lonely horror of that perception short-circuited her as if she were sitting in her own personal electric chair. Her God was a jealous God, gifting her feelings for freedom she refused to follow, her faith never to flower. Time to depart her fully plucked field.

Conservatives in Love

"Please help me! I'm going to fall!"

She was hanging off the side of a cliff, feet dangling.

"Well, looky here. Little Miss Perfect is asking for help. I thought you already knew everything! If you'd been responsibly selfish like I have you'd find yourself in the ascendant position I'm in now."

"Hurry, or I will fall!"

"Always thinking of yourself! Besides, you seem fine to me, it's not like you're sliding down."

"Do I have to fall to prove I'm in trouble?"

"How else would I know?"

"But then I would be dead!"

"I certainly wouldn't doubt your credibility at that point!"

"This is a nightmare."

"Can only be your own fault. Can't be living your life expecting other people to bail you out of trouble. That's completely irresponsible."

"But we're all in this together!"

"Libtard drivel. I'm incentivizing you to help yourself. The Lord helps those who help themselves - and I'm here to do the Lord's work."

"You're an asshole! Whatever you do unto the least of you, you do unto me."

"Judge not lest you be judged yourself! God, I love being a conservative Christian!"

"Just think how you'll feel if you don't help me before it's too late."

"Look, Miss Chicken Little, the sky isn't falling for you like you hysterically claim and you want me to risk my life and well being because you got yourself in a bad spot? I don't think so!"

"How much of a risk is it to lower your hand to help me up?"

"I don't believe in that sort of inappropriate touching between a man and a woman. If my wife saw that she would rightly condemn me."

"You must be a pervert to sexualize everything in life!"

"The only pervert here is you. Don't see me going around whining, "Help, help! Woe is me!" That's why I'm in the morally superior position."

"I can't hang on much longer."

"So says you. I'm so tired of liberal self-serving rhetoric used to justify immoral behavior. One has to see the objective truth and serve only that."

Then she fell screaming to her death and the wife came over.

"What was that awful sound?"

"Some woman who expected me to take time out of my own life because she couldn't handle hers."

"Sounds dreadful! You didn't touch her did you?"

"I stayed true and pure. She got her just desserts in the end. She refused to take care of her life so she lost it."

"Thanks to the good Lord for that! What a wretched woman."

"There's a lesson to be learned here today. I can see now more than ever the importance of cutting off benefits, lowering the minimum wage, and slashing social security. That's the only way some people will ever learn."

"I love you! If only everyone were like us the world would be a better place!"

On Borrowed Time

[From an ancient Japanese chest covered in thick dust, a transcript is found written during the last hours of an escaped condemned man.]

I was supposed to have been executed an hour ago. It was on my honor to show up at the correct place and time, and besides, they knew there was no way of escaping the castle grounds. I could try and hide and sneak around like a cowardly idiot but that would only make things worse for me.

But that's exactly what I did.

I'm crouching in the bushes with this parchment paper I was supposed to use to write my death poem. I don't know what possessed me to hide. I know there's no point in it. I just don't want to face facts, I suppose.

I hear the angry shouts of the searchers. It thrills me in a way to feel I possess them so. Two samurai passed by me, one angrily complaining of how he wanted to get home to his pregnant wife as the search for me delayed him. He wants to be free and I want to be free, yet neither of us are. Is there not sad irony in this?

I also hear the birds like never before. It's strange, as if I've never really listened to their songs. I feel transported to another world, one carefree and simple. I want to linger here for hours on end. Only too late do I discover this wonder. I feel more a fool than ever for my wasted life.

It's true, I showed my unclothed erection to Lady Onichi. Why is this so forbidden? Everyone acted as if the world would end. No true harm was done but men must live as prisoners of their body according to society. If I am not imprisoned like the others then their anger knows no bounds. The sentence for death from the chamberlain came immediately.

Will anyone read this scribe when I am dead? Will this paper be destroyed in the same anger that takes my life? That somehow seems more a loss than my useless life. I seem unable to stop these irrational acts, and yet on the other hand, sharing my body and wanting to survive don't feel that irrational. But certainly, somewhere, there is something wrong with me.

I must crouch lower. Two women are passing by. I will write down what they say, if anything. Here it is:

"I hope they catch that castle pervert. I just don't feel safe."

"Me either! My Obutada said he'd cut it off if he ever saw it out!"

The two women giggled. In this time of perfect clarity I could see their acting and role playing. They wished to be helpless heroines "saved" by their gallant husbands from my oh so dangerous penis. Had I heard this before I would have taken their words on face value and felt deep guilt and shame. I see now this is how they facilitate their sex so no wonder everyone wants my head cut off.

Wow, I can even hear the water from the castle stream. It's soothing beyond words. I've passed it each day for over a year on my way to clean the stables but never noticed its quiet calmness. Now that I've been condemned I find I want to live more than ever! Oh, that I could reverse time.

Bakana. The voices are getting angrier. "He must be somewhere! He's to be found before it gets dark! He will pay for this!" Waiting makes it worse yet in my weakness I still hesitate. Nature irresistibly calls me to join her in this wonderful Spring day. Of all the times to do that! Maybe Nature has always been calling me.

I'm in a twilight world between hopeless pain and the paradise of the planet. Before, living my life was a waste. But now losing it seems the waste! They will torture me for making them work so hard to find me. But I seek only to relax and nap in these sharp leafed bushes. If I am the bad man they say I am, the gods will strike me down for that. Let me rest and see.

Oishi, what a delicious sleep. Not only did the gods not strike me down, they blessed me with peace. So who is right: the gods or the men who pursue my death? I feel invigorated! I feel I will live forever! I wish to explore all the world, all the birds and streams and living things. I wish to give thanks for every day. What a time for me to decide to open up!

It is dark now and it seems they have given up for I see no torches. In the morning I must find the strength to face them. I wish to see one last dawn and take that with me to my grave. Whatever they might do to me for this delay, I will take a sense of peace I did not have previously. I will enter the void a better man.

It is afternoon the following day. I have been banished from the castle and the province. Our highly revered Lord returned from Edo last night and was told of my story. He's always been known as a "different" thinker and he thought my, uh, gesture to Lady Onichi to be a refreshing one and considered my act a better outcome than the rampant impregnation that goes on around the suffocating castle. Politically, I could not stay but my life has been spared.

I will treasure this chance and this fine paper that has been my only friend and confidante during the worst - and best - hours of my life never to forget. Maybe I can make something of myself, after all. I feel I've been put into a new world even if I face the same old woes of trying to find a woman who doesn't scream bloody murder every time I have a boner.

Will You Leave It

"Would I might

But ever see that man!"

- The Tempest, 1.2

Murder scene?? Don't judge too quickly!

Let's face it: crime is simply a matter of geography, nationality and stated intent. There are no radical absolutes. A crime at one longitude and latitude is dismissed as an inconsequential act at another. Once we realize this we realize there's nothing to get upset about. Strawberry fields forever!

First off, lets change the longitude and latitude of an American random shooting to say, Bhakkar, Pakistan. Feeling better already ain't we? No more wailing and gnashing of teeth. Ain't no bullets from Pakistan gonna reach us! Shit happens, dude.

Now let's change the victims names from Johnny, Suzie and Ashley to Achmed, Kassim and Abdul. Don't even seem like real people no more do they?? I know I sure don't know anyone with those names. Non-American = non-person. They don't love their families over there like we do. It's just...different, you know. I can see your eyes glazing over!

Who are you compared to a national insecurity drone strike, kid?

OK, so maybe you have some lingering trace anguish but I know how to resolve that too - and then some! Let's pretend that President Jesus had special secret knowledge that only HE can know and a terrorist suspect was in the audience! Gotta zap him right then and everyone around him! Innocent people gotta die! It's the new hip: everyone's smart enough now to determine who should live and who should die by summary execution. Yeehaw!

So admit it! You ain't feelin' bad no more, is ya? In fact, I bet you feel pretty damn edgy and "with it" to be so hip, you kewl killer dude you!

"...in my false brother
awakened an evil nature, and my trust,
like a good parent, did beget of him
A falsehood in its contrary as great
As my trust was, which had, indeed, no limit,
A confidence sans bound..."
- The Tempest, 1.2

You may now resume your regularly scheduled concerns: Apathy and TomKat snark!

Half Life

this is beyond awful...this is hell

i'm swimming at the equator, chasing a dying sun

i can only swim as fast as the earth turns

if i stop or slow down i lose the sun and slip into darkness

if i don't stop to rest i die anyway

what do i do?

where can i go to live??

- nightly nightmare

"This is stupid," muttered Margaret, only half realizing she'd even spoken aloud. However stupid, she never for a second considered changing the channel in her vacuous Plano home as the flat screen blared its babble.

"I can't believe they got away, Lieutenant. Those two fucking punks rape a nun and never see a day behind bars. And your dumb ass still wants to tell me there's a God?"

"They didn't get get away. They're unconfessed. There's no escape until then."

"That's just stupid. Those two spics are back in Mexico, free as birds. No way we'll ever see them again. And you know what? They're going to do it again. I feel it in my bones. Tell me more about your God."

"I see you agree with me."

"What? Agree with you nothin'!"

"You agree they'll keep doing it until they confess. They have to confess or they'll never be free. One thing I can tell you is you have to be free."

"You know, Lieutenant, sometimes I wonder why you ever became a cop."

Click. Margaret was beyond annoyed, without knowing why. In insecure moments like this she did what she always did: she reviewed her clients' real estate listings online. However empty it ultimately made her feel, she clung to this routine, a worldly success she could point to as indisputable proof of the rightness of her life choices. It was most important to her to prove that point since her soul cried out otherwise.

No new emails. No bids. Nothing. She hoped against hope she'd get a bite any second. But it was late in the evening. People were busy. The world was turning. Margaret was anchored to her starving monitor, its light the only thing between her and the enclosing darkness. She perused a couple of news aggregate sites. Slim pickings there. She rummaged through her mind for something productive to do. She'd already done everything. End of the road.

"Being a nun is dumb." Her mind traced back to the TV show and the uncomfortable feeling it gave her. If she'd had an email to answer or any sort of retail activity to conclude she could have pushed off that feeling for another day. So how to feel good?

"All it is is running away from life. That raped nun didn't forgive those boys like she said. She only got harder inside, steeling herself against her feelings. She'll be horribly dry and rigid when she gets older. I should write about that and expose it to the world."

Running away from life, steeling herself against her feelings, Margaret followed the ancient axiom of writing what you know about. She imagined herself as an Enlightened Being talking to a Lost Nun, setting her straight.

"This isn't dedicating your life to God hiding yourself away like this. We're supposed to live!"

"This is my life," insists the nun who believes that being willing to die for her beliefs means she is willing to die for God, mistaking stubbornness for faith. "I can only hope God gives you the same fulfillment I have found."

Margaret had been sent to Catholic school as a child and hated it. They were always lording over her their greater piety, gloating on how they'd been saved as she herself yearned to find her way. Most of all she remembered the uttered lines that brought stinging guilt that she now channeled into her own nun's character. Bitch!

"Jesus didn't die for our sins like you say. We murdered him for no reason! Whore of Babylon!"

She turned off the monitor, disgusted with people who make stupid choices. Margaret feared the night, the dreaded Recurring Dream looming, waiting for her to doze off so it could attack. In her half-life as a real estate novelist, no matter which side of the fence she was on, the other side was always greener. Some things cannot be bought. Never could she shake the dream of becoming a successful writer. All the gold in the world couldn't make that to happen.

But in half-life, Margaret was successful. She made good money as a realtor, had a knack (if not a passion) for it, and she led a very comfortable lifestyle. She also did writing she hid from home visitors and, most of all, her clients. She even denied an interest in literature during business time all the while she floated away during presentations, notating her clients' characteristics and working them into her grand and glorious unseen novel. Then she'd squint her eyes hard as she could.

I'm getting money. I'm doing writing. I'm a successful writer!

To keep the fantasy alive, she refused any romantic entanglements. Then she'd have to explain herself and all the bad choices in her life. Complete isolation was required to keep the half-life vision alive. But no soul however unclean or pure escapes the thorns of the world. Margaret's agency was bought out by a national chain, steeped in the disease of corporate culture.

"From now on," read the memo, "every realtor shall start his or her day writing 100 times 'I love being a realtor!' This will create a positive environment to promote sales as well as be an excellent team building exercise. Our iconic orange beanies are to be worn when showing a home or conversing with a client in person. Each day will end with the 'Jig Of Joy', hopping on one foot from side to side until your supervisor deems it sufficient time. We must be right. We have a billion dollars in cash."

"Just because you have cash doesn't mean you're a success!" stormed Margaret, ripping the memo to shreds. But her horrors were only beginning. She alone among her co-workers was outraged. To them, this was simply part of the deal of keeping their luxurious lifestyles. Tino actually said he'd wear a clown outfit if they told him to, "Makes no difference." As the only one with an identity - or half-identity - outside of work, Margaret felt the ice melting under her feet.

But I don't love being a realtor. It's just a way of getting money. This is beyond humiliating. I can't lie like this. My life is over. If I lose my money I won't be a successful writer anymore. This cup is too bitter to drink.

That night she retreated to her online novel, the one place where she could feel good of her own volition outside worldly thorns. Where I go to feel alive I can't make a living. Where I go to make a living I can't feel alive. Then her own words rushed back to haunt her: Just because you have cash doesn't mean you're a success! Stunned, she staggered to her bed sticking her head under the pillow, her muffled words only she could hear.

"I'm a total failure and a fool! How do you like your phony success now? I can't wear that stupid goddam beanie! Real authors are laughing at me. I don't ever want to write another word. Life has no point! I'm just like those lost nuns trying to buy a stairway to heaven. I'm being punished for living a lie. You have your revenge, God. I'll quit pretending to be a writer and let my book be just like its title: Gone With The Wind."

The Kidnapping Of Karla, Part 2

You fucking asshole! I can't believe what you did! What kind of person are you? You really liked her and now she hates your guts, wanting you dead. Fucking prick. You must be the biggest jerk in the world. All this time you spend ranting about the world and everyone else - well look at you!

"I want to die...I want to die..."

Why should she have to pay because you screwed up your life? Isn't that what you always bitch about, how you pay for the sins of others? You're no fucking better, douche bag.

"I was out of my head. I wanted to be with her so badly. What could I do? Ask her back to my hellhole? I have nothing legitimate to offer. It all just started coming out. How will I ever live with this?"

Nobody likes you. Nobody has ever liked you. She's going to figure out you had feelings for her. If that happens she'll come looking for you and that will be the end of you, you fucking piece of shit who deserves feelings for no one. Out of the frying pan and into the fire!

"My life is hell upon hell. I deserve to die, I know. I won't fight it anymore. If God were truly merciful my life would be taken as I walk down this street."

But Karl's life was not taken. After suffering a total moral collapse he refused to speak as much as possible. He spent four days eating nothing but a honey bun and a fruit pie, hoping to off himself. He kept wondering why God didn't take his life already. It was obvious he was never going to have a life. And it was even more obvious the more he liked someone the less he could trust himself. Before this he never realized how urgent it was Judas hang.

*****

Karla wasn't lying when she said she wasn't rich. Anyone showered and wearing a nice outfit was rich in Karl's eyes but she was stuck in a retail clothing job she hated. But she was determined to be "responsible" and be regarded as a good person. Her burning envy of her boyfriend having an actual career had been the true driving element behind their spat that night. And where did that lead her? Into being kidnapped!

If only it hadn't happened. Karla felt the trajectory of her life permanently altered. It was her own failings that put her into that trap. She felt a new emptiness she hadn't known before. As if helplessly caught in a whirlpool she was being sucked into an abyss she could not fight. How would she find her way home?

Of all the days she needed a pleasant day at work, this was it. But the universe conspired otherwise, sensing the void in her life. Today would be her worst possible.

"Jimmy's out today so I need you in back doing all the stocking."

"But that's not my job! I'm not a stocker."

"Your job is to do what I tell you to do whether you like it or not."

Karla physically stumbled backwards, stunned to hear the same words spoken all over again. Falling, falling falling. She felt sick in the pit of her stomach. Every fiber of her being told her to flee, to be free of this. But where was out?

Where is out? How can I be asking myself this again? It's like I'm still trapped in that warehouse. This can't be happening!

Karla wanted to cry but she feared the tears too much. An emotional wreck, she was glad to be hiding in back not facing the public. Little did she realize this was the beginning of the end.

The falling sensation only got stronger. Try as she might, Karla could not escape the feeling she was still kidnapped, her asshole boss the new Karl. When her friends complained of their asshole bosses and shitty jobs it seemed the whole world had gone mad. But wasn't this the same world as before? Why is it just now she noticed?

I hate feeling used!

God damn that Karl. That feeling of outrage he awoke in her did not leave when he left. "Karls" were everywhere! And that same helpless feeling shackled her. Who could she run to? Where could she go? Was she damned to drink her life away in denial? When she experienced her first "black out" night it scared her what she was becoming. Then she heard Angry Aaron at work the next day.

"Look at this fucking bullshit. "Ninety percent insured!" and a picture of that smiling cocksucker gloating like he's done something. That son-of-a-bitch is worse than any plantation owner. For the rest of my fucking life I gotta carry this shit on my back. "Where's your card, comrade?" So fucking what if I have insurance. If anything goes wrong I'm still fucked! Any of you got 4,000 dollars for my deductible? Don't I have to fucking eat and pay rent? Do I exist to make that psycho happy? And even if I do make more money that just means I pay more to the insurance thieves! And these people are writing this shit like it's a good thing. Well, fuck you assholes! Don't piss on me and tell me it's raining!"

Karl was speaking to her still, channeling himself through Aaron's voice. Karla was transported back to the warehouse and this time she knew she'd never leave. She really was Karl's for life.

This can't be happening! This can't be real! It's like I never left! I'm so angry I can't stand it! I don't know what to do with all this rage seeping out of every pore. It makes me want to...

*****

Karl never saw Karla come back to the warehouse with or without the police or a vengeful gun. He imagined the worst, of how he'd damaged her for life, left a walking zombie in world she now knows she can't trust. Like a moth to a flame he returned to the scene of the crime, squatting and staring for hours in silence. There is nothing. I am nothing. There can be nothing. As surely the most unfavored child of God he awaited his doom. And Karl suspected that returning here would facilitate that.

Slowly the door opened but Karl did not move. The angel of death had come at last. What possible protest could he mount? Time to die.

"I've got just one question for you," spoke a new and different Karla. Her eyes were focused with a sense of resolve rarely seen in a world drowning in guilt and shame.

Karl cowered, frozen in fear. As Karla before, he too wanted to cry but too much feared the tears to let them fall. Of all the things to flash back to at this moment of death Karl remembered the suited man talking on his cell phone in his black BMW stopped at an intersection on a miserable rainy day. Outside and wet, Karl had never felt so lost seeing he who was his opposite: successful, purposeful, a winner. The clicks of the recently unemployed Karla's heels echoed louder as she approached.

"I've got just one question for you," she repeated, then smiled in what normally Karl would call a warm dream. "Who do we kidnap next?"