Within the next hour and a half, Miss Catherine will become a free woman for some hours. One that will sleep for eight hours before having to go through her daily routine right before that day's work. Miss Catherine looks around the bar and realizes that the establishment was in its quiet moment. It's a regular occurrence during this time of the night. It was indeed busy just an hour ago but the customers go out to do whatever their life requires of them when the time is up. All at similar times too and it probably helps that other bars are found in more busier and high volume areas during the late night compared the alley here. But Miss Catherine enjoys the quiet moments just as much as the busy moments. She already made a good amount of sales for the day and would like the quiet moment to go on till closing. As she thought about this, the door opened up in a slow, almost creaking fashion. A new customer has arrived.

"Hey, is this place still open?" the rather scruffy looking man said. His black sunglasses sticking out from his rough attire. It almost shined in the dim bar.

"Yes. It is for another hour, sir," Miss Catherine answers. The man looks at her with glee as he waddles to the bar. Miss Catherine may want keep an eye on this one as Miss Catherine has learned from her time bartending that there is nothing wrong with judging people, as negative as that sounds, it tends to work. The man slouches onto the seat and gleams at Miss Catherine.

"What would you like, sir?" Miss Catherine asks him.

"Get me a lager...pint...the cheaper the better," the man replies as his head rests on the bar table. Miss Catherine recognizes this body language isn't a good sign but she decides it's best just to cut him off early instead of not letting him get anything altogether. Good to make some more sales.

"Coming right up, sir." Miss Catherine grabs a pint glass and figures it's best to get him a Culls Light. Low alcohol content and one of the cheapest lagers on tap.

"You doing alright, sir?" Miss Catherine asks him while pouring the pale straw beer into the glass.

"It's over. I just want to die," was what the man could say. This put Miss Catherine slightly off. It wasn't going to be the first time a suicidal person would become a customer of the bar but it was always trouble to have to deal with them.

She places the beer in front of him. "Are you going to be alright?"

"I lost it all! I put all my money on Number Five after doing all that research and I lost!" the man began to ball out. You see such sorrowful scenes happen in movies but to happen in front of Miss Catherine was a real pain. Getting expectations from fantasy does not translate well into reality. "Hey, Miss...you got a job opening here?"

"Sorry, not for the time being," Miss Catherine answered.

"What the hell am I supposed to do? I tried to hang myself and the rope snapped! I jumped off a bridge and it felt like nothing, so I jumped off the same bridge twice and again, it was nothing! I jumped off a building only to wake up on the roof because I passed out on the way up! What does God want from me?"

"Maybe he's telling you that your time is not up yet?"

"I sucked six guys off for $12 total. I had to make some sort of income and ended up degrading myself! I don't think I can live any longer."

"Why would you do something like that?"

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"I read online somewhere that if I could suck some guys off for a dollar each, I could make a million dollars if I end up sucking off a million guys. So I thought if I charged $2 a sucking, I could get there at half the time. But dammit! It was awful! It tasted indescribably salty, my knees hurt, and my mouth aches! What would my girlfriend think!?"

"That's...I'm sorry, but I'm not sure how to answer that..."

"My life is over, Miss! No...wait." The man grabs his beer and raises it up above himself with importance as though the glass was the Holy Grail. He tilts down the glass and swigs down the beer that flowed down like a waterfall. The glass never touched his lips. Miss Catherine was sure such sights were only possible in cartoons but the man was able to perform it flawlessly. Perhaps he should've gotten a job at a circus.

After emptying his glass, he slams it down on the counter with a loud "thunk!" Miss Catherine does not enjoy having to risk the glass getting worn out after countless number of other "thunks".

"If God isn't going to let me die, that means I must be blessed. Blessed with this misfortune!" exclaimed the man. A strange thing to say, indeed.

Miss Catherine asks, "Sir...are you feeling okay?"

"Okay!? I've never been better! This is brilliant! You know how people do crazy, painful stunts for entertainment, right?"

"Yeah..."

"That's just it! I'm going to become a stuntman! Putting myself in harm's way for the people to enjoy the misery of a single man. And that man is going to be me!"

"That seems wonderful, but you have to calm down and think this through."

"What are you saying, Miss? I'm invincible! God doesn't want me dead! He's not going to let me die! And I'm done swallowing all that disgusting man fluid! Thank you, Miss! I feel like I've gotten back something that I lost…something that has gone missing throughout all these years of me just trying to pull through, but I've found it. The missing piece has been discovered! Everything that fell apart can be glued back together! It may not be easy at first but I'm guaranteed to make it!"

"Sir, I have to ask you to calm down."

"I can't, Miss! I can't! I'm flying towards heaven! Not literally, but this flower's going to be blooming real soon! This kingdom will not fall to the ground! I'm going to become the world's number one stuntman! Why didn't this occur to me earlier? Oh, Miss. Thank you so much for opening my eyes! This miserable, old, pathetic man will no longer be a miserable, old, pathetic man. I will be something I never was in my life: successful. And I have you to thank for! Here, take all the money I have left."

The miserable, old, pathetic man reaches into his pocket and slams down the content on the counter. His hand lifts away to reveal a $5 bill and an impressive stack of coins which probably amounted to $3 or $4. It certainly wasn't much of a tip, but Miss Catherine was more than ready for this customer to leave and let the power rush to drain outside of the bar.

"Wish me good luck, Miss! I don't think that's necessary though. I have a great feeling with what's coming ahead. The road to the future is paved in yellow bricks. I can almost see it," and that was the last thing the man said before he hopped and skipped out of the bar while humming to a familiar tune about a yellow brick road. Miss Catherine wished the best for the man after having to hear the tough times he went through. As much as Miss Catherine wanted the man to leave as quickly as possible, she always had sympathy for the unfortunate souls of customers such as the miserable, old, pathetic man with sunglasses.

It was a week or so after Miss Catherine last saw the miserable, old, pathetic man. Miss Catherine was in the warmth of her cozy apartment which peered high from the city's skies. Her laptop's screen glows with the web page of the news section of an anonymous message board. Miss Catherine's attention was caught by a certain thread regarding a man named Harold Thomas (age 38) who was the stuntman for an indie film but met with his death after an attempted stunt turned into a fatal motorbike drowning accident. The image of Harold Thomas was that of the miserable, old, pathetic man, complete with his sunglasses. Miss Catherine's heart sank ten feet down. Was there something she could have done? Could she have saved Mr. Harold Thomas' life? Such things should be left alone and not be thought about for too long, otherwise it may drive one crazy and Miss Catherine knew that. So, she decided to forget about the miserable, old, pathetic man, the incident with him at the bar, and his untimely death. It would be unhealthy for Miss Catherine to dwell on such issues and she understood that quite well.

Oh, Miss Catherine. We hope you have a good night. We really do.