So things go on like that for a while. I don’t know how long. A few weeks, a few months. Whatever. I get good at it. So good that those people in Neiman’s office start sending me things other than strangely placed wads of cash. I got a coffee mug that says #1 guy on it. That's pretty cool. I don’t drink coffee since it makes me have semi panic attacks, but you know, you don’t have to always put coffee in a coffee mug. Or any other receptacle for that matter. You can put some cereal and milk into a wine glass. You can put a fish in a toilet bowl as long as you don’t flush it. They’re all just receptacles for whatever you want. I usually just drink water out of the #1 guy mug, but now I leave it for piles of time and it gets a little dusty inside, so I just open my cupboard and gaze at it lovingly since I don't want dusty water in my mouth.
All manner of things I’ve been doing. Those expensive climbing shoes came in real handy on one of the files. I did indeed have to climb up on top of a building under construction and walk out on a steel I-beam. Who would have guessed? I felt like one of those guys in that crazy picture where they’re all just sitting on a beam, eating lunch, legs reaching all the way out into space, a thousand feet above a bustling city that would swallow them whole if they were to slip off suddenly. A pigeon flaps a little too close, some funny guy leaves a banana peel on the beam, thinking that everyone would just laugh and step over it, but someone who doesn’t get the joke and is completely unaware of how truly slipppery banana peels are gives it a step and goes plummeting to the ground. His job was available again even before he even hit the pavement. Lot of guys waiting for an opportunity to make it to the top.
Those high up jobs pay a lot of dough. Or at least that’s what it seems like. Although maybe it's more like when the astronauts were fired off into space and came back down, almost like they were a rugby team or something, cheering and high fiving and smiling through the quarantine box at all the onlookers, then they finally get out, squeeze their way through the crowds covering their yard and driveway, slam and lock the door, pull the drapes and sigh out a job well done while reclined on their small and somewhat uncomfortable dark orange couches. Their wives would check the mail, being as polite as they could be while elbowing their way through the crowd who shouts over and over again “what was it like! It sure sounds cool! They see any Martians or moon people up there? Hynuck hynuck hynuck.” The wife would smile politely, holding a envelope with the NASA stamp on it, knowing that this is the paycheck for the blastoff and possible death in the vacuume of space for her beer drinking and carousing husband.
She plops it on his lap and he tears it open. After all, that was the most badass thing anyone has ever done, he should get paid like, a million dollars or something, right? Lot of danger up there what with the red beeping lights and his dumbass fellow astronaut bounding around the moon, knocking things over and almost dying eight or nine times. He pulls out the check and it’s for $213. but at least there’s a signed letter from the president. Good thing, because he can definitely bring that tot the grocery store and buy a loaf of bread with it. What a pain in the ass. All that for just enough to pay his mortgage for one month. He tells himself that he did it for the love of adventure, and to get on a cereal box, but secretly he hates smoking off brand cigarettes.
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I hope it’s not like that. I know it’s not like that for me. I got a fat payday off that tip top of the world job and all I had to do was walk on a beam above the city and drop a quarter off into space. I don’t know where it landed and I don’t care to know. I just gave it a drop and walked right on back to my house, another record secured for a high risk red file. That one bought me the newest flatscreen TV and the entire collection of the Sopranos, and there’s like, eight seasons in that show. No chump change. Next time I get paid, I’m going to buy something to keep me company. Something easy to take care of, like a fish. Not something I can get too attracted to though, something cheap that I can leave for a while, then if I come back and it’s dead, I can say to myself “aww, he’s dead.” Then flush him down the toilet and start immediately again with a new one. I don’t want anything furry.
Things that are furry usually have teeth, and the ones that are nice with their teeth live too long for my liking. You buy a dog? That’s fifteen or so years right there. A cat? A little less, but they might get mixed up in some kind of feline AIDS out in the wild, bring it on back to you and make you pay a vet $3,000 to fix it up for them. Otherwise you have to keep it inside all the time, just knowing that it’ll take any opportunity to hop outside and run directly into traffic. Sweet release. He hates being cooped up and would rather go to kitty heaven than listen to you talk nonsense to it while forgetting to feed it it’s favorite food with the gravy already inside the can. That's no kind of life. If something would run away from you, you should maybe think about getting something else to put in your house. A houseplant. A clock radio. Something like that.
Like I said, I don’t much care about the things I’m doing for Neiman. I was initially just curious, but since I haven’t had to directly do something to anyone, I don’t really give a shit. Drop a quarter off a high building onto the street below? Who cares. Dump a can of chili onto the street? Who cares. Unscrew a bolt on the side of a bus stop bench? I don’t care.
The day comes where Neiman doesn’t call me. I wonder if I took care of all the business and there’s nothing left? What would I do then? Retire? I don’t think I can retire with what I have stored in the shoebox under my bed. I got a few grand, which was exciting at first, but then I got tired of counting it over and over again, besides, have you ever smelled cash before? It doesn’t smell too nice. Almost mushroomy. I wash my hands whenever I touch it now.
Why isn’t he calling me? Should I call him? I don’t have the number, but maybe I can get like, a caller ID type thing just in case? What if Neiman dies or goes on a long trip and leaves me out to dry? I like doing these things. They make me feel powerful for some reason, like I’m helping save the world or something although I’m sure that’s exactly what I’m not doing, but, you know. I could be. I pace my apartment and the phone still doesn’t ring. Pisser. I flip on my big fat TV and nothing is different on it. It's just bigger is all. I don’t really know the point, it just seemed like the thing to do. On the upside, I don’t have to turn on any lights in my living room at night, this TV is fukkin’ huge and blasts out a lot of light.
I chill on the couch for a while, zoning out and worrying. I fall asleep. I wake up and the phone is ringing. I check the time and it’s 10am. I slept in. I let the phone ring eight times before I pick it up. Let Neiman sweat a little like he had me sweatin’ yesterday.