Detective Story

Most people struggle with how to start a story. They will sit and stare at a blank piece of paper or a computer screen as the case might be. While this might be the worst start to a book ever at least it is started and we can skip over the dramatics of “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” In the end all times are that way and it is only history that can tell us how to judge them. My history teacher once told me that the victories over the Native Americans were glorious for the Americans. Those times were not as bright for the indigenous population of America. So I guess it is really perspective and history that determine the best and worst of times.

That being said it is probably best that we move on from discussing history and what kind of days other people were having and get right to the kind of day I am having. Which is piss poor. It isn’t bad enough that my wife walked out and took the kids or that the she left her cat, who in turn left a surprise in my shoe but now some oversized undersexed uni-browed man was placing his fist against my face in a not so polite manor all because I asked the wrong, eh, possibly right question. What was that question you ask?

I simply asked him if his mother had tossed herself off a tall building because of the horror she had unleashed on the earth. I guess I struck a nerve.

Now you might be wondering why how I ended up having my face rehabbed by this giant of a man with a miniature education. You might even be wondering why my wife left me, and if your sadistic your probably wondering why the cat took a crap in my shoe. All of these are excellent questions, with the exception of the cat. Why did she poop in my shoe? Only the cat knows and it is unlikely that she is going to be spilling her guts anytime soon. The rest all go back to a few days ago when I was napping at my desk and enjoying the peaceful sounds of the road construction crew outside my window as they destroyed the hole filled tire trap they called a road outside the roach infested health hazard my landlord called a building where I kept my dirty, poorly lit room I called an office. My career had not started that way but as it turned out I wasn’t very good at my career either so in the end everything may have balanced out.

Leaning back in my chair, my feet resting on the old desk I had found resting against the trashcan of a salvation army store, was when everything started moving me towards this guy’s fist. The door swung open and there silhouetted in mid day light was the outline of what turned out to be a very attractive woman who wished to employ my services. Now these events were both unique and not so unique. The door to my office had a tendency to open quite often. Usually the wind blows it open or some lost parent is looking for a bathroom, but it was unique that someone was looking for my services and even more so that it was a woman.

Several things happened as she stood in the doorway. The first was I guessed she was looking for a bathroom and her offspring was just out of sight. These are the pearls of having an office right off the interstate in a small town just outside a big town. Kids always have to go to the bathroom about the time the car really gets going on the highway, which is about 2 miles before you get to the exit by my office. The second was the construction noise stopped. The third was a sense of foreboding ran through me and even though the room with it’s salvation army discarded desk, old leather chair, and middle aged resident was quite warm a shiver ran down my spine.

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