Wrong Guy, Wrong Day
A short story (1800 words)
Today proved to be a rotten end to a rotten week. George trudged his way to the parking garage after a late Friday meeting with his boss.
“I know you've had it tough with your mother,” Ernie had said. Ernie the department manager, Ernie who wanted to be a director, and Ernie the boss who always kept an eye on schedules and the bottom line. “But you've been letting too many things slide.” He passed the personnel action form to George. “I have to give you this written warning.”
George had noticed that Ernie slid the document across the desk toward him. The warning meant bad news in a big way. The next step in the company's process would be firing, and meanwhile, the warning would sit in his personnel record for the next six months, waiting for his next misstep.
“You can't afford to forget any more deadlines.” Ernie pointed at the bottom of the form. “Sign here.”
Mom had been in the hospital for a week because of complications arising from her COPD, and Tuesday her doctor moved her into ICU, because she was accumulating fluid in her lungs, and she had been caught one too many times sneaking a smoke. She was coming close to drowning in her own juices.
Two weeks ago George quit smoking. Seeing what was happening to Mom, and losing Dad to cancer five years ago looked like very good reasons. Cigarettes might have been a pleasure, but after a hard look at the dark side, George decided that he didn't want to go out that way: Dad's stage IV throat cancer or Mom's COPD. Shoot me or stab me, no thank you.
George's doctor was delighted with the news that George wanted to quit. He handed over a free box of nicotine patches with instructions on how to use them, the phone number for the Lung Association's quit smoking program, and three pamphlets on smoking cessation.
Giving up the habit was not going to be easy. Everybody knew that, but George didn't appreciate just how hard until he went through it himself. He noted the symptoms of nicotine withdrawal in one of the brochures and checked them off as he experienced them: insomnia, constipation, trouble concentrating, and irritability for starters. He would read the same paragraph over and over again in a document at work before realizing what he was doing. He had been eating more, nibbling on snacks and junk food as well. The cliche chewing gum wasn't quite enough, and George had supplemented it with wholesale amounts of pretzels, M&Ms, and chips. He hadn't weighed himself since seeing his doctor, but already his clothes were getting a bit tight.
As he pushed open the exit door and entered the parking garage, George remembered that he'd have to defrost something for dinner. Debbie, his fiance, had moved out last week. Their past year together had started off well, but after she moved in, they soon discovered new and novel ways to grate on each others' nerves. Stupid little things like leaving the toilet seat up, leaving the toothpaste uncapped, and leaving yesterday's newspaper heaped on the coffee table had grown from minor irritations to felonies.
Sure, they had their fights, but George still missed her company. Coming home to an empty house had proved to be a difficult adjustment. He had days where he preferred the quarreling over the silence. They still had something, and he wanted to set things right again, recapture the romance that had originally brought them together.
The parking garage stood silent before him in half darkness. No matter what time of the day or night, the place was always gloomy. Despite being above ground, it reminded him of a cave, because of the dark and the musty smell of the concrete. The only difference between day and night showed in the color of the shadows, blue-white during daylight hours and sickly yellow after dark, when the sodium vapor floodlights tried to push the gloom away.
He reached to the flap on his shoulder bag and unzipped the pocket. It was the place where he used to keep a spare pack of smokes. George stopped himself and zipped the pocket shut. “I don't do that any more.” He had stopped carrying a lighter and no longer had any matches in the house. “Ah, shit,” he muttered to himself as he remembered that the only thing he had in the freezer was a roast, and thawing that out for dinner would take forever. Besides, what would he do with four pounds of beef? It was something he and Debbie had bought for a fancy Sunday dinner that never happened. He had enough cash to hit the drive through at Wendy's and grab a burger.
Normally an easy going guy, the laid-back guy in the office, unflappable and keeping his cool, George noticed that after giving up cigarettes his temper had gotten worse and his language coarser. He'd earned more than occasional reproachful glances from letting the wrong word out in the office, and Ernie had brought it up as an “attitude problem” at the end of their conversation.
Attitude problem? With his mother killing herself with COPD five years after cancer took his father, his fiance dumping him, troubles on the job, can't concentrate for shit, and feeling like “normal” was an abstract concept after a week without cigarettes, a man might just be a little off center and out of sorts. Shit on a stick, have some patience. It'll pass.
He rounded the corner to the row where his car was parked. The Dodge needed new tires, probably new belts as well. The warranty expired six months ago, and the car seemed to think that now was the time to start wearing out. George thought he saw some motion in the corner of his eye, but after a week like this, he just wanted to go home.
They electronic key fob was acting up again, and the car door didn't unlock until George has pressed the button the fourth time. “Piece of shit,” he muttered as the headlights flashed and the door unlocked, then he felt something poke him in the back.
“Give it up.” The voice belonged to a younger man, maybe a teenager, and another sharp poke followed.
George's heart skipped a beat, and he turned around to see a thin man, not much more than a boy, wearing a sweatshirt and knit cap. He had a small pistol in his fist that he waved at George.
“Gimme the keys, your wallet, your phone.” His eyes looked as dead as a mannequin's.
After everything else, why not cap off the week with a carjacking? Son of a bitch, things had gone right down the shitter. George dropped his keys in his pocket and glared at the thin young man.
“I said give it up.” He raised the pistol.
George's right fist pistoned out to land on the man's face, just under his cheekbone. It had been over two decades since George had his last fight, a schoolyard scuffle during recess over something stupid and forgettable. He didn't know where the move came from, the same way he didn't know why he growled “cocksucker” at his razor when he nicked his chin shaving this morning. His hands seemed to know more than he as to what to do.
The man's head whipped to the left from the impact, and George's left fist came up to connect with the thin man's throat, just under the jaw.
“The fuck I will, motherfucker.” George spat the words at the carjacker. He had experienced angry outbursts during evening rush hour traffic over the past two weeks, and the brochures mentioned irritability as a symptom of nicotine withdrawal. George had been surprised by the vitriol of these outbursts on the drive home, dropping F-bombs against other drivers as he struggled through traffic, wondering if he had suddenly developed Tourette's Syndrome. He had had incidents at home, cussing out the trash can after he missed tossing in an apple core. Until today, he had never done anything more than yell and kick the trash can.
The thin man staggered backward into the adjacent parked car and brought up the pistol, aiming at George's head.
George grabbed the gun and twisted, wrenching it from the other man's grip. He glanced at it, a small framed automatic. The nickel plating cracked and showing rust along its slide. He slammed the pistol into the carjacker's face, feeling the impact, then tossed it to the side, not caring where it went.
Blood ran from a gash across the carjacker's cheek, and he sagged to the floor.
George grabbed the carjacker's sweatshirt and hauled him up to his feet. The thin man seemed to weigh very little. “After the week I've had, you're fucking with the wrong guy, motherfucker.” He slammed him into the adjacent car and kept his grip. “After the shit I been through, you're not stealing a goddamn thing from me, asshole.” George pulled and swung the carjacker around to slam his head into the door pillar of his car, then shoved him out to the lane.
The carjacker fell, then gathered himself to his feet, staggering.
George approached and landed a kick to the man's backside. “Get the fuck out of here, motherfucker.”
The carjacker took the hint and hobbled away, his pace increasing to a jog as he receded into the distance.
George felt his breathing return to a normal pace, and his knuckles throbbed. Both hands had purple bruises growing across the knuckles, his left hand starting to scab from a cut. He'd probably have to ice them down tonight to ease the swelling, because they were starting to ache already. He flexed his fingers and everything moved the tight way, but it hurt. His shoulders protested from what he had done to the carjacker. Time to get in the car and out of here before the guy came back with a few friends.
George shook his head to clear it, as if that would help to remove the fog that had been slowing his thoughts the past two weeks. What did he just do? Wasn't he once the guy who just turned the other cheek? Who was this man who turned the tables on a carjacker?
He stooped to gather up his bag. During the fight, the carjacker had dropped something, a hard pack of Newports. The flip top box crumpled but not crushed. George opened it. He didn't smoke menthols, but there were four left inside. He didn't carry a lighter any more, but his car had the dashboard lighter and an ashtray.
George opened his car door and tossed his bag and the box of Newports onto the passenger seat. He had the weekend to sort things out. Somehow there had to be a way to save his job, win his girlfriend back, and keep Mom alive.
This is something I wrote in 2017 after trying to quit smoking to avoid a $3000 surcharge on my health insurance. My employer at the time was imposing fines on smokers, the overweight, high cholesterol, hypertensive, etc, etc. Around the same time, my mother passed away after several years of dementia and related problems. Not a great time, but write what you know…