Of Silver and Bags

 I find myself in a strange room, not Star Trek strange it's not that exotic, just a room that I am fairly certain I've never been in before, and I begin to wonder why and how I got here, and who is responsible for my presence in this strange room when the door opens. A cheery, fat fellow walks in, smiles brightly and says "Oh good, you're awake at last." I nod, not quite sure when I was supposed to have "gone to sleep" and not sure why I would have, and I figure it's best not to talk much (or at all) until I figure out what in the blue fuck is going on here. The fat fellow pushes his glasses back up on his nose, smiles again, and proceeds to look at me with some curiosity. "You seem to have calmed down a bit since they brought you in earlier today. Good that means that maybe now we are ready to begin with why you are here." I nod again, narrowing my eyes, but still don't say a work. Since I don't know where "here" is exactly, and do not remember being brought "here", I figure to let fatty do most of the talking. He nods "I understand your reluctance to talk, maybe you don't remember the last few hours, and are worried about what you've done to be wearing that" here he points at the "gown" that I am wearing. Paper thin (aren't they all) and a light shade of blue that has been tied at the waist, but still feels like I am less clothed than I need to be whatever the situation.  

"You were found wandering down Elm, near Main babbling about "trying to find someone to sell her cocaine, and were quite adamant that you did not want to cooperate with the fellows who found you. In fact, one of them has a lovely bruise on his jaw thanks to you. However, there were more of them than there were of you, and eventually you were "persuaded" to get in the car, and be taken here." I grunt in reply, as I do the math, and figure out where here is, still I have no recollection of wandering down Elm, or any other street near Main, at least recently. I begin to wonder if that 'last call' drink might have been a bridge too far, and perhaps that is the reason I am about to have an unpleasant time with this fat fellow. I shrug mentally to myself, and think it wouldn't be the first unpleasant time I've had with a fat fellow. I suppose I should try to make the best of it. Fat boy chooses this moment to stand up, leave the room without a word, come back a few minutes later, and toss a bundle of clothes in my lap. "Here, we washed them, and got them clean, put them on, we have an appointment, and that," he pointed at my gown "isn't suitable attire for our meeting, it would shock the tender sensibilities of the majority of the Nazi party, and certainly we aren't going to be meeting any of them, get dressed."

I nodded again, and he had the decency to leave the room, while I got dressed into my newly clean clothes, they smelled like industrial cleaner, but I guess beggars can't be choosers. Chubs comes back into the room, gives me an appraising look, and snorts "good enough for our purposes I suppose, but you could do with a shave. Oh well, no time for that now, and I am sure they won't mind, I'd imagine they seen you look much worse many times." I raise an eyebrow at the mention of "they", but fatso ignores my silent inquiry, and walks out, motioning for me to follow. I sigh, ponder the identity of they, suspect it isn't going to be Nicole Kidman coming to take me away from my life of toil that I am going to meet, and follow him out the door. I follow the fellow down a few hallways of your typical bland, institutional type building with the gray walls, and the neutral smells that are designed to be calming, but rarely succeed. We pass no one on the way out, and we eventually make it to chubs car. "Get in we don't have far to go, my office is close, and I figure that would be the best place for our little conference." I slid into the passenger seat, and buckle my seat belt. I figure at some point this is going to be a bumpy ride, might as well get prepared in advance. 

A few minutes later, we pulled up to a typical office building that I assumed contained my new fat friend's office. Confirmed seconds later, when he said "my office, get out, and remember try to play nice. Playing nice is going to be VERY important for your future." Just what I wanted a fat, cryptic fellow trying to be all James Bond on me, while I was still trying to sort out the last missing few hours of my life. I go out of the car, and followed the smug bastard into the building. "In here old boy, and remember, PLAY NICE." He opened the door, and gestured me inside. I walked in, took one look around, noticed the occupants,and turned on my heel with a snarl to head back out the way I had came. Suddenly fatty had a large playmate at his side, a large man with a lot of muscles that were just begging to be used on some idiot like me. Fatty smiled again (he's quite the smiler, our fatty) "now, now just stay calm, and have a seat, and Clarence here" he waved at the mountain beside him "won't have to ensure your compliance."  I looked up at the mountain, and figured that I might hit him, but I doubted he would have the decency to fall down if I did, and therefore would probably hit me back, and since I am a decent fellow, I would fall down, and probably wouldn't be in the mood to get back up, so I decided to not test that theory.

I turned back to face the room (and the "music" inside), glanced around, and took the seat furthest from the other occupants.  There were two of them, and neither would ever be confused for members of my fan club (I am convinced I have a fan club, though I've never met anyone who claims membership).  Fatty chimed in with "I guess you all wonder why you are here?" Neither of the other two spoke a word, just sat there stony faced, clearly as unhappy as I was in be in this situation. I decided to finally break my silence, and replied "not particularly wondering as much as can't see the point of it. None of us, and I am sure my silent partners will agree, think we have anything further to discuss with or about each other."  Tubby grinned, and replied "Oh, I sure you, and these two lovely ladies actually agree about that, it might be the only thing you agree upon, but I am here to give you the, unwelcome to you, news."

I looked at my companions "since I've apparently got a hole in my recent memory, can either of you lovely ladies clue me into what this fat fuck is talking about?"  I pointed at the smug, fat bastard across from us. Both of my companions shook their respective heads in the negative, one looking innocent as is her custom, and the other looking angry as is hers.  Mr. Know it All waved a hand "oh no, no none of you would have any idea that this little conference was going to happen today, so don't rack your brains trying to figure out if you missed something. I mean you have missed something, all three of you, but none of you would have any idea that you missed THIS."  Here he waved a print out of some considerable thickness, and said "you see when we found Mr. drunk off his ass there (here he pointed at me) wobbling down the street last night, he had this on him and was waving it around like a street preacher waves the bible, the only thing missing was the 'doom and gloom' speech about it being the end of the world. Which is ironic, because after reading this" here he dropped the manuscript onto the table in front of him, " someone's just might." 

That was when the drunken memory flooded back to me. I stood up, rather too suddenly for my head to get the message, swayed a bit, pointed my finger at the fat bastard and shouted "you fat son of a bitch! I knew it! I knew you'd betray me, and here you are making ME pay the price for YOUR betrayal!" I lunged at the table, grabbed the papers sitting there, and begin walking to the door. "Call your boy the mountain if you have to tubby, but I am walking out the door, and out of this shit show of a meeting. I suppose I'll give you the customary 30 pieces of silver for this little 'passion play' at a later time, but for now, I am getting the hell out of here."  He put up a forestalling hand trying to placate me "now, now it's not as bad as you think maybe you should read the highlights of that little manuscript before you go off the rails entirely." 

I glanced down at the papers I was holding and rifled through them quickly, oddly most of them were blank. "Are you taking the piss out of me, their blank" I said. "Look closer at the last two pages" he replied. I thumbed to the two back pages, and smile bleakly. "Of course, I should have known that even drunk me would have to be too clever by half. Here you go ladies, I'll leave this mystery solving bit with you" and I left the room. I had made it about 5 steps out the door before I heard them both mutter in unison. "that son of a bitch!" Being the aforementioned son of a bitch, I resolved two things to stay off Elm Street, and to thank a certain apple seller for his silence.