No Such Thing as a Selfless Deed - A short story and The Young Fresh Fellows

Here is a short story about Dave. He's not nice but at least he's morally grounded.

• It should be noted that Dave has a false confidence that was instilled at a young age. He had a very good mother and received many participation trophies for his mediocre to poor work.

I live a few miles away from a tired, old dingy hotel in desperate need of renovation. Whenever I'm leaving home, located in a posh and gentrified location, it's astonishing to find that the impoverished can merely live a block away. I suppose that is what makes a city eclectic.

Today, I was in the mood for McDonald's, but not wanting to be seen in such a dive, I took a scenic route headed toward the said hotel with my sights aimed at a McDonald's in a location I most likely would not be spotted. That is not to say that I know many McDonald's locations, you just happen to come across them sometimes because every place in America is littered with them. In fact, if memory serves correctly, I just decided to drive that way and figured I would run into one based on demographics. Yes, that's it.

It was a blistering hot day. As I approached the intersection of 49th and Aurora, a man asked what was playing on my car stereo. I told him the fact that he didn't know didn't warrant a response. As the man walked away, my car began to putter as if it were going to break down at any given second. I turned up the stereo and noticed my check engine light was on. I think it had been on for some time, but everyone knows that those are just put there by the car companies to bring your car in and get you to spend more money. The purr of the engine crescendoed into a hissing noise when suddenly the AC gave out.

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Song I was listening to:

- The Young Fresh Fellows are a nice little slice of Seattle Alternative.

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Alarmed by the noise my car had made, I quickly looked around to make sure I had not been spotted by anyone I knew in the area. To the left of the intersection, there was a grassy bank. Nestled between the bank and a run-down Blockbuster was the old, dingy hotel.

I pulled my car into the parking lot of the hotel. As I pulled into the parking lot my car idled roughly before the engine died. I got out to check what was happening under the hood and heard a laugh behind me. It was a laugh that I recognized. I looked back and found my coworker's wife exiting the hotel with another man. Holding her by the hips and standing behind her, he lifted his left hand, brushed her long red hair to one side and began kissing behind the ear on the other.

At this moment I grimaced and turned my head in disgust. Perplexed by the idea that there were actually two people on this earth interested in boning this broad. I gathered myself and thought about the inappropriateness of what I had just said. I then corrected myself, I can't believe someone would actually want to possibly elope with that terribly unprepossessing human being. Or, perhaps they were just in there shagging rotten with no end game.

My coworker, who sits in a cubicle next to mine at work, is always watching home videos in the office. I always found it so annoying whenever he called me over just to show me the videos. But by what divine intelligence would lead me to cross his wife for the first time in such a precarious situation.

I pulled out my phone, did a backwards summersault from the front of my car to the cover of the passenger side. With the agility of a mynx, I quickly got back to my feet in a crouch position, peeped over my hood and snapped a picture inconspicuously.

Then I felt a moral dilemma. Would I be helping or hurting my coworker by showing him this? Thinking back to the home videos and the repulsive way he incessantly rambles on about loving his wife at the office made me step back and think about it. I put my phone in my pocket and got back into my car.

I'm not a religious man, so I don't pray. I contemplate. I contemplated for my car to start and sure enough, it did. I looked in my rearview mirror, they had both entered a raised, metallic blue Toyota Tundra and began to pull forward. The parking lot had three rows of spaces for about 8 cars each. I was in the middle row while they were in the row closest to the hotel.

At that moment something came over me. I am not a religious man, so I don't pray. I contemplate. I contemplated about my coworker's situation, my car, their life, and that environmental-murdering-metallic-blue Toyota Tundra. As their car began to pull forward I set mine in reverse on a direct course to their car. The slick bastard tried to swerve but as I had quickly picked up speed, it was to no avail. I backed straight into them. My little 1986 Honda CR-X stood no chance. It was absolutely smashed.

"What the hell are you doing, guy?" The man shouted as he got out of his car.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't see you guys. I wasn't looking behind me, no one comes to this hotel midday. I'm so sorry."

"Dude! My truck, look at the fender, your shit red paint job is all over the bottom of it!"

I calmly looked at my coworker's wife who clearly had no idea who I was and said, "Please, let me call the police and we can sort this all out. My insurance can take care of this but I need a very detailed police report. Names, etc."

She interjected, "No, no! Not necessary! There must be some way we can work this out."

"Yeah, uh, I mean, we don't need to involve no police or nothing." The sprawling man stammered.

"Guys, come on. It's the right thing to do. We gotta be above board about this." I said matter-of-factly. "I got both our cars covered by insurance in this but I'm gonna need a police report. I love this car, it's my baby it's a classic."

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That following Monday, I ran into my coworker with the licentious wife and he made some snarky remark about my new ride.

"Hey-oh! Look there at ol' Dave," he sneered. "Mr. I-don't-buy-new-cars-because-they-lose-value-as-soon-as-they-are-off-the-lot, in the new SUV."

"Yeah, what do you know? I suppose I just got that itch."

What a jack ass.

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@musingsltd is just a dude living in Japan, which has been his home for the last four years. His goal is to share his cultural insights about Japan and America with readers from both countries, creating a bridge of understanding between his two homes. He also blogs sports, terrible gambling insights, draws comics that lack art in every sense of the word and gives unsolicited advice. Why not kick your reservations to the curb and follow the guy, huh?

Drawings were done by @musingsltd