Sugar and Garlic

We are walking by an array of check out isles. It's a mission to the customer service desk. The head of each isle is petaled with an assortment of impulse buying items but the salivating allure of jerky and candy bars and the eye catching red and yellow font shouting A list celebrity's infidelities are no match for what captures our attention and subliminal thoughts. We're on a mission.

Of course there are always hitches during a mission and this would be a very minor one- An over weight toad of a brunet cuts her shopping cart, filled to the brim with frozen pizzas and Doritos complete with a little brat hanging off it like a monkey cut left in front of us, queuing her self in line. At lest for a moment we had to stop. Our big ticket item slid forward a bit in our own cart.

People in NA or AA talk about having a moment of sobriety. A moment in which during one of your most fucked up desperate points providence gives you a fresh objective view to see how silly and messed up you are. I'm just saying is all, so we're thinking along the same lines. And so for that brief moment, only by accident, our eyes get caught on this bud of consumerism. With a smirk Fat Eddie says "you should yank one" referring to a package of Bic pens hanging by the horoscope scrolls above the gum.

We've been doing this take back scam off and on for a while now. What you do is counterfeit a receipt for a big ticket item like a flat panel HD tv, go to the store, find it, then "take it back" for cash. One of the first times doing this I happened to notice a set of fancy fountain pens with ink cartridges. I thought it was really cool and classy, something those old proper bohemian opium den dudes would have been using back in the day. I was still on a rush from the initial time we pulled the scam so I strait up shop lifted 'em. It was one of those jokes where you had have been there for it to be funny but Fat Fucking Eddie roasted me about it. So after that I would steal markers and pens as a way to continue the inside joke. But by now it wasn't so much funny as it was course of habit.

We used to called Eddie "Fat Eddie" ironically. In high school he was skinny, lanky dude. After the second time he got outta jail he started to get fat. For any one that partakes in the fast-living excesses of smack and coke derivatives that a grand theft like this is about to bankroll, well it's remarkable to not loose weight let alone to gain it.

I've only been to jail once. A little doughier on the gut, still thin in the face but the most significant change was a bad (as opposed to bad ass) prison tat. John, or J, he's the other guy I'm with, has been to jail three times and besides his haggardness, he still looks the same but mentally he is more off the hook than any of us. Anyhow, ironically, Fat Eddie (or Fat Fucking Eddie or Fucking Fat Eddie when he wasn't around) is a fat junkie.

"I've already got those". I look at my bad tat of a feather on my fore arm. I forget the reason why I decided on a feather but now that I look at it it could easily be a fountain pen feather that those old school wig wearing motherfuckers would have used to sign parchment documents and shit. We sway the cart around the toad woman and proceed to walk to the costumer service desk. Our big ticket item this time is a quadraphonic wood burning toaster complete with a butter warmer and NevrBurn technology. I feel bad that we are even making it look like people buy this crap. This is stupid. Fat fucking Eddie is fucking fat, I have a dumb tattoo and J is a god damn psycho. This is such a stupid life.

"Can I help who's next?" the girl at the desk could be toad women's daughter. "Can I help who's next?" She repeats her self with apathy as she scratches her ass. Well, we might as well do it one last time. We've already come this far. Anyways.