When a good man is pushed too far, he uses his brains, or maybe he just gets lucky.
I've been thinking about how to get even with someone who has more ego than brains, but too much power as well, and came up with this silly story. Don't take it too seriously. Its only purpose is to describe an act of humiliation for someone who thinks they are superior.
While it is a variation on the theme of my earlier story by the same name, there is no connection.
There is no sex in this story.
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I pulled into a parking spot at Jimmy's and turned off the engine. I was exhausted. I wasn't tired. I didn't need sleep, although sleep had been hard to come by lately. I was just emotionally drained.
I should explain. Jimmy's is really the Lighthorse Brew Pub. Jimmy Lee is the owner and a lifelong friend of mine. Jimmy, whose real name is James Harry Lee, is a distant descendent of Lighthorse Harry Lee who was a distinguished officer in the American Revolutionary War, although he is perhaps better known as Robert E. Lee's father. Jimmy's always been proud of his lineage, but when he opened a brew pub, Jimmy embraced his heritage more than ever before.
Jimmy is about as good a friend as a man could have, and like all good friends we gave each other no end of grief knowing full well that if push ever came to shove, we would have each other's back. I was born up north to parents who were themselves born up north, and Jimmy believed that it took at least five generations to be a true Virginian, so I was forever branded a Yankee and he was a Rebel, which is itself no great slur when you live in Virginia.
We graduated high school and went off to the university taking paths that slowly diverged. I took the usual path toward medical school. It was a tough program, but good, and it got me where I wanted to go. Now, years later, I was an OB/GYN looking after every parent's most precious possession. Jimmy studied Chemistry and took a lot of electives in the hospitality program, and all the while he was brewing beer in our apartment. He spent a few years after college doing what he called his graduate education by working in restaurants and bars until he felt he knew the hospitality industry well enough. All that time, we never lost touch.
Now I was parked in the lot alongside his pub trying to catch my breath, slow my heart rate, and stop the pounding in my temple. In less than twenty-four hours my life would be on a new course with new challenges and far less pain. You see, a few weeks ago I realized that my wife of five years was having an affair. I wasn't sure who she was cheating with at the time, but the signs were unmistakable. I hired a private investigator, and it took him almost no time at all to confirm my suspicions. Since then I'd spent my every free moment signing legal documents with my lawyer and getting my financial affairs in order.
I will forever remember the afternoon I walked into the office of the investigator that I hired. I had spent every day since I hired him telling myself that he would confirm that my wife was faithful, and all my fears were in my imagination. I didn't believe it, but I told myself a lie just to get through the waiting. It didn't go that way. The man I hired gave me the news I dreaded, and when I thought it couldn't get any worse it did. Her lover was a cop. Then I got the short story on one particular cop, and I knew I was in a world of hurt. Officer Harold Dickerson had a particularly bad record of bringing suspects into the station in a bad state. It seems he liked hiding behind his badge and beating on people who were too afraid to fight back. I knew his kind. I've known his kind all my life and I could write his biography without ever meeting him. He had an abusive father and a mother with little self-respect. He was a mediocre student either out of a lack of talent, interest, or family support. One or both parents drank, and he was raised to believe that his only importance lay in what he could take from others. He projects an air of superiority and feeds on the fear of others, but at his core he knows he is a disappointment to those who raised him and that makes him a disappointment to himself. He is a man to be avoided and his weakness is his own ego.
Tonight, if only for a few minutes, I would forget my problems, sit with my friend, and we'd talk. At least, that was the plan. I got out of my car, and I could feel my back tighten. That's a bad habit of mine and when this is over, I need to sit down with a therapist for some deep discussion. All my tension seems to go into my back, and I need to learn how to avoid that, or I'll be a walking paperclip someday.
I walked slowly into the Lighthorse, oblivious to my surroundings, and walked over to the bar to greet my friend. It was a brief moment later that I realized my mistake. On Thursday nights the Lighthouse was a cop bar. Don't ask me how it happened, but the city's finest had taken a liking to the place and the regular patrons took to avoiding it on Thursdays. It wasn't so much that they felt unwelcome; they just felt out of place. Jimmy didn't particularly like it, but business is business, and he wasn't about to drive away paying customers especially when he knew everyone would be on their best behavior that night.
Jimmy knew what I had learned, so when I walked up to him, he gave me an odd look. I turned to look around and that's when I realized what I'd walked into. It's not that I felt entirely unwelcome. I'd delivered a number of their kids and a bunch of their grandkids, and I knew many of their faces. In fact, I was generally well-liked by the officers in my town, but this just wasn't what I needed on that night. I turned to look at my friend, smiled and shrugged my shoulders, and turned to walk out. My back was now even tighter, and I was walking with an unnatural gate. My back pain was shooting down my right leg as I started across the parking lot to get to my car and go home for one more night of pretending I wasn't furious with my wife when I saw the source of my pain walking in my direction. Officer Dickwad!
"You okay there, doc?" He said "doc" just a little too loud as if that little bit of familiarity meant something. The bastard knew full well who I was, and he was sneering. I suppose he thought he knew something that I did not. Well, if information is power, he didn't know how little power he really had.
"You have a little too much to drink tonight? You know alcohol won't solve your problems."
Asshole! I ignored him and thought, "No, but a good divorce lawyer will" as I continued walking to my car.
"Hey, I'm talking to you!"
I turn to look at this worthless excuse for a man, and without a word I continue walking to my car. My back is getting tighter if that is possible.
"Okay, that's far enough! You get in that car, and I'll haul you in for DUI."
I'd had enough with this unibrow, double-digit IQ, knuckle-dragging piece of crap. I turned and said, "It's called DUI, not WUI. Walking under the influence is not a crime."
Well, Officer Dickworth didn't like that. He marches over to me in the most menacing manner he could muster. "Okay, Doctor Bishop!" He pronounced my name in a manner dripping with contempt. "I'm giving you a breath test. If you fail it, I'll run you in for just trying to get into your car."
It's at times like this that the mouth writes checks that the body can't cash. I looked down at him (yeah, I was about three inches taller than Officer Dickbreath) and said, "You know the problem here? You got no skin in the game!"
He looked at me like he had no idea what I was getting at.
"I know that I'm stone cold sober. I haven't had a drink in days. Now, you can push that badge at me and try to be something more than you are, more than you'll ever be, or you can turn around and go into that bar with me and we can do it in front of all your friends." Desperation brings out the crazy in a man.
I guess Officer Dickless figured he'd have a little fun humiliating me in front of his friends, so we walked into the bar. Just to get under my skin, and thinking his secret was still unknown to me, he says, "So, how's your wife going to react when she has to come down to the station to bail you out?" He was chuckling. I guess that's what passes for humor when you're the kind of coward who goes around screwing other men's wives.
We walked into Jimmy's, and I called over to my friend, "Jimmy, ring the bell!" Jimmy looked at me like I was crazy, but he reached for the ship's bell that hung behind the bar for those times he wanted to get everyone's attention and gave it the most uncertain ring I'd ever heard.
Every conversation stopped. Every face in the room turned in my direction. "Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Doctor David Bishop. Many of you know me, and this is Officer Dick... Dick..." I turned to him and said in a loud voice, "What was it again? Oh yeah, I remember. Dickerson. This is Officer Dickerson." I placed a lot of emphasis on the first syllable. "It seems that the good officer is an amazing judge of the human condition, and he has decided that I am too drunk to drive. Of course, I told him that I was not. So we made a small bet, and we came in here for your entertainment so that you can see the outcome of that bet. I offered to take a breathalyzer test and if I fail, he will haul me into the station and book me. I, of course, won't resist, and I will confess my crime to the judge. But if I pass the test, he has agreed to drop his pants and sing I'm a Little Teacup! What do you think of that?"
