Nino’s horoscope had said that today his life would change and it was right. He felt like he was walking ten feet above the ground. The buoyant feeling rose from his gut, through his heart and his smile, lifting them all along the way. He had gotten the job! Not just one he could settle for, but the one he really wanted. After nine months filled with online job applications, food stamp applications and unemployment insurance, it felt like he was simply upgrading from a crappy full-time job to a decent one.
The timing couldn’t have been better. He had received letters from all of the social service agencies stating that his benefits had run out. Rent was due, but he would just have to suck it up and pay it, along with a hefty late penalty, out of his first paycheck.
When he reached the bus stop, he noticed his shoe was untied. He squatted down to tie it, but he heard a ripping sound and felt a sudden cool sensation on his rear end. It was the only suit he owned. It had once belonged to his father and was so old that it had gone completely out of style and then come back in again. It had always been a little tight in the butt, but that was part of the reason that it looked so good on him. It was part of the reason that he had been hired. What could he do? He was due to start his new position on Monday and it was Thursday afternoon.
He would have to go to the thrift store and find a replacement. The problem was, he only had $3.75. Not enough to purchase a suit, even at thrift store prices. He would have to work for a month at his new job before he received his first paycheck. All of his credit cards were maxed. He had already borrowed from his friends to the point of straining his closest relationships. The first victim of his desperation would have to be his pride.
He borrowed a strip of duct tape, a Sharpie and a cardboard box panel from a nearby construction crew. He taped the gap in his trousers shut and fashioned a sign: “Need $$$ to buy clothes for work.” He walked to a busy intersection nearby, crossed halfway and stopped in the median. He had only held the sign aloft for a few minutes before he saw the driver’s window rolling down on an approaching pickup truck. He went to the edge of the curb and held his hand out, but instead of a handout he got doused with the contents of a fast food cup half full of soda.
A disgruntled homeless man approached him, upset that Nino had usurped his territory, and shoved him hard in the chest. Nino stumbled off the curb directly into the path of an oncoming eighteen wheeler. His horoscope was spot on.
Literature in Small Doses 