Subscribe!"What was that?" He thought to himself. He had been startled awake from a rather pleasant dream, and thus was immediately in a foul mood.
Overhead, he could hear his neighbors arguing. "Not again." He groaned as he buried his head under his pillows.
In the apartment above his, a couple was arguing, and both had likely already forgotten what caused the initial spat. He accused her of not caring about his hobbies, of not supporting him and of not giving him enough personal space (she had, after all, deleted some rather lascivious material from his computer not long ago, an act that had absolutely infuriated him beyond reason). She accused him of not caring about his feelings, of being self-centered about his hobbies and need for personal space. What about her needs?
As the argument continued, a thought popped into her head. "Perhaps it's time to end this, just like I always do. I'll show him!" With that, she calmed down, yelled one last insult at him and stormed out of the room. She was going to need a little bit of time to make things seem realistic.
About ten minutes later, she returned. He was still fuming and ignored her when she walked into the room.
"I'm sorry." She said.
He was shocked. "What?"
"I'm sorry. I want to make things up to you. Here, take my ATM card and withdraw $50 that you can spend on your games and videos."
"Are you serious?" He said, still shocked.
"Yes. My ATM card is in my wallet with my PIN. Now go before I come back to my senses."
"Okay. Thanks. I'm sorry too. I said some things I shouldn' have said. I won't buy any videos."
"That's okay. Now go."
He stood up and walked over to her, giving her a hug and a kiss. He couldn't believe what was happening. "I'll be back soon!" He cheerfully yelled back to her as he left.
As he was walking to the ATM, some thoughts began to trouble him. "She probably just wants me out of the house so she can plot some type of revenge against me. What's the worst it could be, though? At least I'm getting $50 out of the deal. That will buy me the new game I've been wanting." With that thought, his brief fears subsided.
He approached the ATM and noticed that there were more people than usual in the area. "No matter. Probably just a tournament or match at the university is letting out now." He took out her ATM card and put it into the machine. It asked for the PIN, and he pulled out the sticky-note that she had written it on. He entered it and the machine asked what he wanted to do. He selected withdrawal, entered the amount as $50, did not get a receipt, took the money and ATM card, and turned to leave.
Almost before he could completely turn around, he felt a blow to his shoulder and suddenly found himself on the ground. In the next moment, his face was ground into the sidewalk, a knee in the back of his neck. His hands were being cuffed, and he couldn't fight back, even if he wanted to.
"What's going on?" He was able to cough out.
"You're under arrest. We got a report that somebody stole a lady's wallet. She told us where she was and that the perpetrator might try to take money out at an ATM since she had left a note in the wallet with her PIN on it."
"Well, my girlfried gave me her wallet so I could get some money out. We had a fight and she wanted to make up to me, so she told me I could take some money out. . ."
"You think we were born yesterday? How do you think this looks? You have an ATM card that's not yours, and you fit the description of the suspect. And you just took money out of an account that's not yours."
"But I swear to you, my girlfriend. . ."
"She said she broke up with you this morning, and in your anger you took her wallet."
"This is unbelievable!"
"Come, let's go!"
All of the commotion had not gone unnoticed by the restaurant owner across the street. He had seen the plain clothes officers drive up and take postions around his restaurant. His fear had been that they were there for him. He was already making preparations in his kitchen to make things more on the up and up.
For years now, he had offered brown rice as an option on his menu. However, he didn't really sell brown rice. What he did was to scrape the darkened rice from the bottom of the rice pots each day and give that to customers wanting it. Some had complained, but none had yet caught on. The police presence outside made him worry that his time was up. He could see the headlines now. "Restaurant owner jailed for selling browned rice, not brown rice." There were other more serious violations at his restaurant, like underpaid illegal aliens washing his silverware in week old dishwater, the refridgerator humming along at a balmy 58 degrees Fahrenheit, and the lack of hairnets on the cooks. But, he was worried about the rice.
Seeing the police take away the man at the ATM had allowed him to relax. Although he had seen his life flash before his eyes, it wasn't enough to make him change his ways.
