When the train ground to a halt, midway between stations, Jeremy sighed in frustration. He was going to be stuck here a while. What else could go wrong today?
Jeremy's designer suit stood out among the other commuters. His wallet and Rolex watch had already been stolen, but he didn't know it yet. Perhaps it's just as well he didn't know. This had not been a good day for Jeremy.
When Jeremy woke up this morning, he was CEO of DeGrasse Industries, making seven figures, respected by his coworkers, and married to the sexy Sandra, daughter of the powerful and wealthy Marquez Spagnoli.
All of it was gone now. His jealous younger brother Growl turned Sandra against him using a clandestinely taken photograph of him kissing a stripper named Candy that Growl paid to set him up.
Growl then used his mob connections to frame Jeremy for a drug running operation. Now, Jeremy's reputation and job were gone. Neil DeGrasse, the chairman of the DeGrasse Industries board, called for Jeremy's resignation to preserve the reputation of the firm his grandfather Haas DeGrasse created. Jeremy, under Mr. DeGrasse's gaze, wrote a letter of resignation, saying he wanted to spend time with his family.
So Jeremy, devoid of job, company car, and company driver, unable to hail a taxi, had boarded the commuter train to get back to his house, not particularly looking forward to Sandra's vitriol when he got there. And now, the train was stuck.
Jeremy took the time to reflect on his life, something he rarely had time to do.
To be honest, he couldn't remember much of it. Most of his childhood was a blank. He remembered leaving with his Uncle Red on a fishing trip. At the time, his Mom and Dad were about 25 years older than he was. The next thing he knew, he was home from college and his parents were much closer to his own age. It must have been during that time that Growl was born, since he couldn't remember having a brother at home either.
Jeremy came to the realization that most of his life (or at least what he could remember of it) was nothing more than a quest for power and money and fame. His allegiance to his family, his company, and even Sandra had been only in extremes, complete fealty or total repugnance. He related to no one as a person, only as a way to achieve his goals.
In fact, now that Jeremy had a moment to think, his life was nothing but crisis after crisis, some of which would be unbelievable if they didn't happen to him. (For example, his mother was once possessed by a demon that caused her to poison her best friend.)
For the first time, Jeremy considered if this was the only way to live.
Then the train started again. Jeremy noticed that Candy the stripper was actually sitting a few seats in front of him. Maybe he could charm her into betraying Growl.
Copyright 2013. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.
This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
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