Chapter Two

            As Jeff stepped in, he immediately thought of stepping back out and just driving around the neighborhood for a bit. He often did this after a rough day at work. Which was pretty much every day come to think of it he realized.

            I would literally give my left testicle to quit my job, he thought. As the matter of fact,

might as well take both while your down there. Not like I've used either in the last ten years

except for the occasional release in the downstairs guest bathroom while pretending to take a

shit. I could never use "our" bathroom, which is really "her" bathroom of course. She'd know.

Somehow. She's demonically intuitive that way, he thought.

            Most of my shit to get ready is in the guest bathroom anyway, that way I don't disturbher beauty rest while I get ready at 5pm in the fucking morning to make sure I'm at myamazingly rewarding job by six. Kids, wife, mortgage, car...I'd keep the first and burn the ladderif I had the chance.
           "Honey, I'm home!" Jeff said almost puking in his mouth as he usually does when shit

comes out of it.

            "It's about fucking time. Jesus. What took you so long?" Jeff's wife Vicky asked. Were

you driving around the block again? Charleen Becket said she sees you just driving aimlessly

around our block with that creepy dead expression on your face that you get all the time."

            Charleen Becket. Ever since her husband left her, she's been keeping herself busy with the personal lives of everyone else in the neighborhood, Jeff thought. And to think that bitch waved at me all four times I drove past her house the other day. It's funny the people we pretend to be. Just waiting for the chance to judge and cause chaos in the lives of others to bring some kind of validity and make some kind of sense out of the fucked up cards we were dealt. Charleen Becket probably feels she was dealt a shitty hand, but the truth is she squandered the pocket aces she had when she verbally abused her husband Phil to the point where he was willing to loose everything he had worked for in a divorce just to get the fuck away from her. I saw Phil in downtown LA not to long ago during my lunch break. He was wearing ratty, wrinkled cloths and said he had barely enough money to survive and that he was living in a piece of shit studio in Little Tokyo and that he hadn't been this happy in years...God, I envied him.

            "You know I don't like it when you cuss around our children," Jeff replied.

            "Oh, I'm so sorry your holiness. It's not like they don't hear it at school for Christ's sake," Vicky argued.

            "I seem to recall Sarah's teacher calling me last week to talk about Sarah's recent use of the word you just used in front of her and where she might have heard such language. I told herit wasn't from me and it definitely couldn't have been from my saint of a wife," Jeff saidfacetiously.

            "You're such a fucking hypocrite! You were screaming obscenities at the top of your

lungs last sunday in front of David and the entire neighborhood as the matter of fact," Vicky said raising her voice.

            "I drove a nail through my thumb putting up his basketball hoop. I had to go to the

hospital," Jeff pointed out, trying to keep his cool.

            "Semantics!" Vicky screamed. "The point is, she could have heard those words anywhere and it's not fair of you to put the blame on me. You blame me for everything that is wrong in these kids lives and I'm fucking sick of it."

            You are literally to blame for every drop of psychological damage these kids have

endured during their very short existence on this planet, you complete fucking horror of a

woman, Jeff thought.

            "Okay. Fine. They could have heard it anywhere. Can we drop it, please?" Jeff said.

            "Whatever. We have an hour to get ready for the party next door. Please wear the new pinstripe shirt and silk tie I bought you at Nordy's last weekend. I don't want our outfits

clashing," Vicky mentioned as she walked out of the kitchen.

            Jeff had just remembered where Vicky was with the car when he put the nail through his thumb. They used to have two cars but had to sell Vicky's BMW once they couldn't afford the payments anymore due to Vicky being an out of work Real Estate agent after the market went to shit. He remembered David coming out of the house after he called his Mom to tell her what happened and him saying that Mom said to take a cab to the hospital because she just ordered lunch and couldn't get back with the car...What a woman, Jeff thought. What would I do without her. Probably throw a fucking parade.

            Jeff snapped out of it and realized he hadn't even had a chance to say hello to the only thing that mattered to him in life.

            "So guys, how was your day?" Jeff asked in a chipper, suburbinite father fasion.