The best part about having connected Albanian brothers as landlords is that no one fucks with you; no one who matters, anyway. No one who could truly hurt you would be foolish enough to piss in their pool. Those greasy little pseudo-Greeks would kill you for a dime. Take money out of their pockets and consider it a declaration of war. Whack a low-level thug living in one of their properties and they're losing rent. Do it on premises and you've drawn police attention. Rub out some punk who lives above their money-front of an Italian restaurant and you've signed your own death warrant-- their patronage will decrease at the initial shock, increase briefly in the name of morbid curiosity, and then plummet again once the cursed crime scene stigma fastens itself to the joint for good. That's a bell curve you don't want to produce. That's a wave you don't want to make. That's exactly why I moved to 564 Brewer Street, Mordred, New Jersey when things got hot at the old pad. My fanclub started monitoring me, taking notes on my habits from conspicuously close stake-out sedans with tinted windows. It was only a matter of time before they pounced. It takes a fool to fuck up, a man to admit it, and a genius to work his way out of it. I'm not claiming any of those titles, but I'd bet my unknown bastard children that I'm safe. For now.
The problem is that I got greedy. Pigs get fat, hogs go to slaughter. Some sage I worked with at an up-and-up job told me that once. Then I got the axe while he stayed on with the company. Guess I was a hog there, too. Goes to show you what sweating for a living will get you. I'd prefer to bleed a little, barely enough to turn a profit. I bled a bit too much on this last gig. Drew that attention I didn't want, though this kind wasn't from Johnny Law. It was from Chen Lau. Don't ask what my scam was. I wouldn't be much of a magician if I showed you what was under my hat, much of a crook if I was honest, or much of a salesman if I told you how much coin was to be made on the sheep of society. Want to buy some swampland in Florida? I'll sell it you cheap. Bring waders along with your sunglasses.
But back to this Johnny Lau. I went into my endeavor with the same mentality from high school: pick on those smaller than you. That was another mistake on the long list of them. Those little Chink cockbites don't seem like much face-to-face, but what they lack in size they make up for in numbers and sheer tenacity, not to mention brutality. Never underestimate the sadistic side of a Chinaman. I've seen what's left of those unfortunate enough to land in their clutches after screwing them. It isn't much. It isn't pretty. Still, I pushed buttons and assumed the role my agent's created: arrogant smart-ass typecast ad nauseam. I used to call them Orientals during our brief transaction discussions. It became a miniature game for me, a side wager placed while the big bet played out. How many times could I refer to the short little pricks with the adjective used to refer to rugs without them Bruce Leeing me prematurely? Every money lender envisions making his debtor go away eventually, one way or another. On the darker side of things it's never with a handshake and a smile. The borrowing addiction runs rampant in our world, even more than smoking or fixing. All of our lives are spent in some debt. The nation's at sixteen trillion. Great example, Uncle Sam. You've paved the way for all of us and enabled a legion of lenders.
The slant-eyed faction was my chosen poison. I figured any thug I could roll into a ball and use in a game of garbage can bowling without breaking a sweat would be my best host to leech. Little did I know that there are a ton of them, and they're loyal, and most of them have unquestionably legitimate businesses. Why is that? Because it all looks great on paper. The numbers add up since the accountants are Asian. Racist, you say? Not in the slightest. That race has been spanking us scholastically since our silly boys first sailed East for spices. Now, when I tell you the Spics are too lazy to come get me here, the smarter of the Niggers are too afraid of becoming another statistic, and those I-talian Guinea-whops know better than to cross an Albanian by shitting where he eats-- let alone two of them bonded by blood and bank accounts-- that, my friend, would be a statement worthy of criticism. I'm not prejudiced. I fall into a few of those stereotypes myself. Let me not admit that too vividly. It makes for a weakened antihero. My head's tired enough these days from keeping my ear to the ground to listen for tiny, pissed-off feet. I can barely carry this story.
What's left of it adds up like those numbers the yellow men in black suits were scrutinizing; there are, in back rooms of third-generation businesses on Main Street, USA, tiny abacuses with golden "Made in China" stickers on them being manipulated by hands smaller than my kid nephew's. It turns my stomach to think that they've got me holed up like this, but it's my fault for not getting out of the racket in time. I knew that I wish pushing it with that last one. I knew, and didn't give two shits. Not even one. There's a saying I never understood. What I lack in brains I make up for in hardware. I've got enough tools of the trade stashed to hold off a small army of them until the boys in blue arrive. Everything's registered and on a permit. My story holds water. My shit reeks of roses. The District Attorney would have a hard time pinning anything on me other than a few unpaid parking tickets. I keep those around for the sole purpose of not coming off as curiously clean if I do finally get pinched. Everyone's got some facts worth hiding. If it smells like shit it probably is. No one trusts a man with no dirt...
...Which reminds me that I really should do laundry tonight. It's almost two in the morning, the perfect time to run sorties without being noticed. A new twenty-four-hour 'mat opened up down the street last week, Lucky Dragon Launderers or some forgettable name like that. It's locked at night to keep the homeless from loitering, but there's a sign to bang on the steel door in the alley around back for an attendant to let you in. How convenient it is that I don't even have to drive to wash my clothes anymore. Meals are delivered by busboys set loose, the dumpster's right below my window, and the only time I have to leave the protection of my safehouse is when I run out of clean underwear once a week. Good luck nabbing me, Charlie. I've got this all figured out.
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