I Don't Want to Die in Bloomington, Indiana

By Ryan Stahl

Arthur Glessner Sturges is drunk again. No surprise there but being 250 miles away from his hometown of Belfield, Ohio has set his teeth on edge. That and the fact he just ran into his ex-fiance, Victoria. Arthur hasn't seen her in over eight years and, much to his chagrin, she is staying at the same hotel he is in Bloomington, Indiana. The next morning, Arthur feels something is off. Drunk though he was, he remembers most of the conversation he had with Victoria outside his hotel room... Well, maybe not most of it, but some of it. He finds a black high heel outside his room and, while he knows Victoria is no Cinderella, he feels obligated to return her slipper. Victoria's door has been forced open and Arthur recognizes signs of a struggle. "Find her" is written in lipstick on the bathroom mirror. Victoria is dead on the floor. After being abrasively questioned by the police and released, Arthur makes a hard burn for the saggy, familiar bosom of Belfield. His parting gift from Bloomington, aside from a nasty hangover, is a post-humous letter from Victoria telling him they have a seven-year-old daughter together who is in danger. "Find her." The words haunt Arthur as he stumbles through a whiskey fueled game of cat and mouse that uncovers a dark secret from Belfield's past. A secret that not only jeopardizes the life of a daughter he never knew he had, but also the future of mankind.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hawes & Jenkins Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 8, 2024
• ISBN: 9781637843680

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I Don't Want to Die in Bloomington, Indiana

Ryan Stahl

ISBN 978-1-63784-367-3 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-63784-368-0 (digital)

Copyright © 2024 by Ryan Stahl

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Hawes & Jenkins Publishing

16427 N Scottsdale Road Suite 410

Scottsdale, AZ 85254

www.hawesjenkins.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

For those who have held my heart in their hands and not squeezed too hard. You know who you are. This is for you.

Book I

Victoria

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Book II

Amelia

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Book III

Arthur

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Author

For those who have held my heart in their hands and not squeezed too hard. You know who you are. This is for you.

Book I

Victoria

1

Living is what scares me. Dying is easy.

—Anonymous

And just like that, I was thirty-five years old lying in a cold garbage-filled ditch, bleeding out from a stab wound to the gut I didn't think I rightly deserved. That was not how I imagined my life—or death for that matter. Here's the thing: life and death rarely happen in accordance with what we have stored up in our ghostly hearts.

It all started in a hotel lobby bar. You know the kind. Hushed voices and lackluster professionals sipping on their cheap but hard-to-pronounce sauvignons, moscatos, or mixed drinks that made the nethers of the lounge lizard at the end of the bar skip to my lou my darling. That usually led to a misplaced hope that he or she would get invited back to one of the lackluster professional's rooms for a midnight romp in tu casa—a bit strange.

I had seen it all before. All too familiar. It was that kind of place where I spotted her. Yes, that her. The her who ruined me. The kind of her I never expected to see again, but turned up like a black spot on my lung X-ray: surprising, but not altogether unexpected. Although a whole state over, it was a bit unexpected.

What the hell is she doing here? I asked my coworker, who was doing his best impression of a human wrecking ball on a twenty-four-ounce porterhouse steak with all the dressings courtesy of the company credit card.

Who? the big black wrecking ball of a man asked in between gristle-filled bites.

Point of fact, my coworker was big, he was black, and his general shape was that of a wrecking ball. I would say African American, but he preferred being called black. He said African American sounded too uppity and privileged for the way he grew up. His words, not mine.

Her! I said in a hushed voice and pointed.

He turned, midchew, and followed my finger. Ug…Uh-ug…ughhhh! he commented.

Little did I know, my big black wrecking ball of a friend was choking on his food. I thought he was just as surprised as I was until he started gasping harder and harder for air. As much as I didn't want to cause a scene and draw attention to myself, I also wasn't going to let my friend choke to death, no matter how much steak he chose to eat that night. Plus, I felt a little responsible for diverting his attention from chewing and directing it toward the her who was living cancer to my life.

I jumped around behind him, quick as you please, balled up my fist, placed it above his belly button (though my shoulders strained at the effort to complete the task), and thrust upward. I was, after all, certified in CPR and other lightweight lifesaving techniques.

But wait…that's not how it all started. It all started in a rest stop bathroom off Ohio state route 696. I was urinating around one of those Bible awareness booklets that some other heathen had thrown in the urinal, feeling somewhat sacrilegious at the idea of pissing on the ideals of a faith over two thousand years old. Quite literally in that case. I'd have felt just as bad peeing on a booklet about any other faith for that matter. Except the Flying Spaghetti Monster faith. That was just asking to be pissed on.

My name is, was, and forever shall be Arthur Sturges. Arthur Glessner Sturges if we are being accurate and mildly biblical. Who am I and why does my name matter? I'm nobody, and it doesn't, other than in the context of this story. I didn't do anything spectacular. I didn't reinvent the wheel. I'm just a guy. I was born in 1984 in the middle of Glessner Avenue between Arthur and Sturges Streets in Belfield, Ohio. If we're being technical, I guess that's where the story really started: A coke-addled mother in the early eighties plopping out a baby in the middle of a street while her part-time pimp, part-time lover smacked the shit out of her for not waiting another twenty seconds to plop me out in a delivery room. The hospital was a literal twenty seconds away from where I was born. I guess I just couldn't wait to get out of that coke whore.

Don't get me twisted. I love my mother. As much as an addict can be loved. I just wasn't keen on her being so uncreative as to name me after the crossroads on which I was plopped out on. Although maybe my view was askew. Arthur Glessner Sturges didn't have a terrible ring to it. No one ever tied it together that there was a crossroads in Belfield connecting all three streets, and that's where my name came from.

Growing up, the only odd question I was ever asked was why my mother's last name was Worthington and my last name was Sturges. Truth be told, even the nurse who wrote down the information for my birth certificate asked that question. My mother's answer was simply Fuck off, bitch. She was coming down off a three-day bender when the nurse asked, so while I don't condone her answer, I do somewhat understand it.

Dammit, this was getting convoluted. There were too many starting points. Isn't that the ever-glowing dichotomy of life? So many starting points and only one end? Anyway, now you know who I am. Now, let me tell you why I was in a hotel 250 miles away from my home in Belfield with a big black wrecking ball of a man who was, and still is, my closest compatriot and confidant, saving his life with the Heimlich maneuver while wondering if he actually had the constitution and abdominal real estate to finish that twenty-four-ounce porterhouse.

One, two, three, I said as I gave a strained but confident upward thrust into my friend's stomach area.

Gruuuuk! He gagged, right before a fist-sized piece of USDA-approved beef shot out of his esophagus like a pinball from a plunger trough. The piece of beef sailed across the 1970s retro-patterned carpet and into the lap of the her who ruined me.

That was not the first time she had a thick slab of meat from a stranger between her legs. I wasn't salty or anything. My intention was to stay incognito and let her slip back into the shadows of my self-loathing past. Thanks to my choking friend, those intentions fell to the floor with his lump of masticated meat.

She looked from her lap, up to me, back to her lap, and—based on the half-disgusted, half-amused smile on her face—the irony of the situation was not lost on her either. She was smart, quick-witted, and a match if ever I had one. I was just too lovestruck to appreciate that in the heat of our moments.

Arthur? she asked as she nonchalantly parachute-popped the chewed piece of beef from her thigh-high skirt onto the retro carpet and blotted the grease stain with some champagne from her glass.

As though she had to ask. Who does that? It's only been…well, seven, no, almost eight years. I haven't changed that much. A new haircut, sure. Maybe a five-o'clock shadow and ten extra pounds, but I still looked like Arthur Sturges, even to my legally blind grandmother. If I had to guess, she had me pegged the minute Chance and I walked into the hotel lobby bar.

Damn! This whole time I've been referring to Chance as my big black wrecking ball of a friend and haven't even had the courtesy to introduce him by the name his mother gave him: Chauncey Laurence O'Shaughnessy. Everyone called him Chance because he described himself as a risk-taker and a heartbreaker. His father was a white Irishman from Killarney; his mother was a black woman from Detroit. More on Chance later.

What the hell are you doing here? I blurted with my arms still wrapped around Chance's gut.

She laughed. That cute but ever annoying laugh that said, I've got you. Oh, you thought I was gone forever? Surprise! And guess what? I know you still have feelings for me. I didn't have feelings for her. No, really. She was a ghost that haunted my booze-saturated liver, but that was it.

Let go of me, man. Chance grunted as he wriggled free from my bear hug.

You're welcome, you ungrateful fiend, I said as I sat back in my seat.

Good waste of steak if you ask me, Chance said, staring at her.

She walked over to our table and sat down in one of the unoccupied chairs, brazen as ever.

"Please, have a seat and ruin my dinner too," I said as she got comfortable in the chair.

Why are you so salty? she asked. I haven't seen you in seven, no, almost eight years, and this is the welcome I get? A steak in my lap and a grumpy attitude from you?

The steak in your lap wasn't entirely my fault, Victoria, I said, hissing through my chipped front teeth.

Shit. I forgot to introduce the black spot on my lung X-ray, the her who ruined me, the devil incarnate. Sorry, I'm horrible at introductions. Victoria Ramone was the love of my life at one point. There, I said it. Happy? Things change. People change. End of story. Yes, I was salty.

I'm not salty, and I'm not grumpy, I said to Victoria, which was received by a unified grunt of dubiousness from Chance and Victoria. What? I'm not.

Aren't you? Victoria said, toying with me.

No.

You might be, Chance chimed.

Who asked you? I snapped.

No one, Chance replied. But I'm a risk-taker and a heartbreaker, and I've known plenty of women who have acted like you after I've broken their hearts. You're salty and grumpy because Victoria broke your heart. No shame in admitting it, but the first step to healing is admitting there's a problem, and, friend, you haven't admitted there's a problem since she left your ass.

Well put, Chance, Victoria said.

No one asked you, bitch, Chance retorted as he wiped some regurgitated steak spittle from the corner of his mouth.

Say what you will about the man's appetite, but Chance had an unwavering loyalty to his friends. For that, I was eternally grateful.

"So, Victoria said with an overdramatic eye roll, of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the—"

Don't, I said, holding up a finger.

She puffed out her lower lip and mockingly groaned. Okay, fine. What are you guys doing here?

Victoria Goddamn Ramone. What else could be said about her? At one point in my life, those hefty locks of straightened dirty blonde hair, Venus-inspired body, and blue eyes that any Hitler youth would be murderously envious of were the eighth, ninth, and tenth wonders of the world to me.

I met Victoria in a bar in Belfield eight, no, almost nine years ago on a Memorial Day bender that yielded little to no memories for me outside of a cute girl's number written in permanent marker on the inside of my boxer brief's waistband. Next to the number was written Victoria's Secret. She had a thing for irony. We dated for a year and a half. Fell madly in love. At least I did. She had other plans. You know the story. Tale as old as time and all that. That's the bitch of the whole situation. I was all in and never once suspected that she always had one foot out. Her love was like playing a deranged game of hokeypokey.

What were her other plans, you ask? Why, climbing the corporate ladder at her job by way of sexual infidelity, of course. His name was Darnell. He was a nice-enough guy. I still punched him in the mouth on principle when I found out. Then we went and had a few beers. That was when he told me she had been sucking and fucking her way around the office to gain favor and move up in the company. Victoria didn't discriminate either—man, woman, creed, race, sexual preference. She slept with whoever she thought would give her the best opportunity to advance, according to Darnell. My normally acute skills of observation were hindered by that four-letter L-word and prevented me from seeing the signs. Lesson learned.

So, did Victoria achieve her goal? I couldn't say. After I found out about her being the office Segway, I ghosted her and fell into as many bottles as I could find. No big soliloquy in the rain professing my love and asking, Why, why, why? while I cried, cried, cried. I just slipped away. That's not to say it didn't hurt like hell, but what was the point in making a scene? My actionable absence spoke for itself. We lived together during that whole rodeo; however, my name wasn't on the lease, and I had plenty of friends with couches. Well, a friend with a couch. That friend being Chance.

She did leave a voice mail a couple days after I went my merry way. It was a one-word message said with the emotional proclivity of a salted snail: Sorry. And that was the last I heard from Victoria Goddamn Ramone for seven, no, almost eight years.

Okay, okay. It takes two to tango. It wasn't all her fault, and I know that. I guess I was the one who drove the first wedge between us. She talked about wanting to have kids, and my response was something like Ew, why. Or maybe it was Why the hell would you want to do that? I was drunk during the conversation and didn't have the inhibitions I needed to be more delicate about the situation.

Hello? Earth to Arthur? Victoria said.

What? I replied, shaking the intruding memories from my mind.

What are you guys doing here? she repeated.

Don't see as how that's any of your business.

Chance seconded my comment with a guttural grunt.

There's no need to be so cagey, Victoria said.

Isn't there? I replied.

Well, at least tell me if you two are still working that gig you started?

The gig she was referring to was the start-up company Chance and I partnered on pre-Victoria Ramone: C&A Replicating. Chance and I had known each other for years. We once worked together at a thermostat manufacturing plant in Belfield as maintenance technicians. One day I got the idea to replicate certain consumable replacement parts via 3D printing and realized I could turn a profit not just in the thermostat manufacturing industry, but in pretty much any industry that was paying for marked-up replacement parts through parent companies. We started in 2011, about one year before I met Victoria. The overhead costs were slim to none outside of raw material and the 3D printers themselves. Of course, the different types of raw material often caused limitations on the types of parts we could print; however, Chance and I have moved to more sophisticated types of 3D replication, thusly eliminating those limitations.

Our process at C&A Replication for determining what and if we could help a particular company is as follows: meet with the company head honchos, tour the facility, meet with the maintenance technicians, get a P&L report (profit and loss) for maintenance-related costs, determine which spare parts, if any, could be replicated, get prices for parts, figure up a quote with a modest but profitable markup for replicated parts, present the quote to the head honchos of the company, and with any luck, make some money. So far, so good. Our little business venture had yielded us clients from northeast Ohio, as far west as Indianapolis, and as far east as Pittsburgh.

Yep, I said. You ready to get some beer, Chance?

I'm more in the mood for a stiff drink myself, he replied.

The company's buying, I countered.

The joke being the company credit card was really C&A Replication's business credit card, so in essence, we were buying. Or I was since the credit card was in my name.

Chance and I stood and unceremoniously departed the scene to the chagrin and confusion of our waitress. As not to be a total ass, I turned around to Victoria and said, Sorry. Irony. I'm sure she would appreciate it.

We had more than a few stiff drinks and stumbled back to our rooms around 11:00 p.m. This leg of our tour was done, and we would be heading back to Belfield midmorning tomorrow. Should be plenty of time to sleep off the inevitable hangover from all the liquor. I should have drank beer. Wait, never mind. I was mixing beer and liquor, I think. It was going to be a rough day tomorrow.

The ghostly halls and indistinct voices coming from the seemingly endless rows of closed hotel doors was enough to set my teeth on edge and make me want to sprint to my room. Inside the room wasn't much better. Chance and I had been living in and out of hotels for the better part of four years, and sometimes I forgot what my apartment looked like and, occasionally, that I even had an apartment to call home.

The air conditioner chattered out a steady drone, locked in mortal combat with the encroaching heat and humidity of the July weather in Bloomington, Indiana. The rooms always smelled of half-hearted attempts of using disinfectants and other cleaning products, but the random smears on various surfaces and occasional curly hair on the rim of the toilet left over from the previous occupant told a different story about the dedication of the hotel's housekeeping. I slept on the top of the sheets. I am not brave enough to pull back the comforter and stare into the abyss of what could be hiding under the top sheet. I also realized my fears may be completely unwarranted. We all have our problems. Leave me to mine.

I was settling in, preparing to fight off the spinning room, which would likely lead me to being a penitent man before the porcelain god, when suddenly, there came a rap, rap, rapping at my chamber door.

2

Chance, I muttered to the room as I pogoed myself off the stale-cushioned couch. He must have locked himself out of his room again and was either too embarrassed or too wobbly to make his way back to the front desk and ask for a replacement key. I hated being the responsible one sometimes. I always kept an extra key to Chance's room anytime we traveled for just such occasions.

I looked down at my pants as I opened the door, fighting to get the key out of my slacks while I said, You know, Chance, you really should stop giving your key to random broads at the bar hoping they will come back to your room. Truth be told, it's kind of creepy. Has that ever work—

I stopped midsentence as the card popped from my pocket and landed on the floor in front of a very naked (and very white) pair of petite feet. Without looking up, I cocked my head and stared at the feet. In my inebriated state, the neurons in my brain were shuffling around like a squad of discombobulated army recruits trying to fall in line.

I chuckled as I looked up, then went completely cold. You're not Chance.

I should hope not, Victoria Goddamn Ramone replied as she toyed with a tiny gold necklace around her neck, attracting attention to her supple and barely contained breasts. The slinky blue dress she was wearing barely contained any of her. If it was hiked up any higher from the bottom or pulled down any lower from the top, it would've been considered a waistband rather than a dress. The smell of stale cigarette smoke wafted into the room along with the sweet scent of Jacky D and Coca-Cola, to borrow the phrase. It was clear she had been out dancing at some dive bar by the fact her high heels were kicked off beside my door, and her feet were bright red around the tops of her toes and where the straps of the high heels dug in.

What do you want? I groaned as I picked up the key to Chance's room.

To see you, of course, she said as she sauntered, damn near stumbled, closer.

I put a hand out near her midsection in hopes she would halt her advance, but we were sending mixed signals. She saw my hand out as an invitation and closed the gap, putting her firm stomach in the cup of my palm. I could feel her breathing increase and smell all the previously mentioned scents with even more vigor. The hairs on my neck stood on end, and all the blood rushed to my nethers. In a vain attempt to course-correct my oncoming erection, I tried to think about baseball, gardening, Chernobyl, or something else nonerotic.

An elderly woman walked by and appraised the unfolding sexual scenario with such shaming disdain that it provided an insta-kill to my boner. Thank you, babushka.

I extended my arm and gave a gentle push to Victoria's midsection to keep her in the hallway. Let me be frank with you, Victoria, I said.

I'd rather you be Arthur, she replied. I've never been into the whole role-playing thing. She bit her lip and flashed a satisfied, if not completely coy, smile.

Funny.

I thought so.

Good night, Victoria. I sighed and began to close the door.

She stuck her left foot, covered in ranging sizes of nautical star tattoos, in the doorway. I need your help, she said as she fidgeted with the diamond pendant that hung at her suprasternal notch.

I opened the door again and stared at her for a second. She seemed genuinely troubled or at the very least uncomfortable. Then again, she was a good actress when she wanted something.

I'm not licensed to accommodate the type of help you need, I replied. I can't write prescriptions for dick…or whatever you're into nowadays.

I'm being serious! She stomped her starred foot down on the psychedelic seventies carpet to emphasize her point.

Irony, as I've mentioned, was always Victoria's thing, not drama. She was never one to throw tantrums or seek unsolicited validation from random strangers by posting copious amounts of half-naked pictures of herself on whatever social media platform was popular that year…not that anyone would complain if she did. She had the body and features to accommodate such things. In the words of a wiser man than me, She was worth a look. That was not her style though.

I stared at her carotid artery for a moment and watched her pulse drum out a time signature on par with the double bass of a death metal band. Something had her truly shook up. Or it could have been all the booze and grinding on random strangers at the local dive bar that had her heart rate jackhammering. The younger me would have liked to think it was the sight of me, mixed with the booze and grinding on random strangers, that had her all bothered, but that would mean she probably got rejected at the bar, and I was her least worst option for a late-night booty call. The pissed-off, overly intoxicated, grudge-for-life, card-carrying-member me just wanted to lie down and hoped I didn't end up offering the entire contents of my stomach to the porcelain goddess's offering bowl.

Look, I said as I simultaneously pinched the bridge of my nose and rubbed my eyes in an attempt to make the tilting doorway stop tilting, I'm being serious too, Victoria. It's been a long night for the both of us, it looks like. I nodded to her kicked-off heels beside the door, which she took as a pause in the conversation.

See, you still got it. That's the kind of help I need, she said.

Huh? Got what? What? My head started to feel like a wave of buzzing electricity was ebbing and flowing from the back of my scalp to the tops of my eyebrows. I really need to sleep. Good night, angel.

Angel? Damn. Even though it had been seven, no, almost eight years, that name still haunted me. It was my pet name for her. Get over it. We liked watching a lot of the old detective noir films. She didn't seem to mind the name all those years ago, and she seemed pleased to hear it all these years later.

After a pregnant pause past its due date, I patted her on her bare shoulder then eased the door shut. There was a loud thump and what sounded like her body slipping down the front of the door. I thought I heard a sniffle, but wrote it off as some misinterpreted ambient noise from the room.

I sprawled out on the couch and started to drift off when Victoria's muffled voice came through the door and caused me to start with a jerk.

I never should have come here. I guess I deserve what is coming for me, she said in a barely audible whisper. Just know that… Well, whatever happens, I want you to know that I'm… I've always… Fuck it. Forget it. I'll be in room 409 if you decide you want to talk.

It sounded like she used the door to shimmy herself back into a standing position, then said, again in a whisper, Goodbye, Arthur. Don't forget me.

How can I forget you when you won't leave! I mumbled. I felt like an asshole for not taking the opportunity to say it louder, but I wasn't aiming to wake up the whole corridor of hotel dwellers. I heard Victoria stumble down the hallway, and then the sandman sprinkled his magical powder to take me to the realm of discombobulated drunken dreams.

I awoke with the taste of parmesan and the feel of an Arabian night surfing around my mouth. I'm not sure where the parmesan taste came from. I stopped drunken midnight eating weeks ago and made sure there were no snacks in my room to ensure the elimination of that nasty habit. Plus, I was trying to drop some weight. Coming in at 195 pounds, my body mass index told me I was obese for my five-foot, eight-inch frame. I didn't feel obese. Sure, I had the beginnings of a little paunch gut, but my waist size was the same as it was when I graduated high school, and no, I didn't have to suck it in to get my pants buttoned, thank you very much. I mean, my belt buckle left a sizable and sometimes painful indent in the bottom of my mini gut anytime I sat down for too long (like a long road trip, for instance), but I think calling that obese was a bit overkill. I never did and never would have the Greek Adonis male figure of, say, Brad Pitt or Gerard Butler in the movie 300, but even so, I could stand to lose a few pounds.

Despite the copious amount of drinking the night before, I did not feel like total shit on a stick, nor did it appear I gave any offerings (from my mouth or any other orifice) to the porcelain goddess. She stood seat up, gleaming white, and awaiting the rancid fury I would likely unleash on her before breakfast.

I pushed myself off the couch into a standing position and tested the waters of my balance. I was a little shaky and could feel my heartbeat thud-thumping in my head, chest, fingertips, and feet. Nonetheless, I was still able walk in a straight line and look at the sunlight tearing through the slit in curtains without wanting to puke or throw something at the sun to try to break it.

I went over to the sink and splashed some cold water on my face, then glanced at the clock: 6:59 a.m. Chance and I were due to check out this morning and head back to Belfield. As much as I hated to leave Bloomington, Indiana… Wait, no, that was a lie. I was chomping at the bit to leave Bloomington. It was a nice college town, for sure, but just didn't have the same drab appeal as good old Belfield.

I took care of the hygienically appropriate activities of the morning and, while offering my rancid fury to the porcelain goddess, checked the messages on my phone. I had one missed call from Chance a little after eleven o'clock last night and a voice mail to go with it. I dialed my voice mail and listened to the message on speakerphone.

"Yo, man, Chance's deep, booming, and undeniably drunk voice rattled. I can't find my key card thingy for my room. You know? To unlock my door. I was going to come to your room and retrieve the extra one, but saw you had a booty call standing at your door. Was that Victoria? Man, are you going to smash that? Look, if you are, no judgments here. She is a fine-looking woman, but come give me my key card thingy before you do. I need to lay it down and rest my neck. Call me back. I'll be in the lobby."

Chance was about twenty-five years older than me and always claimed to be old school when it came to certain technological advancements. For instance, he hated using social media for networking. He was old school and networked with people at the local bars or by knowing people who knew people who knew people. Even so, Chance was a way better PR person than I could ever hope to be. It is my honest-to-goodness belief that he could strike up a conversation with a dead person and get them to give him directions to the best restaurant in town. Chance also always came up with endearing phrases for newish technology…like key card thingy. Some of his other more endearing phrases for newer technological developments were asking anyone with a cell phone if that was the new iPhone despite the make or model, calling the push-button starter in keyless cars the lazy man's ignition, and calling our 3D printers plastic printers.

Shit, I muttered as I finished listening to Chance's voice mail. I wondered if he slept in the lobby or actually worked up the courage to ask the front desk person for a key to his room. Despite Chance's social butterfly personality, he got embarrassed easily and hated it. That is why he didn't like going up and asking the front desk person for a replacement key card. To him, it suggested that he was a doofus and lost his card and fuck all that. His words, not mine. So we came up with the agreement that