REALTY SERVICE

My tales of debauchery truly began during the ever formative high school and teenage years. I always felt the inner urge to be some sort of a wild child, almost destined to be “Bluto” of Animal House fame. One of the oddest tales I have to offer, is actually one I still hear from others, the kind that may land me in that “legend” category.
Although the tale in itself took place a year after my high school career had ended, the tale began to take place long before this. At this time, I was setting a new standard for lows in my life, which of course I’d continue to reset the bar on and on. I had recently been ‘removed’ from my second college, Iowa western in Council Bluffs. I attended one class in the three months I was there and once they started putting the heat on me, I hit the road. I barely had a home to come crawling back to. My parents were at the end of their rope with me and rightfully so. So to be to the point, I didn’t have too much of a welcome at the time.
I hadn’t been home for two days when me and Lance Foster got together for some beers. Now, I know I’m not the only person guilty of this, because I’ve seen tons of other kids do this. But for some reason we felt the need to thumb our noses at the school and law enforcement. So being the detestable young pukes we were, we propped a couple of lawn chairs and a cooler full of the Milwaukee’s best light on the front lawn of his parent’s home. As the afternoon went by we had more than a few locals walk by giving us the warm and friendly small town welcomes I’ve grown accustomed to. Of course I felt cool, as old school mates got out of school I was there to prove my rebellious nature to them by offering a beer filled hand for a wave. After a couple hours of this, Lance’s neighbor came home from work.
His name was Gary and he was an Uncle of a good friend of ours. Needless to say, Gary knew us both well. Gary had recently purchased the house across from Lance’s family, and conspicuously enough had left the Realty Sign in the yard. We had a conversation about the usual subjects. At one point I finally mustered up the courage to ask Gary about the sign remaining in the yard. He replied, “Just trying to keep people talking I guess, but if it were to disappear and end up in another yard, I wouldn’t be upset.” I still to this day think Gary said this intentionally, knowing what chain of events he was setting in place.
To back track a little bit. The principal and head football coach at my school didn’t part with me with tearful goodbyes. We flat out despised each other. Now naturally after quite a few beers, I became bored. I also became quite intoxicated. Lance and I had sat their plotting chicks to call or bars to try and get into. Then it happened. Parks, as I lovingly referred to him came driving on by. Due to my underage consumption of alcohol, I actually made a good choice by not flipping ole DP the bird, choosing a menacing glare instead. I explained to Lance my hatred of the bastard, amongst other things. More time went by and the thoughts of Parks driving by kept rewinding in my drunken mind. It’s time I act.
Lance and I continued to sit there, being how none of the chicks we had called had any interest of hanging out in a front yard, getting drunk on a Wednesday night. So we sat, and we drank. At this point our conversations were struggling and we sat there in silence, staring at that bedeviling Realty sign across the street. Finally I broke.
“I’m gonna do it.” I mumbled
“Do what?” asked Lance.
I sat there for a few moments in silence, taking another huge swallow of my beer. “I’m gonna put Parks’ house up for sale.”
Lance just chuckled his sarcastic little laugh which just drove me nuts. “Bullshit. You ain’t got the balls to do that.”
“The fuck I won’t. Just watch me”. Immediately I sprang to my feet, only to damn near do a face plant. I opened up a cooler and grabbed about three more beers. Loading up my pockets, I made my way across the street, calmly and coolly pulled that damn sign straight out of the ground.
“You fucking idiot, I gotta see this.” Goaded Lance. I guess you got to know him, but this was his way of antagonizing, and he was definitely one of the best in the game at this. He grabbed a few beers and beckoned, “come on pussy lets do this.”
So we began our trek across town, which was maybe a five block walk. I had the sign hoisted up on my back, almost like I was bringing a suit home from the dry cleaners. We walked and drank, plotting my devilish little plan. Once we came into visual range of my target, we stopped. I finished my beer, telling Lance where to wait and be my lookout. As nonchalantly as I could be, which is completely mind boggling if you think about it. I was drunk off of my ass, carrying a fucking for sale sign across town. I approached my target, and quickly scanned the area for witnesses. Seeing none I made my move. I walked right into the yard and planted that sign. Of course, it couldn’t be easy and needed a little help getting set into the ground. Putting my feet around the frame of the base, I climbed up on it to use my weight to push it into the ground. Now folks, this kind of thing require a certain level of balance, and when you are a drunken ass nineteen year old, balance is pretty much out of the question at this point. I bounced as much as I could, but eventually, gravity took over. I finally did my face plant right there in the front yard, over the sign. I laid there at first, slowly coming to the realization of what had actually happened. Then the voice beckoned.
“What the hell are you doing?” I knew this voice; it was DP’s better half, Mrs. DP. Without looking, out of fear of being identified, I took off. I booked it across the street through the neighbor’s back yard and took off on a dead sprint to where Lance was. I didn’t know it at the time, but she had apparently shouted, “I know it’s you Jamie”. I wasn’t concerned with her words; I was all about getting the fuck up out of there. I ran to our rendezvous point, which was vacant.
Lance, wisely saw the events go down and decided it wise to remove himself from the situation. So there I was, all alone, but at least I had my beer. So I opened it, and began my stumble back to Lance’s. Along the way, I was to pass a house. That house belonged to some close friends of my family’s. At this time, due to their relationship with Park’s, our families had somewhat of a falling out. As I crossed the railroad tracks at the Co-op, I’d seen some headlights fire up and a pickup scream up the street from the house. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind who it was, so I made myself invisible for a moment. I continued on my way eventually and as I passed the friends house a figure came out of the dark and approached me. It was BC, patriarch of the friend’s clan and DP’s assistant coach.
As calmly as could be, he approached me and made small talk. He beat around the bush but finally said, “What the hell you walking around at this time of night?”
Always on my toes, I made up some bullshit story about meeting some friends who were fucking around and left me at a party. It was so bad, even I couldn’t believe it. I also knew that there was a fantastic possibility of Park’s coming back, so I bid BC goodbye and went about my way. I was right; I heard the pick up again and decided it best to get out of sight.
I snuck through some yards and saw Lance. Talking to DP. The only thing I could truly comprehend was Parks was pissed. He sat in his vehicle and all of a sudden I see a baseball bat point through the driver side window, only to have Lance yank it out of his hand. At this point, Lance informed him of what he intended to do with this newly acquired piece of athletic equipment. Parks knew enough of Lance not to call his bluff, and decided not to push the issue. I waited until the lights were gone and I ran up on Lance.
“You fucking idiot. I ought to kick your ass, just for that. That fuck told me to tell you he called the fucking cops. You’re fucked dumbshit.”
As we stepped back into the yard, the situation became clear as three sets of cop lights come blazing into town. Farragut is a very small town and I couldn’t recall the last time there needed to be three deputies in town at one time. “What the fuck?” I shouted.
“Fucking told ya. That deuche bag told me he had called the cops. Get the fuck out of here.” Commanded Lance. Without hesitation, I bolted.
This had to be a sight. I was drunk off my ass, trying to negotiate the obstacles of small town backyards in the middle of the night. I was hurdling dogs, running into fences, getting clothes lined at least twice. But I got out of there. I’d noticed Bill’s pickup joining the fray, and not being quite in “game time” shape, I needed to find a place to hide. Looking back, it seems it was the dumbest spot imaginable, but it served its purpose. I found a bean stubble field, just on the outskirts of town and lay there, in the middle of the field. For about forty five minutes, I watched the cops, Bill, and Parks circle the town looking for me. You would’ve thought I’d raped his wife.
Finally, as the ‘patrols’ had died down some, I made my move and went back to Lances. Upon arrival, I lost it and just puked all over his yard. Lance heard me out there and came out. “Hey, dumbass. The Sheriff called. You have twenty minutes to call him back, or he’s gonna get warrants. Call him or get out, I ain’t having the cops kick down my door looking for you.” Reluctantly, I did so.
SM is the county sheriff. He is friends with my parents and I’d never had any ‘real’ run INS with him. I called him up and told him I’d wait for him in front of the house. Lances parting words were, “I won’t make bail, dumbfuck.”
Of course, being drunk and scared, it’s hard to say what exactly was going through my mind at this point. As SP pulled up, I pulled it together and decided a full confession was in order. SP stopped, unlocked the doors and I climbed in. Fully expecting to be cuffed and stuffed, this caught me off guard. As Steve pulled away, he drove in silence momentarily, and then finally spoke.
“You know Jamie, I’m a busy guy and really like my sleep. Nothing irritates me more than being woke up at 2:30 in the morning for horseshit like this. You know it was a joke, I know it was a joke, but apparently old DP doesn’t feel that way. I advise you to be quiet and respectful, maybe apologize. Just don’t put any more fuel on the fire.” Then we pulled into the driveway of the very same home I’d just desecrated.
Now being a cocky little drunk ass, when I got out of the car something happened. I saw old DP at the door and couldn’t bare the thought of cowering and being apologetic towards him. Smug as could be, I approached the door, three deputies and the sheriff flanking me. BC was there, sitting off in the shadows, almost as if he too was trying to make sense of this odd little situation. And then he started in.
“Well?” Bellowed DP, flashing me back to those many moments spent in his office in high school.
“Well what? It was a fucking joke, I’m sorry.” I replied
“ A joke. My family is scared to death, you little punk. What right do you have putting my kids though this?” Almost begging me to fly off.
“It was a fucking sign, DAN. It was a joke. Sorry if I’m the only one around here with the balls to say what everyone else thinks.” This, getting a slight chortle from one of the deputies.
“My family doesn’t feel safe now, how do you intend to apologize to them?” Demanded that arrogant prick.
“I had no intentions of this affecting them, the joke was meant for you. That is all it was you know, a FUCKING JOKE.” Growing more and more irritated at the situation, the inflection of my voice proving this.
“This isn’t a joke. Its terrorism, vandalism, and harassment. And it won’t be tolerated. You need to grow up young man, you’re what, nineteen now. It’s time to be a man. But just so you know, I already called your parents and let them know what you did.”
Now this straw broke the camel’s back. Telling me to grow up in one breath, tattling on me in the next was the breaking point, and I got stupid. Not to mention tough. I glared right at him, eye to eye. I took a step forward trying to go nose to nose and exclaimed “fuck you then”. Quickly, one of the deputies, a complete psycho by the name of JK, grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and yanked me back. This wasn’t like me. Although I wasn’t afraid to fight, at this point in my life I’d been in a few, but I’d never tried to challenge anyone like this. If it’s not bad enough I was surrounded by the fuzz, Park’s was quite a bit bigger than I. But, I was irritated.
Of course, as life in a small town goes, this was now a circus. Three o’clock in the morning, cop cars everywhere, the neighbors began to notice the commotion. Did I also mention, my aunt had lived next door to DP. Only in my fucked life could something play out so sweet. I recall noticing the glare of light from the door opening, but I never turned to look, for fear of breaking my death gaze I had fixed on old Dan. Then the voice chimed in, “Jamie, are you ok?” It was my Aunt Karoline, showing a little concern for her nephew. Of course one of the deputies informed her all was ok and asked her to refrain from saying anything more. At this point to end the situation and get everyone on their way, Sheriff SP spoke up.
“DP, you’ve got seventy two hours to decide on charges. Let me know soon.”
“Believe me SP, I will.” Replied the big dumbass. SP grabbed my arm and lead me to the car.
The ride back was awkward as hell. SP expressed his disappointment towards the situation. He stated he knew that it was a joke, and a funny one at that. In his own little way, he convinced me that he appreciated it and the fact that I was the only one with the balls to speak his mind. He also informed me of the charges DP wanted to press, and believe me there was a number of them. He wished me luck and ended things by saying “I hope I don’t have to see you soon”.
I walked back into Lance’s and informed him of the activities. Of course he was stunned and couldn’t believe that I wasn’t carted away to jail. He decided at this point to inform me that my parents had called and was on their way. Now, my step dad is the greatest guy in the world, but additionally he is probably the last guy in the world I would fuck with. Panic mode had set in at this point. I’d fucked up, and being how I couldn’t have been on thinner ice with my parents, again I was on the run. I could see their vehicle pulling into town, so I hid at the school. Lance, as well, didn’t ever fuck with my dad. He snitched me out very quickly, and the old explorer pulled into the alley at the school. They stopped and yelled my name a couple of times, and then it pulled away.
The whole time, I was merely yards away, hiding in a bush and waited until the vehicle was gone. I crept out of the bushes like a cat burglar, backing down the alley. Only to back straight into my mother. Startled, I started to run. But as always, my mothers strange kinetic powers made me stop. I was caught, dead tired and gave up.
The ride home was quiet, and knowing me, my parents chose not to talk. The next day was different. I was sobered up and still pissed. But we did talk about and surprisingly enough the support was there. They too knew it was bullshit, but stupid none the less.
In the weird ways of small towns, this odd little chain of events built up a sort of notoriety about me, a legend if you will. People remember me for this event more than anything, and from time to time an old acquaintance will ask about this. I love to share this tale, just because the whole mess that was made by a simple little prank. There is a lesson to be learned, and I still don’t know what it is. I do know this. That stupid little prank got a lot off of my angst ridden chest. I had a lot of hatred for that puke at the time, and to be honest that incident only added fuel to the fire. I’ve seen him once since then, and believe me no pleasantries were exchanged. Goes to show that some people just don’t have a sense of humor.