22
They sat me on a wooden chair in the corner of a small cubicle with office-style fabric-partitioned walls that reached up maybe eight or ten feet. A long, thick shelf which served as a desk ran across the entire back wall with smaller shelves and cubbyholes above. Nothing remained of the original business, only dirty, takeout food containers, soda cans, and coffee cups. The space was cramped and smelled of tacos. So I wouldn’t get lonely, they provided me with a companion; a burly brute with a broad, bland face and a pronounced Neanderthal skull. He had a meaty nose atop a large mouth, and penetrating beady eyes who kept me in his sight as if I were a blazing fire seen for the first time. He wore a short sleeved, tight black t-shirt with ‘Just Do It!’ in faded white letters whose sleev
