I recently reconnected with an old friend, Eve. She reminded me of two stories from a decade ago that for some reason I've never immortalized on this page. No longer.
Eve and I were, for a time, the best of friends. Her boyfriend, Jim, was a selfish man-child, and in her life I complemented him rather well. I came to look at him and myself as the salt and pepper shakers of her life. He got laid, and I got to do everything else. It might sound like a raw deal, but for several years I had the stability of having a partner yet was allowed to date as many women as I wanted. I did not consider this a bad deal in the least.
Jim treated Eve as if, by deigning to date a single mother and letting her wash his socks, he were doing her an enormous favor. I hated him. He and I had little in common, but I gamely tried to work on the relationship. We played poker and video games, and Eve would smile at us. I never told her I thought him unworthy. I don't do that to my friends, as a rule. But my god, did I enjoy busting him up at the poker table. In one glorious sitting at the old Tulalip casino, I got four fours-of-a-kind. I've never had a day like that again, but it was exceedingly well timed. I was able to exchange a lot of my frustrations for cash. His cash.
One day, Jim told me he was going to Prague with another woman, a "friend," and he was afraid of how to tell Eve. I wished him luck. I knew I wasn't gonna mention it. A month later when she discovered his imminent trip, all hell broke loose. "I told you!" he said. "I told John!" And then he left. And for the month he was gone, his girlfriend cried on my shoulder every single night. I hated him more and more.
About the time Jim returned, Eve met another guy. With great flourish, she dumped Jim and started dating the man she would eventually marry and have kids with. Jim was not pleased. He sent psychotic emails to me, Eve and the new guy. Although it was plain to everyone that he'd cut his own throat, he did not see it that way. To everyone's astonishment, he blamed me. While he had been gone, I had turned Eve against him. That's when he put a $30,000 price on my head.