That Stupid Gun...


I hate borrowing stuff.

About 2 years ago I stopped by an old friend's house to check in and see what was happening. During that time in my life there was all kinds of goofy stuff going on. I was dealing with drug addicts and raging alcoholics on a pretty regular basis and I'd gotten myself into quite a few interesting situations. By interesting I mean the kind of situations where you have to check your shorts now and again to make sure you haven't soiled yourself.

My friend asked me if I had a gun at the house and I told him, "No sir I sure don't." He insisted that I must have one on the premises. I told him that I wasn't sure and I didn't have the cashola to buy one. He reached into his kitchen drawer, you know, the one where the utensils are supposed to be, and pulled out a Smith and Wesson .357 revolver. He placed it in my hands and said, "There you go, now you can't say you don't have a gun in the house."

I looked at him with what I'm sure appeared to be an excited gander. I told him that I couldn't accept it and he shoved it back in my hands saying, "Don't worry, I ain't givin' it to you. Just keep it while you need it and I'll get it back later." This is known in my world as a forced-borrow. Please don't ever force me to borrow anything...something bad will happen.

Side Story: A very conspicuous false-erection.
Bear with me as I try to explain. I pulled into the driveway with my newly acquired, borrowed .357 on the seat next to me. As I got close to the house I noticed someone's car parked by the garage...a church lady's car. I needed to get this gun into the house and into a safe place. I didn't want to walk in holding it and have to explain to everyone why I had this monster. Immediately a faint little flicker of an idea crossed my tiny mind.

*I'll stick it in my pants.*

I can sneak it into the house and get it into our safe without anyone seeing it I thought to myself. So I stuck it in my pants. Just as I was about to reach the front door it opened before I could grab the handle. It was the church lady. She was on her way out and just had to give me a hug before she left. Oh please don't hug me, please don't hug me, please don't hug me...

She hugged me. She gave me a really strange look. She chuckled and she left. I just know she felt that gun in my pants and thought I was happy to see her. CRAP!! I hate this stupid gun already!

Okay...back to the present...or at least near the present.

The gun sat in the safe. For nearly two years the gun sat in the safe. I never fired the gun even once. I took it out of the safe a few times to look at and act like a gunslinger in the mirror, but other than that it saw no action whatsoever. Each time I would get it out it had a little more mold on it. It was old and nasty and had a thin, green layer of grossness to it. I would wipe it off and put it back into the safe so no one could shoot themselves with it. Even though I didn't have bullets in it anyway.

About 3 weeks ago I got a call from my friend asking for the gun back. I only see this guy once or twice a year and I was pretty surprised he actually wanted it back. I'd forgotten about it...I figured he would have too. So it took me until today to remember to bring it back to him. I went into the safe to get it and it had transformed into a rusty piece of worthlessness since last time I saw it. I panicked a little bit because I told him I would be bringing it by today. It was in horrible shape. You couldn't even get the spinny-thing that holds the bullets to open.

I did not want to deliver this thing to my friend. What was he going to do? Ugh...isn't that one of the worst feelings? So anyway I thought about it and my friend has always been a super gracious person and I've never imagine him hating me over this. So I dragged myself over to his house and I showed him the bad news. He looked at the rusted revolver as if his favorite puppy got hit by a car. I took the blame for the whole thing and tried to apologize as profusely as possible. All he said was, "Oh wow, that's really a shame. Man, that's a shame."

I stayed with him for about an hour or so and we made small talk, but I don't think he wanted to talk to me at all. I felt terrible and I kept hoping for him to let me off the hook, but he never did. On my way out I told him that I was really sorry for what happened to the gun and he didn't say a word. I said that he needs to let me know how I can make it up to him or if I can buy him a new gun and he just kinda sat there and nodded. It was like I broke his little heart or something.

Now I feel like crap and I'm pretty sure he hates my stinking guts. I hate when there's no resolve. I hate that stupid gun. I never wanted it in the first place and it caused nothing but trouble from the beginning.

Have I mentioned that I don't like borrowing stuff from people?



3 waggish utterances thus far...:

DanThoms said...

Well thats just terrible. Your a regular Barney Fife.

Helen Ann said...

Well...He did force it on you!

Krista said...

I just about peed my pants laughing at the *I'll just stick it in my pants* thought. Too frickin' hilarious.
I mean ... it's HORRIBLE that he did borrowed you such an ... inconvenient item.