So Here He Was, Bloody, Bound, Beaten And Bruised, Wearing This [expletive] Cubs Jersey

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This is how my life ends, he thought to himself ruefully. What a [expletive] joke.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. His wife had been hounding him for months to take a vacation, and his coworkers had been on him for even longer. He always put them off, saying there was too much of this to do or too much of that left to do, but when his cousin, a financial analyst in Chicago offered to let him stay at his apartment for a week, the opportunity was too good to pass up.

So here he was, bloody, bound, beaten and bruised, wearing this [expletive] Cubs jersey, while his cousin and everyone else was up on the rooftop watching the game. He’d been staring down the barrel of a handgun for the better part of three hours.

The funny thing was, if any of it was really funny at this point, that he was only still in the apartment because he needed to take a dump. Everyone had gone up to the rooftop after the pregame show ended, but he stayed behind to take a dump in peace. He still needed to take that dump.

Instead, he’d spent three hours being asked “Where’s the money? Where’s the drugs?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he’d say. “I don’t even live here.”

He sensed the man was getting tired of that explanation, but what could he do? He really didn’t know where any money or any drugs were.

The man had gone into the other room with a cell phone, and he could hear him talking on it, though he could only make out a few words. He heard him say “OK” and then walk back into the room.

“I’m sorry, my friend,” the man said in an accent. “But today is not your lucky day.”

He looked up and saw the same gun he’d been staring at for the last three hours. He had told himself that if it came to this, that he’d be strong, that he’d be OK. But really he was (expletive) sick. He thought of his wife, and their young daughter. He prayed that it would end quickly.

The man stood him up, and turned him around, facing toward the front door. Suddenly, he heard a crash. Primed for a gunshot, he screamed, and that dump finally came. He heard a loud thud, but he was paralyzed with fear and he didn’t dare turn around. He was still alive.

He turned around and found the man lying face down on the apartment floor, glass from a nearby window scattered around him. His mind was telling him to run for the door, but he was still too shocked and scared, and his legs wouldn’t move.

He looked at the TV and it all finally made sense. He saw Jorge Soler rounding the bases.