And right at that moment I start to sweat. But I take my checkbook out, I start to sign the check, and my hand shakes, because I’m so scared of what I’m doing…so I sign it, right, and my hand starts shaking.

Don’t do that.
Don’t do what?
You’re embarrassing me.
Your insecurity is your problem.
Don’t talk back to me.
I’ll talk back.
Don’t talk back.
I’ll talk back if I want.
I’m telling you to stop shaking. Stop shaking this instant.
You want me to stop, stop me. I’m your hand, you’re pulling the strings.
**
I would have gone with the gabardine.
Just sign the check.
The belted trench makes you look fat.
Just sign the check.
The gabardine has check lining under the collar.
You’re mocking me.
The Burberry Check is registered as a trademark.
This is crazy.
You’re Madison Avenue now. The Burberry Check is Madison Avenue.
Oh yeah?
You want to be Madison Avenue?
I want you to sign.
The gabardine has slash pockets. I look good in slash pockets.
I want you to sign.
Dig your own grave, Madison Avenue.
**
How many times are you going to trot me out?
You’re my hand, I’ll trot you out whenever I want.
I mean the anecdote.
It’s a funny anecdote. It’s a self-deprecating anecdote.
It makes me look bad.
It makes me look bad.
No it makes me look bad I’m the one that’s shaking.
It makes me look bad too.
It makes me look worse.
It makes us both look good, actually. It makes us look boyish and lovable.
It makes you look boyish and lovable. It makes me look weak.
It makes you look vulnerable. But in a good sense.
Can I tell you something?
Tell me then sign the check.
The belted trench does not make you look boyish.
**
There are two of us there is only one of you.
You’re threatening me.
I’m saying that if you want the check signed you’ll go with the gabardine.
Oh I’m afraid now. Now I’m shaking.
Careerist.
Appendage. Appendage.
**
I’ll cut you off like the editors cut off the end of this anecdote.
No you won’t, Ted. You won’t because we’re not on Madison Avenue any more. We’re in Los Angeles where in 1952 a basketball made of dry ice fell out of the pure blue sky. Los Angeles where every year 75,000 people undergo a procedure called rehabilitation (rehabilitation is the fancy word for rehab). Los Angeles where for some unknown reason, a raglan sleeve is called a Garland sleeve. This is Los Angeles, Ted. The anecdote is in the past. Cutting off one’s own hand is legal in Los Angeles, but if you were going to cut off my hand you would have done it long ago, when we were still on Madison Avenue and the glittering prospect of mingling among the elite of the advertising world still beckoned, that world with its Vivaldi buskers, cutthroat excitement, manic holiday parties, secondhand smoke, secondhand smoke, prestigious honors, that lovely statuette on its black pedestal, the lovely slim gold statuette, the shiny black pedestal, Clio. Clio. Clio. Clio.

___________________
Fortunato Salazar lives in Los Angeles, where every week he is involved in an average of 1.67 automobile-bicycle near-misses (he’s on the bicycle). He has work in recent issues of McSweeney’s, Yankee Pot Roast, Thieves Jargon, Johnny America, and other journals.

Tags: fortunato salazar, Prose, V.XI