Follow the Fortune Cookie

Day Seven: The Do-Over

"30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" 
The Prompt: Here’s a mistake I would love to have a do-over for.
The Music: "Don't Let No One Get You Down" - War

The Mistake.

         I'm having difficultly narrowing down a mistake. There are dozens that come to mind; all of which are as painful as the first. The very first mistake my tattered grey matter can think of. Yet that mistake is untouchable as it was the mistake of a small child. It would be like picking on a kindergartener because they're just so small and are less likely to hit you. Give them a year or so, then their sadistic need to bring down others will kick in. Kidding. That doesn't really kick in until junior high.

         Here's an incident that was somewhat foolish:

         For a while I was a house-cleaner for my godsister as her house keeper. Jay is an jolly and boisterous and has no sense of clean whatsoever. She would like to leave little piles of weird things for me to clean up while she was at work. My favorite was four-day old soup that had developed a nice layer of mold on time. Yummy.

         Jay has been with the same man for almost fifteen years, A--. He is a nice guy on the wrong side of the law. His boss, who I met once by accident, turned out to be a high-ranking member in the Salvadoran cartel. Anywho, A-- was an extremely clean person but refused to pick up after Jay on principle. More work for me, but that was what I was getting paid for.

         One day, doing their laundry, I came across a semi-automatic at the bottom of the laundry hamper. Being all of twelve, it was a pretty shocking moment. Scared, I put it in the corner and started on their bedroom where I found a 9mm between the night table and the bed. The trend continued throughout the house, ending with a wad of hundreds next to a container of expired milk in the refrigerator. Somehow, I had become an extra in a remake of "Good Fellas".

         The mistake was dealing with it myself and not freaking out. I got lucky that none of shit blew up in my face. Jay and A-- are good people, don't get me wrong, but they are also some the stupidest criminals in the world. My godsister came home while I was cleaning. I still remember the expression on her face while holding the 9mm by my pinkie, asking her what I should with it since I had already made the bed.

         Emotion clouded judgment. I think we can all agree on this.

         I don't know what happened to the hardware after that. Stupidly Amazingly, I went back two weeks later to clean. Except for the usual science experiments on the stove, the apartment was clean of anything that could possibly send me to prison to do a dime. I was lucky enough that Jay and A-- cared enough not to get me in trouble. Or they that I would tell on accident. I like to think the former as it has more of a Hallmark feel to it.

The Do-Over.

         Easy. My prints were all over the place. The moment I saw the first gun, I should have grabbed my crap and headed out the door. CSI 101. End story.

The Reality.

         The do-over, unfortunately, is not a plausible possibility. I do not have the power to go back in time. I do not have the ability to erase that part of my history. Here's the rub: I wouldn't if I could. Sure, I play back that scene with relative frequency in my head much like a movie of past transgressions and movie clips, "Godfather" soundtrack and all. But if I went back and did everything over, I would never learn not to do that stupid thing in the future. You live. You learn. You have a shot of whiskey. You mock terribly horrible movies much I like I did last night. You move on. A little bit of wisdom - fortune cookie style.

This is summer, in California, during the late afternoon played in winter, in Washington, during the dead of night. Enjoy.