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  I smiled and said, “Yes, I'm Mike Ferris.”

  “You probably don't remember me. I'm Sally Silverstein. We were in middle school together, but my parents later moved to Aurora.”

  “Actually, I do remember you.”

  “Really?”

  “You had a nice wardrobe. I especially liked the yellow sleeveless dress.”

  Sally laughed. “I haven't thought about THAT dress for awhile.”

  “My favorite.”

  “So, the sleeveless dress really did it for you?”

  I sighed. “It was very revealing.”

  Sally laughed again. “That was sixth grade. I got my boobs in sixth grade.”

  “I know.”

  “You remember my boobs?”

  “I sat one row behind and to the left of you. I could see your boobs up the back of your sleeveless arm from where I sat, when you wore the yellow dress. Sorry, I know that sounds perverted, but ...”

  “But you were eleven and liked what you saw?”

  “Yes.”

  “I was such a tease. Suppose I said I knew you were looking.”

  “Could I have your number?” I asked.

  “Sure.”

  “Here, take my phone and add it to my contacts.”

  “Take mine and add yours.”

  We exchanged phones. I thought we were going to hook up.

  Suddenly, gun shots rang out. Panic ensued. We were jostled by bodies heading every which way. Sally was swept away with the crowd. I was pushed in a different direction.

  I found a quiet spot next to a tree. I fumbled with Sally's phone. Meanwhile, I tried to remember my own cell number, but drew a blank.

  At that moment, Lela found me. “Why do you have a pink cell phone?” she said.

  “Um ...” I replied.

  The phone rang. Lela snatched it out of my hand and answered the call.

  “No, he's not here,” said Lela. “He left with his pregnant wife and tossed this phone in the trash.”

  The next day, Sally met Lela at the weed dispensary to exchange phones. After getting my phone from Sally, Lela laid my phone on the counter and whacked it with a hammer. The crystal turned into a mass of interconnected spider cracks.

  Lela said, “That's you if you hook up with Mike. Any questions?”

  “Nope,” said Sally, “I think I got it. Thanks for returning my phone intact.”

  It was too early for a phone upgrade with my present carrier, so I switched vendors. At the insistence of Lela, I also switched to a new unlisted number. I didn't switch the number for my detective agency, however.

  My office was actually a basement efficiency apartment I rented from a bail bondsman near the city jail. When times were slow, I did a few skip traces to help pay the office rent. Not easy money, there. The last bail jumper I apprehended did a good job of kicking my ass before I finally subdued him.

  Generally, I didn't hang out at my office, but my answering service said I've been getting a lot of hang ups from a blocked phone, so I decided to hang out on a gloomy afternoon to see if I could catch one of the calls.

  The phone rang. Blocked number.

  I answered with, “Ferris Detective Agency.”

  “About fucking time you answered your phone,” came the reply.

  “Sorry. I don't come into the office much.”

  “Ok, whatever. Just so you know, it wasn't me who broke your phone.”

  “Sally?”

  “Yep.”

  “Sorry things got weird.”

  “Your lovely Lela bashed your phone with a hammer. Said it would be me if I hooked up with you.”

  “Lela has issues.”

  “For real?”

  “My previous girlfriend was an alcoholic. Lela was an improvement over her.”

  “You know I'm Jewish, right?”

  “I knew that.”

  “Normally, I don't hook up with Christians. I was going to make an exception in your case, because you got to me with that talk about my yellow dress, but now it doesn't look so good for you. A little home wrecking isn't beneath me but, I'm not tangling with loco Lela.”

  “I understand.”

  “Good. Well then I'd like to hire you.”

  “Say what?”

  “I have bigger problems than Lela. I just got a restraining order on my ex. I'll pay you to serve him with the papers.”

  Sally's ex worked at an auto body shop. Dude and I were standing near the ex's car at quitting time. A big guy with tats walked up to the car.

  I said, “Theodore Washburn?”

  “Fuck are you?” he replied.

  “I'm the guy asking if you're Theodore Washburn AKA Ted.”

  “Piss off!”

  Ted launched a roundhouse left that clipped me on the right cheek. I staggered back. Ted stepped closer to finish me off.

  Dude waded in with a lightning fast combo. Ted was down in no time. Groggy Ted was having difficulty lifting his head off of the street.

  Dude extracted Ted's wallet and looked at the driver's license. Then, Dude shoved the wallet and the restraining order down Ted's grimy t-shirt.

  “You've been fucking served Teddy boy,” said Dude.

  Wizo wired Sally's house for a cut-rate fee. He sat in a van, monitoring the wireless camera feeds. The van was parked in a neighbor's garage.

  After the document serving, Dude and I rushed back to Sally's neighborhood. We were sitting in my car, observing the street behind Sally's house.

  Sally and Ben were inside the house. Originally, I was supposed to be the inside man, but Lela nixed that idea.

  Lela parked her new car on Sally's street, down the block. She was using her car's bluetooth capability to communicate with the rest of us. We were all dialed into a conference call that we were using for Sally's security. We dubbed it 'Sal-net'.

  Lela said, “I've got a sun bleached black pickup truck that hasn't seen wax since the factory. It's stopping. Big guy getting out. He's walking on the sidewalk. No wait! He ducked into the neighbors bushes on the east side of Sally's house.”

  Wizo said, “I see him on the side camera. He's checking windows.”

  We all knew what he would find. All of the curtains were shut tight, except for a small gap in the bedroom curtains.

  Dude and I got out of the car and cut thru the neighbor's yard. We didn't want to go too far too soon, but we wanted to be ready to rush Sally's house. The plan was for us to wait at the property line until Ted broke into the house.

  Wizo said, “He found the bedroom window. He's watching now.”

  Lela said, “Time to strip, honey.”

  Sally walked thru bedroom. Meanwhile, she stripped off her blouse and tossed it on the bed. She continued walking to the attached bathroom. From the bathroom, she tossed more clothing items on the bed, bra, shorts, then finally panties. She turned on the shower.

  Except for the blouse, Sally didn't actually strip. The bra, shorts, and panties were props she was throwing from the bathroom. She put on another blouse.

  Wizo said, “He's moved to the back door. He broke the window in the door. He's reaching inside. Ok, the back door is open. He's in the kitchen now.”

  Lela said, “I'm calling 911.”

  Dude and I sprinted forward. I headed for the back door. Dude circled to the front.

  Ted rushed thru the kitchen. When Ted entered the living room, he saw a fully clothed Sally leaning near the front door. Ben was nearby.

  “Bad Ted,” said Sally.

  Ted charged forward, meanwhile shouting “Fucking bitch!”

  Sally opened the front door and ran out.

  Ben intercepted Ted and grabbed an arm. Ted shrugged off his attacker and sent Ben flying into a glass coffee table.

  Ben barely slowed Ted. Moments later, Ted followed Sally outside. Sally paused on the grass and looked towards the front door. Ted was charging out. Sally froze.

  The first squad car arrived. The police officers observed the scene on the lawn.

&n
bsp; Ted ran up to Sally and punched her in the cheek. Sally went down and rolled into a ball. Ted stepped forward and delivered a kick.

  Dude cleared the corner of the house and yelled, “Teddy Boy!”

  Ted turned and squared on Dude. When Dude got closer, Ted jabbed with a right fist. Dude blocked with his left and jabbed with his own right. Dude's right connected with Ted's left eye.

  Ted shook it off and came at Dude with more punches. Dude blocked and punched back. Ted got the worst of it. Dude finished it with a left hook that landed on Ted's right ear. Ted collapsed.

  Sally ran to Dude, hugged him, and said, “My hero!”

  The original police officers were both male. They wrestled Ted into their squad.

  Another squad arrived, this one containing female officers. Sally and the female officers went inside to get photos of Sally's injuries.

  Lela, Dude, Ben, and I chatted on the front porch. Ben had cuts from his glass table encounter. I had a nasty welt on my cheek.

  Dude said, “She hugged me, said I was her hero.”

  Ben said, “I fell into a glass table for her and Mike got punched in the face. What are we, chicken noodle?”

  Lela said, “You're MY heroes. Come on guys, I'll drive you to the ER.”

  Ordinarily, tough guys like us wouldn't have gone to the ER for these minor injuries, but we knew it was best for Sally if we got the injuries officially documented. We left Dude standing on Sally's porch.

  Dude and Sally hooked up. After that, whenever I saw Dude, he never failed to comment that Sally's breasts were firm and perky.

  Phil rehabbed in Grace's spare bedroom. When he was able, Phil worked as a salesman on a used car lot owned by Grace's Cheyenne tribe. Later, Phil and Grace married. Phil gave up the booze, but he developed a fetish for being tied up during sex with Grace.

  In June 2013, the Obama administration tightened it's stance on medical weed. Federal harassment of dispensaries commenced again shortly thereafter in many western states.

  On August 29, 2013, Federal DOJ Secretary Holder released a memo to Federal prosecutors, which announced a hands off policy towards legal recreational weed. Holder wrote that the DOJ will “trust but verify” that Colorado and Washington will regulate recreational weed in an acceptable manner. Holder then went on to list 8 bullet items that would be unacceptable. One unacceptable thing was “drugged driving and the exacerbation of other adverse public health consequences associated with weed use”.

  Lela said, “The document is biased by the assumption that there really are public health consequences associated with weed use. It's stated as a fact, but there's no proof of it.”

  “Loophole?” I asked.

  “Maybe. You know how it is. DOJ documents are open to interpretation. This latest document will go thru a spin cycle, where the spinner decides what it means. All it would take would be a conservative federal prosecutor out in the field spinning those alleged weed health consequences into an excuse for a hard line crack down.”

  “It's a mixed signal from the feds. I wish we knew the real truth.”

  “The truth is another lie,” said Lela.

  “The wider the eyes, the bigger the lies,” I replied.

  When the October 2013 federal shutdown occurred, Lela said we should defund weed prohibition and furlough DEA Director Michelle Leonhart.