2288. Luggage

It all started when I picked up the wrong suitcase at the airport. The suitcase was identical to mine – bright red with a purple ribbon tied on the handle. I always tie a distinctive coloured ribbon on the handle so as not to mistake which bag is mine. I simple grabbed the suitcase without needing to think and caught a taxi home.

First things first. I dumped the suitcase on the bed, visited the bathroom, and then put the kettle on to make a coffee. While the kettle was warming up I thought I might as well unpack. Unpacking is one of my pet hates, and sometimes if I don’t unpack immediately, a half emptied suitcase can sit on the bedroom floor for a week. So I have learnt to do the dastardly deed as soon and quickly as possible.

I undid the zipper on the suitcase and opened it wide. It wasn’t my stuff inside. There was some underwear, socks, a pair of men’s shoes, a belt, and a pair of nail clippers. Nothing else. No address. Nothing. I went through the couple of zipped pockets on the outside of the suitcase and they were empty.

Then I noticed that the suitcase had an artificial bottom. It too had a zipper around it. It contained several plastic bags of white powder. I presumed they were drugs of some sort. Of course I could go to the police, but…

If the owner had taken my suitcase by mistake they would know my name. They would know my address. I always attentively labelled my luggage. Even my phone number. If I went to the police I still couldn’t rest easy.

And then, there was a knock on the door…

2014. A smoking gun

Jude had not been brought up well. His father was an alcoholic; at least he was until he turned up to work drunk and “accidentally” fell down an elevator shaft. Jude’s mother was addicted to quinine and her kidneys had packed up and she too was dead.

Jude had an older sister who took over his care, but she was on drugs and got her drug money in the entertainment business. She worked from home.

When he was fourteen, Jude didn’t “discover” for he already knew, but “realized” that there were easier ways to make money than to work. He’s made a few contacts via some of his sister’s clients. He looked a lot older than fourteen. School had long gone down the drain. He worked as a pimp with the occasional bit of burglary thrown in for luck.

Then his big break came. One of his sister’s ex-clients said he’d give Jude ten thousand if he did his sister in. Jude said he would but what way was it to be done? The guy said he didn’t care, so Jude got a gun and shot his sister dead point blank. It was all pretty easy.

When Jude went to get his money the ex-client turned him in. “This guy murdered his sister.”

Jude got life. The ex-client got off scot-free. He was clever like that.

1593. A bit of a romp

Jock was all of nineteen and more than halfway through his apprenticeship with a building firm. He loved to party on the weekends, and if he didn’t have to work he would have loved to party every night of the week.

One Saturday night he was invited by this guy and his girlfriend to go back to their house for “a bit of a romp”. Jock thought it a good idea, and followed the couple’s old van to their house in his car.

Would he like a beer? A coffee? Anything? Jock thought he’d like a coffee. Why not? He had a night of “romping” ahead of him and plenty of time later for a beer or two.

Twenty minutes after finishing his coffee he knew it had been laced with something. One of his hands started to shake, and he felt scared. There was no reason to feel scared but he did. He was terrified, in fact, of something unseen. He stumbled outside and got in his car. He drove off.

He didn’t have a clue where he was going. He just drove, quite slowly because things were a bit fuzzy, but he had to get away. There was someone standing under a street light. It was a hitchhiker. Jock stopped.

“Can you drive?” asked Jock. The hitchhiker could. “Can you drive me home? Someone laced my coffee and I’m not thinking straight.”

The hitchhiker drove. When he got safely home Jock gave the hitchhiker money to get a taxi to where he was going. All night Jock sat up in his bed staring at the door. He was scared stupid. He thought someone would come through the door to get him.

This was a turning point for Jock. He settled down (ever so slightly), met someone, fell in love, and they now have five kids. Most weekends Jock takes the kids camping or fishing. Or they just mess about. A good story, eh?

826. Drug testing

The story was that the boss wanted to test his younger employees for drugs. They had to handle complex machinery. He trusted his older employees; most of them had worked for him for years.

Take Sefton Fisher for example. Sefton was fifty-nine and had worked for the company since he was nineteen. That makes forty years of faithful service. The boss called Sefton into his office.

“Look,” said the boss, “I want to drug test all these younger folk, but that looks bad. I wonder if you’d mind getting drug tested so it looks like I’m being fair.”

“That’s no trouble,” said Sefton.

The drug tests were done. All came out clean. Except for Sefton. He tested positive for opiates.

“But I haven’t taken any medication or recreational drugs,” said Sefton.

Another test was done. He returned a positive result for morphine. Sefton was fired immediately.

Today, he has no job. If only they’d told him not to eat toast with poppy seeds for breakfast each morning.

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