How an Ordinary Dinner Table Comes to Need a Few More Chairs

(Author: Allison, Xanga: theautumnrain)

Walter stared at the ordinary Italian hitmen. A tiny crease of a frown crinkled vertically down his forehead. "Do I know you?" he asked. And he took a slight step backward. He was, to tell our audience the blatant truth, just a tad worried. After all, when an otherwise very ordinary day is brought to a shuddering close by the entry of two, tall, strong, machine-like, briefcase toting hitmen, one is bound to feel a few shivers.

"Do we know him?" The two men standing just outside the door glanced at each other; and it may here be noted that the fleeting glance shared between the two contained not a little surprise. Suddenly, the man on the right looked swiftly over his shoulder, gave his cohort a hearty shove, and they were in the house. "Presto! close de door," said this man to Walter. Walter did as he was told. "You ask, 'Do I know you.' I says to myself, 'Does I know him?' And then I has an answer. Aha! Si! We haf met before under more, em, pleasant circumstances."

"We have?"

"Si, amigo. Do you not remember Great Uncle Guido's chicken farm, just outside Bologna? Twenty-five years ago? And your two cousins - with whom you rode the calves and terrorized the geese?"

"You - ? You mean - ? You're - ?"

"Si, the very same."

Walter was perplexed and slightly over-joyed. "Well, then, why don't you sit down?" he said, somewhat dubiously. "My wife cooks some excellent peas."

[Edit 11:07 AM, 9/5/05]
One minor typo corrected. -Jordan