The phone buzzes on mute next to the snoring PC refugee’s face.
“Hello.”
“James!”
“Master Lee.”
“Who else would be waking your ass up at eight a.m.?”
“Yessir.”
“Look, James, I’ve got a school. I’ve got students—and YOU need to get up here and train them. I’ve got a hundred-and-five people here. YOU are going to show them how to box, how to fight with a stick and how to survive with a knife. DO YOU UNDERSTAND me, James?”
“Yessir.”
“Look, this is no joke. I’m going to put a hundred-and-fifty bucks in your hand when you walk through that door and you’re going to straighten these people out—DO YOU UNDERSTAND me, James?”
“Yessir.”
“James, are you sick? Don’t tell me that you’re still in bed at eight a.m. And if you show up here any fatter than the last time I saw you you can expect a bullet—DO YOU UNDERSTAND me, James.”
“Yessir.”
“Okay, so James, I’m up here at Jimmy’s old place—God rest his soul…I miss that man, and I miss you too. So when can you be here?”
“October Seventeen.”
“What the fuck! Where the hell are you?”
“The Rocky Mountains, Sir.”
“What, you committing suicide or finding God on a mountain top? Baltimore needs you, Son.”
“Well, these nice folks—”
“Nice, Nice! I need you mean. You need to straighten these people out and whip them into shape. TEN O’CLOCK, you hear me, James? TEN O’CLOCK. The number is…”
The call mercifully dropped and he nodded off hoping beyond hope that some golden-voiced bimbo would be the next caller…
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