The Fiddle Game

I’ve been sitting at this table for almost forty minutes now, and I think the waiter’s getting pissed. Every time he comes by to ask if I need a warm-up, and if I’m ready to order yet, he gets a little snippier. Last time he sloshed the dregs of a lukewarm pot of coffee into my cup and bustled off without saying a word. I’ll have to order food sooner or later, but I’m too nervous to eat... I should have brought something to do – I usually carry a magazine or something to doodle on – but Seth told me not to do anything suspicious, and I’m still not sure what qualifies. So I’ve been sitting stiffly in my chair and fidgeting with the silverware, pretending to still struggle with the menu whenever my waiter passes by.

Glancing around the restaurant, I realize I’ve neglected Seth’s advice to always be aware of my surroundings. “Count the people in the room – know the number of men, women, and children, in that order, and pay attention to what they’re wearing. If shit goes down, you don’t want to be caught off-guard. And sit with your back to the wall – in a corner if you can – and watch the door.” He has an annoying habit of talking like he’s in a spy movie, but he always seems to know what he’s doing, and eventually I learned not to question the way he does it. I count four men and five women – not including the wait staff and a man I assume to be the manager, who occasionally pokes his head out from an office next to the kitchen – and no children. I’m the only one sitting alone at a table, and I’m starting to feel conspicuous.

Finally, I hear the door ding and I look up to see Seth hobble in and stamp the snow off his boots onto the bristly black mat before yanking a wheeled suitcase through the door behind him. He’s dressed in a long beige trench coat, the ties undone and hanging loosely at his waist, and he has a tasseled hat pulled down past his eyebrows. I wouldn’t say he looks homeless, but he also doesn’t look like someone who necessarily has a change of clothes. He’s hunched over, hand on his lower back like a caricature of an old man, and his scraggly, reddish facial hair has grown into something like a beard. The door shuts behind him with a second ding. He looks at the sign by the door that says “Please Seat Yourself,” adjusts his hat, and trudges to a booth in the corner, one of his suitcase wheels squealing in protest. I try to make eye contact with him, prepared to nod sharply and discreetly, but he stares straight ahead until he reaches his booth and stashes the suitcase beneath the table. He pulls one of the sticky menus from behind the condiments and flips it open. I flag down my waiter.

“Yeah?”

I take note of his name tag – Eddie. That seems like the vigilant thing to do. “Yes, I’d like the Reuben, please. With beans instead of fries, and the thousand-island on the side. And I’ll take the check now, if you don’t mind.”

“We don’t start serving lunch until noon… Sir.”

“Oh!” I glance at my watch, struggling to decipher the hands. It’s 11:46. “Um, well… then I’d like oatmeal.”

The waiter sighs and drones: “That comes with fruit or hashbrowns, and your choice of toast – white, wheat, sourdough, or rye.”

“The white wheat, please.”

He glares at me.

“Sorry, I mean wheat. Sorry. And fruit’s fine.”

He walks away before I can remind him about bringing the check. Why in God’s name did I order oatmeal? I haven’t had oatmeal in years, ever since my sister said it reminded her of warm dog vomit… Now I’ll be too nervous and too nauseous to eat.

The shirt that I’m wearing makes my neck itch painfully, and it occurs to me that I probably should have washed it. I imagine I’m getting some sort of second-hand skin disease. I purchased my entire outfit at Goodwill last night – except for the pants, which I found tucked in the bottom of my dresser – and I smell like moth balls unsuccessfully masked by Old Spice. The look I’m going for, I’m told, is “professional.” Apparently this means dark, solid colors, a collar on my shirt and my jacket, a pair of shiny, black shoes, and an air of haughtiness to tie it all together. I resist the urge to drink with my pinky extended.

I watch as a pretty waitress with a pixie haircut walks over to Seth. She stands with her hip jutted out, and laughs at something he says. He gestures widely and makes another joke – she laughs again, apparently genuinely amused, and he puts his hand on her arm. He orders, she walks away, and he leers at her backside before unraveling his silverware and spreading the napkin ceremoniously across his lap. He drums his fingers across the table in an awkward rhythm, and I compulsively flip back through my menu, noting with regret that I could have ordered chocolate chip pancakes. …Or would that have been suspicious?

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I met Seth a little over a year ago, while we were both working at Carmino Brothers’ Pizza. He’s considerably older than me – probably in his late-30s, but I’ve never asked – and still wasn’t the oldest guy delivering pizzas for a living. At first, we were both delivery drivers, until I got my license revoked after a minor DUI incident that I have no memory of besides waking up in my mom’s truck, sideways in the middle of a roundabout. After that I was stuck in the kitchen, making minimum wage, zero tips, and Portland’s third-best Chicago-style pizza.

I had dropped out of the anthropology department at Oregon State University halfway through my sophomore year, intending to save up enough money to move out of my mom’s house and go back to classes as an independent man. Four years later, with my credits about to expire, all I’d managed to do was move into a two-bedroom apartment with three other people and only have to ask my mom for help with the rent every couple of months. I took the bus to and from work, and otherwise rarely left my apartment. I didn’t have a girlfriend, but sometimes I would drunkenly hook up with the girl I shared a room with. Her name was Denice, and she smelled like boiled yams, and we didn’t like to talk about it.

“Hey Ferret, you want to learn how to make some extra money?” Seth asked me one night before closing. We were alone at the store, the assistant manager gone early, as usual, and I’d been sweeping the kitchen as Seth ate handfuls of cheese and played with his phone.

I was apprehensive, but I was also desperate, so I said “Sure.”

“Alright, check it out,” he said, leading me over to the register – a behemoth sitting proudly in the middle of the front counter. It had a handle on the side like a slot machine, and made a violent ka-chunk every time the drawer opened. Attached to the side was a dull gray, touch-screen computer monitor, which always required repeated, forceful jabs to respond. Seth stroked the register affectionately. “Say you get a cash order for a carry-out pizza – at the counter or over the phone, it doesn’t matter – and whoever’s managing is gone or not looking or whatever. You take the order like normal, but don’t put it in the system. Just write it all down on a piece of paper, and figure out the total. Then make ’em the pizza, take their money and put it in the till, give ’em the pizza, and then when they leave you take the money back out and we split it 50/50. Easy as pie – pizza pie.” He snorted at his joke.

It took me a minute to piece all the steps together, and when I did I was still doubtful. “What if they ask for a receipt?”

“Tell ’em the machine’s broken... write one by hand... hell, I don’t know. You’re a smart guy, you’ll think of something.”

“But… I mean, won’t someone notice that we’re missing product?”

“Look, how many times a night do you drop dough on the floor and have to throw it away? You really think they keep track of that shit? As long as you’re not doing it with every pizza that goes out the door, you’ll be fine. Trust me, I’ve been doing this since I started here. I did it with popcorn when I worked at Cinemagic, I did it all the time at the car wash… Just don’t ring it through the system, and they’ll never miss the cash. It’ll be like your own private transaction. Shit, you’re the one making the pizza – why shouldn’t they be paying you?”

I hesitated. “But what about the cameras?”

“Seriously man,” he said, rolling his eyes. “It’s like you don’t even want free money. They never check those unless there’s like a break-in or something. I promise, you’ve got nothing to worry about.” He clapped me on the shoulder and gave me a conspiratorial grin. “So what do you say, you wanna give it a shot?”

The next cash order I took, I tried Seth’s method. I was so nervous that I closed the customer’s $20 bill in the drawer without giving him any change, and when I re-opened it I knocked the coins from their trays, sending them dancing across the kitchen floor.

But I got better at it, and by the end of the week I was leaving my shift with an extra thirty or forty bucks after splitting it with Seth. I couldn’t tell you where that extra money went – it certainly didn’t change my quality of life. I still reheated Carmino Brothers’ pizza for almost every meal. I still took the bus, I still shopped at thrift stores, I still only did laundry once a month… but I do seem to remember indulging in higher-shelf whiskey on a number of occasions.

Eventually I started keeping more than my share, and Seth never found out. The first few times I did that – cheated him out of his cut – it was followed by raw, nauseating guilt. What if he found out? Would he turn me in, and deny his part in it? Would he wring the money from me some other way? I spent a couple nights lying awake, turning over scenarios and trying to come up with responses. Sooner or later, though, the guilt faded. I convinced myself that, really, I didn’t owe Seth anything. I could have figured that scheme out on my own. I probably would have, too, and then I’d get to keep everything I earned. As it was, I usually gave him around $5 from every $20 I made.

Seth ended up quitting without notice after the management got suspicious about our declining sales. Within a week, my paranoia got the best of me and I followed suit. I got another part-time job working in a parking garage tollbooth, which gave me plenty of time to read, but not much in terms of a paycheck. So Seth and I found other ways to make money – or rather, he taught me. “Ferret, you kinda remind me of my little brother,” he told me once, ruffling my hair. “He was a piece of shit.”

One day last August, Seth picked me up from my apartment in his nasty green Cadillac de Ville. The passenger door didn’t open from the outside, so he’d have to reach over from the driver’s seat and push it open, like the world’s laziest chauffeur in the world’s crappiest town car. I climbed in, ducking under the malfunctioning automatic seatbelt which buzzed back and forth on its track, and he drove off. Techno music thumped through the car, the bass cackling from blown subwoofers, with a melody that seemed to be composed entirely of sex noises. The pizza smell had not faded.

Seth tossed me a lumpy plastic bag, tied shut at the handles. I opened it and removed a dark blue dinner jacket with a huge, yellowy stain across the lapel.

“So... am I supposed to wear this?”

“No, dingus. You’re gonna get it dry cleaned.”

“Oh, alright. Are we scamming a dry cleaner? How do we do that, what’s the plan?”

“Dude, calm down,” he said, stopping at a red light and pulling a dented flask from under his seat. He glanced around furtively, sank down in his seat and took a long pull. He screwed the lid back on and stashed it away as the light turned green, licking the leftover booze from his chapped lips. “You’re just dropping it off at the dry cleaners, and we’ll come pick it up tomorrow. Make sure you get a receipt.”

He pulled up in front of Spic n’ Span Cleaners and I took the bag with the jacket inside. The man at the counter was an enormous Middle Eastern fellow with a magnificent mustache, his face pressed into a scowl, and his fists pressed into the counter. I approached tentatively. When I reached the man, he broke into a huge grin, slapped the counter and shouted, “Hello, hello! Welcome to Spic n’ Span. What do you need from me today?”

I took the jacket out of the bag and set it in front of him. “I need this cleaned, please. If I could get it back by tomorrow, that’d be great.”

He picked it up by the shoulders and held it in front of him with disdain, like a dead animal. “What is this? What did you spill here?”

I hadn’t prepared for this. “Um... I – I think it was some kind of curry.” That seemed right.

The man scoffed, and grabbed a plastic hanger from underneath the counter. He slipped the hanger into the jacket expertly, and hung it on a rack behind him. “I get it done for you in... two hours, maybe four.” His smile returned. “You will pay now, yes?”

I paid $20 plus tax, and left with the receipt and a claim ticket. Next, Seth and I drove to Kinkos and asked the cashier for fifty sheets of whatever was closest to receipt paper. We went to a self-serve copier and ran off 100 copies of the dry cleaning receipt, two to a page. I spent the next half hour cutting the copies down to the size of the original receipt while Seth stood outside, chain-smoking and talking animatedly into his cell phone.

When I finished, I met Seth outside and we drove back to his place. He lived in a detached garage converted into what he insisted was a “bachelor pad,” furnished with a bedspring and mattress on the floor, a mini-fridge, a couple of sad-looking pot plants under a tarp, a massive, expensive-looking sound system that took up most of the wall opposite the garage door, and crate after crate of vintage pornography magazines. The owners of the house, he once told me, owed him a favor, and he lived there rent-free. “And they let me use the bathroom in the main house. But they don’t like me bringing in guests – you’ll have to hold it.”

We laid the duplicated receipts out on the cement floor and Seth produced stamps, boxes of envelopes, a pen and paper, and a list of addresses. “OK, here’s the plan,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “We send a copy of the receipt to each of these restaurants, with a note that says – you might wanna write this down – ‘I was dining at your establishment on September 4th at 6:30pm, and our waiter spilled a glass of pinot noir all over my white dinner jacket. Attached is my dry cleaning bill, which I expect you to reimburse in full. You may send cash or a check to 557 W Myrtle St, #12, 97205. I trust you will mail payment in a timely manner. Thank you, signed David Hernandez.’ Think you can handle that?”

“Who the heck is David Hernandez?”

“He’s a buddy of mine who uses that shitty little Umpqua Bank downtown. Do you know how many David Hernandezes there are in this city? If someone ever figured out what we were doing, they’d never be able to trace it back to him, and definitely not to us. He doesn’t worry about where the checks come from, and in return I sell him some crank.”

“Wait... you deal meth?”

“No, but I got another buddy who does – I just bring it to him.”

“... Alright.” I decided to worry about that later. “So these restaurants get the letter, and they just send money – just like that?”

“Not all of ’em, obviously. Some are smarter than that, but most of ’em don’t want to deal with a pissed off customer, and so they just send a check to keep him happy. Sometimes they even throw in a little extra, saying ‘We hope you’ll give us another chance’ or some pussy shit like that. Isn’t that great?”

“Couldn’t we have just made copies of the letter when we were at Kinkos?”

Seth hesitated, picking at the corner of a stamp. “I didn’t think about – er, I mean... that would look suspicious. It’s gotta look like we’re only sending this to the one restaurant. Come on, Ferret, use your head.”

“Whose address is this?”

“Christ, you ask a lot of questions. It’s this old couple’s ‘summer place’... a mobile home. I used to house-sit for ’em, and I made a copy of their mailbox key. They won’t be home til next May at the earliest, so it’s the perfect dead-drop.”

“The perfect what?”

“Dead-drop. You know, like a secret location where you pass shit back-and-forth with your... what’s the word...? Cohorts.”

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A bowl of oatmeal jiggles in front of me, and the waiter sets a small cup of cantaloupe next to it. He refills my coffee aggressively, not making eye contact.

“Thank you so much,” I say. “And if you get a minute, could I please have the check?” Seth had stressed how important that was.

“I’ll be right back.”

I prod at the unappetizing bowl of lumps and realize I’m actually hungrier than I thought. I try to spoon some into my mouth and immediately gag. Cantaloupe it is, then.

I look over at Seth. His waitress has just set a banquet of pancakes, eggs, hash browns, orange juice, coffee, and fruit (much better fruit than mine, I notice…) in front of him, and he’s already begun tearing into it like he hasn’t eaten in weeks. I can’t hear him from where I’m sitting, but I imagine he’s making sounds like a pig at a trough – snorting and snarfling and just barely not choking. He takes his napkin from his lap and tucks it into the front of his shirt, something I’ve never seen a real person do, but it actually seems practical given how violently he’s eating. A smock probably wouldn’t be out of the question.

My waiter – Eric, right? I check. Eddie… damn – returns and sets my bill on the table. Realizing that his opportunity to make a tip-worthy impression is dwindling, he cranks the charm up to an eleven.

“I hope you’re enjoying your meal, sir. I just love the oatmeal here, it reminds me of breakfast as a kid – my mom always used to say it ‘sticks to your ribs,’ keeps you full all day.” He gives a fond sigh and looks into the distance nostalgically, as though remembering a long-forgotten childhood. He can’t be older than seventeen. “Anyway, here’s your check, and let me know if there’s anything else I can get for you.”

Eddie leaves and I pull out my wallet – well, my prop wallet. Normally I carry a bacon-patterned billfold that I ordered from a catalogue. It gets lots of compliments, but rarely from women… Today, however, I’m carrying a black, faux-leather wallet with $25 in cash, no ID, and no credit cards. All Seth’s idea.

I place a $10 bill with the check, finish the rest of my cantaloupe, and look back at Seth. He’s just finished shoving the last pancake into his mouth – by hand – and is sucking his fingers clean one-by-one. He removes the napkin from his shirt and catches the attention of his waitress, who proceeds to marvel over his appetite with the false enthusiasm of someone who works with the mentally ill. She leaves to fetch him his check just as Eddie returns to take mine. He eyes the $10 with disappointment.

“...Do you need any change?”

I consider asking for all of the change, down to the penny, but instead I look away and mutter, “All yours, Ed.”

Seth’s waitress returns to his table and he takes her arm again, looking desperate and apologetic. He launches into an animated spiel, gesturing from the table to his pockets and finally burying his head in his hands. I know exactly what he’s saying – we practiced dozens of times, both of us playing each role, until I could recite his lines by heart: “Ma’am (or Sir... Ma’am in this case), I – I can’t believe it, I must have left my wallet at home. This has never happened to me before. Oh God, what am I supposed to do?” Suddenly, he lifts his head up and smiles sheepishly. “Wait! I have an idea. Under here,” he says, pulling his suitcase from beneath the table, “I’ve got my old violin. I was bringing it to my nephew over in Salem, but I could leave it as collateral while I run home and get my wallet.” Seth gently removes a well-loved violin from the suitcase and presents it to the waitress. “What do you say? It’s got to be worth at least fifty bucks, and I promise I’ll come right back.”

The waitress looks around uncomfortably before turning back to Seth, explaining that she’ll need to speak with the manager. Seth nods and says “Of course, of course. I’d be happy to speak with him, if you’d like.” At this point, he assured me he would be able to make his eyes water, but I can’t tell from where I’m sitting. The waitress touches his shoulder reassuringly, and then heads to the manager’s office. Seth looks up, making eye contact with me for the first time, and immediately looks back down. So far so good.

After a few minutes, the waitress returns with the manager in tow. He’s a tall, scrawny black man with thin wire glasses and pants pulled so high they make my testicles ache. He walks in long strides, bouncing ever so slightly at the peak of each step as though keeping time with music in his head, and he adjusts his very short tie at least three times before reaching Seth’s table. Seth repeats his performance – with some variations, I’m sure – and the manager takes the violin and looks it up and down, plucking a few strings with his thin, knobby fingers. He says something to Seth, who rummages around in his suitcase, extracts a bow and hands it to the man. The manager nods and Seth springs up, shakes his hand enthusiastically, wraps the waitress in a brief, tight hug, and dashes out the front door, pulling his squeaky suitcase behind him.

The manager says something to the waitress, gestures to the violin, and shakes his head slowly from side to side. She returns to her other tables and he walks back to his office, closing the door behind him.

Okay – my turn. I swig the last of my coffee, wipe the sweat from my palms onto the seat of my pants, and stand up from the table, pulling my jacket from the chair back and draping it over my arm. I walk across the restaurant, past Eddie carrying a stack of to-go boxes to a table, and knock timidly on the manager’s door.

“Come in,” he barks in a voice much deeper than I’d imagined.

The room is dark except for the light from the doorway, and a green desk lamp that casts an eerie glow across the man’s face. His glasses shine back at me, obscuring his eyes. A radio in the corner of the room coughs out a quiet garble of music and sports coverage, stuck between two stations, and I see the violin and bow lying on top of a short, black filing cabinet behind the manager.

“Hello,” I say, unsure whether I should offer to shake hands. “My name’s Arthur Iverson, and I couldn’t help but notice your interaction with that gentleman and the violin a moment ago.” I’ve given my voice a slightly posh inflection – not exactly British, but definitely PBS. I’m rather proud of it. “You see, I’m a – ”

“Close the door, would you?” the manager interrupts.

“Oh, of course. My apologies.” I pull the door shut behind me, and the room grows even darker. I suddenly feel trapped in here with the manager, like a man who’s just himself in a bear den. “Where was I? Ah yes, I’m a dealer of rare and antique musical instruments, and unless I’m very much mistaken, you – er, I believe you might have one in your possession. Here, take my card.” I produce a business card from my jacket pocket and hand it to the manager. He takes it between two fingers and holds it close to his face. It proclaims, in embossed gold lettering: “Arthur Iverson – Rare and Antique Musical Instruments – Appraisal, Purchase, & Consignment,” followed by a bogus phone number and address, and a small picture of a piccolo on the backside.

The manager looks at the card and then back at me, his face betraying no emotion. I still can’t see his eyes.

“Listen, son...” he says, shifting in his seat. “Fuck you.”

I’m so taken aback, I hiccup. Then I hiccup again. “Um... I’m sorry? Sir, I – ”

“No, shut up. Listen to me, I know the little trick you’re playing. What do they call it, the – the “Fiddle Game?” And you’re even using a goddamn fiddle? Jee-sus, how fuckin’ unoriginal.”

My heart has started pounding in my ears, and the manager’s voice seems to fade to the background. It doesn’t seem like the hiccups are going to stop.

“Let me guess,” he continues. “You come in here and tell me that this fiddle – this piece of shit thrift-store fiddle sitting behind me – is in fact some rare Stradi-something-or-other that’s worth fifty thousand dollars, and as a dealer you’d be happy to pay at least half that on the spot, and would I please give your card to the fine gentleman who owns it when he comes back?”

My script actually called for a hundred thousand dollars, but I doubt that’s wise to mention just now.

“Then, you make some excuse to rush off, and when that hobo-lookin’ fuck shows back up, I’m supposed to try and ‘trick’ him out of this priceless fiddle by offering him, what, a hundred bucks? But he says ‘No, I can’t bear to part with it – I promised my nephew,’ so I offer more and more, certain I’ll still make a ludicrous profit flipping it to you, and he leaves here with a thousand dollars and a free meal. Then you two go home and screw on a pile of my money while I’m stuck with a worthless fucking fiddle. Did I get it right? Answer me – did I get it right??”

“That’s –hic– about right.” I’ve been looking at the carpet, and don’t intend to look back up any time soon.

“I don’t know who your friend is, but you can tell him not to bother coming back, or I’ll call the police on his ass. I – am – not – to – be – fucked – with. Got it?” I look up at the manager as he leans back in his chair, raising his chin. He steeples his fingers and gazes through them at me. “Now get out of my restaurant, and don’t let me ever see you again.”

I nod numbly, open the door without looking, and back out of his office. I leave the restaurant and walk several blocks before I realize I’m still holding my coat. I shake the snow off and slide it over my shoulders.

A few blocks later I reach the bus transfer station, and I walk through the automatic doors of Number 14 to take a seat on one of the hard, blue plastic benches. The woman across from me has a pushcart full of blankets and recyclables, with a small dog wearing a coat perched on top, staring at me with big, wet eyes. I waggle my fingers at the dog, and its owner smiles a wide, nearly-toothless smile, sending a warm tremor down my body.

I pull my phone out of my pocket and scroll through the contacts until I find Seth’s number. I hesitate, my finger poised over the call button, but finally I press it and hold the phone up to my ear. After one ring, an automated message clicks to life and informs me that this subscriber hopes I enjoy the following ringtone while I wait. A tinny rendition of some cliché Classical song screeches through the speaker, the imitation violin tone making my head throb as I desperately hope the call goes to voicemail.

The music stops abruptly and Seth drawls out, “Talk to me.”

“Hey, Seth. How, uh – how’re you doing?”

“How am I doing? Ferret, what the hell are you making small talk for? How’d the friggin’ job go – are we good? Did that dipshit buy your act?”

I swallow, trying to force some moisture back into my dried-out mouth. “Yeah. Yeah, we’re good. You can head back there, I’m sure he’s in.”

“Great. I’ll call you after, then. I’ve got like six more of these violins, so we can run this again tomorrow on the other side of town.”

I glance up and see the old woman still smiling at me – a pleasant, blank smile, devoid of meaning, but warm nonetheless. Her dog wimpers and tries to burrow itself into the blankets, but the woman doesn’t take her eyes off me. I’ve forgotten what Seth just said, and I realize I’ve been quiet for too long. I mutter, “Okay. Uh... good luck.”

“Pshh, I don’t need luck. I’ve got that little bitch right in my pocket. Hey Ferret.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m proud of you, buddy.”

I hear a beep as the call ends, and for a moment I expect the Classical music to start back up. When it doesn’t, I return my phone to my pocket and close my eyes tight, focusing on the starbursts that shine to life behind my eyelids. I consider the woman in front of me, wonder if she’s still smiling, and then – in one sudden, continuous stream – I hurl soupy cantaloupe all over my shiny, black shoes.