Dave's Best Friend Floyd

All of my writing is fiction and the stories and characters are all products of my imagination. They were created for my fun and, hopefully, your enjoyment. Some of the events in the stories are not particularly condoned nor encouraged by the author but are there to create and enhance the story of the imaginary characters and their lives. Comments are always encouraged and carefully reviewed. All characters within the story are 18 years of age or older. Hope you enjoy!

This story came about in an odd sort of way. I received a comment on another story in a different category, that included a bit of a challenge. This is the result of that. Not sure if it totally answers that and not quite sure of what I'm doing but thought I'd give it a shot anyway. Has been kind of fun and a little different for me. Very experimental kind of writing. Also, some of the grammar isn't the best, but that's the way I think Dave, the narrator would talk. Like to hear what people think so comment away.

Hi. I'm Dave and my wife kinda asked me to share this story with you. At first, I didn't want to because, hell, I'm sure not no story teller and not a writer neither. Sometimes, I can hardly write my name but here I am, doing this, so we'll see what happens. Actually, I'm a plumber and have been all my life. I guess when some of us plumbers get together, we do tell stories. Most of them probably wouldn't be fit for even a site like this one. But, enough of that. I need to stick to tellin' this story and not get distracted, like thinkin' about those plumber stories. Like I said before, I'm not a story teller and I'm sure that's going to be tough but, here goes. Oh, and please excuse the way I talk and write sometimes. English wasn't my favorite course in school. I actually didn't care much for any of them. Maybe arithmetic and math 'cause I could see where they might be a little useful. And wood shop and metal shop of course. Those I liked. But not history or those government courses because they were so boring. English too, it was the worst of all. I guess I should have paid more attention back then. Might have helped me do a better job on this story. I didn't know back then that I'd be doing this though. Shit, there I go, wanderin' off again. Sorry.

There are just four people in this story. There's me, I'm Dave, and my wife, Nina. Then there's my best friend, Floyd and his wife, Trisha. If Nina or Trisha was writin' this, I'm sure they'd say that Floyd was my BFF. I guess that's okay, though, because that pretty much describes him. I'll get to the others later though because I'll just start off with myself.

Like I said, I'm Dave and I was born in a house trailer because my mom didn't have no money to be able to go to the hospital. She had a friend who was kind of a mid-wife or something and she helped. Everything went okay I guess, because here I am. My mom lived by herself in the trailer. I mean, there was no husband or dad. She did live there with my dad but he was killed in a motorcycle accident that must have happened right after she got pregnant. He didn't have no insurance, of course, and the only thing that saved us was that the trailer was paid for. Mom worked cleaning houses for people and I got a paper route as soon as I could to help out a little. The trailer was pretty nice as trailers in the park went. Had two bedrooms but we did have to go to the wash house at the park to use the bathroom and shower when I was little because that part of the trailer was busted and we couldn't afford to fix it.

That's when an important part of this story happened. Some organization heard about our trouble and they paid a plumber to come fix the place up. He was a really friendly guy and I got to watch him, all the little stuff he did, and it looked really interesting. I decided right then I wanted to be a plumber and fix things for people. Took a few years but I finally made it. Mom really worked hard to raise me to be a good person. It was tough because we lived in the south end. There were probably worse places to live, maybe in the bottoms, but no one bragged about living in the south end. School was pretty tough too. They talk about bullying now. They shoulda lived on the south side and gone to Haverton, where I went. There were fights in the yard every day and no one bothered them much unless they got too bloody and some of the girls went to the office to report it. It was just the way life went there and nobody thought anything about it. I had my share. I wasn't the biggest guy around but I wasn't too afraid of no one. Maybe I should have been because I got bloodied up a few times. Nothing serious which was good because we sure didn't have no money to go to a doctor. Nothing really serious is what I mean. My nose is still crooked from it bein' busted in one fight but it healed up okay.

I'll just mention here that Floyd went to Haverton too and that's where we met. He lived in the same trailer park as I did but his trailer only had one bedroom and no bathroom. He did get the bedroom since he went to sleep earlier than his mom and dad did and they made the couch into a bed every night, then folded it back up in the morning. We played together all the time and we had our share of fights too. That's the way you settled things on the south side. Nobody talked. You just had a fight and then it was over and settled and you went back to livin'. Seems strange when I think about it now but it worked then. And, I guess it seemed to work pretty well with me and Floyd too.

I mentioned a little before about school and how bored I was most of the time. I made it through high school though. We never mentioned college at our place. Since my grades stunk and I was no athlete either, there was no chance of that. I did enjoy the shop courses though, working with wood and metal. I guess I did okay there because I liked it. Has made me wonder ever since about the other classes. If I'd a done good in them as well, if I'd have enjoyed them a little more. Maybe, but we'll never know, will we? After high school I got hooked up with a plumber who took me on as a helper and taught me about plumbing at the same time. I said before that's what I wanted to do and, probably because of that, I was really interested in learning everything I could about it. It was really like one of those apprenticeship program things, but not like official or anything. I guess Harry, that was the guy that taught me all the stuff, just liked me and wanted to help me. Pretty soon, I was a licensed plumber thanks to him and I worked for him and did good. I really loved the job.

Something else happened about that time too. I met Nina. Before that I knew what girls were for -- oh, shit, I shouldn't say it that way. I liked girls and knew that you got married and had a family. I saw other people do that. But I never had a father and mom worked so fucking, sorry, so gosh darned hard all the time that I guess I didn't really know what a regular family was. Nina loved three things in life. I'll tell you about number two right now since the others hadn't happened yet. She loved ink. Not ink well ink, like they used to have in the schools. Tattoo ink was what she loved. She didn't live in the trailer park but she did live in the south end which meant she didn't have much money. She learned real quick that tattoos cost money. She told me the first time she stopped in a tattoo shop and asked about how much they cost they told her at least $50 for even a small one and even more for more fancy ones. She about died I think because, living in the south end, she sure didn't have money like that. Her family wasn't quite as poor as mom and I were, or as Floyd was as it turned out, but they didn't have anything extra.

Now that I'm married to Nina and know her a little better, it doesn't surprise me at all that having no money didn't stop her. She started doing odd jobs for people and made money that she kept saving to get a tattoo. Plus, she gave some of it to her mom and dad to help out, you know. Plus, somehow, she figured out how to negotiate. I think it was just born in her or something because there sure wasn't no one to teach her. She worked out a deal with the tattoo place that she'd come in when they weren't busy, she'd recommend them to any of her friends who wanted a tattoo and she'd promise never to get a tattoo anywhere else if they'd give her a good deal on the price. It worked, and she got a butterfly on her leg for only $25. That was the first one and she's got a lot more now but more about that later.

Nina and I got married when we were both 19. I didn't really know what I was doing then, I guess. I just knew she was a great girl and I thought it might be nice to be around her all the time. I guess I was kinda surprised when she felt the same way about me, just a dumb plumber's helper. Bein' from the south end, I guess, made us a couple of things. Since we both had some kind of job, we thought everything would be okay and, from the way we lived when we were raised, we didn't want to have kids until we could afford them. Most of our friends started having kids even before they were married and life was never easy for any of them. Not by a long shot. And that brings me to Nina's first love. It was me. So, it's me at number one and ink at number two. I'll get to number three in a little bit.

It was kinda funny, you know, that after we were married, when I was sittin' around, drinking a beer and watchin' TV, Nina was always readin' a book. I really never tried to find out how smart she was or what grades she had in school. I didn't give a shit about that. I just liked to be with her and, now that we were married, to climb into the sack with her at night and have what I guessed was fantastic sex. I didn't really know a damn thing about sex when we were married and she didn't either. So, we just figured stuff out. We listened to friends talking about stuff and we'd try some of it ourselves. Anyway, it sure seemed great to me and I looked forward to those nights when we did it. That's what we called it and I think lots of people called it that too. We'd "do it" every chance we got too. We didn't have a lot of money so we couldn't do a lot of stuff that other people did so, we'd "do it."

Another thing about south end folks. It's seems that, rather than workin' hard for our money we wanted to get rich quick. That meant the lottery. I suppose we could have done lots of stuff with the money we spent on lottery tickets -- Nina used to say that a lot. But you know what, we hit a $50,000 dollar jackpot and we couldn't believe it. Before that, in the summer we'd go fishing quite a bit, just sit under the bridge and once in a while catch some good fish that we'd eat. Mostly it was just fun and easy to do. When we won the money, I wanted to buy a bass boat and a big motor so we could do some real fishing. I had lotsa plans for that money. That's when I learned about Nina's third love. I'm gonna say it and you'll have trouble believing it because we're south enders.

It was the stock market. Yeah, that's right, the stock market. She didn't love it at first, she was just interested in it from her reading and stuff. I had heard of it, but only on TV news and stuff and had no idea how it worked or what it was good for except it seemed that people could make money from it somehow. Well, Nina sat me down and tried to explain it all to me and it just didn't make sense. You spent your money, then just sat around. No work, no nothing. And, in a while, you made money. She said you could lose money too, but not if you were smart. I guess that was my problem. I'm not that smart so I couldn't really understand much about it. Here's the hard part though. She said we'd make a deal. She was the negotiator so I decided to listen to what she was gonna say. She said that lottery win was a gift from out of the blue and we needed to really take advantage of it. My boat and motor was how I was going to take advantage of it. And other stuff too I was sure I could figure out. She said her deal was this. She'd give me $5,000 of the money for whatever I wanted and she'd take the rest and, well she said she'd invest in the stock market. I wasn't sure what that meant so I said how about we split it 50-50 and she could invest or whatever.

Then she played her trump card. She asked me if I trusted her. Hell, yes, why wouldn't I? She asked me if I thought she was smart. Smarter than me for sure. She said, give her a year and see what happened. In a year she'd give me my half if that's what I wanted. What I wanted was a bass boat and a motor -- oh, and some good sex along the way. I didn't think she'd cut me off but I hated to take the chance. We didn't have much but I was at least smart enough to know she was worth more than $45,000. Wow, $45,000. I'm not sure my mom even knew how to say, $45,000. But, I did it. She got her money and I got mine.

I checked into bass boats and motors. Of course, I'd need a trailer to haul it, and a car that could pull the trailer. I found out I could spend way more than we had won on all that stuff. So, I bought myself a new rod and reel and stashed the rest away. I figured I'd find something to buy before long and was happy with that. Nina showed up with a little computer and spent a lot of time looking at that and tappin' away on those keys. As long as I had my beer and TV, I was happy. I did forget to mention that we had a little house now. With both of us working and no kids, we got a nice two-bedroom place, in the better part of the south end of course. Nina figured it all out and we got one of those FHA loans where you didn't have to have no down payment. We got it before we won the lottery money or we maybe could have used that for a down payment. Something about a 30-year loan or a 15-year loan. Nina grumbled a little about it but it didn't matter much to me.

I did mention the beer and TV. That's where I spent some of my money. Not on beer. I bought one of those 42-inch flat screen TV's. Plus, Nina had agreed to use some of her money to pay for Hi-Def so I had good TV to watch while she fiddled with the computer. Once in a while, I'd ask how things were goin' and she always said it was goin' good, whatever that meant. We had some fun and got along good and at the end of that year, she gave me -- well, really just told me -- that I had my $20,000 from the lottery ticket. Still not enough to get my boat and stuff and I didn't have anything to stash this time so I figured I'd just wait and see. Let me make this short now. Two years later and we were talking about having kids because we seemed to have a little more money and Nina sat me down for a talk. I wasn't sure what to expect, you know. Maybe she had lost all our money in that stock market thing she was always fooling with.

Maybe I'll just tell you about the conversation as best I remember it.

"Things have gone pretty well with the stock market," she started out.

"That's good," I answered because I was happy for her about that. She seemed to enjoy it and I was glad it was going good, even though I wasn't quite sure what that meant.

"Do you like being a plumber?" she went on.

"Hell, yes. Never want to do anything else. I love it."

"Would you like to start a plumbing business, your own business?" Now what the hell was that about. We didn't have money to be startin' businesses.

"We ain't got money for that," I said. "Would be fun though I bet." She just looked at me and had the biggest smile I'd ever seen on her face. "What's going on, Nina?" Still that smile and it looked like she was even shaking a little. I was getting kinda worried.

She started. "Dave, as of today we are . . . " and she stopped and just looked at me.

"Are what?" And then she said a word that I knew but didn't really understand.

"Millionaires." That's all she said, just that one word.

Well, you can imagine my reaction at that. "Bull shit!" I said, plain as I could.

"We are," she said. "With the money I have put away and the stocks we own we're worth way over a million dollars." So, I asked a lot more questions and she showed me some papers and things she'd printed out and, unless she was totally lying about everything, it looked like it was true. South end Dave and his wonderful wife, Nina, were millionaires. Then she told me we could get the business started and she was gonna pay off the house. I said that we could buy a new one but she said, no. We had room here and we were still south-enders and we could even have one baby here if we wanted to and there was a bedroom for the boy or girl, whichever it was. I knew from the way she looked when she talked about the baby that she was ready for that to happen. She said that if we had a second one, then we could look for another house.

Well, as you can probably guess, things moved on from there. I bought a new truck with "Dave's Plumbing" on the sides, rented a little building and put a sign up outside and had a lot of help from Nina getting' things going. Remember, I was her first love and she was showing that every day. But, her second love was ink and that was happening too. She got a tattoo of an eagle on her back -- her whole back. The wing tips went down below her waist. It was pretty spectacular. I had to laugh a little when she had "DAVE'S" put on her belly, right above where her cute muff started. So, I was having a good time with my new business and she was having fun getting "inked" and she was also still goin' with the stock market stuff and kept tellin' me it was getting better and better.

Now, goin' back a little, about the same time that I met Nina, Floyd met Trisha. Of course, Trisha was a south side girl too, but a little different than most and I never could quite figure out how she and Floyd got together. Floyd was a redhead, with that kind of a temper sometimes, left-handed so he complained that the world was all the time backward to him -- everything was designed for right-handed people. He got to be a carpenter and a pretty good one. Plus, when you got to those awkward places that you couldn't quite contort yourself to hammer or something, you just called Floyd and that left-handed stuff came in pretty handy. Trisha was, well, Nina always called her a sweetheart. That seemed to describe her pretty well. Floyd was, well, big and burly and a player. I mean a sports player. He played everything and was good at it all through high school. Played tackle in football, forward in basketball and first base in baseball. Could hit that freakin' ball a mile when he connected. Yep, he loved sports.

Now about Trisha. She was tiny. At least she seemed tiny next to Floyd. I guess she was maybe five foot two or so. I should have been good a figuring that kind of stuff but I never was. She was -- what did Nina always call her? Pet . . .? Damn. Wait, I think it was petite, that's the word. Tiny and cute as a button. We'd go on double dates together, nothing fancy or anything but it was fun and Floyd really seemed to like Trisha and, I guess we were a little surprised, but you could tell that she really, really liked Floyd too. I mean really, really liked him. And then they got married about the same time as we did. Floyd was my best man and I was his. Same kind of thing with Nina and Trisha for the maid of honor stuff. Matron of honor I guess for the second one. They lived not far from us and we got together all the time. We went fishing together, just under the bridge stuff since I still didn't have my bass boat, and, turns out all four of us liked to play rummy. Sometimes Floyd and I would play gin rummy when it was only the two of us.

Now, there was a kinda problem with Floyd. He wanted to get rich and have money and I'm not sure he liked it very much when Nina and I got that way. Floyd wanted to get rich quick. He spent a ton of money on the lottery but he never hit anything bigger than one time he got $100. He was always talkin' about some scheme to get lots of money. I guess he worked hard and made a decent hourly rate, but he wanted to get a bunch of money somehow. Trisha just went along with whatever Floyd wanted and hung there with him. Like Nina said, she was a sweetheart.