The tale of a story OR How I learned to start fearing for my life – Chapter 7

7. The explanation

As I drove down the streets of Bucharest, it felt like I was on autopilot. Nothing made sense in my head, but I knew I had to get away from the gunfire sounds. Soon things started to clear up and I noticed that, Andreea, George and myself were all breathing heavily and cursing fate for this night. After a while, Andreea just started laughing, George was thanking God for being alive and I was just surprised we managed to escape. And even though I still hated the death trap we were in, at least it was useful in our hour of need. I think the fact that it was such an old piece of crap is the reason why it deflected most of the bullets fired at us. More modern cars aren’t built completely from steel, but this one was, which, in a way, made it feel less like an iron maiden, and more like a shield. That, in turn, made me think more about all the times I made quick assumptions about decrepit things, how I thought they were automatically useless, when, in reality, they might have had something unexpected to offer.

The tale of a story OR How I learned to start fearing for my life – Chapter 6

6. The heist

After Stephan finished giving Michael all sorts of instructions, we followed them downstairs and exited the building through a different way then the one we came in. I found myself standing in a parking lot where Dave, just as Stephan told him to, had prepared two cars for us. Now I use the term “car” very loosely here because the objects in front of us, which we were supposed to drive, could only be described as “death traps”. Dave had prepared the two most rundown, beaten, excuses for cars that ever existed in this world. I swear, the doors on those things couldn’t open properly because of the sheer magnitude of rust and dents in them. It felt almost inhumane to even keep those things, much less have someone drive them. I didn’t know if I should get inside one of them or take it out back and put a bullet through it.

The tale of a story OR How I learned to start fearing for my life – Chapter 5

5. The plan

Speechless is a poor substitute for how that number affected my state of mind. To say it put a damper in my negotiations would be like saying that your house burning down is making your living arrangements difficult. There was nothing that came to mind as an appropriate response. George was more clear minded then I was, so he responded on my behalf.

The tale of a story OR How I learned to start fearing for my life – Chapter 4

4. The price we pay

Now here’s the thing, I like to think of myself as well articulated, somewhat good looking individual with a possible bright future in writing. HOWEVER – please take note of the capital letters – none of that really qualifies me as a negotiator. Not even a bad one… come to think about it, I’m not that good when making any sort of deal.

*Note to self: learn how to negotiate business deals, possible bright future in hostage negotiations if writing never picks up (sorry, but like I said earlier, I tend to lose track of my thoughts sometimes, which is what a lot of people tell me, but it happens rarely, so it’s not like I have ADD or something like that… wait… were was I going with this? RIGHT!).

Having that said, here’s what happened next:

The tale of a story OR How I learned to start fearing for my life – Chapter 3

3. The scary, yet surprisingly arousing car ride

It was around 12:30 A.M., Andreea, George and myself were just exiting the bathroom – after helping George regurgitate the tequila he drank – when I realized the music stopped and the bar was empty with the exception of the bartender and two men I didn’t recognize. One of them was walking around the place, he seemed to asses the damage done to the bar, while the other was standing in the middle of the bar, just staring at us, until he said:

The tale of a story OR How I learned to start fearing for my life – Chapter 2

2. The bar

Like I said, I had never gone to many bars before, much less one called Iron Vikings. I could almost smell the testosterone fueled, motorcycle-loving, kick-your-ass-if-you-even-look-at-them-in-a-funny-way, kind of people that hanged out in bar with a name like that. As such, I knew I had to dress accordingly. I put on my only pair of black jeans, my black winter boots (it was summer by the way), a black T-shirt that had written on it: “Anarchy in the European Union” (that used to belong to my sister) and my dads old, black leather overcoat (seriously, and I can’t stress this out enough, IT WAS SUMMER, 32 degrees Celsius during the night and 43 during the day). Before leaving my apartment I practiced a few angry faces in the mirror, I wanted to be prepared for anything. On my way to the bar I also stopped at the local pet shop and bought one of those chains that are used instead of leashes (you know, in case your dog turns out to be a bear in disguise). I hanged the chain from my jeans, stopped to see my reflection in the store window and that’s when I knew I was ready for anything.