The Business by confusedalarms . (read the beginning after the end novel .txt) 📖

Sights few men could look upon and stay calm, and those men were mostly criminals, murderers or psychopaths. No! You're not going to go there again! Think! What's

the point? You'll just get yourself crying again! Of all the days in

your life this is the one where you need to stay ALERT and FOCUSED!

Alright wise-speaking voice, you win. He realised he was still standing just outside his door. It could have been 10 seconds, could've been 10 minutes since he had opened it. He didn't know, he didn't heve a watch. Watches were for people who followed the rules. The business wasn't so strict. His night's waiting in an alley had proved that. They had eternal life, so what did it matter if they wasted a day or two doing nothing? What did it matter if they showed up late for meetings? They didn't need sleep, so it was never too late. He descended the narrow metal staircase leading up to his apartment and walked out onto the main street and through Las Vegas. As he walked he passed by a motel distastefully called Last Resort. No!

, he thought. NOOOO!! You are NOT going to walk down your stupid...

III: Memory Lane

July 1992. He was Mark Anderson, a normal young man in his late teens, who had rushed into a marriage with his high school love Tina Lee. It was the first night of their marriage. They had just entered their hotel suite with the words 'Just Married' handwritten in his mother's neat, curvy handwriting on a cardboard sign taped to the door. They could hear the afterparty going on downstairs, but paid no attention to it. They only had attention for each other.
'Well, that was painless', Tina said in her high voice that was like butter to his ears. They had been a little anxious about Tina's parents' reaction at the wedding, as they hadn't been exactly delighted with Mark and weren't really supporters of early marriage (just four moths after they had met each other at the diner where she was a waitress). But the crucial moment, when the master of ceremonies says 'Speak now or forever hold your tongue', they had both remained silent, though it has seemed like they had had trouble stopping themselves from shouting out.
'You can say that again,' he said.
'Well, that was painless,' she obeyed. That was just Tina, silly jokes like that, that was one of the reasons why he loved her so much. That and the ass, of course. Because it was the ass that had caught his attention at that diner, not her jokes, because you don't tell jokes when you're waiting tables at 3 am. He watched as she began unzipping the somewhat more compact dress she had put on after the ceremony to be able to walk around. He watched as she revealed her young body. They had both been raised Catholic and had agreed not to have sex until they were married. It was their first time, and there aren't many things in your life that are more exciting than your first time. This was what they had been thinking about since they had officially been pronounced husband and wife. If he was honest to himself it was what he had been thinking about since he had turned 13 and had borrowed a sex tape from one of his friends, discovering for the first time the wonders of masturbation. He watched as she began unhooking her bra to reveal a pair of young, round, as of yet uncaressed breasts. Already he could feel the excitement bubbling inside him, already he could feel his dick getting hard. This is going to be short but awesome

, he thought.

February 1993. As it turned out he was right. Their happiness as a couple had been short but awesome. They had gone on honeymoon to a luxurious resort in Florida for two weeks, something they both had been saving up for since they had first decided to get married. There they had had sex exactly 32 times, and as time went by he was getting better at controlling himself. That first time in the hotel room had lasted 3 minutes at best, if you only counted the actual deed. Now he could control himself enough to keep from coming about 20 minutes after they had really taken off, which was good for her and for him, too. She hadn't come yet, but they had read in some advice books from the library that most women had to wait years for their first orgasm and that it was extremely rare to have an orgasm the very first time, so they weren't worried. 'I'll just have to be patient, she had said, 'After all, we have years to come, don't we?' 'We sure do, my love.' But they couldn't have been more wrong. In fact it had alreay started when they had come back from the honeymoon to find that Tina's mother had died in a car accident. Their marriage's first test came too soon, and too soon they were fighting every night over stupid things, fights that usually ended with Mark making Tina cry, Mark melting immediately and trying to comfort her, and then Tina going to spend the night at her father's. But one day, after one of many such fights, Mark had been thinking. What if she doesn't go to her father's at

all?

This thought had been so believeable that he had taken his bike (they didn't have a car yet) and rode it to Tina's father's house two miles away. When he had rung the doorbell there had been no answer and all the lights had been off. She's not here.

This couldn't be true. Oh yes it can.

He had then cruised every motel within a 10-mile radius of his house. There had been 12 motels, he still knew that number. After he had been to the 11th empty motel, he was finally beginning to feel a little relieved. Maybe they were asleep

, he kept thinking. But he was going to check that last one, Last Resort

, too, just to be sure. It was only a quarter mile away, he could be home by 2.30. He had arrived there and walked into the somewhat dirty lobby.

'Are there any guests right now?' he had asked the sullen-looking receptionist.
'Yea,' she had said, chewing pink bubblegum,
'Room 7. But I wouldn't disturb 'em if I was you. They sound like they're havin' a good go at it. Can ya hear?'

He could. They were in one of the rooms closest to the lobby. He ran up the stairs, ignoring the 'What the hell d'you think you're doing?' form a cleaning lady that was sweeping the floor, saw a door with the number 7 painted in peeling black paint across it, and threw it open. And there she was, lying on the bed, getting her ass pounded by some black guy. Her ASS

, for fuck's sake! During the honeymoon he had asked maybe 10 times if they could at least try, but she was the stricter catholic and had said that it was against the Lord to have anal sex. And now here she was, with some random nigger, doing the very thing she had refused to do for her husband, who had always been very loving and considerate toward her.

'Mark! Oh shit!', she cried.
'Who the fuck is that?!', he screamed.
'How DARE you, Tina!'
'Wowowow, you married babe?', the nigger asked. So he didn't know.
'You stay outta this, asshole, or you're gonna get your dick cut off!'
'Chill, dawg!'
'Mark, please calm down. We can.. '
'CALM DOWN! YOU WERE GONNA TELL ME TO CALM DOWN WHEN YOU'RE THE ONE GETTING ASSFUCKED BY SOMEGUY AT A MOTEL?!!'
' Mark..'
'No Tina! We're done! If there was anything left between us it's gone now. Goodbye.'
He walked out the door.
'Mark, please, I'm sorry! Wait! Mark..'

But he was gone.

January 1994. He now lived in the center of Las Vegas instead of in the suburbs. He had stayed at a motel after leaving Last Resort

, and the next day he had rented a small place above a Starbucks shop for $150 a week. He had gotten a job as an order-accepter/coffeeserver at the Starbucks he lived above and earned a salary of $1250 a month. The Starbucks didn't have long hours and he didn't have to stand in traffic jams every morning. All he had to do was go down the stairs and into the shop through the back door. He was happy for now, but knew he couldn't work in a Starbucks forever. He had to get a job that payed better. The problem however was that he wasn't a very bright person. In fact he had dropped out of high school in his last year, so he didn't have any qualifications, which worked against him at every job interview he went to. So for now he was stuck in Sin City. He had begun to hate the nickname of the city. It reminded him too much of Tina, and her reluctance to sin with him during the honeymoon, the memory of which was now starting to fade as if it had happened 10 years ago instead of 2.
Friday the 13th of January started in perfectly normal fashion. 6:00am wake up, 6:30am get out of bed, 6:45am breakfast, 7:00am Go to work, 7:01am arrive at work, 12:00am lunch. But after lunch, around 2:00pm, something happened that changed the course of his life. The Starbucks wasn't really crowded, there were about 5 people in, so it was hard to miss them walking through the door. But he didn't see them because he was taking a piss. He flushed and went through the door to the bar he stood behind 8 and a half hours a day, and there they stood. Tina and some guy.

'Mark! Oh!'', she said.
'Who is this, darling?', the guy said.
'This is my former husband.'
'Oh...oh shit.'
'Let's go, Dave,' she said and they quickly started walking.
'Wait a minute!' They turned around.'How long has this been going on?', he asked.
'8 months. In fact, we're engaged. Why?,'she said.
'Oh, I just...' he turned around and walked into the back of the shop, where he sat down on a box of whatever and held his head in his arms. He didn't know how long he sat there. Thoughts, terrible thoughts, went trough his head. 8 months...wait a minute. That means she got it on with him only 3 months after. I was deeply depressed and suicidal for 6 goddamn months! She didn't love me. She lied to me. She sinned. She must pay...pay for her sins...but