A week had passed. For the vast majority of the people in Los Angeles, life was good. But life was not good for Albert.
Albert’s house was in shambles. Dirty clothes were scattered all over the floor in his bedroom.
The kitchen had days of dirty dishes piled in the sink. The garbage overflowed with trash, and it stung to high heaven.
Inside his den were numerous empty TV dinner trays and other discarded food containers scattered on the floor near his lazy boy chair.
There were three empty Jack Daniels bottles on the computer table near his seventeen-inch MacBook Pro laptop.
The inside of his house was starting to look like a landfill.
Albert sat depressed in his lazy boy chair while staring at the blank TV. His hair was a mess, and he had two weeks of beard stubble. To him, his life was over.
Another week passed, and Albert sat in his office. It was a mess. Papers were thrown all over the floor and all over his desk. He has been weeks behind on his project, and management has started to notice.
Albert sat at his desk and stared out the window. His work clothes looked as if he had slept in them; his beard stubble was longer, and his hair was still uncombed. It had been two days since he showered. Albert looked pathetic.
Another week passed, and Albert walked out of the liquor store with a bag of booze in hand.
His hair and beard were even longer, and people avoided him, thinking he was a creepy homeless bum.
Yet another week passed, and Albert sat in his messy house. He took long swigs from a Jack Daniels bottle while staring at the blank TV from his lazy boy chair.
He leaned over and barfed on the carpet.
Another week of depression passed for Albert.
Albert moped through his office area. It’s been four days since he showered. His clothes were wrinkled, and he got stares and whispers from his coworkers who once respected Albert.
Albert went inside his office and sat down at his desk. He just glanced out his windows with a blank, lifeless stare.
Five minutes passed, and Henry Yates, the sixty-five-year-old senior executive of the architectural firm, entered Albert’s office with a cardboard box in hand.
He walked over and set the box on Albert’s desk.
“Mister Taylor, we no longer require your services. Please pack your personal belongings and leave the premises within thirty minutes. You can stop by my secretary’s desk and pick up your severance pay,” Henry said, then turned around and walked out of his office and slammed the door shut.
Albert looked at the box. His eyes welled up as his life was slowly being flushed down the toilet.
Later that day, Albert drove his 2010 blue Prius in a daze. His cardboard box of personal belongings sat in the passenger seat.
Albert drove his Prius right through a red light. Numerous other cars blew horns, screeched, swerved, and cussed while they missed his car by inches.
A few days later, Albert moped down to his mailbox in his tee shirt and underwear.
Albert opened his mailbox and removed four days’ worth of mail. He thumbed through the envelopes that piqued his interest. He saw one from his mortgage company, and it was a letter for late payments. Albert ripped up the letter and let the pieces rain to the ground.
He moped back to the house with the other mail.
A few days later, it was Sunday night.
Albert was drunk again. This time, he went up to the rooftop of the Wilcox building in the Los Angeles area that was now ninety-five percent complete. It was the building he designed, but he didn’t get a chance to finish it because he got fired.
Albert sat on the parapet with another bottle of Jack Daniels in hand. His feet dangled over the side where there was a four-hundred-foot drop.
He stared up at the stars and pretended he was looking up at heaven. “Ginger, I love you too very much. I can’t handle living without you. You were my whole life,” he said to the stars while his eyes welled up.
Then one of the stars up in the sky grew bright, then dim, and he didn’t notice since he was staring out at the Los Angeles area. It was the city where Ginger and Albert once had a sweet, romantic life.
Albert took a massive gulp of whiskey and swayed toward the ground. He started to fall over the side, and his eyes widened in shock the second he thought he knew he was going to fall. He didn’t care. Then, all of a sudden, there was an invisible force that pushed against his chest. He fell backward and landed on his back on the gravel rooftop.
He passed out.
Meanwhile, over in Washington, D.C., inside the White House, President Barrow sat at his desk in the Oval Office.
Jason Stone, the fifty-five-year-old Chief of Staff, sat in a chair while Vice President Richard Stanton, sixty years old, sat on the couch. “We’re still on track for the Vegas visit next week,” he told the President.
“And the Andy Fig show?” President Barrow replied.
“The best seats in the house,” Jason replied.
“I better practice my trumpet and get my embouchure back,” President Barrow stated.
“Are you sure the country is ready for your trumpet playing?” Vice President Stanton teased.
President Barrow chuckled. “I hope so.”
Jason gave a smile, but inside, he wasn’t sure it would be a good idea for the President to botch up while playing the trumpet in front of a live audience.
A side door suddenly opened, and eight-year-old Kristen Woods entered the Oval Office. She ran over to the President with a limp.
President Barrow moved his chair away from his desk while she ran over to him.
“Grandpa!” she cried out in joy, then jumped on his lap.
“Be careful, honey, you don’t want to hurt me,” he told her.
“No way! I love the President,” she replied, then kissed his cheek.
“I tell you what, Kristen, why don’t you come up on stage with me in Vegas?” he said to her, then looked at Jason. “Can we do that?” he asked.
“It won’t be a problem. I’ll arrange it,” Jason replied.
Kristen’s eyes widened with joy. “Can I sing?”
“I don’t see why not. We’ll do that song you love,” President Barrow offered.
Kristen hugged him. “You’re the best grandpa,” she said.
Kathy Barrow, the sixty-year-old First Lady, entered from another side door.
“It’s time for bed, Kristen, and I can imagine the President has important matters to discuss,” the First Lady told her.
“Okay, Grandma,” she said, then gave the President another kiss on the cheek before jumping down from his lap.
“Goodnight, Mister President,” Kristen said while she walked over to the First Lady.
President Barrow smiled while everybody watched Kristen walk over to the First Lady. They left.
“She seems to be coping with the loss of her parents,” Jason told the President.
“She’s getting better. That car accident was terrible, and it’s a miracle she survived. I’m thinking her doing this concert with me will be great for her spirit,” he told Jason.
Vice President Stanton looked a little bothered overhearing that story about Kristen. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” he asked President Barrow.
“Of course. The public would love to hear Kristen sing,” President Barrow replied. “So let’s get that in work,” he said to Jason.
“Yes, sir. I’ll call Andy’s agent and get this worked out. I’m sure he’ll be happy to accommodate,” Jason replied.
“Thank you, Jason.”
“No problem, sir,” Jason replied, then stood up. “I’m going to head to my office and get this in work right away,” he said, then walked to the side door and left.
President Barrow and Vice President Stanton had a brief discussion about other matters concerning the country.
The sun rose the next morning over the Los Angeles area.
Upon the roof of the Wilcox Building, three construction workers went up there for some touch-up work. They saw Albert, still on his back, near the parapet wall.
“What the fuck is that?” the one worker asked his buddy.
“He looks like a homeless bum,” the second worker replied while they walked closer to Albert.
“He smells like one,” the third worker replied with a nasal tone from pinching his nostrils closed.
The three workers walked up to Albert and saw the Jack Daniels bottle on the gravel with whiskey still inside.
“Yep, he’s a drunk,” the one worker commented.
The one worker lightly kicked Albert’s side. “Wake up, you stinking bum,” he said.
Albert stirred a little.
The worker again lightly kicked Albert’s side. “Wake the fuck up, you bum,” the worker said.
Albert woke up and saw the three constructions that stared down at him.
Two of the workers reached down, and they each grabbed one of Albert’s arms. They brought him to his feet.
“You’re trespassing,” one worker told Albert.
They escorted Albert, who was still groggy, away.
Five minutes later, the three workers, along with the foreman, walked Albert out of the front entrance of the Wilcox Building.
“If we find you here again, we’ll call the police and press trespassing charges. Do you understand?” the foreman told Albert.
Albert nodded that he understood and stumbled away.
The foreman and the three workers watched Albert stagger away.
“He sure looked familiar,” the foreman said.
“A stinky bum is a stinky bum. And Los Angeles is full of stinky bums,” the one worker replied.
The other workers nodded in agreement, and then they went back inside to begin work on completing the building.
Albert stumbled over to his Prius. Then his eyes widened, and he bent over. He barfed by the rear of his car. Albert wiped his mouth, got inside his car, started it up, and drove off.
Albert must have had an angel watching over him because he ran through three red lights and avoided nine close calls without crashing his car.
Albert got home and immediately went to bed, sleeping for most of the day.
Later that night, the sky was again filled with twinkling stars. Then one of the stars grew bright, then dimmed.
Inside his den, Albert sat in his lazy boy chair and stared at the TV while he drank another whiskey bottle.
His MacBook Pro laptop mysteriously powered up.
Albert noticed and set the bottle on the floor. He got up, walked over, and shut down his laptop.
Albert walked back to the lazy boy’s chair and sat down. His laptop powered back up.
Albert turned around and saw the Heavenly Chat website on his monitor. It featured beautiful angels that flew over beautiful countryside, accompanied by the words “Chat With A Beautiful Angel” that scrolled across the top of the site.
Albert got up and walked over to their laptop, closing the website. It reappeared.
Albert closed it again. It reappeared.
Albert turned off and unplugged his laptop.
He moped out of the den.
It was the next morning, and Albert rolled out of bed around eleven twelve.
Albert went into the den and grabbed the Jack Daniels bottle off the floor by his lazy boy chair. He took a swig.
His laptop mysteriously powered back up, and the Heavenly Chat website appeared.
Albert saw the website and dropped his bottle, a little pissed. It smashed on the floor.
He rushed out of the den and made a call with his cell phone.
Two hours later, Albert’s doorbell rang.
Albert walked into his living room and up to his front door. He opened it, and Rodney, a twenty-two-year-old skinny computer geek with glasses, stood outside. He held an attaché case with software to fix any computer problem.
“Did you call about some problems with your MacBook laptop?” Rodney said.
“Yeah,” Albert replied and let Rodney inside.
Rodney looked at the pigsty while he walked through the house. “What a pig!” Rodney thought while entering the den and stepping over old, crusty microwave dinner boxes.
Albert walked him up to the computer desk.
“My laptop keeps on turning on, and this website called Heavenly Chat keeps appearing. I can’t get it to stop,” Albert told Rodney.
“Hum, that’s really odd,” Rodney said, then opened his briefcase and thumbed through the discs, looking for one he felt would fix Albert’s problem.
An hour passed, and Rodney was finished with Albert’s MacBook Pro laptop.
“Well, I updated your anti-virus program, removed some viruses, installed the best popup blocker program, and did some other maintenance. That should eliminate your problem,” Rodney stated.
They both stared at the monitor, and the website didn’t appear.
“We got it fixed,” Rodney said and looked proud of himself for fixing another computer problem.
He packed up his discs and shoved them in his attaché case.
Albert handed Rodney a check and then escorted him out of the den.
After Rodney left the house, Albert walked back into the den. He got pissed when he saw the Heavenly Chat website reappear.
Albert sat down, frustrated, at his computer desk. “Okay, you win!”
The “Become A Member” banner scrolled across the screen on the monitor.
Albert became curious, so he clicked on the banner.
The “Please Enter A Username” block appeared.
Albert thought for a few seconds, then typed “ATScrewed” for his username and hit the Submit button.
The “Welcome ATScrewed! You May Now Chat With One Of Our Angels” message appeared.
A chat window appeared, and Angel 12978 was assigned to it.
“Why are you harassing me?” Albert typed as his response to picking an Angel.
“We wouldn’t do that,” the words from Angel 12978 appeared.
“But your website won’t go away,” Albert typed in a response.
“That’s because you need me,” the words from Angel 12978 appeared.
“Need you? Why would I need you?”
“You’ll find out,” the words from Angel 12978 appeared.
The Heavenly Chat website suddenly disappeared.
“I need a new computer and a stiff drink,” Albert said, then got up and walked out of his den.