Vera wasn't anti intellectual, it was simply that pragmatism was her grounding spot. There wasn't the nuance, for her is was just noise, stray data around the margins to prevented getting to the heart of things. It was in her taste in clothes (largely Goodwill) and her choice of music…for her is was the ONE album, "Double Nickels on the Dime", which would always come on at some random spot when she started her car. It was a weird sense of pragmatism even her; let someone else make the mix tape, so that it is all different and all the same.
Alfredo rolled over, and ended up sitting on the edge of the bed. The dim glow of electronics was enough of a nightlight to make out Vera's profile. She lay still. Alfredo, on the other hand, always hogged the bed. But somehow he managed.
It was at this moment in contemplation that he heard the sound of a car door opening. Downstairs. In front of his house.
He waited.
He heard the definite sound of a car door creaking. Definitely. Vera drove a 1975 Chevy Nova. The door definitely squeaked.
At this point, Alfredo had to make a decision. A very hard thing for him to do. He had just argued with himself for half an hour……about italian neo-realism. Now, he needed to find his cell phone….it was downstairs…..sitting on the coffee table in the living room.
He put is slippers on, thinking it would deaden his steps as he crept downstairs. He was tempted to peek outside, and paused for just a microsecond to look at the front door, but then he snapped back into focus, and found the phone, just where he left it. A small miracle indeed.
The next 5 minutes will be re-examined again and again….in the future, in the same way that those pesky italian neo-realists argued in Alfredo's head. Things became quite blurry, but there was evidence at the end that could point to some of the major points.
First, there was the phone call. It was, as records would later show, brief and incoherent. 15 seconds, to cover the most basic of information: a noise outside, and an address. After the briefest of time, Alfredo decided to look outside after all, as he could now hear the sound of a engine's starter kicking in and out.
He doesn't remember grabbing the umbrella. Creeping out of the back of the house, looping around to the front, hiding under the bushes. The car kicked in, and shut off again. Alfredo could see someone half in and half out of the car.
He then ran towards the car, and gave the car door a good kick. Some one cursed. The thief stood up, and unexplicably Alfred found a Sony Explod radio/CD car dash unit hurtling towards him, but fortunately the thief was a poor aim, and it fell on the ground.
What happened next seemed like destiny, as a CD popped out. Alfred picked it up, and threw it like a frisbee.
It is important to understand that Music CD's are not frisbees. They do not fly particularly well. They have a tendency to turn sideways, which this one did. But it did hit the car thief squarely in the head, and despite it's small mass, knocked him over. Alfredo doesn't remember this part - the part about the umbrella, but when the unknown person started to get up, evidentially he was met with a solid whack from the pink umbrella.
Later they would find fragments of the Minuteman CD on the ground. Alfredo offered no explanation, but in retrospect, should have at least made something up. There was definitely a chance to elaborate. He was so unfamiliar with actually acting on something immediately. It actually made him uncomfortable. Vera, on the other hand, saved the fragments for many years. Alfredo, for her, was a tiger in a pair of bedroom slippers.
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