There was darkness then bright, bright light.

Stewart flipped his hands to protect his eyes from the illumination that streamed in from above.

He strained forward but a thick tight belt across his shoulder and one equally imposing across his waist kept him firmly locked into place.

It didn’t help matters that he felt logy from lack of sleep yet hyped up on bad coffee.

It only made matters worse that his head was spinning and he was a bit sick to his stomach.

He was recovering from the past horrific night and to be frank was a bit pissed that he was being interrogated in this manner.

He kept his mouth shut. Times like these demanded that kind of tact and decorum.

“More coffee?” a probing voice across from him asked, sensing Stewart’s apprehension.

The plump thumb of a stocky hand twisted the top off a thermos while the remaining ape fingers easily palmed the large bottle in place then prepared to pour.

Stewart shook his head, no. He felt numb.

“Did you say anything to him? Did the two of you talk?” the authoritative voice reverberated.

He thought hard but it was even harder to think than to feel. He came up blank and shrugged his shoulders.

“You don’t know?”

He was blank.

“Don’t know or can’t remember? Which one is it?”

“I don’t know - I mean I can’t remember.” Stewart said.

“And you’re very sure of that? Not a word?”

“No wait! I said I needed him.”

“Interesting. Why, do you suppose?”

“Well, not to fuck my wife!”

“Did you know some women while getting raped have had orgasms during the attack?” asked the older man.

“So you don’t think I’m crazy?”

“Women are complicated romantic beings.”

“So that’s all?”

“Maybe it isn’t anything more than you trying to understand her.”

“I guess so,” Stewart heaved with a sigh.

They heaved to a stop and the blinding light was mechanically extinguished by a sunroof which glided home after a button was pressed.

“Sorry about that,” said the driver as he looked at the bags under his eyes in the rear view mirror. “I need my vitamin D and it’s the only sun I have time to get these days.”

The elderly more distinguished man was Paul, an old family friend and almost a father figure to Stewart.

“You know, I’ve always been fascinated by dreams. Always had a bit of a knack at interpreting them.”

“So what do you think?”

“A complete and utter mystery.”

“Thanks,” Stewart said, sarcastically, who though again regretted forgetting his sunglasses was glad that the jerky ride was over and hopeful his car sickness would too soon be.

They walked towards a line of people which snaked around a large building.

“How did Janie take it?”

“She was shook up. She did a Google search and thinks I have night terrors but still wants me to go to the doctor. She said when she looked into my eyes it was like I wasn’t there.”

“Well, that doesn’t sound that bad.”

“Seems I was loud too.” Stewart continued. “The neighbors complained. The Russians. Which is why the cops came. Seems I was hitting things.”

Stewart suddenly felt very uncomfortable at his painfully honest revelation even if it was to Paul, a man he had known all of his life. He diverted: “I never knew you were into that stuff.”

“Yeah, well…, you can see how good I am at it.”

“Sure” he said a bit too sardonically. He hoped Paul wouldn’t detect his tone.

But the old man hadn’t. He was back to the task on hand.

“Business, though, is in the dumper. We can’t get a decent line of credit. And, our old one wasn’t extended. And, this was a line I’ve had for the last twenty years, mind you. Other than that things are great.”

Stewart smiled at the joke, not knowing it wasn’t intended. He didn’t have the heart to tell him he should keep his day job.

“Sorry about this,” said Paul referring to the long line which wove its way around the mammoth savings and loan.

Stewart grimaced less at the wait than at the procession of naïve faces who could have been medieval peasants on their way to church to receive sacrament. In their own way just as ignorant. In their own way just as needy of salvation.

Paul and Stewart became two more parishioners as the men, each glum for their own reason, walked up and stood at the end of the line.

They weren’t alone. Everyone in line shared somber tone, though looking at the inspiring altar gave them hope. They all prayed for help - or at least their money back.

For the same reasons the cathedrals were erected the way they were in the dark ages, modern banks were built to impress and inspire confidence. This one looked straight out of ancient Greece with Doric columns and Corinthian entablatures. It was a mismatch of ancient structures from different cultures and times. But no matter, nobody cared either way as long as the ATM crammed into the Roman arch belched out cash on demand.

Despite the forged heritage of a heterogeneous hunt-and-peck pedigree this bank, like the whole banking system, was threatening to fail. It was a time reminiscent of the Great Depression as massive deregulation led way to rampant business corruption. Banks were overextended with bad home loans that were sold in common stocks and bonds.

The whole resulting massive economic expansion was a house of cards which started to crumble when people, who couldn’t possibly afford their variable rate loans in the first place, started to default. Since loans were granted on “stated income” alone, suddenly, anyone could pull their broken down beater into a palatial new car port. Suddenly, everyone could be a “G” like the ones on “MTV Cribs”.

It didn’t matter because in the great game of passing the buck, after official paperwork was submitted, nobody would check. That also meant that not just the bank sector but the stock market as a whole would tumble in a vicious cycle after cash and credit dried up. And it wasn’t just a psychological reaction. Legitimately good businesses were really hurt in the process. Suddenly, being a “G” was more real than ever before

MBA students fresh out of grad school wanted to be a “G” too. They repackaged bad home loans into bonds and fraudulently made them desirable by intentionally messaging math to create an “AAA” rating instead of their deserved “BBB-” stamp. These wrongly labeled bonds were then sold to Asian Markets who would gobble up anything “AAA” because they were supposed to be safe. Suddenly it became a world problem.

People who had no idea in hell what a “G” was were becoming “G”s.

The whole system ran with the blind eye of Federal Reserve Chief Alan Greenspan who the nation and the world, in fact, trusted and thought could do no wrong. Little did they know he was a near-sighted captain. Little did they know there was a ship running out of control.

Alan Greenspan’s main remorseful defense when he addressed congress was that he thought more people in homes would provide greater national stability and of course continue the economic boom which was undeniably good for the nation. And, he admitted he was wrong.

He was too busy looking out the eyeglass in reverse to see a world more and more full of glorified “G”s.

Little did he know the ship would soon run aground. Little did he know the banks would soon go bust.

Stewart and Paul watched an old lady who started beating on one of the outdoor ATM machines. Any other day and people would have thought she had lost her mind as she bashed the state of the art touch screen with the hook of her cane. Today all that changed.

“Crooks! Crooks!” she screamed out as the fat manager bobbled out to reason with her.

The crowd applauded as she thrust and parry with her wooden foil to keep him at bay. Then, they laughed as she augmented her vehemence by squawking expletive spiced approbations accented by     syncopated purse strikes. Ultimately, though, their laughter darkened sliding into distress at the tragic comedy of the symbolic revenge on the system, ever so slight as it may be.

But, when the manger grabbed the old woman by a tattered sweater sleeve, and pulled her cane away, which caused her to cry out in pain, the crowd quickly denigrated into a mob who wouldn’t settle for mere symbolism anymore. They chased the bloated junior exec back into his mismatched castle which though designed by its very nature to keep bad people out now did the reverse.

The metal security gate draw bridge slammed down. The doors locked with a steely master lock click. And, the fluorescent lights uneasily flickered off effectively transporting the fat manager and his minimum wage serfs inside back to the dark ages.

“Well, this is no use.” said Paul as he started walking back towards his car with Stewart in tow. “They don’t want to hear about my credit issues. They’ve got problems of their own.”

“Will you be alright?”

“Oh sure. Maybe now I’ll finally just be forced to follow my bliss.”

“The dream stuff?”

“Right”, he said as they got in the Beemer.

Paul dropped the clutch and brought her to speed. As they roared passed the bank he opened the sunroof Stewart shielded his eyes, again.

But, then through his narrow slits Stewart felt the intense force of a glistening silver Mercedes AMG S65 which was so new and so mercilessly shiny that it may have well as sent two suns cruelly beaming directly into his eyes. He was forced to re-double his squint.

The car tore out of what could have been The Bat Cave but was actually the executive parking for the bank’s president. It ripped past them as if they were still horse and buggy and burned its way onto the freeway, chirruping its tires as the driver shifted into fifth.

It may have been the bank president inside but no human could possibly tell with having to see through the impossible 80% window tint and overcome the motion blur that went beyond the shutter capacity of the normal human eye; the car was just way too fast. And for anyone who wondered why an old business fossil could possibly need a twelve cylinder sports sedan fully equipped with twin-turbos, F1-inspired manual shifters and 604hp which would easily rocket the car to 62mph in well under five seconds… This was probably the reason.

To get away.

“Those guys always get away,” chirped Stewart.

“Look,” said Paul hopefully, as his Beemer, lumbering to follow the silver streak onto the freeway, was passed by flashing blue and red lights.

A siren roared as the highway patrol cruiser pulled up on the tail of the AMG. Behind the Benz, the police chopper aggressively wove back and forth but then at the last moment let him go with a flash of his brights and the sad cry of a dying siren. A black glove gave a thumbs up out the window over the surveillance light.

As the police car turned off its lights and slowly rolled to a stop on the shoulder the AMG S65 went supersonic.

Stewart shook his head at the officers as Paul’s Beemer passed them. “They’re letting him go?”

“11-99 plates. If you’re rich enough you can buy your way out of anything. When you have that kind of money avoiding a speeding ticket is a convenience issue, not an economic one.”

“That’s fucked.”

“Yeah, life’s a shit sandwich. Welcome to our world.”

“Huh?” said Stewart revisiting yet another bad dream.

“Buy something nice for Janie. You know?”

Paul’s voice trailed off as the loping rumble of the engine eased Stewart into a day-dream like the heart beat of a mother sooths a child.

He thought about what it meant to be very rich. To have so much money that even getting a new car or yacht or house, or anything, becomes boring.

He dreamt about living a pampering life protected by padded cushions everywhere.

“Padded coffins” he said aloud.

“Huh?” Paul said as he downshifted and rolled to a stop at the bottom of the off ramp.

“Most people only dream of living as padded a life as they’re getting on their way out.”

“Now you’ve got me” said Paul.

“Nothing. Sorry.”

Still he wanted that padded life. It made perfect sense to him and everyone was doing it from the hamsters he just saw in their cages with Janie who stuffed their cheeks with food to people like Bernie Madoff, who were beyond rich, yet still created Ponzi schemes to become even richer. Too much was never enough when it came to padding. When it came to self-protection. When it came to being safe.

A fragment of the dream from last night flashed back into his mind: ‘be the protector but still feel protected’.

When they were almost at Stewart’s he turned to Paul: “Got time for a field trip?”

“That’s my boy!” Paul bounced back for once intuiting the moment with perfection. He pulled the car over and waited for further directions.

As Stewart relayed their destination, he, for that one all to brief moment, felt very safe by being called ’son’ by his old mentor who was indeed very much a father figure.

After they arrived, he got out and turned to Paul, then said with a smile on his face: “Hey, when you do finally go into this new-age dream interpretation stuff it may be best if you don’t throw around phrases around like ’shit sandwich’. You know?”

“Be good” Paul smiled back as he dropped the clutch and drove off.

Stewart found himself back inside his old Petco. This time he was the one oblivious to the whispers of the cashier girls who recounted and doubled the extent of his crazy angry tirade the last time he was in the store with Janie.

Oblivious to it all he went up to the cashier and asked: “Have anything… hamster related?”

It didn’t help matters that he felt logy from lack of sleep yet hyped up on bad coffee.

It only made matters worse that his head was spinning and he was a bit sick to his stomach.

He was recovering from the past horrific night and to be frank was a bit pissed that he was being interrogated in this manner.

He kept his mouth shut. Times like these demanded that kind of tact and decorum.

“More coffee?” a probing voice across from him asked, sensing Stewart’s apprehension.

The plump thumb of a stocky hand twisted the top off a thermos while the remaining ape fingers easily palmed the large bottle in place then prepared to pour.

Stewart shook his head, no. He felt numb.

“Did you say anything to him? Did the two of you talk?” the authoritative voice reverberated.

He thought hard but it was even harder to think than to feel. He came up blank and shrugged his shoulders.

“You don’t know?”

He was blank.

“Don’t know or can’t remember? Which one is it?”

“I don’t know – I mean I can’t remember.” Stewart said.

“And you’re very sure of that? Not a word?”

“No wait! I said I needed him.”

“Interesting. Why, do you suppose?”

“Well, not to fuck my wife!”

“Did you know some women while getting raped have had orgasms during the attack?” asked the older man.

“So you don’t think I’m crazy?”

“Women are complicated romantic beings.”

“So that’s all?”

“Maybe it isn’t anything more than you trying to understand her.”

“I guess so,” Stewart heaved with a sigh.

They heaved to a stop and the blinding light was mechanically extinguished by a sunroof which glided home after a button was pressed.

“Sorry about that,” said the driver as he looked at the bags under his eyes in the rear view mirror. “I need my vitamin D and it’s the only sun I have time to get these days.”

The elderly more distinguished man was Paul, an old family friend and almost a father figure to Stewart.

“You know, I’ve always been fascinated by dreams. Always had a bit of a knack at interpreting them.”

“So what do you think?”

“A complete and utter mystery.”

“Thanks,” Stewart said, sarcastically, who though again regretted forgetting his sunglasses was glad that the jerky ride was over and hopeful his car sickness would too soon be.

They walked towards a line of people which snaked around a large building.

“How did Janie take it?”

“She was shook up. She did a Google search and thinks I have night terrors but still wants me to go to the doctor. She said when she looked into my eyes it was like I wasn’t there.”

“Well, that doesn’t sound that bad.”

“Seems I was loud too.” Stewart continued. “The neighbors complained. The Russians. Which is why the cops came. Seems I was hitting things.”

Stewart suddenly felt very uncomfortable at his painfully honest revelation even if it was to Paul, a man he had known all of his life. He diverted: “I never knew you were into that stuff.”

“Yeah, well…, you can see how good I am at it.”

“Sure” he said a bit too sardonically. He hoped Paul wouldn’t detect his tone.

But the old man hadn’t. He was back to the task on hand.

“Business, though, is in the dumper. We can’t get a decent line of credit. And, our old one wasn’t extended. And, this was a line I’ve had for the last twenty years, mind you. Other than that things are great.”

Stewart smiled at the joke, not knowing it wasn’t intended. He didn’t have the heart to tell him he should keep his day job.

“Sorry about this,” said Paul referring to the long line which wove its way around the mammoth savings and loan.

Stewart grimaced less at the wait than at the procession of naïve faces who could have been medieval peasants on their way to church to receive sacrament. In their own way just as ignorant. In their own way just as needy of salvation.

Paul and Stewart became two more parishioners as the men, each glum for their own reason, walked up and stood at the end of the line.

They weren’t alone. Everyone in line shared somber tone, though looking at the inspiring altar gave them hope. They all prayed for help – or at least their money back.

For the same reasons the cathedrals were erected the way they were in the dark ages, modern banks were built to impress and inspire confidence. This one looked straight out of ancient Greece with Doric columns and Corinthian entablatures. It was a mismatch of ancient structures from different cultures and times. But no matter, nobody cared either way as long as the ATM crammed into the Roman arch belched out cash on demand.

Despite the forged heritage of a heterogeneous hunt-and-peck pedigree this bank, like the whole banking system, was threatening to fail. It was a time reminiscent of the Great Depression as massive deregulation led way to rampant business corruption. Banks were overextended with bad home loans that were sold in common stocks and bonds.

The whole resulting massive economic expansion was a house of cards which started to crumble when people, who couldn’t possibly afford their variable rate loans in the first place, started to default. Since loans were granted on “stated income” alone, suddenly, anyone could pull their broken-down beater into a palatial new car port. Suddenly, everyone could be a “G” like the ones on “MTV Cribs”.

It didn’t matter because in the great game of passing the buck, after official paperwork was submitted, nobody would check. That also meant that not just the bank sector but the stock market as a whole would tumble in a vicious cycle after cash and credit dried up. And it wasn’t just a psychological reaction. Legitimately good businesses were really hurt in the process. Suddenly, being a “G” was more real than ever before.

MBA students fresh out of grad school wanted to be a “G” too. They repackaged bad home loans into bonds and fraudulently made them desirable by intentionally messaging math to create an “AAA” rating instead of their deserved “BBB-” stamp. These wrongly labeled bonds were then sold to Asian Markets who would gobble up anything “AAA” because they were supposed to be safe. Suddenly it became a world problem.

People who had no idea in hell what a “G” was were becoming “G”s.

The whole system ran with the blind eye of Federal Reserve Chief Alan Greenspan who the nation and the world, in fact, trusted and thought could do no wrong. Little did they know he was a near-sighted captain. Little did they know there was a ship running out of control.

Alan Greenspan’s main remorseful defense when he addressed congress was that he thought more people in homes would provide greater national stability and of course continue the economic boom which was undeniably good for the nation. And, he admitted he was wrong.

He was too busy looking out the eyeglass in reverse to see a world more and more full of glorified “G”s.

Little did he know the ship would soon run aground. Little did he know the banks would soon go bust.

Stewart and Paul watched an old lady who started beating on one of the outdoor ATM machines. Any other day and people would have thought she had lost her mind as she bashed the state of the art touch screen with the hook of her cane. Today all that changed.

“Crooks! Crooks!” she screamed out as the fat manager bobbled out to reason with her.

The crowd applauded as she thrust and parry with her wooden foil to keep him at bay. Then, they laughed as she augmented her vehemence by squawking expletive spiced approbations accented by syncopated purse strikes. Ultimately, though, their laughter darkened sliding into distress at the tragic comedy of the symbolic revenge on the system, ever so slight as it may be.

But, when the manger grabbed the old woman by a tattered sweater sleeve, and pulled her cane away, which caused her to cry out in pain, the crowd quickly denigrated into a mob who wouldn’t settle for mere symbolism anymore. They chased the bloated junior exec back into his mismatched castle which though designed by its very nature to keep bad people out now did the reverse.

The metal security gate draw bridge slammed down. The doors locked with a steely master lock click. And, the fluorescent lights uneasily flickered off effectively transporting the fat manager and his minimum wage serfs inside back to the dark ages.

“Well, this is no use.” said Paul as he started walking back towards his car with Stewart in tow. “They don’t want to hear about my credit issues. They’ve got problems of their own.”

“Will you be alright?”

“Oh sure. Maybe now I’ll finally just be forced to follow my bliss.”

“The dream stuff?”

“Right”, he said as they got in the Beemer.

Paul dropped the clutch and brought her to speed. As they roared passed the bank he opened the sunroof Stewart shielded his eyes, again.

But, then through his narrow slits Stewart felt the intense force of a glistening silver Mercedes AMG S65 which was so new and so mercilessly shiny that it may have well as sent two suns cruelly beaming directly into his eyes. He was forced to re-double his squint.

The car tore out of what could have been The Bat Cave but was actually the executive parking for the bank’s president. It ripped past them as if they were still horse and buggy and burned its way onto the freeway, chirruping its tires as the driver shifted into fifth.

It may have been the bank president inside but no human could possibly tell with having to see through the impossible 80% window tint and overcome the motion blur that went beyond the shutter capacity of the normal human eye; the car was just way too fast. And for anyone who wondered why an old business fossil could possibly need a twelve cylinder sports sedan fully equipped with twin-turbos, F1-inspired manual shifters and 604hp which would easily rocket the car to 62mph in well under five seconds… This was probably the reason.

To get away.

“Those guys always get away,” chirped Stewart.

“Look,” said Paul hopefully, as his Beemer, lumbering to follow the silver streak onto the freeway, was passed by flashing blue and red lights.

A siren roared as the highway patrol cruiser pulled up on the tail of the AMG. Behind the Benz, the police chopper aggressively wove back and forth but then at the last moment let him go with a flash of his brights and the sad cry of a dying siren. A black glove gave a thumbs up out the window over the surveillance light.

As the police car turned off its lights and slowly rolled to a stop on the shoulder the AMG S65 went supersonic.

Stewart shook his head at the officers as Paul’s Beemer passed them. “They’re letting him go?”

“11-99 plates. If you’re rich enough you can buy your way out of anything. When you have that kind of money avoiding a speeding ticket is a convenience issue, not an economic one.”

“That’s fucked.”

“Yeah, life’s a shit sandwich. Welcome to our world.”

“Huh?” said Stewart revisiting yet another bad dream.

“Buy something nice for Janie. You know?”

Paul’s voice trailed off as the loping rumble of the engine eased Stewart into a day-dream like the heart beat of a mother sooths a child.

He thought about what it meant to be very rich. To have so much money that even getting a new car or yacht or house, or anything, becomes boring.

He dreamt about living a pampering life protected by padded cushions everywhere.

“Padded coffins” he said aloud.

“Huh?” Paul said as he downshifted and rolled to a stop at the bottom of the off ramp.

“Most people only dream of living as padded a life as they’re getting on their way out.”

“Now you’ve got me” said Paul.

“Nothing. Sorry.”

Still he wanted that padded life. It made perfect sense to him and everyone was doing it from the hamsters he just saw in their cages with Janie who stuffed their cheeks with food to people like Bernie Madoff, who were beyond rich, yet still created Ponzi schemes to become even richer. Too much was never enough when it came to padding. When it came to self-protection. When it came to being safe.

A fragment of the dream from last night flashed back into his mind: ‘be the protector but still feel protected’.

When they were almost at Stewart’s he turned to Paul: “Got time for a field trip?”

“That’s my boy!” Paul bounced back for once intuiting the moment with perfection. He pulled the car over and waited for further directions.

As Stewart relayed their destination, he, for that one all to brief moment, felt very safe by being called ‘son’ by his old mentor who was indeed very much a father figure.

After they arrived, he got out and turned to Paul, then said with a smile on his face: “Hey, when you do finally go into this new-age dream interpretation stuff it may be best if you don’t throw around phrases around like ‘shit sandwich’. You know?”

“Be good” Paul smiled back as he dropped the clutch and drove off.

Stewart found himself back inside his old Petco. This time he was the one oblivious to the whispers of the cashier girls who recounted and doubled the extent of his crazy angry tirade the last time he was in the store with Janie.

Oblivious to it all he went up to the cashier and asked: “Have anything… hamster related?”< >< ><-->

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