Officer Lowell, it’s good to have you back on the squad.
Honestly, I have no problem about being back here.
Glad to hear it. And just to be up front, when you injured your hip running after those young toughs stealing Mrs. Biltson’s TV set, I honestly figgered you might be better off working desk duty. In some other station, far away from here. But that didn’t quite work out. So, you came back, and that’s great.
Yup.
Then I thought you might enjoy traffic duty. You know, doing all that crazy waving to let the cars go by. Turns out, though, you need two good hands to do that. And, if we can believe what the doctors tell us–heh,heh–you’ve only got one. So, once again, we were fortunate to get you back.
Indeed.
There was also that time me and the guys thought you might just want to retire, what with being old and all, so we took it upon ourselves to remove your locker, throw it in the river, and replace it with a vintage KISS pinball machine. But I guess you really had no intention of retiring, so I apologize for that.
We live, we learn.
Then there was that time we wanted to send you to the local fire station in exchange for one of those cute spotty dogs. Sure, the dog lost half its brain in a nasty scrap with a fox and would flail violently at any and all humans it came in contact with unless someone kept that song “Mambo Number Five” on continuous loop on the CD player. But me and the guys kinda thought it’d be fun to have an animal around, so we went for it. Didn’t work out, though, and, in retrospect, I’m delighted.
No harm, no foul.
And, of course, most recently, when you dozed off in your squad car, we assumed you to be dead, and instantly buried you and your car thirty-six feet underground in an abandoned scrap heap seven hundred miles outside the city limits. We then constructed a fifteen-story office building on top of that, forged a note to your family explaining that you’d felt a void in your heart since the passing of Luther Vandross and that in an attempt to fill said void you were joining the French Foreign Legion, and re-routed your personal subscription to “Tits and Fast Cars Magazine” to our station so that me and the boys could enjoy it in your absence. Imagine our dismay when you radioed us to say that you were still alive and needed to be dug out.
Mistakes anyone could make, really.
You’re a good man, Officer Lowell. A lesser man would…
A lesser man would probably rise from that makeshift grave he was buried in and swear unholy vengeance on the ones who put him there. Vengeance which may or may not include carving out their spleens with an ice cream scoop, burning the station to the ground on “poker night,” handcuffing each and every one of them to a rabid emu or at the very least contacting the local papers to see if there’s any interest in video of several officers from this very station — including the seargant — sexually violating a cactus during the last policeman’s convention in Tahoe.
Probably. Uh.
Well, thank god I’m not a lesser man.
Er. Yeah.
::Shakes hand with sarge and walks out into squad room::
Dude. You’re back!
Yes.
Thank god. They wanted me to take your desk over on the left corner of the office, but I like mine on the right corner.
No worries.
This calls for meat and beer. And I’ve got a bunch in my locker. You down?
As always.
Yow! Time to get shit-tay!*
*Patent pending.
