On the Ropes: A Duffy Dombrowski Mystery Read Online Free PDF Page B

so don’t get me wrong, but I can’t spend a lot of time playing these things out in my head. That’s for you guys. She’s in jail because she broke the law, and I helped get her there. The long and the short of it is, jail is often a dangerous place and Walanda is crazy. Just because she’s crazy doesn’t mean she’s not in danger.”
    “I think I got ya,” I said.
    “Regardless of whether she’s in danger or not, there ain’t nothing you can do about it,” Kelley said.
    I decided to leave it alone. I bought Kel his next round and let him get lost in the game. Meanwhile, the Foursome were locked in a heated debate about the important subject of why we have daylight-savings time.
    “It’s because the farmers need the sunlight,” said Jerry Number One.
    “Tell me one thing,” said Rocco. “How the hell does turning the clocks back give them more sunlight?”
    “It’s simple,” said Jerry Number One. “It’s because they get sunlight earlier in the day instead of having to wait.”
    “Why don’t they just get up earlier?” asked Jerry Number Two.
    “They do,” said TC.
    As fascinated as I was with the topic, I decided to get going and headed out the front door toward the Eldorado. From the front of AJ’s, I could see Al sitting up on the passenger seat happily chewing on one of my eight-tracks. It was the soundtrack to Paradise, Hawaiian Style , which was going to be hard to replace.

5

    “Hey Duff—how can you tell when a Polack’s been using your computer?” Sam said. I did my best to ignore him.
    “There’s Wite-Out all over your screen!” Sam laughed.
    “Mornin’ Sam,” I said.
    I was trying to catch up on my notes, which was mostly the equivalent to dabbling in fiction. Notes are supposed to be written in D-A-P format, which stands for Data, Assessment, and Plan. The idea is to make each session with a client sound strategic and planned so that if a third party, like an insurance company, picked up your files they could understand the direction your client’s life was going. Unfortunately, the lives of most people, let alone the people who find themselves in need of our services, rarely work out in neat, organized ways.
    Take, for example, the session I did with Eli when he came back to treatment following the unfortunate Slurpee machine/public nudity incident. In our session behind closed doors, this is actually how it went:
    Eli: “I was so trashed that the towel-headed woman looked like Diana Ross to me. Somehow I convinced myself that Mr. Endou was Barry Gordy and I know Mr. Motown gotta be into some kink.”
    Me: “But Eli—they don’t look even slightly black, they work in a Mobil station, and she had on one of those Pakistani outfits. Besides all that, they said ‘no.’”
    Eli: “To me it was just one of Diana’s funky outfits and I thought she was playing hard to get.”
    Me: “Whatever, Eli—it’s pretty clear you ought to lay off the Olde English.”
    Eli: “Fuck yeah—nothin’ but fuckin’ trouble.”
    In my notes, that session appears:
    D: Client discussed self-defeating behavior patterns related to alcohol use involving poor relationship boundaries.
    A: Client struggles with personal relationships and uses alcohol to facilitate social interactions.
    P: Client to identify alternative means of making social contact without alcohol.
    Notes like this make it seem like Eli is chock full of insight and I am the ultimate conduit to him seeking enlightenment. It’s not easy being a professional in the business of saving lives.
    I had seventy-five records with a ton of these notes, a few treatment plans, and treatment plan updates to do. It was boring and, as far as I was concerned, it didn’t really serve a whole lot of purpose, except for the anal retentive of the world. Unfortunately, my boss was captain of the all-anal all-star team. My guess was the Michelin Woman’s sphincter was so tight it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle