Thirty Minute Guarantee Read online

turned to high on his brain. His vision blurred for a moment then focused again. Only it didn’t focus on what was actually in front of him. It focused on what looked like the Lake Side Pub. He could see Bill and Chad sitting at the bar talking to Lauren the bartender. She had just set down two pints of beer in front of them. Then he saw himself step into view and the others looked to acknowledge him. He saw all this as though he was watching a movie being projected in front of him, only it wasn’t projected on to a screen. It was more like it was projected on a thin layer of fog cast over his eyes.

  He shook his head, clearing the vision from his head, his eyes focusing on the world around him again, and finished retrieving his phone from his pocket and called Bill. He answered after three rings.

  “Hey, what’s up Eric?” Said Bill answering the phone.

  “Not much. Rough day at work. You wanna go out for beer?” Eric asked knowing the answer.

  “Chad and I are already at the Lake Side. Come on down, we’ll be here for a while.”

  “Okay, I’ll be there in a bit.”

  “Cool. See ya soon.” Bill said before hanging up.

  On his way to the Lake Side Pub, Eric stopped by his apartment to change and grab a bite to eat that wasn’t pizza, or anything else that they made at work. As he was changing he glanced at the clock and saw that it was quarter past eleven. The heat bloomed up inside his head again, his vision blurred and the fog fell over his eyes. Again he saw inside the Lake Side Pub only this time he didn’t see his friends or himself. He saw a guy get up from the bar and walk over to another guy sitting at a table and punch him in the face. The heat subsided and his vision returned to normal with the force of the blow delivered by the man in his “movie” causing Eric to step backward and bump into his dresser. He shook his head and looked around his bedroom. Everything was the way it was supposed to be, no fog, no double exposed site.

  “What the hell is happening to me?” He asked the empty room as he put on his coat and left.

  When he arrived at the bar at half past eleven everything was exactly as he saw it in his first vision. He was walking up to the bar and saw Chad and Bill sitting there talking to Lauren as she put a pint down in front of each of them. All three of them turned and looked at him as he walked up. A shiver ran down Eric’s spine at the déjà vu he was experiencing. Lauren poured another pint for him and slid it over as he sat down next to Bill.

  “Can I get a shot too?” He asked as he grabbed the pint and drank down half of it in one pull.

  Lauren raised her eyebrows and gave him a smile. “Rough day?” she said as she poured him a shot of his brand of whiskey.

  “You could say that.” Was all he said back in reply.

  “Dude, what’s the matter with you tonight? How bad could your day have been?” asked Bill.

  Lauren put the shot down in front of Eric and turned to another customer further down the bar. The whiskey in the shot glass didn’t even have time to settle before Eric picked it up and threw it back.

  Slamming the glass on the bar he turned to Bill and Chad and said. “I almost ran someone over tonight.”

  “Oh shit!” exclaimed Chad. “When?”

  Bill just stared at him slack jawed.

  “About an hour ago. When I was on my last delivery. Fucking made me late for the delivery too. I had to pay for it myself.” Said Eric taking another pull from his pint before telling them the story of his encounter with the old man, about swerving to miss him and how the guy attacked him then disappeared leaving behind the belt of his bathrobe.

  The door to the bar opened just as he finished telling his tale and the guy he saw in his second vision came walking in. The guy walked up to the bar and ordered a beer. Eric couldn’t help but stare at the guy, he couldn’t believe this was actually happening. Everything he had seen earlier was happening for real. The newcomer to the bar must have felt Eric’s eyes on him because he looked him right in the eyes and said, “What’s your problem?”

  The mans words made Eric flinch. “Nothing, sorry.” Was all he could manage to say and turned away from the man back to his friends. He chanced another glance over at the man and saw him sitting there brooding over his beer, he was working his fingers like he was trying to loosen up the knuckles, getting ready for a fight.

  Eric scanned the rest of the bar looking for the unlucky guy that was going to get punched in the face. He didn’t see him. There were four tables in the bar and three of them were occupied by people other than the human punching bag. Giving the room one more quick sweep, his eyes stopped on the door as it opened again and the second guy walked in and went straight to the empty table.

  “No shit!” Eric said out loud.

  “What?” asked Bill.

  “There’s going to be a fight.”

  “What? How do you know?” said Bill laughing. He liked to see a good fight whenever he could as long as he wasn’t involved. He was known for instigating fights between other people on occasion.

  “I just know. I can’t explain it but I know there is going to be a fight and I know who’s going to start it.” Eric leaned closer to Bill and Chad and whispered, “The guy sitting at the bar that came in a couple minutes ago is going to get up and walk over to the guy sitting by himself at that table and just haul off and punch him. He’s gonna knock him the fuck out too.”

  “Bull shit!” Said Chad and Bill together.

  “I swear it. He’s just gonna get up, walk over there and punch him in the face. I don’t know why but he’s gonna.” Said Eric.

  “Okay. Say your right. How do you ‘just know’ this? You gotta give us more than that.” Said Bill.

  “Fine. You probably still wont believe me when I’m done telling you.” Eric paused for a moment before telling them about what he thought were headaches. “In the last hour or so I’ve been getting these weird headaches. Well, actually only two so far, but every time I get one my eyes get fuzzy and I see things.” Eric paused again to look at his friends trying to get an idea of what they were thinking right now. They showed nothing, just stared at him so he went on. “The first time was just before I called you.” He looked at Bill. “I saw the two of you sitting right here at the bar talking to Lauren, then I came in.”

  “We always sit right here and we always talk to Lauren.” Said Bill. “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  “It’s not just that.” Said Eric. “It’s the little things, the details. It was the way all of you looked up when I walked in, the way Lauren set the beers down and the expressions on your faces. It was like it had all happened about a half hour earlier. It’s the same with those two guys. I saw it happen and now they are both here sitting in the exact same places that I saw them.”

  Chad laughed. “Okay. Whatever dude. It’s just déjà vu.”

  Bill looked at Eric. “Seriously dude, you must have had a really bad day at work.”

  “You know what? Fuck the both of you. You’ll see. Any minute now that guy is gonna knock the shit outta the guy at the table.” Said Eric finishing his beer.

  Eric flagged down Lauren for another beer. Just as she set down the fresh pint in front of Eric the guy at the bar chugged what he had left in his bottle of beer, stood up and walked across the bar to the guy sitting by himself at the table and without saying a word gave him a right cross knocking the guy out of his chair and sprawling him across the floor. He laid on the floor unmoving except for his twitching feet. The attacker calmly turned and left the bar as people moved to look after the unlucky guy lying in a puddle of his own blood and drool.

  Once the guy was upright and conscious again Lauren called the cops for him. He gave his statement while the two people from the volunteer ambulance corps tended to his busted nose. In a town as small as the Village of Lancaster anytime there is any kind of emergency just about every emergency vehicle in the town responds. By the time the police got around to questioning Eric and his friends they had pretty much figured out that the guy everyone had described had done it
and only asked them if their story was the same. They all said yes.

  Over the next several weeks Eric’s friends began to notice that he really had acquired a talent for knowing what was going to happen shortly before it did. They would be watching a game on television and he would predict the final score exactly and tell them what the last play would be. Before they left to go to the casino one night he suggested that they take a different route than they normally would because there would be an accident on the 190 Interstate that would stop traffic dead for hours. They were listening to the radio on their way when the DJ informed his listeners that a tractor-trailer had overturned shutting down all lanes of traffic on the 190 and that drivers should seek an alternate route. Later that night he had to tell his friends it was time to leave the casino, the pit boss was going to be coming down with security to talk to them because they were winning too much. The guys had figured out that if Eric could see the numbers on roulette that would come up in a half hour they could play those numbers and win big. Chad had warned Bill to keep his bets reasonable so as not to draw too much attention. Bill made it about five minutes before he broke down and started betting heavy, drawing the attention of the eye in the sky. Even after Eric’s warning about security Bill wanted to keep going but Chad was able to pull him away. Security followed them all the way