Momzer Boy

     This tale is about Izzy the Momzer, who cheated at cards and with women and even once gave his own brother a stolen car without telling him.  But keep in mind that the word momzer, which means bastard in Yiddish, is sometimes used as praise for someone who can manipulate to his advantage.  And if cousin Izzy had just been your average crook, the amazing thing that happened to him would probably not have taken place.        Luckily for him, he was also a good conniver.

     True to his nature, Izzy at one point had gotten involved with the mob in Brooklyn.  He became the middleman in some kind of credit card scam, I was told, but then he tried to swindle the swindlers.  Mobsters are not too fond of that kind of stuff so they put out a contract on him.  When Izzy heard this he panicked and hired some local goon, this knuckle of man everyone called Brick, to protect him.  It was expensive – Brick did not care who he killed for as long as he got paid well – but what choice did he have?

            
     On Flatbush Avenue one day Izzy saw this mob guy on the other side of the street and shuddered.  The hood raised his hand and – stiff and quick – beckoned Izzy to come over.  Since his protector was nowhere to be seen, a sudden terror shot through Izzy as he became convinced that this was not just some tough guy but Death itself come for him.  Not just because of the credit scam but for his whole life of cunning escapades.

     Thinking that his last moment was at hand, Izzy panicked and ran away.  He raced down the street as fast as he could, ducked into alleyways, ran through some abandoned buildings, all the time waiting for the sound of the shot which never came.

     He ran from house to house all through the night, clawing his way up drainpipes, racing across the roofs, until – dim and dazed by his own fear – he finally collapsed, exhausted, in the street the next morning at the exact same spot where he had seen Death the day before.

     Wiping the tears from his eyes, he looked up to find the very same assassin standing above him, silhouetted in the early sun like a vulture waiting.  The hood was posed as though he had not budged an inch from his spot through all that time of Izzy’s desperate scramble.

     “Why’d you run yesterday?” the hood asked in a rumbling voice.

     “I know who you are,” Izzy said.  “I know you have orders.”

     “Then why you don’t come when I called you?”

     “Because I knew you were going to kill me,” Izzy cried.  “I knew it was my destiny to die yesterday at your hand.”

     “Yeah?  Well if it was your destiny, why’d you run?”

     “I got scared.  Who can accept their own destiny?”

     “I don’t know about that, but you got it wrong.  I wasn’t set to kill you yesterday.  My orders is different.  I just wanted to axe you a question.”

     “A question?  What question could you possibly have for me?” Izzy asked.

     “I wanted to axe you what you were doing at this spot yesterday morning when I have strict orders to shoot you here today.”

     At that the hood took out his gun and pointed it at Izzy lying at the curb.  Somewhere deep in his psyche, Izzy knew that there was no use arguing with Death but a lifetime of bending the rules had become a habit too hard to break.

     “Wait a minute,” Izzy said.  “I was here yesterday because I knew you would shoot me then,” he explained with as much charm as he could muster from the gutter, “and I am only lying here now because you didn’t shoot me.  It seems to me that you missed your chance.”

     The hood, who was nowhere near as dumb as his job suggested and even had a year in law school, laughed at that one, mostly at the incongruity of Izzy about to be shot lying in the street and posing a hypothesis. 

     “But here is where your contention fails, counselor,” the hood said mockingly.  “I did not miss my chance because yesterday you were wrong and today is today and here we are.”

     Satisfied by his own logic, the hood took aim and the sound of a gunshot whacked through the cool morning air, setting off a few car alarms.

     In the next moment, the hood collapsed where he had been standing.  Izzy grabbed himself all over but did not find any holes.  Then Brick, his protector, ran out from behind a car.

     “Good thing I didn’t shoot him yesterday,” Brick said, helping Izzy to his feet.  “C’mon, let’s get the hell outta here before the cops come.”

      “You were here yesterday?” Izzy said.  “You saw him call me from across the street?  And you didn’t shoot him?  Why?”

     “’Cause yesterday wasn’t the day to save your life, Iz.”

     “Why not?”

     “’Cause obviously, today was, if you see what I mean.  I guess even a rat-cheat like you can’t cheat your own destiny.  Let’s go!”