I promptly replaced my loss with the very same wallet, different color.
Last Thursday night I went to the Bounty Hunter, this sprawling box of a video poker bar that has karaoke every so often. My brand-new roommate works there, and I wanted to be a good sport, so I did my ol' standby: a tone-deaf performance-art rendition of Billy Joel's "Movin' Out," which involves a lot of wide, sweeping arm gestures, fist-pumping, and William Shatner-esque vocal blasé-ness.
When I got back to my seat, I realized my wallet and makeup bag were missing from my purse. The guy formerly sitting next to me was gone, and he left behind a full drink. My roommate assured me that he was a regular customer and a very nice guy with plenty of money and he'd never do that, and was I sure I even brought my wallet? Did I really have my makeup bag?
I frantically searched the bar, including underneath the table by the karaoke zone. The DJ/MC/sweaty pig in the poly blend shirt with the black-and-red flame motif started flipping out on me. "Why don't you tear the whole place apart?" he bellowed. And then he started whipping furniture out of the way. "The only wallet you'll find back there belongs to me!"
I tried to assure him I wasn't accusing him (because I wasn't! I was hoping my belongings had just fallen out of my bag), and the next thing I knew one of his die-hard followers—a plump, long-haired brunette of a certain age who'd earlier in the evening sung Nelly Furtado's "I'm Like a Bird" in a very raspy, almost Gremlin-like voice—stood in front of me with her dimpled hands on her ample hips. "I'm going to check your bag to make sure it's not in there," she announced, and grabbed my purse and started yanking everything out.
"Hey," I told her. "You're not the f--king airport security. Give me back my stuff!" She punched me in the head. I looked at my roommate like, Um, bitch just punched me in the head. Where I come from, this means I kick this suburbanite's ass like right now. I'm a tiny lady, but what I lack in size I make up for in crazy. And then the woman punched me again. That did it. I popped her.
Soon it was an all-out bar brawl, the soccer-mom karaoke fans versus me. They yanked off my glasses, pulled my hair, pushed my plastic gold mirrored headband forward on my eyes so I looked like a Star Trek extra, twisted my scarf around my neck so I couldn't breathe.
My friend Randall jumped in and took my heat. Some other guy, a silver fox who'd just finished singing The Eagles' "Peaceful Easy Feeling" (I shit you not) in a meek, flat voice while strumming a flaccid inflatable yellow guitar, threw me in a corner and staved off the hateful warthogs. Meanwhile, the jerk who stole my wallet was racking up over a hundred bucks in—what? Fritos and beef jerky?—at every convenience store down the road. I think this time I'll get a different wallet.