I left messages on his answering machine but didn't hear a thing from him until he just showed up the same day our computers were being delivered.
It was early in the morning before we opened for business. I'd gotten a good deal through a small computer dealer in Silverlake and they'd agreed to deliver bright and early so that we could set it up and get running by lunch.
"What they hell is all this?" he asked in an especially nasty manner that immediately set me off.
"Well...Miss Wrong Side of the Bed this Morning, we're going to become a cyber cafe and ride the Internet into the future."
He scrunched his eyebrows together and wrinkled his nose. "It's just a fad."
"We can make good money off it," said Jenn. "It'll bring in a more varied crowd."
"Just what we need," he said. "Computer geeks sitting around on their lard asses down-loading porno. They'll buy one cup of coffee and sit here all day."
"You've got a bad attitude," she countered.
"Watch who you're talking to, Jenn. I'm your boss, now."
"Hugo is my boss. I work for him. Not you."
"Not for long if you keep up with that shit."
I rolled my eyes. They were like a couple of kids.
He flipped out a hand and smacked me on the arm, hard enough that it made my skin sting underneath my Pendleton. "And you! Why didn't you ask my permission before you did this?" He indicated the boxed computers on the floor.
I rubbed my arm, trying not to be obvious about it. "I've been trying to get a hold of you for the past week."
"I've been home."
"Then you should answer your phone."
"Relax, Steve," said Jenn. "There's nothing you can do about it, now. They're bought and paid for."
"Nothing I can do about it, huh?" He took a couple of steps towards the boxes, drew back a boot and gave it a kick, his foot going through the cardboard.
Jenn and I spoke at once: "Hold on a minute!" "You asshole!"
"Nothing I can do? Nothing?" He pulled his foot out of the box and drew it back again.
I bolted towards him, but I wasn't fast enough.
His foot flew into the damaged box and crashed through the front of the computer monitor inside.
I grabbed him and swung him away before he could do more damage.
"Steve, why are you doing this? That's a $600 monitor!" I screamed in his face.
He flinched for a second and laughed, n