As the sergeant plucked the Staples away from my welfare application to release the picture of Bobbie Joe I knew that it at least would help me a bit that the picture of her was only in black and white and a bit grainy which would help me out a bit as well. I was chuckling as he stuffed the picture of her under my face but he apparently found none of this funny. I suspected that officer Lopez would at least give it a chuckle it so rightfully deserved.
“She’s not really pregnant is she Mr.Stettler?”
28
A Secret Spyder Verse I wiped the smirk away from my face. “No. It’s just a basketball.”
“And she wasn’t really born in California either was she Mr.Stettler?”
I defended myself just a tad bit. “Well no…. but she was shipped from California!”
“I see that, and she looks quite human. But she’s not even that is she Mr.Stettler?”
I didn’t like where the sergeant was going with this. And how had he stumbled across my welfare application? Did we now have snitches working for the state? Is this why my mom’s creepy second husband was hell-bent on stealing my mail?
I straightened up in my chair. “Where are you going with this?”
The sergeant unfurled my welfare application I had filled out months ago. He now appeared to be in his peacock moments.
29
“Mr.Stettler. Haven’t you once in fact shared a jail cell with an inmate convicted of Welfare fraud?”
I tried to recall each and every one of the cell mates I had bunked with over the years. Then I recalled the red headed little shrimp first time offender that went overboard with playing the system.
Couldn’t recall his name but cheered for him all the way for his white collar crime as I sensed he came from a very poor family to begin with. His “Welfare” winnings eventually landed in all the hands of the other inmates anyways because he was simply just too small to defend his commissary. I think the judge picked up on that and was rather soft on him.
The sergeant pointed towards a box on the welfare application and circled the number $90 with his finger.
“What’s this all about Mr.Stettler?”
I recognized my own writing on the application. But what I didnt recognize was the $90 he was pointing at.
30
A Secret Spyder Verse I defended myself. “I didn’t write that!”
He pointed towards the nine and then towards the zero. “This isn’t your nine? This isn’t your zero? Thought you were the handwriting expert. Thought you caught the lady you believed forged your name once onto a payment contract. You telling me this ain’t your penmanship?”
I scooted in my chair to better scrutinize the welfare application.
It was in fact my penmanship.
“Well yeah sergeant. I guess technically I did write that. But I KNOW I included a couple zeros after it! This document has been Photoshopped!!!”
“Ummm….yeah.err…whatever…but you tried to claim your sex doll as a dependent? Actually two dependents because she’s ostensibly pregnant?”
I frantically grabbed the welfare application and leafed towards the back page looking for the page with my signature.
31
“Well hold on sarge….I know I wrote next to my signature April Fool’s day. You see this application was in fact filled out on April Fool’s day.”
I frantically flipped through the pages looking for where I made it clear in the application that I was merely making a joke of the whole thing. I finally found my signature on the last page but the
“April Fool’s” remark had been erased as well! Who was doing this to me!! Who was pranking the prankster?????