Close to Nowhere by Tom Lichtenberg - HTML preview

Epilogue

He'd imagined that the hardest part would be explaining to Matilda that he had to return the toys to the company now that he no longer worked there, but when he put it that way she was totally on board and even eager to help him wrap them all up. She insisted on making perfect little packages out of toilet paper for each item. They made an adventure out of it, including a long walk to the post office, using colored markers to address the bubble-wrap envelope to the attention of“Gabby”, waiting in the long line and letting Matilda handle the entire transaction.

As for Richie's handwritten notes, Eugenio just threw them away. He didn't want anyone to know how much he really did know, and he was glad he'd made that choice when it came time to testify before the federal grand jury assigned to the case. All he could tell them about was the chicken leg, and it wasn't even perjury to confess that he had no idea what that was all about. By then he was well on his way toward completing his professional child care credentials and had long been steadily employed at a local day care center. Maybe his bad luck had simply run out, or maybe he'd finally aligned himself properly with the universe, but he preferred Matilda's explanation, that some of the magic that had rubbed off on the snail had also rubbed off on him.

The End