"How much?" he asked at last.
"Two cents" came the reply.
"Two cents? Are you kidding me? It's gotta be worth much more than that. C'mon!" he bellowed, indignantly.
"That's the going rate for a soul these days" Nick said, dismissively. "You think you'll get more upstairs? He pays nothing... figures they all belong to Him anyway."
"But two cents, man. That ain't worth spit." He began to wonder if he'd made a mistake getting involved in this deal.
"Take it or leave it" came the reply. "Now, I'm busy... either sign or stop wasting my time. There's plenty more fish in the sea you know." He stood up as if to leave, fully aware of the effect it would have. He'd done it too many times before.
Lee panicked. This might be the only chance he'd ever get... the only chance for getting his name in lights short of changing his name to 'Exit'. The only chance of attracting women (men, even... he'd always wanted to try), the high-life he'd always craved, back from he was a little boy that nobody liked because he stank of pee and looked at other boys' 'bits' in the toilet. His one and only chance of escaping the obscurity which defined his life, slaving away in his little basement room night after night, in that drug-induced haze which freed him from his inhibitions and allowed his imagination free-reign. A twisted, sick and perverted imagination, true, but it was his ticket out. Or so he thought.
He seized the paper in front of him greedily, and scrawled his signature in the space provided.
"We're done" said Nick, as he headed for the door. "I'll be in touch."
His laughter as he ascended the stairs from the little basement apartment stayed with Lee for the rest of his days. It haunted his dreams and allowed him no peace for the remainder of his empty, miserable, wasted life.
And short, too.
And short, too.
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