When I was eighteen years old my
father gave me his steel-blue Colt 9mm government model semi-automatic pistol because he was afraid if he kept it he would kill himself. I met a guy a few years ago who was really into guns and one night when he was at my house, he
asked to see it. I can’t remember his name, he was the husband of a woman who worked with my wife and we were making a go at developing a social relationship with them. This guy had been in the army and when anyone asked him about it he
would only say he had been “in military intelligence” and “couldn’t talk about it.” He liked to read Tom Clancy novels and he drove a Porsche. When I gave him the pistol, he held it to his face, sighted it, popped out the clip and after examining the bullets shook his head sadly.
“These bullets are crap,” he said. "They wouldn’t stop anyone.”
“Really,” I said, finding this hard to believe.
“Really,” he assured me.
A week later he arrived at my house with a ziploc bag full of bullets that he made himself in his garage.
“I couldn’t sleep at night knowing you had those crappy bullets,” he said. “I was worried about you.”
“Thanks,” I told him.
I hated that guy. I’m glad Sam doesn’t work with his wife anymore. We never have to see him.