2001-07-31 - 7:40 a.m.

Yeah, I could learn things from Marius. How to live off the cuff, how to finesse life, how to take chances, make it real, make it count. He�s everything I want to be, exaggerated to the nth degree. I was steered toward a safe existence, a stable career, the grounding of family. I was taught to be frugal, and I took it to heart. I�ve always got to make sure I�ve got a few thousand in the bank, just in case my car died, I lost my job and couldn�t get it back. I pay my bills, credit cards, parking tickets. No debts and no credits; no obligations. Create the illusion of a risk-filled life, while inside, you always know you�re playing it safe.

Marius never had much use for playing it safe. For him, it was always about sex, drugs and rock and roll. His life is a series of misadventures, seeing how tight of a fix he can get himself into and still get himself out. He�s in a fix now, but he�s sure this time will be no different. He�ll find someone to charm, someone to finesse, some way to keep going this life he has built on the power of suggestion and the American dream.

Just a couple months ago, he was evicted from his house because he didn�t pay the rent. He moved in with Linda, an ex-girlfriend. He lost his car when, with about 40 unpaid parking tickets, the city of Chicago booted his car until he could pay them off.

So he printed up some fliers and passed them around, drawing in people looking for a good time, people who will do his bidding for eight hours in a night in exchange for 25 bucks, free drinks and concerts, and a chance to be close to the magic that is Marius. I show up in search of adventure, and play right into his hand. Turns out he has several drivers, all looking for excitement, all unreliable.

Now Linda has told him he has to move out in two weeks, and his dog, Melvin, has to go now. There�s no room for dogs in her apartment. So he takes Melvin around wherever he goes, making calls with a borrowed cell phone to find someone, anyone who will take him. He asks me, but we�ve got no place for a dog. Finally, as he�s hanging outside the guitar store, an employee comes outside and sees Melvin laying out on the sidewalk. She loves dogs. He offers 60 bucks for her to take care of him for a week. She�ll do it.

As the girl returns to the store to help close up, Marius crouches in the darkened parking lot and combs Melvin�s fur. The strands collect in the brush, then Marius pulls them out and takes the brush to the fur again. �Now you be good,� he tells Melvin, looking into his eyes and smiling. This may be his closest friend, the one friend he doesn�t borrow from or sell to, the one he can just laugh at and play with. Of course, the dog�s part of the sales team, too. He draws in the chicks.

But tonight will be Melvin�s last night on the job for a while. He�ll be gone for a week or two, until Marius can find them both a new home.

Marius can hardly think that far ahead, but he imagines an ideal plan, the kind that never work. He and a few drivers will come out to the Pantera show on Wednesday and make a killing � say, five hundred. He�ll take it to the racetrack, win (of course), and ring it up to a thousand. Then he�ll have enough to pay a security deposit.

You gotta have confidence, you gotta have faith, that you�ll make a killing next time out, that your time will come to score at the races. Only it doesn�t always work. At the Pantera concert, security doesn�t let him in the parking lot where the kids are hanging out, so he�s stuck at the nearby McDonald�s during the game. His drivers all want to see the show, but he�s only got enough mojo to get two of them in. So buys two tickets out of his own pocket. He feels responsible for them, like he�s a babysitter taking his kids on an outing.

And surprise of surprises, it isn�t his lucky day at the track. It hasn�t been his lucky day in a while, but he can just feel it, so close, he�s been so close so many times recently, it�s gotta come around, he�s gotten out of these jams so many times before it�s gotta work out.

He can�t think what else to do. He�s been gambling since high school. He decided then that he didn�t have much use for book smarts � he was into metal � and he took up smoking cigarettes and playing poker in empty classrooms of his school. He dropped out eventually, armed with the knowledge that you can get by on charm and luck. He knew music and he knew how to sell himself, and for 12 years as a video salesman, that�s been enough.

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