It was 4:13 in the morning when the deed went down. I was sure it was a shady guy and it probably happened in a damp, dark basement. I’m sure the perp was impaired. I would bet he was eating chips.
I don’t know that it really happened this way, of course, but this is how I imagined the $1,842 were charged to my credit card.
He bought some sort of welding machine online, in the early morning, from an industrial supply company located somewhere in the middle of the United States. He used my credit card number. I’m sure his mother was sleeping upstairs and never suspected a thing. Our well loved credit card company never notified us of this questionable charge.
Perhaps the credit card company speculated, as I initially did, that this was a typical charge. It was, admittedly, indicative of the husband's typical car guy, credit card behavior. The credit card company threw the husband under the bus. As a result, we were never notified of this unusual charge.
When I found the charge, days later, I asked the husband what he had done. The husband was offended, as he should have been, and denied it all. The credit card company believed my claim that the husband was innocent, refunded my money and declared my impeccable credit a preserved manuscript.
When the dust settled, we determined that it was the perp who was guilty. I felt violated and was perplexed, “How does this happen?”
It was 11:49 in the morning, a few weeks later, when the deed went down. I knew it was me and I knew it happened at Sally Beauty Supply in a strip mall that was in the same parking lot as an Applebee's and across the street from a Kohl’s. I bought, in person, a $5 bottle of semi-permanent aqua blue hair dye. I was sure it would stop me from looking like I was 65 years old every time I looked in the mirror at my gray curly hair. The sun was out and I hadn't eaten any chips. But only because I there weren’t any within arm’s length.
The credit card company’s first reaction when they saw the blue dye charge was to flag it as suspicious. I had always been a low maintenance kind of gal, and gosh dang it, they knew it. They texted the husband immediately. Criminal activity was goin’ down. No one from this joint credit card account had EVER been to the beauty supply store.
The husband called me 3 minutes later. They want to know if you’ve been places.
“Yeah, I’ve been places. “ I barked back with a little bit of attitude.
“Did you try to become high maintenance?” the husband asked me, not using those exact words.
“Oh yeah, I did.” I declared with confidence. “I’m goin’ blue. And then I won’t feel so bad about myself.”
“You go girl!”, the husband said in a different, smart, husband who’s been married for 27 years kind of way.
The credit card company took some convincing but they eventually believed in the power of the blue hair dye. The credit card company eventually thought my $5 blue hair dye was a more believable charge than the $1,842 charge from from a chip eating industrial basement guy.
Basement, chip eating guys fail.
Blue hair rules.