"You need some serious guidance," said Addison rising from beneath the floorboards.
  "Your shock value is uncanny," said April, putting down a collection of short stories from McSweeny's.  "So how the hell is purgatory?"
  "Eh... boring."
  "Does it burn?"
  "Well what do you think I'm doing above your ceiling fan?"
  "It was because of me - wasn't it?"  said April, squinting.
  "..."
  "Well can you come and go at will?"
  "Don't worry about what I can and can't do.  Let's just chill."
 
DREAM SEQUENCE 24 - TWO YEARS PRIOR

  April put down the rusty razor blade and turned on the tub, cranking up the heat, then she grabbed a stalk of celery from the fridge and cleaned up the tail end of a two-month-old jar of crunchy Skippy, soon realizing the place was a mess and full of body lotion, then she could hear the detective from Nashua describing the scene of her suicide that entailed hair care products, mouthwash bottles 'lion on the floor there with old receipts from all over the map, crumpled up and stuffed into empty popcorn bags, seeing the sticky cans of Moxie soda and empty bags of chips with the pomegranate-lemonade containers and dried out air fresheners, three month old turkey sandwiches only half eaten, wrapped in Bounty paper towels, forgotten about to turn into nothing more than moldy rocks, loose tobacco, plastic plates with ketchup and hot sauce stains there, and coffee cans and adult diapers with piss in 'em there, with cardboard boxes with nothing in 'em, a coupla' damp towels, empty two liter bottles of Cheerwine, a buncha' dirty clothes strewn about, various sweaters and jackets with many pockets, a small trash can heaping with coffee grounds, and linens with piss and shit stains, and bottles of multi-vitamins only half eaten, and old cellphones that no one wants or could ever even hope to activate that are no better than paper weights, and wires and crunchy taco wrappers with the cheese crusted on em there, and stinky blankets and socks, along with old old training manuals from electronic and cosmetic store that were stuffed in Hefty Cinch Sacks only half full, and staples and cotton swabs for her earwax problem, a few large tooth combs, a coupla' empty bottles of Gold Bond Medicated Powder, some baby wipes from Luvs, and baby powder, some roasted chicken bones with mold on 'em and some Top butts w/o the filters on the side in a filthy ashtray, some off color Franz Kafka jokes written on wrinkled paper napkins and tossed aside, some decals and fingerboards, two pairs of headphones where one of the ears don't work there, Styrofoam boxes with a little fuzzy chili that seems to be leftover from Cook-Out, two pairs of church shoes, a whole 'lotta hangers, some wire and some plastic but mostly wire though, a beard trimmer dat don't work no more, shuts down after about a minute, two black bras, eight pairs of Hanes boy shorts, two bikini style caked in shit, one PlayStation controller, a toenail clipper, some plastic grocery sacs, more cups with pee and cigarette butts in 'em, some metal forks with caked on egg, a 'buncha Saltine cracker wrappers, an old pair of sunglasses with the yellow lenses that look like they belong on Iris Apfel, a snowmobile helmet, four pairs of pleather gloves, and some old junk mail with a bunch of other funny names of previous residents on 'em there.
  "I fixed the internet.  Sorry - something wrong with the outlet.
  "What do you think about this little workstation I have set up here?  Huh?
  "I can't really give you opinions about this stuff."
  Down to the letter, they all slithered into the office door.  There was one crate of hard copy on the floor in the corner next to one of the windows sitting next to a small coffee stain.  It looked about a week old.  Trent walked inside pulling up a chair in front of Jules.
  "Take a seat."
  "Thanks."
  "I had a chance to pull out your resume and I'm really liking your track record in sales.  Looks impressive."
  "I don't really sell much."
  "Oh?" Jules was surprised.  "How so?"
  "I adapt to certain situations very well."
  "Well it doesn't seem like you want the job very much.  You seem trapped.  Aloof?"
  "Aloof - yes - well - I do - but more than anything else Jules, I really want to put my mind to something that pushes my brain a little harder.  It's never good to lose focus.  It's all downhill from there."
  "Well we can't teach you focus here Trent, but we can teach you several other fundamental components on how to become successful at this firm.  There is a boatload of money to be made here if you just pay attention and learn anything you can.  Soak it all up - study the pitch - 'cause if you make yourself coach-able - mold-able - we'll give you the tools to make it happen.  How much revenue did you generate for Lawton & Associates last year?"
  "Ten mi.  35% of it was in the last quarter."
  "OK well we'll teach you how to double that.  Look - Trent - I'd be shooting myself in the foot if I asked you about all your sins over the years.  Clearly you're a talented guy.  I think you'd fit in right here."
  "So what's next?"
  "Can you be here Monday?"
  "Sure."
  "Do you have reliable transportation?"
  "Absolutely."
  "Good."
  "To the wolves!" said Trent, standing up shaking his hand.
  "That's the name of the game," said laughed Jules.  "To the wolves."
  Right when Addison bought that Ford F-150 was when things started to get dicey.  He was able to find work - mostly hauling timber and scrap, but he lived in that truck.  There were a few girls he would shack up with on occasion - sleep on their couch, eat their food, get a shower and drive them to work, but with his criminal background, finding anything long term seemed highly improbable.  The doo doo gooders™ posted a list of formal complaints at the Napalm Plant at Royherntenbaum.  The funny business continued with all the chain link fence name calling and random Chromie Contests.  Everything seemed important all at once.  The collective conscious was put to task one afternoon at Simac Courts.
  "Give me something I can actually return guys," said Addison, tying his shoelace.  "Never mind that.  Harris.  I'm gonna serve you a cannonball.  You ready?"
  Addison hit a very fast serve right on the baseline and Harris returned a can opener on the back corner of the singles tramline.  Addison sliced the ball back over and Harris power slammed it on Addison's center service line.
  "Sneaky," said Addison.
  "Fifteen-love," said Harris, spinning his racquet, grinning.
  "Fifteen-love?" said Trent.  "What the hell does that mean?"
  "You don't know a thing about tennis man.  Pay attention 'cause I've seen some wicked shots come out of you - need to see you get a little more accurate with 'em thought.  Pretend you're Cyclops if you have to.  Focus.  Neither of you guys are ready to start keeping score yet so let's just keep volleying and see some nice returns.  Don't worry about brute force tonight.  That will come the more you develop your technique.  I know I told you the entire purpose or end-game if you will is to injure the other player with the ball.  It's called 'jamming your opponent' in technical terms.  Trent, if we were playing at Wimbledon, my whole objective would be to hit you in the eye to blind you.  That would be game, set, match, and you'd invariably run home crying to mommy.  Got it?"
  Trent threw his racquet at Addison and put him in a headlock.
  "How 'bout I just beat your fuckin' face in?"
  "Guys." said Harris.
  Addison spun around, putting Trent in a choke-hold.
  "Attacking your opponent would cause you to forfeit!" grunted Addison.  "Gotta play fair," he laughed.  "Not to say stuff like THIS doesn't happen during among amateurs... get off a me fag!"
  Harris grabbed the racquet off of the court and walked to the baseline.
  "Are we gonna play?"
  "Exactly," said Addison.  "Come on."
  "I'm bored," said Trent - tennis wasn't his thing.
  "I know you are.  This is new stuff.  There's a pretty sharp learning curve though, and once you begin to grasp some of the basic fundamentals, you'll start to improve and have some serious fun with it."
  "Tennis sucks my ass."
  "You give up too easy."
  "You tell him Harris."
  "And you lack finesse.  I'm repeating myself when I say you've hit some great returns, even if they are far and few between.  I think you just got lucky.  This requires an element of focus.  Maybe it's not for you, but try to think four or more moves ahead when the ball leaves your racquet AFTER the serve."
  "Huh?"
  "It's just like chess or shooting pool.  Don't think in real time.  Control the court and predict what your opponent is going to do.  Make them scramble to stay alive and at the right moment, a gentle tap over the net will beat a power slam.  Look - I can pontificate and generalize all night long, but the only way to really see how good you can be is to just keep playing."