Being Bill

Mom writes:

“Do you remember me telling you about Bill Z?

“He apparently was forging checks. It was a big hoo ha involving bankers and stuff, so he made the Most Wanted list back in April.

“Right before you moved back to go to college, he had to attend a managers meeting in Pensacola (he had go because it was required for them to become accredited for something or other.) He’d bought a house over behind the mall in that spiffy neighborhood and movers were coming to move his grand piano. So, your stepfather[D] volunteered to go impersonate him at the meeting, if he paid both our ways, etc.

“He agreed, so we went down to the meeting being Bill and Betsy Z.

“I stayed in the room and ate room service and so on with company money. Your stepdad went to the meeting where he had to stand up spontaneously and tell them about himself, even though he wasn’t really himself.

“One of the guys knew Bill, but he didn’t rat D out.

“The guy that ran the thing just loved your stepdad/Bill. I went downstairs too early and he insisted on buying my lunch cause “Bill” had added so much to the program.

“The next year your stepdad had to go to a meeting for salespeople. He had his nametag on, and ran into the guy who ran up saying, “Hey, Bill!”, to which D replied “D”. He said, “Bill?”, D said, “D”. He said, “Aren’t you Bill Z?”

“So your stepdad said, “People always get us mixed up.”

“Bill is the sweetest man in the world, so we thought there had to be some mistake and maybe he just wrote the bad checks meaning to cover them. In fact, I didn’t think he did it at all

“However, I just found out that they’ve caught him working in a convenience store in a different state. It turns out he is not Bill Z. It was never his name. He changed it 30 years ago when he moved to this area.

“I figure that when his picture is on the news, that guy from that meeting will call up the FBI and say, “Wait, that’s not Bill Z! I have a tape of the real Bill in a meeting back in ’97!” And then we’ll wake up to flashing lights and SWAT teams.

“We’re the only people I know who can impersonate people who are impersonating people.”