When I arrived back at the office the phone guy was there to reinstall my fax/managers line and the water man came to reset the water meter. Everything appeared to be working when they left. Twenty minutes later Tammy yells out from the back, "Something's leaking, there's an inch of water behind the toilet and it's rising!"
My client comes back while we're on the phone with the tax business owner and the building owner so I leave Tammy to turn off what'll turn off with the water and I get down to business with the tax client.
Things went fairly smoothly because the lady brought back everything I'd asked for concerning their business receipts and expenses and two and a half hours later I've got the copies of the return printing. The lady is on her cell discussing the return with her husband who is on his way from Louisiana to sign the return so they could get it in the mail. I sort of gathered by their conversation that the two were separated and the tension was running a tad high between them.
The hubby finally gets there just as I've gathered the printed forms, placed my signature everywhere it was needed, and was getting ready to have the missus sign where she was supposed to on all copies.
I have no idea what started their argument, the man was from Jordan and I could only understand about 2 words of every 10 or so he uttered, but suddenly he is grabbing all of the forms, he slaps a cup out of her hand, and all hell breaks loose. She yells at me to call 911, I yelled back at her, "WHY? what's going on? YOU call 911," and she does. I had sent Tammy on an errand but the gal that does some of our computer tech stuff was in there with me. She wasn't much help cause she's almost completely deaf and I was pretty much cornered so that I couldn't get to where Carrie could see me trying to get her attention (she reads lips really well).
The couple took their yelling outside and the guy had the tax returns in his hand. My only concern at this point was that I'd done over two hours work and that man appeared to be leaving the building with it and without paying for it.
Then the couple comes back in, still bickering, and 3 police cars come screeching to a halt in front of the office. Five of Forrest City's finest come strolling in to handle the problem. Since I had no knowledge of the language these folks were yelling back and forth I couldn't tell the officers much other than you'll have to ask them. When one officer asked me if I was ok, I told him that if he'd gather those forms that the man was waving around I'd be fine cause I'd rather they not leave the building again without payment for my services first.
The man finally agrees with the officer that he should pay me and throws a credit card down on my desk. Well I wasn't about to tell him that we didn't accept credit cards so I told one of the officers to tell him. He then goes to his car and gets his check book, as he's coming back into the building, one of the officers says, he has something in his hand.
Folks,,"ohfuckohfuck" was going through my mind a lot during this ordeal and when he said that, it left my mind and flew from my lips. Luckily, for the man, he only had his pen in his hand, cause I'm sure those officers were tiring pretty quickly of his ranting and raving.
The officers stayed until the man drove away and promised me that they'd be driving by through my stay at the tax office this season.
About 20 minutes after things calmed down and everyone who didn't belong there had left, the door opens and this little man comes in with a walker. He introduces himself as the plumber sent by the buildings owner. I looked at Tammy and just shook my head.
I sure do need a few beers!!
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