What's wrong with this picture?
(Not a story about Mimi)
The Garage was where you went to offload merchandise too hot to fence anywhere else, where you went to buy things that no other dealer would touch. But David didn't know any of that when he passed by The Garage. He saw the sign in front, "FLEA MARKET - 2 FLOORS OF SHOPPING - SATURDAY AND SUNDAY," and decided to go in.
David nearly jumped when he saw the bouncer behind the door. David was not short, but the bouncer was a full head taller, and then some. His arms were almost as thick as David was wide. His hands looked like they could wad David's skull up like a sheet of crumpled paper.
"Any weapons?" the bouncer growled.
"Errr -- no."
"Then you go that way."
David thought about turning around and leaving, but the bouncer's command sounded persuasive. He gulped and headed in to the flea market.
David had never been to a flea market before, but he was pretty sure that this was not what they were supposed to look like. It was dimly lit with diffuse red light. David's nose filled with the smell of smoke as his eyes adjusted.
A table in front of him was laid out with guns and larger weapons that David did not know the names of. Further back, he could see tables with bags of pills and powders. On the other side of the room were rows of cars and motorcycles. Another dealer was offering cages with dark moving shapes inside.
The buyers and sellers here looked uniformly menacing. Many of them were large and heavily tattooed like the bouncer in front. The rest were dressed in suits that reminded David of movie gangsters -- except these were real gangsters. Some of the men at the tables were surrounded by stiff-looking bodyguards, standing at attention. Others had women draped around them, wearing very little.
The group in front of David stopped their conversation to glare at him. "Um, I think I'll be going now." David backed away slowly.
"And where do you think you're going?"
The dealer who stopped David had grease-slicked hair, teeth that glinted gold, a loud, ill-fitting suit, and way too much jewelry. "You're not going to leave without buying something, are you?" The dealer opened up his suit to reveal watches, chains, coins, lighters, and other shinies hanging inside.
"I think I've the wrong place, so I'm just going to let myself out--"
"You're not going to leave without buying something," Greasy repeated. He wasn't smiling anymore this time.
"Uhhh--"
"How much cash do you have on you?" Greasy demanded.
And that's how David ended up buying a $1 coin for $20.
OK, so it didn't quite happen like that. I went to check out the Antiques Garage last weekend. There was an older gentleman there selling old coins. I thought it'd be cool to own one, and his prices seemed reasonable when I did a quick check online. So I bought a silver Peace Dollar from him for $20.
I took the coin home, cleaned it up a bit, and decided to weigh it. It was 19.4 grams. All the sites I checked online said that the coin should weigh 26.73 grams. Uh oh.
Another website said that fake coins were often magnetic, whereas no real US coin should be. Sure enough, I could pick up the coin with a refrigerator magnet.
I went back the next day to get a refund. I wasn't quite sure how I was supposed to confront the seller and tell him that he sold me a fake coin. I told him that the coin felt a little light. (He snapped his fingers, and I turned around to see two displeased goons glowering at me -- OK, not really.) He pulled out a scale, took some other coins from his display case, and weighed them. They all weighed the same as my coin -- all underweight.
I had brought a magnet with me -- and all of his coins stuck to my magnet. He mumbled something about how he thought they were all real, that he couldn't imagine why someone could go through the trouble of counterfeiting cheap coins like this, etc. I got my money back.
And now I know I have to bring a magnet next time I go to a flea market.
