47. The Boating Accident

This is a scene from the novel Five Dollar Wrench.
Here’s the Table Of Contents.
The story begins with 01. This Is My Confession.

The Boating Accident

I am your boating accident.
— A Human Iceberg

On May 15th, 1991, an awful child was born and given the name Arthur. He should have given it back.

Exactly thirty years later, I spent the night in his goddamn closet, because he had the gall to come home while I was searching his apartment. I figured I’d slip out once he fell asleep, but then I fell asleep. So that went well.

I didn’t get home until the next afternoon. That’s when I discovered a flaw in our grocery-list code-word system. Every time a job went well, Claire picked up stuff from the produce department, as if we’d been texting real grocery lists. Y’know what’s in the produce department? Goddamn health food. Our whole kitchen was going to hellth.

Luckily, I managed to find a few things that were edible.

I then went to my workshop, in the basement, to enjoy a quiet bowl of Cocoa Puffs, maple syrup, and gummy bears, when Claire came bouncing down the stairs with way too much oomph.

“Hey hey! Shay Shay! Something happened while you were away!”

“Dear God, why are you talking like that?”

“Remember Ray Ray?”

“Was he the one living on a bro boat?”

“Ever since his wife threw him out.”

“Yeah, he was one of the pictures I showed you when we first met. I’d been saving him for a while.”

“And you forgot about him. That’s why we didn’t get to him sooner. Seriously, girl, you need a system for this shit.”

“Fuck you. What’s up?”

“I got Ray Ray in the hot tub a few weeks ago and you did The Bitch Boomerang.”

“I hate that name, Claire. It’s the French Dupe & Drop And... oh, that’s stupid. Whatever! What’s the goddamn question?”

“Have you searched his boat yet?”

“No. I like to put distance between your date with a mark and when I search for his Bitcoin seed words, just as a precaution. Why?”

“You might want to rethink that for this jalapeño.”

“He’s hot?”

“He gives me heartburn. Look.”

She handed me a newspaper. It was folded open to a story about a guy that got caught vandalizing the Jackson 5 mural on Lake Street in Gary. You don’t fuck with the Jacksons. They’re still a big deal around here. They made Indiana proud.

“Second paragraph in the article,” Claire said. “Read the name.”

“Oh, wow. It’s Raymond Raybe.”

“Yup. And he had priors, so when he got caught, they hauled him straight to jail. He’ll be there for at least a couple days.”

“Why would he vandalize that mural? He doesn’t like music?”

“Shay. He’s racist as hell. Look at the picture. He painted a goddamn white power symbol over it.”

“Oh, fuck that! Looks like it’s time for Ray Ray to have a boating accident.”

“A what what?”

“A Boating Accident. It’s Bitcoin slang for lying about your stash being gone. It’s like, ‘Don’t ask for money, bro. I lost all my coins in a tragic boating accident.’”

“I don’t get it.”

“It’s another meme.”

“Well, he’s locked up, so it’s a great time for him to get got.”

When she’s right, she’s right. Robbing Ray Ray while he’s in jail? That’s karma.

It was fun, too.

I went to the Portage Marina the next afternoon. I brought a bottle of tequila in case I needed a cover story. When some geezer asked if I belonged there, I held up the bottle and yelled, “Yeah, buddy! Whoo! If the boat’s a rockin’, don’t be mockin’!” He cursed and walked away. Problem solved.

My plan was to wander through the marina and make a list of which boats might be Ray Ray’s, then go back at night and... Okay, I didn’t have a plan, but it didn’t matter. It was obvious which boat was his.

On the third dock after the boat ramp, next to a little red speedboat...

There it was. The Raytrix.

It was a middle-aged balding tech-bro boat. Not a yacht. Not a fishing boat. This was a white fiberglass piece of crap with a sad stripe down the side to make it look fancy. Or sporty? And it had a tiny radar hat on top like it was pretending to be a real ship. The cabin was just big enough to sleep two. This thing had midlife crisis written all over it.

Boats are bonkers. If you’re hiding Bitcoin seed words on a boat, you’re a damn fool. A boat means easy access for me and limited space for you to hide stuff. I was out of there in twenty minutes.

In fact, it took longer to find his boat than his seed words. They were engraved in a piece of metal, hidden at the bottom of a tackle box. “Huh. I see a tackle box but no fishing gear.” Of course it was in there. Come on bro. I took a picture of it and left.

I picked up a box of Cap’n Crunch on the way home because I was feeling inspired, and I spent the evening trying to restore Ray Ray’s Bitcoin wallet. Bro did a bad job of engraving his seed words into a credit-card sized metal plate. When I finally figured out what his words were, I only found a wallet worth a couple hundred bucks.

There had to be more, so I stood on my desk and pounded the ceiling to summon Claire. Her bedroom was directly above my workshop.

She came down a few minutes later.

“You could just call me, Shay.”

“I know, but this way’s more fun.”

“What’s up?”

“You tell me. What’s the deal with Ray Ray? He’s supposed to be loaded, right?”

“Yeah. His ex-wife is rich. She’s wicked, but he’s worse. He only married her for the money, then he ended it and got half. She found out he cheated on her, so she’s trying to get everything back, plus a pound of flesh.”

“And you know this because...?”

“I know for the same reason I know he has large testicles.”

“Which is?”

“He bragged about it. Wanna know what happened when he sat down in the hot tub though?”

“Oh, no.”

“Butternut squash.”

“Okay. Wow. Well... is he smart?”

“Does he sound smart?”

“It looks like he was smart enough to hide most of his Bitcoin. I think I found a decoy wallet.”

“Artichoke that asshole, Shay.”

“I don’t know what that means, but I guess I’m going back to the boat to search again.”

Maybe Ray Ray had another set of seed words? More likely, he was using a passphrase.

Seed words are like the keys to a Bitcoin wallet. A passphrase is your own custom text that you use with the seed, to create a hidden wallet that can only be found using the seed and the passphrase.

Some Bitcoiners put a little Bitcoin in the wallet made by the seed words. They use that as a decoy, and they hide the rest of their coins in the wallet for the seed and passphrase.

That seems smart, except, whoa bro, a decoy wallet doesn’t work if the thief knows there’s more.

The next day, I went back to The Raytrix for a more thorough search. It took a while, but I found a small spiral notepad in a Ziploc bag, stashed in a panel for accessing electrical stuff. The notepad had all kinds of info. It had names, dates, and phone numbers for the women he was banging, plus his bank accounts and financial info... passwords... It was all in there.

I took two pictures of every page.

I kept a set for myself, just in case it might be useful (cuz yoo nevah know).

I put most of the other set in a shoebox and drove all the way to Winnetka so I could leave it on his ex-wife’s porch. I pounded on her door and rang the bell. Then I ran like hell and hid behind a car so I could watch, just to make sure she found my gift.

Feeling satisfied, I went back home and emptied Ray Ray’s real wallet. I got a coooool 11.428 BTC, which at the time was worth $533,118.

Ray Ray got got.

I have no idea how long he was in jail, but I bet he wished he never got out.