ACCOUNTANT BY DAY

A man of about 19 came into the store one afternoon dressed like a refugee from a Vampire LARP and approached the counter. “I will be requiring a loan for the sum of one hundred dollars,” he said. “This is not something I have done before.”

I wondered if he was trying not to break character, or if he was just a fruit in black lace.

After establishing that he fit all the requirements for taking out a payday loan, I gave him a loan application and left him alone for a few minutes to fill it out while I photocopied his ID and filled in a few more blocks on my crossword puzzle.

“All set?” I asked when he finished.

“I am,” he said. He pushed his application through the slot under the window.

Reading his name, which was ordinary but perfectly acceptable, off of his driver’s license, I typed it into the computer. Then I picked up his application and read the name he had written on it. I set the application down on the counter and looked carefully at the young man.

“Is this your legal name, sir?”

“It is what I am called,” he said carefully.

“You are called Nightbane Daystalker?” I asked him. To my credit, I did this straight-faced, without laughing.

“I am,” he agreed, totally unashamed.

“Uh, yes, but is this your legal name?”

“The government of this realm does not recognize me as such, no,” he admitted.

I squinted at him, trying to figure whether he was doing this on a dare or something. “Uh, I’m going to need you to write your legal name on this application. You’ll have to sign the paperwork with your legal name as well. I’m not going to give a payday loan to, uh, Nightbane Daystalker.”

Thus we completed his transaction with relatively little incident, although he still insisted on speaking like a leftover from the cast of Excalibur.

I think kids should be smoking reefer and drinking the booze they stole from their parents, not pretending to be tragically fruity Arthurian vampires.