So when you've been a successful entrepreneur, built a company from scratch and then sold it, setting yourself up for a very early retirement at age fifty, set for the rest of your years moneywise, what do you do with the rest of your life? That was my situation. I had more money than any divorced man needed. I'd used a chunk for various charities, set my kids up with college and trust accounts that would provide safety nets for their entire lives, and even given a chunk to my ex, as if she really appreciated the gesture. After all that, I still had more money that I knew what to do with.
I'd spent my entire life working, either at work or doing one of my hobbies, and I just didn't know how to NOT work! After a year fishing, hiking, camping, traveling around the country sightseeing, doing all those things I always said I'd do when I retired... well I was bored. So I did the only thing someone like me knew to do. I started another business.
Unlike my first business, designed to grow and make money, this one was designed to be FUN! I loved gunsmithing since I was young. I loved to disassemble, work on and even modify firearms of all kinds. So it was just natural for me to set myself up with a machine shop, a storefront and of course, a massive indoor shooting range to test my work. What started out as my hobby on steroids, turned into another successful business. I'd already hired a total of five people to help me run the place. I bought and sold new and used firearms, but preferred the unique or classically old. This afternoon I was busy reconditioning a seventeen hundreds vintage flintlock. I'd been at it for days, carefully disassembling and going over its mechanism with a fine tooth comb. I was putting the final touches on a replacement piece that I had to custom machine before heading home to make some dinner when I heard the storefront door chime ring.
I glanced down at my watch and frowned. It was already well past closing time so all I could assume was that Eddie forgot to lock the door on his way out. I wiped the machine oil off my hands with a rag as I walked out of the shop into the storefront. Standing at the counter were two women. The older of the two was tall, good looking and quite curvacious. Her shoulder length brown hair was done in long fat curls that made me think she was used to frequent visits to the beauty parlor. Through the glass case she was standing in front of, I could see she was wearing a short skirt that matched the light orange blouse that was unbuttoned nearly half way down, exposing a significant amount of creamy cleavage. The other, a somewhat younger woman was nearly a clone of the first, clearly a much younger sister or more likely daughter. Unlike her mother, her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and her dress, even shorter than her mother's, was a navy blue wrap around type, also exposing quite a bit of cleavage, though not nearly as much as her mother.
In front of them they had laid a fairly tricked out AR15 style firearm.
"Hello. What can I do for you two today?" I asked politely, reasonably sure that they were looking for a repair or to sell the AR.
"I understand you buy used guns?"
"If they're interesting." I answered with a nod. "You want to sell this one?" I asked as I stepped to the glass display case and looked down at what I could see was a Bushmaster .223 AR variant.
"I'll be quite up front with you. I've been to a pawn shop, but they didn't want to give me anywhere close to what it's worth. They suggested maybe you'd be able to help us?"
I hefted the gun off the display case top, quickly checking the chamber before examining the rest of the weapon. It had all sorts of goodies added, four sided rail front grips, flashlight and aiming laser, night vision scope and adjustable length stock. All in all a pretty nice package. "So how much do you want for it?"
I could see a pained look on her face before she answered. "MY husband got that for us for protection, but right now we need the money more than the protection. He paid about three for it."
I frowned and shook my head. "Have you ever even shot it?"
"Once," she admitted quietly.
"It's really not worth that much. I'm afraid your husband paid way more than what it's worth. If I were you, I'd have your husband take it back and try and get his money back," I said shaking my head slowly.
"We can't. My husband isn't with us anymore," she answered quietly.
"Oh. I'm sorry," I apologized, feeling a bit bad at the comment I'd just made. "Tell you what. Let's go in the range and see how it shoots and then I'll see how much I can do."
"I'd really appreciate that," the mother said quietly. "By the way, my name is Elaine."
"Hi Elaine. I'm Rodney," I said as I turned and walked the few steps to one of the ammo shelfs and pulled a box of good quality .223 rounds off of it.
"Well, I guess that explains the name, Rodney's Toy Shop," she answered with a smile.
"Yeah. It's kind of like playing with toys," I chuckled in reply as I snapped the first of three rounds into the magazine. Once I had it loaded, I pushed it into my pocket and picked the weapon up off the showcase. "Come this way and we'll see what it does," I said, leading the way from behind the counter, across the shop to the door that led into the range. I flicked on the switches, flooding the two hundred foot long range with light as soon as I stepped through the door. I led them to the rack of hearing protection, handed each of them a pair of foam earplugs and then stepped to the first shooter's booth. I dug into my own pocket for my electronic ears and pushed them into my own before slapping the magazine into place.
"Shooting!" I shouted to the empty range out of habit before pulling the charging handle on the AR. I felt the bolt snap back into place with the muted thump that meant it had carried a round into the chamber and then lifted the weapon to rest it against my shoulder.
"BANG! BANG! BANG!" The weapon sounded as I fired the three rounds down the range at a target that was hanging near the far end. I used the scope to look at the grouping, pleased that even free hand the whole group was less than an inch separated. "Shoots well. Nice and smooth action, though a little stiff. Clearly hasn't seen much use at all. Tell you what. With the night vision scope I can do, oh, two on it"?
"Two thousand? Are you sure you can't do more? We really, really need the money!"
"I'd like to do more. I could maybe go as much as twenty-two hundred, but that's really all I can do."
"I guess if that's all you can do," she said quietly.
"But mama. We NEED three. At least until the insurance decides what they're going to do." The daughter said from behind her mother.
"I know sweetie. But I don't know where we can get the rest. The only thing I have left is my wedding ring and I'm not going to hock that!"
I wasn't sure exactly what the issue was, but clearly they were at the end of their money and were trying to get over some hump waiting for insurance money. I've had friends pass away and knew all too well that sometimes the life insurance could be slow coming. I was still thinking about how I might be able to help them when the daughter stepped past her mother and looked right at me. "So what would it take to get to three thousand?"
"Huh?" I asked in surprise. "The gun just isn't worth that kind of money," I said, shaking my head.
