Software Salesman Lies to Wife

[The Pickle]

ALICE, TX – Citizens of this sleepy South Texas town are still dealing with the aftermath of Robert Garcia’s lie. “You think you know a guy and then he does something so crazy you realize you never knew him at all,” said Bill Chauncey, Mr. Garcia’s colleague at the local software factory.

According to sources close to the Garcia family, Mr. Garcia visited a topless bar one evening in early May, but told his wife he had been at a company party. “It wouldn’t be good if Liz found out about this,” Mr. Garcia told Mr. Chauncey the next day at work. “I’m not going to mention it to her.”

“It was like an earthquake with aftershocks,” said Mr. Chauncey. “Who’s ever heard of a sales person going to a strip club? Then to find out that not only had he been to one of those places, but that he also lied to his wife about it. It just makes you wonder what else he lied about.”

Sam Shepherd, a former colleague of Mr. Garcia’s, thinks he’s lied about much more. “I think Rob plays a lot of golf when he is supposedly meeting with prospects. I also think he uses his expense account to take his buddies to expensive lunches. Some other people I know think he inflates his pipeline numbers and drinks heavily. I once heard him on the phone with his credit card company too; I think he is in a lot of debt. I bet his wife doesn’t know about that either.”

If Mr. Shepherd’s allegations are true, Mr. Garcia could be terminated or face life in prison with no chance for parole. “We’ve never heard a case like this before,” said Annette Simms, a public defender for Jim Wells County. “I’m not sure there is a precedent. With all the strippers and the alcohol and the debt and the expense accounts all mixed up in a sordid tale of sales depravity – it’s really like a Hollywood moving picture, not something that real people do.”

Mr. Garcia could not be reached for comment, but asked through a family friend that we not mention to his wife that he may have gone to a topless bar, and not a company party.