"What do you mean we don't have enough?"
"I mean we don't have enough!"
I groaned. "Well, do we at least have enough for the lawsuits?" I begged. "I don't want to be swimming in debt before the night is over." Helpy twiddled his tiny fingers, then shook his head. I banged my fist against the table, sending a few pencils flying off, and banged my head against the wall. I saw Helpy reaching for me, but stopped moving when I spoke again. "We can't finish the week without dealing with all these lawsuits; that could only get us in more trouble," I observed, "but we can't pay for them..."
"We might be able to hold them off for now," Helpy began, "but we'd need to cut all other expenses and trust we earn lots from here to the end of the week."
I sighed. It's Thursday, I thought, so we'd only have two days' worth of profit to pay. This is problematic.
"Mikey? Mister Afton?" Helpy said. "What if we-"
"Buy Lefty," I said, with the enthusiasm of a lightbulb clicking on suddenly. "He's five bucks, and you said yourself he could bring in, like, two thousand just by being in the restaurant." Helpy gasped.
"Sir, that will not be a good financial decision in the long run!" He said, but I brushed him off.
"We need the money now, Helper Freddy," (I only called him by his full technical name when I was being stern) "'potential lawsuits' be damned. Bring me the Rare Finds Auction catalogue."
Helpy reluctantly obliged. I flipped to the page with Lefty on it, tracked down the number, and began dialing it into my phone.
I noticed Helpy looking anxiously at the image of Lefty, examining everything. I sighed. Hopefully this wouldn't be a bad idea.
"Hello, is this Mister Em? I'm interested in your animatronic, Lefty, that was in the Rare Finds Auction catalogue. My name is Michael Afton."
