The Misadventures of Dave

The problem with Dave was not that he was unlucky. Unlucky people get struck by lightning or lose their wallets. Dave's problem was more specific and more persistent: he had a gift for being in precisely the wrong place at precisely the wrong moment, and an appearance so thoroughly average that people constantly mistook him for someone else. He was the human equivalent of a blank form — medium height, medium build, brown hair of medium length, a face that security cameras seemed to forget the moment he passed. This had caused him minor inconvenience for most of his thirty-four years. On the day everything changed, it nearly got him killed.

It began, as most of Dave's disasters began, with a sandwich. He was standing in line at the deli on Fourteenth Street, trying to decide between turkey and roast beef, when a man in a very expensive suit grabbed him by the elbow and whispered, "You are late. The others are already inside." Before Dave could explain that he was not late, was not expected anywhere, and did not know any others, the man had steered him through a door marked EMPLOYEES ONLY and into a room containing four people in ski masks, a detailed blueprint of the municipal bank, and an alarming quantity of plastic explosives.

"Dave," said the largest of the masked figures, in a tone of weary familiarity. "We said eleven sharp." Dave opened his mouth to say that his namewas indeed Dave but that this was almost certainly a coincidence, and then closed it again, because the man had placed a ski mask in his hands with the unmistakable expectation that he would put it on. Dave put it on. He had always been bad at confrontation.