Editor's Note: Catch up on our TWBG series by checking out the first five episodes: Part I , Part II , Part III , Part IV , Part V . Part VI Part VII Part VIII

Do you know that feeling that you get in the pit of your stomach—the same one that echoes through the chambers of your heart in heavy, thumping beats when you make the decision to stand up for everything you believe in?

It’s a precious moment of broken inertia, defiant momentum, and something quite like fear. It is a second or two that represents the dividing line between subjugation to a situation and complete control of it, a willful mark wherein you choose to take the initiative and fight, assume a defensive posture, or simply walk out the door. And that act of walking away is sometimes the longest walk you’ll ever take.

The length of the hallway leading from The Barrister’s office to the elevator doors had somehow metaphysically doubled or even tripled during the twenty minutes or so that we were discussing the fate of the store, culminating in Dollar Bill and I collectively making one of those decisions in one of those moments. The elevator seemed to take an hour to reach our floor—the doors opening as The Barrister came barreling around the corner.

“Wait, you can’t just walk out on this!”

He was screaming the screams of a desperate man standing on the precipice of damnation. He was watching not only his way out of financial ruin but also his opportunity to turn a profit on us slip away.

The elevator doors started their much-too-slow process of sealing Dollar Bill and I off from the sixth floor. The Barrister flung himself into the space between, wedging his arm and shoulder between the doors. For whatever reason, the elevator didn’t seem to care about his desperation and kept closing regardless of safety concerns.

“YOU CAN’T JUST LEAVE!”

His portly body couldn’t make it through the narrowing gap so he retreated and the doors shut and we went down. I looked at Dollar Bill with incredulity. He shook his head and said “Let’s just get out of here before he does something crazy.”

We descended.