The Figure Part 1

He ran across the hotel's lobby floor shouting at me. I was in no mood for whatever gamble this kid had concocted in my short absence. I had just arrived in town from a cross country flight, California to Maine. Maine?
Why the fuck, Maine?!
Fucking politics.
The dismal varicose veins of roadways spattered across America's soil had me in no mood for anything Duke was about to bring up to me.
"Sir!" He ran up to me, his voice high and loud. Very loud. Far too much cheer in that tone he had going too. The kind of tone that was enough to choke a man on his own whiskey. His hubris all stemmed from a low-rent county fair, it was just opposite the city from our hotel.
Shit.
In my childhood, this news would have excited me. My teenage hormones would have hit me with a hard on so stiff that I'd have found a half decent chick to bone all week long. Now, however, in the paramount of my writing career, and my mid-thirties, my brain turned strictly to cocaine, maybe even heroin, and the crazed story that would come from buying the drugs. Every one of the people I would buy from were the twisted personalities that erected the cavalcade of steel rails and rigged games that attracted all the local mouth breathers to what was pathetically dubbed the 'county fair'.
"You can go for your cotton candy and force fried foods deep into your gullet. I'm going for the story." I revealed a cigarette from my coat and promptly lit it as he reminded me of my publisher's commands to keep this young lawyer behind me at all times. Good damned logistics. I dragged my cigarette and swilled my lukewarm beer, "very well then, don't piss your pants, boy, because its time for you to grow the fuck up and I ain't about to hold your hand."
We hopped into the convertible Duke had conned out of the rental shack near the airport. He wasn't bad for a rookie lawyer but I could tell he and I were about to pop every damned cherry in one night. I sped off from the hotel parking lot and hopped a curb as I pulled two bones out of my hat. I smacked my lips down on one and through the wind that rushed down into the front seat, I lit it up with a crack of my Zippo. I held one out for the boy to snag, "you smoke any of this shit while you were in college?" Of course I didn't give him time to respond. I just snapped the lit on out of my mouth and tossed it into has lap, "smoke it or get your suit burned, you make the choice."
Who the fuck really knows why the publishers assigned this boy to me. Probably some kind of demented hazing they had been planning for their next new lawyer. They took a good man from my life, someone I'd considered a sidekick. A real lawyer, a true man. They fired him after he messed up an incident with a sweet and sexy publicist I'd chose to include in a story I had written up for small time publication while I lived in the Florida Keys. Apparently she wasn't too pleased that I had not refrained from changing her name, for artistic purposes, really.
The fair was exactly what I had expected it to be; the fattest men and women, children with high blood pressure and diabetes, and people so lazy they were abandoned all day in front of the same forsaken funnel-cake stand. The putrid smell of the fair gagged me as deep inside, that teenager wanted to come rushing out and find myself some strange lady to desperately try to impress as I regale them with made-up stories of war from my time spent in the military. I was a foolish little piece of shit. I looked behind me, Duke was following me like a drunk chicken, and swayed side to side each time we would have to stop in the crowd. I had all ready smoked the brains from his head and whiskey from the driver over really soaked into his blood stream.
My hound dog nose went right to work. Would it be PCP, cocaine? China white? The thought of what I could find was an easy distracting from the depraved sea of people that we swam. We quickly found ourselves in the seed backside of the county fair. We were in the dark alleys created by the campers and RVs that you dared not even look down as a child. That was where I found my people. The liquor slugging, rail snorting, pot smoking brethren that would get me my fix for the proper writing tools.
Duke's face was priceless as we approached a group of drunkards. His chin actually touched his chest and his skin as pale as an egg shell. Their radio blasted as they sat out in the chairs, a typical scene for me from my group of friends but Duke's lavish law school lifestyle had not prepared him from what we walked up on. I could smell the sweetened skunk odor layed thick in the air and I knew immediately that these would be the right people.
"God damn is it good to see some fine gentleman in this squalor they call a fair," I spat my cigarette on the ground and quickly lit another then pulled the whiskey out from my coat, "anyone care for pull?" They all took me up on my offer and I wasted no time as my bottle was spun around, "any you men want to make a little money and help another man out?" Their eyes stared right through me, "Jesus, have you all gone catatonic all ready? What hell did you take? I want some for myself and my colleague here."
They looked Duke over, he was definitely my weak link. I new the young blood could be my undoing on this adventure but he did have to be hot on my heels. Their eyes came back on me and obviously alpha male rose from his tattered lawn chair and approached me with his shoulders cocked back and a sideways stride. I assumed he hid a gun on his hip I couldn't see.
"Why'd we sell to a bloke like you? Bet you're a cop," his draw was definitely from the British Isles.
"Good god, are you Irish?"
"Accent don't mean a thing," now it was as redneck as the deepest Cajun.
"God damn, I know I"m not on enough drugs yet to be going this crazy. Pick a region and stick to it!" That was a a mistake. He picked slur of sounds that billowed out from his throat, I could only assume it to be Russian. "Come on! This is America and we speak English."
"Good on, ya."
"I'll be happy with Australian, so long as you speak fucking English!"
"Easy there, mate. You don't have to go mad on us," brave son of a bitch had the gumption to snag the cigarette right from my lips and take a drag. "How do we know you ain't know cop, undercover and here to bust the gyps that rolled in with the carnival?" He then pushed the cigarette back into my lips, he had soaked in enough slobber to disgusts a saint Bernard.
"Duke here is my lawyer."
"That's really going to help your situation, isn't it."
"Depends on if you would be offended on speaking with my very inebriated publication lawyer. You could really think of him as your human resources guy." I handed my flooded cigarette back to him and pulled out another, "in fact, seeing as he really is here more for you than me, it could really behoove you to have a nice long conversation with him while I finish my whiskey and get to know your company."

An Untitled Short Story

He paced around the kitchenette and wiped crumbs from the counter and set a dish in the sink. He didn't bother to pay attention to the news that played quietly from a radio. It made him too angry. He only left it on for background noise as he would clean. Once he was finished in the kitchenette, he straightened up the couch, on which he slept each night, and put all his books away on the shelf. The books were all he really owned in his tiny studio. The couch had been found down the street, the table was furnished by the landlords and the radio was borrowed from an acquaintance that had recently moved away.

      He walked over to the radio and reached for the knob. He turned it down all the way just before the switch would click it off, he paused a moment, shrugged his shoulders, and turned it back up to the previous murmur he had had it at before.

     He ate some leftovers he had in his mini-fridge and listened to the radio.

     More news about the ravished economy, impending doom from North Korea and fears of the gay rights movement.

     He cleaned up after himself and listened to the radio a little bit more. 

     The streets were becoming increasingly unsafe too, or so it seemed to the crime report.

     He sat down on the couch and fell asleep as he listened to the radio ramble on about another news story of a bank robber that got away.

He woke the next morning with an ache in his neck. The radio was still on. His apartment filled with the sound of cheery morning news and feel-happy-love songs between segments. He groaned and cracked his neck. His eyes shot wide open and he dropped his hand into his lap.

     He stood up from the couch and reached in between the arm and the cushion. His arm went deep into the lint filled underbelly of the couch. Sure enough, his treasure was still there and his arm shot out with a pistol in his hand, a Beretta M9 the last of his real posessions.

     He stood as he checked if it was loaded then set it on his table. The radio was still on. He was too entranced by the cobalt gleam to hear anything. He contemplated the decision he was about to make with a grimace on his face, his mouth crooked, only on the left side.

He'd chose to continue with his normal routine for the rest of that day. He canvased the town shops with his résumé, stopped briefly at the library and helped out for a short period of time at the community garden across town from his apartment. This time, he did it all with a 9mm gun in the belt of his pants.

     After he had ended his day, he returned home to his small apartment, it was just after three P.M. And dropped off his newly borrowed book from the library and ate a salad he was able to make with some of the vegetables he had earned volunteering at the garden.

     He ignored his radio entirely. He hadn't even turn it on as he cleaned the one room that was his apartment. He just sat in the silence of his cold home and checked the gun again, cocked it, and placed it back in his pants.

At 4:13 P.M., he placed a ski mask he had just purchased over his face and walked into the First National Bank across town from his apartment, near the community garden. The gun drawn and held into the air.

     “Hands in the air and don't anybody move!” He shouted through gritted teeth as he looked around the lobby.

     No guards. Barely any customers even.

     “I don't want to hurt any innocent people here! So just cooperate with my demands and I'll be on my way!” He noticed a clerk began to lower one hand, “Oh no, ya don't!” He ran up to her, she was a beautiful young woman, obviously fresh out of college and scared shitless by her first armed robbery at her new job. “Don't you even think about it!” He pointed the gun right into her heart. “It might even be best that you get up off of that chair and fetch the bank manager before I shoot your neighbor,” he then pointed the gun to the older woman next to her and looked at her name plate, “Gladys, here!”

     Gladys didn't budge and held her hands where he could clearly see them.

     The younger lady disappeared into the back for a moment and he pointed his gun towards Gladys, who smiled at him briefly. One of his eyebrows crooked up in intrigue.

     “Sir,” the young lady returned with the bank manager, his hands in the air and a calm voice arose from his lips, his face was scrunched with fear though, “please don't do anything rash. Gladys has grand children.”

     “What about you? Got kids, big whig?” He pointed the gun towards the manager.

     “I do, a newborn boy. His name's Jack. What's yours?” The manager walked up to the counter.

     “Call me Floyd,” he stepped backwards into the lobby and turned to look at the frightened customers. A young couple and an old man. “All of you, up against the counter. Everyone in the back! Get up front! I want all of your hands on the counter. Now!”

     Everyone obliged.

     “Now,” Floyd looked back at the manager, “I'ma call you Jack, get it, suit?”

     “Anything you desire, sir.”

     “First off, don't you call me 'sir' and we'll all get out of here with no more holes than when we walked in the bank.”
     “Of course, Floyd.”

     “Now, empty all the drawers. You had better make it fast too. I don't have much time left today.” The manager nervously fumbled around all the drawers and stuffed the money into a bank sack. Bills fell to the floor has he tried to stuff more and more into the bag.

     “Zip it off before you lose the peoples' money, Jack!”

     The bank manager handed an overstuffed and zipped up bank bag to Floyd.

     “Good man, Jack,” Floyd paused a moment and felt the heft of the bag as he bounced it in his unarmed palm. “This is gonna make a lot of people happy.”

     “I'm sorry?”

     “Jack, my poppa taught me something very important at an incredibly young age, wanna hear his wisdom?”

     “Yes, Floyd.”

     “Never question, cheat, or lie to the man pointin' a loaded gun in your face,” Floyd pulled the gun up to the bank manager's face. “Now tell me somethin' else, Jack: how much money y'all got in the safe?”

     “I...” the manager's voice broke, “I...I don't...”

     “Now, Jack, you wouldn't happen to be going against my daddy's words, would ya?”

     “No,” the manager took a deep breath and sighed a moment, “we just got a shipment of cash from corporate today. Nearly thirty grand.”

     Floyd laughed with a short escape of breath, “you and I are about to make a lot of good, hard workin' people very, very happy.” Floyd pulled the gun back from the manager's face, “now you go and be a good little manager and fetch exactly what your customer wants.”

     “That would be?”

     “Don't play dumb with me, Jack! I want it all!”

     “Of course,” the manager backed away from the counter and walked over to the safe, “Gladys has a code that must be entered too.”

     “May I, Floyd?” Gladys stood up and removed her hands from the counter. She cracked a small smile at him again and all Floyd could do was give a little nod in the manager's direction.

They both disappeared into the safe. After a short moment, Gladys came back out alone. The manager came out another minute later with a brief case.

     “Here's all the cash we received,” he heaved the brief case up to the counter, “should I get the coin for you too?”

     “No,” Floyd grabbed the briefcase off of the counter, “that'd all be too much to carry.”

     Gladys glanced at Floyd again and smiled sweetly, this time for far longer than a mere glance.

     Floyd turned around to exit, “y'all are about to help me make many people very happy. Good day, everyone.” He turned to the three customers who had stood in silence the entire time, “I'm sorry to have inconvenienced the three of you.” With that, he placed the gun into his pants and turned to walk out.

Officer Nelson sat in his cruiser and listened to the chatter on his radio as he ate his lunch. Aside from the APB on an individual accused of a bank robbery, the day had been uninterestingly boring. Only traffic tickets and removing a crazed homeless man from a store that had refused to sell him liquor. A piece of ketchup dripped from his burger onto his uniform. He promptly wiped it away with his napkin, tossed it out his window, and looked up to see a man with a briefcase walking into the bank across the street from the Jack-In-The-Box he was sitting at.

     “Well, I'll be,” he reached for his radio, “fucker's hittin' another.” His radio squelched as he snapped the talk button down, “This is car 240, I've got a 10-20 on our APB. Alamo Credit Union at 23rd and 52nd. He's hittin' another.” Nelson tossed his burger down in the passenger seat and shifted his car into gear.

     He closed off one side of the street with his cruiser and flung his door open. With his gun drawn, he dropped to a knee beside his cruiser and pointed his gun at the door. The sirens of the other cruisers were dim in the distance, Nelson couldn't hear a single one of them, he heard nothing over the cold steel rapping of his hear beat.

     Before the sweat could build on his brow, his nervous thoughts were interrupted by his commanding officer, Sgt. Clemmens, “What've we got here, Nelson?”

     “Perp is inside right now, sir.”

     “Alright, everybody!” Clemmens turned to the other officers that had arrived, “I want all your lead pointed on that door. It's his only exit and we've got it covered.” Clemmens turned back to Nelson and placed his hand on his shoulder, “Good work, Nelson.” Clemmens walked off shouting more commands, “I want someone to get me on a line straight to this bank. I'm sure we've got...” His voice faded as he walked off and Nelson just tightened his grip on his pistol. Only three other officers had shown up and followed suit. They propped themselves and their guns on their hinge of their doors and waited.

     Seconds were minutes and minutes were hours.

     After ages had passed, Clemmens walked back up to the officers from behind them, “here's the case, men! Perp refuses to speak on the phone and the bank manager claims he doesn't feel threatened. No demands to top it all off. Keep your eyes on your irons and pointed at the door. I want that son of a bitch dropped like a rabid coyote if he so much as twitches!” Clemmens popped open the passenger door on Nelson's cruiser, “mind if I post with you?”

     “No, sir, not at all.”

     “Thanks, Nelson,” Clemmens drew his six gun and knelt down, he noticed the burger splashed against Nelson's seat, “good God, Nelson, you were on lunch break too?”

     “Never on break in the blue, sir.”

     “You'll be a detective soon enough, son,” Clemmens looked back to the door and noticed some activity on the other side, “he's comin' out, men! Be ready.”

Floyd stepped out of the bank door with the brief case still in on hand.

     “Freeze!” Clemmens shouted at him and the word reverberated in Nelson's ears.

     Floyd's hands rose to the air. His coat drifted open in a warm breeze and one of his feet stepped away. He shot down to a runner's stance and began to bolt away from the door. His hair bounced with him as he started his pace. Nelson even noticed the butt of the gun tucked into his pants as he turned and the coat froze in the air, stagnant in the breeze.

     Nelson's finger jerked down on the trigger nine times. He followed Floyd's every step as he folded in half and fell to the ground. Floyd's blood splattered on the bank's brick wall behind him and the shots echoed in Nelson's ears.

     “Perp's down!” Clemmens shot up and ran up to Floyd as he settled on the ground. He handcuffed him and took his pulse. “Dead too. Nice shooting, Nelson!”

     The other officers holstered their guns and walked up to the body.

Nelson stood behind his door and fumbled to get his gun back into place.

     Clemmens walked up to Nelson, “first one, son?”

     “No, sir,” Nelson spoke as he finally snapped the gun down into his belt, “shot a man in New Orleans.”

     “Every perp deserves a bullet,” Clemmens rubbed Nelson's shoulder, “make sure these boys don't muss up any of your bravery in their paperwork,” with that, Clemmens waltzed to his car and tore off in return to his office.

     The victims started to come out of the bank. One by one they walked out into the Texas sun and squinted at Floyd's body on the ground. The bank's manager was already speaking with one of the other officers and Nelson walked up to get the scoop.

     “So,” Nelson spoke as he rested his hands on his hips, “how much did he take from you?”

     “Not a dime.”

     Nelson's heart dropped into his stomach, “excuse me?”

     “He came in with a brief case full of money and paid off a bunch of mortgages.”

     Nelson could say nothing.

     “He demanded at gun point we catch up the mortgages of all homes about to be foreclosed upon that the money would cover.”

     Nelson had to ask, “well, hat's in the briefcase then?”

     “Receipts.”

     “Nelson!” Another officer shouted from behind him and he walked over.

     “Um, Nelson, man, his gun ain't even loaded.”