(Every Sunday, I release a new short story in the ‘Sunday Story Time’ series! I write these stories the day they are published, usually within 2-3 hours. These stories could be about anything, but they will all be brief, 2-3 minute reads. Enjoy! )
Calvin Mondale Robs A Bank
Calvin Mondale is about to make the biggest mistake of his life.
He thinks there is no other choice.
He is wrong.
We join Calvin and his friend Rudy as they observe Bank of America branch #2451 (across from the Applebees on Walerga) from the safety of Calvin’s 2002 Dodge Caravan.
___
“Let’s go over the plan again,” said Calvin.
“Dude, we’ve been over it a million times. You’re too nervous.”
“Just..humor me.”
“Fine. Jesus Christ,” Rudy preened himself in the mirror as he spoke, “I walk in first, hand the note to the teller, and you hang by the door in case we need to lock the place down. Which we won’t. The teller will hand over the cash and we’ll be outta there before anyone knows.”
“And if we have to lock it down?”
“I pull my shit and jump up on the counter,” Rudy mimed a machine gun back and forth.
“We’re NOT going to shoot anyone, Rudy,”
“Of course not. I’m just having some fun. You seriously need to chill.”
This was Calvin and Rudy’s first bank robbery. But you wouldn’t know it by the relaxed, almost excited way in which Rudy was approaching the whole affair.
“Last chance to back out,” Calvin said, keeping his eyes locked on the doors of the bank.
“I’m good, bro,” Rudy said with a smile.
How is he SO relaxed right now?!, Calvin thought to himself.
He took a deep breath.
“Alright. Let’s go.” Calvin opened his door and stepped out of the van.
With pistols tucked under their shirts, Calvin and Rudy walked toward Bank of America branch #2451.
___
Calvin met Rudy in Boy Scouts 15 years ago. Rudy was constantly in trouble, starting fights, setting things on fire, and just generally fucking about. Calvin on the other hand was Senior Patrol Leader and on track to earn his Eagle Scout rank two years ahead of schedule.
Calvin secretly admired Rudy.
After high school, Rudy had a failed career as a club DJ and a couple of short stints in jail for credit card fraud. He was working as a diesel mechanic when Calvin got back in touch.
Calvin went to college and graduated middle of his class with a degree in Exercise Science. He expected to be top of his class, but college didn’t come as easy for Calvin as high school did.
After college, he moved in with his girlfriend, Becky, planning to work for a year or two and then find a grad program that would accept him. Instead, Calvin and Becky had a whoopsie baby. And then another. Best laid plans and all that.
With two kids, a stay-at-home girlfriend, and a low-paying job as a personal trainer, Calvin found himself buried by a mountain of debt. With more piling on top of him every day.
__
2 weeks before the robbery
“Babe, the water bill goes to collections on Monday,” Becky motioned to a piece of paper on the refrigerator door “$97 dollars,”.
Becky was in charge of ‘collections keepaway’ as she and Calvin called it. She kept track of due dates on things like rent, water, power, and credit cards, and told Calvin when something was within a week of being turned over to a collections agency.
“That should be okay, so long as we can make it work for the next few days with what’s in the fridge,”
The grocery bill for a family of 4 was nearly as much as rent and was the first thing to get trimmed when Calvin and Becky were short.
“We’ll manage,” said Becky.
This was not the life Calvin had envisioned for himself. And, more to the point, it was nowhere near the life he wanted to give Becky.
She’s his college sweetheart. They met freshman year and have been going with each other ever since. Prior to college, Becky had lived one of the hardest lives you can live in the US. She came from coal country, Kentucky. Poverty, abuse, addiction, and disease shaped her childhood.
Calvin, on the other hand, was raised by a middle class family in the suburbs of LA. When he met Becky, he had encountered nothing in life that came anywhere close to the level of struggle Becky experienced.
Calvin and Becky were opposites in every way but one.
A shared secret they were determined to carry with them to their graves
—
It was just after the lunch rush, 1:09 pm, and all was quiet at Bank of America branch #2451.
Calvin and Rudy crossed the street in silence.
Calvin’s mind wandered. He thought back to the secret. His reason for being here. Doing….this.
I can’t keep this up.
Calvin snapped back to the task at hand.
Rudy had entered the building ahead of him to get in line. When Calvin walked through the doors he stopped at the brochure rack, as planned. He picked up a brochure on The Smart Way to Save for Retirement and pretended to read
Calvin could feel sweat starting to bead on his forehead.
Rudy was at the front of the line.
“Next please,” came the teller’s voice.
Rudy stepped forward.
This was the point of no return.
—
It was late at night, after a particularly rowdy fraternity party when Calvin and Becky came across a man in the street.
They were walking back to Becky’s dorm and having trouble keeping a straight line. Just shy of the world spinning. The sweet spot.
The man was lying face down across the sidewalk in a growing puddle of his own urine. He had the tattered and layered clothing, not to mention the stench, of someone who calls the street home.
“We should fuck w-with him,” Calvin said, as he poured the rest of his beer out on the man’s head.
And then, before he could even register what he was doing, Calvin kicked the man in the ribs.
He felt a rush.
He had never felt this way before. It was adrenaline and invincibility.
He kicked the man again.
The man reached an arm out grasping at anything he could find.
“He’s trying to grab me!!” Becky shouted as she reflexively kicked, striking him again in the ribs.
They were both drunk out of their minds. The sober versions of themselves would be appalled at such abhorrent behavior.
In the morning, a death was reported on the local news. A homeless man. Internal bleeding.
Calvin and Becky were shocked. In the cold, hungover, light of day, they felt the lowest either of them had ever felt. They couldn’t look each other in the eyes.
That afternoon Calvin received an anonymous message in his student email account:
“I know what you did. I have the proof. Wire $3,000 to the account below or the video will be released to the authorities.”
Sure enough, the email contained a video attachment showing Calvin and Becky’s entire encounter with the man.
The unknown blackmailer has been part of their lives since that night. With a new demand every few months. Always $3,000.
What Calvin and Becky don’t know is that the blackmailer’s most recent demand was in fact his last demand.
Fate struck him with a car. Or perhaps it was karma. Whatever it was, he died on impact.
The demands would stop coming.
—-
Calvin watched out of the corner of his eye as Rudy stepped forward and handed his note to the teller:
THIS IS A ROBBERY
I HAVE A GUN
EMPTY YOUR DRAWER INTO AN ENVELOPE
HAND IT TO ME
IF YOU ALERT ANYONE I WILL KILL YOU
The teller stood there. Frozen. Complete deer in the headlights. This was a contingency they had not planned for and it threatened to scrub the whole operation.
“I’m not fucking around lady,” he said in the loudest whisper he could get away with.
Rudy lifted his shirt to show his gun.
It was a bad choice.
“Gun! He has a gun!” Screamed the woman behind Rudy.
Instant bedlam. Tellers abandoned their posts. The handful of customers in line started for the doors.
Suddenly, two shots rang out. “Everybody on the ground! Now!”, Calvin stood blocking the door, gun in hand.
“Get on the ground and nobody gets hurt,” He could feel his adrenaline surging. He recognized the same feeling of invincibility he experienced that night with Becky..
“Phones, now,” Rudy motioned towards the middle of the lobby with the tip of his pistol.
As phones began sliding across the floor Calvin realized someone was missing.
Where is the security guard? He was just he – *THUMP* –
Calvin collapsed to the floor.
—
Calvin regained consciousness as he was being cuffed to a gurney. He could see Rudy face down on the ground, in cuffs.
He would later learn that when Rudy saw the security guard cold cock him, he panicked and started shooting at the guard
He missed the guard, but his bullets ricocheted, hitting three people.
Killing one.
What was supposed to be a quick, quiet job turned into charges for armed robbery, robbery by threat, and second-degree murder.
—
Calvin was buzzed through the metal door that separated the hallway from the room where they return your belongings at the end of your sentence.
For Calvin, it was the keys to his 2002 Dodge Caravan, which Becky sold years ago, his phone (outdated, useless), wallet with expired ID, and a fortune from the Chinese food he ate in the van while staking out the bank all those years ago..
The fortune read: Long life is in store for you.
A cruel irony given the 20-year sentence he had just finished serving. Rudy made out worse though. He’ll be locked up for another ten years.
Becky had left him a decade ago and his kids stopped visiting.
At 52, Calvin stepped out through the prison door and into the free world.
Catching a bus to the halfway house gave him time to realize how alone he really was in the world.
He opened the door to his assigned bedroom.
There was a letter on the bed.
“I know what you did. I have the proof. Wire $3,000 to the account below or the video will be released to the authorities.”
MW 