17 November 2011

The Last Job - Part 3

“Take a different way back to the flat,” Jason said, out of breath, wincing with the pain in his knee. “The police can’t know exactly where we were.” He breathed hard and clutched his knee. “That wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“What the hell happened in there?” Richard demanded. “More importantly, what the hell am I going to do about Priscilla? I can’t tell her what happened. She trusts me.”
 
“I don’t know what happened. That woman. She was supposed to be asleep. All of a sudden she just rolled over and turned the light on.” Jason grimaced. “We need to get something for my leg.”
 
“We can’t go back to the flat,” Richard said, panicked. “I can’t tell Priscilla what happened.”
 
“Well, let’s at least go to mine,” Jason pleaded. “I need to ice this real bad.”

The Mini flew through the cramped city streets in the early hours of the morning, arriving back at Jason’s flat. Jason left the car and limped his way up to the flat. He turned the key in the lock, then hobbled into his living room, setting down his backpack on the way to the kitchen.
 
“We can’t stay here, Rich. You know that, right?” Jason asked Richard, who had just entered the apartment. “I think we should try to get out of the country.” He took the ice pack out of the freezer and secured it around his leg.
 
“What do I do about Priscilla?” said Richard. He paced back and forth running his hands through his hair. “I was going to ask her to move to Naples with me once she finished finals. That takes a lot of trust, and I betrayed that trust.” He sat down on the futon and rested his head in his hands. “I should never have gotten involved with this. It’s cost too much over the years.”
 
Jason sat down next to Richard. “Rich, we’ve known each other since our freshman year at college. I know we really screwed up this time, but it’ll get better.”
 
“No.” He stood up and paced again. “There’s no way I’m going to leave Priscilla behind. She deserves to know the truth about what we do, where I get my extra money from. Door to door sales doesn’t bring in enough to live like we live. I’m going to tell her and then turn myself in. It’s the best thing I can think of.”
 
“Rich, don’t do this to yourself.”
 
“I have to! You’ve been so hung up on that rush you feel that you’ve lost all sense of responsibility. This was supposed to be the last one. I was finally going to get what I wanted—a life without secrets, and now we’re stuck in this mess because you screwed up!” Richard said.
 
“Look,” said Jason. “Just go along with it for now. We need to get out of town for a little while. That couple tonight saw both of us and they’ll have called the police, who WILL be looking for us, whether you like it or not. Now I know a guy north of here who can help us. We can lay low for a while there."

“I don’t know,” Richard said. “Priscilla will wonder what happened.”
 
“Just tell her you have to go out of town for business.” Jason shrugged.
 
“Errrr…” Richard’s face contorted as he debated whether or not to accept Jason’s proposal. “You’re sure this guy can help?”
 
“Positive. When have I ever let you down?” Richard glared at him. “Besides tonight,” Jason responded with a grin.
 
“I don’t know. I will lose her if she finds out,” Richard said.
 
“Rich, they saw you too. If they catch you they’ll throw you in jail,” Jason said. “Do you want Priscilla to have to deal with that?”
 
“I just don’t think running off like this without any warning is the best idea for my relationship,” Richard said.
 
“Look, Rich. I know how attached you two are and you don’t want to hurt that, but the police are going to be looking for us,” Jason said, his voice slightly elevated.
 
“But you don’t know that!” Richard stood up. “I think you’re just trying to get out of here because you’re in trouble, and I’m the only ride you have.
 
“Richard, I’m dead serious. I know that man in the house saw you too. He almost hit you with that damn bat. How could he not have seen you?” Jason shot back.
 
Richard paced back and forth, brow furrowed. “How long would we have to be gone?” He said.
 
“I don’t know. It would probably have to be at least a week. Most likely two,” Jason said.
 
“That’s a long time.”Richard said. “She won’t buy it.”
 
“If you don’t want to go to jail, you would be wise to join me,” Jason said.
 
“Ugh, why did you have to screw this up?” Richard asked. “I really don’t have much of a choice, do I?”
 
“Sadly, not much of one, unless you want to get picked up by the police soon,” Jason said. “I just have to grab a few things from here.” Jason said as he got up and went to his room. “You know, I really think you’re doing the right thing here if you come with me,” he said from the other room as he stuffed clothes into a large duffle bag.
 
“What, abandoning Priscilla for two weeks? How is that the right thing?” Richard asked.
 
“What I meant was saving yourself from jail so you two can still be together.”
 
“Well we wouldn’t be in this situation if things had gone according to plan tonight,” Richard said.
 
“Yeah, well. Shit happens. You just have to adapt when it does,” Jason said as he strolled into the living room with his bag over his shoulder. “Let’s go. Time’s wasting.”
 
Richard broke his long stare at the coffee table and met Jason’s gaze. “I guess this is goodbye then.”
 
“Rich, you can’t be serious.” Jason looked crestfallen. “We’ve always been in this together. You can’t just give up.”

“This obsession of yours ruined my life. Either choice I make will likely destroy everything.” Richard slouched back in the futon. “I’m done hiding.”
 
“The key is on the counter. Just lock the door when you leave then.” Jason opened the door and looked back at Richard. “Take care of yourself.”
 
“Likewise.” Jason shut the door.

09 November 2011

The Last Job - Part 2

Jason leaned his bike against the stone wall of Richard’s apartment building, then walked up to the stained wood door and rapped the cast-iron knocker against it three times. He shivered slightly in his blue button-down shirt. Slung across his back was a small black bag containing his supplies for that night. The door swung open and a girl roughly the same height as Jason stood in the doorway. She had shoulder length black hair done up in a ponytail and ice blue eyes that examined Jason from head to toe. She glanced with suspicion at the bag slung on his back.

“Evening, Priscilla,” Jason said. “Is Richard there?”
 
“Yes. Come in, Jason.” Priscilla stepped back and called down the hall. “Richard! Jason’s here.” Richard walked out of the hall to his bedroom in jeans and a collared shirt. “Ready to get out of here?” he said.

“Yeah.” I’ve been ready to go since I got here.”
 
“Alright, Baby, we’ll probably be back pretty late. Don’t wait up for us.”
 
Priscilla nodded and gave Richard a kiss on the cheek, glaring at Jason over Richard’s shoulder. Following the streetlights the two walked down the street and turned into the alley where Richard kept his car. “We’ll change here.”
 
Jason took off his button down shirt, revealing a solid black t-shirt. He quickly threw on a pair of black cargo pants and a pair of solid black Chuck Taylors. Over the top of his t-shirt he zipped a black hoodie and put a black beanie on his head to darken his light brown hair.
“Rich, have you ever told Priscilla what we do?” Jason asked.
 
“No, why would you ask that?” Richard’s voice was muffled by the black turtleneck he pulled over his head.
Jason grunted. “The past few times I’ve met you at your house she’s given me a look that tells me she knows what’s up,” Jason said. “It’s kind of unnerving.”
 
“I haven’t told her anything. You can be sure about that. I don’t want to think about how she would react if she found out,” Richard assured Jason.
 
“I dunno. I just get this weird feeling about it whenever she looks at me,” Jason said.
 
Richard wore almost the same gear, although his height made him look rather awkward. Jason snapped his tool belt around his waist and shoved his other clothes inside his bag after tossing a small bag onto his back. “Let’s roll,” he said as he climbed into the passenger seat.
 
Richard lowered himself into the driver’s seat and started the car. The familiar cough and sputter of the engine greeted the two as the car came to life. Richard turned left and drove past his apartment into the roundabout at the bottom of the hill he lived on. The ride to the target house was uneventful as the majority of the city’s residents had turned in for the night, save for the occasional couple on a late-night stroll through the streets.
The target house sat on a narrow, poorly lit street. “Are you sure about this place?” Jason looked doubtfully at the cracking shutters and the poorly maintained tile roof. As the two stared at it from down the lane Richard assured Jason that the house was worthwhile.
“Wait here,” Jason said, exiting the car. “I should be out of there in about an hour. Be ready to get the hell out of here if anything happens.” With that Jason scaled the low wall onto the back of one of the houses and made his way to the tile roof. Stepping gingerly to avoid setting any of the tiles loose, Jason reached the rooftop of the house. Slowly, he lowered himself to the outside of one of the left windows into the spare bedroom, his feet resting lightly on the outcropping below the windowsill. He grasped a drain with his left hand while he carefully opened the window, shifting to the left as the right side swung towards him.
 
“He’s crazy,” thought Richard as he watched the performance unfold from down the street. Jason crept into the spare bedroom pausing to survey his surroundings. To his right was a single bed with a multi-patterned quilt draped over the top and at the foot of the bed sat a small dresser. The door to the upstairs hallway was closed. Jason silently moved to the door and opened it inward to the room. Two doors other doors opened onto the hallway further down from the bedroom door he had just come from. Jason assumed these to were master bedroom and the bathroom.
 
He walked down the staircase and into the living area. A sofa stood in front of a large fieldstone fireplace, upon which a flat-panel television was hung. The coffee table was littered with various market magazines, and National Geographics were stuffed in the magazine holder on the left end of the sofa.
 
As he moved into the study through a door to the right of the kitchen, he noticed a flicker of movement in his peripheral vision. Jason’s heart raced while sweat collected under his sweatshirt. He peered out of the door only to see a small grey cat happily flicking its tail from side to side while it drank from its water dish below the granite kitchen counter. Jason breathed a sigh of relief. Turning his attention to the study, he searched the room for anything valuable. The walls were lined with bookshelves filled with books, including a full encyclopedia set, something he hadn’t seen in a house since he was young.
 
Finding nothing in the study, Jason headed back upstairs to search for the safe. He figured the most likely location to deter such an easy theft would be near the family. He crept up the stairs, watching the cat carefully to make sure it didn’t follow him, and slowly opened the door to the master bedroom. He glanced around to make sure he was safe in entering the room. Seeing the elderly couple sound asleep in bed, he decided to enter.

The master bedroom was larger than Jason expected. Against the wall at the foot of the bed stood an ornately carved dresser, topped with a mirror which had various reminders and photographs tucked into the frame. A sliver of moonlight illuminated a bench at the foot of the bed, upon which a yellow robe was draped. Large photographs of the couple on vacation hung on the sponge-painted plaster walls. Finally Jason’s eyes drifted to the center of the room, where the couple was tucked into a four-poster bed.

Jason stepped into the room and closed the door nearly shut, then crept to the dresser. He examined the mirror and the wall behind it, finding nothing, then moved on to the picture hanging above the wife’s nightstand on the far side of the room. The picture looked to be from early in the couple’s marriage. A young man with a backpack on his back posed with a young blonde woman in the mountains, the snowcapped peaks visible in the background. The man was dressed in slacks and boots with a red collared shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. He had clean, combed-over brown hair and his arm was around the blonde-haired woman, who wore a yellow sun dress with red polka dots. Jason noticed this picture hung slightly further from the wall than some of the other pictures he passed in the room. He carefully removed the picture from the wall, revealing the dial of a small safe.
 
Jason reached into his belt and pulled out a small stethoscope which he put on before holding the bell near the dial. The dial clicked away in the stethoscope in Jason’s ears as he listened for the low clicks of the tumblers. He turned the dial until he heard the three tumblers move then turned the handle slowly to avoid the grinding noise of metal against metal. As he opened the safe door he glimpsed various legal documents and valuables. The minimal light in the room winked off of jewelry adorned with precious stones sitting on the small shelf. Carefully grasping the documents to keep them from falling everywhere, he pulled them out and set them on the floor. He reached back in to grab the jewelry, pulling out a black pearl and opal necklace and sapphire earrings. Jason’s heart beat faster as he looked through the documents. Among them he discovered various legal documents, deeds and savings bonds.
 
Distracted by his discoveries, Jason failed to notice the movement in the bed. The woman stirred, rolling over towards the windows. Her eyes slowly opened to see a black shape moving around the nightstand. “Alan?” she said groggily.
 
Jason froze, his heart pounding. He had never been caught before. All his attention to detail, all of his planning, went out the window. Slowly, his mind returned to reality. He tried to hide behind the nightstand and stuff the safe contents into his bag. He moved quickly as everything around him seemed to move in slow motion. The woman fumbled for the lamp chain in the darkness, clicking the light on to reveal Jason’s bag sliding behind the nightstand.
 
Down the street, Richard sat behind the wheel of the Mini, drumming his fingers on the dash. He watched the guest window waiting for Jason. Something was wrong. Richard opened the door then walked toward the house.
 
Back in the apartment, Richard cowered behind the nightstand while the husband, who he now knew as Alan, scrambled out of bed. Jason peeked around the nightstand to see Alan reach under the bed and pick up a baseball bat. Jason grabbed his bag and jumped to his feet. For a second the two froze, staring at each other as though daring the other to make the first move. Jason bolted towards Alan, swinging his bag at his face. The bag connected with Alan’s face and he staggered back, allowing Jason to run towards the door. As he entered the hallway Alan threw the baseball bat at Jason, hitting him in the back of the knees and causing him to fall. Jason slung the bag over his shoulder, then sprinted to the guest room window.
 
Nearing the house, Richard saw Jason peek his head out of the guest window and jump from the second story, hitting the cobbled street hard with a roll. “Get the car going!” yelled Jason as he ran limping toward Richard. His right leg had taken the brunt of the fall out of the guest bedroom, and his knee radiated pain with every step. He winced whenever that leg hit the ground. Alan ran to the window and shouted at the pair. He threw the baseball bat after them, which landed just shy of Richard.

Richard sprinted back towards the car. He turned the key in the ignition in a panic. This had never happened before. The Mini coughed and sputtered as it tried to start, yielding no result. “Dammit!” Richard exclaimed in desperation.

“Come on, you piece of shit! Start!” Richard swore at his car. He tried twice more, giving it some gas until finally the car cracked and popped to life. He cranked it into gear and sped towards Jason. Jason ripped open the passenger door as Richard screeched to a halt next to him, and dove in, shutting the door as the Mini barreled down the street and away from the house.