The Forging

by Jeffrey Hancock

  With the tag-team voices fighting it out, I wondered if this thief is a frustrated ventriloquist with mental health issues. As I lead this thug, I steered us through the aisle with all the seasonal items. A chorus of motion-activated Halloween decorations started screaming, booing, and generally making nuisances of themselves. The day shift has it the worst. Every kid gets joyful glee out of testing every last noisemaker. I hate seasonal displays, but this aisle has the best pick-up from the surveillance cameras. With any luck, this guy will be recognized and caught. As we approached the pharmacy counter, I could see no one is waiting to pick up their prescription. I silently rejoiced for the stroke of luck.

  “Go around to the pharmacy’s side door. I want back there,” Mister Creepy Voice commanded. He put his hand on my shoulder and pushed me in the direction of the door. His touch feels cold and wrong like an oily film is spreading out and covering me. The touch lasted only a moment, but the feeling stayed. I shivered. I’ll need a hot shower to shake the cold and to clean off the film when this is all over. We reached the door. “Open it.”

  “It’s locked,” I replied.

  “You’ve been playing it pretty smart, Mr. Clerk Guy, so don’t start acting stupid.” I reached into my pocket for the keys. “Easy. Pull those keys out slowly.” I fumbled with the keys trying to find the one that fit the door.

  “Don’t hurt him. He’s doing as you asked,” the second voice was still straining. I finally found the correct key despite my trembling hands. It took me three tries before I could fit the key into the lock. I opened the door and saw Marcy doing some restocking. The pharmacy must be slow tonight. Well, things are going to get busy in here pretty darn quick.

  She looked up with a start. “Nathan, you know you aren’t supposed to be back here.” She noticed my pal with the two voices and a gun. Her eyes grew wide.

  “Close the security curtain. This will take a few minutes, and I want some privacy while she works,” I obeyed him lickety-split.

  Marcy looks like the merry-go-round of her thoughts is about to spin out of control, “Marcy, look at me.” I put my hands on her shoulders, “Calm down.’ I am trying to get her to look me in the eyes, “This gentleman promises no one will get hurt if we do as he says. We can do that, right, Marcy?” Her breathing is getting faster. She wouldn’t look at me. “Marcy. Marcy. MARCY!” She jumped and finally looked me in the eyes, “You can do as he asks, can’t you, Marcy?’ I am nodding my head yes the whole time I spoke and willing her to relax. She started calming down.

  “You are just Mister Helpful tonight,” his voice is calm, but I could see sweat beading down his face. Maybe the second voice is gaining the upper hand. “Alright, Miss, I have written down all the different meds I want. Bring me each one, all you have in stock.” He handed her a folded piece of paper. She opened it up and read it. A puzzled look came over her face, “Don’t think about it and just get me those meds.” Marcy grabbed an empty box and went about her task. “Hurry, Miss. I am not in a mood to be messed with,” It took her maybe two minutes to collect everything on the list. She handed the box to the robber. He grabbed it and his shopping list. He glanced down at the collection of bottles. “Is this all of it? It looks light to me,” he growled.

  Marcy broke into tears, “It’s everything on the list. We don’t carry much stock on those drugs. They’re mostly special order.”

  “No, don’t hurt her. I think she is telling the truth,” the second voice was pleading. “I’ll stop fighting you.”

  “Very well, with this caper going so smoothly, I can be magnanimous. However, I can’t have you getting help while I finish up with him. Turn around and put your hands behind your back.’ Marcy did as instructed. Mr. Magnanimous pulled a roll of duct tape and a tie-wrap out of his pockets. Tie-wrap - You know those plastic strips electricians and computer nerds use to bundle up wires. Cops use them, too, as cheap handcuffs. He handed them to me, “Wrap her wrists. Do it right. I’ll be checking. If it’s too loose, well, let’s say it will ruin the rest of her short life.”

  I took the tie and wrapped Marcy uptight, maybe even a little too tight, “Don’t try anything, Marcy. So far, he hasn’t hurt anyone. Play it safe.” Tears are streaming down her face, and her nose was running, but she was quiet.

  ‘Excellent. Tape her mouth shut. I don’t want her making a sound.’

  ‘Can I wipe her nose first?’ I asked as I turned and looked at him.

  “Be quick. This is taking longer than it should.”

  I wiped her nose on my sleeve. Yuck. I held her cheeks in my hands and looked her straight in the eyes, “Ok. You're fine, Marcy, stay quiet. As soon as he is gone, I’ll come back and free you,” I tried to instill confidence in my voice in hopes Marcy would remain calm and not try something which could get us hurt or worse. I placed the tape over her mouth and helped her to the floor, “Don’t do anything.”

  The thief checked over my tie-wrap job then proclaimed, “Good enough. Now, to the office,” he glared down at Marcy, “Listen to him girl and don’t try anything or your boss will pay the price first,” he emphasized the last word.

  We left the pharmacy quickly but not rushed. He is doing every step of this hold-up with the practiced calm of someone who has done this many times. “Why are we going to the office?” I asked myself. He hasn’t shown any interest in the cash in the registers. He can’t believe I can open the safe. Oh God, he needs privacy for what he’s going to do next. Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap.’ My knees started to wobble. Suddenly, I feel hot. Everything is starting to spin like I am going to faint. “Wait. Calm yourself down. Breathe. Yes, breathing is helpful. Don’t panic. He hasn’t hurt anybody, yet. Maybe he wants something else. Yes, if he planned to kill people, he would have had Marcy come with us. He has something else planned,” my mind raced. “Sir, if you want to get into the safe, I don’t have the combination. All the drugs are kept down in the pharmacy. Don’t waste your time. You should go.”

  I heard the second voice join in with, “He’s right. You should go.”

  “Don’t try to tell me what to do, boy. I won’t hesitate to rub you out,” the creepy voice stated in the strange accent.

  ‘Boy? What did it mean? I had at least fifteen years, maybe twenty on him and rub you out? He must have seen too many gangster movies.’ I pondered.

  We made it to the office without further conversation. The place is a mess. An old metal desk with a faux wood grain finish sat opposite the door. An equally ancient chair is behind the desk. On the far wall behind the desk and chair are some shelves. Books and company manuals filled them along with the hard drive and monitor of the surveillance system. Filing cabinets line one wall. Opposite the cabinets is a large two-way mirror which overlooked the sales floor. Two folding chairs faced the front of the desk. Papers and folders are strewn all over the desk with little regard for order. Mike, the General Manager, has a system to the way he keeps his desk. It had something to do with Chaos Theory, I think. Never clean Mike’s desk. This is Rule Number One. I made that mistake once early in my tenure at the drug store. He made me scrub all the carts with a bucket and sponge. It is the favorite duty he would assign anyone who pisses him off. Usually, the guys who power-wash the sidewalks at night would hose the carts off, but not if you are Mike’s “special friend” this week.

  “Sit down and clam up,” the strangely accented voice told me. He looked out the two-way mirror. He didn’t appear to get agitated. The floor must have looked quiet. He walked around behind the desk, pulled out a pair of wire cutters from his coat, and cut the power cord and feeds to the hard drive. He moved the drive to the desk, disturbing some of the paperwork as he did. Oh look, he wants to be Mike’s “special friend.” Next, he cut the phone lines. “Okay, let’s have the cell phone,” he commanded.

  “We aren’t allowed to carry a cell phone while on the clock. Mine is in my locker in the break room.”

  He looked at me like he is going to burn a hole through me with heat vision. “Empty
your pockets and turn them inside out. Take off your watch and ring, too. If you lied to me about the phone, little Ms. Marcy will be accompanying me on a little road trip. I assure you she won’t like the ride.’ I put the contents of my pockets on the desk a wallet, my keys, eighty-seven cents, a half-full container of Tic Tacs, and a small wad of lint. I took off my watch and placed it next to my wallet. As I went to pull off my wedding ring, I hesitated. I had never removed my ring during my entire marriage. Damn, if I am going to do it. A fire started to burn inside my chest. My heart started to pound. My jaw tensed. “Mr. Clerk Guy, I see something I don’t like. I see wheels turning behind those eyes. Think about it. Is your life worth the ring?” My chest fell. The rage ebbed away. I am beaten without even a fight. I took off the ring and placed it next to the contents of my pockets and my watch. “I’m impressed. You didn’t let your emotions rule over you.”

  “He’s done all you asked. Don’t hurt him. Let him and the girl go,” the second voice pleaded.

  He began looking through my wallet and found the picture of my wife and daughter. A sick kind of smile came over his face. “Cute girl. She favors her mother, I see. Tell me how did you get so lucky? Based on what I see, your wife is slumming it with you as a husband.”

  “It’s what I’ve always thought. I believe I won the wife and daughter lottery. I’d love to talk about the family all night, but all the paperwork from the robbery is going to keep me late tonight. So, if we could finish up here?”

  “Why? Are you in a hurry to die? It’s the plan, you know. The next step is to put two bullets in your head.” He pulled the gun and pointed it right at my face. I stared at the working end of the barrel. My eyes moved up to his. He thumbed back the hammer of the revolver. I heard it click into place.

  “This is it. God, don't let my wife and daughter see me dead with two holes in my head,” I prayed. They say your whole life flashes in front of your eyes before you die, but the only thing I see is the eyes of the man who is murdering me. They are cold and empty. He looks bored. I sensed more than saw something change in those eyes.

  “You have made this whole endeavor go more smoothly than I had hoped. No one has been hurt, and only meds were taken. Which makes this whole enterprise low priority for the police. All evidence of me will be gone when I go. The only things left will be eyewitnesses to this caper. Hell, the girl won’t even remember my hair color. So, tell you what, I’m going to save the cost of two bullets and leave you be. Of course, I will have to make sure I get enough time to make my get-away.’ He pulled another tie-wrap out. What is he wearing, a freaking utility belt? “Tape your mouth shut.” I complied. “No calling out for help. Sit down behind the desk.” I moved to the slightly nicer chair behind the desk. “You get to pretend you’re the man in charge. Well, you get to pretend you’re in charge,” a slight smile, more of a smirk, came to his face over his attempt at humor. “Put your hands behind your back. No, around the chair back too, you idiot. You will be in here for a while I think, so try to stay comfy.” He grabbed a couple of sheets of paper off the desk and pulled out a pen from his pocket and started writing. He held up the messages for me to see. “Do Not Disturb’ is written on one. He taped the other note to my chest. “Start counting to five hundred and don’t even try to free yourself until you finish. Oh, one last thing. You need to pay for the moment you attempted to grow a pair,” he picked up my wedding ring and smiled. “This will cover it,” he popped the ring into his pocket. He grabbed the hard drive. As he left the office, he taped the note with “Do Not Disturb’ to the door. He is gone.

  After I finished counting - I wasn’t going to fool around with this guy - I tried to free myself, but my efforts failed. It is somewhere around ten minutes later when Raul discovered me.

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I opened my eyes. I am back to the here and now. “That is exactly what happened.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Embers. I have no more questions for the witness at this time, Your Honor.”

  From the judge, “Ms. Refrain, your witness.”

  I looked over at the defense’s table. Besides Mr. Galos, there are seated four lawyers: three men and one woman. I hate lawyers. To paraphrase the movie Other People’s Money, “Lawyers are like nuclear weapons: once someone uses one, it screws everything up.” For what I would take as a simple robbery case, someone is dropping an awful lot of nukes.

  The three men in rather ordinary, although well-fitting, navy blue suits and dull ties, sat at the defense’s table. Fresh yellow legal pads sat in front of them like placemats for a grand banquet. Number two pencils rested on the right-hand side of each pad: knives ready for carving. I can guess what’s on the menu. I had met each one of these hacks before. Oh, I am sorry. "Shysters," when each had his chance to depose me. I told each of them the exact same account of that night as I told the jury. I am not sure what they could possibly want to ask me, but mine is not to reason why. Mine is to recite and die…of boredom.

  The fourth lawyer, a woman I had never met before, stood. I have seen some beautiful women in my day, “Hi honey. Are you listening? You are way prettier,” but this goddess is…is…is perfect. Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she had to walk into mine. She stands about five-foot-six. She has brown hair with red highlights which caught the light. It fell in soft curls around her face. Her face is oval-shaped with bright eyes of hazel. I did not get a clear picture of her age, early thirties, I think. She is young for a senior partner in a major San Diego law firm, “Refrain and Associates.” Her skin is flawless and youthful. She has perfectly arched brows which are neither too thin nor too thick. She does her makeup in a fashion with no heaviness, no missed chosen color; in fact, you could hardly tell it is there. Perfect. Surprisingly, she is not dressed in what you would call a business fashion. She is wearing a bright yellow dress which buttons up the front with a white collar, but no lace. The dress is belted around the waist in matching white with a buckle of polished brass. The dress is mid-thigh in length. She is slender, but not overly so. One of the three extras from the Matrix movies handed her a piece of paper he had pulled from a file. She stood there a moment looking at the paper. You could tell by her demeanor Ms. Refrain is the big boss, she’s in charge. She's the boss, headwoman, top dog, big cheese, head honcho.

  Sorry, I channeled the movie Airplane there for a second.

  I wanted to be strong, so I played the melody to the song, a Simon and Garfunkel tune, “I Am a Rock,” in my thoughts. The title from the song fits the situation. I need to be strong. Sometimes I enjoy this quirky memory of mine. I can replay any song I have heard, ever. It is kind of like having an internal "iPod," only without the earbuds that keep falling out and a limit on how many songs it can hold. At least, I hope there is no limit on my memory. Damn, that’s a gloomy thought: I could run out of memory. I would be stuck in some lame version of Fifty First Dates but without the happy ending and cool boat.

  The judge coughed, “Ms. Refrain.”

  “Sorry, Your Honor,” she looked up from the paper she was reading. “Mr. Embers, this should not take long at all.”

  I turned off my mental radio station. I heard in my thoughts the Duff Beer guy from the Simpsons say, “This is K R A P signing off. Oh yeah!” Note to self: hire a better voice for my mental radio station’s disc jockey. “Duff Man is sad.”

  “I have a few questions for you,” Ms. Refrain stated with an almost musical quality. “Your statement to police on the night in question is word-for-word exactly the same as your testimony here today. Could you explain this?” Ms. Refrain asked.

  “What is there to explain? It all happened exactly as I said. It was the truth then. It is the truth now. It was the truth when they deposed me,” I responded, pointing toward See, Hear, and Speak no evil.

  “In my entire career as a criminal defense attorney, I have never witnessed that. In my research, I have failed to find a case where it happened before. You must have rehearsed your part very we
ll.” Before I could form a snappy comeback, she faced the judge. “Your Honor, I would like to show the jury some video of the witness’s depositions to my associates?”

  "Objection, your Honor, if the defense wants to present evidence, they can do so during their phase,” Mr. Wayne affirmed as he rose.

  “It goes to credibility, your Honor,” Ms. Refrain countered.

  “I will allow it.”

  “Thank you, your Honor,” she smiled as the judge ruled in her favor. She motioned to Manny, Moe, and Jack at the defense table. One of her minions put up a projection screen across the courtroom opposite the jury but angled to let the judge and yours truly see the screen also. Another one grabbed a laptop and placed it on a table in front of the screen. He immediately opened it up and started typing away. Finally, the last one carried over a projector and put it on the table. He started connecting the laptop to the projector with some cables. As each man finished his task, they walked back to the defense’s table and sat down. They did all this with the efficiency of a NASCAR pit crew.

  Ms. Refrain walked over to the laptop and pressed a key. Three images came into focus on the screen. Each image is of me, in all my glory, sitting at a table. “Mr. Embers, are these images of you?” I responded in the affirmative. “Are the date and time stamps correct and correspond to the dates and times you were deposed at my office?” I told her they are correct. “Would you please watch a few minutes of your depositions?”

  I wonder what would happen if I answered no thank you. She hit another key on the laptop, and the images came to life. I watched as my image recited what happened in triplicate. The show went on for only a couple of minutes before the judge instructed her to stop.

  “Mr. Embers, this video of your depositions shows you using the same cadence, facial expressions, and why, you even took breaths at the same moments in your testimony. I find this remarkable and highly suspect,” she smiled the way a spider smiles when her web starts to wiggle. “Mr. Embers, could you be a talented actor?” She did not wait for an answer. “I applaud your performance.”