A Routine Robbery

My fucking hands are sweating so badly. Please someone, please anyone, stop this.

I gripped my pistol so hard I was afraid I would burst a vein. Paul told me not to worry about it. He’s done this before. He handed me a pair of old white apple headphones. He told me to put them in my ears and to drop the plug into the barrel of the gun. No one will suspect a thing if they think it’s a phone. People don’t pay attention, he said. I put my facemask on first, which no longer even looked out of place in this fucked up world.

It was just a regular old Chase bank. We waited in fucking line. I couldn’t believe how casual Paul was being. He said banks account for petty theft in their annual budget, and as long as we stayed cool, we’d be in and out.

“What are you listening to?”

I looked back behind me. They were cute. If I had met them anywhere else, perhaps this would have gone differently. Instinctively, and to avoid speaking, I pulled out my phone to show the screen, only, it wasn’t my phone.

Panic. I shot them dead.