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Errands
by Kyle Moore

Why is this taking so long? I scan the greasy street, on the lookout for someone…anyone who might screw up my plan. Not a single person. Of course not, who would be stupid enough to walk through this part of the city at three in the morning? You would have to have a death wish, or be a loser like me. I crouch down. Become invisible. Be one with the street. Across the way I can see that Joey is doing the exact same thing as me. Hiding. Playing it cool. It’s definitely hard to pull off. He looks like the definition of a criminal. Cheap leather jacket, tattoos spreading like fungus up his neck, and the idiot’s so dumb that he refuses to take his ski mask off even though no one’s around. I hope he has trouble breathing through the poly cotton blend.

We’ve both been here for forty-five minutes and there’s still no sign of the truck. Possible scenarios begin running through my head. Maybe the driver is a recovering alcoholic and a particularly tantalizing beer commercial he heard on the radio knocked him off the wagon. He’s face down in a ditch somewhere sleeping off his bender, while other ruffians besides me pilfer his truck. That would be just my luck. Or perhaps there were mechanical problems and the driver pulled into a gas station. The attendant, being a hot young sex pot of eighteen with daddy issues saw the burly truck driver coming from a mile away and decided to use this precise occasion to get back at her over bearing parents. Nah, stuff like that doesn’t happen outside of Penthouse Forum.

My cell phone vibrates and I peer at the text message with dismay. “Don’t forget the eggs?” My girlfriend. Good God, what an idiot. She’s the only person in the world to actually believe that an unemployed ex-con with no scrap of moral dignity would really go egg shopping at three in the morning. It’s not just that she believes my excuse; it’s that she believes it every time I use it. I was sure that any sensible person would have figured it out at least the third time I came home with no eggs and unexplainable cash stashed in my boots. Thank God she’s hot.

A flash of headlights paints the alley and Joey and I jump into action. This is it. I race to the front of the truck with my hand on my gun.

“Stop,” I yell to the driver. “Get out of the truck and put your hands up!”

Screeching tires as the truck jerks to a stop.

I open my mouth to speak but am stopped when I feel cold metal placed against the back of my head and hear the unmistakable click of a pistol being cocked.

“You forgot the eggs baby,” my girlfriends whisper is obvious.

Handcuffs click. I guess she wasn’t as stupid as I thought.