Empathy

Red was never my color. But as it stands, right now, I have no choice. Robby made sure of that. My partner in crime, so to speak. Rubber bands aren’t the only things to snap under pressure.

Routine,  by  the numbers. Everything was what you would call normal, at least by our standards. Anxiety was getting to me though. I wasn’t prone to panic attacks, so this wasn’t exactly business as usual. In my line of work, panic, faltering, one odd move can get you killed.

“Easy man. Nothing to it,”  Robbie says to me. His red hair, a mane, flowing like fire in the high winds by the water. It was high tide,  and no place for someone who can’t swim. I shivered for a moment. “You got yourself worked up over this? Think of what a gazelle feels like, man.” I picture this. Picture this weak, pitiful creature. Being watched, being stalked. No match for the cheetah. This is not exactly a comforting image. The cheetah, it leaps, without warning, at the gazelle. I empathize.

I must be going soft.

The emptiness I feel does nothing to quell the nerves.. neither does that Xanax Robby is force-feeding me by this point. One by one, little blue tablets race down my throat. Coating my insides with tranquility. Numbing my brain. Tricking me into a field of wildflowers and grass.

But right now, in this state, the flowers are dying; the grass is burning. I’m thinking this is maybe what a nervous breakdown feels  like. I’m thinking, I should have retired while I still had the chance.

But Robby assures me that he feels like this all the time, hence the Xanax. I’m thinking maybe the coke he takes through his nostrils like air, but I don’t say this.

We get into his van, charcoal gray, the kind only pedophiles and Mexicans drive, and we hurl toward our destination at a speed I thought impossible for this heap. My hands shake as I light a cigarette. Another blue pill chased with what I think is vodka. At this point I’m not sure of much.

The music blaring from the radio does little to soothe me, and I attribute my rising nausea to it. This ans maybe an overdose, but I keep downing the little football shaped saviors anyway.

“Oh so many ways for me to show you how your savior has abandoned you Fuck your god!” Robby screams this line at me along with the radio. It feels personal, but I’m not sure why. The chorus keeps running through my head even after the song is long finished, and our journey half complete.

It’s not like you killed someone. It’s not like you drove a spiteful spear into his side. Praise the one who left you broken down and paralyzed. I’m not sure why, but this strikes a chord in me at the moment. Panic grips me just a little lighter. Hope all systems are go. I hope things go as planned.

We drive, a dark blanket of night surrounding us save two cones of light leading the way. Dionysus and his lantern. Searching for that one honest man. The meaning of life all boils down to a fruitless

 Search. We’re all liars in the end. We pass a billboard, glowing under its own lights, and I just make out the words YOU LOSE as we speed by. I chase more Xanax with liquor and light another cigarette; try to clear my head of that image.

By now the vodka and Xanax cocktail is working its magic, casting its spell of confusion and well-being on me.

“You’re right, Robby. This job will go off without a hitch,” I mumble. I don’t think he hears me over the blare of the radio, but he smiles anyway. I grin drunkenly back. I’m getting confident, my cigarette gets shorter, and I sing “You never thought to question why.”

“What did you say man- oh shit, that song ended like twenty minutes ago. Snap the hell out of it. We got work to do.” This while he’s shoving Xanax into my greedy little palm.

Home free soon. One last job and I’m home free. He’s right; we have work to do. Some more than others, I chuckle under my breath. Lines from the long finished song, ‘Judas’, ‘Judith’, something like that, continue to flash through my head.  Even though he’s the one, who did this to you, you never thought to question why.

Just one more job.

Never- choke on a lie.

We arrive, my head swirling but my intent, my goal, still intact, still rock-steady. I yank open the van door, a little too forcefully, a little too carelessly. I step out, drop my cigarette and stamp it out til it’s cold. For some reason I feel a sense of accomplishment. I hear Robby’s door slam, and I reach for my mask. Clouded. I’m just coming to the realization that the surroundings aren’t familiar. This isn’t the building we cased. All our planning gone to hell.

“What the hell, Rob. What are we-“ Cracked in the skull from behind. Confusion, pain, a concrete bed with my name on it.

I roll over, face my attacker. Robby’s face looms. He looks large from this angle. Goliath getting his revenge.

“No more man. This shit is done. Finite. Comprende, you dumb spic?” He spits these words at me, taunting. He’s won, and the backup is at the warehouse. Barking up the wrong tree. The wrong alley. Everything wrong, gone to hell, and here I am, just another piggy getting slaughtered. His last words; “Oink Oink fucking piggy,” and an agonizing pain in my chest. Not the heart, but too damn close. Wearing red because I wear blue. Footsteps fading, I wonder if the wire is intact, if this tracer really works. YOU LOSE. If I never thought to question why. I stop wondering.