Into the Unknown

Martin

In my apartment sitting on the couch in my living room, there's a dim yellow lamp that's lit up on the arm-side table. It doesn't illuminate very much, but it's all I could afford when I moved into this place. An empty beer-can is sitting next to the lamp body; it's been there for a couple days. The faint scent of alcohol from the can wafts through the air. I wince from the strength of the smell but I don't get up to throw away the can.

Instead, I'm sitting here with a yearbook displayed from when I was a sixth-grader. My hair was cut military-style. That was how my mother wanted it to be. After being around those security guards of hers for years, she learned to think she herself was in the military. In a way, she always has been. I don't think her mind was ever at home when her body was. Her studies have always meant everything to her; they have defined who she is, what she has become.

My teeth are also crooked as I posed for the school photograph. It wasn't until seventh-grade when I got my braces. After they were removed my freshman year, I became the most popular freshman boy at school. That was before William-fancy-pants showed up and took everything away from me, including my best friend.

Shelby is smiling in a photo farther down the page from mine. My last name initial is 'F' while hers is 'L'. Alphabetically, she was put between Anne Langley and David Mason. Shelby's hair is neatly put back into a French braid that wraps around to the front of her left shoulder. She looks adorable, innocent, not knowing that she would be murdered about a decade later.

I brush my fingers over her photo, as if she was really here and there being a strand of hair in the way of her eyes. It's a heart-wrenching thought to know that Shelby will never be around again. Those lively eyes of hers will never give me the same kind of vigor as they used to.

My laptop is beside me sitting on the other cushion of the couch. Folding the yearbook away, I place it on the table beside me and open up the computer.

Since work hasn't been very busy or bustling lately, vacation has been a heavy contemplation. For the past couple weeks, a get-away from Princelan has seemed comforting. Traveling to a new place where dreary thoughts and memories don't override my mind is something that I have been craving lately. My mother would not approve of such a retreat but she's not here to entrench me with her sour speeches.

Going to the Internet, I look up airplane tickets to the Bahamas, Maldives, and the Caribbean. Because of the season right now, tickets are at a fairly reasonable price compared to summertime and when the holidays come around, which isn't too far from now. I might as well book a trip while I can still afford it.

I decide to go with the Maldives. Searching for airlines that I can afford, scrolling down the page just looking at prices, I find the cheapest ticket possible, just over five hundred dollars. It's a lot, but a vacation is worth it.

After I've filled in all the required information, I fill out my debit card information to make the payment. As I click the final SUBMIT button, a red tab comes up saying: PAYMENT NOT ACCEPTED. PLEASE TRY AGAIN.

"What the hell?" I say under my breath.

Thoroughly, I go through everything I filled out, making sure it's correct. Once again, I click the button.

PAYMENT NOT ACCEPTED. THERE IS NOT A SUFFICIENT AMOUNT ON THIS CARD.

'Not a sufficient amount'? Where has my money gone?

I thought for sure that I would have enough money after my paycheck at the end of September. Did my bills for last month really cost that much?

In a panic, I log onto my bank account to check my deposits. Sure enough, the deposit for my check was accepted, but the money I had to transact apparently added up to more than I earned . . .

Oh no, I tell myself. This can't be happening.

Subsequently, I close the computer down and go to my window that views the town from the story my apartment's on. The streetlights have lit up the streets, a car passing on Highway 92 every couple minutes. I take some deep breaths which helps the initial panic. But deeper inside, there's something more that wants to be revealed. Something that has to come out. I'm not sure if it's anger, frustration, violence, regret, possibly even something treacherous.

If my mother wasn't the one to pay off the payments I had for the shop, then who did? Did somebody ever do it at all? Could I have done it on accident without realizing, flushing out my bank account? That's impossible though because there is no way I would be able to pay all of those off after a single months' wages.

Desperately, I think of something that I never expected myself to do.

I have to rob the bank . . .