Bad Pennies Chapter 20
Previously In Bad Pennies
Years ago in high school Josh told his father he was gay. His father beat him. He ran off and was picked up by his boyfriend, Paul. The two of them have an on-again off-again relationship over the next few years.
This chapter is a flashback to just before the robbery that has caused them so much trouble in this story.
16 Months Earlier
“It’s just better if he thinks I’m just a luckless incel,” Josh said. The high tide of Commencement Bay lapped against the cement wall near the Point Defiance Boathouse. Josh and Paul walked the sidewalk above the wall in the early Fall evening, like they had a hundred times since high school. And they’d had this conversation or variations of it before. Josh would find some method to keep the peace with his father. Paul would object to the very concept.
Paul shook his head. “You told him you were gay when you were seventeen and he beat the shit out of you. You think he’s forgotten that happened? Why even pretend with him?”
“He’s my Dad.”
They continued to walk, but didn’t say anything for a few minutes. It’d been weeks since they’d last seen each other and while Paul’s sudden reappearance wasn’t surprising, he’d gotten used to Paul’s cycles. He came back to Josh when things didn’t go his way. A relationship didn’t work out. An opportunity fell through. He was feeling down. So rather than wait around, Josh said, “So what’s up?”
“You know how I’m working at that process serving place?”
“Sure,” Josh said.
“The guy that runs the place, Cooper. He keeps giving me shit that just doesn’t pay. Papers I gotta serve on people who are never home or never answer their doors. Servings out on Vashon. He’s been screwing me like this for weeks. I even put my stuff in storage already because I think I’m going to lose my apartment.”
A jogger passed them, they continued to walk towards the boathouse. Josh tried to find a way to explain the mix of emotions he had at the prospect of living with Paul again. He started to think out loud, “I don’t have a lot of room at my place and every time we try to live together we-”
Paul held up his hand.
“I got a better idea.”
“What’s that? Tell your boss you quit?”
“No. We’re gonna rob him.”
They got back to Paul’s car and talked about Paul’s plan. Cooper had a safe in his downtown office. Paul said security was minimal, plus he had keys to the office, knew the combination of the safe, and had found the perfect time to do it: during his boss’s annual Christmas party.
“This is why I need you,” Paul said. “His Christmas party is at his house in Ruston. I’ll be there with his other servers and clients. Cooper will literally be my alibi. While you go in and do the deed.”
As they drove up the hill from Point Defiance, through Ruston, Josh found a giddiness he didn’t expect. A robbery. It seemed like a fantasy. Who steals money out of safes anymore? People with opportunity. People who are criminals. He looked at Paul’s sharp face and piercing brown eyes. He always seemed to have the answers even when Josh didn’t like them.
“It’s a good idea,” Josh said finally. “But how much can we realistically expect to get?”
“Best guess? A few grand. The guy isn’t loaded, but he owes me money and I know your budget isn’t exactly unlimited these days.”
Josh worked temp jobs. More often than not, he was at the candy factory. Almond Roca. Tacoma’s little piece of candy history. Boring assembly line shit, but it paid the bills. Most of the time. He couldn’t deny that a cushion of cash would be nice. As Paul pulled to the curb, Josh had a thought.
“Why me?” Josh asked.
“You’re the only person I trust.”
The night of the Christmas party, Paul dropped Josh off a couple blocks away from Cooper’s office on Broadway. Josh had dressed in black jeans, a black hoodie, and gloves that were both warm and too large for his fingers. He kept the hood up. He also carried with him an empty duffel bag that should be more than sufficient for the cash in the safe. He got to the corner and used the first of two keys Paul had provided to open the outside door to the building.
No alarms began to blare. In fact there was no sound at all except the buzzing from a dim green light from the ‘Exit’ sign that gave the only illumination. The three story building was full of small offices. Cooper’s was on the first floor. The third door down the hall on the right. That’d been Paul’s instructions. Josh made his way there, pulling out the second key. He put the key in the lock and tried to turn it one way, then the other, but it didn’t budge. He jiggled it. No luck. He realized his hands were shaking.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Okay. He pulled the key out of the lock, then stuck it back in, this time it unlocked without issue.
The office had no windows making it safe to turn the light on, so he did. The office was as Paul had described. A couple cheap desks and chairs, some filing cabinets, and an ornate, antique safe built into the wall. Josh felt his pulse quicken. He began to sweat. He was really doing this.
He had memorized the three digit combination. Even still, his first attempt failed. He thought it might be the gloves he was wearing. Maybe he wasn’t stopping on the right numbers. He tried a second time with no luck. His phone buzzed, scaring the hell out of him. He pulled his cellphone out, thinking belatedly that maybe having a cellphone on him during the commission of a crime was a bad idea. The text message was from Paul. Just three words:
“HE KNOWS. GO.”
Josh pocketed the phone and decided to try the combination one last time. He carefully turned the combination dial knowing he should be rushing. He selected the last number of the combination and pulled the lever. With a ‘ker-chunk’, the safe door unlocked. He opened the door and was not prepared for what he saw.
There were not ‘a couple thousand dollars’ in the safe. There was more money here than Josh had ever really seen. It reminded him of a game show or something. It took him all of a second to decide what to do. Opening the duffel bag, he began stuffing as much of the cash in the bag as he could.
Josh heard something in the hall, which was amazing given how his head throbbed with his heartbeat. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He’d filled the bag and his pockets with cash. He hadn’t quite grabbed all of it, but it was past time to go.
As he went into the hallway and put the shoulder strap of the duffel over his shoulder, he saw the outline of a man walking through the front door to the building. Josh ran the other way, further into the building. He found a door with a sticker indicating a stairway and took it, running up the stairs to the second floor. He started trying doors, hoping to find one he could duck into, lock, and hide in.
He stopped a moment, but heard no one on the stairwell behind him. That did not mean he was safe.
At the end of one hall he found a bathroom. He went in, found a stall, and crouched on the seat. He didn’t hear anything. He waited for what seemed like a long time, but was probably only a few minutes. His legs ached. He was still sweating.
For the second time that night his phone scared the shit out of him.
Paul again. Three more words.
“I’M OUT FRONT.”
Josh got off the toilet and walked out of the bathroom cautiously. The dim light cast shadows everywhere. If he was going to get out of here, he had to go back downstairs. Paul wouldn’t wait forever.
The silent stairwell made him think that perhaps Cooper or whoever was here was gone. Maybe he’d hid long enough. That hope disappeared the moment he opened the stairwell door on the first floor.
“Right. You thought it was a waste of money. Guess what? That camera you thought was junk hit me up the moment someone broke in,” he heard a loud voice say from down the hall. After a moment the voice said, “Where the fuck do you think I’m at? The office. Safe is wide open. I think he ran further into the building but I ain’t running after him alone in this creepy ass building.”
Though he had never met the man, Josh assumed the man on the phone was Cooper. Cooper’s office door hung open, but he remained in his office. Could he walk by the office without Cooper noticing if he was fast and/or lucky enough?
He had no choice.
“YOU HEAR THAT YOU RAT FUCK??” Cooper yelled. “WE’RE COMING FOR YOU!”
This, it turned out, was the exact moment that Josh had chosen to dart past Cooper’s door, down the hallway to the front door.
“HEY!” Josh heard Cooper say. He didn’t look back. He heard a loud bang and part of the front door frame splintered as Josh opened the door and ran into the night and the relative safety of Paul’s car.
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