TELL HER I’M SORRY

By Ryan Usher

Francie Mayer was drunk. Oh boy, was she drunk.

There had been a party at her girlfriend’s place downtown. Her small, homely house had been packed to bursting with almost two dozen partygoers, most of them local college kids, but of course, there were a few that were a little younger.

And of course, there was a lot of alcohol. You couldn’t turn around without knocking over a beer or a shooter or someone’s half-empty bottle of Stoli. There was also a lot of pot, and though Francie wasn’t into smoking shit, she reeked of it nonetheless, and damn if she hadn’t gotten a contact high or two.

As often happens when you mix two dozen crazy, hormonal college-age (give or take) kids and a little friendly controlled-substance, you usually ended up with a fair amount of casual sex as well, and Francie had certainly had her share of that tonight. She remembered at least three, and she was sure one of them gave her the bruise she vaguely noticed on her collarbone earlier. There may have even been more, who knew?

Eventually, though, she did have enough, and she snuck out a little after two, still quite drunk but still ambulatory. She started down the street to her small apartment four blocks away. Thank God she had no classes tomorrow, she’d be a total waste if she did, and her grades were bad enough as it was. Her father was paying her way through college, and at first, she was an enthusiastic student, but things started slipping as she discovered the party scene, and on more than one occasion, he had threatened to cut her extraneous funding off if she didn’t shape up. She laughed as she tottered down the street. She was lost in her own muddled thoughts, and she was quite unaware of what was going on around her.

Her mistake.

A pair of deep green eyes watched her pass from the darkness of an alley. The eyes belonged to a man named Jason Hill, twice an ex-con and still in the business of parting fools with their money using a gun and his surroundings to his advantage.

The girl didn’t look like a tough mark at all. She teetered from a long night partying, and when he caught a glimpse of her eyes, though they may have been bright and pretty under most normal circumstances, tonight they were dull and stupid with drink. An easy mark, in other words. He was confident. He did like a challenge, but he was not above taking what God gave him, and if God gave him a drunk college co-ed, that’s what he’d take, sure as shit. Jason Hill didn’t have any delusions of grandeur, he did not believe he was a Billy the Kid or Clyde Barrow, he was just a two-bit pickpocket. But he was a capable one, his dozen arrests and two stints in prison notwithstanding, and he made quite a bit of money this way, and save for his weakness for a little whole-grain every now and then, he had no vices to waste it on. He was good, and his confidence was evident in his eyes and movements.

As he had a thousand times before, he drew his Glock. He chambered a round, because although he wasn’t into killing at all, and had never done so, under the right conditions, a warning shot could do wonders for breaking the will of a mark that had any smart ideas about escaping, or worse, playing hero. Then, hiding it in the sleeve of his coat, he slunk out of the alley and started in her general direction, shortening the distance between them, but at a slow, calculated pace. It was quiet, all he could hear was the soft ambiance of the slumbering city, the soft padding of his own footsteps, and the slower, irregular clicking made by her garish, ugly heels.

Finally, when he was within six feet of her, he held the Glock in his outstretched right hand, and pointed the bore at the base of her neck. The touch was ice cold, and she shrieked even before he instructed her to freeze, though she was unaware that it was a gun, she had no idea what it was, but it was a shock nonetheless. She did not hear Jason stalking her, and therefore of course didn’t expect cold steel to be pressed against the back of her neck.

Jason did not let her hold the illusion very long, however. He coolly informed her that he had a gun, and told her to turn around slowly. She did, at first not believing his words, thanks in part to her inebriation. Once she caught sight of the Glock, however, it was a totally different story. Her eyes, puffy and red from drink but pretty and blue even still, widened with terror. She dared not make a sound, though she could not help sobbing. He held out his left hand and told her to hand over her belongings. She did so, whimpering and whining but saying nothing intelligible. She turned over her purse, her fake gold Timex, two rings of questionable value, a Nokia celluar phone with a ridiculous floral faceplate, and finally, her black leather Gucci (almost certainly fake).

With his free hand, he stuffed the watch, phone and rings into one pocket, and the handbag into a larger one hidden within the liner on the inside of his coat. There was easily a couple hundred bucks here. Perfect score, considering how easily it all went down.

Then he saw the headlights. They were coming a bit faster than they should have been, up Hollis Avenue and turning sharply onto Reston Street. Jason swore. He did not put the gun away, though he did turn so that he kept it aimed at his victim without being easily seen by anyone in this car.

Then, the car pulled up to the curb where Jason stood, and a flash of fear shot across his eyes. There were three men in this car, a black Cadillac from the mid ‘90s, it seemed. The Caddy came to a stop, and the men opened the doors and got out, almost in perfect unison.

Jason’s flash of fear became a thick, paralyzing terror as he saw the driver reach into his waist and pull out a gun. The other two men followed suit, again, with near perfect coordination. Every one of them wore black three-piece suits and dark sunglasses, even though it was well after midnight. They looked like FBI goons, maybe CIA. Terror gave way to full-blown panic. It was all coming apart, especially his iron-tough confidence. He had just stepped into something far beyond his ability to control, he wasn’t up to fucking with the Feds, and the Feds weren’t known for fucking around themselves. He had never felt panic before, and most unfortunately for him, he had no idea how to control it.

Francie saw the men, and though Jason could not realize, her expression was one of relief. Her father must have known where she’d been, and sent someone to…

Then something happened. A twitch, a mere involuntary muscle spasm, some crazy mix of human chemical reactions forcing his brain to send the wrong instructions to the wrong muscles at precisely the wrong time. Maybe it was a stroke of bad luck, or evil fate. Jason did not know just what happened, and he wouldn’t have had the time to comprehend it or even stop it if he did, but he would swear to the very last that whatever happened wasn’t a conscious decision. Whatever caused it, it happened.

He pulled the trigger.

A deafening roar issued from the weapon, far louder to Jason’s ears than it had any right to be.

When he replayed the next few seconds in his head, which was practically the only thing his mind did for the rest of his life, it was all in slow-motion, and every naked detail was readily available for show. As it really happened, though, it all took less than a second. A nine-millimeter slug launched forth from the muzzle of the Glock, slicing through the air going several times the speed of sound. It twirled a deadly whirlwind, due to the rifled bore. When it struck the girl’s skull, it was slowed, but not stopped. The bullet merely blasted a neat hole through its obstacle. A few thousandths of a second later, the bullet came to a complete halt, lodged deep within her brain, shutting it off forever.

Her eyes opened even wider than before, with mortal shock, but the expression on her face didn’t match it. Instead, it looked like one of mild surprise, as if she found a five-dollar bill on the ground, and in that way, it was morbidly grotesque. It happened so fast that she had not even the slightest chance to avoid it, or to even know it happened. She dropped hard to the freezing concrete, her short life severed prematurely at the age of twenty-one. Blood pooled from the wound in her skull, but nothing else within moved.

Jason was in terrible shock, his mind refusing to believe what had just happened. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. He had the money and the goods. He should be on his way back to his dingy apartment in Ashley Terrace. He should not still be here and this should not be happening! The girl was dead! He committed murder! He stood rooted to the spot for what seemed like an interminable length of time. It was only his own stupid luck that the three men in the car were similarly caught unaware, and were also struck dumb by the senseless murder they had just witnessed.

However temporarily, Jason’s life was saved because he broke free of his shock about two seconds before the gunmen did. He took off running, full-speed, into the alley from which he came. The sight of his movement galvanized the gunmen, and they took after him. One of them fired his pistol, but Jason was already around the corner, and the bullet tore off a chunk of concrete instead.

Jason’s eyes were bulging with fear as he looked around wildly, hoping to find an escape route. He had marks go wrong before, and always he was able to escape, but none of that mattered half a damn now. His confidence had completely abandoned him, and the sizable vacuum its departure left behind was totally filled by dread terror and even a sick, pitiable remorse. He didn’t mean to kill her! He never wanted to kill anyone! Why did those stupid fucks have to pull guns?

He heard their footsteps thundering down the deserted alley behind him, and perhaps about two seconds before they turned the corner, he spotted a wooden door. Jason did not wait to see if it was locked or not, for to delay would certainly cost him his life. Instead, he kicked it open, hitting it square with his heel. The door was flimsy, and flew open with a slam and the crack of weak, dry wood giving way beneath his strength. He ran into the building. The trio of gunmen saw him and continued their hunt.

It was very dark inside. Wherever he was, it was a large place, and it was lit by a single, naked sixty-watt bulb hanging from the ceiling. He blundered through the place, almost tripping several times on large objects that he could not see. He heard the humming of a furnace, but it did not mask the sound of his pursuers. They had dropped their pace, they now fanned out and proceeded with deliberate, careful movements, something these boys probably learned at the Academy, search-and-destroy or whatever the fuck they called it. Jason was not certain if they could see him, but he did not want to take the opportunity to find out. He kept running away from them, but his lungs were screaming in pain from exertion he did not anticipate, and it didn’t help that his terror was an iron band, further clamping over them and further restricting his breathing.

Jason finally had to slow down, for each breath he drew made a dry, wheezing whine, and he felt like he was about to black out. He stopped and leaned against a steel rack shelf to catch his breath for a moment.

Then, one of the gunmen saw him, and yelled to the others. Jason almost screamed, and turned to run again, but as he did, his ankle was caught by what felt like a loaded can of paint, and he fell forward hard. His right knee struck the cement floor, and he heard it crack a few seconds before he felt the horrible lancing pain that came with it. He no longer was fully aware of his situation, he merely yelled a hoarse, strained scream of pain and fear and disgust. His mind was flashing all sorts of alarms and threats but none of them no longer mattered, for he saw the three gunmen converging on him, and he knew he was fucked.

The light did not shine on him here, save for a dim reflection of light, he was almost invisible, though all this served to do was delay the inevitable. Jason sat, extending his broken right leg and nearly screaming in pain as he did so. Sweat streamed down his face, despite the near-freezing temperature. He was still afraid, but now his fear was tempered, tempered by the knowledge that there was no way out. Fatalism brought him back from the brink of sanity, and gave him clarity of purpose strong enough to overcome the horrible pain in his right leg, at least for a moment. But that was all he needed.

He popped out the Glock’s magazine, checking its contents. He only had six bullets in it to begin with, but now there were only four left in the magazine. One was in the chamber, and of course, one of them of course was lodged in the rapidly cooling meat that was once the brain of a young woman who made the mistake of being drunk and alone in the wrong place at the wrong time. He did not know what happened to the third, he supposed he must have fired it by mistake, or maybe miscounted when he loaded the chamber. It didn’t matter at all. He had four left, altogether. Maybe he would have the luck of the devil, and be able to take down all three of his pursuers. Before tonight, Jason had never killed a human being in his life, but he already had the blood of that girl on his hands, what was the blood of three more men, if he could help it? He was already in a shitload of trouble, whether he survived or not, and as the saying goes, may as well take a sheep if you’ll hang for taking a lamb. And, at least they were armed. They were out for blood themselves.

He slammed the clip back into the gun, and took a deep, snotty breath. He felt strangely calm now. He could see one of the gunmen still meandering through the warehouse and its narrow aisles, looking for him. The gunman stayed still, and he did so just a moment too long.

He didn’t really mean to kill these guys, either. He didn’t want any more death, but it was too late for that shit now. He wasn’t too keen on dying himself. He aimed the gun with two shaky, unsteady hands. The sight lined up with the silhouette of the hesitant gunman.

He pulled the trigger again. A sharp, loud burst preceded a blinding muzzle flash (or was it the other way around? He couldn’t remember). The gunman cried out and fell over, but he continued to wail after he fell. The shot apparently was not fatal. Jason sighed. He didn’t really expect to make it out of here alive, the only way that could possibly happen was if he could peg two of the next three shots. He felt a small glimmer of hope, and he wished he did not. False hope could be a real killer. He did have three bullets left. If it came down to that, if he missed the first two, there was always one left for himself, after all. Did it really matter though, other than whatever stupid satisfaction might be gained from having the power to end one’s own life, but either way, if someone’s bullet is going to get you in the end, does it really matter if it’s yours or theirs?

The injured gunman was yowling like a cat with a stick up its ass, and no doubt the other two were converging on his location already. Jason briefly considered spending another bullet to silence him, but quickly decided against it. They would find him, and Jason guessed that they would be stationary for a good three seconds or so. That would give him the chance to take a good, steady shot at one of them. Assuming his aim was true, it would then be a one-on-one battle, though he would be at a great disadvantage. Not only was he totally incapable of movement, but the shot he was to fire would essentially be a giant, blinking neon sign pointing the last gunman right to him.

He raised the Glock again, taking aim in the general direction of where he thought another one of his pursuers would emerge. He tried his best to keep the aim steady, but it was harder this time, so awful was his pain. But the thought, the tiny hope of survival gave him the extra concentration.

After what seemed like an eternity, one of the gunmen came across the other, the one he had shot. Like the first, he appeared to Jason as nothing but a silhouette, the ghostlike light from the old bulb a halo around his stocky frame. He knelt down to examine his fallen comrade.

That was all that Jason needed. It took less than a second to level the sight at his head. He pulled the trigger for the third time that night, and once again, the gun spit a lot of noise and light, and one hollow-jacketed nine-millimeter round. The bullet struck the second gunman in the neck, and the impact obliterated his throat and caused a splash of gore to explode from the other side. Jason wasn’t totally sure, but he thought he could actually see the gory shower from his vantage point. Gunman number two was definitely not going to be a threat anymore.

The first one was no longer screaming, but now rather moaning in disgust, and Jason could hear him pausing once or twice, the moaning replaced by the dry sounds of retching and the liquid sounds of vomiting.

Jason, for his part, could not believe he had been visited by such a stroke of luck, for he had been expecting both gunmen to appear at the same time, but this had not happened. The third one could no longer be able to pinpoint his quarry right away. He now held an advantage. He almost giggled, and he had to force himself to stop. It would be stupid to alert him to his presence, but even more so, he felt like his sanity was slipping a little (though, who could blame him?). The thought of losing himself was definitely not one he wanted to dwell on, not now, not later.

Jason waited for the third gunman, again holding the gun steady and ready. The gunman, however, seemed to have other ideas, for he was not appearing. Perhaps he was smarter than his foolhardy comrades, one who got a bullet somewhere, and one who definitely left a good portion of his brains on the cement, for their troubles. Maybe number Three did see it all. Maybe number Three was sneaking around. If he was trying to avoid being seen, and was being careful about it, he could very well sneak up on Jason. However, Jason was shrouded in darkness himself. This was his only defense. That, and the two bullets left in his gun.

Jason slumped back, taking deep breaths but taking them slowly and deliberately, keeping them as silent as possible. The pain in his leg was hellish and hot, but there was nothing he could do about it, so he tried his damnedest to ignore it.

Two bullets left. He now had margin for error. He almost laughed, but his breath instead caught in his throat. He heard something shifting around, rubbing against cardboard boxes. Number Three was close, very close. There was a stationary rack separating them, and Jason did not think he had been noticed, for his movements seemed a little too random for someone who knew where he wanted to go. He knocked items off of shelves and tripped over others unseen.

Too bad for him.

Jason shifted position with his left arm, and had to bite down on his cheek to keep from crying out in pain. It took him awhile to get that under control, and he had to be careful. He was discovering new upper thresholds of his capacity to tolerate pain seemingly every time he moved a muscle, and he did not think it was so bad that he had to risk shock, but he knew that one wrong move could give him a jolt so bad he might faint, and if he fainted, he was dead.

The last remaining gunman did in fact seem unsure where Jason was, and Jason sat, as patiently as he could, to await the right moment, though after two minutes, he still had not been able to get a clean shot. It then hit him that perhaps he did not he was wounded, that the gunman (He of course was well past the notion that his adversaries were any sort of federal agents) was hunting a mobile adversary. That gave him an idea.

He was propped up against some sort of debris. Some of it was bags filled with what felt like gravel, but much of it he could not know without seeing. With his head, he pushed some of it aside, enough so that he could lay nearly flat on his back. He could not know for sure but he felt he was concealed enough that his enemy would not be able to use his shadow to see him.

Then he yelled, a yell of pain and anguish. No small part of that was real, but the actual intent was draw the gunman out. He let it go on for several seconds, hoping that he would be able to stop himself in time. He finally forced himself to, and it was a close call if ever there was one, for not even a second later, Jason saw the silhouette of the man, who held his gun at the ready and pointed in his general direction.

He crept ever-so-slowly towards Jason, but it was obvious that he could not see him. The barrel of the man’s gun alternated back and forth, fanning left to right, and it was not the smooth, cunning movement of a confident hunter, but rather the jerky, erratic movement of someone who was scared and expected the phantom who killed his two partners to jump out at any moment. How ironic, when said phantom would be completely visible to him had the lighting been better. He came closer and closer, and he finally turned the corner into the aisle where Jason lay, unaware that it was the same one in which his dead comrades lay.

Jason swung the gun around and aimed at the third gunman. But in doing so, he moved the wrong way somehow, and fresh bolts of pain lanced from his broken knee, and it caught him by surprise. He did not yell, though almost did and was barely able to stifle it.

Unfortunately, the gunman heard him, as his senses were more acute from being in such a high-strung state. He could not see Jason, but he still fired three shots, in quick succession. Somewhere in the milliseconds between the first and second shot, Jason fired his weapon.

The first bullet missed Jason totally, the aim off by over two feet. The second grazed his left ear, tearing off a small chunk of cartilage and flesh. The third hit him square in his chest, piercing his left lung, and the pain was incredible. He could see his own bullet nailed number Three in the groin, hitting him high and basically annihilating his bladder. Number three fell to the floor and thrashed in agony, screaming even louder and shriller than the first. Jason had once been a medical student, a thousand years ago when he was at William & Mary, and he knew the wound would be fatal, for septic shock was certain to occur, and without medical attention, he was as good as dead.

Not like he was much better off himself, though. He could feel his left lung filling with blood, and every time he took a breath, it was wet, sloppy, and magnificently painful. He was either going to bleed to death, or he was going to drown in his blood, but either way, it was curtains for Mr. Hill. The only questions were which would get him first, and how long it would take.

Then he remembered.

There was one left. He still had one bullet left in his gun. There was a third way out of this mess after all. The result would be no different, and it was a hell of a stretch to say it would be a happy ending, but it would certainly be a lot quicker, and a hell of a lot less painful.

The pain from his leg and his chest was incredible, and it was a struggle just to see. He had to do it now, before he became unable to, before things started to shut down, and he was left to gag and choke for the final ninety seconds or so left of his life, ninety seconds that Jason was certain would feel like ninety long, excruciating years just waiting to die.

He raised the gun, a movement which required extraordinary effort. He opened his mouth and pushed the barrel inside an inch or so. He gripped the handle backwards, his thumb resting on the trigger.

Dear God, he thought, I didn’t mean for it to come to this. I didn’t mean to kill her. Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. I’m going to Hell for what I did, for a lot of things I’ve done, so I won’t get to say it myself. Dear God, please tell her I’m sorry.

A tear ran down his face, and he liked to think it was a tear of remorse. He closed his eyes tightly, and gripped hard with his right hand. The Glock let out a final, mighty roar. It kicked, smashing into his upper teeth, but he did not feel that, nor did he feel the fast flash of heat from the fire. He didn’t feel anything. The Glock’s final bullet flew out of the barrel, and it did not have to travel far or long. It blew through the back of his skull, leaving a fine crimson mess everywhere, just one of many to be found in this dark hellhole tomorrow morning. Jason’s head slumped backwards, and his body went lax, and thus the tragedy finally played itself out. Jason Hill died, leaving a lot of thoughts and a lot of business unfinished. One thing he never did figure out was who his killers were, or why they arrived where they did when they did. Had he known that Francie Mayer was the only daughter of Frankie Mayer, a man with many close ties to organized crime, a man who wasn’t well-known, and preferred to keep it that way, and a man who was fiercely protective of his blood, if he had known that Frankie Mayer sent out three armed men to find his daughter because she had been missing for three days and he had no idea where she was, had no idea she was spending her last days partying like an animal, he may just have decided to look for a mark that didn’t appear to be so damnably easy.

But of course, you know what they say about hindsight.