Salt Shaker

Daisy, a middle-aged waitress with her name embroidered in cursive on her uniform, paused in the middle of filling the diner’s salt shakers to scratch under her bra. She’d been filling the shakers for over a year and hadn’t really noticed their unique weight and design before. The first thing that caught her eye was the shiny, rounded chrome, helmet-like top resembling a deep sea diver’s helmet drilled with generous sized holes. The rest of the shaker was made of thick glass, formed with five sides meeting at round-bead corners. Even when empty they had significant weight. She hefted the salt shaker in her hand as she took time to study it. Tilting her head, she casually wondered why she never realized their unique character before. 

In the front of the diner, seated alone at a table set against the front window sat an old man. His order: a single fried egg, one strip of well cooked bacon and a dry piece of white toast, had just been placed before him. The old man sat with a strong military posture, back rigid, head held as if on a pike. He reached for a salt shaker with rugged hands that showed hard labor scars, then paused. If someone was observant, keenly observant, they’d notice a narrow reflection in the old man’s glasses. The ant farm image in the reflection made him pause. A speeding vehicle slalomed down the street with a police cruiser in hot pursuit. The cruiser’s naked red lights exploded across downtown buildings and startled pedestrians. The hard coursing vehicles flashed past the diner windows. Inside, the waitress continued to fill salt shakers and the old man broke the yoke of his egg. The high-speed chase rattled the diner’s plate glass windows in its terrible wake.

Daisy’s focus was so intent on filling the salt shakers, she missed the two cars slash by the diner. The old man narrowed his eyes behind metal framed glasses. He knew what was going on, old men always know. Old men that lived lives to over flowing, having walked many paths before. He knew exactly the reason for the chase and the reckless speed. His hundred mile squint sent dry wrinkles running into the sides of his coarse, cropped hair. His jaw muscles tightened under #40 grit beard stubble while his glance settled on the heavy salt shaker in his hand. His eyes moved briefly over a prison tattoo inked into his palm. Before salting his fried egg, he threw some from the glass shaker over his shoulder. At the same time, the waitress felt a compelling urge to also throw salt over her shoulder. Having done so, she went back to her job. 

The man behind the wheel of the hounded car kept wiping his mouth every time he glanced at the rearview mirror. Normal passage of time had ceased to exist for him. His hands were a blur trying to control the steering wheel and the weight of the stolen Chevy Impala through sharp turns around city curbs. Built-up centrifugal force slid the Impala too far to one side and the car slammed momentarily against a pair of parked cars, then bounced back into the street at speed. During that scant, weightless moment, the driver saw a quick rerun of events that had occurred just minutes before…

…There’s always a first time for everything and a first time for robbing banks was no exception. Charles- alias “Chucker”, entered the bank and took a place in line for a teller. He stood there, his hands calmly hanging at his sides, but his mind raced, a scrambled whirlwind. His jittery eyes scanned the entire interior of the bank lobby. He spotted all the security cameras, then made a mental note of bank guard positions. He counted the total number of people in the lobby, 13.  The line moved, Chucker took a step forward. His left hand began unbuttoning his long trench coat from the bottom, up. He noticed the second hand of the large wall clock behind the teller counter slide slowly around. The slender, red second hand left a hazy, pink smear behind it. There wasn’t going to be time for a hold-up note. He had left his car double parked and idling directly outside and that decision was already drawing attention. 

No one says ready, set, go in a bank robbery. The start signal for the havoc is the drop of sweat that snakes down the forehead, slides off the bridge of the nose and drops silently, ending with a faint splat on the floor.  Chucker threw open the sides of his trench coat and pumped a sawed off shotgun one-handed. That sound alone got everyone’s attention without him shouting a word. 

“ON THE GROUND.” He ordered, then fired a round into the ceiling. People fell, some stumbled, the guards froze like fountain statues. The red second hand on the large clock halted mid sweep. “PUT ALL THE CASH ON THE COUNTER.” Chucker yelled and fired another slug into the wall next to the head of a bank guard who was slowly reaching for his sidearm. 

The tellers threw bundles of cash onto the counter in front of them. They scurried like frightened mice, their hands and shoulders shook uncontrollably. Chucker started at one end of the counter and scrapped the money swiftly into a gunny sack while still holding the shotgun in one hand. He was quick— his method primitive but effective. He only made one mistake, he turned his back on the guard near the door for one tick of that red second hand. When he twisted the gunny sack closed and turned for his getaway, the door guard was just pulling his service revolver. Glass shattered, women screamed and men shouted. The wall clock stopped. The glass entrance to the bank was blown out. The guard lay, ripped open and draining life.

Chucker cleared his way to the door, swinging his shotgun like a Cro-Magnon club. He had exhausted his shells by cutting two more security guards in half, then used the barrel to break the neck of a third. Alarms were ringing and people were fleeing the premises. Chucker used the flight of customers to cover his escape. Jumping behind the wheel of the idling Impala, he wrenched the steering column gear lever into drive and stomped on the accelerator just as a police cruiser side-drifted into the street one block behind him. He hadn’t made a clean job of the hold up... 

The chase took the two cars tearing through downtown. Chucker tried to make it to an expressway entry ramp.  The Impala’s V-8 horsepower would soon put distance between him and the pursuing cops. He just needed a couple breaks and he’d make his get away. The hot pursuit flew by stores and businesses and could be heard from blocks away. Only two blocks separated the expressway and escape. He threw the Impala between two elevated train support girders hoping to shake the police cruiser behind him. He shaved his angle too close and snapped off the side mirror. A chunk of metal whipped back and fractured the door window. 

Startled, Chucker saw images fast-forward before his eyes. 

…His blood-shot eyes bore witness to countless scenes of his fingers drumming on school desktops. He struggled to forget the many times he didn’t stick around for answers to his questions. He sucked his lips in when the image of a headstrong young man too impatient to wait in line appeared then bolted away from the side of his mother’s hospital bed.  Chucker never could just sit still and figure things out… 

 The high speed chase made him grip and un-grip the steering wheel in an adrenaline rush.  Chucker cut a glance into the rearview mirror one last time. When his eyes flashed back to the current scene in his windshield, all he saw was the blade of a snow plow jerry-rigged to the front of a city dump truck careen into the side of his car. The heavy steel blade cut through the fender and across the middle of the Impala’s interior. The Chevy sheered in half, one section continued forward and another spun off to the side. As the momentum of events came to rest, Chucker found himself thrown clear of the wreckage, but his torso was severed in half. 

Chucker lifted his shoulders from the asphalt so he could look down at his missing lower half. 

“Ain’t that a bitch.” 

His chin hit his chest and the light in his eyes dimmed as he watched the closing credits roll on his life. The projector light flickered. At the very end of the film, he saw a puppy, a furry, energetic little puppy jumping and licking the hands of someone, someone who was giggling, he felt weightless and happy. The image darkened to black just as the puppy was seen running out into a busy city street. 

The next thing he became aware of was his head being rolled on the hard edge of a railroad track. He believed his eyes were open, but all he could see was jet black nothingness as his head continued rolling. Gradually Chucker stopped feeling his head dragged on iron. A drab, yellowish light flooded his lost vision. He suddenly found himself seated in a chair. He looked down and watched the lower half of his body re-materialize. 

He sat behind a desk in a huge, endless warehouse full of desks and there was a steady hum of voices, like the hum of millions of flies. Chuck looked across the desk at another person talking to him. He tried to focus on the person’s lips that worked without voice. Someone turned the volume up. 

“…. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’ve been here for ages, and still I don’t know what to do. They told me you could help me. Are you going to say anything? Can you help me? What are you staring at?”
Chuck looked from side to side. There were countless rows of desks with a person on either side. The humming grew louder. 

“What is this place.” Chuck asked the man opposite him. 

“Why are you asking me? I thought you had all the answers, that’s what I’ve been waiting here for. And I want some answers, I’m not leaving until I get my answers.”

Chuck ignored the babbling man. He tried to push himself up to leave his seat. Nothing happened. He shoved at the desk hard. Nothing happened. Chuck looked down at the desk in disbelief then his eyes rose slowly to the babbling man on the other side. It was then he noticed something sobering. Behind the man that didn’t stop talking, stood another man, and behind him, another man and a woman, it went on like that as far as he could see. Nameless people waiting endlessly in line, each leveling a deadened stare at him. Chuck couldn’t feel his fingers drumming on the desktop. He had no feeling at all, couldn’t leave the desk and the man opposite him wouldn’t stop babbling.

Tired EMT’s crammed two body halves into a morgue bag and zipped it up before tossing it into the back of the ambulance. More police cars arrived and started to untangle all the snarled traffic. The failed get-away had grid-locked everything all the way back to in front of the diner where the old man put the last bite of egg into his mouth.  He chewed slowly without looking out the window. After swallowing, he left a quarter tip on the formica table and left. The waitress screwed the chrome top on the last salt shaker.  The old man ate at the diner every single morning. It was the waitress’s start of shift routine to fill all the salt shakers. The welcome bell on the back of the diner’s door didn’t ring when the old man passed through it.