Big Time Boys

&;#65279;The Big Time Boys

It had always been the four of us, always four, right from the
beginning. We were a
team. Life had never been particularly kind to any of us as we grew up,
just a mile on the wrong side of town. Three of us still live within
that wrong mile today. It's still not much of a life, but we get by ...
just.

It was dissatisfaction that caused this whole sorry mess. We were
unhappy with the hand we had been dealt, with the cards we held, but
instead of trying to get along the best we could, we thought we'd take
the easy option. How wrong we were. It was never going to be easy. And
it wasn't.

I can't remember where the idea came from in the first place, who first
voiced the suggestion, but that really doesn't matter anymore. The
thing was that someone thought of it and, after some heated discussion,
we all agreed that it was a good
idea. We all agreed. That is important to know. None of us went into
this under any
illusions, we knew what we were doing, and still we went ahead.

In the cold light of day, it was a half-assed plan to start with. At
the time, we thought we were invincible. We actually believed we had
found the recipe for the perfect crime. We were kids, only stupid young
kids. What did we know?

It was planned for a Friday evening, that way we figured nobody would
even discover anything until Monday morning and we'd be home free by
then. Every evening in the run up to that Friday night, we sat huddled
in enny's coffee house,whispering about the high life we were going to
live on the proceeds of our first major crime. It was laughable really
since our total criminal activity to date had been stealing apples from
Mr Durkin's orchard back in '68 and pinching penny candy by
shaking the dispensing machine outside the corner store in the school
holiday. We were master criminals indeed and we were going to start a
crime wave the likes of which had never been seen in these parts. What
a joke.

I remember Jimmy saying how he was going to buy a motorcycle and escape
to California and become a movie star. How we laughed. And Frankie was
going to buy himself a train ticket to 'anyplace outta here ... one
way'. Luke was going to use his share to go to school in New York and I
was going to buy a house with a white picket fence on the right side of
town. A place for me and Amy to live in, happily ever after. It's funny
how things never work out the way you plan them, how life always seems
to have other ideas...

Friday came around far too quickly and before I knew what was happening
we were sitting pale faced in Jenny's, the untouched cola going flat in
the glasses in front of us. We were fizzing enough already. If any of
the others ever thought of abandoning the plan, they never said so. All
it would have taken was for one person to say 'I don't want to do this'
and we would have walked away at the end of the evening,home to our
beds and our unsatisfactory lives ... only of course nobody said a
word. How I wish I'd been brave enough to be that lone voice.

I have thought about it long and hard since that day and I've had
plenty of time to think. Locked in that cell for night after night, my
thoughts my true jailor, I turned it over and over in my mind....what
happened, what went wrong.

Our alibis as carefully rehearsed as our plan, we were set, and we
reached the old warehouse at a little before midnight. It was easy
getting in, that was a piece of cake. For a storage depot holding that
amount of money, security was pretty slack and it was no match for four
determined young men. Once inside the building our torches played
across the warehouse as we looked for what we had come to collect. We
had inside information from Jimmy's cousin who worked in the offices
during the morning shift and we knew that the really big stuff was kept
in the safe at the far end of the depot. The safe was actually built
into the floor and was twelve feet
underground with reinforced walls and doors. We were going to have to
blast our way in and we had come prepared. Luke was the brains of the
operation and he had calculated the right amount of explosive it would
take the blow that baby apart. He had even conducted a test run out at
the old mine on the far side of town. It was a dead cert he said.
We were pretty sure that nobody would notice the explosion, but Jimmy
was going to wait at the entrance with the car revving outside, just in
case we needed to make a quick getaway. But nothing was going to go
wrong, we had every angle covered. I began to relax as I held the torch
for Luke as he set about placing the explosives on the safe door.
Frankie stood to the side smoking a cigarette and holding the sacks we
planned to use for our booty. Frankie was the muscles of our gang,
making up for what he lacked in brain power with sheer brute strength.
He could carry really heavy weights effortlessly and was vital to our
success.

The last sensible thing I remember was Luke making a daft comment about
lighting the blue touch paper and retiring. He had warned us about the
noise of the explosion but it was nothing like I had expected. The
blast shook the basement,rattling my brains, the floor rocked beneath
our feet and then the fireball ripped through the building. That wasn't
supposed to happen. The heat burned my eyeballs and I closed my eyes,
feeling the lashes melt together as I blindly stumbled towards safety.
My lungs burned as I tried in vain to breathe. There was no air, the
fire
consumed us and I knew for sure we were dead.

But I didn't die. When I woke in hospital, it all came flooding back to
me. Frankie, poor dumb Frankie was dead. Burned to a crisp and all
because I hadn't been brave enough to say anything to stop all this
foolishness. .

I stumbled out on to the concrete, tears streaming down my blackened
face. My lungs burned and I gasped hungrily at the cool night air,
barely noticing the cooked flesh hanging from where my hands used to
be. Jimmy panicked when he saw us emerge and he revved the car up and
drove away, the tires squealing on the hot tarmac.
Luke was behind me and as I turned, I saw he was burning, flames
licking at his frightened features. I pushed him to the floor and
rolled over and over on top of him trying to extinguish the flames,
both of us crying and gasping for precious air. As we lay in the hot
dirt, I heard the sirens in the distance, getting closer and then I
remembered Frankie.

Luke and I served four years each for our attempt at the big time.
Jimmy got eighteen months for his last minute change of heart. Frankie
got life eternal.

Things were never the same after that.Jimmy never got to be a movie
star of course and he works in the gas station, pumping gas day after
day , getting drunker than drunk each night. Luke never made it to
school, he still can't make it out of bed most mornings. And me?
Well... Amy married another guy and lives in a nice house with a picket
fence on the right side of town. The only one of us who got what they
wanted was Frankie...He got his one way ticket outta there.