About Me
This is a true story. It was 9:55 pm on Saturday, February 13th. I was a senior at Central Michigan University working on my Journalism degree. I paid my way by working three jobs; delivering pizzas for Mr. Tony's from 8 pm to 2 am, hall monitor at the local high school in the afternoons, and working the liquor counter at Gould's Drugstore on the weekends. My summer job of repossessing cars (the most fun job I ever had) paid for my tuition and books for the year, and the three part-time jobs covered rent, food, beer and weed.
The high school gig was the best because I could get my homework done with minimal interruptions as I kept the night class kids (who had been expelled from day classes for a multitude of infractions) from destroying the building and/or killing each other in between classes. The pizza job provided quick cash from tips but the hours prevented me from ever attending my 8 am classes, which were all eventually dropped and re-taken at during more civilized time slots.The drug store was a big place, much like a Rite-Aid that sold just about everything. It also afforded a nice fringe benefit in the form of free booze that would accidentally be placed in the dumpster outside during our shift and recovered a couple hours after closing. My friends Keith, Dan and Jon also worked there. The hours were convenient in that closing at 10 pm didn't interfere with our partying.On this night it was five minutes to closing and I was ringing up beer & liquor as for the last-minute rush of customers, which were primarily college students and a few old, harmless, red-eyed, local drunks. I was thinking about the keggar I was planning to attend at the Forum Apts. as soon as I got off.I had 5 customers in my line when the door to the parking opened (just to the left of my cash register) and a black-clad man with a matching ski-mask and pointing a .45 automatic pistol at my face ran past me yelling, "don't push any buttons! Don't push any buttons!" It was 20 degrees outside and snowing, and being a college town where students tend to walk everywhere, ski-masks were common. .45 automatics were not, but I figured this was a prank. He looked like those guys in the grainy footage of the terrorists from the '72 Olympics in Munich. I had a big grin on my face for about one second, until his accomplice (whom I'll call Shorty) followed him in the door and stopped in front of me. He pointed an AK-47 at my face and yelled, "don't push any buttons!" Simultaneously the 3rd perp (I'll call Goon) made a loud entrance in the store's other door about 60 feet to my right and pointed his sawed-off shotgun at Debbie, a sweet, meek townie who was working front register. The first guy (Ringleader) continued on to the pharmacy at the back of the store. They now had my full attention.I could feel the blood draining from my face and I was no longer smiling. A co-worker, later recounting events for the police, said, "so they came in yelling, 'don't push any buttons,' and McCarthy yelled, 'There aren't any buttons here! There aren't any buttons here! I swear to God there's no alarm system!" I don't recall sounding so much like a scared little bitch, but I was and I probably did. All three were dressed the same. Only their weaponry varied.Shorty was about 5'6" which made his rifle look even bigger. I knew it was a Russian-made AK-47 from seeing them in countless war films. It was very black and ominous, and the large, forward-curving banana-clip looked sinister and potent. He made all 5 customers lay face-down on the floor in front of the counter with hands behind their heads, then took all of their wallets. One of the guys was a middle-aged man and his wallet had a badge attached to it. "Are you a COP?! Are you a fucking COP?" he screamed at the guy. "I'm a security guard at the hospital," he said. Shorty kicked him hard in the ribs and put all wallets on the counter. He turned his attention back to me. His eyes were green. He was young, maybe 21 or 22. I was scared and he knew it. "Put all the money in the bag!" He didn't yell it, but he barked it with authority. In the movies, at least the old ones I'd seen, the bad guys always brought their own bags. They're in the bank vault or at the teller's window, and they hand over a canvas bag. This is what I expected, so I said, "What bag?"
His eyes widened and his crooked, stained, trailer-park teeth clenched as he took a step forward and hissed, "any one of the 500 FUCKING bags by your FUCKING hand motherFUCKER!" I could hardly breathe as I smashed my right fist into the big button that opens the register while snapping a paper bag open in the air with my left hand. I grabbed the 20's, 10's, 5's and ones and dropped them into the open bag on the counter. Thinking I'm done, I paused and put my hands up again. I should have just shut the hell up, but I looked down and saw all the change and, trying to be helpful and remain alive, I asked, "do you want the change?" His response was immediate, furious and punctuated with another shake of the AK at me. "I want EVERYTHING motherfucker!" With my left hand still in the air, I used my right to grab handfuls of coins. I was shaking and between the drawer and the bag I lost half of them. They skittered, clanged and bounced off the register, the counter and the floor, ending up everywhere.
He moved closer and raised the stock of the rifle from his waist to his shoulder. I knew this was bad. His eyes flared and he yelled, "UNDER the drawer motherfucker!". We didn't keep large bills under the drawer like some stores do, but of course, he didn't know that. I tossed the tray from the drawer over my shoulder and saw 3 empty manilla envelopes. I put them in the bag and my hands went back up. My chest felt tight. I was holding my breath and I remember thinking that if he yells at me again I just might piss in my pants. I glanced to the right to see that Goon had his money bag full and Debbie laying prone on the floor behind the counter.
There was a major commotion at the back of the store. Glass was shattering. We couldn't see what was going on, but we sure as hell could hear it. Dan, the Pharmacist on duty was a 35 year-old, chubby, slightly effeminate man. When the managers went home at 5 pm, the pharmacist was in charge. We liked Dan because most nights he stayed in the back and left us alone. He was so nervous that he was having trouble with the combination lock on the big safe in the pharmacy. It held the entire day's cash along with drugs with a street-value in the hundred of thousands of dollars. He had already failed to open it on his first two attempts. "You better open it this time asshole or I'm gonna blow your fucking head off, YOU UNDERSTAND ME?!" Ringleader screamed at him. Then, "What's that? You got a KNIFE? You got a KNIFE MOTHERFUCKER?!!" He had pistol-whipped Dan, and when he fell to the floor, the spatula tool they use to count pills had fallen from his lab-coat.Shorty and Goon were exchanging nervous glances. This was taking longer than they had planned. The clock above the walk-in cooler said 10:05. They should have been in and out in under five minutes. They had already been in the store 10 minutes and the safe wasn't even open yet. More glass was breaking, which I figured was the shattering of the locked display cases that held more controlled-substances.Shorty wanted to see what was going on back there, but he had six people to watch, including me. He started edging his way toward the end of the aisle, while keeping the rifle and his eyes on me. When he reached the opening at the end of the aisle, he turned his head for a quick look, but evidently something was blocking his view to the pharmacy. He looked back at me. I hadn't flinched and I kept my eyes down, but could see him easily in my peripheral vision. Finally he swung around the corner, rifle and all. he was almost out of view. We could hear Ringleader yelling at Dan to empty the safe quickly.Satisfied that everything was under control, Shorty began backing up toward me, but must have realized that he had taken his eyes off of me for almost 15 seconds..more than enough time for me to try something stupid. I hadn't. I was frozen in place and looking right at him when he spun quickly, rifle at waist level. He had pivoted on his right foot, and when he faced me, at a distance of six feet, he planted his left foot on the tile floor that was wet from snow that customers had tracked in all evening. Our eyes were locked, as his left boot kept going. He was doing the splits in front of me, in slow motion. We both knew he was going down. He could either release the weapon with one or both hands and try to break his fall, or he could hold it and land hard on his ass. He chose the latter. He was halfway to the floor when I looked at his right hand and saw his index finger inside the trigger-guard, on the trigger. I was paralyzed with fear. I realized I was going to die in less than one second. (to be continued)
