It started out as a very normal day and ended up so horribly traumatizing. I was just going to my bank to deposit my latest paycheck and it got so twisted. If I had ever thought I was going to get caught up in this…well I would’ve just rolled over and gone back to sleep. I would do anything to be able to sleep again without the images flooding my mind. They appear in all my dreams, and sleep is now impossible. But, I am getting ahead of myself. You see, I can remember the whole thing almost as if it’s like a movie playing over and over again in my mind.
This day starts out like any other. I wake up still groggy and half asleep. My mind is still slow like a computer trying to warm up. After my annoying alarm went off, I slowly got up and brushed my teeth, threw on some clothes to wear. You know, all the normal stuff people do in the mornings. Then the movie seems to skip, probably because it wasn’t a real significant part of my day. It jumps from playing what I saw, to the screen going blank and all you hear are my thoughts.
Thursdays I have to work the late shift at the day care center I work at. Normally I would watch the kids in the morning before school, but Thursdays I took the after school shift. In my mind I was thinking about all the things I would have to do today before I went into work. My mind was still very slow, so my thoughts didn’t exactly add up and it took a few times for me to get it right. I finally decided the only thing I needed to do was go to the bank and drop off my last paycheck.
Simple enough, right? Nope, wrong, nada, no. Just stop right there. If I could change any one thing in my life it would probably be this. I thought nothing of it as I got into my beat up blue Ford Explorer. The bank wasn’t far away from my house, and it only took about ten minutes to get there.
I pulled into the parking lot and hurriedly grabbed my check. I could feel someone watching me; you know that creepy feeling you get when some ones eyes follow every move you make? I was getting that but I didn’t think much of it. I just assumed I had taken some one else’s parking spot.
Now, here’s where my mind starts to slow things down. I see every critical step I take up to the bank in slow motion. As I pull open the door to the bank I can almost smell that certain sent the bank has. I calmly get into line with the other people in the bank. There are only about five other people in line and three employees behind the desk. Its only about two seconds after I walk in that I see them. Them, of course being the robbers.
The bank is set up so it has a door on each end. The door I walked in had barely closed before I looked up and saw the two men dressed in black from head to toe. They had black ski masks on and pulled over their face. In their hands they carried two guns each. It only took me a split second to realize this was bad. My body went numb, my face dropped, and I started to shake a little.
“ALRIGHT, NOBODY MOVE!” the mans voice was rough and scratchy. All I could think about what how overly cliché that saying was. Like yeah right, some one is totally going to be like ‘uh, actually, I really enjoy moving. And I saw you two guys with the guns, and I was really planning on pissing you off and moving.’ Trust me, no one was thinking of moving. These men were big and burly. Their movements were very choppy, almost as if they didn’t know how to handle themselves well. The guy who was a little bit smaller went up to the cashier and demanded the money while the other guy told us to get on the ground if we wanted to live.
And man, did I want to live. Everyone else in the bank went down to the floor. People around me were crying silent tears. Some even looked like they were about to die they were so pale. I would’ve been crying too, but everything hadn’t hit me yet. I was still in slow motion mode in my mind. Shock I guess is a better word for it. I just waited for it to be over with. The men got what they wanted and then turned to us with blank looks on their faces. They didn’t seem to know what they were supposed to do. After what seemed like a couple of minutes of them just doing nothing, they fired two shots in the air and ran. That’s when the movie ends for me.
I woke up in the hospital. More dazed and confused than ever before. The doctors told me that one of the shots that had been fired hit off of something and came back and hit me in the shoulder blade. And from there I just passed out. Nothing after that really happened, except I am left with this crippling fear. I can’t even go outside anymore with out starting to shake. If only I could take back that day…