No Negotiating by Kevin Myrick

They stormed into the bank with masks over their faces and carried what he thought were Uzis. A shorter one told them all to get down on the floor in a line, and he put zip ties and had them cuffed with plastic zip ties. “Count off, you’re one.” He was lucky number 13.

The cops came and surrounded the building after the manager hit the panic button under his desk when they first stormed in. The robbers didn’t care. They wanted an audience for what they were about to do.

“Number 13,” a big one dressed all in black said, and motioned for him to get up with his gun. “Come forward.”

The short one – they called each other “Johnson” – pulled him up by his jacket and shoved him over toward the window. “It’s your lucky day. We’re going to let you go.”

“Why?”

“Because, we want you to tell them there will be no negotiating.”

“That’s it?”

The short one pushed him out of the door then retreated inside. A guy dressed in body armor and with another machine gun pulled him away from the building, then over to the guys in charge. They asked them if they said anything?

“They said was there will be no negotiating.”

As soon as he finished giving the officers the news, the windows blew out and an explosion busted his ear drums. One minute the bank was there, the next minute it was gone.

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Where Do Dreams Come From? by Kevin Myrick

It was bedtime, and Benny was sleepy but doing his routine where he didn’t want to go to sleep yet. He wanted to ask me questions, even after a bedtime story and to get up to use the bathroom. I indulged him, like I always did. Then he asked me where dreams came from.

I began to tell him the story of how dreams were made. “One night, a smart man named Mr. James Walter Waterstone of Broadbottom, England, sat down and started thinking about a whole new concept that would change humanity forever. It didn’t have a name, but he tinkered with powders and medicines until finally he concocted the perfect formula. He called it “dreams” and he took the concoction one night and by the morning he remembered fantastic things happening to him.”

“That’s not true Daddy,” Benny said. The boy was smart, could see through these bedtime stories without trouble. “Tell me Daddy: where do dreams come from?”

“They come from inside your head,” I said. “They are sometimes about good things and sometimes about bad things. And its OK to be scared about the bad things, but you know what?”

He shrugged, like he always did at bedtime.

“The bad things aren’t real. They are only in your head.”

“But there are real bad things in this world, right Daddy?”

“Yes,” I said. “But you know what?”

Another shrug.

“I’m going to do my best to keep anything bad from happening to you,” I lied.

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The Stinky Kid by Kevin Myrick

You remember the stinky kid at camp when you were young? I was that kid at Space Camp, the summer after my fourth grade year. I thought I was hot shit in my blue NASA flight suit and my Space Camp t-shirt. I had aviator sunglasses too. It was the best time of my life.

The other kids didn’t like me that much; I believe I got stuck in mission control because I was young and smelly. No one said a word to me about it.

It wasn’t like I was the stinky kid on purpose: I’d forgotten my lock combination and I was embarrassed, so I didn’t tell a soul. I was young and had never been in an environment with group showers. Showers were a private thing; I went in once at the camp and told myself I wouldn’t go back. I still feel weird about showering in campgrounds and at the beach.

When we graduated at the end of the seven days of going through “real astronaut training,” there was a graduation ceremony where everyone got silver wings and a certificate. Afterward when I met up with my aunt and grandparents, they were astonished to learn I hadn’t bathed in a week. The family still laughs at this story.

Somewhere packed away with other mementos of a life that is long gone, my mother has it all saved – the suit, the wings, the certificate. All I have are my memories of being the stinky kid.

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Prince Charming By Kevin Myrick

“Would you please open the window?” Marcy brushed the gray hairs from her eyes, which watered from the second-hand smoke. All she wanted was fresh air.

The window slowly lowered and the chilled autumn air hit her face like a splash of water. She laughed at the memory of the time she woke her brother with a ice water bath.“What’s so funny?”

“My brother, you should meet him. You’d like him a lot.”

George said nothing, and the moment was gone. It seemed at every turn of the evening George was missing their moments together. Maybe he thought she was too old. She should have dyed her hair.

Then he slid his free hand up her skirt along her thigh. His hand was like a cold, coarse stone against her velvet thigh. She didn’t like men with rough hands. She brushed his advance away and pushed her skirt back down.

They could have heard a pin drop in the car for the rest of the ride to her house, where she looked at him one last time and found nothing admirable, nothing memorable about him. She was glad they didn’t share too many memories. She would quickly forget he ever existed.

Marcy stood cold on her sidewalk and watched the tail lights disappear behind her. Her guard dropped when she finally walked through the door and asked anyone who was listening through her tears where she could find her prince charming?

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