The Bank Job – a short story for English reading comprehension

And we all charged in as one.

We had done this a hundred times before; we were well-practised at it.

Before we even got through the door, Colin grabbed my arm.

“Not like last time, Joe,” he said, his voice low. “You hear me? We can’t afford another mess-up.”

I nodded, but I didn’t say anything back.

Colin raised his shotgun and made sure all the people in the bank could see it.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is a bank robbery. Everyone get on the floor and you will not get hurt. All the staff — out front now.”

He spoke calmly and quietly.

Jason, always good with technology, had disarmed all the alarms and cameras. And me, I stood at the door, keeping nosy people out and the customers and staff in.

This was a piece of cake.

“You,” said Colin, and pointed to a middle-aged man by a desk. “Give me the keys to the vault.”

The man faltered and tried to speak, but Colin approached him and waved the shotgun in his face.

“This is no time for heroics, my friend,” he said.

The man produced a set of keys, and Colin took them from him. As he reached across the desk, I caught sight of a small photo frame — two kids on a beach, squinting at the camera, grinning. The man’s hands were shaking so badly he could barely let go of the keys.

From behind me, Jason let out a laugh. “Sweet,” he said.

We had done all our homework on the bank. We knew exactly how much they had in the vaults. We would be raking it in.

I looked around at the people. They were all lying down on their fronts. Some peeked up at me and Jason.

We must have looked pretty intimidating with our masks on — I wore a grinning cartoon duck mask. Jason had a wide-eyed cartoon dog mask. And Colin was a sharp-toothed cartoon rat, because he was in charge, and it suited him.

Near the counter, a middle-aged woman lay with her hands trembling, a plain gold wedding ring catching the light. Beside her, a security guard stared straight ahead, jaw tight, like he was trying not to think about his family.

Just normal people trying to get on with life.

I almost said something then — I felt the words rise up in my throat — but I swallowed them back down.

Not yet. Not here.

I looked at the gun in my hand. It was loaded.

Would I use it if I had to? I don’t know. But it now looked so evil, so bad.

That’s when I noticed her.

One of the cashiers, a young woman, hadn’t lain all the way down like the others. She was on her knees beside the trembling older woman, one hand resting gently on her shoulder, murmuring something too quiet for me to hear.

Not defiant. Not brave in the way you’d expect.

Just steady. Kind and reassuring.

She looked up and caught my eye through the eyeholes of my mask.

She didn’t look afraid of me. She looked at me like she could see straight through the mask to whatever was left of the person underneath.

That look did something to me that the photo and the wedding ring hadn’t quite managed alone. It finished the job.

I turned to the side and placed the gun on a counter where people fill in forms.

Then I removed my mask.

The security guard looked up at me in amazement. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

Jason stared ahead at all the cashiers’ windows. He turned his head and saw me with my mask off.

“What — what are you doing?” he said. He stepped forward. “Put your mask on. Where’s your gun? What the hell are you doing?”

I shook my head at him.

“This is wrong,” I said. “This is all wrong. We shouldn’t be doing this.”

Jason called out to Colin. He didn’t say his name, of course. But he shouted out to him.

Colin rushed out from the door leading to the back of the bank. He saw me and stopped moving.

In a stage whisper, he spoke to me. “What’s wrong with you? Why have you taken your mask off?”

“I’m sorry, guys,” I said. “But this is all wrong. We should not be doing this to these poor people. Look at them. They’re decent, hard-working people.”

Colin came towards me in three large steps. He put his face close to mine. His rat mask grinning back at me.

“I knew it,” he said. “I knew you’d do this again. I told you — not like last time.”

“I’m not asking you to stop,” I said quietly. “Just me. I’m done.”

“This is madness,” he said. “This is completely insane.”

Then, in the distance, the sound of police car sirens.

Colin froze. Jason swore under his breath.

“Someone must have hit the silent alarm,” Jason said, panic rising in his voice.

Colin looked at me, then at the door, then back at me, calculating. For a second I thought he might use the shotgun on me instead. But he just shook his head, like I wasn’t even worth it anymore.

“You’ve ruined everything,” he said.

The sirens grew louder. Blue light flickered against the windows.

I didn’t run. I sat down on the floor, right where I stood, hands open in front of me.

The young cashier — Karen, I would learn her name was later, when the police were taking statements — stayed kneeling beside the older woman until it was over.

When the officers came through the door, Colin and Jason tried to bolt for the back exit but didn’t get far.

I was arrested too. Of course I was. Taking my mask off didn’t undo the first twenty minutes of the robbery, and I never expected it to.

But as they led me out in handcuffs, I heard Karen’s voice behind me, talking to one of the officers.

“That one,” she said, “he put his gun down. He tried to stop it. I want that written down.”

It didn’t change what happened to me. I still went to prison, same as Colin, same as Jason, a little less time.

But sometimes, in the exercise yard, I think about that look she gave me — like she could see past the mask — and I let myself believe that when I get out, someone might actually be waiting.