When You’ve Gotta Go

Carl was the one holding the gun but it was his own gut that felt as if a bullet was tearing through it—bouncing around his intestines like a goddamn pinball machine. He needed to take a shit and he needed to do it now. 

“Where the hell’s the bathroom?” he shouted at the teller, his black cotton ski mask absorbing the oncoming dookie sweats. 

“What the fuck are you doing, man?” Eddie asked, his gun fixed on the bank patrons, making sure none of them moved a muscle lest they wanted to leave there without it. 

“I need your bathroom,” Carl yelled again, shaking the gun in the teller’s face. “Tell me where it is or I’m going to shoot you and ask somebody else.”

“It… it’s around the c-c-corner,” the teller stammered nervously.

“Hey, no,” Eddie said. “We’ve got to get the money and get the hell out of here. Use the fucking bathroom somewhere else.”

“I’ve got to take a shit.”

“What?”

“I said I’ve got to take a fucking shit.”

“You want to take a shit in federal prison?”

“You knew I had IBS before you asked me to do this with you,” Carl said with urgency, shifting from one foot to the other.

“I don’t fucking care about your IBS!” Eddie shouted. “You’re not going to the goddamn bathroom in the middle of a bank robbery!”

“My grandmother had IBS,” the bank teller chimed in anxiously. 

“Stay out of this!” Eddie yelled. “Put the money in the bag or my partner here is going to shoot you in the fucking head and I’m going to open fire on everyone else!”

“Okay, okay,” the teller stuttered with his hands up. “Please, just don’t hurt anybody.”

“I’m taking a shit,” Carl said.

“Goddammit,” Eddie pointed the gun at his partner, “Nobody’s going to the fucking bathroom!”

“No,” Carl corrected him, “I’m taking a shit. It’s hot and it sucks and it’s coming right out of me.”

“You’re shitting your pants right now?” Eddie asked. “Are you fucking serious?!”

Sirens wailed outside, flooding the bank with flashing red and blue lights. Customers rushed out the front doors, taking advantage of Eddie being distracted by his partner. Even the bank teller managed to duck behind the counter and scurry to safety.

“Shit,” Eddie said when he realized what was happening.

“Weren’t you supposed to keep a gun on those guys?” Carl asked.

“Shut up! I ought to fucking shoot you!”

“You’d gun down a handicapped? That’s low, Eddie—even for you.”

“You’re not fucking handicapped!” Eddie shook the gun in Carl’s face.

“I have IBS!”

“Fuck you and your IBS!”

“Freeze!” the first cop yelled as eight of his buddies swarmed the bank, their guns fixed on the would-be bank robbers. Before Eddie and Carl knew it, they were nose down on the bank floor, their hands in cuffs behind their backs. 

“What the fuck is that smell?” a disgusted cop asked.

“This one shit his pants,” another cop answered. 

“I have IBS, goddammit!” Carl shouted into the floor.

“Save it for the judge, buddy,” the same cop replied. “Somebody get these assholes out of here. I’m tired of smelling them.”

“So help me God, I’m going to kill you when we get to prison,” Eddie said when the duo were packed into the back of the squad car, the scent of Carl’s rotten bowel movement poisoning the confined air.

“Don’t be like that, Eddie,” Carl said. “It’s a medical condition. I couldn’t help it.”

Outside, police spoke with customers and the bank teller about the attempted robbery. Eddie dared to peek as the car rolled away, singing its sad, sad song. It was a bank robber’s worst nightmare:

They were all laughing.