Hey guys, I really appreciate that y'all are adding me on your favorites or alerts, but could you guys review too? Not to sound ungreatful or anything. I love you all so much!! And I discovered that Dashboard Confessional actually has a good song. I'm really not a big Dashboard listener, but this has a nice tune, and it served my purpouse. So there you are, I suppose.

Oh, and beware of bad language in this.

Chapter 6: How to Tell when Someone's Listening
Accompanying Track: Don't Wait by Dashboard Confessional

I change the story every time. The truth is just too much; I don't want to relive it. And besides, it's far too much fun to come up with a new past every time; and watch as the poor fools I tell the story to try and comprehend the feelings that I must've been going through. When I'm not even telling them the truth! It fills every heist and everything with hilarity. My life is absolute hilarity.

Just fucking hilarity.

How can I tell when they're listening, you ask? Well, I'll give you an example.

Last week, I held up one of Gotham's favorite banks, and one of those nice lady tellers comes over to me and screams:

"You don't scare anyone here, freak! Batman'll come save us!"

I hate it when people do that. They always go 'blah blah blah, Batman will save us'. People are so boring that way. Honestly, they're all so monotonous; all but one. But that's another problem for another day and it has nothing to do with my story now.

Anyway, after saying her peice, she stares at me in a way that I guess could pass for defiance. All I see is a scared little girl who got in a little too deep. And now she's got no way to pull herself out. I approach, grab her blonde locks, and yank her close. Out popped my baby, the completion of my right arm. A potato peeler.

Weird for a menace to society to weild a potato peeler, you say. I can tell you that it does the job better than most knives would, and it's much less hard to clean; as though it was specifically made for cutting faces. Huh.

Well, anyway, I take her by the hair and pull her close, so close that I can smell her foundation, lipstick, blush (I know a little something about makeup, alright?)...and she was all mine for a moment. I like the feeling of possesing her; holding her ever closer. I stared into her brown doe eyes for a whole two minutes, and watched them as they soaked in the fullness of her predicament. She's very beautiful...uncommonly so; too pretty to be a telller in a bank. Huh. The dames these days...

Anyhoo, I trace my little friend gently across her hairline and watched her shudder. I bit down a laugh and brush my scarred cheek against hers, and growl in her ear.

"You wanna know how I got these scars?"

She shakes her head, no. She doesn't. But I pull her hair so hard that she her eyes tear and she chokes out a pathetic yes. She has wanted to know all along, but she is too afraid to say yes. Which is understandable. I'm not the most handsome guy in Gotham, I'll admit. But heck, is that any reason to be rude? I should say not.

God, I keep getting off the track of the story. Okay, continuing with the story, I think for a second, taking just enough time to suck my teeth and come up with a beginning. The lie usually flows easily from there.

"Well, it was a long time ago. I was only...14.

Her red lips start to quiver. I must be pulling her hair harder than I thought. I let her go a little, just enough so that her head goes back to the normal position.

"It was a little after five on a slate-skied fall day. Ugh, it looked like it was going to rain, and never stop raining. But that was the day that my mother came home early from her job at the factory."

She's staring at me, horrified. That's how I know that she's listening. She doesn't try to look away.

"And Mommy goes 'hey kid, c'mere'. And what else does a good son do but go over? Well, I do, and she pulls out a bottle of beer. An empty one. One that she cracks on the table and points at me. I back away and say 'what're you doing mom?' and she just smiles. Then she wipes her hand across her face, and all the concealer comes off. A nice big scar is etched across her face. A smile."

By this time, my little friend has wandered into the bank teller's mouth. She is looking around, panicked, but no one is making a move to help her.

"Well, she grabs my hair and yanks me close. And she tells me 'kid, you worry too much for your age. You really oughta smile more.' she picks up one of the nice, serrated shards and shoves it in my mouth. And she tells me 'let's put a smile on your face'. Annnnnnd..."

I think some tears are coming from the bank teller's eyes. I smile grimly. I've really got her now; she's swallowed the story hook, line and sinker.

"S'matter honey? Clown got your tongue?"

She makes a move to respond, but I pull the glass through her cheek, and she screams loud enough to wake the dead.

Heh.

That's how you know when they're listening.

That's how you know, and that's when you crush 'em. Because that's what the assholes of the world need today. To be crushed into the floor.