The Double Press

By Spenser Willden

Editor's Note: Play this music as you read to get the full experience.

 Bee-beep.
        The crosswalk button plays the first two notes of Mozart’s Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. If the street were less busy, Charlie would press the button again, to match the timing of the song a bit better, but just as he reaches towards the button, a taxi-cab pulls up to the curb. He withdraws his hand. Oh well, he thinks. Next time.
        Charlie checks his watch. Half past ten. He’s got time. He begins humming Mozart. He should’ve never thought of that song, now it’s gonna be in his head for hours. He thinks he’s starting to understand where Salieri was coming from.
        A man walks up beside Charlie, dressed to the nines in a gray-woolen suit. He swings his briefcase absentmindedly by his side, brushing his overcoat. He smiles and nods at Charlie, who smiles and nods back. Charlie looks straight forward, staring at the red hand on the crosswalk sign, silently willing it to become that little guy so he can walk past. It doesn’t change.
        He returns to his humming. The man cocks his head and looks at him. Charlie looks back, giving him a polite wave and nod. The man nods back, before turning towards the street.
        Bee-beep.
        The man’s hand withdraws from the button.
        Charlie snaps to attention. He stops humming.
        The man swallows. He knows what he did.
        Charlie turns to face him.
        This man, this Wall Street-looking jagoff, didn’t trust Charlie to have the common sense to press the button before he had arrived. He thought Charlie a dunce, a simpleton. Did he not hear him humming Mozart? The nerve of this man. The guts. The gall!
        Charlie casually reaches his arm past him.
        Bee-beep.
        The man locks eyes with Charlie. His thin eyebrows furrow in anger. He sets down his briefcase.
        Bee-beep.
        Bee-beep.
        Bee-beep.
        Charlie snarls.
        Bee-beep.
        The man pops his neck.
        Bee-beep. Bee-beep.
        BEE-BEEP. BEE-BEEP.
        BEE-BEEP. BEE-BEEP. BEE-BEEP. BEE-BEEP.
        Charlie makes eye contact with the little guy on the crosswalk sign.
        BEE-BEEP! BEE-BEEP! BEE-BEEP!
        The man sees the little guy turn into the red hand.
        BEE-BEEP! BEE-BEEP! BEE-BEEP!
        They both turn back and look at the crosswalk sign. It’s counting down! They snap back to each other.
        Charlie pushes the man to the ground and runs into the crosswalk. The man picks up his briefcase and makes a mad dash forward. He clobbers Charlie in the back of the head. The briefcase unlatches, papers flying everywhere. Charlie falls to the ground. He clutches the back of the man’s pantleg and pulls him to the ground. He crawls over him, kneeing him in face. The man grabs Charlie by the balls and twists. Charlie screams in agony.
        Suddenly: HOOOOOOOOONNKKKKK
        Both men look up just in time to see two bright headlights barreling toward them. They scowl at each other one last time.
        SKRREEEEEECH. KSCHHHH!