Dakota

Running around with Dakota never lost its charm.

At first, it was small knick-knack shops off side streets in bad suburbs we were robbing. Now, out of nowhere, she’d stop us, and the man or woman walking towards us, with her gun held against their temple before screaming like a madwoman at them for their wallets. I was in love.

To be honest, this whole thing wasn’t really my scene. I wasn’t a particularly threatening man nor was I able to fight for myself if it were ever needed. I was pretty useless, but Dakota hadn’t seemed to notice. Did she love me, too? She certainly liked having me around when she was out doing jobs. She was always telling me how strong a person I was as she split open yet another skull, and even though I knew she was lying as she must have seen me cringe, I took the compliment none the less.

“Baby, pass the gaffer tape would you?” I jumped as she spoke, jerking me from my thoughts. I passed her the roll of tape sitting by the cash register we’d yet to raid, and let her do her thing. She was particularly skilled with knives, so it seemed. I didn’t understand her fascination with them, nor did I understand why she hated to hear them scream, but this curiosity only made the heart grow fonder.

“You might want to leave,” she warned, that wicked smirk growing on her face. She waited until I’d closed the store door behind me, and I would only be able to imagine what was to become of the owner. A bit of kicking and a few muffled words later, and she was walking out the door counting the cash in her hands. She handed me her knife to clean, which I wiped on my shirt and slipped away from prying eyes.

“I’m finally there,” she whispered, kissing the paper notes in her hands before shoving them violently into her back pocket.

“Finally where?” She ignored me as we walked. I was a little worried about the blood on my shirt, and might not have wiped the blood off there if I’d have known she wanted to take the main streets back to her flat.

“It feels so damn good when you can just feel, at one exact moment, that your life is finally figured out. Things will be good. You know?” I nodded, slowly, unaware of exactly what she’d been planning to spend her cut of the money on and suddenly dying to find out.

I didn’t know much about Dakota. I knew her name, and how she liked to do things her way, but that was pretty much it. We talked about day to day things; the weather, the locations, and the people we victimised were all we discussed. I had a gut feeling she’d had a hard life up until she’d met me, and liked to believe I made her feel less lonely. She made me feel that way.

“How has your life just figured itself out?” I asked, curious, and she turned around to walk backwards so she could face me.

“You don’t know a lot about me, James. You don’t know a lot about me at all.” She smiled as she looked up to the sky, before bringing her gaze back down to me. “Do you love me?”

“Yes,” I replied, without hesitation. Of course I loved her. She had to have known that already.

“Would you do anything for me?”

“Yes,” I replied again, my heart filling with joy. She wanted me. She needed me by her side.

“I feel the same way.” She turned back around and began walking forwards again. “I have five grand now, which I couldn’t have acquired without your help. You’re a diamond, love.” I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing at all. She had five grand? I’d thought we had the money, together.

“But I thought –”

“James, James… you’re so… young. You’re so naïve. You might have made a girl very happy.”

“I thought you just said –”

“I said I would do anything for the one I love, yes, and you just assume that I love you?” I stopped in my steps then, and couldn’t move another inch as I felt my heart hammering in my chest. Was it going to explode? She didn’t usually play these games with me. Dakota wasn’t one for games.

“My love, his name is Freddie. Freddie Jones. He’s in prison, and I finally have enough to bail him out.” She turned to flash me a sweet smile, before she started walking again. “I never loved you. You were a pawn, James. I could never love a man like you. Why, you’re hardly a man at all.”

“You lie,” I said, disbelief being the only thing I had coursing through me. “What is going on, here?”

“You’ll see…” she said in a sing-song voice, one I hadn’t expected her cold spirit would be capable of. What she did next, I wouldn’t have thought she was capable of, either. Without any warning, she ran off screaming at the top of her lungs, her arms flailing all about the place.

“Help! Oh, God!” she screeched, and several people turned their heads to see what was going on. “He has a knife! He killed a man, oh, please help!” I thought I’d been paralysed with one of either disbelief or rage, until I saw an officer rounding the corner and that Dakota was screaming at the top of her lungs in a direct path towards him.

Running around with Dakota had suddenly lost its charm.

I ran around with myself after that, to several different countries and eventually settled in Asia; where, exactly, is something I simply cannot tell you. Dakota, if that had even been her name, was still in my heart, but in a whole new way. They say a woman will make a man strong. I was certainly getting there and once I was where I wanted to be, then to Dakota I would return.