What's It Like to Kill a Man?

It is a hot summer week night in Newark New Jersey at 2 am. Most of the streets were deserted. Except for the one Cori Mauser was on. She was a Walmart employee who works the night shift and goes on break at 2 am. At the moment she was walking down the street to see if she could purchase food from the 24 hour McDonald's.

"Hello?" Cori spoke clearly into the intercom at the drive through. The lobby was closed her only option was the drive through.

"Hi, What can I get for you tonight?" A man's voice replied to her.

"I'd like to get a medium double cheeseburger meal please."

"What kind of drink with that?"

"Um... A rootbeer?"

"Alright, a medium double cheeseburger meal with a rootbeer? Will that be all tonight?"

"Yes."

"Alright, pull forward to the second drive through window, your total will be 6.96."

"Thank you." Cori said before walking around the building to the second drive through window where the man who took her order was hanging out of the window.

"Oh.. You're not in a car?" The man called out to her before she approached the window.

"No..."

"I'm not supposed to be taking your order or anything if you're not in a car and you're trying to go through the drive through." The man explained to her once she got up to the window.

"Oh.... I'm sorry, I won't come back through again unless I'm in a car..." Cori told him hoping that he was only telling her what he was for future reference.

"I can't give you the food or do any transactions unless you're in a car... so if you want to come back around in a car...I can give you your order."

"Oh.. I don't have a car though.."

"I can't give you this food then, sorry. Have a goodnight." The man said sort of blandly and shut the drive through windows in Cori's face.

She sighed to herself for a second then knocked on the drive through window causing the man to turn back around.

"Yes?" He asked with a slight bit of attitude in his voice.

"What if I give you an extra five dollars?" Cori asked trying to bribe the man to give her the food she ordered.

"No, I still can't do that I could get fired."

"-But no ones else is here, no one would know. And the food you made would have just gone to waste." Cori added trying to reason with him.

"There are camras people would find out and I would get fired. Please leave." He said to Cori before shutting the windows in Cori's face again. Defeated she checked the time on her dying phone before she started walking back to Walmart. Her break was an hour long and she still had 20 minutes left. She figured she would resort to buying some Ramen cup of noodles at Walmart and hot water for tea that you could have to make them.

It wasn't a bad plan, but when she got back to the store the doors were locked and no one was around to let her in. She knocked loudly on the front doors and waited a minute before deciding to pull out her phone to try calling the store to see if anyone would answer the phone. After a few rings the Walmart hotline came on and was telling her to press buttons depending on why she was calling. The last option told her that it would connect her to a manager at the store. Right before she pressed the number 5 her phone died. Cori looked at her phone in disbelief and then tried turning it on again. Nothing happened. She sighed and slid the phone back into her pocket.

"Looks like I'm not eating till I get back home.." She muttered to herself figuring that by the time someone would come let her in her break would be over. She usually ate before she went into work but she had slept in today and had to rush into work. She tried knocking loudly on the doors again, failing to get somebody's attention. No one was up at the front but Cori kept slamming on the doors every couple of minutes just in case anyone were to go up there.

After about 10 minutes of banging on the door and waiting Cori decided to head around back to see if maybe someone would hear her if she banged on the back doors. She figured it wouldn't work since the new stock had already gotten delivered at the beginning of the night so no one would most likely be in the back. But it was worth a shot.

Five minutes later still defeated to get anybody's attention she headed back to the front of the building again hoping that since it was the end of break someone would come and let her in. At work she was pretty quiet and kept to herself, and no one really talked to her either. She figured no one noticed that she left the building tonight, especially since no one else left for their break. She sat down on the bench in the front of the store for a minute and wondered how long she would have to wait to be let back in to work. She tried thinking of somewhere she could go to call the store and have them let her in, but nothing was open besides the McDonalds.. and that guy wouldn't be letting her use the store phone. She also didn't have her work number memorized so she would have also had to have a way to look it up to call.

Cori placed her head in her hands and sighed to herself wondering what she could or should be doing right now. She knew there was a possibility she might not be let in for a couple hours, or at least until someone had to come out for a smoke break but that still might not be for at least another hour. She didn't want to just leave the store and go home. She didn't want to get in trouble and have no reason to defend herself since she would have left. She figured she would wait until someone either noticed she was missing and would hopefully go out front to see if she was there. Or until someone came out to smoke a cigarette.

Two and a half hours passed with Cori standing up and knocking on the doors every five minutes or so before a co-worker of Cori's came out front for a cigarette.

"Cori? What are you doing out here?" He said casually as if she had decided to start smoking and came out 5 minutes ago for a cigarette.

"I tried to get McDonalds on my break and when I got back here no one was up at the front to let me in... I've been waiting here since like 2:40." She explained calmly, even though she was upset about it inside. She would missing 2 hours from her pay check for no good reason, just because she got stuck outside.

"Oh, Shit! That really blows, I'm sorry no one came out here for you!" He apologized sincerely while handing her the keys the manager had given him to let himself back in.

"It's ok, Thanks.." She brushed it off and let herself back in the store. Although Cori was extremely frustrated at how her night had played out already, she was very good at masking her emotions and hardly ever let anybody really see her get upset.

"Cori?! Where were you?" She head as she approached the area she clocked in or out at.

"I got stuck out front, no one head me knocking on the doors, I tried calling the store before break ended and my phone died before I was connected with the store.." She explained to her manager calmly.

"I don't believe that, I'm sure somebody checked the front to make sure everyone was inside." He said to her as if she were full of shit, he was a little angry.

"No one did, unless they came at the five minute interval where I went around back to see if anyone would let me in at those doors." She spoke again.

"Or you really weren't there waiting to be let in at all, and you decided that you felt like trying to get away with a longer break tonight." He accused her.

"No, I wouldn't do that, I need the money, I want to be working. You can check the security cameras. If you do you'll see me standing at the front of the store trying to get somebody's attention." She explained calmly.

"No, I don't need to pull the cameras. I'm sure you weren't just waiting out front the whole time." He said as if no one would ever do that. "You're getting a write up and I'm sending you home for the rest of the night."

"But you don't know for sure that I wasn't waiting there for someone to let me in. Can you please check the cameras before punishing me when I haven't done anything wrong?"

"I'm not checking the cameras. Go home Cori." He said firmly to her before turning around and walking away.

Cori stood dumbfounded at the front of the store for a few minutes. She was so surprised he wouldn't hear her out, or give her benefit of the doubt but she was also extremely frustrated at the whole situation. She thought he would have been more reasonable especially since she was a good worker. She never called out, never got in trouble for talking with anyone too much, and she covered anybody's shifts. She was so frustrated that she waited at the front all that time to make the situation better and it backfired. Maybe she should have gone home. Maybe her manager was only mad because he saw her and would have forgotten and not realized if she hand't come inside. Cori thought for a minute before leaving and wondered if she should try and go to the manager above the one just speaking to her or if that would just make things worse. She figured maybe she would just head home and try to clear things up the next night she would work by talking with a different manager who would agree to pull the tapes.

Cori went to the break room to get her purse luckily seeing no one else there. She didn't want to tell anyone about what happened she figured it was pointless, and no one really gave a shit anyway. When she got back outside to the front of the store she noticed the sky had began to brighten just a little she figured it must be almost 5 in the morning. She began wondering what she was going to do with the rest of the day as she started her 20 minute walk home. She had to walk out of the huge parking lot first before walking down the main street for about 10 minutes, then down a few less populated streets before coming to the one that her apartment was on.

Cori was still angry at the whole night and was pondering the idea of getting another job as a second, but also in case she got fired from Walmart, or if she wanted to quit because the management sucked. She was trying to think about where she could apply that would be close to her apartment and wouldn't conflict with her work scheduled. She was so deep in her thoughts she didn't notice someone had been following her since she got off the main road. It was a man dressed in black trying to conceal himself with the buildings around them while trying to keep his distance from her so she wouldn't see him. Cori was walking with her purse over her shoulder while looking at the ground ahead of her feet and occasionally looking forward to make sure not to walk into anything.

Right before she was going to cross the deserted backstreet to get to her street. She felt someone pull at her left arm from behind her. Confused and startled Cori gasped and looked up to see who was grabbing her. As Cori was pulled around to face the stranger her hazel eyes were met with a pair of dark almost black ones. She noticed the person grabbing her was a man with pasty pale looking skin and black shoulder length hair. She was quickly pressed up against the wall of the building that was right next to them.

Cori's first thoughts were that she was being mugged and she quickly thought to try grabbing the box cutter she kept for work in her purse. It was the only thing she had that she could use as a weapon. Before she moved her arm anymore then 3 inches the man grabbed the middle of both of her arms and pushed them harder against the wall with incredible speed. That stunned Cori for a second before she tried to throwing her weight into the man to shove him away so she could escape. The man had so much strength Cori couldn't move her shoulders off the wall. She was surprised by how much strength and speed the man had it frightened her.

Initially she wasn't as scared as most people would have been in that situation since people have tried to mug her a few times before and she luckily none of them had a gun and she was able to defend herself with her box cutter, and before that a knife that she used to have. But in this situation the man that was pinning her against the wall seemed to have more strength then anyone she had ever come across. She was incredibly frightened by that and right before she could think to try anything else to escape a chloroform coated cloth flew up over her mouth and nose to put her out.

Within 2 minutes the man felt her body go limp before he threw her over his shoulder and fled the scene.