The Broken Flower Pot

BAM! BAM! BAM!

“Come in,” says the gentle looking old man behind the desk, he has been waiting for this for a few hours now.

The door opens and in walks a man of extraordinary size. His head is clean shaven and he has a moustache that has been dyed blonde. He is missing a tooth that slightly effects the way he talks. The thing that strikes the old man is the man’s eye’s, which are a piercing blue.

The man walks with an aura of confidence around him. He has come here for one reason and nothing will stop him from doing his job. He walks slowly over to the giant oak desk where the old man is sitting and writing furiously.

“You know why I have come here then?” The bald man asks the old man, already knowing the answer.

“Of course, but I must tell you that it will make little difference what you do to me.” The old man replied kindly.

“Just give me that piece of paper and this can be done with very quickly or you can try to be a hero, in which case I get the paper anyways and you experience a world of pain.” The bald man says, not showing any signs of emotion.

The old man laughs while he finishes writing something down on the piece of paper. He puts his gold pen down and opens the desk drawer. The bald man standing in front of the desk immediately goes into his coat and pulls out his Browning Hi-Power pistol and points it at the elderly man. The old man just laughs again and drops the paper in the drawer. Then the old man seems to spring to life. He quickly pulls his own pistol out of the drawer before slamming it shut.

The bald man standing in front of the desk was not expecting such a quick movement from the seemingly fragile old man and had to dive to the side to avoid the first shot, which flew past his ear so close that if actually clipped it on the top. The bald man was back on his feet in a second and firing his weapon. Bullets flew all around the room as both shooters were running in diving while trying to aim for a shot that would put down the other. Soon the old man was in trouble as his gun was clicking on empty. He stopped and stared down the bald man who was aiming his gun at him. He waited patiently for the bald man to pull the trigger. He watched as he pulled the trigger back, only for the gun to make the same clicking sound as his. The old man chuckled when he realized the break he had just caught. His smile soon faded though as the bald man pulled a knife out of his coat.

“Any other weapons coming out of their that I should know about?” The old man asked, trying to mask the feeling of fear he felt at that moment.

“I won’t need any others.” The bald man replied, taking a stride forward. In an instant, he was leaping for the old man with the knife held out in front of him. He would have ended the fight right there had he noticed the old man put his foot under the foot rest by the chair. As the bald man flew forward, the old man kicked with all of his strength and sent the foot rest flying upwards, connecting with the leaping mans hand, sending the knife flying through the open door way and out into the hallway. The old mans plan worked but he forgot to take into consideration the flying body of the bald man. The bald man flew into him, knocking him back into the book shelf by the wall. The book shelf shook and the antique vases up on it were knocked off. Both men were able to avoid the falling vases but were disoriented from the sudden movements they had to make. As quickly as they could, both men struggled up to their feet.

“Well, I guess that knife wasn’t the only thing you would need huh?” The old man asked, clearly mocking his opponent, trying to get him to do something irrationally.

The bald man didn’t even reply, all he did was smile very widely. The old man was very shaken by the smile before realizing why the man was smiling. In all of the rush with getting back to his feet, he didn’t notice the bald man with his hand behind the book shelf. With one swift motion, the bald man shoved the bookshelf forward, sending it and all the contents on it down in a flurry of pages and broken glass.

The old man was able to move but fell down at the last second. He turned over onto his back and screamed as the massive book shelf came down on his legs just below the knees. The old man felt his bones give way under the antique shelf and knew that the fight was finally over. He tried to ignore the insurmountable pain running through the flattened part of his legs. He looked over at the bald man and spew out every curse he could think of.

The bald man came over to him and crouched down. He slapped the old man as hard as he could, temporarily stunning the old man.

“You had to go the hard way, everyone has to go the hard way, everyone wants to be the fucking hero, well this is what happens to heroes.” The bald man commented, saying every word with hatred in his eyes.

With that note, he walked over to the window where a flower pot sat. There was a card propped up against it that said “Number One Prize at the San Diego Gardener’s Convention” on it. The bald man picked it up and dumped the flower and dirt onto the bear skin rug. He then walked over to the old man and crouched down next to him.

“Here is your fucking hero.” The bald man said, lifting the flower pot over his head and bringing it down on the old man’s skull four times before the pot broke into a hundred pieces. The bald man looked at the piece that was in his hand and laughed at the blood stain on the broken piece of the pot.

He tossed the broken pot away and went over to the desk. He looked at the drawer where the old man had put the piece of paper. He opened the drawer and pulled out the paper. He read what it said aloud to himself, hardly believing what it said.

“Well congratulations, if you are reading this then you were able to kill me. I hope you were thinking that you won because I get to be the one to kill that idea. The only reason I put up a fight is because I needed to give the police time to show up. I tripped the silent alarm as soon as you walked into the room. My death means little, as I told you, because the code to the safe is not here, I have entrusted it to someone very near to me who will die with the secret. You will never be able to find it, I have made sure of that. So with this all done with, I know I can die in peace. Signed, Jonathan Williams the III.”

The bald man put the paper back into the drawer. He took a step backwards, completely stupefied by what he read. He ran to the window as he heard a car door outside. He peaked through the blinds to see two officer’s getting out of their car.

The bald man knew that he would have to play his cards right if he was to make it out of the situation. The bald man quickly grabbed his pistol off the ground and positioned himself behind the door. He quickly reloaded his weapon and waited patiently for the officers.


Fifteen minutes later, another squad car showed up. The two officers got out of the car and slowly approached the front door. As they approached the front door, it swung open. Both officers instinctively lifted their guns up towards the door.

“Whoa, whoa there boys, easy there.” Said the officer who opened the door. Both officers lowered their guns but the larger officer noticed that the officer at the door had a slight speech impediment.

“What happened here?” The tall, muscular officer asked.

“The old man is hurt real bad. My partner is upstairs helping him out. You guys should go help him, I’m radioing for an ambulance.” The officer at the door replied.

The two new officers ran up the stairs to help out. After moving out of their way, the officer at the door went outside to the car. Anyone seeing him walk would have knew right away that he wasn’t an officer in a hurry to do anything. He walked with a swagger that was unlike a normal officer.

He got inside the cruiser and took off his hat. He rubbed his cleanly shaven bald head and laughed out loud to himself.

“Don’t pull that tricky shit on me, old man.” He said out loud while wiping a small trickle of blood off of his ear. And without another word, he drove off.