When Joey walked into the bathroom for the second time, there was only one man at a urinal. That’s okay, he figured. The man would be out of there soon enough and as long as nobody came in to sit down, it’d be alright. There were four stalls in the bathroom and the first time Joey had come in, one of them had been occupied. He didn’t like that. This time they were all empty, and Joey sat down in the first one. He sat for a few seconds until the man at the urinal had left, and then he was alone.

     Joey whistled a tune for a minute, and once that lost its entertainment value, he pulled his phone out of his pant pocket. He had scrolled through five posts on Instagram and the bathroom door opened. Joey quickly lowered the volume on his phone and, after the door closed, he coughed to establish to the newcomer that he was currently occupying the stall.

     Matthew heard a few seconds of what sounded like a baseball game from the first stall. It was quickly turned off, and the gentleman in the stall coughed. It sounded more like a forced clearing of the throat than a real necessary cough, so it was probably just the occupant’s way of letting Matthew know he was there. Loud and clear, Matthew thought. He didn’t want to intrude on the man in the stall’s privacy for too long, so he washed his hands and splashed some sink water on his face. He struggled with the motion detecting paper towel dispenser for a few tries, whispering different expletives until he finally got a sheet to come out. He tore it and used it to dry his hands and his face and to blow his nose. Matthew, pondering the complete silence from the occupied stall, checked his smile in the mirror, picked a small piece of food out of his teeth, and exited the bathroom, not before clearing his throat as a sign of his departure and his thanks to Joey for allowing him to borrow his privacy for a few minutes.

     The door shut and Joey let out a short breath through his nose. He estimated that he needed to occupy his mind for about five minutes more before his body would allow him to exit the bathroom. That is, if nobody else were to come in. Joey turned his phone back on and finished watching the video he had cut off earlier, then switched to playing a game for a little bit. After doing so for about 40 seconds, he received a notification, a headline that particularly interested him. He touched the notification so that it brought him to the full article just as the bathroom door opened again.

     Mikey was laughing at Danny as he walked into the bathroom shortly behind him. “-the kid was just holding onto the handle from the outside so I couldn’t get out,” Danny explained loudly. “He was that much stronger than you? You couldn’t open a door?” Mikey asked, laughing as he walked and stood in front of one of the urinals. “No no, it was the door handle mechanism or whatever,” Danny stood in front of the short, child size urinal because it was the only one that allowed for there to be the acceptable “cushion” urinal in between Mikey and him. “He was holding it down so the lock on the handle wouldn’t unlock when I pushed it down.” “Oooohh ok I got it,” Mikey responded to Danny with sarcasm. “Ah screw you,” Danny said unconvincingly to Mikey as he flushed his urinal. “I’ll show you next time we’re there. It’s the lock.” They were both looking at themselves in the mirror while they were washing their hands. Mikey continued to joke with Danny saying, “how about you just arm wrestle my nephew. That’ll tell me all I need to know.”

Danny and Mikey continued to talk and laugh loudly while they dried their hands. Danny tore and used paper towels after failing to activate the motion detecting dispenser a few times and Mikey dried his hands on his pants while they exited the men’s room.

     “Thank you.”

     “Sure,” Mikey replied to the sharply dressed gentleman he had held the men’s room door for.

     Joey turned his phone on again and began to read his article while the two loud men exited. He looked up from his phone when he heard sharp footsteps and realized another person must have entered the men’s room during the others’ exit. Joey thought of announcing his presence to the gentleman but did not do so after a few seconds of silence that followed the footsteps. The stall doors were tall enough that one couldn’t see underneath to tell if they were occupied or not, so Joey figured he should let the other man know he was there. He did so with a sharp sniff through his nose just as the sink turned on. Joey doubted the man heard his sniff over the sink.

     Michael turned off the sink having not touched the water. He stood, looking at himself in the mirror, took a deep breath, then turned and walked towards the stalls.

     Joey heard the footsteps of the man approach his stall and, seeing through the crack of the door, he noticed that the man was dressed nicely in a black, maybe pinstriped, suit. He passed Joey’s stall without slowing down. Joey still thought the man had no idea he was there.

     Michael walked to the last of the four stalls. It was a handicap stall, so it was larger than the rest and it was oriented so that its door faced the corridor of the bathroom while all the other stall doors faced the wall opposite them. Michael gently pushed on the stall to feel if it was locked. Feeling no resistance, he pushed it open, walked in and closed the door.

     After the stall door closed about two seconds went by before Joey heard the lock. Joey heard the sharply dressed man take a deep breath and he thought to himself that the man seemed anxious; he thought this based only on the limited information he had gathered from inside his stall. Joey heard the man either put down or lift the toilet seat in his stall. Joey then heard the porcelain of the toilet seat and the bowl itself repeatedly bump against each other. It was a sound that couldn’t be created by a person simply sitting down on the toilet. Joey was confused by the sounds of the toilet along with the sharp breaths and grunts he heard coming from the man’s stall.

     Michael struggled to find the best way to balance on top of the toilet seat and almost slipped multiple times on the seat. The toilets at this restaurant were very outdated and the tanks hung from the wall about three or four feet above the toilet bowl itself. Michael used the tank to balance himself.

     The man a few stalls away from Joey took another deep breath. Then Joey heard the sound of moving porcelain again, this time much heavier than the sound before. He heard the sharply dressed man doing something, moving something, or opening something. Joey couldn’t make out exactly what it was but there was some abnormal activity happening in the man’s stall. The next sound Joey could clearly identify was the sound of a sealed plastic bag opening.

     Michael opened the plastic bag and took out the brown paper bag inside. The bottom of the plastic bag had touched the toilet water just a very little bit. Careful as to not drip onto his suit or shoes, Michael placed the empty bag on the windowsill a few feet away while holding onto the toilet tank for balance. He replaced the heavy lid to the tank and slowly stepped down off the toilet seat while holding the brown paper bag.

     The first sound of moving porcelain returned and was followed by the sound of crumbling paper, maybe newspaper, and another deep breath from the sharply dressed man. Joey realized it was far too late to let the man know he wasn’t alone, especially after such abnormal sounds coming from his stall. Joey was silent as the man walked by his stall.

     Michael stopped in front of the mirror and placed the brown paper bag down to wash his hands. He spent about ten seconds trying to activate the motion detecting paper towel dispenser before the machine finally offered him a sheet. He tore it and dried his hands then stopped and stood in front of the mirror, looking at himself.

     The sharply dressed man took another deep breath. Joey then heard the crumbling newspaper again and the sharp, slow footsteps of the man’s dress shoes as he exited the men’s room. Joey read the rest of his article while his body finished on the toilet. As he was ripping the toilet paper he needed, he heard, coming from the dining room of Chez Lucia, the distinct sound of a gunshot twice.