Mr. Ballin

Billy and Debbie had run the store together for almost 20 years, and they had stocking shelves down to a science.

They barely even had to look while they were doing it.

So today, like most days, they spent the time talking and joking with each other.

For as long as they'd been doing this, Billy and Debbie never got bored working at the store together.

In fact, they didn't understand how anyone would get bored working with the person they loved.

because the two of them had been pretty much inseparable from the moment they met back in 1982.

At the time, Billy, who was eight years older than Debbie, already owned the grocery store, but he'd been having trouble running it by himself.

So, when Debbie came in looking for a job, he'd hired her right away.

And it didn't take long for them to discover that they had a lot in common.

They were both single parents, they loved living in a small town where they knew their kids would be safe, and they could talk to each other for hours without ever running out of things to say.

Billy and Debbie's relationship had quickly gone from boss and employee to boyfriend and girlfriend to husband and wife.

And their children from their previous marriages ended up loving each other as much as Debbie and Billy did.

So they had all quickly formed this really tight-knit, blended family.

Now, almost 20 years later, the kids had grown up and moved out, but they all lived close by, so the blended family was still together.

In the store, Billy kept stocking the shelves, but Debbie glanced up at the clock hanging over the counter and said that maybe they should call it a day.

Billy was supposed to meet up with their son Randy, and if he wanted to do that and still get home in time for the first pitch of the Atlanta Braves baseball game, he needed to head out now.

Everyone who knew Billy assumed he must have been born in an Atlanta Braves baseball cap, because he wore one pretty much every day.

They also knew he absolutely hated to miss a Braves game.

But today, Billy wasn't sure if he should just take off, because he really didn't like the idea of leaving Debbie alone at the store.

The couple didn't like to talk about it, but on a night about three months earlier, when Billy was closing the store on his own, three men wearing ski masks had burst in, duct taped Billy's mouth, shoved him into the walk-in cooler, and then robbed the cash register.