Murder a go gos, p.31
Murder-a-Go-Go's, page 31
Annabelle opened the door a few inches.
“I’m putting out our trashcans for the pick-up in the morning,” said Chester. “Do you have any trash?”
“No, thank you.” Annabelle wanted to shut the door, but she was afraid of what that might start. She didn’t want to anger him.
“Okay,” he replied with a smile. “I’m just being neighborly. Speaking of being neighborly, I know you called the police, Annabelle.”
She gripped the edge of the door, ready to slam it in case he tried to barge in.
“I want you to know that Mallory is fine. We’re all fine. I don’t know what you think you saw, but insomnia can cause hallucinations. We want to make sure you’re sleeping.”
“I’m sleeping,” she replied. “Where is Mallory?”
“She went to stay with a friend for a few days.” But the smirk on his face told a different story. “She’ll be back at the end of the week and maybe you can show her how to make those muffins, so we can all sleep better.”
“Of course.” Annabelle closed more of the gap.
“Okay, good.” His smile faded. “Sleep tight.”
At three-forty in the morning, she looked out the window. There was no light on at the Miller house. With Mallory gone, his nighttime pacing had stopped. But Annabelle didn’t believe that Mallory was at a friend’s. There was something about Chester and his lack of pacing that made Annabelle feel he had taken care of Mallory. Permanently. She knew she would never sleep again unless she found out and the evidence might be gone by morning.
Annabelle crept outside, a soft drizzle falling from the skies. It was cold, the night air getting to her bare arms, but she didn’t want to go back inside to get her coat. She wanted to get the task over with.
The Millers’ trashcan was on the side of the main road, next to where hers should be but she hadn’t put it out. She pulled off the lid and opened the first bag. Coffee grounds, wrappers, and papers. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Annabelle moved to the next bag, beans spilling out as she torn it open. There was nothing that conveyed Mallory was in trouble. Or dead.
She was about to put the lid back on when she noticed the basket she had given them with the muffins. The basket Mallory loved.
Annabelle returned to her kitchen, placing the empty basket on the counter. A feeling stirred deep in her bones that something had happened to Mallory but a basket in the trash didn’t prove it. She doubted the car would provide any evidence as Chester had spent the day cleaning it, but she remembered Mallory’s comment about the compost. She had to look.
The area was silent as she crept up the driveway and passed the freshly washed car. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. She didn’t even know what she was looking for, except something that showed Mallory wasn’t okay.
She made her way around the back of the house. The compost bin was a large round one that needed to be rotated to open. It would take strength to turn, it might make noise, and it wasn’t big enough to hide a body. But she had to look.
Annabelle pushed with both hands, the contents thumping as the barrel turned. The lid was on top now, but she waited, making sure the house was still quiet. It was.
She opened the container, the scent of rotting kitchen scraps and garden cuttings nearly overwhelming her. She grabbed a nearby stick and turned it through the mass, the darkness limiting her vision. There was nothing.
And then a bit of yellow material. She pulled at it.
It was a sleeve. She tugged until more of it came through. It was the yellow sweatshirt Mallory wore when they left the property this morning. And it was covered in blood.
Lightning crackled across the sky, illuminating the garden and the bloodstains on the sweatshirt. Except it wasn’t lightning. It was the upstairs lights in the house.
Annabelle yanked at the fabric, but the other sleeve wouldn’t break loose.
He would have seen her now, standing at the compost. Holding the evidence.
She pulled harder as the downstairs lights went on. She was out of time. She would have to leave it behind.
She pushed it inside, closed the container, and ran back to her house.
Annabelle wanted to call the police, but Chester would get rid of the sweatshirt by the time they came. She didn’t have any other proof and they already thought she was prone to hallucinations.
She did the only thing she could. She locked the door and climbed into bed.
For the first time in years, Annabelle didn’t want to sleep. She wanted to wait in the comforting blankets until the morning light of safety.
A knock sounded at the front door. Only danger knocks at your door in the middle of the night. Danger like Chester.
Annabelle didn’t have a gun in the house. She only had kitchen knives and they hadn’t been sharpened in years.
She pulled the blankets up more, hoping he would go away, but the sound of the front door lock turning changed that.
Annabelle reached the living room just as the door opened.
“Evening, Annabelle. I had a key made when you were out one day. Just in case.” Chester wore his game show smile as he stepped inside. “Not sleeping again?”
“Get out of my house.”
“No, I don’t think so. I think I’m going to be here a little while.” He closed the door behind him. “It’s a funny thing, insomnia. Can make us think we see the strangest things. Like a man putting his wife in line.”
“You need to leave,” Annabelle replied, her voice strained.
“Did you know that you can think you see something when actually you’re dreaming? Night visions and night terrors. Your eyes are open and you’re walking around, but you’re seeing things that don’t exist. They’ve done studies on it.” He stepped toward her. “I know you looked in the compost. It’s just an old sweatshirt.”
“I didn’t see anything.” Annabelle moved back, desperate to find something to use as a weapon. “Please leave.”
Chester rested his hand on the counter near the kitchen. “Neighbors can be interesting, don’t you think? Living in close proximity, you think you have a connection to them. A right to know what they’re doing. But you don’t. You just happen to live on the same street.” He reached across the counter to the wooden block and pulled out a knife. “Don’t you agree, Annabelle?”
“I was dreaming. I saw nothing. You’re right.” She forced a smile.
“Why did you call the cops, Annabelle? Why did you tell them you saw me hit Mallory?” He outlined the blade of the knife with his finger as he spoke.
“I thought I did. But I was wrong.” She hoped it would convince him to leave, but she knew her time was up. After her husband died, she wondered what her last minutes would be like. She thought of drifting into a final sleep or even collapsing in her garden. Not with a neighbor holding a knife. Her knife.
“You interfered with my life, didn’t you? You just had to go where you didn’t belong.”
“I was only looking out for your wife. I thought she was in trouble.”
“Yes, you were being neighborly.” He walked forward as Annabelle backed up. “I think it’s time you were no longer a neighborhood nuisance.” He swung the knife, but the effort was half-hearted. It didn’t even come close to Annabelle, but it was enough to make her jump back into the hallway.
“That was just the beginning,” he laughed. “See, it’s all part of the game.” Chester glanced around the living room. “Maybe I’ll take over this house, too. I can own the whole street. Free to do whatever I want. Finally fix up that silly garden of yours.”
The garden. Her garden. She didn’t need his help and she didn’t need his tools and now she didn’t need to die.
Annabelle inched backwards as Chester followed her into the hallway.
“There’s nowhere for you to go. You’ll never be able to outrun me.” He grinned.
“But you like the game,” she replied as an idea formed. “So, let me keep playing it.” She just needed enough time to get the garden hoe from the garage.
“Do you know why I pace in the middle of the night, Annabelle? I think about things and make plans. Sometimes they take one night. Other times they take two. Tonight’s plan took thirty seconds.”
Annabelle nodded as her back hit the door to the garage.
“Looks like the game is ending,” said Chester.
Annabelle turned the handle behind her and pushed the door open, rushing through to the garden hoe on the wall. The wood handle was cold and heavy in her hands, but it would do.
Chester stepped inside. “You think that can stop me? You can’t even lift it. You had to use the four dollar one we let you borrow.” He laughed but there was no joy to the cold and calculated sound.
“It’s my own tool. I’ve always had my own tools, I just didn’t use them.”
He laughed again. “It’s old and useless. Just like you.”
“I don’t know, I think it helped the garden.” She smiled as she propped it on her shoulder. “Besides, I used to play baseball. I know how to swing.”
“When? In the 1800s? You’re nothing against me.”
“Let’s see.” She readied for the pitch.
“Your call.” He held the knife up and charged. She swung the garden hoe, just like she used to with the bat in scrimmages as a child, her years on traveling teams as a teenager, and the community games in the park with her husband.
It hit him across the face and he stumbled back, the knife still in his hands. He put his hand to his cheek. “I underestimated you.”
“You shouldn’t have.” Her morning walks and the time spent gardening had kept her body strong, but even she was surprised.
“Women like you need to be put in their place. And your place, like Mallory’s, is underground.” He raised the knife. “Round two.”
He ran forward, and Annabelle hit him with more force this time, as if her life depended on it. And it did. He fell to the ground, but she kept going, a strike for each one she saw Chester give Mallory.
When she was done, she stepped over his lifeless body and went into the kitchen. She picked up the phone but paused before she called the police.
They would never believe it was self-defense. They would ask her why she hit him so many times. They would ask why she called them the other night when Mallory said everything was fine.
She stared out at the corn moving with the storm, the stalks lashing against each other.
She didn’t need those questions. She didn’t need those assumptions. And no one would ever miss Chester.
She knew what she needed to do.
It took all night but the next morning, the flowers outside her window were perfectly in place, a straight line with fresh soil around them and the new fertilizer buried just a few feet under.
Annabelle finally drifted into the best sleep in years.
Back to TOC
Skidmarks On My Heart
Eric Beetner
We met after a car crash, and it was a car crash that brought us back together. Weird, I know. But that was me and Emma.
She rear-ended me on a night when the streets were rain-slick, and I think she was about three cosmos in. I got out of the car in the middle of the lane, ready to punch some guy’s face in for busting my tail light. She got out of the car laughing.
“This is a joke to you?” I said. “What, you liked getting plowed into from behind?”
“Sometimes.”
She smiled a snaggle-toothed smile and even in the rain I could see a light in her eyes radiating from inside. The rain went from misty to downpour and we both stood and laughed. That night she took me to her place and apologized for the tail light. I accepted that apology.
And yes, we did it from behind. We’d known each other three hours and we already had an inside joke that made us both think about sex. Not a bad way to start.
Of course, when you meet in the rain and fuck on the first date, it’s going to be all downhill from there.
There were signs, little things. A dark streak. A bad girl.
She used to carry two-dollar bills in her purse. I asked why. She showed me. Out at a bar she told me to order a drink for a girl at a specific moment. I rolled with it. She held up a twenty like a flag for the bartender to see. Always worked. She ordered two double shots of Jameson. He scuttled off to pour and she swapped out the twenty for a two, neatly folded over.
When the bartender set down her drinks, I leaned in and spoke too loud.
“I need a vodka martini and hurry it up. I might get laid tonight.”
He smiled at the idea that he might be my wingman and gave me a quick nod as he reached, eyes on me, for Emma’s two-dollar bill. He brought her back six bucks in change and she walked away with two free drinks and four dollars profit. When he dashed off to mix my martini, we retreated to a dark corner of the bar and left him to wonder if my girl got cold feet or skipped the drink and went directly into the sack.
But life steps in and you can’t have a job and go out to bars on the grift every night. Things settle down. A match flares up, then dies a little into a steady flame. Eventually it will burn out and singe your fingers.
She stayed over less and less. The laughs got shorter. We used umbrellas when it rained.
I got invited to a party and I didn’t invite Emma. I don’t know why, I just wanted a night with other people.
It was a strange slowdown in our relationship. We didn’t want it to end. We wanted to recapture the magic. It was like we were each on opposite ends of a tug of war rope and both pulling like hell to keep from falling in. But when you do that you have to pull against each other, not toward each other.
Our nights apart stopped getting the full explanation when we saw each other again.
“How was your night?”
“Good.”
“Good.”
That covered it. I hadn’t slept with anyone else, but I noticed girls more. I wondered how they’d look in the rain.
I got my tail light fixed. Seemed symbolic somehow.
I was in that same car, different street, rain-less night, when I saw Emma. She was getting into the front seat of a BMW. Front seat meant it wasn’t an Uber, but I checked for a window decal to be safe. Nope.
I followed them. Like a jealous husband. Like an asshole.
They parked in front of her place. I could see them in silhouette on the front seat, a streetlight glaring through the windshield like they were on stage. They kissed.
I felt the rope sliding through my hands. I was losing the war.
My foot was on the gas before I even knew it. I rammed the back of his Beemer and the jolt knocked me back to sense. Enough to know I’d fucked up.
He got out of his car with the same righteous anger I had when Emma bumped me. His fists were already clenched. I reversed, but that made him madder.
“Hey, motherfucker. Get out of the car.”
I could see Emma climb out of her seat dabbing a hand at her lip, which was bleeding. Cut on his teeth when the impact hit and his mouth was on hers. My blood heated up again.
He stood directly in front of my car. I could see the hood buckled a little, a curl of smoke coming out from under. He aimed a finger at me like a weapon.
“Stop right there, asshole.”
I think Emma recognized me. Didn’t matter though. I gunned it.
I clipped his knees—he was tall—and he slapped the hood once with his torso and then flopped back. I was braking by then and he kept moving with the momentum of the impact. He flew about three feet and landed on his ass, his head whacking off the pavement.
So that was bad enough, but when I went to back away, I neglected to put the car in reverse. I shot forward and felt the crunch when the front of my vehicle found him on the ground and shoved him forward until he sandwiched between our two cars.
Emma screamed.
I got out. More smoke from the hood drifted up between Emma and me. It was like a thin veil that held our secret, we only needed to wrap it around us.
“Emma, I—”
“What the fuck?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for—”
“What do we do now?”
The street was empty, aside from us. And one of us was dead. The hourglass was dripping sand. We had to move.
“This is heavy shit,” I said.
“Yeah. You think?”
“We could call the cops…”
She waited for plan B.
“…or we could dump him.”
She swiveled her neck up and down the block. No witnesses that we could see. Some granny in a window might be peeping but we’d have to risk it.
When she turned back to me, the glow had returned to her eyes in a way I hadn’t seen since that night in the rain.
I don’t know if she’d ever seen a dead body before, but she wasn’t squeamish. She got right to work. I backed up. A dark smear of him where he’d gone under my bumper for a ride. A mess of his skin and blood on the back bumper of his BMW. I didn’t want him in my car, so I hauled him into his own trunk and gave Emma the keys, told her to follow me.
We drove him out to the warehouse district, set the car on fire. No prints that way. None of her hair or DNA. I asked her because I was curious.
“Would the cops have you on file?”
She gave me a no-shit-Sherlock look, then she asked, “You?”
I shrugged and avoided the question.
We went to my place and fucked in the shower. Her idea. I think she was trying to capture a little of that rain-soaked feeling.
For a week it was can’t-keep-our-hands-off-each-other and calling in sick to stay in bed with her. The fire in her eyes, the vision of his crushed skull behind mine.
That was three months ago.
I read news reports about the personal trainer found dead in his own trunk. They had zero leads, zero suspects other than some husbands who might’ve caught wind of his extra services for clients who happened to be their wives. Our names never came up.
