Oh god, my head. It feels like someone was using it as a wrecking ball. Christ, what happened last night? Was I drinking? Am I just hungover? My head’s never felt this bad after a night of boozing. I don’t feel like I’m gonna puke either, but my stomach does feel kind of uneasy. I can smell alcohol on my breath. I must have been drinking. Maybe I just got drunk, fell down and hit my head on something. Goddamn, my fucking head!
My body feels like a lead brick. Why can’t I move? Oh christ, am I paralyzed? Shit, what if I fell and broke my neck? Oh man, I’m gonna spend the rest of my life in a wheel chair blowing into a straw like Christopher Reeve. Fuck. I can’t live like that. My life isn’t so great to begin with, what would be the point of living like a mobile vegetable. Wait, I can feel my foot tingling. Maybe I just slept wrong and my body just needs to wake up. I guess that sounds plausible. Come on pins and needles, let me know that my body still works.
“Hello!”
Where the hell am I? It sounds like I’m in a closet except I’m lying on my back.
“Hello! Can anyone hear me?”
Jesus, what’s going on? What did I do last night? Let’s see, I remember Susan called me at the office. She said she wanted to see me. I think I told her to meet me at O’Malley’s Pub around 10. Yeah, that’s right. I showed up about a half hour late ‘cause Tracy wouldn’t let me leave the house. She just kept asking me all those damn questions. “Where are you going, Jack? Who are you going to see? Is it another woman? Is it, you son of a bitch?” Damn, was she
pissed at me. I bet if she actually knew about Susan she would kill me.
Susan, now there’s a real woman. Nothing like that jealous, screeching harpy I married. Susan is just so sweet. She’s always got this big, beautiful smile on her face. I don’t think there’s anything in this world that could phase her. She never complains about anything. She just smiles. I remember the first time I met her. I was trying to get to the post office before it closed to send out all those stupid packages for the office. That damn job. I’m so sick of taking all that crap. They treat me like I’m some sort of bus boy who can pick up after all of those lazy sons of bitches. They sent me to the post office that day to send off a bunch of boxes of pens with the Springer Publishing logo printed on them and I accidentally ran into Tracy on the way. I completely knocked her down and those damned packages flew everywhere. The pavement tore a hole in her jeans and scraped off some of her skin as well. Like the idiot I was, I tried to help her up and spit out an apology, but she just smiled up at me. I took her out for a drink to make up for the whole fiasco and we just hit it off.
I wish I had met Susan before I met Tracy. Then again, Tracy didn’t used to be the shrew she is now. We had been so close in college. We had that damned communications class together with that sleazy professor. What was his name? Roth! That’s right, professor Roth. He’s the one that sounded like Kermit the Frog and Ben Stein had a love child. Tracy always sat one row in front and three seats down from me. I only ever saw the back of her head. Then there was that one day where I fell asleep in class and woke up to Roth standing over me with a ruler, like some sort of pissed off nun. He had apparently asked me a question and was waiting for a reply. And there was Tracy, out of the corner of my eye holding up her notebook with “RANDOLPH HERTZ” written in big loopy letters on a sheet of paper. Roth was so ticked when I gave him the right answer. After that day, Tracy always sat in the seat right next to me. She told me it was only to keep me awake so she didn’t have to cheat for me. I never fell asleep in class again, but I couldn’t keep my eyes or mind from drifting over to that beautiful girl.
We kept seeing each other after the semester was over. We didn’t have any more classes together, we would just get together for lunch on campus or a drink at O’Malley’s on Friday nights. I miss those nights. We would just sit there at the bar and drink and talk until last call, then I would walk her to her apartment and we would sit and talk until the sun came up. We haven’t done that in years. I wonder what happened. We were always so cool around each other, but after the wedding things just went down hill. She had to know where I was every minute of the day. Even before I met Susan she thought I was cheating on her. Probably just because she wouldn’t put out anymore. Once she had that ring on her finger I guess she figured she didn’t have to give me anything.
“Hello? Is there anybody out there?”
What happened at the bar with Susan? Nothing, I think. We just sat there and talked. She was telling me that our one year anniversary was coming up. Christ, has it been that long? I can’t believe I’ve kept her from Tracy for almost a year. Yeah, she wanted to do something special to celebrate. Something about a vacation. I think she wanted to go down to Arkansas for a camping trip or something like that. That’s right, because I told her that she should watch “Deliverance” because she might change her mind. I suggested a trip to New Orleans but she just smiled and told me that all I wanted to do was look at all the topless girls. Man, that smile just bowls me over every time.
When did we leave the bar? I don’t remember last call, so we must have taken off before 1:30 or so. Did I go to Susan’s place? I can’t remember. I must have had a little too much to drink. I think we got a cab. No, she drove. Did she drive me home? Oh shit, what if Tracy saw her? What am I thinking, Tracy has never stayed up past midnight in her entire life. Her inner clock just shuts off when it hits 12.
“Hey, anybody!”
Thank god, my limbs are starting to come around. I was really freaked out there for a minute.
“Tracy? Are you there? Is anyone there?”
I did go home last night. Yeah, I remember that I was really thirsty and wanted something to drink to counteract the beer. It was really strange, actually, the only thing in the fridge was a carton of orange juice. There’s usually all sorts of different kinds of beverages in there. Tracy always wants a variety of drinks to choose from. She can’t just have one open carton of juice, she has to have two or three juices, a 2 liter of soda, a gallon of whole milk and a pitcher of Kool-Aid. She never even drinks the damn things. The juices and the milk expire, the soda goes flat and the Kool-Aid stays in there so long you don’t know what color it used to be. I’m the only one who ever drinks any of it. I wonder if she just decided to pitch out everything so she could pick up new drinks in the morning. She should have pitched out that OJ too, it tasted off. Boy, she would have thrown a fit if she had seen me drinking from the carton.
“Hello!?! Hey! I need help! Somebody! Anybody!”
What the hell is going on here? Where the hell am I? Wherever I am the air is pretty stale. I wonder how long I’ve been out. Damn, my head is killing me. It’s so dark, I can’t see a damn thing. It’s like I’ve been stuffed into a trunk or something. I’ll be able to get myself out of here once I can move my arms and legs again. I can feel the blood circulating. It’s hard to move my fingers around, they’re so stiff.
“Hey, please, somebody! Help me!”
********************************************************
6 AM on the dot. And Jack thought we needed an alarm clock. Huh, Jack thought a lot of things.
Speaking of Jack, I wonder if the prick made it home last night. His side of the bed is still empty, no surprise there. Boy, my little plan wouldn’t work if he spent the night at that floozy’s place. I’d hate to have to go through this all again, considering what I had to do to get that Copertal from Dr. Morris. He’s just like every other man, all he wants is sex. He’s the only doctor in town, what choice did I have? It was awful, I went through an entire bar of soap that night and stayed in the shower until the hot water turned cold.
“In regular doses, Copertal paralyzes the muscles and regulates blood pressure for surgical procedures. Too much can be fatal.”
“You’d better give me the whole bottle, then.”
“Jack, dear, are you home?”
There he is all sprawled out on the kitchen floor. The asshole didn’t even pour himself a glass of orange juice, he just drank straight out of the carton. I bet he thought I would never know. Damn, the refrigerator door has been standing open this whole time. The electricity bill is going to go be outrageous. Thanks a lot, Jack. I’ll probably have to throw out all of this food, too. Well, first thing’s first, I’ve got to get rid of that OJ.
Jesus, he just didn’t want to let that carton go. I hope I’ll be able to put the real carton back into his hand. Those fingers are stiff.
“Whoa!”
This juice smells terrible. Dr. Morris didn’t say anything about that stuff leaving an odor. I’m surprised Jack even drank it. He was probably too drunk to notice. I’m guessing that whore drove him home. Why’d you have to be like that, Jack? We could have been happy. There’s still a lot left in here, I hope he drank enough. He looks dead to me.
Now, where did I stash all of the beverages? Oh yes, they’re in the oven, Jack would never have looked in there. Ok, the Pepsi goes in the back, the cranapple Juicy Juice goes in the door, the milk goes in front of the Pepsi but I’ll have to throw it out later since it’s been at room temperature for about eight hours. Let’s see, the apple juice squeezes in between the Pepsi and the head of lettuce and the orange juice, well, Jack gets that, if I can get the carton into his hand.
All right, everything seems to be in order here, I should go give the police a call. Deep breath, and action.
“Hello... yes... please come quick, I think my husband is dead... he’s just lying on the kitchen floor... please hurry... 1504 Signia Way... apartment number 5... yes... I don’t know what to do... no... please be quick... thank you.”
That wasn’t so bad. I’ve just got to get myself ready before they get here. I don’t think I can conjure up any tears on my own, though. Wait a second, Jack has eye drops in the bathroom cabinet. I’ll go brush my teeth and fix my hair and then I’ll just squirt a few drops by my eyes when I hear the sirens. Dr. Morris better be true to his word. He’s supposed to pronounce Jack dead and personally take him to the morgue. I have all of the funeral arrangements ready to go, he won’t even have to go through the whole embalming process, all he has to do is put Jack in the box. Ha, Jack in the box! Oh, man, Jack would have gotten a kick out of that one. Uh oh, regain composure, the sirens are coming.
“Oh thank God! I just woke up this morning and found him lying on the floor there. He wasn’t moving.”
They’re tracking mud all over my clean floors, damn it.
“He went out last night, around 10:30, I think. I don’t know what time he came home. I went to bed shortly after he left.”
Ah, there’s the good doctor now. Remember our agreement, you nymphomaniac.
“Is he all right? Please tell me he’s okay.”
You’d better not.
“What?”
Say it again. I want to hear you say it again.
“He’s dead? No!”
Yes!
“But, how? He was doing just fine yesterday?”
He was doing somebody else, too.
“Heart attack...”
He had no heart.
“No, I understand. No, please, just take him away, I can’t even look at him. Why did this have to happen? Oh God, why?”
Careful now, you don’t want to get too over dramatic. You’re not trying to win an Oscar here.
“Yes, thank you. I’ll take care of all of the arrangements. I’ll be fine, I just want to be alone right now.”
They bought it. They really bought it. Thank God for small town police. Thank God for Dr. Morris. I still feel horribly dirty about our little barter, but it was worth it. Jack’s gone and by tomorrow afternoon he’ll be buried and forgotten. You got what you deserved, Jack. You thought I didn’t know about all of your little girl friends. Ha! I knew. I could tell. You were
always a terrible liar. You couldn’t cover your tracks forever. I saw you last night. That’s right, I followed you to the bar, our bar. I saw you with her, you bastard. You thought you could keep your little secret from me. How many others did you have? Did you even where condoms? Who knows what kind of diseases those tramps had. Well, you don’t have to worry about any of that now because you’re dead and good riddens.
********************************************************
“Hey, Frank, toss me a beer.”
“They’re warm as piss, Mike.”
“Hey, a beer’s a beer.”
Mike lobbed a sweaty bottle of Budweiser over the fresh mound of dark soil. It had taken the two groundskeepers an hour to fill in the grave after the funeral had let out. It was a very short ceremony with very few people in attendance. Mike had heard a few of the mourners grumbling about the speediness of the funeral as they walked back to their various cars. Apparently the stiff only died the day before, but Mike really didn’t care. He was only there to fill in the hole, not entertain rumors of foul play.
Mike sat down next to Frank on the new grave and sipped his warm beer.
“Man, Lois would kill me if she knew I was here drinking a beer instead of coming straight home.”
“I hear you, Mikey. Greta's always on my ass about where I am every damned second of the fucking day. It’s ri-godamn-diculous.”
“Wives, you’d think they’d have better things to do than keep tabs on their husbands.”
“Yeah, but you know what they say. You can’t live with ‘em and you can’t kill ‘em”
The two men clinked their bottles together and laughed. Six feet below them Jack was just waking up to a splitting headache.
