I didn’t love my wife Karen anymore. I liked her though. I loved my girlfriend Julie. If lady justice (who has a great rack I might add) weighed the feeling of like against the feeling of love, love weighed more every time.
Julie had been nagging me to leave Karen for a while now, so we could start our own life together. I kept telling her I would, but I needed to get my ducks lined up in a row first, and ducks sure as shit don’t fall into line so goddamn easy.
I didn’t want a divorce. I liked the equity I’d put into the house, and the money Karen and I managed to save, and the two cars in the garage, and all the modern amenities we had acquired throughout a successful twenty years of marriage. Divorce would destroy everything we hadworked so hard to obtain.
I liked the hundred grand in life insurance I’d get if something unfortunate happened to Karen. That’d be some quality chicken scratch for Julie and I to start a new life with.
I was out to dinner with Julie, and she was carping me about calling it off with Karen, and I was telling her soon, and that was the truth because I’d finally hit on the perfect ‘accident’ that would befall poor Karin. After dinner, I’d go home and draw a bath for my wife. Unfortunately she’d fall asleep in the tub, and cha-ching, I’m in the bread with a new pie.
Julie had just finished her hors d’oeuvres when Donald walked into the restaurant, and sat at a table near us. Donald was an old friend of Karen’s and mine, and a huge gossip. If he saw me out to eat with another woman, it would be divorce city. I had to think fast, but it was too late. Before I could slip out unseen, Donald saw me, and came over.
“Paul,” he said. “Good to see you.”
“Donald.”
“How’s Karen?”
“Tired,” I said. “Under the water … I mean weather.”
“Sorry to hear that,” Donald said. “And who’s this?”
“Oh, um, this is my sister Julie,” I said, and Julie’s eyes turned to machineguns, mowing me down.
“Really? It’s nice to meet you Julie. I thought Paul was an only child.”
“It’s complicated,” I said.
“I’m eating alone. Mind if I join you?” Donald asked.
That son-of-a-bitch had me raked over the coals with a red-hot poker jammed up my ass. I had to endure the most awkwardly uncomfortable meal of all time. Donald wasn’t buying the horseshit I fed him about Julie, and the further I went down the rabbit hole of lies, the more I unearthed a simple truth: in order to avoid the turnoff to divorce town, Donald would also need to meet with an untimely accidental death.
About halfway through our meal, Julie got an ‘emergency phone call.’
“I have to run,” she said. “It was nice meeting you Donald. Paul, I’m staying over at mom’s place. Give me a call over there later. I want to have a word with you.”
“Will do sis.”
“It was nice to meet you too Julie,” Donald said. “Paul, I thought your mother was dead?”
“It’s complicated,” I said. “What are your plans for the rest of the evening?”
“Nothing,” Donald said. “I was thinking about heading home, and watching a movie. Perhaps some Hitchcock shorts. You want to join me?”
“Yes,” I said.
After dinner, I followed Donald to his dumpy rundown apartment. His flat was on the second floor, and it looked like a fucking shit bomb exploded in the living room. His belongings were strewn about everywhere. He offered me a beer. I popped the top, and chugged.
The liquid courage should have helped me do the deed, but instead it had the opposite effect. I looked around, feeling sorry for Donald. He was a pathetic, lonely and dirty bachelor, but then I thought about divorce, and losing my ass. I grabbed the toaster, snuck up behind Donald as he put a copied VHS tape into the VCR, and strangled him with the chord. Thiswas by no means an easy feat. It took a lot of time and energy to throttle Donald. He thrashed around quite a bit, and even managed to scratch my face.
The noise must have ticked off Donald’s downstairs’ neighbor. No sooner had I choked deadthat gossipy no good bastard, then the door burst open, and a woman in a bathrobe and curlers stood before me screaming bloody murder at the top of her lungs. It took her a few moments to stop bawling me out, and comprehend the scene before her.
“This isn’t what it looks like,” I said, but she wasn’t having any of it, and ran screaming back to her apartment.
I gave chase, and was able to force my way into her abode before she locked the door. She was hysterical, and I needed to shut her up quick before she drew more unwanted and unnecessary attention to my surreptitious activities.
On a counter next to the door, a marble vase held a plastic flower of some sort. I couldn’t tell you what kind of flower it was because I don’t really know much about those sorts of things, but the vase was heavy and durable, so I picked it up, and conked her on the head with it. She went down like a sack of bricks, but gave a little moan, so I gave her a few more solid whacks with the urn until she fell silent, and her face became blood pudding.
Unfortunately her gore had splatter all over me. I went into the bathroom to wash up before making my exit, and that’s when I saw a young boy of about ten hiding in the shower stall. He was on the phone with the police. Needless to say, I was furious with the little tyke. I snatched the phone from him, told the police I was his parent, and that he was making a prank call, and then I hung up.
I just needed there to be no more witnesses, and I wouldn’t have to keep killing. Why was that such a hard thing to have happen? I didn’t want to finish off the kid, but goddamn it, I didn’t want a divorce either, so I lifted up the toilet seat, dunked the boy’s head in the pot, and sent him to his watery grave. Again, I was surprised at how hard it was to drown somebody. It took way too long, and I ended up soaked in toilet water, which was disgusting.
I grabbed a towel, and wiped away the blood and water as best I could.
As I was about to leave, a cop entered the apartment.
“Freeze,” he yelled with his gun drawn. “Get your hands up.”
“Thank god you’re here,” I said, and walked toward him. “I just got home, and found my wife, my beautiful wife, bleeding on the ground.”
I tried to think about what it would be like if I had come home, and found my wife dead, and it made me really sad, and I even shed a few tears. I got down on my knees, and hugged the cop’s leg, and started sobbing.
“Did you check for a pulse,” the cop said, buying my boloney, and holstering his firearm.
As soon as he put his gun away, I grabbed it, and shot him in the head. Again, and I know I’m beating a dead horse here, but I was amazed at how disturbingly gruesome a gunshot wound to the head is. The cop made spasm and twitched something awful, and I think he shit his pants.
“Finally,” I thought as I made a hasty exit. “No more witnesses.”
On the drive home, I couldn’t stop thinking about how Julie had behaved at dinner. She was sort of being a bitch. Was that what it was going to be like with her? If that was the case, forget it.
I arrived home. Karen was already asleep. I took off all of my clothes, and burned them in the fireplace. I crawled into bed, and cuddled up against Karen. What a fool I had been. I didn’t like my wife. I loved her.
by 
Morgan Boyd
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Nice… One ‘thing’ after the next. Well-written and paced!