Teeth gnashed,

pearly white against crisp and blackened skin that flaked off like overcooked turkey in the oven.

Long strands of sinew shriveled up against taught muscle where red under flesh spent time cooking to a perfected pink.

I stared at the work I'd done.

The bone and flesh thing with melted out eyes, and a hollowed nose.

"You actually burned him alive," a voice said behind me. I could almost picture their brows popping up, like they were legitimately surprised before I snorted at the comment.

It sounded ridiculous. "He deserved it," I said coldly. And it had... satisfied my more innate curiosities.

Had I been any younger, I might have been horrified at the act. I had never imagined in my wildest dreams being a murderous bitch, but- here I was, doing just that.

A wilder part of me, that my former self would have never believed, was giddy over it. Giddy over the prospect of my now-husband, then neighbor being the one who goaded me into such behaviors because it seemed to make him feel hot all over just watching me absolutely gut someone.

"Kat-"

The gasped breath with my name on their lips had me yanking my head. I turned back to stare at my little sister, and for a moment, a tiny part of me sparked to life, worried that she'd be terrified of me, but just as quick as the fear jumped forward, it also spurned out its spark and died. "What?"

"W-What the hell?"

"Vampire are scum," I told her very calmly, tipping my head to the side as I regarded the corpse carefully. The disinterest in my eyes probably wasn't missed by her. "Don't feel bad for him. I did him a mercy to save him from Red torching his ass at degree probably hotter than some gas station fuel. Come on." I nodded, yanking my head at her. "He had an accomplice and we can't let him get too far."

A short story about how a relationship can change in a flash...

And there was a place for him at the bedside, where the picture frame sat and the Zippo lighter leaned on the desk lamp’s post. She was busy cleaning the top of the table, leaving the small knick-knacky things on the bed—the dust particles transferred from the lamp’s cover and metal coating onto the clean comforter and pillow casings. All he noticed was that she had moved his brown slippers to her side of the bed, rather than the usual spot next to his dresser where he left them every day and night. It had been a long day and he wasn't going to use their few minutes together as an excuse to start a meaningless argument. To be fair, that had not stopped his feeble mind before. So the slippers had moved, and she was squeezing the spray bottle onto the wooden slat that made the top of the nightstand. It had been her idea to pick it up after a late lunch one March somehow ended up on the wrong side of town; and the houses were rough-looking. There was a collection of wooden furniture planted against the mailbox of a smaller looking house—it was, though, one of the larger houses on the block. There were cinder blocks stacked messily around the mailbox’s rotting wood beam. Evidently, it had been the victim (on several occasions) to a few swift innings of “mailbox baseball.” Next to the pile of furniture was a cardboard sign, withered from a few rainy afternoons, then the sun evaporating the water back out of it. FREE was spray-painted on the sign in bright neon purple. Before we traded in the four-seater for a two-seater, there was still room in my car for something besides two people and the occasional plastic bag of leftovers from an inexpensive restaurant. She had kicked her feet down from the dashboard and slapped at the window lightly—there was a shallow ticking sound that her ring made on the glass. Sometimes, she would switch the wedding ring from her left hand to her right when she was thinking about something enough to forget; he thinks it’s her envisioning her life if she had married that wad of paper from Terre Haute that she went steady with for a while. He meant to bring up the ring habit from time to time, but regardless of it being on his mind for long periods of time, He’d always forget to say something.

“Hey…hey!” she yelped, tapping and pointing at the mound of wood furniture. He was purposefully going slow because the roads were bad and he wasn't sure what kind of kids were raised around those parts. Whether it be the type that throws broken nails and rock clippings under their neighbor’s tires or the type that have parents that let their kids get hit by a long Cadillac. Always the babies that wander off down the stairs, grabbing onto the railing like their mothers did out of habit, and graciously work their way down to the concrete footpath. Their onesie’s grippy feet were grinded slowly as the baby shuffled its feet. A minute walking, a minute leaning forward to crawl and rest, and then back up to work again. Fortunately enough, the baby’s hands were made of the same stuff that Jell-O came from—at least that was what the baby’s older brother thought. And he told his friends such on the school playground when they inquisitively asked about the new kid brother responsibilities. Naturally, the metal gate was propped open from earlier in the day when the father had come home, half asleep, half drunk, and stumbled up the stairs, forgetting to latch the gate shut. Ironically, the baby had more stability from less than a year of walking than the father did from an unstable, disgusting forty-three years. The baby would make a cooing sound like that of a raccoon scratching a tree’s post for something to fall from it. And worse yet, the car would stop a few feet after impact so the baby would be pushed into the clear sky, making contact with the ground seconds later. And the onesie was no longer one piece of clothing.

So he reluctantly flashed his hazard lights a few yards away from the cinder blocked mailbox. Getting out of their four-seater, she was ecstatic placing her flattened wedges against the road’s rough patches. She could tell a car had been parked on that side of the road for a while because a few spots were sunken in and blackened from the skid marks. It was a miracle weeds hadn’t latched themselves onto the tires through the asphalt. Along with the battered nightstand, there was what appeared to be the top and bottom half of a china cabinet, a chair and its severed legs, pieces of an extendable dining room table, and a few wooden slats that had screws in their sides, so he assumed they were bedroom shelves. The pile looked more like a scrap heap for firewood rather than a petty charity giveaway. He wasn’t impressed and tried to visibly show it with his hands in his pockets, sticking out his thumbs like the orange flags in cones when you’re trying to find a parking space at a football game. The collar on his furry brown jacket was pointed forward, with the smoothness of the inner circumference hugging his neck hair. He swayed his head from one side to the other while his neck slowly popped in and out of place; it was one of those hollow cracks that breaks the tension inside, but can easily make someone’s head turn around to make sure your head has all of its wires still attached. However, she was uninterested with her husband’s bodily functions at the moment. Forgetting his manners of opening her door, and also because she practically shoved the door’s latch open, he traipsed behind her while she galloped to the mound, stopping as her shadow provided an overcasted shade to the wood pile. The pile was as dilapidated as the house looked from the end of the street. It was a one story house that was longer than it was wide. A window each flanking the glass screen door and a smaller, rectangular window tucked close to the rain gutter pipe: a bathroom window with the uncleaned frosted glass filtering the sunbeams hitting the ceramic tile. She leaned forward, almost with her knees scraping the concrete curb, and examined the pile: she went back and forth to the nightstand because [a] it was seemingly the only piece of furniture that was completely intact and [b] it was the only cleaner looking piece. There used to be rubber feet on the bottom to keep it from sliding too much and there were also drawers missing because the metal tracks were still drilled in the sides. The husband and the wife glanced a bit for the drawers but were greeted with no luck; and the wife was upset, but she put it past her and began to pick up the nightstand on her own. She felt that the back of the nightstand was held together with a microscopically thin slice of plywood, while the two pieces on the sides were thicker than any of the pieces of wood there. It was definitely handmade, with some chips on the top and sides.

“It needs a home, Chris,” the wife said to her husband. She looked at him as if he would miraculously just say no and walk back to the car. What he really wanted to say is that he didn’t want a trashy piece of termite-infested wood in his new house, much less her keeping those Neanderthalic ideas of taking old things and making them old things taking up new spaces. She talked about it like it was a lost puppy smothered in caked mud and didn’t have a tail anymore. It was lighter than she thought, but she still wanted to pick it up without either stepping on the wood, nor the grass. The grass was yellowed: there was a sprinkler next to the spigot on the side of the house, but from the naked eye, it was rusted closed. The sprinkler was over a foot long, but all of the rubber-ended holes were faced down in the ground and smushed closed, preventing any water from coming out. It was a new sprinkler from the hardware store, but all it knew was the dry dirt of a shady side of town and the cold reticence of the house’s shadow. Chris could also see long streaks in the grass from where a lawn mower had begun to cut the grass, but stopped in the middle, leaving it to grow unevenly. He pictured the entire lawn like a body covered in ingrown hairs: the cells just bubbling at the surface, putting pressure on the hair to just sprout out of the follicles.

“Don’t you think we ought to come back with some towels or something?” Chris said, “I mean who knows where and for how long this junk has been sitting here? And I don’t want dirt in my car, Grace.”

Out of all of his reasoning he attempted to do, all his wife, Grace, heard was him complaining about his car…all about his car, his car, his car.

“And that’s different from the containers of old drink cups and McDonald’s wrappers, how?”

A diabolic shot in the dark, and Chris was flattened and called out by his own wife. He thought it was a bit unfair, but he wasn’t going to argue with logic. She motioned him over, claiming that it really wasn’t that dirty, just dusty from the pollen in the grass. She smacked the back of it lightly to get a feel of the amount of pressure it could handle. He actually walked in the grass, around the dining room table pieces, and helped his wife take the nightstand to the car. It felt inhumane to just take it and leave, but the sign said for him to feel otherwise. Briefly stuck in a piece of wood, Chris unhooked his foot that was too close to the pile and managed to lift the drawerless nightstand to the right side of the car, hazards still flashing. The rigid corners of the nightstand slid, with inches to spare, in the car. They tipped it over on its left side, careful to not let it rock back and forth when they turned corners. As a safety precaution, and because Grace was a month pregnant, she got into the habit of buckling the seatbelts when something was in the back. Chris remarked on her doing that with the bags of groceries, talking to them like they had spit out their pacifiers and she had to clean the cat hair off of them. She buckled the passenger side and middle seat belts inward and secured the nightstand tightly. Chris managed to grab Grace’s hand as she began to make her way back over the pile for a possible round of seconds. He casually guided her to her door and closed it for her, remembering his taught manners at the opportune moment, drifting further away from a bad sense of disposition.

And there was Chris, acknowledging that his slippers were in the wrong place, and his wife cleaning the top of the nightstand promptly before they went to bed. He moved the slippers back, brushed his teeth, and exited the bathroom while his wife put the knick-knacky things back on. She kissed the picture frame, hoping her husband wasn’t looking, and placed it under the lamp’s light—it was a picture of their son, John. He was a baby in that picture: a curious, mindless baby that liked to walk more than crawl when he wanted to. The reflection made her grimace, noticing how blue his eyes had been early on. Once the lights were off, she was there, cradling her warmth in the fetal position, wanting to reach out and hold the picture to her heart until one day she would be in that picture with him. Chris was there to wrap his arm around her waist, feeling her heated pulse beating…beating…beating through her thin clothes. And as the people who were like clouds without rain gave away that free wood on that day with the clear sky, they were there to watch. A half dozen figures were watching in the dark while she rocked herself to sleep, making her body numb and her head spin like a colorful mobile above John’s crib. It played the music, whistling through the stillness of the house, breathing that dry, wooden air from the nightstand. The nightstand breathed right along with them, feeling and seeing things. And John was there with it, keeping an eye on his parents for a while…until things passed over. But how could he truly watch them when they were the ones that were twice dead. They would have been more careful had John given them a second chance to be.

(February 2024)

Mumbai’s chaotic streets were alive with the hum of honking horns and the chatter of countless voices. A city that thrived on its unrelenting pace—until the laughter started.

It began in whispers. A dissonant, cackling echo that seemed to bounce off the crumbling walls of Dharavi’s labyrinthine slums. Nobody knew where it came from. It was a sound that didn’t belong, alien yet intoxicatingly sinister. Then the bodies appeared.

In a forgotten corner of the city, a cluster of mutilated corpses was discovered by a group of schoolboys who had chased a cricket ball into an abandoned factory. Their shrieks brought the entire neighborhood running.

There they lay—five men tied to chairs in a macabre circle. Their faces were stretched in grotesque smiles, lips carved into bloody grins that extended to their ears. Eyes wide open, bulging as though frozen in eternal agony. A note pinned to the chest of the central figure read:

"Let’s put a little smile on this city. – J"

Mumbai’s chaotic streets were alive with the hum of honking horns and the chatter of countless voices. A city that thrived on its unrelenting pace—until the laughter started.

It began in whispers. A dissonant, cackling echo that seemed to bounce off the crumbling walls of Dharavi’s labyrinthine slums. Nobody knew where it came from. It was a sound that didn’t belong, alien yet intoxicatingly sinister. Then the bodies appeared.

In a forgotten corner of the city, a cluster of mutilated corpses was discovered by a group of schoolboys who had chased a cricket ball into an abandoned factory. Their shrieks brought the entire neighborhood running.

There they lay—five men tied to chairs in a macabre circle. Their faces were stretched in grotesque smiles, lips carved into bloody grins that extended to their ears. Eyes wide open, bulging as though frozen in eternal agony. A note pinned to the chest of the central figure read:

"Let’s put a little smile on this city. – J"

, the weight of the city pressed heavier than usual.

The Joker’s arrival in Mumbai was as theatrical as it was horrifying. He commandeered an entire local train, replacing its passengers with mannequins dressed in traditional Indian attire, each holding a severed human head. The train rolled into Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus at rush hour, its horn blaring a haunting rendition of Saare Jahan Se Achha. The people screamed.

And the Joker laughed.

Draped in a tattered green sherwani, his face painted like a demented Kathakali dancer, he stepped off the train. His long purple hair hung loose, blending with the blood splattered on his face. “Namaste, Mumbai!” he cried, spinning theatrically. “Your new master of ceremonies has arrived!”

He lobbed a gas canister into the crowd. Panic erupted as the vapor seeped into the air. Those who inhaled began to laugh uncontrollably, their eyes rolling back as foam frothed from their mouths. They fell one by one, lifeless.

That night, Rajan tracked him to a desolate textile mill on the outskirts of the city. The Joker had transformed it into a carnival of nightmares. Twisted metal beams were strung with garlands of intestines, and flickering oil lamps cast ghastly shadows across the walls. The air reeked of death and decay.

Rajan stepped silently through the darkness, his every sense heightened. His voice, modified through his cowl, was low and commanding. “Joker.”

From the shadows, the Joker’s laughter erupted, echoing like a maniacal symphony. He emerged, twirling a cane tipped with a razor-sharp blade. “Ah, the great Rakshak! Mumbai’s very own cowled crusader. I was hoping we’d meet.”

The Joker’s movements were erratic, his gaze shifting unpredictably. “You know, there’s something about this city. The chaos, the noise, the... madness. It’s beautiful. It deserves someone who understands it.”

“You don’t understand anything,” Rajan growled, stepping closer.

The Joker’s grin widened. “Oh, but I do. I understand that you’re too late.” He snapped his fingers. Suddenly, a group of kidnapped children, their mouths gagged and their tiny bodies strapped with explosives, stumbled into view. A timer on their vests began to tick.

Rajan’s heart pounded. He activated his gauntlet, scanning the explosives. The timer read 60 seconds. His mind raced. “Why are you doing this?” he demanded, trying to buy time.

“Because it’s FUN!” the Joker shrieked, throwing his head back. “Look at you—scrambling to save them, sweating under that fancy suit. You think you’re their savior? No. You’re just a puppet dancing on strings I control.”

Rajan dove into action. His grappling hook fired, pulling one child toward him. He swiftly disabled the explosives with a device on his belt. Thirty seconds. He moved to the second child, his hands steady despite the chaos.

The Joker watched with fascination, clapping mockingly. “Tick-tock, Rakshak! The clock’s running out!”

With a final, desperate leap, Rajan grabbed the last child. The timer hit zero. A deafening explosion tore through the mill, but Rajan had shielded the child with his body. He groaned in pain as shrapnel pierced his armor.

When the smoke cleared, the Joker stood over him, his cane poised to strike. “You’re persistent, I’ll give you that,” he said, leaning close. “But persistence doesn’t win. Madness does.”

Rajan, bloodied but defiant, activated his gauntlet. A surge of electricity coursed through the Joker, sending him sprawling. Rajan rose, his voice like thunder. “You underestimate Mumbai. It doesn’t need a savior—it has me.”

Their battle raged through the night, a brutal dance of fists, blades, and wits. In the end, Rajan outmaneuvered the Joker, pinning him to the ground with a reinforced net.

“You think you’ve won?” the Joker spat, his grin unbroken. “I’m not a man. I’m an idea. And ideas... don’t die.”

Rajan knelt, his eyes piercing through the cowl. “Neither does justice.”

The Joker was handed over to the authorities, but Rajan knew this was far from over. As the first rays of dawn broke over the city, he stood atop the Gateway of India, watching over Mumbai. The laughter had faded, but its echoes remained—a reminder of the darkness he would always fight to keep at bay.

Kooky King Kong kapellmeister

just jabbering gibberish (A - K)

Again, another awkward ambitious

arduous attempt at alphabetically

arranging atrociously ambiguously

absolutely asinine avoidable alliteration.

Because...? Basically bonafide belching,

bobbing, bumbling, bohemian beastie boy,

bereft bummer, bleeds blasé blues, begetting

bloviated boilerplate bildungsroman,

boasting bougainvillea background.

Civil, clever clover chomping, cheap

chipper cool cutthroat clueless clodhopper,

chafed centenary, codifies communication

cryptically, challenging capable, certifiably

cheerful college coed.

Divine dapper daredevil, deft, destitute,

doddering, dorky dude, dummkopf Dagwood

descendent, dagnabbit, demands daring

dedicated doodling, dubious, dynamite,

deaf dwarf, diehard doppelganger, Doctor

Demento double, declaring depraved

daffy dis(pense)able dufus Donald Duck

derailed democracy devastatingly defunct.

Eccentric, edified English exile,

effervescent, elementary, echinoderm

eating egghead, Earthling, excretes,

etches, ejaculates, effortless exceptional

emphatic effluvium enraging eminent,

eschatologically entranced, elongated

elasmobranchii, emerald eyed Ebenezer,

effectively experiments, emulates epochal

eczema epidemic, elevating, escalating,

exaggerating enmity, enduring exhausting

emphysema.

Freed fentanyl fueled, fickle figurative

flippant fiddler, fiendishly filmy, fishy,

fluke, flamboyantly frivolous, fictitious,

felonious, fallacious, fabulously fatalistic,

flabbergasted, fettered, flustered, facile,

faceless, feckless, financially forked,

foregone, forlorn futile fulsome, freckled

feverish, foo fighting, faulty, freezing,

fleeting famously failing forecaster, flubs

"FAKE" fundamental fibber fiat, fabricating

fiery fissile fractured fios faculties.

Gamesomeness goads gawky, gingerly,

goofily graceful, grandiloquent gent, gallant,

genteel, geico, guppy gecko, gabbling gaffes,

gagging, gamboling, gestating, gesticulating,

garlic, gnashing, gobbling, gyrating,

gruesomely grinning, grappling, gnomadic

giggly, grubby, gastrointestinally grumpy

gewgaw gazing gesticulating guy,

geographically generically germane,

gungho, grave gremlin, grumbling, guiding,

guaranteeing, guerilla gripped gatling guns

ginning gumpshun.

Hello! Herewith halfway harmless hazmat,

haphazard haggard, hectored, hastily,

hurriedly, harriedly hammered, handsomely

hackneyed, heathen, hellbent hillbilly, hirsute,

hidden hippie, huffy humanoid, hexed, heady,

Hellenistic, holistic, hermetic, hedonistic

heterosexual Homo sapiens historical heirloom,

homeless, hopeful, holy, hee haw heretical hobo.

Indefatigable, iconographic, iconic, idealistic,

idyllic, inimitable, idiosyncratic, ineffable,

irreverently issuing idiotic, indifferent, inert,

ineffectual, ingeniously iniquitous, immaterial,

insignificant, indubitable, inexplicable, ignoble

itches, ineffectually illustriously illuminating

immovable infused ichthyosaurus implanted

inside igneous intrusions immensely

imperturbable improbable.

Jovial jabbering jinxed January jokester

just jimmying jabberwocky

justifying jangling jarring juvenile jibberish

jubilantly jousting jittering

jazzy jawbreaking jumble

justifying, jostling, Jesus;

junior jowly janissary joyful Jekyll

joined jumbo Jewess jolly Jane;

jammed jello junket jiggled

jeopardized jingled jugs.

Kooky knucklehead klutz

knowingly kneaded, kicked, killed

knobby kneed kleptomanic.

and then you just walked out like it meant nothing, she says, fingers tight around the coffee mug, knuckles white against the ceramic. steam rises between them. outside the kitchen window snow falls in big wet clumps that dont stick.

meant nothing? jesus mae i came back didnt i? im here now trying to explain. he runs his palm over the scratched formica tabletop, tracing old rings from hot cups, memories of other mornings, other arguments.

three weeks later. her voice drops lower. three weeks of silence.

i needed time to think.

think about what exactly? what was so complicated that you needed three weeks of complete radio silence to figure out? the mug makes a sharp sound against the table as she sets it down too hard. coffee sloshes over the rim, spreads across the formica like a stain blooming.

he watches the coffee creep toward the edge of the table. reaches for a dish towel hanging from the oven handle. she pulls it away first, wipes up the spill with short angry strokes.

i was trying to figure out if i could be what you needed. his voice softens. if i could give you the life you deserve.

dont. she crumples the wet towel in her fist. dont try to make this noble.

im not. im trying to be honest.

now? now youre trying honesty?

silence fills the kitchen. the refrigerator hums. snow builds up on the window ledge outside.

remember that summer at the lake? he says finally. that night we built a fire on the beach?

she closes her eyes. dont.

the wind kept shifting, blowing smoke in our faces. but we stayed. kept feeding it branches, kept it burning until sunrise. he leans forward, elbows on the table. thats what we have mae. its messy sometimes, gets in our eyes, makes us turn away. but underneath its still burning. always burning.

we were twenty-two. her eyes open, fix on him. and its not burning anymore cole. its burnt.

no. no, listen. his hands move through the air between them, trying to shape what he means. its like... its like this old truck engine i rebuilt last month. looked like scrap, all rusted out, seized up. but the bones were good. just needed someone willing to dig in, clean it up, replace the worn parts. now it runs better than new.

she pushes back from the table. chair legs scrape against linoleum. im not an engine cole. im not something you can fix up in your garage when you finally feel like it.

thats not what i meant.

then what did you mean? explain it to me. explain how leaving for three weeks with no word, no call, no text, was somehow about saving us? about keeping something burning?

he stares down at his hands. grease still dark under his fingernails despite scrubbing. i got scared.

of what?

of not being enough. of being exactly who you said i was - someone who breaks things he cant fix.

she stands, carries her mug to the sink. looks out at the snow. you dont break things cole. you just stop tending them. let them run down, run cold. then you convince yourself theres something noble in trying to resurrect them. she turns back to him. but some things cant be brought back. some things are just finished.

we're not finished. he pushes up from the table, takes a step toward her. mae please. i know i fucked up. know i hurt you. but dont tell me what we have is dead. dont tell me that fire went out.

it didn't go out cole. her voice is quiet now, almost gentle. you weren't there to see it happen. but it didn't just die - it burned through everything we built. burned until there was nothing left but ashes. and now youre kneeling in those ashes, trying to convince me you can still see flames.

he stops. the space between them feels vast suddenly, uncrossable. outside the snow falls harder, whites out the world beyond the window.

i love you, he says. words naked, unadorned with metaphor now.

i know. she puts her mug in the sink, runs water. but love isn't always enough. sometimes it just illuminates what's broken.

the water runs. he watches her back, the familiar curve of her spine beneath her sweater. remembers other mornings in this kitchen, her body warm against his, coffee going cold on the counter. remembers the weight of her head on his chest that night on the beach, sparks rising into darkness, their whole future spread out before them like stars.

what if... his voice catches. he starts again. what if i could prove it's not too late? what if i could show you?

she turns off the water. dries her hands on the dish towel, still damp with spilled coffee. you already have. she meets his eyes. you showed me when you walked out that door three weeks ago. showed me again every day you didn't call. and youre showing me now, with these stories about fires and engines, trying to romanticize what's already gone instead of facing what's real.

this is real. he gestures between them. us, here, trying to figure this out. that's real.

no cole. she shakes her head. this is epilogue. this is you trying to rewrite an ending that's already written. she moves past him, heads for the hallway. stops in the doorway. i loved our fire too. loved watching it burn. but i was also there to see it burn through. and i won't pretend i still see flames just because you've finally decided to come looking for them.

he stands alone in the kitchen. listens to her footsteps on the stairs. outside the snow falls, erasing tracks, covering everything in clean white silence. the refrigerator hums. somewhere under the sink a pipe drips, marking time. he looks down at his hands - mechanic's hands, used to fixing what's broken. but she's right. some things can't be brought back once they're gone. some fires leave nothing behind but ashes, no matter how hard you search for remaining sparks.

he turns off the kitchen light. walks to the front door in darkness. opens it to swirling snow and biting wind. steps out into white silence, pulling the door closed behind him. leaves no footprints that won't be covered, no trace that he was ever there at all.

The blackened end smoked out its last ebbs of wood. The candle flickered in the background, but the bitterness between us soured the air. She gave me the match to light up the ancestral lantern, but all I wanted to do was to stab its dead flame into her arms. Lighting the ceremonial ancestral lanterns is a custom of our culture, but this honor felt degrading. What was marriage worth if it was not settled over physical confrontations?

When we first met, she was looking for her friend at a cafe. She made the mistake of running late to their meeting, and her friend was already halfway gone without telling her. She was not the type of friend you want around, but she had no choice but to stuck with her only friend left. I caught her attention by shifting close to her and asking about how stressed she looked. Her entire body jolted when I spoke, and it was later on they I learned that relationships have never been easy on her physically either. Perhaps it was this guardedness that wrapped her view on relationships.

Her black hair fell down to her waist, and her eyes were the coldest blue there was. It should have been a warning sign, but no warmth could have convinced me that I was making a wrong decision. She wanted to leave me behind the moment we talked, and it took a good half hour before she relented and gave me her number. She wasn’t pleased with me, so I expected a random person on the other side, but to much misfortune, she answered. d

The flame lit up only when she started to imagine what a good life it would be to marry a surgeon. No more career work—just be a stay at home mom. Her interest in me exponentially increased when she became aware. She wanted a family at the most minimal cost her lavish lifestyle. I thought meeting her expectations would be in the true warmth forward underneath it all.

We engaged, and when the day came, I always threw up due to anxiety. No one interrupted our ceremony, but some days, I wished some random homeless guy just ruined it all. It would have given me enough time to reconsider. Loneliness may have been more preferable than this.

In our culture, it is looked down upon to divorce, and even as the flames died so quickly and her smile became more cruel as we discovered there was no hope for kids, we stuck along with each other. I was the stale bubblegum stuck on then bottom of the school desks. I took the burnt match and smelled the dead essence. I twisted it with my hands, threw in the grass, and wished the lantern of the dead carried me away.

Just tell me you see me, okay? And it doesn’t even matter if I genuinely want you or not. I just looked at your pictures and we exchanged a few words, and in that fraction of a moment it crystallized inside me that you look like the word “No”, like all the women who rejected me in the past— alienated, distant, unattainable. Like a faraway star. And your “No” is like an accusing finger pointing directly at all my flaws. It looks down on me from top to bottom like some arrogant snob, flooding me with all the emptiness and worthlessness I already feel inside.

Listen, I can’t breathe. I’m driving the long way to see you for the first time, and my heart is pounding beyond the rhythm of emotion, creating this familiar suffocating sensation that slowly empties me of air until there’s no breath left, and the oxygen runs out. Listen, you’re breathtaking.

Excitement mixed with anxiety, that maybe this time I’ve found the one who’ll banish all the fantasies out of my mind and perhaps I’ll marry her. But instead of getting excited, I play the disgustingly familiar game with myself: let’s find your flaws so I can momentarily regain control over my feelings—the power I’ve handed you without your knowledge.

I try to breathe and lean back, but the support is a broken reed and when it snaps, I shape its hollow shaft into a barrel aimed at you, marking you with a crimson cross—for I must thaw the ice within you. You probably don’t know, because I never told you, but inside me lives a little boy, frozen in time, growing colder, calling for help. Listen, he and I are longing for the warmth inside you.

Hey gorgeous. Wasn’t yesterday something? The ice melted, did you notice? It melted, and suddenly I see things in you I deeply dislike. That charming laugh turned silly now breaks my heart—the same heart that just moments ago was racing beyond the speed of emotions. But hey, I’m breathing again. Breathing through the pain, finally finding relief. So give me a moment to catch my breath before I mourn the death of the fantasy.

Last shards of a dream—and that’s it.

Listen, why do you keep texting me, insisting on talking every single moment? I don’t want to talk. I don’t want to see you—not now, not tomorrow. Maybe Friday. After dinner. Late—maybe we’ll sleep together, depending on how bad I feel with all the shit I’m putting us through right now. Trust me, I know how pathetic this whole thing is, and I’m dying to free you from the sticky poison that is me. Because you deserve better.

You text me, and I can’t find the mental strength to respond. The thought of talking to you at the end of the day feels like a burden I don’t have the energy to handle. Your need for closeness grates on my nerves, costing me my peace of mind. Honey, you’re one message away from that terrifyingly familiar text: “Hey, I’ve been thinking, and… this isn’t it”.

I’m spinning in this endless loop like a carousel out of control, dizzy and a step away from throwing up. Turns out I overate again and lost my balance.

Now stop. Steady your breathing: Four seconds in, six seconds out. Brief pause. Four seconds, six seconds.

Alright.

Listen, I’m breathing again. And along the way, I met someone else, terrifyingly beautiful and her beauty renders me powerless. She gives me attention and maturely communicates her feelings, but I’m looking for the catch. I need someone else on the side to regulate my anxiety, so I found four more. My appetite is insatiable,

just don’t swallow too much.

Don’t throw up.

Oh.

Listen, I can’t control it, but the megalomaniac side of me comes out and pulls me into an ego trip of raw power.

The invulnerable side of the moon.

Hey, isn’t it great that we got closer? Sorry - I know I wanted this so badly at the beginning but now I’m in the anxiety phase over someone else, more mysterious than you. Sorry I didn’t mean that, but every time I try to focus on you she’s the one floating into my thoughts.

The mysterious side of the moon.

Hey mysterious woman, who I decided is as beautiful as a statue and sends me mixed signals. I wanted to play clean with you. I showed attention and consideration. I cut off past ties, deleted the dating apps, and even bought you a gift. You have no idea how hard it is for me now to limit myself only to you. Look, I swallowed my ego when you replied dryly. I swallowed Klonopin when you didn’t reply at all. I swallowed two more pills when you told me you missed me, but your words didn’t match your actions.

But now you’ve crossed every boundary.

I played detective again: You said you missed me, and I desperately wanted to believe it. When you withdrew, I told you I need to break free from the pain this relationship floods me with. Over coffee, you looked deep into my eyes. You told me you choose to stay and appreciate my maturity. You said “Stay”, but all your body language screamed “Go”. You texted that I’m special, that you don’t want to starve the little boy living inside me—that he’s beautiful and special, just like me. And then you vanished.

I wanted so badly to hold onto that, do you understand? Because no one ever talked to him without a filter like you did. Your silence builds walls inside me and your half-truths close me up, folding me inward like a flower. Hand on heart and without an ounce of cynicism—I just wanted to know you, to get closer to you. I wanted to rest my head on your lap and cry. I just wanted to cry beside you, because honey I haven’t cried in years and I’m on the verge of tears that won’t break through but only choke my throat. But you’ve dimmed my consciousness to such an extent that I can no longer tell truth from lie.

What was real?

Hold on, just a moment. I’ll be right back. I just need to throw up. Where were we? Oh, right. We were at the part where you treated me the way I treated a thousand women before you. Now I remember.

Listen, in the dark, alone, with my head glued to the toilet bowl, I broke up with you in my heart. Now I’m setting a boundary. I’ve cut off all contact until you take responsibility. It’s okay, I’m not punishing you—I’m just protecting myself. I’m human too, you know. I’m breathing again, and with every breath you matter less.

The scarred side of the moon.

Night, and I get another message from you. You better settle for the cold shoulder I’m giving you now, because the grown-up in me wants to heal from you, but my fragile ego seeks to close this circle of pain. You’re on the hurting side now, aren’t you? Just take the hint and fuck off before shit turns ugly. My old self is trying to force his way back. I’m holding him back.

But if you’ve already sent a message, that means you really saw me, right?

The party was like a snake, slowly wrapping around the guests until they could no longer move - the dance floor empty, the balconies sparse. Maybelle let her sandals dangle off one finger, tired and unwilling to move.

Cassidy, Taylor, and Daysha were still gathered around a cocktail table, empty glasses pushed to the side to make room for a tarot card reading. Maybelle had gone to the bathroom then decided to wait here, near the doors, instead of making her way back over. Her feet hurt and her head felt muddied a little as she leaned against a pillar and admired the ballroom.

It had been a surprise that her friend group had even been invited. Chelsea and Brian had gotten engaged, which had been the absolute talk of campus, for the seniors at least. Maybelle couldn't imagine being engaged; hell, she'd never even had a romantic partner before. And then they'd thrown the most grand engagement party their college had ever seen, thanks to Chelsea's family fortune. Campus was small, and pretty much all the seniors knew each other, but Maybelle still hadn't expected the little champagne-accompanied invitation at her apartment door. Maybe Chelsea left one at everyone's door.

The party was held in a historical building just off campus, only a ten minute walk for Maybelle and her friends, but they'd never been inside before today. It was once a grand hotel, according to the plaques, and standing inside it now, Maybelle wished she could time travel back and see it in its full, bustling glory.

She imagined butlers holding leather suitcases in their gloved hands, trolleying them up to the rooms that now held snack tables and offices. Women wearing pearls and little hats would walk into the ballroom, short heels clicking on the marble floor. They'd watch the men at the bar across the way, adjust their lipstick and pretend they didn't notice when the men watched them back.

Maybelle looked up into the sparkling chandeliers, across at the staircase winding up to the balcony, watching two people she vaguely knew flirt with each other, bumping shoulders and suppressing smiles. The ballroom was almost empty now, just a scattering of people at its edges, hidden partially by the large flower arrangements - pink roses and massive fern leaves. Chelsea and Brian were long gone now, and the warm lighting was dim, the pop music replaced by generic Muzak drifting faintly through the room.

"Still here, Maybe?"

Calvin stood just on the other side of the pillar she was leaning against. She was surprised he hadn't brought his friends around with him. They'd been lingering around her table all evening, making jokes while the rest of them rolled their eyes. At one point Maybelle had to pull Taylor away from body-slamming Seb, who kept telling her that her red dress made her look like a crab.

"Still don't know how to tie a tie?" she quipped automatically, peering around the pillar at him. He'd shown up with a knotted tie that, while maybe technically correct, looked horribly uneven. Now it hung over his neck completely undone, pulling her eyes to the unbuttoned button on his dress shirt.

She moved at the same time he did, and they ended up toe-to-toe, looking at each other. Maybelle didn't like that she was close enough to see the beginning of stubble on a face she considered to be always cleanly shaven. "I didn't realize you'd care so much," he said, looking down at their feet. His were in worn tennis shoes, despite the rest of his outfit being formal, and hers were bare. "Forgot how to wear shoes?"

"If you keep staring I'll assume you have a fetish," she told him. "At least I tried." Maybelle held her small pastel pink sandals in between them, brushing them against his stomach and causing Calvin to take a step back.

He narrows his eyes, a familiar expression to her. "Oh, wouldn't you like to know?" She knew he was referring to the fetish comment, but she didn't engage. Boys were predictable, and predictably, he trailed after her when she said nothing and walked around him.

When she reached her table of friends, he was just a step behind. What she hadn't noticed was Seb had squeezed himself between Taylor and Daysha, and Cassidy was explaining his tarot cards to him.

"Basically it means you're gonna die," Taylor interjected melodramatically.

Daysha laughed, and Cassidy shook her head. "No, it doesn't." Cassidy's long fingers splayed over the Three of Swords, and she directed her intense gaze on Seb. "It means heartbreak; you think you've found what you're looking for but it falls through your fingers, lost, leaving you feeling isolated. Not necessarily over a person, even."

"Heartbreak over something other than a person? Sounds like Seb. He'll probably lose his last save in a video game or something," Calvin laughed.

Seb held both index fingers up in front of him. "Whoa, man. As if you have any more game than I do. All that Magic the Gathering is like girl-repellant."

"I'm actually extremely sought-after," Calvin tried to say, but Taylor drowned him out with, "At least he's actually nice to people sometimes." Even though she was a foot shorter than Seb, she was still the most intimidating person Maybelle knew. Luckily for Seb, they were all well aware that Taylor would actually rather sleep with him than strangle him, despite the way she acted.

The rest of them let Taylor and Seb argue, and Cassidy spun her arms around, her long, bat-winged sleeves almost knocking over an empty glass. "Calvin! Your turn for a reading."

He picked up a card suspiciously, moving in towards the table, brushing up against Maybelle's side. "I don't think so."

Cassidy deftly took the card back and shuffled the deck. "If you play something called Magic then I'm sure you'll survive this," she told him breezily.

He made a grim but thoughtful expression, and Maybelle laughed into her hand. He turned at the sound, pinning her with eyes like a hawk. "Fine." Lower, he said to Maybelle, "But put those away, or I'll be too distracted to pay attention." He glanced under the table at her feet, and she huffed.

"Yeah, right. You could make an effort to just not look at me at all, how about that?"

Calvin snorted. "Easily." And Maybelle accidentally caught Daysha wiggling her eyebrows at her. Cassidy had a more subtle satisfied smile on her face. Her friends thought that Calvin and Maybelle's bickering actually meant something, but Maybelle was less convinced.

Calvin was an ever-present distraction, Maybelle knew that. They shared three classes this semester, and each one felt like another opportunity for him to show her up. He was stupidly smart and wildly good at debating, whereas Maybelle was good on paper and couldn't speak when other people looked at her. She'd endured his presence since freshman year, when they'd gotten to know each other during a group debate in a philosophy class. Despite being on the same side of the debate, he had successfully humiliated her by writing out an argument for her to say. It had been riddled with nonsensical and pretentious phrasing, and when she stumbled over her words he'd swooped in like a savior. She wished for every moment after that that she had just broken from his script, but her mind always went blank in moments where she most needed it.

From there Maybelle had poured all of her energy into what she was good at: thinking ahead. She let him have his debates, but she aced every written test and paper. They continued to play this game in their classes today - the two of them consistently had the highest grades in every one of their classes. She knew there was a good chance he liked her, but now that the end of senior year was approaching, what was the point? And besides that, did she like him?

Cassidy was beckoning Calvin close, whispering something as he bent across the table to hear it. Maybelle was jostled by Taylor, who had come around to the other side of the table after calling Seb a dickweed. Maybelle had completely zoned out and missed Calvin's reading, and was beginning to feel the full weight of the night. It was late.

She saw the cards on the table: Seven of Cups for the past, a reversed Eight of Wands for the present, and The Lovers for the future. Maybelle didn't have any of the meanings memorized, but the last one felt self-explanatory. She pushed away from the table, fairly sure Cassidy was in control of the cards, not that she'd ever accuse her friend of that to her face. But in this case it seemed likely.

Taylor took this opportunity to pull her to the side, nearly poking them both in the eye with ferns. "How does my makeup look?" She peered through the leaves back at the table, now a few feet away.

Maybelle did a once-over of her friend. "You literally look like you did at the beginning of the night. Still stunning." It was true, not even a hair was out of place on her blonde head. She must've used a lot of hairspray. Taylor waved a hand. "So my face isn't red or anything? Seb's such a bastard."

After a sigh, Maybelle said, "Yeah, you always say that."

Crossing her arms, Taylor looked at Maybelle. "Alright, Sassy. I hear you complain about Calvin all the time so I don't wanna hear it. Speaking of, why didn't you dance with him?"

Now Maybelle frowned over at the rest of the group. Calvin was still talking to Cassidy, pointing at his cards. His hair was kind of mussed. "He never asked."

Taylor let out a prolonged groan. "This isn't the fifties. You guys have rom-com levels of sexual tension. You could have asked him."

Scrunching up her nose, Maybelle turned back to Taylor. "I don't think that's accurate. And what about you and Seb?" Immediately Taylor's chin jutted into the air, but she said nothing, which was a telling sign. "Taylor? Did something happen?" It would be a relief.

"I might be going to his place tonight. Maybe."

Maybelle internally squealed and externally couldn't stop a grin. "Oh my god, finally."

Taylor was two inch shorter than Maybelle even with her heels on, but she managed to still give the impression of looming over her. "Not a word. It's totally casual, but just, feels right."

Daysha was calling their names, so Maybelle just nodded back, grin still in place. Taylor smiled a little too, contrasting it by saying, "But I might not. Just maybe."

"Maybe, maybe, maybe." The rest of the group was wandering over, minus Cassidy, who was putting her cards away. But it was Calvin, who was behind Daysha and Seb, who had spoken. 'Maybe,' his nickname for Maybelle.

Her eyes skimmed over him, but she then pointedly ignored him. When Cassidy joined them, Maybelle noticed how quiet the ballroom had become. Nearly empty, as it was probably approaching 2 AM. When they opened the hotel's large front doors, a gust of cold night air hit them, sending goosebumps down Maybelle's bare arms.

Maybelle watched Taylor mutter something to Seb, who had to bend down to hear her, then they parted, Seb going left and Taylor going right. Daysha and Cassidy turned right and called goodbye to the boys. Maybelle was last to descend the hotel's stairs, and she watched Calvin, tie almost lifted off his shoulders by the wind, turn left with the barest wave of his hand. Without saying goodbye, he walked away.

Her bare feet hit the cold sidewalk, damp from a little rain, and she turned right to follow her friends back. But she did turn back once, just to look, but he was just a shadow in the night by then.

I awoke to one of the hospital rooms. The white lights blinding my eyes. I sat up, confused. ‘How had I gotten here?’ The last thing I had remembered was being out in the field. I looked around for a nurse but found no one. I pushed the covers off and sat at the edge of the bed. I tried to stand up but fell face first. I gathered myself up and tried again but once more I fell. I looked back at my legs and screamed at the sight before me.

“My leg! Where is my leg?” I yelled out. The sight was horrific, my left leg was gone. All that was left in its place was an ugly stump where my knee should have been. Fear rose in me at the sight. My leg was gone, and I was destroyed. How was I going to make my family proud now? A nurse came running by and tried helping me up. I pushed her back. “What’d you do to me?” I screeched at her.

“Sir, calm down...”

“Don’t you tell me to calm down, I am missing my leg!” I interrupted her. “What have you done to me?” I screeched once more. My heart started to pound against my ribcage, panic rising in me.

“I need help over here!” the nurse yelled out.

I started to panic; my leg was gone. My body was destroyed and for what? I would never be able to serve my country again.  A group of nurses held me down. “What’d you do to me?” I screamed out before feeling a slight prick and becoming sleepy. Everything became calm as I closed my eyes and fell into the darkness.

When I woke up, I expected it to be a dream. Being at the nurse’s station without my left leg. It had to have been a dream; I needed it to be, but it wasn’t. I threw the covers off only to still see the ugly flesh stump that replaced my leg. It still felt like my leg was there, but it was gone.

A nurse came by, “How are you feeling Mr. Capenter?” she asked me. I felt anger at her, though she probably wasn’t the one that mutilated my body. My rage was relentless.

“Where is my leg?” I asked harshness in my words.

“They had to cut it off to save you. It’ll be an adjustment when we get you a new one. Now I’m going to take your temperature.”

“A new one?” I questioned angerly, “I don’t want a new one, I want my leg back the way it was.” I demanded.

She looked up from the clipboard she held in her hand, a little taken aback. “I’m sorry but your leg is gone. There is nothing I can do about it.”

“Why’d you have to take it anyway? It was perfectly fine!”

“When you came in you were injured severely,” An old looking man wearing a white coat said as he walked in. “You had been shot in the leg. We had to perform surgery. We did everything we could to save your leg, but the damage was extensive. The blood supply to the leg was compromised and there was severe tissue damage. The infection set in quickly, despite our efforts to control it we couldn’t save the limb. The infection was spreading, and if we hadn’t amputated it could have spread to your blood stream, and you could have lost your life. We had to act fast. Saving your life was the priority. Now, how are you feeling?”

“Like I want to punch something! I never got hit, I don’t get hit. I’m the best out there, there is no way that I got hurt.” I harshly said trying to understand how everything happened. The last thing I remembered was being on the field talking to one of the soldiers. I think he was a Messager sent to me from one of my generals.  He was telling me about something important, but I couldn’t remember what.

“Even the best soldiers get hurt. Now if you don’t mind letting my nurse take care of you,” the man said. He turned to the woman and whispered something that I couldn’t make out. “Don’t worry Mrs. Hart is the best nurse we have.” He left leaving me and the nurse. She set the clip board down and grabbed the thermometer.

“I’m going to take your temperature now,” she said. “You know, I know what it’s like to lose apart of yourself.” Her voice was soft and kind sounding.

“Sure, you do. I highly doubt that you’ve lost your leg.” I harshly said rage hiding behind my words. Silence filled the room.

Her face dropped. “Your new leg will be here a couple hours; the doctor is going to want you to test it out.” She said monotoned.

“I don’t want a new leg!” I demanded. She looked away awkwardly before closing the door and turning towards me.

“Look, I get it. You want your leg back, you're angry, and you have the right to be, but I am just a nurse. I didn't cause you to lose your leg. I didn’t cut it off or shoot it. I am just here to help make sure that you are ok and help you adjust to your prosthetic leg. I get that you need somewhere to put all your anger and grief, but I am not that person. So, make my job easier and suck it up.” she whispered yelled.

“I’m...” I stuttered a little shocked by her outburst, “I’m sorry.”

“Good, now I have other patients to see. I’ll be back when your leg comes in. If you need anything ring that bell over there.”

The hours I waited were the slowest in my life. Everything seemed to be going at a snail's pace. The world was bleak and dark through those hours. I tried sleeping to pass the time but every time I closed my eyes a sharp pain would hit my missing leg. I kept checking if my leg was missing or if it was all a horrible nightmare. Seeing that ugly stump that replaced my leg shattered any hope I had of it being a dream. My world was crumbling around me the more I checked. The weird thing was it still felt like my leg was there. I could feel my toes move and my knee bend, but all that was there was that ugly corpse of my once living leg.

“Mr. Capenter, your prosthetic leg is in. You ready to try it?” Mrs. Hart asked, opening the door.

“Do I really have a choice?” I asked my tone still harsh.

“Not really. The doctor wants you to at least try it on, so we can see if it needs adjusting.” She walked in holding a box I could only assume was my new leg. She set the box down next to one of the tables. She sat at the edge of my bed and softly spoke, “Look I know that this isn’t ideal, and I know what you're going through is hard, but you have to try. I promise that this will help things feel normal. Once you get back into the pattern of things everything will fall back into place.”

“No, it won’t. I can never do the one thing I was good at anymore. I can never make my family proud. I’m literally incomplete.” I pushed myself to the edge of the bed. My one foot touching the cold tile floor.

“That’s what the prosthetic is for, to make you a complete person. I know things won’t be perfect immediately, but it will get better I promise.”

“And how would you know?” My eyes started to burn with tears. I felt completely and utterly alone. My world was a shadow amongst everyone else's. I was nothing but a failure now.

Mrs. Hart paused, her face softening as she looked at me. For a moment it looked like she understood what I was going through. We both sat in the silence of understanding.

“I know what it’s like to be in your shoes, Mr. Carpenter. To lose a part of yourself and feel hopeless. Like the world is overshadowed by the lost,” She finally said. “But things don’t stay that way, they don’t stay lost forever. It might take time, a lot of time, but you’ll find a way forward. It’s hard, trust me I know, but you’re still here. That has to mean something. Don’t let this one little thing stop you. Not while you still have breath in your body.”

I couldn’t meet her eyes, the tears threatening to spill over, but I held them back. I was still shaking with the weight of it all, trying to process that the man I was, the man I had been, was gone. She didn’t wait for me to respond though. She simply opened the box, revealing the prosthetic, a sleek piece of equipment, practical but cold. She put it beside me gently, as though it was something precious.

“Look,” she said softly. “This is just the first step. We’ll take one step at a time together. I’m here with you. You’re not alone on this journey.”

I swallowed hard, feeling the suffocating weight of everything I had lost, but as I glanced at the prosthetic, something in me shifted, just the slightest bit. Maybe my life wasn’t over. A small bit of hope grew in me. I took a breath.

“Alright,” I muttered, barely above a whisper. “One step at a time.”

Mrs. Hart smiled softly. As she helped me try on the leg, I felt a sense of hope fall over me. I wasn’t whole yet, but maybe, just maybe, I could be.

Rebecca was not only naked, she was also in an extremely compromised position when Buddy burst into their bedroom. Ramon, equally naked, was compromised as well, though less so than was his physically constrained lover. Ramon‘s surprise was immediately apparent, though his attitude changed quickly and naturally from shocked disbelief to defensive self-preservation. Rebecca’s initial reaction, oddly enough, was not surprise at being caught, but was a misplaced anger at Buddy’s unannounced intrusion into the bedroom... as if a man should have to knock before entering his own bedroom. “What is he doing here?” Was the first question that came to her mind, rather than, “what am I doing here?” Why was he not at work, where he belonged? And why didn’t the dumbass knock on the god-damned door? After all, was a vulgar scene with the mother of Buddy’s children as the starlet of the sordid play what he really wanted to stumble in on?

But, Buddy being Buddy, Rebecca wasn’t about to get too rattled, even though she was tied to the bedposts. After all, Rebecca’s primary weapon was her tongue, and that weapon was still free to be yielded at will, though the rest of her fortress was openly indefensible. Her tongue had, in the past, chastised, reasoned with, and sometimes even manipulated Buddy, though her husband was nothing if not level-headed and rightfully so, as the man had a lot to lose. And believing she understood the risks of doing what she was doing in their home in broad daylight, and having done similar things successfully many times prior, Rebecca had played this very scenario out a hundred times in her mind, a thousand times maybe; what she would do if he caught her? What she would say? The risk of getting caught was half of the excitement anyways. Besides, after nearly twenty years together she knew very well how to pull Buddy’s strings and how to push his buttons, so what was the worst that could happen? That he would ask for a divorce? Sadly, divorce would probably be the best thing for them both. She was even ready for it. She wouldn’t mind going back to work now that the kids were a little older. It would get her out more, allow her to meet new people. It might even be fun, especially as she would keep the house with half of what she and Buddy had built together in it, which was quite a lot. So although the initial shock of Buddy crashing in on her and Ramon had been unsettling, Rebecca actually felt a thread of hope, despite how things had gone down. It was almost a relief that Buddy knew her secret, and that a ball which she fully expected him to fumble was now in his court, as Buddy was so simplistic in his nature that it was likely he would barely understand the game that was being played here. That is not to say that Buddy was stupid. He was not that at all. Predictable was the better word.

Now then, if only he would come back, she thought. It had been… what? An hour now? She couldn’t see the clock which had been knocked to the floor during the scuffle. She was actually quite proud that her husband had put up such a fight. Who knew Buddy had it in him, to kick a muscular and younger man like Ramon’s ass so handily? Of course, he’d had an advantage from the start, having burst in while Ramon hovered over her with his own dick in his hands. It had not been an easy thing for Ramon to go from such an attitude and position directly into fighting mode, so the poor kid had gotten his ass kicked pretty much straight away. Still, who knew her Buddy was even capable of such speed and brutality? She certainly hadn’t. Perhaps she didn’t know Buddy as well as she thought she did? And wasn’t this the absolute worst time for her husband to start revealing hidden talents to her?

Yes she’d displayed anger after the initial shock, demanding that Buddy untie her, but her cursings had gone ignored. And now her legs were cramping, the muscles in them tightening high-up around her hips from being outwardly extended like this for so long. “Where the fuck is he?” Her frustrations boiling over she fought at the ropes, jerking as hard as she could this way and that, but her efforts only tightened the knots until her feet were numb and her wrists bloody. It was an absolute emotional roller coaster for her, being left here alone on the bed to wonder what was happening while being incapable to act. Where had Buddy taken Ramon off to? The kids would be coming home from school soon, and the thought of Austin or Callie walking in to find their mother like this began a new round of flailing from her, one that never-minded the numbness or the blood, but it was no use. She could not break herself free. “Fucking Ramon and his bondage shit!“ She screamed! “Ahhhhgggg! Shit! Shit! Shit!” But none of that did any good.

Unable to free herself through anger, and with nothing else to do, Rebecca began to cry. What the fuck? How had she gotten herself into this position, anyway? How had she allowed it to happen? But she knew the answer. Boredom was how, and Ramon had satisfied it. It was her friend Trish who took her to the gym when she hadn’t really wanted to go, dragging her there as though she knew that Rebecca would meet Ramon there, or someone like him; someone young, hot, and aggressive. Ramon’s come-ons had been fast and furious, his confidence magnetic, all of it together creating a delicious whirlwind inside her that demanded release. His lovemaking had also been fast and furious; full of games, tricks, and surprises, unlike Buddy’s ritualistic fumblings. But that wasn’t really fair, was it? Buddy wasn’t bad in bed, just different… respectful. And what woman fantasizes about respectful? Buddy had satisfied her when she was younger and knew no better, but Ramon demanded things of her that Buddy would never, ever think of; dirty, degrading things that Rebecca found she craved once exposed to them. Ramon‘s deviancy led her onward from tea-bagging, to anal, to bondage, to threesomes, the surprises neverending. Sex with Ramon was nothing short of a super-hot adventureland after eighteen years of doggy-style and sixty-nining with Buddy.

It had been wrong. But while she knew it was wrong, she was also powerless to stop it.

Her tears brought another round of spasmic jerking, this one delivering new waves of discomfort to her wrists and ankles while at the same time increasing the cramping in her hips. If only she could close her legs she would be ok, so she fought to close them, to pull the ropes binding her ankles to the foot board loose, or even to break them, but nothing happened except that her cyclical tears started again, and the convulsions, and the worry. Where the fuck could Buddy have gone? Her next prayer was actually spoken aloud, “Please, please, please let him come back before the kids get home! Please, God!”

Her prayer said, she quit fighting and succumbed ever-so briefly to the situation. But submission brought no relief from the pain in her wrists, or the ache in her hips. If only she could close her god-damn legs! “Where the fuck are you, Buddy!” She screamed it this time, as loud as she could, hoping the neighbors might hear it, or anybody else for that matter, anyone who might free her before Callie walked in and saw her mother this way, spread-eagled atop the covers, sticky and stinking, dried cum on her breasts and stomach.

Where the fuck were they? Where could Buddy have taken Ramon that was taking so long? She’d heard the garage door open when they left, and then heard it close again, so they’d obviously gone in the car. Could Buddy have taken Ramon to the police station? For what though? For fucking his wife? Maybe he took him to a lawyer’s office? They could certainly have gotten plenty of DNA evidence of her infidelity off of him. Jesus, if Buddy did file for divorce he could wind up with the money, the house, the kids… everything! Wouldn’t that suck! She had never contemplated that scenario, but here it was, right in front her!

She might have, metaphorically of course, really screwed the pooch this time.

But Rebecca knew better than that. She knew Buddy Carpenter better than she knew anyone in this world, better even than she wanted to know Buddy Carpenter... and the Buddy she knew would never do all of that. He was not devious enough to imagine it. Even in the furious state Buddy was in as he led Ramon from their bedroom he would not have been thinking that way. Divorce done properly is a calculating and malicious undertaking the likes of which Buddy did not have in him. Divorce is a means of destroying one’s enemy without that enemy even realizing it is involved in a war. The subtleties of a successful divorce must be worked out over time, secretly and manipulatively, which makes using divorce as a resolution a woman’s way, does it not, a man being too plodding and direct for it’s success? No, a man catching his wife in this way would not be thinking about how to win the divorce as he drug her lover from his bedroom, would he? “So then,” Rebecca wondered. “What would a man be thinking as he did so? Or rather, what would her man be thinking?”

A memory surfaced then, a distant one from long ago, from way back before she and Buddy were even married. It was the memory of a promise made in the dark of night as she’d held up her new diamond ring, the better to see its sparkling promise in the soft light of a dim harvest moon. “Remember this.” He’d told her as she’d barely bothered listening, lost in the dreams of a suddenly extant wedding day, “leave me if you no longer love me. I’ll be ok with that. But if you ever, for the rest of your life from this point forward, fuck another man while we’re married, I swear to God I will kill you both. Not because you didn’t love me, but because you didn’t respect me enough to cheat on me.”

“Oooh,” she recalled thinking at the time. “Such a tough guy in his cardigan and loafers!”

It had been an empty threat, hadn’t it? Spoken to frighten a giddy girl only twenty years old into obeyance? It wasn’t something Buddy would actually do, that he could actually do, was it? In her time with Buddy he had never shown any sort of bent towards violence whatsoever, absolutely no inkling of it to the point that she had begun to find him almost sickeningly docile and weak, what with him bending to her nearly every wish and want... nearly. She tried to convince herself that it was “always” so, but that was a lie, wasn’t it? Buddy did put his foot down on some matters, and when he did so, that was it. He was at those times frustratingly inflexible, and it was doubly annoying that he was almost always proved right on those matters in the end, despite her hissy-fits to the contrary.

But murder? Buddy was far too kind and gentle to go that far.

Ramon now? Ramon looked like he could kill. His wildness was part of her attraction to him; what with his testosterone infused muscles, and his dangerous looking tattoos and piercings. Ramon seemed almost eager to kill, or at least he had appeared more likely to be a killer up until the moment when Buddy stomped the shit out of him right here in front of her very eyes. She’d found out quick enough that Buddy was not weaker than Ramon, as she had thought and expected him to be. Not even a little bit.

Shit-fuck! What was she thinking? No one was going to kill anyone, were they? But what would she do if Buddy did kill Ramon? Would she turn him in? Could she? How could she do that to Austin and Callie’s father when this whole thing was her fault to begin with? But on the other hand, how could she not? In fact, the thought zipped across her mind as quickly as a shoo-fly at a picnic, that turning him in might be an even better way than divorce to be rid of Buddy. She would get everything! But the thought soured as quickly as it came, as it would come at the cost of her kids hating her forever… unless she could think of a way?

The tears were just about to start again, the whole emotional cycle to begin again, when there came to her from the very wall’s themselves the distinct rumble of the garage door opening. He was back! Oh shit, he was back! But how to greet him? What to say? How to act? Her instinct was to fix herself up a little, to wipe away the mascara that surely stained her face and the dried cum that had her feeling sticky and stiff all over, but that option being unavailable to her, the only other one was to wait here spread-eagled, naked, and to attempt to exhibit a look of shame, even if she did not feel it.

The wait was a long one, too. She could hear him downstairs rifling through drawers and cabinets looking for God knew what. Rebecca thought to call out to him, to find out what he was doing down there, but she did not. She did not call out because suddenly, for the first time in their seventeen years together, Rebecca felt a cold apprehension toward a man who had ever and always been good to her; who was good to both her and their children, who was a good provider, and a good example of what a man should be. How was it then that she had stopped loving him? That she had become unhappy? That she was unfulfilled? How had it happened?

Unfulfilled? Shit! As though Ramon was fulfilling anything at all inside of her other than her vanity. And the unmanly way he had cowered naked before Buddy disgusted her, although even she had to admit that today she’d seen a strength in her husband that she’d never seen before, or at least that she’d never noticed, and would never have believed existed.

Those thoughts left her when came a squeak from the stairwell. He was coming up now, Buddy was. She could sense his weight on the steps, slowly and heavily, one by one, tromping as a young boy will tromp toward some disdainful task. She saw his shadow first, and then his form in the doorway, a countenance so sad upon him that she would not have believed it was him had she not known better, having rarely ever seen him visibly unhappy. Odd it was… to see that her husband actually had feelings. He’d never bothered showing them to her before, had he? Maybe if he had things could have been different, but he stopped there in the doorway not looking at her, the melancholy look on his face unchanging, though his eyes wore an icy expression.

Rebecca began in that same annoying, instigating voice she always assumed with Buddy. “Are you going to untie me before the kids get home? You don’t want them to see me like this, do you?” Even now she failed to notice the condescension in her own voice, probably because it was always there when she spoke to him. Over the years this had slowly become her “Buddy voice.”

He stepped into the room without answering. She noticed then that there was a piece of paper in one of his hands and a pistol in the other, that old revolver of his that he never pulled out since the kids were born. She’d nearly forgotten about that old thing. The idea that the gun was so old that it probably wouldn’t fire anymore gave her some confidence. He set the gun and the paper down on the dresser and walked over to the bedside. Anger had once again replaced Rebecca’s attempt at shame. That pitiful look he was wearing was the very embodiment of why she was cheating, wasn’t it? She softened a bit, however, when he began untying her right hand from the headboard. Thank God!

”Hurry up… please.” She might yet manage to get decent before the kids got home, if he fucking hurried. And she would need to hide Ramon’s things, seeing the pile of his clothes on the floor reminded her. “Where is Ramon? Where did you take him?”

”To the Mason County Bridge.”

”To the bridge? Why?”

”I told him he might survive the jump, but that I was surely going to kill him if he didn’t try it.”

When Buddy didn’t elaborate, she had to ask. “Did he jump?”

Buddy’s answer sounded bored. “Yep.”

Her mind raced. That bridge was pretty high, and the river pretty shallow beneath it. She wondered if the jump was survivable? “Did you see him?”

”He was floating.”

He picked up the paper. “Sign this.”

”Not until you untie me.”

”I’m not untying you.”

”Oh yes you fucking are!” She said it, but he was speaking in that unbending tone he sometimes used, the one that always pissed her off so, the one that told her he was done arguing.

He held the paper up to her so she swatted at it with her one free hand, knocking it away. “What does it fucking say?”

”It says that Jeremy and Lilly are going to assume custody of Austin and Callie. They already have control of their trust, as executors.”

”So you’re going to shoot me?”

”Yep.”

“Jesus, Buddy. You can’t let the kids find me like this.” She played along, not really believing he would do it.

”I called Lilly. She’s picking them up from school.”

”What’ll you do… after?”

”I haven’t decided. I might shoot myself after, I might not. Prison might not be so bad. I guess I can always kill myself in my cell if it is that bad”

”Buddy, you can’t do this. Think about the kids.”

”Me? You wanna put this on me? You think I should be worrying about the kids? Maybe you should have thought about the kids, Beck?”

”All I do is think about the kids.”

”Oh, so now you’re going to put this on them? The kids have caused you to miss your chance at a good time? Is that it? Because of them you can’t be tied up and jacked-off all over whenever you want to?”

”He has a kink.”

”Had.”

”What?”

”He had a kink.”

”Whatever.” She was busy trying to reach the ropes tying her left hand with her free right one. Letting her struggle he picked the paper and pen off the dresser.

“You gonna sign this?”

”No.”

Setting them back down, he picked the pistol up next. There was nothing left to do, or to say. Sensing a new resolve, she stopped struggling with the ropes and leaned back against the headboard. “Go ahead,” her anger flared. “You don’t have the balls. I dare you to do it.”

So he did.

Amazingly, her eyes open, Rebecca saw the blast at the barrel’s end, and she felt its hammer blow. She even heard it’s echoing report, though from someplace far, far away.