Bang Up

by Jeff Strand

"If we'd laughed at you," said Kirk.

  "That's right. You all say that you didn't, and I believe you. One point each. Next question. I'm going to start with Kirk. I paid you to have bad sex with my wife so that she would stop looking. You had very good sex with her. Then, after I made it clear that I was unhappy with the way things had worked out, you shared her with another man. What do you think is an appropriate punishment for you?"

  "That's a tough one," Kirk admitted. "My foot never did heal from when you stomped on it, so I've already—"

  "You're lying," said Ralph.

  "No, I'm not."

  "Yes, you are."

  "Have you seen my foot?"

  "No, I saw your face just now when you told me about your foot. You're lying. Lie to me again and we'll see how fast your foot heals with a bullet hole in it. And the answer is that it won't heal at all, because after I blow a fucking hole in your foot, I'm going to blow a fucking hole in your skull, and the healing process will stop before it had a chance to begin. And then, like I said before, I'll blow a fucking hole in Skip's skull, and then I'll blow a fucking hole in Julie's skull, and then I'll turn this motherfucker around and blow a fucking hole in my skull. Myra will be covered in skull fragments. You think that's fair to her?"

  "No," said Kirk.

  "Then don't fucking lie to me again."

  Kirk decided not to lie to him again.

  31

  "Punishment," said Kirk. "That's a very good question. You can look at it from a lot of different angles. Angle one would be, have I already suffered enough?"

  "No," said Ralph. "You haven't."

  "I would agree with that. You told me not to lie, and I'm not going to lie, so the truth is that except for having that gun pointed at me very little of this experience has involved what anybody would describe as suffering. So the next angle would be, have I learned my lesson?"

  "You had sex with Julie again after I threatened you."

  Kirk nodded. "That is indeed true. So, yes, you can argue that I have a history of not learning lessons. That said, the gun does change things. I can pretty much assure you that nobody in this room is going to have sex with anybody else in this room ever again."

  Myra raised her hand. "I agree with that statement. I've already told Kirk that he's done having sex with me forever, and I'm not even on trial here."

  Julie raised her hand. "I just want to say that while I will never have sex with Kirk and/or Skip again, I haven't ruled out having sex with you again, honey. Also, if a certain female-focused show might ease tensions, I wouldn't necessarily object to—"

  "Not gonna happen," said Myra.

  "Nobody is doing a girl/girl show while I'm waving a gun around," said Ralph. "It wouldn't feel consensual. Back to you, Kirk."

  "Punishment. Right. I don't think I deserve capital punishment. Yes, there were some iffy moral choices made but none of them were truly evil. It was all based on the pursuit of happiness. So while I agree that this week was not free of mistakes, I don't think I should die. Or get shot and live. Really, nothing involving a gun is appropriate punishment for my behavior."

  "So what is appropriate?"

  "That's a very good question. A deep sense of shame, maybe? Because aside from pure terror, shame is the strongest emotion I'm feeling right now. As we sit here and discuss what happened, I feel like an absolute fuckhead. What about you, Skip? Do you feel like a fuckhead?"

  "Oh, yeah," said Skip. "Mega-fuckhead."

  "See?" Kirk asked. "And let's be honest, Skip is not the kind of self-aware guy who would think of himself in those terms unless the feelings were really intense. I can assure you that for the rest of my life, at least once a day, probably several times a day, I'll have moments where I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror or see my reflection in a pool of water and think to myself, 'God, what a frickin' fuckhead.' It's part of my self-definition now. Not to be a drama queen, but it's haunting. Very, very haunting."

  "Low self-esteem is not sufficient punishment," said Ralph.

  "All right. Maybe you could steal some of my stuff. Take the TV. I'm broke. I can't afford to go out and buy a new TV right now, so I'll see spoilers for all of my favorite shows before I catch up."

  "I don't want your TV."

  "You wouldn't have to keep it. You could take it and smash it. You could make me watch while you do it. It would actually be worse punishment to watch you destroy my TV than for me to know that somebody was getting enjoyment out of it."

  Ralph frowned. "I don't think this discussion is working. I may have to kill you." He pointed the gun at Skip. "What do you feel is an appropriate punishment?"

  "Kick me in the balls. Then kick Kirk in the balls."

  "I like that. Simple. Straightforward."

  "That doesn't actually sound good to me," said Kirk.

  "We've moved past you," said Ralph. "Thank you, Skip, for your useful contribution to the conversation. Julie, same question."

  "Kicking them in the balls sounds reasonable and fair."

  "I mean punishment for you."

  "You said we're not supposed to lie, right?"

  "Right."

  "Then my opinion is that I don't deserve punishment."

  "Your opinion is wrong."

  "I knew you hired Kirk. That, from my perspective, gave me license to let him do what he was being paid to do. Now, I didn't know he was being paid to not give me orgasms, but based on the information I had at my disposal, it made perfect sense to go back with him to a hotel room. I thought it turned you on to think of me with another man and you just didn't want to say anything. You hired him, you set the balls in motion, and if things got out of hand, you're the one who should take the blame."

  "I hired him because you were planning to cheat on me."

  "I was not."

  Ralph pointed the gun at her. She cringed and pressed herself into the couch as Ralph held the gun right between her eyes. Kirk wanted to be a hero and smack the gun out of the way, but Myra and Skip were sitting between them.

  "Care to say that again?" Ralph asked.

  Julie closed her eyes, as if to regain her composure. When she opened them, she leaned forward, pressing her temple right against the barrel of the gun.

  "I was not planning to cheat on you," she said. "I never considered it."

  "Bullshit. That is a lie! I saw what was on your screen! You were on dating sites! What, am I supposed to believe that they use a picture of a half-naked couple on a site where you exchange cake recipes?"

  "It was book research."

  "You're not writing a book."

  "Yes, I am. I've written a bunch of books. I've just never told you about them."

  Ralph pulled the gun away from her face. "So, what, you're, like, a famous author and never told me?"

  "I've never published anything. Never even sent it out. But I'm writing a smut novel called Just The Sex Parts Of My Diary and the characters meet on a dating site. It was research. I wasn't looking to cheat on you."

  "Is it any good?"

  "I like it so far."

  Ralph shook his head. "No. I don't believe you. You're trying to save your life."

  "Read it! It's on my computer!"

  "Your computer isn't here."

  "Go get it."

  "But then I wouldn't have everybody at gunpoint."

  "I could go get it," said Skip.

  "Shut the fuck up," Ralph told him.

  "I could go get it," said Myra. "I won't call the police because I know this could end up with mass carnage if you're cornered with no escape. In exchange, you have to promise me that if she's telling the truth, this all ends."

  Ralph nodded. "Yeah, you know what, yeah, I can promise that. If the novel is there, and there's stuff in it where she'd have needed to research online dating sites, yeah, I'll admit that I started this whole mess and I'll stop pointing the gun at people."

  "No delusional stuff," said Myra. "No accusing me of writing the novel on the way back to cover for her. No accusi
ng me of buying somebody else's novel and then cutting and pasting it into a document on your wife's computer."

  "You can see when the file was created," said Julie. "Also, there's a scene in the book that came directly from our life. All I did was change the names. Myra would have no way of faking that."

  "No accusing me of having psychic abilities," said Myra.

  "All right," said Ralph. "Let's do this."

  Julie gave Myra the address and her house key. "I'll be right back," Myra told them, as she left the apartment.

  "I have a good feeling about this," said Ralph. "But I do want to mention that if this is a trick, I'm totally going batshit insane and nobody survives."

  "We'd all deserve it," said Julie.

  "Is it okay if I take a bathroom break?" asked Skip. "I've been stressed out since you got here and I really have to pee."

  "Yeah, I guess so."

  Skip got up off the couch. He started to walk toward the hallway, but Kirk noticed that he was veering off-track a bit, as if he might be considering going for the kitchen counter where all of the makeshift weapons lay.

  "No!" Kirk said. "Bad! Bad!"

  Skip resumed his course toward the bathroom.

  "Do you think she could steal all of our stuff and flee the state?" Ralph asked.

  "Nah," said Kirk. "She has a good job. She doesn't need your stuff." It would never have occurred to Kirk that Myra might rob them, but now Kirk had to admit to himself that he had a slight sense of unease. Just a slight one. Myra wouldn't flee. She wouldn't let this turn into mass carnage.

  "How come you never told me about your books?" Ralph asked Julie.

  Julie shrugged. "I thought you might think that my dream of becoming a writer was silly."

  "No, I think it's great. I'm proud of you. If the books exist. Which I'm sure they do."

  "Do we have to stay on the couch, or can we walk around?" Kirk asked.

  "You have to stay on the couch. There may be less tension than there was before, but this still isn't resolved. We could all still die. Don't forget that."

  "I won't."

  Skip walked back into the living room. He glanced over at Kirk as if asking permission to wander over to the weapons table, and when Kirk made it very clear that permission was not granted, Skip shrugged and sat back down on the couch. They settled in to wait.

  * * *

  "How long has she been gone?" asked Skip.

  "Three minutes," said Kirk.

  "Jesus," said Skip.

  * * *

  "Do you have any board games?" Skip asked Kirk.

  "Nobody's playing board games," said Ralph. "Just sit on the couch."

  "What about cards?"

  "No. You might try to use the playing cards as a sharp projectile."

  "I don't think we could defeat you with playing cards."

  "Don't talk."

  * * *

  Forty-five minutes later, the doorbell rang. "It's me," said Myra. "I've got the laptop."

  Ralph hurried over and opened the door. Myra stepped inside and proudly held up the computer. Ralph took it from her and handed it to Julie, who opened the lid and started booting it up.

  "I'm impressed," said Skip. "I totally thought you were going to rob their home and leave us all to die."

  "Why the hell would you think that?" Kirk asked. "You don't even know her."

  "I guess it's what I would do. I never said I was a role model."

  "Okay, here we go," said Julie. "I think you're going to have to sit down next to me, unless you can hold the laptop, scroll through the document, and hold the gun at the same time."

  "I can't do that," said Ralph. "Everybody but Julie off the couch. You could try something, but when we're this close to fixing all of our problems it would be kind of dumb."

  Kirk and Skip got off the couch. Ralph sat down next to Julie.

  "We're obviously not going to sit here and read the whole thing," said Julie. "We'll just scroll through. If I'm going too fast, let me know."

  "Okay."

  They both stared at the laptop monitor.

  "Oooh," said Ralph. "The action gets started right away."

  "Naturally."

  "Oh, look at that, two chapters in and, yeah, the online dating thing checks out. I'm glad that you took the time to make sure you got the details right. A lot of authors don't bother to do their research."

  "How do you know that if you never read books?" Julie asked.

  "That's what I hear. Wow, that's pretty raunchy right there. I didn't even know you knew that word."

  "Do you like it?"

  "I wouldn't want it done to me, but I like reading about it."

  "This is the part I was telling you about," said Julie, tapping the screen.

  "Oh my God! Yes! I remember that! The goat stole the hot dog right out of that kid's hand! That was the funniest thing I ever saw! Holy shit! I think we even said at the time that it should go into a book!"

  Julie and Ralph laughed for a while, while Kirk, Skip, and Myra waited patiently to learn if the bloodbath had been averted.

  "And that's it," said Julie. "I've got quite a bit to go, but I'm happy with it so far."

  "It's great!"

  "So I wasn't trying to find a guy to cheat on you with."

  "I should've just asked you about it," said Ralph. "If we'd communicated a little better, none of this would've ever happened. It's a pretty good life lesson."

  "Is it over?" Kirk asked.

  "It's over," said Ralph.

  "Are you going to kick us in the balls?" asked Skip.

  "No."

  32

  "This has been interesting," said Myra. "Glad I could be of assistance."

  "Thank you for everything," said Julie.

  "Just to be clear, Kirk, you're never going to see me again. Don't text me, don't call me, and I'm blocking you on Facebook. If I hear from you at all, I'm filing a restraining order."

  "I completely understand," said Kirk.

  "Bye all!" said Myra, waving to everybody as she left the apartment.

  "She seemed very nice," said Julie.

  "She was," said Kirk. "She really was. Not gonna lie; I regret driving her away like this. It's never good when your friend with benefits thinks you're a drooling pervo."

  Julie closed the laptop lid. "I guess I should be heading off, too."

  "So," said Ralph, "is it safe for me to assume that the gun-waving and the threats and all of that are pretty much a deal-breaker as far as saving our marriage is concerned?"

  Julie nodded. "Yeah. You did shove a gun right in my face."

  "I did do that, yes. I remember. I'm not proud of it."

  "Basically what I'm going to do is go live with a friend or relative without telling you who it is. And I'm going to hire some movers to come get my stuff. At some point you'll hear from a lawyer, but I'll leave out the threats of murder if you'll leave out the adultery."

  "Deal," said Ralph.

  Julie stood up. She extended her hand to Kirk. "Well, it's been an adventure. I know you think that because Ralph and I are splitting up, there's a chance that we'll get together again, but it's not going to happen. And you may also think that I'm only saying that because Ralph's sitting right there, but that's also incorrect. It's nothing personal; I'll just forever associate sex with you with being kidnapped and thinking I was going to die."

  "I can't argue with that," said Kirk, shaking her hand.

  She turned and extended her hand to Skip. "It was nice meeting you. Obviously, the same thing I told Kirk about associating sex with you with being kidnapped and thinking I was going to die applies to you as well."

  "That sucks," said Skip, shaking her hand.

  Julie left.

  "Well," said Ralph, standing up, "I don't think any of us would say that this turned out well, but it sure could've been worse, right? I mean, the walls and floors could be covered with blood. So we did okay. I don't feel rewarded that our paths in life have crossed, but, hey, shit ha
ppens. Bye."

  Ralph shoved the gun into the waistband of his pants and left the apartment.

  "I don't care what any of them say," said Skip. "I still think it was worth doing."

  Kirk had no response to that.

  "Mind if I hang out here for a while? I have nowhere else to be."

  "I'd rather you didn't."

  "You sure? We could play some Monopoly."

  "I will never play Monopoly with you. Never."

  Skip shrugged. "Cheer up, buddy. At least we have each other."

  Kirk glared at him.

  The End

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