3
One of my greatest joys is the reading of stories. Remember that kid in class who always had a book tucked behind some boring textbook or trivial assignment as his teacher prattled on? That’s me. Great stuff, books. I am especially fond of mysteries and murders. The kind of bone chilling, titillating, horrific tales that keep you up late at night clutching your blankets, pulled up to your nose. Many a moonless evening I’ve lain awake in bed shrouded in darkness, too afraid to close my eyes or get up and flick on a light. I lay there with the covers snugly wrapped around my nose and listen. Just listen.
Is there someone in my closet? Was that a noise I heard coming from the bathroom? It sounds like someone’s prying open the window! The creaky hallway floorboards catch my attention and I become certain someone is stalking down the corridor, fast approaching my room.
Then all is silent again. The only noise I can hear is the beating of my heart. A dull, rapid vibration. THUMP, THUMP, THUMP. I hear this and nothing more.
I’m sure everyone has experienced such feelings. To think that a burglar has sneaked into your home and is creeping throughout the house. Who knows what these lunatics are after? They could be toting a gun. Heck, they might have an actual butcher knife! Imagine waking up in the middle of night and catching a glimpse of some slack-jawed hooligan right before he brings down a butcher knife across your throat. That’s only if you’re lucky. The psychotic might hack you bit by bit just so he can hear your screams… These are the kinds of thoughts that keep me up at night.
Many of the stories I read are based on actual cases. They call this genre true crime stories, I believe. You should read some of these grotesque, macabre offenses. Let me give you an example.
One man, a guy in his thirties, lived at home with his parents. A real antisocial, loser type. He was a verifiable morlock. His entire existence consisted solely of abiding in his parent’s basement and playing online video games all day, day after day. A nice life, huh? He would sit down there in darkness, playing for hours in the dimly lit room. Fingers pecking away at the keys – his hand wildly reaching out for candy bags on the desk. Wrappers strewn about the room. The typical gaming addict… or so they thought.
He possessed many of the same characteristics of an addict and exhibited many of the well-known traits. For instance he rarely changed his stained (at one time white) undershirt; there was a perennial can of soda on his computer desk; and he always wore a bathrobe and boxers, never anything more, except for a pair of socks if it became too cold. Anyway this loser, a grown man remember, sat down there all day zoning out on the video games. He didn’t work, he didn’t socialize.
Naturally his parents grew a bit tired of his mooching lifestyle. They attempted several interventions, all to no avail. They spoke candidly to him, but sadly these tête-à-têtes were rebuffed immediately. Their leech of a son simply continued on playing games, showing no signs of slowing down. One day the father thought of an ingenious plan… He cut the son’s network connection.
Problem solved, right? Wrong.
The portly, pathetic son became incensed. He was furious. “You can’t take my games away!” he shouted in the most stereotypical child-like manner. But the parents remained obstinate and refused to give in. They gave him an ultimatum. Either get out and find a job or no internet. Pretty rough, huh? As it turns out, junior had another solution. He lasted only one day before snapping. Which some consider to be a great feat in and of itself for such an ardent gaming addict. Anyhow, three days later the police came to check in on the house when neither the mom nor dad showed up for work.
Upon entering the home, they discovered the mother first. Her body sat propped up on the sofa setting flush against the living room wall. She had a replica fantasy sword stuck through her heart which pinned her corpse to the couch. On the wall behind her, written in blood, was the gaming term: PWND!
Next, the police ventured into the kitchen where they found the father’s cadaver. He’d been shot in the head, supposedly with the .45 pistol lying beside him. On the large white fridge behind him were written the words: BOOM! HEADSHOT!
A noise coming from the basement alerts the police. They head downstairs, guns drawn. And what do they discover? Junior sitting at the computer playing his video games like nothing ever happened. They hauled him into jail, but not before roughing him up a bit. The lead officer had been so repulsed by the crime that he’d beaten the son pretty badly before cuffing him.
It turns out he’d stolen his dad’s wallet and paid for one month of internet connection. One was left to guess why he killed his parents. Perhaps it was done in his game withdrawal fit of rage. In which case, perhaps his crime was justifiable.
Now I ask you this. What kind of psycho kills his parents over an internet connection? You’d have to be pretty mentally unstable to murder for a reason as asinine as that. His story is a bit more lurid than I like. It’s more sensationalistic, less intriguing. I prefer reading about methodical murders. The kind that puzzles the police and even goes unsolved. The perpetrators plan the slayings with such meticulousness and punctiliousness that it boggles the mind.
The murderers or murderesses are of high intelligence. You’d have to be. How many goons do you see getting away with the perfect murder? Not many. Unless they luck into a favorable circumstance and have Stewey the country bumpkin sheriff as the sole detective. Otherwise it requires a sharp mind to concoct the perfect murder. You must leave no trace. Or if you do leave a trace, make it appear to be pointing at someone else. A diversion. A framing. A setup. In my opinion it’s best to avoid that all together and simply circumvent suspicion. Leave no traces.
You’ll find those killings are a rarity. Most murders are done madcap and slapdash. Hasty, you know. Some loon comes home and finds his wife with another man. He snaps and shoots the ruffian. A redneck cuts off some gang member on his way into town. The ruffian follows the redneck, pulls up alongside his car and puts two rounds into the toothless moron. A disgruntled cashier received one too many miswritten checks and blew his top, along with the elderly woman’s head who tried to pay for her groceries with it. Some persnickety boss passes over a faithful employee on a promotion. The employee shows up to work the next day with a sawed-off shotgun and sends his boss flying through the third story window with a hole in his chest. A man insults his wife’s cooking. She prepares him a special dish laced with poison and he winds up dead, falling face first into a plate of mashed potatoes.
Murders such as those. Unplanned, hurried, impetuous.
Any goon of low intelligence can commit those murders. It takes a true virtuoso to execute the perfect murder. Jack the Ripper. The Zodiac. Those guys were good. Not that I condone their behavior. I simply use good here in the sense that they performed untraceable, unsolved crimes. And that’s how it should be done. Either do it right or not at all.
Back to my crime stories. I rather enjoy being frightened. Aside from preventing me from sleeping at night, that is. But I do take pleasure in the suspense and mystery. In fact I could tell you, right now, how to commit the perfect murder in a dozen ways or more. However, I myself could never carry out such a heinous crime. I’m afraid my docile nature is far too squeamish.
Here I now find myself lying in bed, terrified. My eyes are glued open. I’m listening for the slightest sound of a break-in. Will I be killed in my sleep like so many of the victims in my crime stories? I hope not. And what are the chances of it occurring? Pretty good!
So far no one has actually broken into my home. But that doesn’t rule out of the possibility of it happening. And I’m no less comforted by that fact. According to statistics 1 in 5 homes will experience a home invasion. That gives me a 20% chance of being chosen! Another strike against me is that I live in a secluded, quiet neighborhood. The type of a place a burglar dreams about. There are no vantage points to see from. Hardly anyone can see their neighbor’s doors. Each of my doors has three deadbolts and one standard knob lock. My windows are doubled pained
and secured with custom locking devices.
But there is my skylight… I’ve never gotten around to fixing that blasted thing. There’s only one flimsy latch keeping it shut. A burglar could flip that baby open in a matter of seconds. Then he’d lower himself down into my kitchen, grab a butcher knife from the drawer and come stick it in me while I slept. A slow gutting is in store for me…
There are roughly 6,000 unsolved homicides a year in the U.S.A. alone.
Murder is on the rise and I fear my time may be arriving shortly. These are the kinds of thoughts that keep me awake at night.
4
I can’t stand these bloviating, gasconading, degenerates! How smug and vainglorious they are. The pretentious fools! What have they done that is so special! I just want to get into my car, follow them home one dark night and run the fools over… twice!
Excuse me… I just came from an incident this morning on my way to work. I’m a bit irate, miffed. One of those bums who wash your windows at the streetlights accosted me. It started out pleasantly enough. I never look for trouble. But today I didn’t have any spare change and on top of this, my windows weren’t in need of a washing. They were spotless. Here’s what happened. I’ll retell the situation from the first person, present time narrative.
As I’m driving down the street, the light changes to red and so naturally I stop. When all of a sudden this squalid hellion rushes into the street, holding some equally filthy rag and spray bottle filled with a yellowish liquid. His own urine for all I know. He squirts a few drops of the piss onto the rag and reaches across my windshield to wipe it down. I motion him to stop. But you know those people. Brainless. He doesn’t understand the universal sign language for STOP! NO MORE! so I figured English is ruled out as well.
I lay on the horn to get his attention. And the blaring noise startles him like some kind of backwoods hillbilly who’s never seen a car in his life. I wonder if this preschool dropout has ever heard a horn before judging by his reaction. He scowls at me. I pound on the horn again, waving my hand NO. The miscreant becomes irate! He slams his fist down onto the hood of my car, making a small dent. Jesus Christ. I don’t drive the nicest car but I prefer it to be dent free. Not only that, but everyone feels like a big man in their car. For some reason those thin windows and curved pieces of metal embolden every human. A normally timid man might become a real rabble-rouser once he’s inside a vehicle.
A few months ago my window washing sprayers somehow got angled toward the front of my car. Probably by some riffraff causing mischief. Now they practically shoot upwards at a 45 degree angle toward the front of my vehicle. I twist the stick -- soap comes flying out the sprayers. The liquid makes a perfect arc, striking this idiotic bum squarely in the face. He shuts his eyes as the soap enters them and begins pawing at his face with those god-awful dirty hands. This is probably the closest thing he’s had to a bath in decades. But the flea-bitten imbecile still refuses to move. He stands there moaning and writhing in agony.
The light turns green and this insignificant hobo remains in the intersection, screaming his head off, rubbing his eyes with that filthy piss cloth. I can only imagine the grime and muck being smeared into his peepers. Now bear in mind, I’ve never been late to work. I most assuredly didn’t plan on being tardy today due to an ignorant guttersnipe. So I inched the car forward and bumped him with the nose. It catches his leg, causing him to double over slightly. Not enough however. He’s rubbing and shouting and rubbing and shouting. The clock is ticking away. I’m growing agitated. I CANNOT BE LATE!
I press down on the accelerator once again. This time with a bit more pressure, perhaps a little too much, because the car jolts forward and the derelict is flung onto my hood with a thud. Now he’s got one hand rubbing his eyes and the other grabbing at his lower back, which was ridiculous, because I only hit him going ten miles per hour tops. He lies on the hood for a few seconds as I wait for him to roll off and slink back over to his cardboard home. That doesn’t happen.
Instead I begin driving with the bum still splayed out on the hood. But I couldn’t allow this to continue much longer. I did what anyone in my situation would do. I drove on and looked in my side view mirror to check for any cars on my right. All clear. My foot presses down on the pedal, propelling the car along with ever increasing speed. There’s a pile of black garbage bags not far off. It looks soft enough. The moans and groans are still reaching my ears. Terribly irritating. Time for this ol’ boy to go, I think. And with that thought, I torque the car hard to the right just before reaching the bags and slam on the brakes full force. The hobo on my hood goes sailing into the air... Unfortunately he overshot the bags, instead landing on the pavement sidewalk. He then slid a few feet before smacking into the brick building. Dozens of people, if not more, witness this -- but no one cares. Everyone is an observer and not a participator.
Except for one rat faced goon. A college aged punk. He approaches me on the left. His car slows down as the slightly tinted window descends. I expect another confrontation to ensue; but to my surprise, there isn’t one taking place. The punk shouts to me, “Awesome dude!” then cuts my car off, pulls over to the curb and tosses a slurpy at the bum. It catches the stunned hobo in the jaw. Which I can only imagine relieved some of the stinging pain from the wiper fluid.
5
There it is again! That infernal clanking breaking the silence! CLANK! CLINK! CLANK! My boss is in his office, the door slightly ajar, banging the spoon against the bowl. Three empty protein shakes lay scattered about on the floor beside his feet. A haze creeps into the room. A dull vibration follows. My vision begins to blur. It’s how I imagine Superman feels when kryptonite is thrust upon him. My hands instinctively cover my ears as I rock back and forth in my chair like an infantile retard. But the strident noise manages to penetrate through my thin hands.
The clanking continues, growing louder and louder. I’ve lost all sense of time. Just the rhythmic rocking of my helpless body. Some one taps me on the shoulder. I open my tearing eyes to look up. It’s Mr. Cromwell… At this point I realize the clanking has stopped, yet the torment persists aching in my ears. I imagine wiping away the imaginary blood, leisurely trickling out from the hearing cavities.
Wilmer Cromwell has the large glass bowl in his hand; some remnants of his lunch remain at the bottom. The spoon still lingers inside like a bellicose rival. He asks if I’m alright. “Sure, just a headache,” I say, fighting off the urge to snatch the bowl from those manicured fingers and smash it into a million pieces upon the marble flooring. Wilmer flashes his arrogant grin and departs to his office. My mind is still jarred; nothing seems real at the moment. Everything is foreign. But then I look up and see Ellington Fairfield, the black lawyer from down the hall, standing in my doorway. He’s got one finger raised, calling me over like a lost puppy. I look back over my shoulder once to make sure Wilmer is gone, shortly thereafter my feet and I are walking on over to Ellington.
“I’ve got to talk to you,” he says quietly. “Come here, quick!”
“Sure,” I say apathetically.
We move down the hall a little ways. He leads me into his office. I enter first. Fairfield follows and shuts the door behind himself.
“Jardine,” he says, getting my name wrong, “this is about Wilmer…”
“Oh? What about?”
“I saw you two talking in there… Wilmer went into his office as soon as I walked by your window.”
Ellington pauses and stares at me like I’m missing something of grave importance.
“Yeah…?” I ask shrugging my shoulders.
“Well… Was he talking about me? Negatively, I mean.”
“What?”
“Was he making comments about me?”
“Huh? Comments? Like what?”
Ellington sighs. He places a large warm hand on my shoulder.
“I mean… racist comments.”
Oh boy, not this again. It seems Ellington is convinced everyone in the office is a closet ra
cist. He’s the only black man in the building, you see. And for some reason he thinks I’m the only person who isn’t racist. Which is true. I mean, I’m not racist but I don’t believe anyone else in the building is either. Except for maybe Storton. I once saw him spit (a big massive ball of slobber) right into Ellington’s water jug before putting it on the cooler.
“No, Mr. Fairfield. Mr. Cromwell wasn’t referring to you at all. In fact he hasn’t mentioned your name in a number of weeks.”
“So he’s too good for me, huh? Is that it? Too good for the black man?”
I sit there dumbfounded. What can you say to that? But, just to have a little fun I angle my head down in defeat, playing along, acting as if I’ve been caught. “Yes… I think that’s the reason. He mentioned something about it awhile back.”
“Jesus Christ!” Ellington says, throwing those big hands up over his head. “I knew it! That racist scumbag!”
I sit there, my head shaking in disbelief. He probably thinks I’m disgusted by my “racist” boss, but really I’m flabbergasted by the nitwit before me. Ellington shields his face with one hand and motions for me to leave with the other. I get up to do as he asks, and actually, leave the room feeling rather satisfied. The instigator of yet another interoffice feud.
“See? It weren’t heavy like you said it was gonna be, Ms!”
Todd Storton is coming up the stairs on my left. He’s carrying the always ever-present four water jugs. A good-looking office girl is walking in front of him. She turns back slightly, smiling politely. I can tell it’s a fake grin – she confirms this by turning away and rolling her eyes, instinctively I’d wager. Professional office courtesy. Feigned interest. Storton’s face looks like he’s just scored the winning touchdown in the championship game.
CLANK: A Book of Madness (Psychological Satire Novel) Unsettled Office Worker Loses the Last Screw Page 2