The girl walks right on by me without so much as a courtesy smile. I look over to Storton and find him staring at the woman’s butt. His eyes dart from cheek to cheek.
“Well done, Storton, you’re a real ignoramus,” I say mockingly (using today’s word of the day). The dimwit doesn’t register my sarcasm.
“Thanks, Josh,” he replies.
At least it’s a J.
6
My boss’ associate is named Percy Sullivan. Together they form “Cromwell and Sullivan Attorneys at Law.” Put simply, Percy is a complete twit. If Wilmer is the pretentious suave partner, then Percy is the corrupt, gluttonous swindler. He’s a portly fellow with bad breath and thinning hair. Every one of his features is short and squat just like his general appearance. The first impression you get of Mr. Sullivan is one of abhorrence. You look at him and automatically think “there’s goes a pudgy snake, a real slimeball.”
He looks more like a used car salesman than a lawyer. His style of dress is passé and antediluvian, consisting of extremely high-waisted pants and shabby, dull colored suits. Most of which appear to be moth bitten. Occasionally the sleazebag will wear a loud tie which offsets the insipid clothes to a comical degree. It would seem he specializes in conning elderly women. They’re absolutely smitten by his charm. I find it revolting. He dotes on them like a cavalier courter -- or should I say courtier? Opening doors, retrieving items, walking their little purse dogs. The ignorant women smile fondly. They’re all too happy drinking in and garnering the attention of a younger man, even if he is only after their wallets.
I don’t concern myself enough with these matters. But just once I’d like to scream at those old bags “He’s swindling you! Run away!” Who cares. Either way I get my pay check at the end of the month. Percy Sullivan can go right on bamboozling and hoodwinking the decrepit, widowed seniors of the world.
However, there is one thing I cannot stand about Percy… his laugh. I’m positive it’s feigned, not to mention absurdly overdone. Each time he hoots it sounds like he’s being punched in the gut, having the wind knocked out of him. Great big belly laughs. Long Ooooooh! Huh-hah! Oooooooh!’s. How one would go about refining such a chortle is beyond me. Or why they would ever want to… Other times he makes a wheezing noise while chuckling. I find it equally disgusting.
“Good evening, Jared,” Mr. Sullivan says to me as he walks out the door. I fake a smile and find myself staring at the doorway long after he’s left. It’s inexplicable, but for some reason I keep staring and staring. Wilmer Cromwell has already gone home. Now it’s just me in the office. I sit there thinking, “Is this what my life has truly become?” I’m a two-bit, easily replaceable lawyer’s assistant for Christ’s sake! Then I shake my head in despair as I prepare to leave the building. But first, there’s one of my many lofty duties to perform… I enter Wilmer’s room to collect the empty muscle shakes. He’s far too lazy to do this himself. Why not leave it to the peon! Enter me.
And this is where I see it… Wilmer’s computer. No one, as far as I know, has ever seen its contents. The machine is an enigma. For as many times as I’ve heard him tapping away on the keyboard, every instance where I have walked into his office, Wilmer immediately minimizes or exits whatever his onscreen activities were. He’ll sit there with a big goofy grin. Upon seeing me, he will say something to the effect of “Great work today! Keep it up!” He doesn’t have a clue… The computers tempts me to turn it on, just take a quick peek at the internet history. But alas, my spineless demeanor (or good natured, you might say) doesn’t allow it.
On my way out, I cross paths with Natasha. She’s looking just as radiant as ever. Yet, I can tell she’s still a bit disgusted by me. All due to that Storton and his fat, mendacious mouth. Her hand is holding a key to lock her office door. I’m doing the same with mine. It’s at this juncture that I wish for us to speak. Some little fun conversation of sorts… but I lack the moxie. I want to explain that what Storton said was an outright lie. That he is a perverted deviant with no social tact or manners of any kind. Instead, she walks by with her nose sticking up in the air. I even lack the courage to catch a furtive glance of her stunning physique as she disappears. My head hangs in shame, leaving me to count the scuff marks on the floor left by our indolent janitor. We’re all just cogs in a machine. Some more dispensable than others. Me? I’m the kind of cog that if removed, would cause the machine to function even smoother.
I think about going home, yet can’t bring myself to budge. Some strange sensation grips my entire being. Dull clanks ring inside my head – the earlier noise resurfacing in my thoughts… My legs give way. I find myself slinking down to the floor, propped against the wall. Sobbing like a small child.
I’m not sure what happened after my collapse, but the next thing I know I’m being prodded by a shoe. Ellington’s meaty foot tapping against my ribcage.
“Hey Jonathan, you alright?”
“What? Who?” I ask (a heavy grogginess still enveloping my thoughts), before realizing he obviously means me. I’m always a bit dazed and disoriented after waking up. Evidently I fell asleep right there in the hallway, all through the night, now it’s the next morning.
“Sure, I must have fainted.”
“As long as you’re alright,” he says before leaning down and whispering into my ear. “Keep an eye on Cromwell for me, will ya? I think I saw him at a gun shop yesterday.” He tilts his head sideways, looking at me with a bulging, fearful eye.
“Sure,” I say.
Minutes later I’m seated at my desk ready to take on the day. Or something like that.
A man discovers his wife is having a torrid love affair. He does what any sensible person would do: begins plotting her death. A real intricate, cerebral machination. No stone was left unturned. He spends exactly one month planning out every detail, leaving nothing to chance. And I mean nothing.
Here’s what he did. Whenever the wife told him, “I’m going to the tennis club,” he knew that meant she’d be meeting with her paramour. And as of late she’d been playing a lot of tennis. Lord knows how her stroking was coming along. This man here was a well-known, well liked, prodigious banker. A real hard worker and upstanding citizen. Perhaps a little too hard of a worker, which might be why his wife cuckolded him.
By the end of the month his wife was playing tennis every day of the week, without fail. He mentions to her she must be pretty devoted to the sport. The conniving wench laughs, stating that indeed she is. She loves it. So much so in fact that she’s on her way going to club right then. The man smiles, but just before she leaves, he asks if he can come watch her play. The woman stalls, prevaricates, and in the end convinces him that it would be too dreadfully boring. He concurred with that, alright. It was just the response he wanted.
The next piece of the puzzle fell into place. He asks their elderly maid to clean the living room while he rehearses an important business presentation in the next room – no interruptions. This is done so that the maid believes him to be in the adjacent office with the door shut. Previously he had recorded himself speaking into a tape recorder. The presentation was a heated plea for bank management reforms. One which he would deliver the following week. And quite cleverly, he had recorded messages of him barking commands to the maid every once in a while. Saying things such as “Later on you’ll have to help me clean out the attic,” “You must be sure to have the room spotless, I’m expecting company soon.” The maid would reply and the recorded voice would cut her off abruptly, “Sorry, I’m awfully busy. I’ll discuss it with you later,” then go right back to the presentation.
The man surreptitiously sneaked out the backdoor wearing a disguise. He carried a silenced .45 pistol with him as he hailed a taxicab. The taxi reached the desired location within ten minutes. Tennis club showdown. The man pays his toll and exits, electing to walk the few remaining blocks to the hotel room where his wife was busy playing an intense game. He dials a number on his cell phone and, posing as a school staff member, a
lerts the person on the other end of the line that their son has been involved in an accident. He’s at St. Morgan’s hospital.
Immediately afterwards, the hotel desk clerk bolts from the building with a panicked face. The banker enters the hotel, casually walks behind the now unattended front desk and retrieves the master key card. He tucks the prepaid cell phone back into his pocket, making a mental note to dispose of it later. Then the man strolls to the elevator, riding it up to the fifth floor. His wife always used the same room for her tennis lessons. He’d found that out during the month of surveillance.
The man exits the elevator and walks to room 503. There’s a DO NOT DISTURB sign on the knob. The banker chuckles to himself. He slips the key card through the scanner with steady, surgeon hands – calm as can be. The door swings open. He moseys along inside to find his wife right in the middle of a big match, the game winning point in fact. Both players, the wife and her beau, glance upward startled by the fake bearded man. The banker pulls the pistol out from his pocket. Our lovely lady, on top of the scorecards by all accounts, attempts to shriek in fright – she is cut short, summarily shot dead along with her opponent. Game. Set. Match.
Before leaving, the banker places a card into the dead man’s pocket. During his investigation he discovered that the lover had a few outstanding debts to some very unhappy bookies. The banker had gone to the man’s house earlier and stolen what little money was in the apartment. This card was to deceive the police, making them suspect a mob hit.
It worked like a charm. He heads home, sneaks back into the house and enters the living room through the office door. The maid is still busy cleaning away. She assumes he’s been in there the entire time. Police discover their two bodies the next morning. Our heroic banker plays the role of disconsolate husband to the letter. No one suspects him of a thing. It’s written off as a double homicide committed by peeved mobsters. An investigation is prompted by the banker, presumably to hunt down his wife’s murderer. Shortly thereafter, the bookie is forced out of town due to the constant hounding of police. The banker pays off the mobster to conciliate any harsh feelings.
Three years go by with the case being left cold. It is only due to vanity that the banker is eventually caught. He writes a boastful letter detailing every step of his crime and mails it to the local paper. Within hours of its publication, police bring him into custody, where he is soon charged with murder. Two life sentences without the possibility of parole is the reward for a perfect crime.
I envy that man, aside from the getting captured part, of course. These are the cases that interest me. Flawless. Faultless. Untraceable.
7
The Natasha situation has been weighing heavily on my mind. It’s not that I think I’ve got a shot with her. Because I don’t. But I’d prefer if the entire building didn’t think of me as the guy who wants to, what was it Storton said? Ride and spank her all the way home till the cows come home? That doesn’t even sound like something I’d say. But nobody knows that, they care even less. I’m simply the resident pervert now.
As of late I’ve been noticing the other office girls in the building staring at me with a contemptuous eye. I can surmise Natasha spread the gossip around, which makes her a gossipmonger. Normally these kinds of people are first on my hate-list. However, she’s good-looking enough that I’ll overlook the flaw and continue on adoring her. Nuisance or not, the body, no not just the body – her aura is magnetic.
Last night proved fairly eventful. I spent several hours drawing portraits of Natasha. Large, massive, some near full-scale representations. Now don’t think that I’m this crazed lunatic obsessing over a woman who hates my very presence. But, she has a spectacular face and amazing figure. Simply put, it’s great inspiration for my artwork.
They turned out decently. Nothing good enough to display in an art gallery of any credibility. Although the pieces are…unique is the word I’d use. Unique. The style being a cross between cartoon and realism. Everything is in proportion. Just imagine putting a photograph into a “cartoonizer” machine. The result is what my piece looks like. I add a fun flair to everyday things. A lively touch. Some vim and vigor.
Drawing has been a hobby of mine for quite a number of years. The process is relaxing, therapeutic, cathartic – it allows me to vicariously live out certain fantasies which I harbor. In my youth as a middle-schooler I got into a small amount of trouble because of my doodling. I’d drawn several comics depicting me slaughtering my teachers. That’s how the school counselor phrased it anyway. Slaughtering. Perhaps it was a bit dramatic, don’t you think? In truth, they were much more like butchering.
Anyway, as a result of this little run in, they placed me under psychiatric evaluation for three days. I was taken to a special place for loonies -- where they keep you in a tiny cell and everything. Their attendants performed numerous tests on me during my short sojourn. Basic examinations to evaluate my sanity levels. Real simple stuff. Nothing to worry about for any sane fellow.
Naturally, I was released with a clean bill of health. Only now the other children forever thought of me as the teacher killing psycho. That seemed a bit odd to me. I didn’t kill a teacher. I only drew what I thought was a funny cartoon. Yet those bloody children, my supposed peers! labeled me as the teacher killer… That’s all in the past, though. The incident taught me a valuable life lesson: always keep morbid drawings to yourself! The phase carried on for only a brief while. No one ever had anything to fear. Cute, innocent drawings, that’s all. Anyone with an eye for the creative would look upon these with great appreciation. Currently, there’s a large stack of them in my lounge. But in recent years I have nearly ceased drawing them altogether.
It’s only since acquiring my current job that I’ve reintroduced the style into my repertoire. Maybe it’s Todd Storton making me angry. I’ve drawn a few comics where he is dispatched of in various comedic fashions. Quite a sense of pride I have derived from these, being perfectly honest. In one of them he is carrying four water jugs up the stairs. He slips and falls, and continues tumbling down the steps. The four water jugs, bouncing along after him, land on his body at the bottom of the stairs -- crushing his internal organs, causing internal bleeding and eventual death. I slept well those nights.
Natasha. The cartoon version of her has taken on a noirish vibe. I depict her wearing a blood red evening coat and low brimmed hat titled at an oblique angle, covering one eye. She’d be the broad in crime stories who lures the protagonist into danger. The deadly temptress. Femme fatale. Once I finish the drawing, I’m left sitting and staring at the piece for an inordinate amount of time, before finally climbing into bed. Then I dream, experiencing vivid fantasies involving her. Nothing sexual. I imagine what sort of femme fatale she’d be. What crime she’d perpetrate. Who she’d deceive. Sometimes I play the detective Natasha comes to with a problem. Her ex-husband was shot -- now dangerous, mysterious men are stalking her. She leaves out the part about her being the murderer, you know, the one who killed her husband to pocket the last of his fortune.
Stories like those. Just to pass the time.
The psychiatrists from the Looney bin diagnosed me as antisocial, emotionally detached, and possibly mentally unstable. Not too flattering, huh? Although that’s not quite accurate, not by my calculations. You see, I’m an observer. I don’t mind being amongst people, but I rarely speak when I am, which gives me the appearance of an antisocial. But really I enjoy watching and observing. Why should I be forced to talk? There are enough blabbermouths in the world already. What’s wrong with sitting quietly and drinking in the merriment of others? And as far as emotionally detached? Who’s to say what is emotionally engaged or emotionally unengaged? Pencil pushers with fake degrees. Hah! You earn those after reading several outdated textbooks, staring at mice sniffing around for cheese, and blowing your professor. So who is it to say? Certainly not those supercilious pundits and quacks. Let me tell you maledicent filth-ridden sacks of slime something! You imbecilic cretins! Moonca
lves!
Forgive me… I’m forever breaking off into those tirades. But you might too if supposed “experts” classified you as antisocial, emotionally detached, and borderline psychotic. Not exactly kind, flattering words are they? I would have much preferred kind, cheerful, friendly.
At one point the doctors prescribed me a few medications. I’m not sure what they were, but suffice it to say, I didn’t continue taking them for very long. There were three different pills I was supposed to take once a day. And sure, my mind cleared. The negative thoughts went away. But I became a vegetable. Nothing interested me. I was in a state of the doldrums. Grayscale. Zombie mode. One can’t live in those conditions for long.
I remember taking the pills one day and being involved in a car crash roughly three hours later. The light turned red -- I kept going, it didn’t matter. I wound up T-boning some skinhead’s mini pickup truck. My mind didn’t register the crash, at all. I sat in my seat, still pushing the pedal to the floor. The tires spun but naturally the car didn’t go anywhere because our two vehicles had been mashed together. Interwoven steel holding me in place, like a little yap dog yelling out “Somebody better hold me back! I’m warning you!” This bald reprobate came running over and ripped open my door. He then plucked me from the car, and set about raining foot stomps down on my body as I lie on the ground, limp, numb. I couldn’t feel a single one of them. I remember looking up at the blue sky and thinking how pretty it was.
CLANK: A Book of Madness (Psychological Satire Novel) Unsettled Office Worker Loses the Last Screw Page 3