She knew that there was no way she would be able to do a show tonight. She was a nervous wreck. Her hands were still trembling. She took out her cell phone and called the station manager. As soon as he answered the phone, she blurted out:
“I’m sick—I can’t go on tonight.”
“Vera?”
“Yeah. I’m not feeling well. Play a ‘best of’ show or something.”
He sighed in disappointment. “But there’s so much buzz about you… We’ve been getting calls all day.”
“I just threw up,” she said. “I’m sick. My head’s…” She was about to describe her mental state, but faltered. “I can’t do it,” she said pleadingly.
The station manager sighed once more. “Okay.” He began another sentence, but Vera disconnected the call. She spoke to the limousine driver then:
“Take me back home.”
During her drive home, the thoughts would not leave her. When the boyfriend eventually died (somehow she imagined him still lying on the ground, suffering) …when he finally died, he would come back to life worse than ever. There would be no one there to tell him that everything was fine. Nobody would be there to make him forget all the horrible things that had happened. She had presumed to make things better—to play God with the boyfriend’s life—but she had only made a bigger mess of things. She looked at her watch. It was not too late to go back…but she shuddered at the thought of it. She could not do it. She could not go back to that scene. She did not have the stomach to hold him as his corpse came back to life; she could not talk to him in the calm manner that Stacy would, giving him a hundred intricate directions on what he was to remember and what he was to forget. She would only make matters worse. She knew it. …Maybe Stacy was home by now. Maybe Stacy would get there in time and make things right. Vera had to wash her hands of it all. Stacy and the boyfriend were on a crash course with disaster, and Vera felt in her gut that she had to free herself of them before they dragged her down with them. She was running away as a coward, but she was honest with herself about what she could and could not do. The time for courage and integrity had passed: she had failed miserably. All she could do for now was accept that fact.
Whatever the case, she did not want to think anymore. She needed to sleep—to have a wonderful dreamless sleep. She still had some sleeping pills that her doctor had prescribed for her during a stressful, sleepless patch of her last book tour. She would take them when she got home and allow her thoughts and cares to fade away.
As soon as she got home, she went to the medicine cabinet and took two of the sleeping pills. They had probably expired months ago, but she did not care. She took them and went straight to bed. She was relieved as she felt the drug-induced oblivion of the sleeping pills taking hold of her.
The cell phone rang. It rang six times, before the call was automatically directed to her voice mail. She was aware of this vaguely. The drug-induced sleep was wearing off, but as she remembered all too well, the drug always left her feeling anxious. When the phone rang again, she jumped. She turned on the light. She had tossed her bag on the bed when she entered the apartment. She got out the cell phone and answered it.
“Yes?”
It was the detective. “Are you okay?”
She grimaced, remembering everything that had happened. “…I’ve been better.” She glanced at the time, seeing that it was a little after 2 a.m. A hundred horrible scenarios flashed through her mind as she thought of all that could have happened to the boyfriend in that time. He had probably come back to life and gone on a rampage. She tried to convince herself that it was not her concern, but she was unable to delude herself this time. She felt her heartbeat picking up—growing erratic. She pulled away from the phone and inhaled deeply. When she put the phone to her ear again, the detective continued:
“I noticed that your show tonight was a repeat.”
It took her a moment to realize what he was talking about. “I wasn’t well,” she explained.
He detected something in her voice and assumed it to be exhaustion. “Did I wake you up?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No problem. I’m up now. …Maybe I need to talk.”
“I need to talk to you, too.”
“About what?”
“Your friend Stacy.”
Vera shuddered. “…What about her?”
“Her boyfriend’s dead. We’ve been looking for her.”
Vera was trembling; she sat up straighter. “…What did you just say?”
“Her boyfriend is dead.”
“But he can’t die.”
There was a bemused tone to the detective’s voice. “Everyone can die, Vera.”
“But he can’t die. This is all a misunderstanding.”
He paused, confused, eventually putting her reaction down to grief. “I’m sorry to bring you such bad news—especially in the middle of the night. I guess you were close to both Stacy and her boyfriend.”
Vera shook her head. This had to be a misunderstanding. The detective did not know the boyfriend’s secret after all. She tried to think clearly, despite the groggy, anxious feeling that the sleeping pills had left her with. At last, something occurred to her. “Did you see his body?”
“Yeah, I was just at the crime scene.”
“When did you see him last?”
“An hour ago.”
“He was dead an hour ago?” she said, her face creasing.
“Yeah,” he said jokingly, “and he’s still dead.”
Vera stared at her alarm clock, doing and redoing the math in her mind. “Do you know how long the body was dead?”
“Why do you care?”
“I’m just wondering,” she said numbly.
“I think the coroner said about eight hours.”
Vera’s insides went cold; unconsciously, she pulled her sheet over her exposed shoulders. This had to be a mistake! The boyfriend could not die. He would come back to life…but he should have come back to life seven hours ago. It only took an hour and six minutes for his body to reanimate. Vera was nibbling her fingernails, trying to see some kind of escape hatch—
“Vera?”
She jumped. She had forgotten that he was on the phone.
“Are you still there?” he asked again.
“Yeah,” but as she said it, it occurred to her that she had dropped the ice pick on the floor after she stabbed the boyfriend. Her fingerprints had been on them, and on the door. Her vomit had been in the sink, and she was pretty sure she had left Stacy’s keys in the apartment somewhere. When the police checked the fingerprints, they would have an airtight case. On top of all that, the limousine driver had driven her there and seen her state when she ran from the building—
“Oh my God!” she whispered when she saw the extent of it!
“Vera?”
“I feel sick,” she blurted out. “I gotta go.” She disconnected the call and ran to the bathroom. Once she was in the bathroom, she dry heaved into the sink until some bile came spewing up. When she was done, and her stomach muscles felt shredded, she collapsed onto the floor, staring into space. …Had she really done it? Had she really killed a man…?
Maybe half an hour passed. Maybe it was longer. Vera returned to bed and lay there in a daze. Eventually, the buzzer for the intercom sounded. It sounded four times before Vera realized what it was. Someone was waiting outside for her. She was not in the state of mind to see anyone about anything, but she felt, somehow, that it did not matter anymore what she wanted. If she had really killed a man, then there was no point resisting whatever was to come. She expected it to be the police. Maybe the detective would come for her personally. She got up and walked over to the intercom. Her legs were unsteady. She swayed from side to side, then leaned on the wall, facing the intercom. She pressed the button to speak to the person outside: “Who is it?”
“It’s me—Stacy.”
Despite what she had resolved in her mind, about not resisting what was
to come, Vera gasped and backed away, staring at the intercom as if it were Stacy. Vera was trembling again. However, the impulse to flee passed, and she went to the intercom again, pressing the button:
“What do you want?” she said too loudly—as if trying to convince Stacy that she was not terrified.
“Vera, please—let me in. We have to talk.”
“What do you want?” she said again, her voice quieter now—cowed.
“I know what you did to my boyfriend.”
Vera could not move. The words seemed to echo in her mind.
Stacy went on, “Let me in, Vera. We need to talk.”
“The police are looking for you!” Vera screamed, even though the statement seemed unconnected to anything. Maybe she wanted to scare Stacy away.
Characteristically, Stacy chuckled. It sounded otherworldly over the static of the intercom. Vera shuddered again—
“Let me in, Vera,” Stacy said; and then, “You need me.”
Those strange words, which Stacy had been using since the beginning, finally made sense to Vera. The full extent of her situation hit her again—how she had dropped the ice pick on the kitchen floor; how she had left the keys (with her fingerprints on them); how the limousine driver had seen her…She saw the limousine driver in the dock at her trial now, describing how she had run from the place…. Yes, Vera needed Stacy. That was plain. If there was any hope of her getting out of this, then she needed Stacy. Moreover, if the case was already hopeless—and Vera could not help thinking that it was—then there was no point in avoiding whatever was to come.
Vera stared at the intercom for a few more seconds, and then she pressed the button, to open the door.
Vera left the door open for Stacy, and sat down on the couch, waiting for Stacy to enter. The reality of her entrapment hit her again, and she grabbed her head in her hands. She was in this position when Stacy entered. She looked at Stacy when she came in, comparing the serene face she now saw with the cackling maniac she had seen that afternoon. She stared at it in bewilderment, wishing somehow that that serene expression would somehow portend her salvation. Stacy smiled at her and walked over to her, sitting down as though nothing had happened.
Stacy said: “Are you okay?”
Vera stared back at her as if not understanding. At last, she shook her head: “No, of course not.” And then, she found herself rambling on, as if she were compelled to account for herself: “…After you killed him this afternoon, he called me over. You didn’t tell him a story when he came back to life, so his mind fell apart again. He said you weren’t there.” She was talking even faster now, seeming on the verge of tears. “…I killed him,” she said at last, “…but he didn’t come back! They say he’s dead!” she broke down, looking at Stacy with tears in her eyes. Stacy hugged her.
“It’s okay, Vera. It had to happen sooner or later.”
When they detached, Vera looked at her confusedly. “What had to happen?”
“His death. You saved me by killing him.”
Vera’s face creased. “What do you mean?”
Stacy looked at her and smiled wider. “My boyfriend was never immortal, Vera.”
“But I saw—”
“You saw him coming back to life after we killed him. That’s all you know to be fact. He was never immortal.”
“Then how…?”
“You know how, Vera.”
Vera stared at her; her eyes finally grew wide when the answer occurred to her. “It was you.”
“Yes, it was always me. Every time he died, I was there. I was the one that gave him life. When you killed him without me, he could not be brought back to life, because I wasn’t there to hold his soul.”
Vera could only stare. About ten seconds of silence passed. Vera relived everything in her mind, seeing that what Stacy had said was true. Stacy had been there every time. It had always been Stacy.
“I can store souls within me,” Stacy explained again.
“But how?” Vera asked, bewildered.
Stacy smiled. “You’re still asking the wrong questions, Vera.”
“Damn it, Stacy!” Vera screamed in frustration.
Stacy laughed at her. “…Anyway,” Stacy said after her laughter died down, “You saved me, Vera. If you hadn’t killed my boyfriend, I would still be the raving lunatic you saw a few hours ago.”
Vera’s face creased again: “…I don’t understand.”
“Didn’t you notice how unstable I got over the last few days?”—Vera nodded her head—“Every time I killed him, a piece of him stayed with me. I had all his thoughts and memories in my head. After a while, so much of him was in me that I lost myself—lost sight of reality. When you killed him without me, he was purged from my system.”
“You don’t care that he’s dead?”
“I needed him, Vera,” Stacy said simply, “but this was never about him and me. This was always about you and me.”
Vera did not understand at all. There was even a side of her that did not want to know. She looked away and shook her head. The reality of everything hit her once more, and she sat back heavily. “Either way, the police have an airtight case against me,” she said then. “I left all that evidence behind when I killed him.”
“I know,” Stacy said nonchalantly, “—I was the one that called the police.”
Vera’s frown deepened. “But, why?” she said, feeling betrayed.
Stacy smiled. “Relax, Vera. It’s not what you think.”
“What am I supposed to think?”
“No one will ever suspect you, Vera.”
“But I left all that evidence! I left the bloody ice pick…my keys with my fingerprints. I even left my vomit in the sink!”
“I took care of it.”
“What? …You did? I don’t understand.”
“The police will find evidence, but it won’t point to you.”
Vera stared, unable to understand. Stacy revealed:
“Everything will lead to the senior citizen porn couples.”
“But why?” She did not want to be implicated, but she did not want to frame anyone else either.
“Don’t worry about it, Vera. The case will never hold up.”
“Why not?”
“For one thing, they’re totally insane. I killed and reprogrammed them earlier,” she went on in the usual matter-of-fact way; Vera’s eyebrows raised. Stacy explained: “When they came back to life, I told them everything to say and do. In ten minutes, they’ll be found running naked down the street; when the police question them, they’ll rant and rave and say things that will put them at the scene of the crime. Their fingerprints will be found on all the evidence. It will look like some kind of orgy gone wrong.”
“But they’ll be sent to prison,” Vera pointed out. “They’ll die there.”
Stacy shook her head. “They were already dead, Vera.”
“What do you mean?”
“When I realized that I had this power to bring people back, I discovered that I could sense when people were going to die. That’s where I disappeared to on Monday. I was amazed by the power. It was as if some force were calling me—leading me to them. I went out to their neighborhoods and knocked on their doors. I’d be right there when they had their heart attacks or stokes. When they came back to life, it occurred to me that I could make porn stars out of them.”
“Goddamn,” Vera whispered.
Stacy sniggered. “I’m not saying I was entirely sane at the time. Anyway, they were already dead; with the madness I programmed into them, they’ll be sent to an insane asylum, not prison. I gave them instructions to revert to their old selves once that happens, so that their stay should be a short one.”
“It still doesn’t seem right, Stacy. I was the one who killed your boyfriend. I can’t have anyone else in jail for even ten seconds if I’m the guilty one.”
“But you’re not guilty, Vera. Technically, my boyfriend was already dead. He died when he fell off that ravine. Everything else was
like a daydream. You killed a corpse. The people about to be picked up for your ‘crime’ are corpses.”
That still did not seem moral to Vera, but she had to admit that she was relieved. Stacy was smiling at her when she looked up; Vera was suddenly desperate to believe in that smile.
“Are you sure it’s going to work?”
“Of course.”
Vera remembered something else: “What about you? The police are looking for you. How will you explain your absence?”
“I won’t have to. After forty-five minutes of pointless police interrogation, the old couples will let it slip out that they have me tied up in the trunk of their car. They’ll tell the police where they parked the car, and when the police finally track down the car, they’ll find me bound and gagged.”
“Huh?”
“That’s where you come in,” Stacy said with a smile. “Are you up to it?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Good. Let’s get going.”
The old people’s jalopy was waiting outside Vera’s condo. Stacy handed her some latex gloves, then she put on a set of her own. They got in the car, and Stacy drove them to an even more secluded section of Vera’s neighborhood. As always, Vera was amazed by how detail-oriented Stacy was—how she accounted for every last concern. A sense of relief was creeping into Vera now. Stacy was saving her life. In a way, they were both starting afresh; and Vera, in that moment, would do anything for her. Once Stacy parked the car on the curb, they got out of the vehicle and walked to the back. Stacy opened the trunk and took out a roll of duct tape.
How to Kill Your Boyfriend (in 10 Easy Steps) Page 24