Beautiful Mess

by Herrick, John

  “Have we met before?”

  “You don’t remember me?”

  Now that he mentioned it, maybe he did look familiar. Dirty-blond hair. An inch-long scar beside his right eye. A face that looked older than the man’s voice suggested. He must have lived a rough life.

  Nora shook her head. “I’m sorry, I meet a lot of people.”

  “Poor little dear, you must be confused. You must be so confused.”

  “I am.” Nora quivered at her honesty. “It’s the light. Do you see the spotlight over there?”

  “I do.”

  “It’s so bright. I can’t see, I—I can’t find my way.”

  “Take my hand,” said the man. “I’ll show you the way”

  “Can I trust you?”

  “Of course you can.”

  Nora hesitated. A detail about this man seemed off-kilter, but what was it? Nervousness began to bubble within her gut.

  “Take my hand, Nora.”

  “I don’t think so.” A hint of trepidation. Her legs, weak as a wishbone in carbonated water, quivered before her mind had a chance to respond. “I’m sorry, I need to leave.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “No. Don’t. Please leave me alone.”

  She began to run.

  The man followed. She could hear his footsteps, his filthy leather shoes scratching the pavement.

  Nora sprinted faster and dared to look over her shoulder. She’d had a head start, which had broadened the distance between them. The man ran, too, yet he appeared to do so with halfhearted effort. A jog. At any moment, she sensed, he could accelerate and overtake her. Was he teasing her? Did he know something she didn’t?

  Terror struck her. Nora tried to run faster. Before long, she gasped for breath. Why hadn’t she given up those cigarettes long ago? Now she regretted her decision to continue smoking. Her body would be in much better condition today.

  Nora approached a lawn and continued running toward a forest on the other side, one that reminded her of a park in Colorado where she and her high school friends had hiked on weekends.

  Seconds later, the man’s footsteps stopped scratching and began to swish.

  He had reached the grass.

  Sooner than she’d expected.

  Nora glanced at the forest ahead. Could she find a place to hide?

  No, she thought, the man was too close. Wherever she turned, he would see her. And once she reached the trees, dodging them would slow her momentum.

  Her lungs were on fire. Muscles burned in her legs. Her breaths came quick and shallow in her fright.

  Nora veered left. She had almost reached the edge of the forest. What was on the other side of it, she had no idea.

  Keep running, Nora. Don’t let him catch you.

  Finally, she reached the forest. Nora stumbled over dead foliage and wound between trees. As she knocked branches out of her way, they swung back and scratched her face, cut her arms. She couldn’t keep her footsteps steady on the cracked, uneven ground. If she twisted her ankle, she knew she was as good as dead.

  She heard the whipping of tree branches behind her. The stranger had entered the forest, too.

  Aside from Nora and her pursuer, the forest was deserted. Nobody to see or hear her scream as she died. Treetops loomed overhead, blocking the daylight, obscuring her view further.

  Tears stung her eyes and dribbled down her face. When she peered over her shoulder again, she discovered the stranger had closed the distance between them by half.

  Somebody help me!

  She mouthed the words but couldn’t locate her voice. A squeak grated against her vocal cords, which were raspy from those cigarettes. She felt her energy start to dissipate, which caused her to stumble as she ran. But she couldn’t let herself stop. He would kill her.

  One more glance over her shoulder. The man had donned a black ski mask. Nora’s blood turned to ice.

  When Nora reached the other side of the forest, she stopped short. Her heart jumped in terror at what she saw: a swimming pool, aqua blue, the shape of a jelly bean. The water’s surface appeared pale beneath the leaden sky.

  Then it happened. Her greatest terror.

  Arms locked around her belly and squeezed. The man wore black gloves. She detected the pungent scent of oil, the kind used to maintain a shotgun. The smell of his polyester ski mask sickened her. His breathing pattern, though heavy, remained collected and determined.

  Soon he overpowered her. Nora feared what he might do to her before he killed her.

  “Don’t hurt me!” Nora pleaded. “Please don’t hurt me!”

  The man didn’t reply. He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her to the concrete surface beside the pool. Nora tried to fight, swinging her fists in a frenzy, but the man responded with a throaty laugh as he dragged her across the concrete like a wounded deer. Her legs scraped against the prickly surface and she knew it had broken her skin. She was bleeding, though not much. It was only her leg. Right now, anyway.

  Her voice returned. She screamed.

  Nobody answered. Who owned this pool? A crow, poking along the side of the water, squawked and took flight.

  “Please don’t!”

  “I know who you are. You’re Nora Tasmyn, a frightened little creature,” the man grunted. “I’m here to help you. To end your fear.”

  “Please!” she whimpered as the man dragged her closer to the water. She gasped for breath. To her horror, she discovered her legs had become deadweight. She couldn’t move them. “I’m begging you! Please don’t hurt me!”

  “This will end soon.”

  The man twisted her hair tighter. As he did so, his fist moved closer to her scalp and the pain decreased.

  But her face inched closer to the water as he forced her head forward. Nora flailed her arms.

  “No! Please! No!”

  When her face hit the water’s surface, she held her breath.

  Fight, Nora! Fight!

  If she didn’t escape, she would die underwater. Somebody had to help her. Anybody.

  She opened her mouth to scream—and realized her mistake immediately.

  Water filled her lungs and Nora felt a burning sensation. She flailed faster. Water splashed around her.

  The man shoved her head down farther.

  With her last remnant of breath, Nora screamed, but the water muted the sound. Large bubbles spewed from her mouth as the final trace of oxygen departed her lungs.

  Total darkness.

  Sweat had drenched her body and dripped from her hair. Nora bolted upright.

  The clock read 1:48 a.m.

  Her heart palpitated. She sucked deep breaths through her mouth. Panting, she willed her hands to slow their tremble. A shiver overtook her, so she laid her head against the pillow and drew the ivory sheet closer to her chin, then pulled it over her head completely.

  Thirty minutes later, she realized sleep would elude her for the remainder of the night. Nora climbed out of bed and slid her feet into a pair of slippers she kept at her bedside.

  She thought back to when she had roommates. If they still lived here, her roommate’s dog, a Corgi, would have followed her through the hallway, its claws tapping along the hardwood floor. When she stopped to turn on a light, she would have found the animal staring up at her, its head cocked, waiting to see what she would do next. On nights like these, she missed that dog’s company.

  Nora padded into the kitchen, fished through a cupboard, and settled on a box of chamomile tea. When the kettle whistled, she tossed a teabag into a mug and poured the boiling water into it. A few squirts of honey and lemon juice, then she stirred the concoction and breathed in the aroma. Steam warmed her nose and cheeks.

  Allowing the teabag to steep, she wrapped her fingers around the mug’s hot surface and made her way to the living room, where she nestled on a sofa, crossed her legs, and tucked her feet underneath them.

  Tonight marked the fourth consecutive night she’d experienced insomnia, but the issue had pla
gued her over the course of two months. As for the nightmare, she hoped it was a one-time occurrence.

  She covered herself in a fleece throw and sipped her tea. The liquid soothed her throat, which she had worn raw in the midst of her intense screams. Listening to the swirl of a ceiling fan and the soothing noise of the water heater in the garage, she tried to snooze, careful not to drop her mug. Yes, she wished her roommate’s dog were here to hop onto her lap and nuzzle against her.

  Every day, she fought a lingering impulse to cry. It wasn’t always a heavy, emotional feeling; sometimes it felt like a light burden, a shadow upon her soul, winter frost upon glass.

  Nora refused to take another sleeping pill tonight. It was too late for that option anyway. For that matter, she wondered if tonight’s nightmare was a side effect from putting those chemicals in her body in the first place. She had popped them with growing frequency. Already Nora sensed herself treading along the verge of dependency and feared the cliff.

  So here she was. Sleepless, scared and sullen.

  She retrieved her cell phone from its charger—she hadn’t browsed the Internet all day—and visited a news site. She scanned a few world news stories, then navigated to the entertainment section, where she noticed her name in big, bold letters.

  That wasn’t unusual, so she didn’t react—until she read the rest of the headline.

  NORA JUMELLE SHOCKER

  SEXTING PHOTO LEAKED!

  It wasn’t the top headline, but it appeared above the fold. Nora gasped.

  She clicked to read the article, and when the page opened, she found a large, unflattering photo of herself just below the headline. A full-frontal shot, with black bars censoring the R-rated areas.

  Nora’s eyes darted to the article’s posting time. Just after midnight. A couple of hours ago.

  Fuck, Nora muttered.

  She felt too humiliated to cry.

  CHAPTER 38

  FROM THE CORNER of his eye, Del noted the time as the doorbell rang again.

  3:17 a.m.

  Rubbing the sleep out of his eyeballs, he opened the front door and, as expected, found Nora standing on his front porch. A light drizzle fell, which had moistened her hair.

  “Sorry to bother you,” she said, “I didn’t know who else I could trust.”

  “That’s okay,” Del replied with a yawn, his voice groggy. “Come in. I’ve got a pot of coffee brewing.”

  Nora had called thirty minutes earlier and asked if she could stop by his house. She didn’t mention why, only that she needed to talk to someone before the world awoke that morning.

  The last time Nora had visited his kitchen was—well, that one night and the morning that followed. To his credit, he remembered how she liked her coffee. Del poured two cups and they sat at the kitchen table. Nora shivered, wrapping her hands around her mug for warmth.

  “A cold rain has started outside,” she said.

  “Just a spot shower. They haven’t predicted anything bigger.”

  Del eyed Nora. Based on how she bit her bottom lip and tapped the cup with her fingernail, he figured he should let her begin the conversation. If she’d called him in the middle of the night, it couldn’t be good.

  “Do you know why I’m here?” she asked.

  “No, can’t say I do.”

  As he took further note of her, she didn’t strike him as nervous. Instead, she looked troubled, perhaps scared. Come to think of it, her voice had sounded off-kilter on the phone. Had he noted a tremor in it?

  Nora stared at the dark liquid. Del perceived it as an attempt to avoid eye contact. Then her shoulders slumped.

  “There are some pictures,” she said at last, her voice restrained. “Some not-good pictures. Online.”

  Del had a hunch where this topic would lead. “Pictures of you?”

  “Yes.” A confession, as though he were her priest. “I met a guy at a frat party while I was in college.” Nora met his eyes. “I was on my own for the first time, eighteen years old, free to be myself. And a bit of a wild child back then.”

  Del nodded. He detected nuances of shame in the way she spoke and hesitation in her demeanor.

  “As you can imagine, we did a lot of drinking at that party. He was a gorgeous guy, and I made the mistake of giving him my phone number while I was still half-sober. A few hours later, we were both drunk and started texting back and forth. One thing led to another…” Her voice drifted. She waved a hand in defeat.

  “And?”

  “And…the words became photos.” Nora took a deep breath and sighed. “I deleted the photos he sent me.”

  “But he didn’t return the favor.”

  “No, it doesn’t look that way.” She’d returned her eyes to her coffee and sipped. “I’d forgotten all about that night until now.”

  Del felt bad for Nora, who looked numb.

  He sympathized with Nora. Del, of all people, understood indiscretions. He had engaged in his share of them. Fancying himself an expert on the female form, he had explored dozens—make that hundreds—of nude women over the years. But Del Corwyn had never left a woman humiliated or scared. Some called his lifestyle selfish, and perhaps it was, yet he had always respected a woman’s dignity.

  “These photos have hit the news in the midst of all the Oscar publicity. The timing would have been bad no matter when it happened, but lately, people are paying closer attention.” She gasped with fresh realization and her hand flew to her mouth. “Oh shit, that photo’s gonna go viral. Already has, probably!”

  Del eyed her but said nothing. She leaned forward, her face full of sincerity.

  “Photos like this—I would never do this type of thing, Del. Not anymore.”

  “I know you wouldn’t,” he whispered, giving her a pat on the hand. His response seemed trite, but it was all he could think to do. He wanted to embrace her, to comfort her in her distress, but felt unprepared for this.

  Nora shook her head, her movement ever so slight, which Del assumed was a reaction to the mental bombardment that must have roiled inside her. The anger. The resentment.

  The regret.

  Finally, Nora peered at him again, her face exhausted. An air of resignation hung heavy upon her.

  “This must seem so strange to you,” she said. “None of this social media existed when you became a public figure.”

  If Del had come of age in Nora’s era, he admitted, he might have made the same error in judgment. But she was right, social media had changed things. When he was a teenager, sexual experimentation occurred live, in person, on Friday nights in the back seat of a car at the drive-in. Once the moment passed, the evidence vanished.

  Things were so different today. The evidence never disappears.

  In truth, Del did understand Nora’s dilemma. He had seen it before.

  To this day, he could recall Marilyn’s reaction when her nude image appeared in print without her permission. She had agreed to the photo shoot as a starving artist, long before her fame, back when she was known as Norma Jeane Mortenson. She’d needed the quick cash. At first, her photo was included in a little-seen, dirty calendar. But when the photo rights were sold, she’d felt like a prize horse, sold to the highest bidder at a state fair. People made millions of dollars from that photo and, by Marilyn’s account, not a single person had bothered to thank her for making them wealthy.

  She had sought recognition as an artist, yet the public had seen her as a commodity for trade.

  According to Marilyn, she had received fifty bucks for the photo shoot. Years later, it cost her a fortune.

  She had felt hurt, betrayed, as if she no were no longer allowed to control her own life.

  Yes, Del understood. This online picture was Nora’s calendar shoot.

  Del rose from the table, then eased behind Nora and wrapped his arms around her. He hoped she wouldn’t consider it awkward.

  She didn’t.

  Nora closed her eyes. Del watched as a tear pooled along her eyelid and tricked down her cheek.r />
  And he held her closer.

  CHAPTER 39

  THEY SCHEDULED the press conference a few days after Arnie received confirmation and written documents proving the authenticity of Marilyn’s thumbprints and signature.

  Because speculation had fueled such widespread buzz, Del and Arnie expected an enormous crowd. To accommodate such interest—and to project an image of power—Del booked a conference room in a four-star hotel. He had sought a room large enough to contain plenty of media players, yet limited enough to give the impression that one room couldn’t contain this once-in-a-lifetime event. At first, the hotel staff balked at such short notice, but when Del mentioned the subject matter and the ensuing publicity the hotel would receive, they changed their tune. Amazing, the influence you could wield when power was in your hand.

  He and Arnie wore suits and ties—a power red tie for Arnie, while Del opted for royal blue.

  Del observed from behind a curtain as the room filled to capacity, attendees donning credentials. Reporters from national and local news sources filled the seats, pens, paper and mobile devices in hand, while a slew of videographers set up shop along the sidelines. Photographers lingered near the podium, ready to duck and shoot once the action started. As Del had hoped, the rumors had attracted an overflow crowd. Many reporters, unable to find a seat, assembled toward the rear of the room, while late arrivals spilled into the hotel corridor and elbowed each other for a peek inside the room. A cacophony of chatter filled the conference room.

  Del’s energy surged. Soon he and Arnie would become the center of attention. He’d received precious little media hype since the year of his Oscar nomination, and today’s ambience fired him up. As far as Del knew, Arnie hadn’t received this much attention in his whole career.

  When the press conference commenced, he and Arnie made their way to the podium. Per their earlier agreement, Arnie would do the talking, while Del, as possessor of the rights, would project an image of authority by standing silent until a reporter directed a question to his attention.

  “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the press.” Arnie cleared his throat. “My name is Arnie Clemmons. As you are aware, rumors have circulated regarding the existence of an original screenplay written by the late Marilyn Monroe.”