Body Counting

by David Whitman

  Getting the corpse of Harriet Kain was a revenge he had been planning all year from the juvenile detention center. It was all he had talked about to Claire on their many phone calls. It had been Lionel Kain’s fault that he had spent the hellish year there in the first place. The old man had testified as a witness in his assault trial. If Lionel had not testified, there wouldn’t have been enough evidence to convict Kenny. The plan was to dig the corpse up and put it in Lionel Kane’s yard. Kenny had called it “beautifully macabre”.

  After a little trouble, he managed to get the crowbar lodged into the lid of the coffin. It came open surprisingly easy. A wave of foul, rancid air exploded into his nostrils and he fought the urge to gag. It was so pungent it seemed to physically knock him backward.

  Harriet Kain was remarkably well preserved for someone who had been dead for the last two years. Her skin was dried out and parched, but you could still get a good impression of what she looked like when alive. Her long white hair hung down onto her shoulders from where it was still attached to her skull. Her eyes had sunken in considerably, along with her lips. Grey teeth poked out slightly and Claire could see the wire that ran through the flesh in a failed effort to hold Harriet’s lips together by the coroner. A large centipede-like insect crawled across the front of her white wedding dress and down into the coffin.

  “Oh, God,” Claire said from the top of the hole, shaking her delicate hands back and forth rapidly. “That is so disgusting. Are you actually going to touch her?”

  “No, I dug her up so I can stand in this fucking hole and look at her,” Kenny said, reaching under the corpse and trying to remove it gently from where it lay without breaking it. There was a little bit of an illusion that she was attached to the bottom of the wood with Velcro as he pulled it from the coffin with a repulsive ripping sound. He put the alarmingly light body over his shoulder and climbed from the grave.

  Kenny looked very creepy to Claire in the dim light—his face half in shadows like some crazed grave robber from an old horror novel.

  “You want to grab the shovel and the lantern, please?” Kenny asked, trying not to breathe the foul air that Harriet Kain was emanating. When he got to his car he laid the body on the ground while he unlocked the trunk. He put Harriet inside and coughed, gagging slightly. He waited until Claire showed up with the shovel and tossed it into the back as well.

  He slammed the trunk closed, grimacing as more sour air escaped. “God almighty, you would think that she would have gotten rid of some of that stink by now.”

  Claire just nodded weakly and got into the car. Kenny opened the door and sat down angrily. “You know, you showed a lot more enthusiasm for this last week.”

  She offered a fake smile and then turned her face toward the window and the comforting darkness. “I know. Somehow seeing her corpse makes me realize we’re talking about a human being here.”

  “What about me?” Kenny asked. “I spent a year of my fucking life in juvie because of her no-life-having husband. It was either kill his ass, or punish it.” He smiled weakly. “Besides, I like the psychological horror that this plan has to offer. No one will screw with me after this.”

  Claire nodded and put her hand on his knee. “Can we just get this over with?”

  He slapped her hand away angrily, punching the air conditioner on. “This heat is driving me fucking insane.” He turned to her angrily, wiping the sweat from his brow. “And what the fuck is with the patronizing tone?”

  “I’m sorry, but what the hell did she do to anybody?” She gestured to the back of the car. “If I was dead and buried, I wouldn’t want someone digging me up to put me on display somewhere.”

  By the time they got to Lionel Kain’s house it was already near midnight. The neighborhood was dark as Kenny parked on a side street and exited the car. He leaned back into the open window. “You’re coming with me. This won’t be as fun unless I have company.”

  She sighed and got out of the car, saying nothing. Kenny pulled the collar of his shirt over his nose and opened the trunk. He removed the corpse and began walking down the side street toward the Kain residence.

  Kenny draped Harriet over the chain link fence that ran around Lionel Kain’s yard like an old towel and turned to face Claire, a big smile on his face. “Man, this is going to be entertainment heaven. You have no idea how bad I want to get this bastard back.” He climbed over the fence gracefully and then helped Claire across as well. “Okay, I’m going to put the Crypt Keeper here on his front doorstep and ring the doorbell. We can hide in those bushes there.”

  Claire reluctantly went into the thick bushes as Kenny crept quietly up to the front door. She felt like she was going to vomit, her stomach turning around in her body violently. She felt an urgent need to flee, but stayed like some captured animal in front of an out-of-control and careening car. All she could do was stand there and watch it collide with her thin frame.

  Kenny sat the corpse against a column, adjusting her arms to look as lifelike as possible without breaking them off. Nodding, he fixed her long hair so that it hung down over her shoulders and stepped back to get a better look. Pleased with himself, he rang the doorbell and quickly retreated into the bush.

  After a minute, they noticed the curtains move slightly. Lionel’s face appeared, peering out into the darkness. A second later, the front porch light came on. She shuddered as the corpse came into clear view in the light. The door opened cautiously and the old man peeked out. There was a harsh intake of air and he ventured slowly outside.

  The old man walked toward the body sluggishly, almost like a sleepwalker, his breath escaping him in a soft hiss as he moved. His mouth was open slightly, a pained expression in his eyes. Stopping when he was only a few feet in front of Harriet, he stared down numbly. For a brief moment he said nothing, his wrinkled hands curling up into tight fists. The old man stared out toward where they hid, his face a mask a mask of dignified rage. The look of profound anguish in his eyes stabbed into Claire like a blistering knife, twisting into her painfully.

  A brief sob escaped from his lips and then he seemed to weaken visibly, his body struggling to stay upright. Suddenly, he broke down into tears, falling to his knees. His shoulders shook violently and he leaned forward and buried his face in Harriet’s fragile chest. “Oh my god,” he began to whisper like a mantra, running his hands through her coarse hair. Some of the hair came out in his hands and he held a clump out and looked at it briefly. He made a pitiful sound as he let the strands of hair fall slowly to the ground.

  Claire looked over at Kenny and was appalled to see that he was laughing so hard that he could barely breathe. She was witnessing the most profoundly dreadful and disturbing thing she had ever seen and he found it delightful. Any feelings she had ever had for him instantly disappeared, burning away painfully. In that moment, Claire was so ashamed of herself that she felt like dying.

  The old man bent down and lovingly picked up his dead wife. He was weeping as he entered the house and turned the porch light off.

  “Man, that was priceless!” Kenny hissed, squeezing her arm and giggling.

  That night Claire was unable to sleep. The pain of what she had been a part of slashed through her psyche relentlessly. They had forced a man to relive through what was possibly the most tormenting experience in his entire life. Every time she saw the powerful image of the old man crying over his dead wife’s corpse, she felt nauseous.

  The next evening, after a full day of soul searching, she found herself on Lionel Kain’s doorstep. She knocked quietly as if some part of her was hoping that he would not answer at all. Less than a minute later, she was looking into the old man’s pained, haunted eyes.

  “Can I help you?” Lionel asked, his voice hoarse.

  “May I come in, Mr. Kain?” she asked, fighting to speak above a whisper. “I really need to talk to you.”

  He stepped aside. “Sure, come in. We were just about to sit down for dinner.”

  Claire followed him into the
kitchen, stopping suddenly as she tried to chase a scream back down her throat. She wasn’t completely successful and a tiny moan fell from her lips.

  Harriet Kane was sitting upright at the table.

  He pulled a chair right across from the corpse. “Please sit down.”

  “I am so sorry,” Claire whispered, her eyes filling with tears.

  He put a wrinkled hand on her shoulder. “Don’t cry. Why are you upset?”

  “I helped him do this,” she said, her voice quivering. “And now you’re sick.”

  He guided her into the chair. The sight of the corpse hit her like a clenched fist and she closed her eyes. It was then that she noticed the smell, a sharp, pungent odor of decaying flesh and dirt.

  “Well, you’re right about one thing, Miss,” the old man rasped, a line of sweat above his top lip. “I am sick.” She opened her eyes when the sensation of cold metal touched the flesh on her neck. A warm teardrop hit her wrist and she saw that the old man was silently crying. “Have you ever been in love, my dear?”

  She tried to speak but the only sound that came out was soft, trembling hiss of air. Her eyes followed the old man’s mottled arm to the knife he held in his hand.

  “I wouldn’t answer that question with a nod,” Lionel said, offering her a slow, creepy smile. “I’ll just assume that you haven’t been in love, because no one who knew what love was would do what you have done to me.” He looked over at the decaying corpse, swallowed heavily and then wiped the tears from his eyes with his other hand. “Harriet didn’t deserve this. It’s bad enough she suffered so brutally by dying of cancer, but to be dug out of the ground like this is disgusting.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said again, feeling a line of blood run down from where the knife was embedded slightly into her flesh.

  “What you have done can never be forgiven,” he whispered, but he released some of the pressure on the knife. “She’s been dead only about a year and it feels like she was just alive. She sat in the same chair every day.” He smiled, his eyes lost in old memories. “I remember in the last six months all she would eat was broccoli because she heard somewhere that it helped fight against cancer. The both of us knew she was kidding herself. Before she died, she told me what I meant to her. I actually felt inadequate, almost like I wasn’t worthy of her.” He looked back down into her eyes. “She deserved better than me. All I was able to offer her was broken promises and lost dreams. When she died that horrible night in the hospital, I begged the Lord to take me as well.”

  He paused for a moment, struggling with his pain as he tried to bring himself to composure. “I’ve visited her grave every day since she died. I’ve missed her so much. I sit down in the grass and tell her how lonely I am, how much I miss her. Sometimes, I can almost see her smiling. One day I ran into a younger woman in the grocery store. She was the spitting image of my Harriet when we met—blonde hair, these striking blue eyes. She looked over at me and our eyes locked for the briefest of moments. She smiled at me, and I felt myself melt. It felt like Harriet had visited me. That one smile brought back so many memories of her it hit me like a gun. I felt like she was telling me it was okay to move on. Okay to think about things other than her.”

  Claire had nothing to say. She listened to the old man talk and saw Harriet Kain go from corpse to person in her mind. She stared at Harriet as he talked, putting a face to the dried, mottled skin.

  “I was finally coming to terms with her death, finally accepting how terribly unfair life could be,” the old man continued. “Then one night, I open my door and this …” He stared at the corpse and started to shake, his eyes brimming with fiery anger. “This violation is outside. I lost myself last night, went totally insane.” He stared down at Claire, his eyes dancing with rage. “Do you know what I did last night in that insanity? I took her to bed and held her. When I woke up in the morning, I was holding this fucking corpse. Kenny Thompson did this, didn’t he?” his voice dropped to a low whisper, his face pale. “He did this to my Harriet. Paying me back for his own sins.”

  She nodded as his eyes narrowed. He increased the pressure of the knife on her neck. “I want you to call him and tell him to come visit us.” He pointed to the phone. “Tell him he has to finish what he started.”

  Lionel removed the knife and watched her silently as she moved to the telephone. She put the phone to her ear, trying to ignore the fact that her hand was shaking back and forth uncontrollably. When Kenny answered she had to say his name twice as the first time only came out as a mouse-like squeak.

  “Kenny, come to Lionel Kain’s house,” Claire said, her voice trembling as her eyes moved down to the kitchen knife held to her throat.

  Kenny snorted and laughed. “You gotta be kidding me. You went there and apologized didn’t you, you stupid bitch?”

  “Just fucking come, you heartless asshole!” she shrieked, the rage surprising her as she slammed the phone into the receiver. Lionel actually removed the knife from her neck and stepped back a little.

  She looked at the body of Harriet Kain and swallowed heavily. The corpse sat and stared through empty eye sockets. As she watched, a tiny black spider crawled from its mouth and fell to the mud-stained wedding dress before crawling away. At that moment, she was so deeply ashamed of herself she did not care if the old man ended her life. As far as she was concerned, the punishment fit the crime.

  An hour later and Kenny had still not arrived. “I guess your friend is not coming,” Lionel said, staring at the corpse and shaking his head. He stared back at Claire, a ghostly smile on his lips. “It might have been that part where you called him an asshole that cemented his decision not to come and help you.”

  She was about to comment that he would definitely be there when the knock sounded on the door. Lionel’s face brightened up considerably and he shouted, “It’s open!” Claire heard the door open from where she sat at the kitchen table and felt her heartbeat rise.

  Lionel looked up toward the doorway and smiled weakly. “We’re in here, Kenny.”

  She heard his footsteps pat carefully down the hall until he peeked cautiously around the corner. Claire watched his eyes widen when he saw the corpse at the kitchen table.

  Kenny’s gaze locked onto Lionel and the knife held to his girlfriend’s throat. “This is too ripe,” he said, shaking his head as a sick smile erupted on his face. “Go ahead and cut her throat, old man. See if I give a shit.”

  Claire felt Lionel’s hand tremble slightly on her shoulder. She watched in numb fascination as Kenny moved over to a chair right next to the corpse and sat down.

  “Was it worth it?” the old man rasped weakly. “Did I really deserve to be destroyed?”

  Kenny never lost his grin—he didn’t even flinch. He reached over and patted Harriet’s stiff arm. “Oh god, get over it, old man. She’s already dead. You’re lucky I didn’t come after you instead.” He studied the knife. “You may as well take that away from her throat, because I can give two shits if you kill her.”

  The old man let the knife fall away from Claire’s neck and stared over at Kenny weakly. “You know, I had hoped to punish you for what you did to me. I wanted to show you how profoundly you have hurt me. Harriet did not deserve this. You are, without a doubt, the most evil person I have met in my entire life.”

  Kenny reached over and grabbed Harriet’s corpse by the hair. Pulling it to him violently, he wrenched the head from the shoulders with a sickening snap. The headless corpse balanced precariously for a few seconds, the spinal column sticking out grotesquely, and then fell to the floor with a sound like a bag of dried leaves. Dust filled the air around him as he looked up and grinned wickedly, the head held by the hair in his hand.

  Kenny stood up defiantly and held the rotted desecration in front of him, a psychotic grin erupting underneath his icy eyes.

  Lionel reacted as if he had been stabbed in the stomach, doubling over slightly, his eyes tearing up. His hands opened up feebly and the knife fell to the linoleum floo
r with a soft click. “Oh my God.”

  “Kenny, stop this!” Claire shrieked.

  Kenny shook his head slowly and widened his smile. Thick veins stood out on his neck as he watched Lionel’s moment of weakness. It almost seemed as if he derived power from the old man’s frailty. “You want me to stop?” he said, moving forward. “You call me down here and put a knife to my girlfriend’s throat in the hope it would hurt me.”

  Kenny hurled the head into the kitchen cabinet where it seemed to implode into tiny pieces of skull fragments, teeth, and insects.

  The old man’s shoulders heaved as he sobbed. “Stop,” he whispered.

  Kenny moved over to the rest of the corpse and ripped the wedding gown away like it was made of paper.

  Claire did not even know what she was doing until the knife was embedded deeply in Kenny’s neck and the hot blood was spraying into the side of her face. All sound seemed to cease as Kenny looked into her eyes; his blood-filled mouth wide with amazement. He fell into her and dropped almost ethereally, his hands leaving red trails down her sweater as he moved toward the floor.

  Claire fell to her knees, sobbing violently. She felt something leave her body like a breezy whisper and she dropped the knife weakly.

  As Claire kneeled on the floor, she was accosted by images of Lionel and Harriet Kain. An image of the old man praying before his sickly wife in the hospital filled her mind. She saw Kenny climb out of the hole, the body thrown over his shoulders. His face, half in shadow, was grinning like a demon.

  She opened her eyes to the sensation of someone rubbing her shoulders gently. Lionel still sat in the chair, his eyes seeming to study something that was not there. It could not have been Lionel who touched her.

  “I know, Harriet,” Lionel whispered, his voice so soft it was almost ethereal. “I’m sorry for the man I became. I know you wanted so much more out of life. I would have died to give it to you.”