Seven Deadly Pleasures

by Michael Aronovitz

  The entire appendage had gone numb and it was becoming difficult to keep it in place.

  The bottom side was tough like old gristle. I slashed at it three times and through the runners of red I could see whitish-yellow pebbly things that must have been small fat deposits or something.

  I stopped. My breath was hot and rattly. I was down to bare bone on all four sides and I had lost what seemed about half a cup of blood. The bathtub was a strange, inverted marshmallow with lots of cherry syrup. I did not feel faint. I eyed the clock, two minutes and ten seconds left, I dropped the razor and gripped my thumb in the towel. The compress bloomed dark red instantaneously. And I was far from finished.

  But I can't hack through the bone with that razor. I can barely hold it as is.

  Tick tock, Joseph, tick tock.

  I knew what had to be done. I needed leverage. I put the edge of the towel in my mouth and bit down.

  Carefully, I stuck my thumb up the spigot, braced my feet against the base of the tub, and wrapped my right hand around the left's knuckles. The greasy blood made it hard to take hold, so I pulled as slowly as possible.

  The bone was spry like a green tree limb. It started to bend and I screamed. I screamed Tina's name into the towel.

  The bone finally snapped and a hurl of momentum threw me against the back of the tub. Shampoos and conditioners that had been perched on the edge rained down on me and hot clouts of pain swarmed my left hand in an angry rush. On the other side of the tub my thumb was dancing a bit in the air, doing small twists and pendulum swings from its chain. It looked alive and I looked away. I curled my mangled hand in to my stomach and crawled to grab hold of my lighter.

  I am not going to bleed to death in my own bathroom. I have to cauterize the wound.

  I glanced back at the clock. Twenty seconds.

  I flicked the lighter's dial to the highest setting. I gripped the towel in my teeth a second time and thumbed up a flame. Slowly, like a mad chemist, I brought the flare to the gaping wound.

  There was a fusion of fire, torn flesh, and bone. My eyes blurred over and I shrieked myself silent as the gash was burned burgundy black. It popped and sizzled and I forced myself to keep the flame in place for a full five seconds.

  I dropped the lighter. There was a hard pulse of anguish between the area of my recently evicted thumb and my forearm, and I wanted to curl to a fetal position to cradle the hurt. But my time was almost expired, so I heaved myself out of the tub, fell on my face, and made a three-legged shuffle for the door.

  The timer went off as I was half through the archway and I gave one huge lunge.

  I fell to the carpeted floor of the foyer and sobbed at the ceiling.

  "Was it good enough, you bastard? Have I come clean? Did I get out in time? Fuck you!"

  I heard something strange, a sound quite loud and out of place. At first I thought it was the mad ringing of the timer in my head, but it was not. It was a car horn honking and honking outside of the house. It sounded close enough to be coming from the welcome mat. I got up as quickly as I could, stumbled down the stairs, and threw open the front door.

  My car was backed up on the front lawn, almost to the door, and rocking back and forth in Tina's flower bed. The Reaper was in the front seat and laughing in a broad display of rotten enamels.

  "Wouldn't it be funny if everyone lost the mask?" he said. "Wanna see what that would be like? This is going to be fun!"

  He melted. Bone and black cloth merged and swam like a mass of cartilage tornedoed in a slow-motion blender. The wet lump shifted, cracked, and made sucking sounds as it reformed.

  It became Thelma.

  "Hi, sweet thang." She gave a parade wave that jangled the many silver bracelets on her wrist. Then she spun the tires in a harsh, rubbery roar that kicked up dirt, mulch, and small stones to pepper the walls and shutters. I half closed the screen door and took cover behind it as she tore donuts into my lawn, sending up a confetti spray of grass, tulips, bulbs, and lilies to the warm summer breeze. Just before her sharp turn across the sidewalk and over the curb, she ran down Tina's flowering fig for good measure.

  A horde of children had been watching and the weird event made them go mad with glee.

  No masks!

  It became a dirt-pile free-for-all as they infiltrated and began sliding, stamping, kicking, and rock throwing. I still had not moved. The pain was too close, the visual chaos outside too surreal, like the symbolic representation of something I could not quite put into focus.

  I snapped out of it when they started to break my windows. Two small boys in OshKosh B'Gosh overalls aimed for the panes upstairs. A girl with pigtails and horn rims walked the plowed up garden and stamped her Mary Janes down on the flowers that remained standing. The bigger boy who lived across the street hefted a large cornerstone and waddled it over to the wounded flowering fig. He dropped it and broke the small tree at its base with a wet snap.

  The sound of it was similar to my thumb's last words, and I marched outside. Children scattered. The woman across the street was standing in her doorway and shaking with laughter.

  I strode down my soiled walkway and broke into a run to tell her my thoughts. My thumb stump was still smoking. I was covered with blood.

  By the time she looked up and registered my approach, I was right in her face. There was no choice for her but to step back and suddenly I was in the strange house, backing her into a corner.

  "You rotten witch," I said. "Do you know how hard my wife worked on that garden?"

  "Get out of my house," she said. I had to lean in a bit because she was whispering. She backed from me farther but kept the low tone through her thin lips. "I've despised you and your wife from day one, it's obvious you hate women, and deep down I know you've always wanted my body."

  What?

  She had mean-spirited eyes but now looked a bit too frightened to make them work their magic. Her shaky voice seemed to complement the cheap, outdated wallpaper and the pastel furniture wrapped in vinyl slipcovers.

  "I'll call the police," she said.

  That turned my momentary confusion back to rage and I was tempted to stamp my foot and cry, "I called them first." Instead, I said,

  "Try this."

  I reached for my pants button but my lack of a thumb denied me firm grasp. She brought her hands to her face and screamed,

  "Rape! Rape! Help, Oh God, rape!"

  "Shut up," I said. "I was going to flash a moon, don't flatter yourself." She kept screaming and I moved even closer. "Believe me, I couldn't lie to you even if I wanted to. I was going to shine a moon at you, that's all."

  She kept screaming.

  I turned my back to it, ran out into the sunshine, and made a path straight back to my house. A score of neighbors were watching from lawns, walkways, and patios, and I could feel their greasy eyes on me right up until I threw myself into the living room and slammed the door tight.

  "Jesus," I said.

  The odds are all even and I'm still losing.

  I heard the drone of a siren in the distance. My hand had settled for a dull, pounding throb and I climbed the stairs with weak legs. Then I halted in the bedroom doorway. There was a strange form leaning into the opened closet with a rag-tag pile of ripped cloth hangers at his feet. His coat was stuffed with Tina's antique jewelry and by the bulges in his pockets it looked like he had just about gotten it all.

  It was my buddy the cab driver and part-time cat burglar. He turned and, with a gloved hand, leveled a pistol at my chest.

  "Don't try anything stupid, kid. I don't want to waste you."

  My bladder cut loose. He saw it, gloated, and rode the fear factor for all it was worth.

  "This is loaded with hollow points. They would pierce your stomach like a dime and come out your back the size of a basketball. By the way, kid, you look terrible."

  There was a peal of tires outside. Our eyes jerked simultaneously and he waved me over to the window. One-handed, he snapped the lock and lifted the fra
me. Now the gun was pressed to my temple as we both looked through the screen.

  A weather-stained red pickup was parked in the middle of the street. On its side was a phone number and block letters that read "D'GIDEO PLUMBING." The thick-browed, tattooed bruiser who owned it was rooting through the job box bolted to the back bed. He was red faced and pissed.

  "Who's that?" the cabby said.

  "It's my neighbor from across the street," I said. "Probably got a distressing call from his wife about a rapist."

  The plumber lifted out a long crowbar and started for my walkway. His fickle wife leaned out of her doorway and begged him to stop. Over his shoulder, he shouted back at her in Italian. The cabby shoved me away.

  "Sit down," he said. "Now! On your butt Indian style. Hands in the back pockets, move!"

  I complied and muffled a scream when my left-handed wound scraped the top pocket band. The cabby spoke through his teeth. His voice had a sort of whistle to it.

  "From that position, you won't be able to get up in time to jump me clean, and if you move I'll shoot you like a dog."

  "Please, no."

  He punched out the screen, walked back a step into the shadows, and pointed the gun downward. He fired twice out the window. There was no roar and echo like the movies, just a pair of hearty pop sounds. I heard screams and moans outside and noticed that the sirens were closer.

  My captor walked over and sat on the bed. He rested his forearms on his knees.

  "Go take a look, son."

  I struggled up and made it to the window. The plumber was flat on his back with his eyes open. There was a jagged area where his forehead used to be and the balance of his scalp lay in the grass like a hairy, down-turned soup bowl.

  "I killed him," the cabby said. "It's your duty to turn me in." I turned and he had the gun offered out to me butt first. He nodded at it. "This is useless to me now. Go on, take it."

  I came away from the window, snatched away the weapon, and aimed at his forehead.

  "Just stay right there. The cops will want a big story out of you."

  He laughed. He stood. He bolted for the door.

  "Hold it!" I shouted. I aimed at the ceiling and pulled the trigger to fire up a warning. I got nothing but an empty click. His voice was a teasing, receding call from the stairway.

  "You think I'd hand you a gun with bullets left in it? Boy, are you stupid."

  I looked at the gun in my hand and realized how badly I'd just been screwed. He had been wearing gloves. Now my blood and prints were on the weapon. I even had motive.

  His last words were muffled, but I heard them from the basement.

  "Better get a new lock system, kid. This deadbolt was a piece of cake."

  There was the faint slam of a door and then other slams of car doors out front. I looked through the window and gasped.

  There was an army of cops outside in the street, cruisers crisscrossed on the pavement and angled up both sidewalks. Orders were being shouted and the troopers were falling into patterns, real cowboy shit, long-barreled guns two-fisted across roofs and hoods. I blinked. Members of a S.W.A.T. team dressed in military black were assuming positions on rooftops parallel to my small fortress which was now considered hostile. They had big rifles with scopes and a couple of men were positioning cannon things that looked like small missile launchers.

  I backed away from the windows and ran downstairs for the door, to throw it open, to run out and blare the truth to them all, to go down in a blaze of glory.

  Tina's clipped and amplified voice stopped me. They had given her a megaphone.

  "Joe? Joe, please come out slowly with your hands held high. I love you so much."

  She's alive.

  I fell to my knees and wept into my palms.

  The mask came back. It forced its way into my brain with such force it was almost physical. Relief swept through me and already I was beginning to sort the mess and fabricate stories. I got to my feet and looked at my watch. 10:01. I sighed and looked around for something white to wave.

  There would be an investigation and I would have a lawyer, maybe a team, good, strong masks all around, thank God.

  In the kitchen, I grabbed a handful of white paper towels. Peace. Truce. At last. Still, on the short trip back through the living room I was not mentally focused on my lawyers, my newest excuses, or the pain in my left hand. I was not thinking of the impending trial or how much bail or whether it would hurt when they threw me face down in the dirt to cuff me.

  I thought of none of these things, for my mind was on Tina. Sweet Tina and whether I would ever again feel the taste of her rosebud lips through the thick skin of both our clever masks.

  Quest for Sadness

  I ordered my butler to fetch me a shotgun. To this he raised an eyebrow and revealed the trace of a smirk.

  "Uh huh."

  "Just do it," I said.

  He stuck a long green blade between his teeth, even though I had told him not to chew grass in the house. He hooked one thumb under the dirty blue strap of his overalls and used the other to push the Marlboro cap higher up on his forehead. He smelled of Pennzoil and gas-powered gardening tools.

  "Winchester or Smith & Wesson?" he asked.

  "Something with a kick. Meet me by the west wall and don't tread dirt on the foyer carpet." He was usually careful, but it never hurt to remind him after his morning chores. I took long strides toward the main staircase and had just rested my hand on the banister.

  "Hey there," he said.

  "What!"

  The old coot stood under the archway and stroked his beard.

  "Whatcha want the heavy iron for? There ain't nothing in the west wing but breakables."

  "The glass," I said. "I am going to shoot the stained glass."

  He sunk his hand into his deep pocket and scratched the back of his right calf with the left boot tip.

  "The whole wall is gonna be rough there, fella. That there glass is thick as a swamp and stands ninety foot high by seventy across. Took them artists six months of hard labor to install and it won't come down easy."

  I flexed my jaw.

  "Bring extra rounds."

  ***

  The madness began yesterday on my private six-hole golf course. I was ten feet off the green and chipping for par when the gun went off.

  That cocky old swine. He brought a .44 Magnum today instead of the starter pistol.

  With a slight frown, I stroked through the ball and landed it in the cup. Touch of backspin. I turned.

  "You fired late." He did not respond. He just sat there in the golf cart, feet up, toothless grin, firearm aimed to high north with gray wisps of smoke floating around the mouth of the barrel. My voice was patience. "I told you that the most sensitive point of concentration is needed an inch before contact with the ball. You shot on the follow-through."

  "Well of course I did," he said. "By now, you've come to expect it like an old hog waiting on a slop-bell."

  "Then we need a new game," I said.

  "Looks like it."

  I set my seven iron in its holder and crossed my arms. He scratched his temple with the muzzle of the .44.

  "Can we think of nothing else?" I said. He leaned over the coffee can he always brought with him and spit a long brown runner into it. He wiped his mouth with a sweaty flannel sleeve and smiled.

  "Let's play Antichrist," he said.

  "What?"

  He nodded at me slowly. The smile stayed.

  "You know."

  "No, I don't. Explain. You're no Antichrist."

  "'Tain't about me," he said. "Every dime-store book of prophecy says the Antichrist comes to glory by age thirty-three. Seems time for y'all to be doing the thinking."

  My thirty-third birthday was in two days, and the glint in his eye was constructed of things other than jest.

  "You are permanently dismissed," I said. "Be off the grounds by five or I will have you bodily removed. Start packing."

  He did not stir.

&nbs
p; "I'll call the police right now," I said.

  I went nowhere.

  He tossed the pistol to me. It cartwheeled through the air and I caught it by the handle.

  "Go ahead," he said. "Aim and pull the trigger. Put a slug right between my eyebrows."

  I did nothing. He stretched out his legs, crossed them at the ankles, and clasped his hands behind his head.

  "Now you must ask yourself why," he said. "Why do you choose not to fire the weapon? Is it because you give a damn about your fellow man? I don't think so. Y'all got more money than God and don't feel nothing for no one. Only way you keep ties with a man is by owning him and you won't pull the trigger 'cause it makes no sense to toss away your property."

  "That's ridiculous," I said. "You are my employee, not my property."

  "That so? Did you hire me or buy me with purpose? How much does it take to purchase a soul? What's your definition of slavery?"

  I had no answer for that. He had been a patient in one of the retirement homes I had sold off. He seemed good with machines so I offered to take him in. His response was,

  "Give me back a life and a pair of work pants and I'll do it for free."

  I viewed it as a gesture of charity, the start of a strong bond of trust between a pillar of wealth and the salt of the earth. Now I was being forced to view it as something else. I studied him closely, my butler, my handyman, my lone companion who sat in the golf cart, the one who was brought on to expedite my will, he who would do anything for me because I owned him. I got a sudden whisper of fear in the small of my back.

  "So, I bargained for your loyalty," I said. "Why is that so wrong?"

  His smile vanished.

  "Because I'd break the knees of a baby or take a bullet in my side for you. Go on, now admit who you are."

  "No. You're the one with the problem and there's really no challenge in this. It is too easy to prove that you're wrong."

  "Then do it," he said. "Prove me wrong." I hesitated and he went on with words that seemed treasured and rehearsed. "Children of Satan don't feel sadness, friend. They are incapable of any sense of loss. Tell me one thing that makes you feel sorrow for another."