by JT Lawrence
“Only for a second,” he laughs, his face still showing relief.
“What kind of idiot would sit and describe exactly how he was going to kill someone in a public place like this?”
His wiring may be a bit shorter than I originally guessed.
“I don’t know.” He laughs in a high pitch. He may be a little hysterical. “I was wondering.”
“Jesus.”
He gulps down a good portion of his draught.
“So you’ve finally cracked an idea. Congratulations. Let’s have one more beer to celebrate, I’m buying. You can tell me all the gory details.”
“You write. That’s the hard bit that nobody sees.
You write on the good days and you write on the lousy days. Like a shark, you have to keep moving forward or you die.”
- Neil Gaiman
13
Mind Map
I spend the next day creating a mind map of the murder. I have time sequences built around Eve’s routines, drawings of her house plan, inside and out, a key taped to the address. I have pictures of her, too. There is a map of the river. I include the pink pills in their packet in my collage; it adds another dimension, like one of her mixed media artworks. I wonder what she would think of it.
The murder weapon is a work of beauty, if I do say so myself. It was a gift from my mother a few years ago, which, I guess, has a peculiar kind of irony. The good thing about it is there will be no record of purchase and I have never seen anything like it in this country. It practically doesn’t exist. Gifts from mom are always a surprise on two fronts. Firstly, because she tends to forget birthdays and Christmas and just sends things on an ad hoc basis. Secondly, the things she sends are puzzling. When I turned thirteen I unwrapped a second-hand bicycle pump. It sounds interesting and eccentric but there was never so much as a note included to help me understand the obscure presents. So I’ve always felt like I just didn’t get them.
The knife is porcelain, Japanese, with an intricate carved handle. Sharper even than those they demonstrate on the shopping channel, where they inexplicably slice open tins and garden hoses. So sharp that I almost lost a finger trying to make gazpacho one day and thus relegated it to a drawer in the kitchen I hardly ever open.
Francina had to drive me to the hospital that day. Me, trying to stem the flow of blood so as to not a) die and b) stain the champagne suede interior of my Jag, with Francina trying to work out the difference between the accelerator and the brake. We arrived and parked at the hospital in starts and jerks of the V8. Francina, flaunting the key ring to other bruised, beaten and bleeding patients, wouldn’t stop beaming for the hour we spent in the emergency waiting room (it was only then she confided she couldn’t drive). Eight stitches and a reattached index phalange later, I let her drive us home again.
I haven’t seen Francina since the party a week ago. She’s usually very good at calling me if she can’t make it to work, but I haven’t heard anything and Thursday was her second no-show. So I’m a little worried but I’m sure there’s a good reason. Like a fashion emergency. The house is still a war zone of sharp objects and party stains.
I’m quite glad to have the privacy anyway. My mind map takes up the entire kitchen table and the last thing I need is Francina in a tutu, mid-vacuum, popping bubble gum, trying to figure it out.
I have some small mementoes of Eve I don’t stick to the map. A picnic serviette marked with her pale lip-gloss, a tortoiseshell hairclip, a Polaroid of us at a fancy dress party. Despite my general good spirits there are fleeting moments of sadness that I don’t have Eve anymore. We were, at stages, incredibly close. At times I have felt that I would do anything for her. The thing that drew us together, I think, is that we’re both pretty much loners. Both had a nasty childhood, both find our salvation in our art.
“Deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance.”
- Oscar Wilde
14
Unfortunately, Corpses Don’t Bruise
Sifiso picks up on the first ring.
“CONGRATULATIONS! I knew you could do it! When can I see it? The suits are going to be so RELIEVED!”
“Sifiso, I …”
“I TOLD them you still had it in you. To be honest, I had my BALLS on the line.”
Before I can stop it, the image of Sifiso’s black hairy balls is firmly imprinted in my front temporal lobe. In my head, I gag.
“So, I don’t have the actual manuscript yet …”
Silence on the other side.
“I’ve cracked something that I know will work. It’ll be my best yet.”
Still nothing.
“So I didn’t want you to worry. That’s why I called. Er … Hello?”
A sigh reaches me.
“Look, Harris, you must tell me if you need anything. ANYTHING. Whatever will help you FINISH this thing.”
“That’s kind.”
“It’s got nothing to do with being KIND.”
“Got any muses in your artillery? Preferably blonde with great tits?”
I’m only kidding. Ha ha.
“Sifiso, I’m only …”
The line goes dead.
So this is the plan I have finally decided on:
I break into the house before Eve gets home from work to do the prep work. I say ‘break in’ but really, we have each other’s house keys for mutual house-sitting so I’m just going to let myself in. In my mind I have come up with a cunning plan that involves stealing her keys for half an hour, having copies made and replacing them before she notices. I would do it for real except that she’s not speaking to me, so it would be complicated.
At 4pm I’ll park my Jag a street down at the local shops where there are lots of cars and walk the kilometre to her building with my backpack. Once inside I’ll pour the GHB powder into the kettle and wait for her to come home. After drinking her Oolong she’ll feel light, uninhibited and disorientated. Because it’s still early and she won’t want to go to bed, maybe she’ll decide to have a bath. If she doesn’t I’ll step out of her bedroom cupboard and run one for her, help her into it. By that stage she won’t think it’s unusual that I’m there. When she’s in I’ll kneel down at the side with her and hold her hand. Tell her she’s beautiful and I will always love her. Kiss her lightly on the forehead and the lips, like putting a child to bed. I need to be up close. And when she’s completely relaxed and has her eyes closed, I will unwrap the knife I have brought and stick it through her ribs and into her heart. Her eyes will flutter open, she’ll look at me, wanting to know what has happened, why she has this heaviness in her chest, why she feels her colour is fading. Then I’ll pull it out and she’ll close her eyes again and it will be over. She will bleed then. Bright red bathwater against the porcelain of her skin. The gentlest murder ever committed.
Or rather, not committed, as I have to keep reminding myself.
I’ll dry her with a soft towel and dress her in clean clothes, cutting them over her chest where she has this new slit in her body, so initially it’ll look like something from the car, like the steering column, has punctured her. I’ll lay her out on her perfectly made bed and wait until 3am when there’s little chance of running into anyone while I carry the body to her car. Enjoy the quiet drive to the river. Once we’re there I’ll put her on my lap while I drive as fast as I can over the bridge and slam into the water below. This is one thing I’ve done before so I know how to get out of it. I know how quickly the water rushes at you and holds you in, wanting you to stay. I know the pressure exerted on the car from the heavy water outside makes it almost impossible to open a door. Jams the windows. I must remember to not panic when I realise I can’t move, can’t get away, that I have to take off my safety belt.
Then I will touch Eve’s skin for the last time and swim away.
I’ll have a car waiting in the trees nearby, with dry clothes in the boot. Drive the hour back to the parking lot at the shops while listening to Depeche Mode and swap cars. Leave the keys with the café owner as organised with
the car hire company, with my fake driver’s license (an international driving permit for only fifteen pounds from www.fakepermit.co.uk). I uploaded a jpeg of my ID photo and the card was in my letterbox within days. It’s convincing enough and comes with a very attractive hologram design. Apparently my credit card statement will read ‘Greeting Cards Galore (PTY) LTD.’, in the same way as when you’ve been to the strip club and your statement reads ‘T# Restaurant’ instead of Teazers (I’m not quite sure who this is supposed to fool).
Once I put my key in the front door of my house I think I’m home free. But that’s the thing. I mean if I really were to go through with it, there would be hitches and mistakes, all the better for the story.
Perhaps when I let myself into her apartment, she’s already there. Maybe her car is at the garage for an aircon re-gas, so I surmise that she’s not home but then end up walking bang into her, in the kitchen. I say I was going to surprise her and she looks around for champagne and roses. Instead, she finds ground-up sedative and a murder weapon wrapped in a fluffy towel.
Or else the GHB doesn’t work: the scumbags have sold me dyed aspirin or speed and, when I step out of the bedroom cupboard she gets the fright of her life and shoots me between the eyes with the 9mm Beretta I never knew she had. Then she’ll feel awful, so awful for shooting her friend in the head: she’ll cry and groan and throw herself over me. Dial for an ambulance, scream into the phone.
Until she discovers the contents of the backpack and then she’ll jump away from the bag and my prostrate body, as if from a wolf spider, cancel the emergency services, wait for me to bleed out, call the police. She’ll sit on the edge of her bed, blood-splattered, gun hanging from limp hand, and look at me with a lost expression. The confusion will lead to exhilaration when she realises she has just cheated death and her heart will pump away.
Or I could be carrying her to the car when I walk around a corner and straight into a drunk resident trying to get his key in the door. He’d look at the body and know she’s dead. He would recognise her pale face as the neighbour he’s always trying to screw. He’d smile and pretend that he can’t see shit because he’s so drunk, perhaps make a sleazy joke, but as soon as he steps into his apartment he’ll slam the door closed, triple lock it, and call the cops.
So I would have to kill him too, the drunken lamb. Punch him in the face, as he’s scrambling to get that stubborn key in the door, and then slit his throat. Take them both hurtling off the bridge. And then of course the multitudinous things that can go wrong in the car underwater are just too much to go into, so let’s not even begin. But when they find his throat slit they’ll know it’s murder, so the whole plan has to change anyway. The car will have to crash and explode to destroy the evidence.
Or I could dump him somewhere altogether different and make it look like he was just a drunk stumbling into trouble. I’d take his wallet and watch and leave his credit card for a travelling bum to find.
Or I could drag him into his apartment as soon as I’ve knocked him out and make it look like Eve killed him in self-defence. Put her fingerprints on a glass of wine. Rough her up a bit, tear her panties. Unfortunately corpses don’t bruise. Still, a bit hard to swallow.
So many scenarios to choose from, my writing hand is itching. Without even touching my Moleskine I dive straight onto my laptop. The phone rings a few times in the background but I block it out. I’m writing so fast that I can hear the sound of my fingers hitting the keys in a strange kind of disembodied way, as if my thoughts are just being deposited right onto the screen in front of me. Divine Dictation. I write for hours and hours without even realising it. The sun is setting and the last thing I had to eat was a rusk with this morning’s first flat white. I’m excited down to my lower intestines. My lungs are filling with air, my blood is rushing.
Christ, I love this feeling.
I feel like I could go all night but I don’t want my prose to tire. I force myself to shut down the machine and I order in chicken tikka for dinner. I’m not hungry but I want to feed my body so that this energy keeps coming.
When I turn in for the night I know that I won’t be able to sleep. I try to read Zadie Smith’s White Teeth but, much as I appreciate her writing, I can’t concentrate on the story. In the first chapter corduroyed Archie Jones is in the process of gassing himself in his Cavalier Musketeer Estate, with his medals in one hand and his marriage certificate in the other, ‘for he had decided to take his mistakes with him’. At the mere hint of death I’m losing focus all over the place. My mind bunnyhops. Eventually I give up sleep and sassy Ms. Smith, and start scribbling the ideas as they come to me. I write deep into the night, promising myself just one more hour every time the long hand meets twelve, eventually falling asleep when the hadedas start making a ruckus in the orange glow outside.
Bless you Jesus!
15
Like Dogs, I’m Sure They Can Smell Fear.
Something wakes me.
My eyes feel as though they have sand in them, reminding me that I haven’t had enough sleep. I look down and see that I have slept clutching my pen to my heart. My notebook is at my bent knee. I feel oddly at peace with the world. I think I’m even smiling a little.
The doorbell rings. That’s what must have woken me. I swear under my breath at whichever hawker is getting me out of bed at this hour but it fails to dampen my mood. I get ready to yell and shake my fist.
I look through the peephole and see a uniform. I rub my eyes.
Blue. SAPS blue. Then I see another. Their squad car is parked politely in my visitor’s bay.
I feel like I’ve been punched in the face.
Has something happened? Has my car been stolen? The neighbour been burgled? Has my father had a heart attack?
Have they caught me buying a fake driver’s license?
Did they catch me buying drugs? Those sneaky anti-crime cameras in the dodgy parts of the city can pick up number plates. It doesn’t help that mine is personalised. It reads ‘MERCENARY’ in honour of my first novel, when now, in retrospect, I think it should read JACKASS.
I jab the speaker button.
“Hello?” I say with all the calm I can.
“Open up please sir, this is the police.”
“The police?”
So I wasn’t imagining it.
“Yes, sir, this is the police.”
Oh my God, I know something is wrong. Maybe if I don’t let them in they will go away.
“Well, what do you want?”
They speak amongst themselves. I hear eish-ing and shushing, ambush sounds, as if they’re discussing how to break down the security gate so that they can slap cuffs on me and drag me to the car.
“We have some questions, Mr Harris,” says one.
“Just open the gate, sir,” says the other.
“Please,” adds the first one.
Oh God. Good cop, bad cop. I’m about to let them in when I remember the giant mind map on the kitchen table. I run through, scrunch it up and look for somewhere to hide it. I feel panic rising and try to keep a level head. I end up dumping it in the laundry hamper in the bathroom and cover it with a towel. Out of breath, I press the buzzer to open the gate and with shaking hands I unlock and open my front door. They both stop in their tracks when they lay eyes on me. I look down and see that I’m only wearing a pair of jocks. In my fright I hadn’t thought of what I had on.
“Come inside,” I say. “Let me just throw on some pants.”
Pants? Why did I say pants?
The Good Cop smiles. Toujours la politesse. The taller one avoids eye contact. I throw open my cupboard and reach for the first things I see: torn jeans and grubby t-shirt. I lead them to the kitchen. They decline cappuccinos. They probably hate people who drink cappuccinos. They probably despise people who sit at arty cafes and smoke Vogues while talking about literature and sipping frothy coffee drinks. They probably drink neat Ricoffy, black and scalding, or burnt, tepid filter coffee, while they find missing persons and h
unt down dangerous criminals and make the world a better place.
They also decline fresh squeezed juice from my Juicerator and Francina’s favourite pecan nut rusks.
The taller one is still not meeting my gaze. I look down again and see that I’m wearing an old varsity shirt that says ‘Half Man, Half Horse’.
I’m sure they can tell I’m nervous. I’m fluttering around the kitchen like Albert Goldman in Birdcage. I plug in the cappuccino machine anyway and flick the switch. I try to calm down.
Like dogs, I’m sure they can smell fear.
“Would you like to sit down?” I ask, sure that they’ll shake their heads. They don’t have time to lounge around my kitchen. They’ve got serious cop business to attend to.
They nod and pull up a chair. I gulp and sit down with them. I read the names off their badges. Madinga and Sello. Shifty-eyed Sello. It occurs to me that I didn’t ask for any kind of identification. I don’t want to piss them off and it’s probably too late anyway, seeing as they’re sitting in my kitchen with revolvers on their hips.
“Do you mind if I … can I ask you for … some ID?” I ask, too bright by far.
They look at each other as if I’ve told them an old joke. Each suppressing a sigh, they reach for their cards and flash them at me, too fast for me to register anything but badly-lit photos and the same names glinting on their golden badges. The cards are back in the shadows of their pockets before I have time to blink. Seem all right. But what the fuck do I know? They may have ordered them from the same place I bought my fake driving license. I wouldn’t know the difference. It’s not pretty to be paranoid, but paranoid people live longer, I’ve read that somewhere. And now I have the distinct feeling that something bad has happened.
“Mister Harris?” Madinga asks, rather too late in the game.