by Jeff Strand
Jared looked at the floor. "Okay, I get it."
"No, I don't think you do. Because I'm going to destroy your career potential. You're going to march upstairs, and you're going to disconnect your PlayStation, and you're going to bring it down here, and I'm going to lock it up for the next two weeks, and you're not going to give me any attitude about it. And if this happens again, I'm going to get a hammer out of the garage and I'm going to smash your beloved game to pieces. I don't just mean cheating; I mean any trouble at school. You hear me?"
"Yeah."
"You think 'yeah' is gonna cut it?"
"Yes, sir."
"Go up there and get it. And don't you dare try to finish the level that you're on."
Jared left the living room.
"There," said Ken to Vivian. "Parental duties fulfilled."
* * *
Ken and Vivian sat up in bed, watching television. Vivian reached under the covers and slid her hand over his crotch.
"Looking for something?" he asked.
She smiled. "I bet it'll get easier to find in a minute."
Vivian rubbed on him for far more than a minute, but nothing was happening. It wasn't that she lacked skill—she was, in fact, quite talented with her fingers. And he recognized that she was still attractive. She kept in shape and was only about ten pounds heavier than when they first met. (She'd been quite a bit heavier at their wedding, but she'd been eight months pregnant with Jared.) Vivian was attractive in a purely objective sense, just not attractive to him anymore. It was like that thing he'd seen online with a half-naked, absolutely gorgeous girl on her hands and knees giving a come-hither look to the camera, with the caption, "No matter how hot she is, somebody out there is tired of putting up with her shit."
He was tired of putting up with Vivian's shit.
Had been for years.
But, points for trying. She was, after all, initiating sex. And it wasn't worth the trouble of saying that he was exhausted, or just not in the mood.
He closed his eyes and thought of the women in cages.
Thought of the first one to die, who had very little skin left now.
Thought of Regina, who might no longer be breathing.
Thought of poor Olivia, maybe the only one left alive in that room. Hanging in a cage with all those rotting corpses. So scared. So pretty. All of them were beautiful.
"Now that's more like it," said Vivian.
They got completely undressed and he mounted her.
Ken fantasized about emaciated, caged women as he fucked the shit out of his wife.
CHAPTER FOUR
"You won't believe the dream I had last night," Gertie told Charlene the next day, as they got ready to begin their shift.
"Was I in it?"
"Yes."
"Was it kinky?"
"No."
"Was I a mermaid?"
"I should probably just tell you."
"That might be better."
"We were walking the streets of Hornbeam Ridge together. You kept saying that it was a bad idea, but in the dream he'd kidnapped your sister, and—"
"I don't have a sister," said Charlene.
"In my nocturnal landscape, you had a sister."
"Okay."
"You kept saying it was a bad idea, but then you said the reason we weren't finding him is that we weren't looking in scary enough places. And it made sense. If we were tracking a psychopath, we wouldn't look in well-lit areas, we'd look in scary places."
"Dream logic."
"And you said there was this door that everybody in the neighborhood knew about and nobody knew where it went. So you led me there, and there were trees with messed-up faces all around it, and we could hear people screaming on the other side."
"My God, that was no dream!"
"Shut up. We got the door open, I forget how, and it basically led to Hell. And my cousin Kimberly and your sister and all of the other women were there, floating on this pier in a lake of lava, tied up with serpents. I knew it was them even though none of them had faces. And we both knew that we could've just turned around and walked back out that door. I know this because I could hear your thoughts. But we didn't. Somehow we could tell that the lava wouldn't burn us, maybe because we didn't belong there, so we swam out to the pier and untied the snakes. Then Satan showed up and I woke up."
"That's a very interesting dream you had there," said Charlene.
"I know, right?"
"Is it coincidence that you met me and now you're having dreams about the devil?"
"My takeaway from the dream is that you were willing to follow me into Hell."
Travis stepped into the back room and tapped his wrist where a watch would be if he were wearing one. Normally Charlene would make a wise-ass remark, but after yesterday she thought she should be on her best behavior for a few days.
Breaks were staggered, and it was an insanely busy night, so they didn't get to resume their conversation until shortly before closing time. Charlene still had a couple of tables when Gertie clocked out.
"Any plans for tonight?" Charlene asked.
"Nah."
"You sure?"
"Nothing like what you're talking about," said Gertie. "I have a date with Netflix, sweatpants, and Chinese carryout."
"You don't have to lie to me."
"I'm not lying."
"One of my skills, and I have many, is that I can tell when people are lying. So when you avoid eye contact, even though all you're doing is telling me about a pleasant evening at home, I have to assume that you're headed out to use yourself as bait."
"All right, busted."
"Why would you lie about that?" Charlene asked.
"Because I'm kind of embarrassed that I told you in the first place. It makes me sound...less than completely stable."
"It does. I'm not going to spare your feelings and pretend it doesn't. However, I've been thinking about it for this whole shift, and I'd like to help you."
"Wait, what?"
"I'm serious."
"Is one of your other skills messing with people?"
"It is, but not right now. I think what you're doing is dangerous and misguided but it comes from a good place, and I want to help keep you safe."
"We can't stick together, though. Only one woman has gone missing at a time. There'd be safety in numbers, and even if he does see us, he'll probably leave us alone."
"Oh, I'm not offering to walk with you. That's just nuts. What I will do is drive around the area where you are, parking at different places for a few minutes at a time."
"He might be looking out for possible witnesses, though. If he sees you sitting in a car, that might be enough to keep him away."
"I won't be within sight of you. We'll keep in touch through text messages. If you don't check in every, say, five minutes, I'll know something's wrong. It's not much, but it's better than you going missing and nobody knowing about it until you don't show up at work."
"I actually really like that plan," said Gertie.
"Let me be clear. If you get into trouble, I'm calling the police. I'm not rushing out there to help try to overpower the guy. That's all on you. But I'll be your, I don't know, protector from a distance."
"That sounds great. I really appreciate it."
"And then you have to buy me drinks when we're done."
"Deal."
"When were you heading out?"
"Right after I go home and get changed. Do you want to go back to my place?"
"Are you—"
"I said that and immediately knew it was a setup for a lesbian comment."
"I'll save the comment for your next setup. Yes, I'd like to go back to your place for some platonic undressing."
* * *
As Charlene pulled into the parking lot of Gertie's apartment complex, she was surprised by how excited she was. She shouldn't be excited. This was absolute madness that could end horribly. Not that Charlene thought Gertie would actually draw out the culprit, but plenty of oth
er things could go wrong when an attractive young woman walked by herself after dark. And if Charlene couldn't even watch her, she wasn't providing that much protection.
Still, it was better than nothing. And what if by some miracle they did capture the piece of shit and help the police find those missing women? That would be unbelievable.
Though Charlene knew it wouldn't work out like that, she still couldn't get rid of the feeling of excitement. She'd had a great many wild experiences in her lifetime, but this was a brand new addition to her resume. It wouldn't be fun—not with lives at stake—but it would be interesting. Very, very interesting.
Gertie got out of her own car, and they walked up the stairs to Gertie's apartment together. "Just to warn you," she said, inserting her key into the lock, "I'm a total neat freak. You're going to see organization and tidiness that may make you uncomfortable, so I apologize in advance."
"Are you saying that you think I'm a slob?"
"I get a 'dirty clothes on the floor' vibe from you."
"I'll have you know that I scrub the grout on my bathroom floor every single morning with a toothbrush."
"Uh-huh."
"Okay, yes, there are dirty clothes on the floor and clutter everywhere. Does that fit into your stereotype of lesbians?"
"I have no idea what the stereotype is for lesbian housekeeping."
"I don't think there is one. Gay guys have one but we don't."
Gertie opened the door and they walked into her apartment.
"Holy crap," said Charlene. "You weren't kidding."
"I warned you."
"You've color-coordinated your books."
"Yep. And they're alphabetized by author within the color coordination."
Charlene walked over to the bookcase. "That is some serial killer behavior right there. Where do you keep your notebooks filled with tiny print?"
"I'll just be a minute," said Gertie, walking into her bedroom and closing the door.
Charlene wandered around the living room. She wondered if Gertie would notice if she slid the coaster on the coffee table a half-inch to the right, and decided that she probably would. Charlene didn't test this theory.
Gertie's Blu-Ray collection, mostly independent cinema, passed muster. Apparently all of her music was digital, so Charlene would wait to pass judgment upon her collection. Her reading habits were all over the place. Charlene was tempted to peek in her refrigerator or medicine cabinet, but that kind of snooping was only acceptable if she'd had sex with the person.
Gertie came out of her bedroom, wearing jeans, a sweater, and a light jacket. She also wore a wig to give her long brown hair. It wasn't a flattering look for her facial structure, so it was good that she was trying to lure a psychopath instead of get a boyfriend.
"Do you have a gun right now?" Charlene asked.
"Yes."
"Oh. Okay, well, guns make me really nervous, so don't, like, fall or anything."
"I won't fall down on my gun." Gertie reached into her jacket pocket and took out the stun gun. She pressed a button and Charlene could see the electricity crackle between the two electrodes.
"I didn't realize you could actually see the electricity on those things," she said. "I thought that was a special effect in movies."
"Nope. I've got an extra one for you."
"No, that's okay. I won't be leaving my car."
"You sure?"
"Positive. Stun guns, real guns, nail guns—they all freak me out. But I'm glad you have them. Shall we be off?"
They got into Charlene's car. As they drove away, Charlene realized that she was more nervous around guns than she'd thought. Just knowing that Gertie had one concealed somewhere was making it difficult to focus on her driving. She'd once done sex play that involved a switchblade knife (but only once) so she wasn't completely weapons-phobic, but damn, she hated having that gun in the car.
"Okay, every five minutes I'll check in with you," said Gertie. "Just a quick one-word text. People are on their phones all the time when they walk, so I don't think that will scare him away if he sees me doing it, but I also don't want him to think that I'm in the middle of a conversation where somebody will notice right away if I stop responding."
"That works. You get thirty seconds of grace period. If I don't get a response by then, I'm calling 911."
"Let's make it at least a minute."
"Why?"
"Because thirty seconds is too short."
"Why?"
"Because if I notice that somebody is watching me, I don't want to spook him by suddenly taking out my phone. There may be a situation where I have to play it cool, and having a thirty-second ticking clock could mess everything up."
"If it's him watching you, don't you want the police to be on their way as soon as possible?"
"What if it's not him?"
"Then don't shoot him."
"I don't want you to call in a false alarm. Give me five extra minutes if I don't respond."
"No. In five minutes you could be in an alley with your ribcage cracked open."
"Two minutes."
"I get what you're saying, but I will be haunted forever if I go along with this plan and you get abducted or killed or both. So I am not going to just wait if something seems to be wrong. If that's a problem, I'm out."
Gertie stared out the window for a moment. "All right. You're the one giving up her evening for me. I will make every effort to respond in thirty seconds, and if you have to call 911, that's fine. Anyway, we both know that there's almost zero chance that I'll actually encounter this guy."
"I knew that. I'm glad you know that."
Gertie lowered the visor and checked herself out in the small mirror. "Does this look work for me?"
"You look better as a blonde."
"Yeah, I think so, too. Actually, the color is fine, but hair this straight doesn't work with my face." She raised the visor again. "I'm not sure if I mentioned this yesterday, but this whole idea terrifies me. I may have given the impression that I'm brave and casual about it, and that's wrong. I'm scared shitless. So unless you think it's really rude, I'm just going to sit here with my eyes closed and do deep-breathing exercises until we get there."
"That's totally cool."
"Thank you." Gertie closed her eyes.
Charlene wondered if this was a bad idea. Then she wondered why she was wondering—of course this was a bad idea. It was a terrible idea. It was a ridiculous idea. The fact that this was a bad idea was never in question. It was the kind of thing a guy would do hoping to get laid.
Her friendship with Gertie was still in the "budding" stage, but she enjoyed her company and didn't want to see her get hurt.
She'd only be doing this once, though.
She'd forgotten to ask if she could turn on the radio before Gertie began her deep breathing, and didn't know if that would mess up her efforts to go to her happy place before offering herself up to an abductor, so Charlene drove in silence.
About half an hour later, she pulled into the parking lot of a convenience store. This already seemed like the kind of place where you could get murdered after dark. Charlene shut off the engine.
"Every five minutes," she told Gertie.
Gertie nodded. "Thank you for this."
"Thank me after you end up not dismembered."
"Morbid humor isn't really what I need right now."
"It's what you get. Are you sure you want to do this? I bet we could find a late-night sushi place. Go to a movie. Knock on a stranger's door and offer to reorganize their bookshelves."
Gertie opened the car door. "I'm heading north. I'll let you know if anything changes. Just sort of keep heading in that direction."
"All right. Please be careful."
"I will."
"Be constantly aware of my therapy bill if this goes bad."
"I'm trying to save my cousin."
"I know, I know. I apologize. Good luck."
Gertie got out of the car, shut the door, and walked off.
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This was suddenly not as exciting as Charlene had thought it might be. Her stomach twisted itself into knots like Christmas lights when you pulled them out of storage. She needed a Xanax.
Everything would be fine. Gertie had already done this dumb shit many times without getting hurt, so she'd be fine tonight, too.
It was five minutes after eleven. Gertie had been gone for one minute. Charlene could still see her. It was too early to check in.
Charlene scrolled through Instagram for four minutes, then sent Gertie a text.
Still alive?
The answer came back right away: Yep :)
Charlene played on her phone for another five minutes.
How's it going?
Fine.
It was probably time to move to a new parking spot. Charlene turned on the engine, wondering how she was going to make it through the next couple of hours without having a nervous breakdown.
* * *
Gertie kept her hand inside of her pocket, fingers wrapped around the stun gun.
She honestly didn't know if she wanted to find the guy or not. She wanted to save Kimberly and the other missing women, and she relished the idea of sending 150,000 volts into the body of the son of a bitch who'd taken them. She didn't relish the idea of being bound and gagged in the trunk of a car. She didn't relish the idea of him stroking her hair as he whispered the wicked things he was going to do to her. She didn't relish the idea of him taking his time with the knife, because there was nobody around to hear her scream.
But she couldn't sit at home and do nothing. The cops hadn't caught this guy. They didn't even have any leads, as far as she knew. She didn't genuinely believe that she'd be the one to bring him to justice, but it helped her sleep at night to know she was at least trying.
Her phone buzzed. She texted back OK to Charlene and tucked the phone away again.
She didn't feel that much safer, but it was nice to know that somebody was with her on this weird scheme, even if Charlene thought she was mentally ill.
Gertie checked in every five minutes. Nothing happened to make her delay by even a few seconds. In fact, she was hardly seeing anybody out tonight. A couple of joggers. A lady walking her dog. An old man who informed her that she shouldn't be out alone at night—there was a madman on the loose.