The Deviant

by Adam Sommers

  Warren’s face fell a little and he fought the urge to cry. He could not cry in front of her.

  “You know why I come when you call, right?”

  “You like it,” she said.

  He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “It’s about Brielle.”

  “Yes, it’s about Brielle,” Warren said and gave the baby a tickle. “Who’s a big girl? Whose got the giggles?” The girl laughed even though she was getting sleepy. “But it’s also about you.”

  “Here we go,” Jayne sighed. “You think you can somehow talk your way into my emotions. They don’t exist. Accept it.”

  “It wasn’t just physical. It isn’t just physical. I know it. I can feel it in you. It’s not my imagination or wishful thinking, Jayne. You have feelings for me. Look me in the eye, tell me you don’t.”

  Jayne turned to Warren. He was still holding her hand, and it was encouraging that she had not yet withdrawn it. In fact, she used her other hand to hold his. They faced each other with their child between them. The way she did it filled Warren Zalinsky with hope. This could be the breakthrough moment he’d hoped would one day come. Will she let me inside her wall? He held his breath.

  “Warren,” she whispered. “I don’t give a shit about you. How many times do I have to say it. I like to fuck you. That’s it.”

  Stunned by her cruel bluntness, but not for the first time, Warren refused to retreat. “That’s bullshit. And it’s getting harder for you to hide it.”

  She laughed, her big head going back on her big shoulders. “Goodbye, Warren. I’ll pick her up in the morning.” She got up and walked away, leaving Warren in the sun with the girl. He watched her go, just like he always did.

  Chapter 41

  Eric found that he could not yet move his limbs. Apparently Jayne knew this would be the case when she had told him to go back to sleep, which is what he did. An hour later, he was in the same position, on his back on what turned out to be a small yoga mat at the side of Jayne’s large bed. He felt surprisingly refreshed—confused and disgusted, but yes, refreshed. He put on his clothes, found his car keys, and made his way down the hall to the door, the driveway, and his car.

  He knew that for the second time in as many weeks he’d been the victim of sexual assault, this one obviously much worse than the first, but he had no idea how to feel about it or how to react to it. Stories that he’d done about sex assaults had all been with women as the victim, often with beatings and chokings and other severe violence attached.

  In his case, Eric was intact and unmarred. There were no bruises on his body, no cuts, no broken bones. There was no way to tell if she had put his penis inside her, anywhere inside her. That part of his anatomy looked as it had before. There was no fluid, no stain. Nothing, in short, that would constitute any sort of evidence.

  What drug she had used, he had no idea. But because he was now able to resume his life, he assumed that it had passed through his system. Until he could figure out what he was supposed to feel, how he was supposed to react, Eric decided to do absolutely nothing.

  That state of numb confusion lasted for a few hours, but by nightfall, he was thinking again, this time much more seriously, about how he could murder her and get away with it.

  Stabbing her in the neck, that same vision from before, loomed large. But he also considered running her over with his car, or going to Fat Tommy and getting a gun instead of drugs. But as he weighed these options, he rejected each one. It wasn’t that he wasn’t willing to do it. He was. The issue, he realized, is that he didn’t so much want her dead as he wanted her to be hurt, humiliated publicly, to be called out and recognized as the piece of shit she was. He struggled with a way to do this, but nothing came to mind.

  No court, no cop, no media outlet would touch his story no matter how persuasively he pleaded. Even the rival Post wouldn’t help him. She had had the owner over for dinner, for Christ’s sake.

  For two days after the party, Eric called in sick. John Williams’ anger was still fresh in his mind and he made himself call early each day to say he was in no shape to chase stories. During those days, he told the same lie to Mitch and asked to be left alone. Mitch Lozatti was a delightfully happy-go-lucky person, but he was no fool and he knew something more than a stomach bug was crippling his friend. Yet he would not do anything to disrespect Eric’s wishes, other than to call once in the morning, and once in the evening to make sure Eric was if not better, at least no worse.

  On the morning of day four, Mitch was out, Dennis was at work. Eric again called the receptionist and told her to tell John Williams that he was going to see a doctor and would call later. They were both lies. But Eric did not care. Once his roommates left, Eric felt it was safe to venture out into the rest of the apartment. He ate a bowl of cereal realizing that soon he’d be completely out of food and would be forced to go to the store. But venturing outside and seeing people enjoying their normal workaday lives without a care in the world seemed like an impossibility. Just thinking about it filled him with jealousy and rage. How could they laugh and smile, argue, chat, go shopping all while he’d just been raped by his hideous boss? Didn’t they understand? He’d never be the same.

  After finishing his breakfast, Eric curled on the couch with a cup of coffee and looked out the window of his ground-floor apartment. Only a few feet in front of him on the grass in front of their building, he watched the starlings peck away at the ground. The little black birds with speckled wings. Really good job naming the birds, Eric thought. He got it. Black birds, white specks. They did look like stars. Starlings. Cute. Watching them, Eric couldn’t help but think: Lucky birds. What do you have to worry about? Nothing. You flap over here, see what there is, eat it. Flap over there, see what there is, eat it. Nothing else to do except run from things that can eat you and make baby starlings and eat. So easy.

  He watched ravens in the yard, too. Big black birds nearly the size of buzzards with menacing beaks, digging in the dirt for spiders, worms, maggots, anything that was edible. Neither the starlings nor the ravens had ugly bitches slipping drugs in their drinks, sitting on their faces with wet stinking pussies. Lucky fucking birds, he thought and sipped coffee. Wish I were a bird, I’d peck her fucking eyes out and eat them, he thought. I’d fucking put on butter and salt and garlic and eat her black ugly stupid eyes.

  One of the ravens waddled up just below his window, unaware it was being watched by Eric behind the glass. It grabbed something from the grass, something big like a grasshopper or a praying mantis, and leapt into the air, its glossy black wings bigger than Eric imagined. As it rose, a giant stream of white guano poured from its butt and splattered on the ground.

  Eric gazed in amazement, not because of how much there was, or that it was so gross, but because he suddenly had a vision of what he must do. He was going to fly away, run from the clutches of Jayne Grayman. But first he was going to put in his resignation, and this would be no ordinary, neatly typed, double-spaced letter on Washington Standard letterhead. No. God had come to him in the form of a bird and issued specific and spectacular instructions:

  Go to the building, sneak into her office, take a giant shit on her desk, and write his intentions in it: “Dear Ms. Grayman, you twisted piece of shit (Get it, shit? Ha ha). I quit.” Maybe even repeat that on the walls, with some other choice offerings: “You bitch.” “You cunt.” Yeah, that sounded pretty perfect. Thanks for the raven, God, Eric said to himself.

  He liked the plan so much he wanted to put it into action right away, but there was a certain amount of preparation required. To get the maximum impact he wanted to make the mess as big as possible. The question was, how many prunes and how much Rolling Rock could he consume while still being able to drive to the office without losing containment before he was ready. Eric Berger did not have the answer, but he was about to find out.

  A few minutes later, Eric was dressed and hea
ded for the store. Once inside, he walked directly to the aisle containing dried fruits and picked out a twenty-four-ounce box of raw pitted prunes. Eric had never bought prunes in his life, but they had a reputation he hoped was accurate. The box said: “Effective natural remedy for constipation.” Yeah, baby. Bring it, thought Eric. He peeked inside the box. The prunes looked dark, moist and dangerous. Perfect, he thought, and walked off to get two six packs of Rolling Rock. As long as he was shitting on her office, he might as well fill it with piss, too, he reasoned. And there was no way he could do any of this sober, anyway.

  At nine a.m. the next day, right after Mitch left, he opened the box of prunes and stuffed them in his face as fast as he could, giving them lots of time to marinate. Then Eric started on the beer, but he didn’t rush. He kept his buzz going all the way until about ten p.m. The last three cans he downed in a couple of minutes and prepared to drive the ten minutes to the office. He understood the risk of either crashing or getting pulled over, but he was so buzzed and so happy and so excited, there was no possibility any sensible thought would prevail.

  The plan was to do the deed, get in the car, find a quiet spot to sleep it off, then head straight to New Jersey. He didn’t necessarily plan to stay there. If all went well, he would leave the devastation he had caused for others to sort through, then return in a few weeks or months and pick up where he left off. Eric Berger had no intention of leaving his job half-finished. He owed it to Julio Nieto and his parents; to Marisol Izikoff; and, of course, to the little Jones boy. Grissom Lester and Commissioner Cohles might get a reprieve, but they were still going down, whether in the pages of The Standard or some other publication.

  At ten-thirty he called Carrie to say goodbye.

  “Hey, ishh Sherick.”

  “Eric!” Carrie was relieved. “Where have you been? What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  “I’m shuper fucked up. I’m just wanna tell ya I’ll mish hew.”

  “Miss me! What are you talking about?”

  “I’m quitting, Carr-car. Putting in my notish right now.”

  “Now? It’s ten-thirty at night.”

  “Not your regular notish, Carolina. Gonna leave a masshive shit on her desk, write I fuck you quitting bitch in it with the receiver of her phone.”

  “What are you talking about? Why are you quitting?” Carrie started to cry. What the hell was happening? Why is Eric talking about leaving Washington? Leaving her? Why was he talking about shitting on Jayne’s desk?

  “Stop, stop, stop. Eric, talk to me. What’s wrong?”

  “Carrie-okee, sweetie. You know I love you. Thass why I’m calling to slay s’long.”

  “Eric, stay where you are. You’re drunk. Don’t drive. Stay at your house. I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

  “Sorry, Car-Car. Made up my mind. Already leaving for the offiz.”

  “Don’t. Don’t! Don’t! Please, Eric,” she begged. “I love you. I love you. I love you. Please, just stay where you are. Why don’t you talk to me?”

  If Eric weren’t so drunk, Carrie’s pleading might have had more of an effect. She loved him? Wow. She said it like three times. Did he love her? Wait, he just said he did. Did he mean it? Maybe. Don’t know. Not important at the moment.

  “I’ll see you later, shugar.”

  “Eric!” she shrieked into the dead receiver.

  Carrie ran around her apartment frantically trying to find her purse, car keys, and tissues. She was heaving huge, body-shaking breaths as tears poured down her face. She couldn’t find her purse. (It was right on the counter). She only had one shoe on and hobbled around not knowing that the other one was just alongside the entry table where it always was. In complete despair, she collapsed on the floor not knowing what to do. Her tear-soaked eyes then lit on the phone at the end of the table and only one word came to her mind: Warren.

  It took three tries, but she finally managed to get the numbers in the right order. When he picked up (thank God), she did the best she could through her hysterics to relay her conversation with Eric. “I’m getting in my car. Please, Warren, please meet me there. I need like twenty minutes to get to the office.”

  Warren lived farther away by at least five minutes, if there wasn’t traffic. But this was no time to give Carrie any more things to freak out about. Whatever was going on with Eric, with her, he could sort out later. “I’ll leave right now,” he said as calmly as he could.

  “Oh, you’re the best. Thank you. Please hurry.”

  “Carrie!” Warren nearly yelled it into the phone. Not his style, but he understood there was a major risk. “You have to drive carefully. Focus.”

  “Okay. Okay. I will,” she said.

  “Promise me.”

  “I promise, Warren. I promise promise. Thanks.”

  They raced from their respective homes as Eric weaved his way down the freeway to the office, his bowels and bladder percolating. He swerved off the highway into the parking lot so plastered he couldn’t see very well and wound up hitting a curb, sideswiping a tree and bouncing down back onto the pavement. It looked like he was going to crash full speed into the front doors, but by magic his foot found the brake pedal just in time, and he skidded to a halt twenty feet from shattering the glass.

  When he got out of his car he lost his balance and fell flat on his back. For a second he did not know which way was up or down and struggled to get to his feet.

  Carrie’s car flew into the lot a few seconds later and her lights hit Eric just as he was wobbling to his feet and staggering in what he hoped was the direction of the front door. With one hand he was gripping his backside tightly. The other was deep in his front pocket. He was hurrying, but kept going off in the wrong direction trying to reach the door.

  Carrie thought about trying to drive her car between Eric and the door, but the way he was weaving back and forth made her worry she’d hit him by accident. Instead, she parked right next to his car, flung the door open and dashed toward him. Before she got there, she heard something behind her. All she could see when she turned around were headlights but she knew it was Warren.

  He parked next to her, saw Eric at the door, and with the grace and speed of an impala leapt past Carrie and ran full tilt into Eric, knocking them both into the ornamental potted plants to the side of the entrance. He ignored Eric’s cries of pain and his own bashed knee, got quickly to his feet and yanked Eric up off the ground in a bear hug, pinning his arms to his sides from behind.

  Eric squirmed and kicked but to no effect. Warren tried setting him down on his feet, but Eric just fell into a sitting position. Warren then hauled him back up with the intention of dumping him in his car and driving him home.

  “WASHZ-OUT! WASHZ-OUT!” Eric cried. “Put me down. Ahmna shit.”

  “Ohhhh,” Warren moaned, and ran carrying Eric behind a bush to the side of the entrance and ripped down his pants. Steadying himself by clinging on to Warren, Eric squatted and relieved himself. Disgusted, Warren pushed Eric off of him and let him fall to his knees. “Ufff,” he groaned. “Take your shirt off and wipe your ass,” Warren told him, and went to find Carrie, who was already on her way toward them. She stopped when she saw Warren’s pale and distorted face. He held up his hand, “Don’t. It’s disgusting.”

  “Uckkhch,” said Carrie as she got a whiff and saw a smear on Warren’s trousers. “Yeah…Just tell me he’s all right.”

  “I don’t know. He’s very drunk. Just missed shitting his pants. But he’ll probably be all right.”

  “Thank you, thank you, Warren.”

  “What’s going on with him?”

  “I don’t know,” Carrie answered wiping her eyes. “He hasn’t been to work in three days. Mitch says he’s been holed up in his room with some stomach thing. Then he called to say he’s quitting. Why would he quit? What’s he done?”

  Warren had zero information. He could
not help Carrie. “I haven’t heard anything. I think the best thing to do is take him to my place. I’ll get him cleaned up. See if he wants to talk and we’ll figure it out.”

  Carrie wasn’t sure she liked that plan. She wanted to take care of Eric. She NEEDED to take care of him. What stopped her from insisting that Warren go home and leave Eric to her was it seemed whatever Eric was going through the last thing he needed was to complicate it with her emotional needs. Besides, she trusted Warren, and her instinct told her he would have a better chance of getting to the bottom of this. She hugged Warren in a long, grateful embrace. “Thank you so much.” She kissed him on the lips.

  Chapter 42

  Zalinsky treated Eric as if he were a wounded puppy. He slowly got him undressed, washed up and propped in a corner of his couch where Eric promptly fell asleep. Warren took advantage of the time to clean the collateral damage off himself and his car. Then he looked around to see if he could find something for Eric to wear once he woke up. The clothes he had come in with were toxic waste and out in the trash.

  Warren expected Eric to sleep the rest of the night, if not much of the next day as well, so he was stunned to see Eric awake by the time he came back to the living room. “Where am I!?” he yelped in panic, remembering the last time he’d come to and not known his surroundings.

  “Relax, Eric. It’s Warren. You’re in my house. You’re safe.”

  Eric closed his eyes in relief, pulled the covers off him, then pulled them right back after he realized he was completely naked. “I’m naked.”

  “You shit your pants and barfed on your shirt. They’re toast.”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “Christ. What were you eating?”

  “I dunno, pretty much the whole…. Oh, shit, wherez a bathroom?”

  Warren pointed Eric down the hall and he made a mad dash. A few minutes later he emerged and picked up right where he’d left off. “…box of prunes.”

  Warren simply raised an eyebrow at him.