I unplug the power cord and retrieve the microwave. I locate Turner’s laptop in his locker, plug that into the power cords, and toss it into the hot tub.
The gym is still deserted when I leave at six-oh-seven. I race to my car, throw the microwave into the trunk, and drive to my usual parking space. I step out of my car feeling like a slave freed from his chains. The sun seems brighter than it’s been for months. I turn my face up and soak in the rays, walk to my office building with a bounce in my step. Next to the sidewalk, flowers are blooming and I inhale their sweet scent. Butterflies flit from blossom to blossom, while birds chirp in the distance. Life is good.
I start my day: fingers fly over my keyboard, page after page of elegant code.
Melody rushes in and breaks my trance. “Did you hear about Chris?” she asks.
I turn my head, blink, and gaze at her beautiful face: heart-shaped, high cheekbones, bee-stung lips, cornflower-blue eyes wide with alarm.
“They found him in the hot tub, electrocuted.”
I stand, ready to wrap my arms around her, tell her everything’s all right. I’ll wait a month or two for her to get over him, then I’ll ask her out. We’ll get married, have kids, everything will be perfect.
“They found a pulse, called nine-one-one. They think he’s going to make it.” She takes a step back. “I’ve got to get to the hospital.” She turns and races from my cube, her footsteps echoing down the hall.
The pain in my head strikes me like a lightning bolt. I gasp and sink to my knees. One, four, two, five…all…all…all…I gaze down. Spiders crawl up my legs. I scrub them off, feel something move in my hair, fling a scorpion from my scalp. Something slithers out of my ear canal, a worm. I’m under attack. I run screaming full-speed toward a blinding light at the end of the hallway. The plate glass window shatters. Four stories down. One, two three, fo…
Back to TOC
Solitaire
Judith Stanton
My Solitaire app is my best friend, available any time of the night or day for a leisurely stroll through the suits, diamonds hearts clubs spades, or a sprint to finish the game.
No strolls or sprints with my husband, Walker Franklin Bailey, who expects me to have supper on the table every night at seven p.m., the moment he gets home from the upscale men’s clothing store he inherited from his father, and from which he’s outfitted every important local priest, politician, and professor, and oh, a couple of top-ranked football players here in Chapel Hill on their way to making millions in the NFL.
He handles all the bills, the stocks, mutual funds, and keeps us comfortable. I haven’t earned a dime in years.
“Emmeline,” he calls upstairs. “Honey. I’m home.” A cliché if ever there was one. “What’s for supper?”
Okay, I admit it. I was playing Solitaire and forgot to put his supper on the stove. What do I have for tonight anyway? Last I looked in the freezer, a chicken pot pie. Takes an hour, should have put it in at five-forty-five.
Didn’t, because ten games in a row, not one posted a single suit, let alone went to completion, which is some kind of record. I know, because I track my games in a palm-sized notebook I found abandoned at the thrift store, fifty cents. It has little lined pages, an elastic binding to keep it closed, a cover with a classic old-fashioned floral design I want to emulate in the new curtains I’m planning for my study.
Walker hates florals.
I turn back to my game. I love the slide of my mouse on my magenta wine-themed mousepad. I take another sip of cocktail hour Chardonnay. Solitaire is unpredictable but orderly and logical at the same time. Click on a card, click on another, and they fall into place.
“Honey? Dinner?” Walker calls up again.
“Pizza okay, darling?” I holler down.
My current game shows signs of completing after a boatload of no wins. When a game finishes, the screen lights up with fireworks and says, You win. I love that little pop of pleasure.
Walker stomps up our plantation-style curved oak stairs, his strides heavy as the defensive tackles he outfits for the big time. He watches Carolina football obsessively. When we were first married, I tried to learn the game, the rules, the plays, the names, so I could watch with him. Ha.
With a squeak, the door to my study opens. Feeling invaded, I minimize the screen.
“Honey,” Walker says, “we had pizza last night.”
Right. Frozen, meat supreme.
“Sorry.”
Or not. I lost my love of cooking for him after learning of his third affair. Met the bitch. Fixed dinner for her and her husband, not knowing. My housewife gene dried up on the vine.
“Honey,” he says again, sounding hungry. No doubt he thinks he busted his butt all day, always does, deserves his supper.
And no doubt I stayed home, and he doesn’t give a flying fuck that Marisol cleaned the house this morning, that I checked up on her after every room, the floors, the stairs, polishing the sinks. After she left, I did the weekly grocery shop—all quick fix and frozen stuff.
“I can start salad in five,” I say, faking cheerful. Just let me finish my game.
“Fine,” he says. It’s not fine with him.
A couple of minutes later, I follow him down the staircase, a palm sliding down the handrail, custom wrought-iron railings bowing out on either side. Mother’s boy, his mom approved. He’s shed the jacket of the Brioni suit he wears to impress his customers, ditched the Peter Millar tie, and opened the top button of his Peter Millar shirt. Sexy, not. And he already tuned into CNN, too keen an observer of economics and international politics to rely on the nightly network news rag.
I pick out the Majolica salad plates, Vietri Pesci to be precise, an anniversary present I requested from him back when I trusted him, long before I noticed his slow takeover of my life. Let me do this for you, honey, over and over, until, after a time, he was saying, Can’t you do anything for yourself?
I tear off chunks of romaine from my grocery shop this afternoon, dress them with the bottled Caesar dressing, my version of cheating, add store-bought Caesar croutons, cheating again. Then in the one authentic thing I still do, I shave fresh Pecorino Romano cheese onto the plate, best quality I can put my hands on, like twenty-four bucks a pound.
“Honey,” he says. “You should have used the Lenox.”
Our wedding china, American. He doesn’t believe it when I tell him the salad was invented by an Italian immigrant in a restaurant in Tijuana. His mother had her standards.
Still, he scarfs my salad which is fresh, crunchy and delicious but then turns on me, a purr that’s like a snarl.
“No steak? You’re pissing our life away at that damn computer.”
Solitaire’s my bliss, I protest inwardly.
He stands and grabs the collar of my yellow one hundred percent Irish linen camp shirt. He chose it for me, saying the haberdasher’s wife must keep up appearances.
“I want my fucking steak.”
Steaks, stakes. I look out the kitchen window to his garden. He stakes his tomatoes. He stakes peonies along his asphalt driveway. He stakes the places where he planted chrysanthemums until the loropetalum overgrew them and they died.
I look at the stake I hold in my hand, a high-profile Wüsthof chef’s knife. I could use it to slice the ribeye if I’d bought one. Or him.
“I’m going to put an end to this,” he growls, and grabs a gleaming golf club iron from his leather Brooks Brothers’ bag in the hall closet, “9” engraved on its sole. An anniversary present from me—his money, his order—and I shrink. He’s only ever used his fists, and only when I pushed him too hard.
No illusions about diamonds, no more hearts.
He shoves me aside and storms up the stairs, his nine iron clanking behind him, scarring his expensive treads. I run after him. He breaches my sanctuary like he owns it, which he does. Then plants his legs in front of my laptop and lifts the club over his head, Paul Bunyan with his axe.
“No,” I cry. “Please, Go
d, no.”
Walker drives his nine iron into its plastic casing, and I swear I hear a tinny silver moan. He slams it again, and I shudder at the sight of keys popping off my friend, its keyboard, its insides flayed open, motherboard shredded, red bits splattering around the room like blood, dark bits floating down like autumn leaves.
He stops, heaving—more, I think, from anger than exertion—and turns on me, hands on the shaft, knuckles white. “No. More. Solitaire.”
I choke back sobs, outrage.
“Say, ‘I understand,’” he goes on in the courteous, measured voice he cultivates to calm a nervous groom in for the fitting of his first tuxedo.
“I understand,” I parrot.
I do not accept. Diamond hard, a gem of anger forms inside my heart.
He drops the club. “Clean up this mess. I’m going out to get a steak.”
I pick up the nine iron and follow. He doesn’t seem to notice I’m behind him or maybe he thinks I’m following him to fetch the whisk broom so I can execute his orders.
At the stairs, he spurns the handrail. He’s golfing fit and proud of it.
From behind, I hook the club head around his ankle and pull. He cartwheels down the curving stairs, careens against the railings, bellowing.
I hear the crunch of bones splintering, hear him scream in pain.
He lands in a lump at the bottom.
I descend slowly, shaking, a hand on the rail every step of the way. Once down, I crouch within striking distance, sure he doesn’t have a punch left in him.
“What are you waiting for, bitch?” he cries in a weak, hoarse whisper. “Call nine-one-one.”
He looks pathetic, crumpled. Beneath his Peter Millar shirt, an arm is bent double at the elbow, and a broken bone pokes through his Brioni trousers. Blood drips from his nose and a corner of his mouth, trickles from one ear.
He’s not moving, not writhing in pain as he should be.
“Honey,” I say and lean against the wall. It’s cool from the AC. “Call them yourself.”
“Can’t,” he groans, then his eyes widen, horrified. His breathing is labored and his eyelids flutter shut. I take out my smart phone and call up my Solitaire app.
Diamonds, hearts and clubs dance before me on the screen.
Soon spades will dig his grave.
Back to TOC
Silk Stalking
Antoinette Brown
I was awakened by the jangle of my phone.
“Martha? It’s Roberta. Did I wake you?”
Of course you woke me. It’s not even nine a.m. But that’s not what I said. “I’m awake.” I struggled to free myself from my blankets and sat up.
“You’ll never guess what happened to the guest speaker after quilt guild last night.”
“She caught her plane and went home to her posh lifestyle and mansion in Spokane or wherever she came from?” I guessed.
“No.” Roberta paused for dramatic effect, as she always does. “She was hit over the head and left for dead in the parking lot outside the meeting room.”
Now I was really awake. “How terrible. What about Joyce? Wasn’t she taking the speaker to the airport?”
“Hit on the head, too.”
I fumbled for my glasses. I swear I can hear better when I wear my glasses. “But they’re alive, aren’t they?”
“They’re both at Chatham County Regional Hospital for observation. The police aren’t allowing any visitors.”
I sat up slowly. “Do the cops have a motive?”
“They were robbed.” I could hear the outrage in Roberta’s voice as it got louder and louder. “Someone stole the trunk full of fabric Alexi used to illustrate her technique!”
That was serious. “The fabric samples are pieces of art. Irreplaceable,” I said and thought, and worth thousands of dollars. “Like the kimono that was lost in the mail last year. And the quilt stolen from the guild’s show in April.”
“Except nobody killed for those!”
“No one’s dead yet,” I corrected her.
“We have to spread the news among the whole quilting community, all over the world. We have to keep her art from being sold. Maybe even get the pieces back.”
“Yeah, let’s hope so.” I needed a cup of coffee. I stood up. No use trying to get back to sleep, especially once my dogs heard that I was up. “Call me if you hear anything. I have to feed the dogs.”
We crafters know that heirloom quilts and valuable fabric aren’t stolen to be sold. They are stolen by other crafters who covet them. They won’t be sold. They won’t be displayed. They will spend decades in someone’s collection. Someone’s stash. Just like the trunk of silk stolen last night.
No one will see it again until I die and my kids give away my stash.
My name is Martha and I’m a hoarder. I am an addict. There, I’ve said it.
When do I suppose I first entered that state? When was it that “hoarder Martha” took the central role in my personality? And why? What was the drug? Was it the thrill of the hunt for the object of my desire or the pride of ownership? I don’t know, and it’s too late to worry about the details. I only know that that my closets are stuffed with vintage clothing waiting to be deconstructed and reused. My chests of drawers are packed with unfinished projects. Quilt racks hold vintage and contemporary quilts. Bins of fabric fill the bonus room. Hundreds of quilting and sewing books fill the shelves in my office. Sewing supplies are stacked on shelves that line my bonus room. Baskets hold colored pencils, markers, and dozens of seam rippers. I lose them all over the house wherever I’m ripping apart vintage clothing and they get buried so I have to buy new ones.
Every flat surface in my home is covered with fabric, sewing supplies, half-finished quilts, deconstructed thrift store clothing. The coffee table, the dining room table, the stairs to the bonus room, the blanket chest. If it’s wide enough for a pair of scissors, it’s covered.
But I do have a few saving graces. I can say that my hoard is no larger than most. I’m able to fit it all into my two-bedroom house. I never stored anything in my attic. Some of my fellow hoarders have to rent storage units or build sheds in their yards. And I only have two sewing machines, one of which is still sitting in its box and has never been used because I don’t have a flat surface for it.
My son Dan fears I won’t be able to pay my bills. He worries I’ll become dependent on him and his sister. He doesn’t understand that I’m really not that far gone. Actually, I’ve never paid much for the stuff in my stash, except the buttons. My buttons have made the transition from hoard to collection.
The fabric, ribbons, patterns, thread, and zippers I’ve bought mostly on sale or from thrift stores. Sometimes I accepted them from friends who were downsizing and needed to get rid of them. But I haven’t accepted everything I’ve been offered, which I think speaks to my self-control. I only keep natural fabrics. Silks, cottons, linens.
My kids are embarrassed, naturally.
Dan called the Health Department. The Health Department sent out an inspector, but he didn’t do anything because I’m not a public health risk. Despite Dan’s concerns I’m not a filthy hoarder. No dirty dishes in the sink. No mold in the shower. Nothing in the attic that could start a fire. My son walks through the house when he comes over. He checks the fridge and the closets. I understand his anxiety. He can’t bring his daughter or his dog over for me to babysit if the house is filthy. I think that keeping my house clean enough for my granddaughter also speaks to my self-control.
And until recently, I’d never committed a crime to add to my stash. I’ve shoplifted an expensive button from time to time, but who hasn’t?
Fabric is hard to steal. It comes wrapped on large heavy bolts. Even remnants can be as large as baguettes. The only fabric I can steal comes in small cuts like fat quarters or charm packs of five-inch squares. I don’t bother with them, but I have noticed that the clerks at my favorite store seem to watch me closely. I wonder if they can see the madness in my eyes. Perhaps t
hey recognize it in themselves.
Of all fabrics, the one I most crave is silk. Silk comes from the cocoons of silkworm larvae. The cocoons are soaked in water to release fibers that are wound on spools. The fibers are woven into fabric on looms. Silk production is slow and labor intensive, which makes silk costlier than other fabric. It’s also more beautiful than any other fabric and feels divine to the touch. Smooth and luxurious. Just last week a piece of eucalyptus and rose hand-dyed silk habotai sold for a hundred and nineteen dollars. It was barely two yards long and thirty-eight inches wide. I could never afford a piece like that.
I used to buy small pieces online, bits of vintage saris and fragments of ball gowns from the 1920s. Even they cost ten or twenty dollars apiece. From them, I created precious little leather wallet books. I page through the books at night, caressing the fabric. But that only made my greed grow. I wanted the good stuff and lots of it.
To satisfy my need, I devised an elaborate scheme to exchange cheap silk for better. A form of alchemy. I created a page on a popular social media site offering to exchange donated rectangles of silk to benefit a fictitious charity that was not explicitly identified. The goal was five hundred rectangles. I knew I could harvest that much silk from the clothing I purchased inexpensively from thrift shops, carefully deconstructed and now stored in large bins in my bonus room.
At first, only a few silk rectangles arrived in the mail. I dutifully sent scraps back in exchange. When I received a piece I didn’t want, I substituted it for one of my discards and kept the process going. Eventually, after weathering ebbs and flows, I received a flood of silk: dupioni, raw silk, jacquards, and brocades.
I placed each treasured rectangle in an acid-free sleeve, along with any correspondence that was included, and put it in a notebook. I soon had five large notebooks of gorgeous silk fragments, all documented. I used up dozens of inexpensive vintage silk dresses and skirts and made room for more.
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