“Maybe she’s hoping one of the husbands she cleans for will leave his wife and marry her,” Emma joked.
And that’s when Tony said: “Nah—they’re all single.”
“What?” I said.
“All the women on Elmwood are single.”
“How can that be?”
“How can what be?”
“How can all the residents on Elmwood be single women?”
“So what?”
“Elmwood stinks with money,” I said. “You can’t convince me that every castle in that development is owned by a single woman. There has to be some husbands.”
Emma elbowed me. “You’re being sexist.”
“I’m being reasonable.”
Tony looked constipated. “Whatever—I’m only telling you what she told me.” He leaned in, dropped his voice. “The ones who leave the keys are all single women.”
“Leave the keys?” Emma asked.
“Yeah, some of the women aren’t there to let them in. It’s a safe suburb; how else would Nadia and her crew get in to clean?”
“They do the ‘Hide-A-Key’ thing for them,” I said.
Tony pointed at me. “Bingo. Like I said, Nadia was completely wasted. And just after mentioning the keys she starts babbling something else about locked rooms filled with antiques and shit. I pushed her on it, and she said all of the homes on Elmwood have these huge security doors in their basements, almost like bank vaults or something. She said they’re always locked up tight.”
I knew where this was going now. I might be miserable and pining for a kick in the ass towards a fresh start, but I’m no thief.
“Please tell me you and Nadia aren’t planning on robbing the place,” I said.
Tony scowled, patted the air and whispered: “You wanna keep your voice down?”
“You are, aren’t you?”
“Nadia? No way. She’d be the first to get blamed if anything went missing; she’d never go along with it. Fortunately she was so drunk that night she doesn’t remember telling me shit.”
“So then…what? You’re gonna do it on your own and frame your girlfriend?”
He snorted. “She’s not my girlfriend. Who gives a shit about some Russian bitch?”
Who gives a shit about a squid? I thought.
“So what are you suggesting?” I asked.
“I’m suggesting we all go.”
“You’re high,” I said.
“I’m not high. It’s almost too easy. I mean the key is right there for us. We take it, stroll casually into the place—”
“And what? Empty it? Don’t you think it will arouse just a tiny bit of suspicion if neighbors see the four of us going in and out of the place carrying televisions and stereos?”
“Who said anything about televisions and stereos? I’m talking about the fucking antiques. That’s what we go for. If we all go and grab something it can be one quick trip—in and out.”
“You said Nadia claimed they were locked in a fucking vault. You been studying how to crack safes in between pumping gas, Tony?”
“She said it was like a vault, not an actual bank vault. Who the fuck would have one of those in their home, Alex?”
“I don’t know, Tony, but neither do you. Until you’ve actually seen the thing, you’d be going in blind.”
“We’ll get it open,” he said.
I looked at Kevin; he was hanging on Tony’s every word. No ethical support there. I looked at Emma. She seemed interested in Tony’s plan. I really hoped I was reading her wrong.
“Okay, suppose you do get it open,” I said. “What then?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“Well let’s just skip over the whole morality issue of stealing for a second, but do you even know what you’ll do with these antiques once you’ve got them?”
“I’d sell ’em, stupid.”
“To who, stupid? You made any recent connections with underground antique dealers you haven’t told us about?”
I expected a giggle from Emma but got nothing. Shit—she was considering this.
“Well, it just so happens that I do know someone,” he said.
“Who?”
“You don’t know him.”
“Oh, well now I’m really convinced.”
Tony’s frown hardened. “I’m doing you a favor by telling you this, Alex. I didn’t have to include you.”
“They’re probably panic rooms,” I said.
Both Tony and Kevin said: “Huh?”
“These vaults full of ‘treasures’ you’re talking about are probably just panic rooms. Lots of rich homes have them in case of intruders. You lock yourself in and call the police. Remember that Jodie Foster movie? Your Russian girl probably just assumed something valuable was insid—”
“Oh yeah?” Tony’s frown dissolved into an arrogant smirk. “Did I forget to mention that one of her employers on Elmwood actually told Nadia that what was inside her particular vault was priceless? Told Nadia it was worth more than anyone could ever imagine? The other houses on Elmwood may have your weird little panic rooms, but I couldn’t give two shits—we’d only be focusing on the one Nadia mentioned.” Tony’s frown returned, a righteous snort along with it when he added: “Lady shouldn’t have blabbed to a stranger like Nadia to begin with. Stupid bitch practically deserves to get robbed.”
“You know exactly which house it is, huh? Nadia told you the number?”
The arrogant smirk returned with relish. “1507 Elmwood,” Tony happily said. “Jumped out of bed and wrote it down in the other room the second she slipped up. I guess this Russian couldn’t hold her vodka.”
Kevin laughed.
Tony continued. “Now, just take a moment and think about how set we’d be if we helped ourselves to just a few of those priceless goodies.” He chugged the remainder of his beer to underline the conclusion to come. “And I’m telling you that this guy who’ll buy the antiques is legit. My Uncle Fred has used him before, and you know what Fred’s like. He’s always ‘finding’ things to sell. Says this guy never asks any questions. Just looks it over and quotes a price—take it or leave it.”
I studied all three of them. Their minds were made up. Even Emma’s. Mine was not. Like I said; I’m no thief.
“Okay then,” I said. “If we went along with this, there’s still a shit-ton of obstacles.”
“Such as?”
“Well, the vault for one. If these are ‘priceless goodies’ then I imagine the locks are heavy duty.”
“I got someone who can handle it.”
“Oh yeah? Who’s that?”
He looked away for a second.
I looked at Emma. “Oh, Jesus Christ, he’s talking about his Uncle Fred.” I turned back to Tony. “Please tell me I’m wrong.”
Tony just stared at me. He didn’t have to say anything.
“All right then,” I said. “So Honest Uncle Fred joins the party and we manage to open the locks. We’re still gonna be four, no, five misfits looting a rich suburban home in broad daylight.”
“We play it careful,” he said.
“That’s your advice? We play it careful?”
Again, he just stared.
I looked at Emma. “I think we’re done here. You ready to go, Em?”
Emma looked at Tony and Kevin first; then at me. “I…okay.”
“So I take it you’re out?” Tony asked as we slid out of the booth.
“You are correct,” I said.
“Shame—I was counting on you.”
“Yeah, well maybe you should have thought it through a little more.”
We were past the table when Tony said something that stopped me like a shove.
“You’re better than this place, Alex. Why you stick around here is a mystery to me. I was thinking this money—this one little score—could be the kick in the ass you needed to get you the hell out of here and moving towards something better.”
I had no words. He’d even used the “kick in the ass” expression I’d thought
to myself only moments ago. Was Tony really this insightful? Or was my wasted potential really that sad and obvious.
I turned and looked down at him. He afforded me only a quick glance, then looked straight ahead at the empty booth and said: “Just think about it and call me later.”
3
Susan Roberts whistled cheerfully while she prepared the marinade in her giant kitchen on 1507 Elmwood Drive.
The rest of the house was equally huge—fit for ten families and showcasing an extravagant décor that hinted only royalty would suffice.
And yet Susan Roberts lived alone and rarely entertained.
Of course tomorrow would be different. She had big plans for tomorrow. Plans she had been making for some time now.
He was coming.
She left the wooden spoon in the big bowl of dark marinade and walked towards the calendar hanging on her fridge. The square holding tomorrow’s date was circled in blue, the time of one o’clock followed by a hand-drawn smiley face written inside the blue-circled square. She caressed the time with a finger as though it were silk.
One o’clock. That was the time she was assigned, and that was the time she needed to be ready. Her belly swirled hot with anticipation.
Susan spun to return to her marinade when the doorbell stopped her midway. It was a neighbor from three houses down. She too wore an anxious smile. She asked Susan for the marinade recipe they were using this time. Susan gave it to her and then asked what her scheduled time was. The woman told her she was scheduled for three o’clock. They shared an excited giggle then parted company.
Susan returned to the kitchen, tied her apron, picked up the big bowl of marinade, and headed for the basement.
The finished basement was almost as vast and as grand as the home’s first floor. A multitude of baroque cabinets, elaborate étagères, and rich doors lined its endless walls.
Only one door stood out, and it was not for its décor. It was twice the width of any other and it was made of steel. Susan stood before it now.
The giant door had two locks: one flat to the door, and one a protruding latch that used a padlock. She set the bowl of marinade down and fished a set of keys from her pocket.
Unlocked, Susan now pulled on the heavy door, its weight making her grunt as she peeled it open.
The door did not lead directly into another room, but to a second set of stairs further down into the earth. Susan hit a switch on the wall and fluorescent bulbs flickered and exploded with buzzing light.
At the bottom of the stairs, a concrete pathway twenty feet long lay ahead. The path was as wide as a school’s hallway, the walls white and as bare as an asylum’s.
At the end of the path Susan paused and shifted the big bowl of marinade to one arm. To her left was another steel door, to her right a giant cage. Behind the thick vertical bars of the cage a man was bound, gagged, and hanging by both wrists. He was stark naked, his body recently shaved, appearing as bare as a newborn child.
The man began to whimper when he saw Susan unlock the cage door and enter. She smiled at him and told him to hush the way a loving parent might tell their child to stem their tears.
Taking a large paintbrush from her apron, Susan began to paint the man from the bowl of marinade. The man whimpered some more, and Susan hushed him some more, still smiling, still coating him in the thick dark sauce until no pink remained.
Finished now, Susan locked the cage again, and before leaving for the stairs could not resist pressing her ear to the steel door in front of her. She could hear slight chirps and scurrying sounds from within. She made kissing noises at the door, and the scurrying and chirping grew louder.
She suddenly became so giddy with anticipation she dropped the empty marinade bowl to the floor and hurried upstairs to pee.
4
Emma and I lay in bed together later that night. We’d started to have sex, but I lost my hard-on halfway through. And no, it wasn’t on account of the threat my penis had made earlier about Emma turning into Carol.
It was about what Tony had said. It consumed me, and even held the distinctive honor of making sex impossible.
Emma was upright on both elbows, the blankets just over her stomach, both breasts exposed. Usually a glimpse like that was enough to make me go from six to midnight in seconds, but tonight it just wasn’t happening. I could think of nothing else to say but: “Sorry.”
“It’s okay. To tell you the truth, I wasn’t really feeling it either.”
“I was that bad, huh?”
She smiled. “No, no—it was about what Tony said.”
A pretty fucking apt example of coincidence, I must say.
“You don’t actually think that was a good idea, do you?”
“No, not that…about you…being too good for this town.”
“Em, he was just trying to convince me—that’s all.”
“But it’s true. You should be somewhere else.”
“Oh yeah? Like where?”
“I don’t know. College? Somewhere where you can pursue your writing?”
I didn’t share my writing with Emma. In fact I shared it with no one.
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“I found some of your stuff,” she said. “I wasn’t snooping, I promise. But I found one of your stories. It was really, really good.”
I was flattered and annoyed. A part of me felt she was snooping. Emma still lived at home, and when she would come to my place I often suspected she dug around when I was temporarily engaged (toilet; shower; you choose). I’m not sure what she thought she was going to find; after seven years we had very few secrets between us. Maybe it was something like this she was looking for. Some tangible evidence of my creativity that meant I was considering leaving her behind.
I didn’t bother to ask her what story she’d read. I just thanked her for the compliment and said, “I’m not going anywhere, Em.”
“But you should. You should go.”
“What about us?” I asked.
“You could take me with you…if you wanted.”
I thought about her comment. Would I? I was admittedly still with Emma for the same reason I was still in this town. She was safe and simple. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t care deeply for her. Still, Emma was insecure and didn’t even try to better herself; she seemed content with mediocrity. And I’m sure if we did move on to bigger and better things there may come that awkward time when I felt her inability to expand would hold me back. But I knew I liked having her by my side. And I knew that she would support me in anything I did. Sometimes that’s all you need. It’s enough to get you through anything, especially the scary transition she was suggesting. Emma was loyal and loving, and contrary to how she felt about herself—or the unfair picture I may have painted earlier about her intelligence—she wasn’t dumb.
Kevin and Tony? Dumb.
Emma? She just didn’t believe in herself. Maybe what she needed was that kick in the ass I needed.
But the means? The means for this possible transition towards a new start? It was illegal. Theft. And call me crazy, but something orchestrated by Tony and his crazy uncle didn’t necessarily make me think this was the sure thing Tony was preaching it to be.
I squeezed her leg gently. “I’d take you with me.”
“So what does this mean?” she asked.
I rolled away from her and stared at my ceiling. “It would be great to have the money. We could, and would leave. But come on…are you honestly going to tell me this doesn’t sound like a huge risk?”
“Life’s a risk.”
“That’s weak, Em. We’re talking about breaking the law. Big time.”
“Yeah, big time. But it would only be the one time…”
I sighed. “If it was a sure thing then maybe I’d consider it, but…”
“Let’s call Tony and tell him we’re in. You and I can have our own agenda. If it looks shady, we leave. If anyone acts funny, we leave. And if we see it to the end, and we get our
money, we leave. You and me. We give this town the finger and drive off without ever looking back.”
I was seeing a side of her I hadn’t seen before. An ambitious side. And I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t reeling me in.
I repeated her words. “You and me. A new start.”
“A new start, baby.”
I leaned over and kissed her. She kissed me back, and suddenly everything below my navel started working again.
She reached down to confirm it. “Oh, well, hello there...”
* * *
There were five of us standing around Uncle Fred’s van the following morning: the original four, and of course, Uncle Fred. The van was a pathetic offering—one or two good whacks away from being beaten into submission. I couldn’t even tell what make it was. What I did know, however, was that if we drove this thing into Elmwood we might as well attach a siren onto it.
“We can’t go in this thing,” I said to Tony.
Fred stepped in front of Tony. “Why’s that, son?”
“Because it’s a piece of shit, sir.”
Fred took a step closer to me.
“Uncle Fred, chill,” Tony said.
Picture a rat. Not the kind you see in a pet store that’s actually cute, but the kind you’d see near a sewer or a dumpster. Now imagine a human version of that rat. That’s Uncle Fred. The big pointy nose, the narrow black eyes, the protruding front teeth, all encased in a slicked head of greasy black hair.
“What’s the problem, Alex?” Tony said.
“The problem is that van looks like Fred Flintstone drove it. It’s gonna stick out like a hard-on in Elmwood.”
“It’s the only thing we’ve got that can carry the five of us, and the stuff we’re gonna be taking.”
“You said last night that we wouldn’t be taking much,” I said. “Only a few valuables.”
“Yeah, but who knows how big they’re gonna be?”
I shook my head.
“So don’t come then, hotshot,” Fred said. “More for us.”
I looked at Emma. Her eyes were wide and innocent. She looked nervous.
I sighed. “How big is the driveway?”
Tony had gone and gotten a good look at the house last night after he’d left the bar.
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