by Welker, Wick
“Okay,” Stark uttered weakly and transferred the call to Denise. He looked down at his hands and then opened the left hand corner of his desk for his bottle of Jack, forgetting about the Coke.
Chapter four
“Hey, guys, come on in.”
Two men dressed in battered sweatshirts and faded jeans stepped into the foyer of the Sanders home. The taller man had a mustache and thick sideburns that reminded Ellen of a seventies disco dancer. They glanced around the house, arching their necks at the ceiling trying to show some sort of authority as handy men. Ellen led them down the wooden planks of the unfinished stairs into the dank basement. The men noticed a slight cling of mildew in the musky air.
“Okay, so we'll start with this room here, towards that corner there…” The worker with the mustache pointed to the corner of the room that was enveloped in a ray of sunlight bursting from a window well above. The manner with which this man looked around at the house and smirking had an eerie quality that started to bother Ellen. He seemed too much at ease.
She quickly responded, “Yes, okay. Gary, right?”
“Yeah, I'm Gary, and this is Scott.” Scott smiled and weakly waved at her.
“I think starting in this room would be fine. Do you think you'll be able to get the bathroom finished today too?”
“Well, it depends. I thought you were going to have some moldings in place for us. Are you going to need us to put those in now?” His voice rose with annoyance.
“You'll have to do that too, so whatever more time it takes is okay with me, guys.”
Gary kept arching his neck and darting his eyes around the room with the same authoritative mood from before. He stopped and gestured toward Ellen. “Is your husband going to be home in the next few hours?”
Ellen hesitated before answering the question with an unintended pause of suspicion. “He…”
“It’s just that we want to know if he might have other specifications in mind.” Gary smiled confidently.
“Well, no, he won't have anything else in mind so you won't need to bother with him.” She swung around and started for the stairs. “But he is in and out all day at different times. He’s usually here around three.”
“Huh, that's funny. When I talked to him over the phone it sounded like he was in the advertising biz.”
Her lip curled with a sense of antagonism. “Yes he is, but what difference does that make?”
“Well, if he works at one of the advertising firms downtown it seems like it might take him a bit longer to get home than three o'clock in the afternoon.”
“The hours he works has no bearing on you laying carpet in this basement.”
“Oh, I didn't mean to offend you, Ma'am, just wanted to make sure I got my facts straight.” He stared at her.
Ellen now noticed what bothered her about this man's presence in her home. He had confidence in his body language and speech in a foreign setting, like a scam artist manipulating a target for an ulterior motive. His smile bothered her more than anything else.
“My husband will be home when he arrives.” Her eyes panned across the room to the other worker who stared blankly at her. “You can get started and if you need anything, I'll be upstairs expecting a visit from a friend.” She briskly stomped up the wooden stairs, knowing that the last thing she said was a lie and it sounded like a lie.
“Oh, don't worry about us, Ma'am, we'll get started. Maybe we'll bother you for some water in a bit.” He heckled from below the stairs at her empty footsteps.
Ellen walked into the kitchen and started wondering about where Keith kept that gun. Then she silently laughed at herself and started making lemonade for the men who were in her basement.
*****
Keith actually started to get a little work done. He thought of four new ideas to pitch to the cough syrup people about color schemes and ad time slots. The last meeting had ended with the disappointed look of the owners staring back at him from across the table and Janice explaining to them about how things are supposed to run in this company. He stared back at them in complete indifference, realizing that he hated his job because he didn't care about the work.
He stretched his arms, peered outside his office, and saw Dave sauntering down the hallway toward him. The expression on his face was a mix of blank unawareness and vague focus, as if he was detached from what he was currently doing and analyzing an unseen complex math problem in the back of his mind.
Keith waited for him to approach. “Hey, where have you been for the last hour? Janice was looking for you and I didn't do too good of a job covering for you.”
Dave brought his eyes up to Keith. “I just got some really bad news.”
“What happened?”
“It turns out that after Lindsey left my house last night she got pulled over by a cop for swerving all over the road. When the cop got out of the car, she just took off. She started a twenty minute hot pursuit all over Jersey.”
“What? Why did she run?” Keith leaned forward in his chair.
“I don't know, but she crashed into a restaurant and…”
Keith winced, “I know the rest. It was on the news this morning.”
“…she had a gun and was shooting at the cops. I can't believe it. I don't understand how she could do that. They killed her on the spot. She's dead and I can't understand it.” He looked off through a window, avoiding eye contact.
Keith paused and let out a long sigh. “I'm sorry, Dave. I saw that on the news and I had no idea it was her.”
“Her sister called me and said she was screaming at them and not making any sense. She was just a crazy person shooting a gun.”
“Was she… drunk? Or…” Keith treaded lightly attempting to sound sensitive.
“I never saw her do any drugs and she drank sometimes, but nothing crazy. I mean, I didn't know her that well, so who knows what she was into.”
“Are you going to be okay? Were you two very close?” Keith began to search the archives in his mind for the generic sympathetic phrases that one uses in situations like this. He had known Dave not to take personal tragedy too well. When his father died suddenly ten years ago, he went missing for three days on Lake Michigan curled up in a rowboat without food.
“No, I'll be okay. I've just got to let this sink in.” Dave too was searching for the typical phrases of a person in shock.
“Let's get something to eat after work, or why don't you come over for dinner with me and Ellen tonight?” He raised his eyebrows in a show of emotional support.
“Yeah, yeah that's good.” He numbly walked away. As soon as Dave turned the corner, Janice came rolling down the hallway. Her lips curled downward towards the fatty jowls of her neck creating deep dark points at the sides of her mouth. It gave her face the appearance of an over exaggerated frown. Her forehead glistened under the white lighting of the office. Keith had become accustomed to the general disdain that he had for this gigantic woman.
“Keith, are you ready for the meeting? We have the cough syrup people coming in about ten minutes.” She scowled above him in his chair.
Keith was about to respond but was abruptly interrupted by a cutting stench around him. It was an acrid odor with the quality of decaying organic matter. His mind quickly began to conjure up images of maggots and rancid meat, beginning to grasp what the possible source of the smell could have been. Janice readjusted her body weight in an attempt to show her impatience, which created a greater waft of the smell from the wake of air movements. Keith slowly realized the horror that the smell was actually coming from a human being.
Temporarily recovering, he answered, “Yes, I'm ready to go. I've got some good ideas for them... it should…” he let out a cough, overcome by the noxious air. He stared up at her and noticed a yellow tinge in her face that seemed to be originating from her chest and back. Her hair was damp with moisture and clung to her temples and cheeks. She stood with her mouth open, breathing much more heavily than she usually did. He noticed her white fingers gr
asping the edge of his desk, her arm almost imperceptibly rattling back and forth to sustain her balance.
He looked up at her oval, leaky nostrils. “Hey, are you okay? You look... sick.”
She paused in momentary disbelief. “Keith, I won't take this from you! I'm not going to be subject to your delusions.” She wasn't screaming but speaking loudly enough for people down the hall to notice.
“What? I'm sorry, but you don't look well.”
“Just get to the meeting,” she barked and attempted to exit the room much faster than her physique would allow, stumbling over her high heels. She left a viscous residue on the table where her palm had been. Keith quickly and methodically opened the window to his office and squirted hand sanitizer on his desk. He had an overwhelming desire to tell the world his story.
In the meeting sat three men with one identical facial expression of annoyance. Janice sat opposite them with Keith at a reasonable enough distance from her that it wouldn't be noticeable that he was intentionally distancing himself from her. Keith began to explain his various proposals on a projector, which cast filaments of dancing light onto the wall. After he droned on in a monotonous tone for a while, he began to realize how boring he must sound.
Before he could worry any more about the presentation, he noticed a slight gurgling sound being generated from Janice's throat. The three men also noticed. She sat, wide eyed, staring past the heads of the three men. Keith halted the presentation and looked over at her. Intermittent snoring perforated the gurgling sound, while the entire room sat watching and waiting in momentary disbelief.
Keith held his breath and leaned over to her. “Janice... what's going on?”
She didn't respond, but the snoring stopped. Her eyes stared vacantly at the wall. The room was completely silent for a moment except for the faint whirring of the overhead projector.
One of the men leaned forward, “I think we'd better call an ambulance.” He paused and with an alerted voice added, “I think she needs an ambulance.”
Keith nodded, relieved that the man was being sympathetic of the situation. He began to look around the office to summon some help but people were only paying attention to dimly lit computer screens. The smell that was issuing from Janice was now palpable to the three businessmen silently watching the scene. One of the men had his suit sleeve cupped over the front of his face.
Keith leaned in closer to Janice and shook her shoulder. Nothing in her body stirred except a few momentary jiggles of fat in her face. He brought his ear closer to her face, certain she was not breathing. There was no movement of air coming from her.
One of the men across the table noticed the alarm in Keith's face and made an inept attempt at being useful. “Maybe you should put a mirror under her nose to see if she's breathing.”
“I'm going to go get some help.” Keith turned to the door but stopped abruptly when he heard Janice say in a silent, dull voice, “No, no, I'm fine.”
He spun around and saw her looking up at him, her deeply set eyes squinting. Keith could only stare back at her, feeling perspiration building on his forehead. In what seemed to be an insurmountable challenge, even for a heavyset person, Janice then proceeded to get up from her chair. She was having trouble with the basic act of rising from a chair; not being able to coordinate the sequential movements of raising her body with her arms, and then letting her legs take the weight to lift up. She was using her arms and legs at the same time, which made her body spring upward and then violently crash back down onto the suffering, swivel office chair. After several attempts of this, she eventually slithered right out of the chair and fell to the ground, knocking the chair to lazily slide in the direction of where Keith was standing.
Through the entire calamity, the three men appeared aghast and amused simultaneously. Finally, one of the bald men got up to help her. Keith and the bald man started to lift her by her shoulders, both cringing at the smell, but trying not to make it too obvious. They attempted to set her back in the chair, but she managed to make it to her feet and was able to stand freely, staring vacantly. She crudely pushed the bald man out of her way and stood in front of the projection screen, the shades of light and color streaming across her face. She stood with an eerie silence and a blank expression.
When men have grown so accustomed to proper social etiquette for the majority of their lives, they become unfit to register psychotically bizarre human behavior rationally. For the four men that stood in the conference office, this was the case. Janice bent her neck down as far as she could and began to thump the back of her head methodically onto the projection screen behind her. With each hit, the sheet rock of the walls vibrated, shaking the motivational posters hanging above her. They simply watched for a few seconds, not being able to react. She had hit her head with enough force that every time she brought her head up, blood began to spurt. It splattered in the projected light and started to drip down the wall towards the carpet.
“Janice, Janice what are you doing! You have to stop. You’re sick and you don't know what you're doing.” Keith began to move towards her but the bald man cut him off and approached her first, pulling her arm and body away from the wall. She quickly looked at him and brought her massive balled up fist right down on top of his head. He sank to the ground and at the same time, tripped Janice who fell on top. She started a barrage of pounding, raising one arm followed by sloppy blows to his face. She breathed heavily while stringy drops of mucous rained down on his suit from above. The violent thrusting of her body shook her high heels off, exposing her stalky feet. Keith saw her matted, blood soaked hair on the back of her head and crimson colored streaks staining the back of her dress. He leaped over a chair and yanked her from off the top of the man who now lay unconscious with his legs crumpled up to his side.
Janice rolled onto her back and looked vaguely in Keith's direction. It was only later, after reflecting on the episode that Keith realized a subtle yet profound change in her face. Her eyelids were droopy and her eyes didn't run in parallel when she moved them. It was as if she had two lazy, rebellious eyes, which were no longer attached to the processes of the brain. Her slackened jaw made her mouth permanently ajar, which resulted in the complete absence of a chin. It appeared as if the skin on her entire face was clinging loosely to the skull, as if she had the face of a plastic doll melting away in the sun.
Janice started to kick upward, her legs running on an invisible bicycle. The futile assault was intended for Keith. Keith turned to the other two men who had remained seated. “We need to get him out of here. He’s not conscious. Come grab him by the shoulders and slide him out now!” Once someone had actually given an order, they looked at each other and circled around the table to the bald man on the floor. They walked with their bodies slanted away from Janice to avoid the relentless kicking. Picking him up by either end, they made their way out of the conference room. The bald man’s gut had come unbound from the confines of his belt and shirt and was precariously swinging over the carpet.
“Janice, just stay here, I'm going to close the door and keep you in here. I'm going to get you some help.” Keith walked backwards out of the room while rolling a chair in front of him as a temporary barrier from another violent lunge. She continued with her aimless kicking and grunting. Keith closed the door and looked back into the conference room through a glass panel. The blood on the projector screen was starting to darken into a black stain.
Chapter five
“Good morning, ladies and gentleman. We are now prepared to board flight 5328 to Holland. At this time, we ask all passengers that need extra assistance in seating children to board first, followed by rows 15-20. We will also begin boarding all our preferred platinum members at this time. We will be seating the other rows shortly, thanks.”
*****
A gray smeared sky covered the playground at Oak Brook Elementary School. Concerned teachers looked up at the low lying clouds, grimacing at the prospect of bringing the children in early from recess. The courtyar
d was full of screaming and laughing with feet stomping repeatedly in gravel. Thirty children twirled, chased, tripped and cried. One organic mass of skin, hair and teeth swirled like a stream eddy around the circumference of the playground.
Ms. Stutsen sat several yards from the playground on a shallow knoll and watched the children. She sat with her arms behind her back, propping up her torso. Every now and then, a boy named Andy would peek out from under a purple plastic tube and wave at her. After the fifth time, she had grown weary of waving back and pretended to read the book lying on her lap, but she really stared into the remote distance of suburban homes. She could see the very top part of the roof from her own home which was two blocks away and started to think about the pot roast that had been cooking in the kitchen for the past three hours. She methodically organized how she was going to prepare dinner when she got home. Then she started worrying about her class. She recounted in her head how many children were absent today: Danny Allen, Craig Ebert, Jen Lippitt, Jackson Bladen, Sarah Conrad, and Jared Freeman... there were at least two more, she thought. She knew she had never had that many children at home sick in her four years teaching. In addition, she heard that three faculty members had called in substitutes as well.
Ms. Stutsen could feel misplacement about something throughout the day. There was something caught in the back of her mind that she could feel herself consciously picking at but never quite uncovering. The layered gray clouds clinging to the base of the mountains and the sighing wind mixing with the laughter of children stirred a maternal instinct within her to protect her young students. She quickly cast the notion out of her mind and subdued her paranoia but knew she could easily summon her hostile instincts at the first sign of more imaginary machinations.
Closing her eyes, she became very aware of the wind as it bathed her arms with warm air. Relics conjured in her mind of a recent trip to the ocean making her feel like she was on the beach. She heard the sound of pebbles being crunched under someone's shoes coming closer to her. Jayne Sanders was quickly approaching her, holding her elbow. Her pigtails swung from the back of her head and she continuously brushed her bangs out of her eyes as she ran.
