by David Boyle
Gray clouds overspread the sky. The automatic timer set off the CD player in the kitchen. Gershwin. Mandy turned up the volume a smidgen, looked outside, and pouted at the sight of the quickly moving storm. Rain, misty or heavy, always made her glum.
Down the hall in the bedroom, Derek opened his eyes, ready for a new day. The curtains were open; feathers of light caressed the bedroom walls and mushroomed across the ceiling. Derek and Mandy had stood in this shadowy room last night—sensuously, erotically charged. He didn’t want to let go of the mental image but a hectic day lay ahead of him.
Prying himself out of bed, Derek went to the kitchen and came up behind Mandy at the sink. He slid his hand up her hip. Mandy moaned, tilted her head back, and smiled coyly. “Don’t start, not now,” she said in a hoarse, sleepy voice. “You have to go to work.”
“What if I take the day off?” he suggested. “See where it takes us. I’ll even fix the furnace. It’s long overdue,” he added, digging for a reason to stay, trying to persuade her.
Mandy cocked her head, grinned. “You’re outta sick time, am I right, cowboy?”
Derek nodded, tucking in his shirt. “True. I guess we can continue this later, though there’s no better time than now, especially looking as you do. Anyway, I’m on the homestretch with this job. I can wrap things up with a solid week, finally get paid. It’s one step closer, babe, one step closer to the plans we’ve had.”
Mandy nuzzled him, offering a seductive preview of things to come. She whispered flirtatiously in his ear, then, pulling away, unbuttoned his flannel shirt. “If you finish early, call me. I don’t leave for work until ten-thirty.”
Derek rebuttoned his shirt. “I’ll do a rain dance. Or you could call me.”
After kissing his wife goodbye, he grabbed his lunchbox and left through the kitchen door. From the window above the sink Mandy watched him walking to his truck. She blew him a kiss which he didn’t see.
Mandy topped-off her coffee and walked into the dining room, the windows cracked open, a forceful breeze fluffing the curtains. She flicked the dimmer switch, turning on the lamp on the corner table, spreading sparse light throughout the undersized room. One of Derek’s layouts—a document he needed at the jobsite—lay on the cutlery cabinet across from her. About three feet long, it was rolled up, cinched with a rubber band and only inches from falling off the edge, the breeze nudging it along. “I better call him lat—”
She heard something falling in the garage. She walked cautiously from the dining room and on past the entrance foyer, noticing the deadbolt had been latched on the front door, ensuring her safety. The garage door was always locked, that much she was certain of. Derek checked it every night before bed and every morning before work, never missing a beat. She opened the garage door and chuckled at her own silliness, her own overactive imagination. One of Derek’s hand tools had fallen from its rack and knocked over a jar of nails. She put everything back.
At Derek’s jobsite the crew was working on a three-tier building, each floor bustling with tradesmen, compressors and hand tools making an irritating racket. Derek had been toiling for months at this site and was almost done with the exterior walls. His co-worker, Steven Jansen, working across from him and installing windows, pulled a cell phone from his holster and looked at the screen. “Weather’s supposed to get nasty later.”
Derek was measuring a 2x4. “I know. This morning the skies were threatening. Surprised they haven’t opened yet. It’s looking grim up there.”
Jansen, dressed in overalls with suspenders and a weather-beaten hat, squeezed a bead of caulk into the window frame. “According to the report I have here, it will be pouring by noon.”
“That’s not such a bad forecast,” Derek replied. “I need a day to fix my furnace. The hours here aren’t helping. Besides, the missus was a little playful this morning, if you get my drift?”
Jansen smiled, caught a glimpse of their boss coming toward them, wearing a hard hat, his belly sagging over his belt buckle, nowhere near as fit as his reliable, strapping crew. He addressed his workers firmly. “All right, girls, listen up! O’Connor’s out. We need to pick up the slack.”
A chorus of moans and isolated cursing. “For those who have a problem, feel free to hit the bricks!” the supervisor said sternly. “We have a contract to fulfill. We’re behind as it is.”
A couple of the men mumbled incoherently. Derek remained silent.
Walking away from his men, the supervisor turned and said, “Don’t get soft on me now. I thought I hired work-men, not pansies.”
Derek tossed a hammer into his toolbox. “This is so typical of O’Connor. That slacker has been out six days this month alone. Why don’t they just cut him loose and be done with it?”
Jansen walked over to Derek, spoke surreptitiously. “That jerk is smooth, man. If there’s one thing O’Connor’s a master at, it’s convincing people, coming up with excuses for everything, making people feel for him. Smoothing over the boss to keep his job shouldn’t be too tall a task.”
Jansen scanned the room, double-checked that no one was paying attention. “He talked Randy Muller’s wife into bed last year, remember? She always visited Randy at work on breaks and such. They seemed inseparable, those two.”
Derek squinted. “And? Where are you going with this?”
“Well…one day Muller was working on another crew, and at that time, his wife hadn’t dropped by the site like she normally did, hoping to hang with him. So he sensed something was wrong and went looking for her. He found her and O’Connor parked at the lake getting it on.
That’s the point I’m trying to make. Sure, O’Connor’s a sleaze for trying, but Muller’s lady could have said no.”
Derek shrugged. “So what happened?”
“Muller cleaned his clock pretty good, threw him a beating. The rest is even more messed up. One of the guys asked O’Connor why he went after Muller’s wife. You know what the bastard said?”
“What?” Derek asked indifferently. “I can’t imagine.”
“His big answer was, ‘I don’t like him, never did. He had it coming, so did his flirtatious wife.’”
Derek rubbed sawdust from his eye, from his curly hair. “What an ass. I don’t care for O’Connor either, but I don’t really have to work with him. When I do, I stay out of his way, and he out of mine. He’s not worth the trouble.”
“You’re a better man than we are, Derek boy, what can I say? One day he’ll get his.”
Derek suddenly seemed confused, his eyes roamed about the work area. “Ah, man,” he said. “I forgot...” Searching the floor for his layouts, he realized he had forgotten them. “Damn.”
Heavy rain started falling. The crew began covering their work with tarps and plastic sheets. Derek made his way downstairs, rushing to the worksite trailer for a towel. The phone rang as he entered the room; his boss answered, telling him Mandy was on the line. Derek clutched the receiver. The men in the room eavesdropped on his conversation. Standing in the corner, he cupped the handset. “Hey, babe.”
Preoccupied with paperwork, Derek’s supervisor, smoking a cigar, paid no attention to him. Derek talked with Mandy in a low voice. “I know. Thanks. Luckily I don’t need the layouts at the moment. I’m heading home for a while. We’re rained-out here.”
The other workmen kept looking over at Derek and then turning away, curious but self-conscious. Derek had noticed their behavior but ignored them.
“What?” Derek said to Mandy. “Did I hear you right? Stop messing with me, you tease. I’ll see you in a bit, love.” Derek, ending his phone call, placed the handset on his boss’s desk.
Back in his truck, Derek wiped off his head and neck with a scrap of towel. He glanced at the clock. 9:00 a.m. He had plenty of time to get home, have fun with Mandy, and send her off to work. As he started the engine and began backing up, his boss came running down the front walk waving his arms. “Hey Wilson, hold it!”
Derek stopped. That was the first time in years the boss had
addressed him by his last name. Unusual, he thought. What might he want? “What is it, boss?”
“If the rain lets up later I’m going to call you. I’ll need you to come back and finish that wall, got me? This job is very important, you know. A lot of money’s behind it. And a big payday for you. Get where I’m coming from?”
“Yes, sir,” Derek said, without hesitation, knowing full well how badly he needed the final installment of the contract, what with all he had happening in his life, and what lay ahead. Now was not the time to question having to come back, even if nobody else would do so under such unfavorable conditions.
Derek pulled out and drove away. As the rain intensified, his wipers couldn’t clean the windshield fast enough. He pulled out his wallet, flipped through the pictures, and stared at the last one—a photo of Mandy, her sapphire eyes staring back at him, her hair combed to perfection. Derek relished a moment of reflection. He and Mandy had been married for ten years, and never a careless misstep, no regrets. Even in the wake of their most heated arguments they always seemed to be drawn more closely together. Driving with his left hand, Derek fingered the picture with his right thumb, smiling, remembering: Last year he and Mandy had made a promise to each other that after he finished his three major projects they would try to have children. He couldn’t wait, the long delay had been excruciating; it was all he could think about from one day to the next. He had been stashing money away at odd times, doing special projects here and there in anticipation of their future child, niceties he would bowl over Mandy with when the time presented itself. Mandy’s happiness, their joyful life together, extending the family—it was all he could think about in this moment as he listened to the maddening sound of wiper blades swaying back and forth, the drumming of relentless rain on the hood. He eyed the dreary sky, checked himself in the rearview, wanting to look his best for Mandy.
Having arrived home sooner than he had anticipated, he wanted to surprise her. Enticing thoughts whirred in his mind. Which outfit would she have on? How would she fix her hair? What kinds of things would she say, and how would he reciprocate? Approaching the side door, he slipped off his work-boots so she couldn’t hear him. He tiptoed through the screen door and into the kitchen, where all he heard was rain slapping the windows, the shutters getting battered, thunder gathering and then fading, the un-predictable storm striking all in its path. Moving toward the living room, he controlled his breathing. The house, dark and shadowy, made him feel like an intruder, a make-believe scenario that excited him, and obviously Mandy had set the stage for this fun game, one they rarely played. She had been adventurous all her life, a risk-taker of sorts, just another of her many irresistible attributes. He couldn’t imagine a more enchanting woman in the world.
Heading down the hall, he glanced in the direction of the master bedroom, the door was ajar, adequate space for him to squirm through, which he did quietly, carefully, like a child sneaking a peek under a Christmas tree. A candle was burning on the night stand on his side of the bed, wax dripping down the stem, overflowing the decorative saucer. The aroma of strawberry permeated the room. Mandy lay under a silk blanket facing away from him, curled into her favorite position, her glossy blonde hair styled prettily, better than the picture he’d admired on the way over. Drawing nearer the bed, he smelled her exotic shampoo, or maybe it was soap. Didn’t matter anyway, more prudent thoughts had arisen. Derek, refusing to waste another second by getting undressed, slipped under the blanket and spooned his wife. He stroked her hair, kissed the side of her head, and massaged her back, gently, as always. He was a gentleman. Everybody—co-workers, the community, Mandy’s family—held him in the highest regard. Even his curmudgeonly boss couldn’t help thinking highly of him and his work.
Though Derek was unleashing his charms on Mandy, she remained unresponsive, forcing him to improvise. He kissed her arm, her shoulder, her neck—her favorite place—again and again. He’d done everything right, so he thought, but found himself becoming frustrated. As he started to pull her toward him the phone rang. Derek dreaded answering it; the rain had stopped a few minutes ago. His boss was probably calling him, wanting him to return to work. “Son of a bitch,” he mumbled. If only he could convince his boss that he had some urgent matters to take care of before coming back to the site. Perhaps he could buy an extra hour or so if he could finesse the conversation. Mandy had stayed unmoving, quiet, while he contemplated the course of events.
Derek picked up the phone. The voice on the other end emitted a screeching laugh.
Derek became irascible. “Boss, what’s so funny?”
“Sorry about the laughter. Sometimes I can’t help myself...Derek.”
“Who is this?” he said, infuriated, realizing the voice wasn’t his boss’s.
The man on the other end whispered. “Let’s put it this way, I don’t like you either, so I left a memento.”
Derek dropped the phone and it slid into the flickering shadow of the candle. He rolled Mandy on her back, and made a paralyzing discovery—a screwdriver protruded from her sternum, the handle flush against her chest. Stunned, terrified, Derek didn’t want to believe that his Mandy had been helpless and had probably taken her final breaths only moments ago.
Reality took hold, wrapping itself around his heart and squeezing mercilessly. Blood leaked from the corner of Mandy’s mouth as she lay dead beside him on the mattress. He jumped out of bed, ripping away the blankets, noticing red blotches on the sheets, the crimson-soiled mattress demarcating the contours of the corpse—a ghastly mess. Derek took a step toward the end of the bed and seized the phone, the strange man’s voice still hauntingly, devilishly, coming through. “Maybe you should have fixed the furnace today.”
“Why? I’ll kill you!” Derek screamed into the phone, his eyes bulging, saturated with tears, with sweat, his entire physiognomy reflecting nightmarish horror.
The caller responded in a subdued tone. “Don’t know why I do these things, Wilson. But you should know: Mandy was no slouch.”
Derek, his face tremulous, stared at the screwdriver sticking out of his wife’s sternum. He held the phone to his ear, it wobbled in his grip. The voice on the phone continued nonstop. “She fought me hard, but it was nothing a little poke couldn’t handle… know what I mean?”
“I’ll find you! You son of a...”
“Now, let’s see,” the voice cut in. “I’m off to see Jansen’s old lady. Ciao.”
Derek blacked out and stumbled forward, his head colliding with the bedpost. His skull met the floor with whiplash-like force, submerging him into a pitch-black void, utter nothingness. He lay unconscious. Behind Derek’s prone body, a short hall led to a closet, then a bath- room. The closet door creaked open, hinges squeaked, and someone emerged with black, gloved hands. The footfalls became louder as they continued down the hall closer to the bedroom where Derek remained prone. The mysterious figure stopped, stood, waited; its feet shifted, its boots squeaked. One gloved hand held something in a closed fist. It opened, revealing an object—Mandy’s wedding ring. The intruder dropped it in front of Derek’s face. The ring clinked, spinning in a circle on the slick floor. The stranger turned and moved in another direction, making a getaway.
Moments later, Derek’s eyes opened to the sound of a screen door opening and slamming shut. Derek extended his arm toward the cordless phone. Bleeding internally, desperate for help, he grabbed the receiver and began dialing, his fingers, scraped and scarred, probing for the numbers, finding them somehow.
The operator: “Hello, 911, what is your emergency?”
Derek blacked out again. The phone slid from his hand, out of reach.
“Hello? Hello?” said the operator. “What is your emergency? You know, this isn’t the number to call if you’re looking to play a prank.”
The call got disconnected.
After a short time, a series of sounds: garbage cans getting knocked over; bottles breaking; bushes being squashed under foot; a car’s breaks squeaking as it comes t
o a stop, its door closing, its engine revving, the car taking off; a dog barking in the distance. Still no sirens—not yet.
Derek hadn’t stirred. The gruesome scene hadn’t changed, save a few particulars: The sun had come out, had carved its way through a once bleak, menacing sky.
Scattered beams stretched across Derek and Mandy’s bedroom, dispensing light on two wood plaques under the bed, both dust-covered. Derek had made them himself, in his spare time, preparing for the children he and Mandy might have had—their longtime, long-planned-for dream, a dream among others. On each plaque a name had been engraved, Shirley on one, Walter on the other—names they had agreed on if they had had children, nameplates for hanging on the baby’s bedroom door. What would be the point, one might ask, of having such grand dreams at all, when life—cruel, remorseless, and nefarious—can so ruthlessly steal them away, even from benevolent, altruistic people? Should Derek live to witness another day, he will have an unanswerable question to ponder for the rest of his existence. Maybe, just maybe, he would rather be dead, buried with his adoring wife, whose last display of endless affection, whose last communication with her devoted husband, was blowing him a kiss, a kiss he unfortunately didn’t see, expressing a profound love, Derek may be thinking, worth giving-up for.
THE TASTE OF LICORICE
The rattling alarm startled Raymond. It was 4:30 a.m. again.
His wife, Erin, groggy and barely awake, reached over and clutched his arm. “C’mon, stay in bed. Five more minutes.”
Looking back at her and struggling to see her face in the dark, Raymond groped for her hand. Their fingers joined. “Can’t, sleepyhead. I’m behind at work…and it’s only Wednesday.”
Yawning, Erin sat up and switched on the lamp. “Me too. I got tons of filing to do for the doctor. Impossible to finish this week.” She moaned. “I’ll put coffee on.”
Raymond wiped his face. “Sounds good. Catch you in a few.”
