The garden of dead thoughts

by Natasha A. Salnikova

  Now Frank tricked his father to get money and he didn’t feel bad. At all. He felt the opposite; he believed he was taking what he deserved. He wasn’t born into this world not to be able to buy some stupid sneakers like everyone else was wearing, while his daddy’s wifey was driving around in a Porsche. Frank was as excited as at any other time in his childhood. He once again felt alive. He was back and his game had changed its focus. It wasn’t purely for fun, but for material gain. It was also for revenge. His dad was going to pay for exchanging them for a younger wife and a younger son. First clothes, then a car, then he would think of something else.

  “What are they saying?” his father repeated.

  “What’s the difference?” Frank sulked. He looked calm and sad, but everything inside him was dancing with excitement. His idiot father had no idea that he was being played. Frank was the mastermind of this game.

  “What?” Father asked impatiently and drank his beer. He was wearing a T-shirt and shorts with pockets. He looked like an old man.

  “I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “Are they calling you names? You have to tell me this stuff.”

  “This is the second trip I’m gonna miss.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me before? How can she do this to you?”

  That was how Frank got another two hundred bucks. Seventy he spent on new sneakers and the rest on games that he’d wanted to buy for a long time. He told his mother that his father bought the sneakers, he told his father it was his mother. His parents didn’t talk to each other at all, they only corresponded via e-mail occasionally, and they certainly wouldn’t waste words on such nonsense as money for a fieldtrip or clothes. Even if they did, Frank would find a way to get out of it, but as he suspected, they just forgot about it. His mother had a new body and a new boyfriend, and his father had a new, growing son. They couldn’t care less about Frank.

  Frank didn’t stop at that. He had returned to his element and it also restored his mood and self-confidence, and so his career began. In the beginning, he couldn’t get money every time. Sometimes his mother or father refused to go along with it, but that happened in any business and he was getting better and better every time. Maybe the final result wasn’t always positive, but by the end of school he had managed to collect a small fortune that helped him during his first year in college when he wanted to dress like a king or take a girl out. Then he found a way to make girls pay for him and how not to stay with a girl when another girl appeared on the horizon, and so on. He decided to drop out of college, although his parents were sure that he had received his diploma. On his graduation day he pretended to get very sick and not be able to attend. They believed him or wanted to believe. Frank couldn’t waste his time on studying, he wanted to work. He wanted to work so hard that everything inside him was on fire.

  That was how he met his first long-term girlfriend, Vicky. He had lived with her for six months.

  CHAPTER 2

  Frank didn’t start dating Vicky just because he liked her. No. Frank saw her in a store, alone and pensive, and watched her for a few days before approaching. Vicki chose expensive items in the store and paid for them by extracting money from an expensive bag. She had an expensive car in which she came to the store every Friday night. Nobody went to the grocery store on Fridays in the evening, except for the old maidens or simply unhappy people, waiting for their loves. Vicki was older than he and she was fat. Frank didn’t have a passion for fat women, but he was not indifferent to their thick wallets. Vicki couldn’t believe her happiness when he started talking to her. Frank hadn’t grown his beer gut yet and hadn’t begun getting the bald spot on his head.

  They started seeing each other and she said that she loved him. Vicki was the first girl he had met knowing exactly what he would get from her, so he spent six long months with her. She didn’t take a penny from him and paid for everything: their apartment, food, entertainment, and even clothes while he was “looking for a job.” On the seventh month of their relationship, his sister died and he had to leave urgently, but there was no money for him to go. A good-natured Vicki gave him money for the plane and expenses. When he didn’t show up and Vicki started calling him to find out what was going on, his aunt answered and said that Frank, unfortunately, had gotten into a car crash and lay in a coma. Doctors didn’t have a lot of hope for him. Then his phone was no longer answered. Even if Vicki started to suspect something, she would never tell anyone about it. It would be too shameful. And there was no one to say, except her cat, Phoebe.

  The scenario was just as successful with girl number two, whose name Frank couldn’t remember to save his life. He wasted only three months on her. The plot didn’t work with girl number three though. Her name was Rosen. Frank was surprised to find out that not all fat girls were the same. Rosen didn’t feel bad about her weight at all, it was quite the opposite. She was proud of her curves and showed them in every way possible with sweaters that had deep cutouts, and tight trousers. Frank tried to lower her self-esteem with some psychological tricks that he managed to learn, but Rosen was deaf to his words. She didn’t react to them at all. When it was time for Frank’s sister to die and for him to disappear from this city, probably to die from grief, Frank had a conversation with Rosen, and it took a direction he didn’t see coming.

  “Her funeral is in two days, I have to be there, but I can’t buy a ticket.”

  “Ask one of your relatives to send you the money,” Rosen said unworriedly. They were sitting in a cafe and she was eating a second croissant with a second cup of coffee. It was coffee that Frank had bought for her with money from his second girlfriend. That was his investment in his business. Rosen was his business. She had a blue sweater on that barely covered her breasts. She had dark, curly hair and long, sharp nails. Her nails were also blue.

  “That’s fine, but all the money will go to the funeral. I can’t ask anyone.”

  “Drive there. You have money for gas.”

  “I don’t have time.” Frank started to get annoyed and thought about stealing her credit card. It was a bad idea, because this idiot didn’t look like the two previous ones and probably would tell the police.

  “What about your work? Ask your boss for a loan.”

  ‘”I wish. Shit, I didn’t want to tell you. The company filed for bankruptcy two weeks ago. I’m looking for something new. That’s pretty much the core of my problem.”

  “I see. Sorry, dear. What a mess. I’m sorry all these things happened to you at the same time.” Rosen didn’t look at him, she looked at the remainder of the fucking croissant with its cream running down her hand.

  “What should I do?” he asked.

  “I’d be glad to help you, but I’ve got no dough at all. I’m sorry. Listen, you are so smart, so educated, you’ll find a new job easily. I suggest that you take a loan from the bank. Yes, that’s the best option.”

  Frank shook his head and made three decisions. The first one was to come up with a better story. A dead sister may not be strong enough to break everyone’s heart. The second one was about his intellect and education. He shouldn’t show off. The third and last one was—time management. He didn’t get enough money from them to justify their relationship, which took too much of his time.

  He didn’t see Rosen again after that, although her big tits and croissant cream running down her hand stuck in his mind for a long time.

  Frank committed the first murder by accident and he told himself he would never do it again. It was sickening and very dangerous. Plus, if he was arrested for some strange reason and his crime was proven then he would get in some serious shit for murder. It was this way with all people historically: murderers usually were punished harsher than scammers. Actually, he wasn’t a scammer; he was a high class charlatan. Maybe his mother wouldn’t brag about his promising career to her girlfriends, but he would create something more presentable for her.

  His new girlfriend had an old mother who was sitting on a pile of dough that di
dn’t let Frank sleep soundly. Frank switched from the girl to her mother and managed to seduce the old woman. He got her drunk, complimented her, talked to her about the cruelty of the world, and the result led them to bed. The old woman was ashamed the next morning, she even cried and cursed herself for doing this to her daughter. It was even better than Frank had expected. This meant he no longer needed to sleep with her, and she would have agreed to anything just so he wouldn’t tell her daughter. Of course Frank wouldn’t stoop so low as to start blackmailing her, but he began talking about going back to college and getting a second degree in technology. He needed money for that. Grandma didn’t even ask any questions, simply gave him as much money as he requested. Frank enjoyed the situation, but he wanted more and decided to go further. He decided to marry the old woman’s daughter. It was a super option. Grandma would continue giving him money to keep him quiet and after her death his wife would receive everything. Then he would divorce her and take the inheritance. Of course it was a long process, but he could accelerate it or change the plan.

  The old witch disagreed with his idea of marriage and began to threaten him with a confession to her daughter. She screamed and cried and then she wanted to leave and Frank grabbed her arm. They were in the witch’s house, which had two stories and smooth marble floors. The old lady slipped and fell, hitting her head, and finally fainting. Frank watched her for some time, but she didn’t come to, so he went to her safe and tried to open it by entering different number combinations. Unfortunately, nothing came of it. Frank waited until the old woman regained consciousness and demanded the code. Not surprisingly, she wouldn’t give it to him and even threatened him with the police.

  “Stupid bitch,” Frank said, pulling a napkin from her table out of the gilded ring and thrusting it in her mouth. He tied her hands, which was easy to do, because she didn’t resist. “I’ll go now and finish off your daughter. Do you understand? I’ll give you two minutes to make up your mind.”

  The old woman did what he said. He still hadn’t decided what to do with her while opening the safe and taking out the money, but when he returned, she wasn’t breathing.

  Frank thanked heaven for small favors, untied the hands of his old girlfriend, and pulled the gag out of her mouth. He put the rope and napkin into a bag to throw away later, and then wiped and washed all furniture and items where his fingerprints could remain. Luckily for him, the old prune had two cleaning ladies who washed and wiped everything twice a week and he hadn’t been here more often than once a week in the last month, rarely passing beyond the living room. He made sure everything was clean, closed the safe, leaving a sum of five hundred dollars in there to make it not look like a robbery, put all his money in a sport bag, and fled the house, leaving the old woman on her marble floor. Nobody knew about the relationship between them, no one had ever seen them together or knew how he entered, because he always parked behind the house as she asked. She didn’t want anyone to see him and it was a wise idea as it turned out. Maybe not for her, but he didn’t complain. He followed the news and obituaries in the newspapers. He found one a few days later, which said that Melanie Doper died of a heart attack and that her family was mourning. Maybe that wasn’t the case, maybe the police suspected foul play, but no one put things like that in the death notice. No one ever came to him with questions about her, but it took a few weeks for Frank to start sleeping soundly again without expecting a knock at his door.

  When Frank stopped at a hotel in another city and counted the money, he couldn’t believe that he was now in possession of ninety thousand dollars. The old prune collected that much in her safe! This could provide him with a comfortable existence for several months, or even a year.

  He spent two weeks in a small town in Georgia thinking of how he could grow in his career, and he came up with the best option. He had to marry a rich old fart and get her inheritance. He didn’t really want to kill them anymore.

  He learned that he had the best ideas when he wandered the streets. He walked around the town for two days, watching, reading articles, thinking, and he found the best way to get acquainted with old maidens. There were country clubs where you could get in only after paying a tidy sum, there were stores and departments with expensive clothes and jewelry. After two days he moved to Atlanta. He decided it was the best city to begin his hunt. It was a big ocean with lots of “fish”. He could even catch two “fish” at the same time. It was a city where he could get lost effortlessly.

  When he was finally ready to hook up with some old crone, he learned that it wasn’t as easy as he had expected. No, they talked to him, smiled at him, accepted his sleazy compliments, but they perceived him as someone else’s son. He arranged his first date after three weeks of perusing, but it turned out that wining and dining old hags didn’t equal dragging them to bed, let alone marrying them. Frank quickly abandoned his attempts with the first old woman who was so religious that he was afraid of becoming a monk or starting to think about all his sins, hell and punishment. The second and third ones were annoying as hell and talked only about their kids and grandkids. It was a disaster. Frank still believed in his idea and knew that if he wanted to get what he sought he had to keep going and not give up. That was what he saw on YouTube in some motivational video.

  True or not, he didn’t give up and that was when the universe heard his desire and he met Dolores.

  Dolores was a small, cheerful old woman who didn’t have children and whose husband had kicked off a long time ago, leaving her with tons of dough. She didn’t have enough time to spend it, as she herself said. She wasted her money buying more of the same type of old lady clothing she was wearing, and on her disgusting white dog, Lucy, which Frank hated right away. Lucy wore a collar studded with diamonds, ate the most expensive food from a silver dish, and slept on a sofa made to order.

  Frank showered Dolores with compliments and flowers, hoping for her senile, old mind to move. She should fall in love with him, agree to marry him, and then follow his script to the end. Dolores was sixty-five and Frank’s grandmother, when she was sixty-five, claimed that it was a child’s age. For Frank, Dolores already had one foot in the grave and he couldn’t wait to help her get there.

  Dolores accepted gifts and compliments, gazed into Frank’s eyes and told him how much she missed romance. He even slept with her, although he almost barfed with disgust. He drank a couple of glasses of wine and watched porn, but next time planned on getting wasted. Only the second time didn’t come. She stopped responding to his calls and when he came to her house, he found a young woman there who turned out to be Dolores’s daughter. Frank was flabbergasted, because the old hag told him she didn’t have any children. What a liar. Maybe because she lied so much or maybe because it was her time, but it turned out that poor, sweet Dolores joined her husband in heaven with the help of a good, old heart attack. Frank’s anger was boundless. He spent two months of his life on her and the bitch died without even thinking about the consequences.

  While Frank stood frozen, thinking about what had happened, about the injustice, and about what he had lost, Dolores’s daughter regarded him.

  “Who are you?” she asked at last.

  “Me? Sorry, I’m just shocked. I saw her like a week ago and she was fine. She was completely healthy, full of life!”

  “I know. We are all in shock. How did you know her?”

  “I ... I just helped her around the house with the computers, that kind of stuff. She owed me a payment for the last month and told me to come today ... Oh, I’m so sorry! It doesn’t matter. I didn’t mean to bother you with this stuff in your grief. It’s horrible. She was such a good woman. My condolences. Sorry for bothering you,” Frank said, but he didn’t move. He looked good, he smelled good, and his eyes were blue. What else could a woman need?

  “No, no, wait! How much does she owe you?”

  “It’s not a big deal. Three thousand.” Frank shrugged. It was a ridiculously small amount, but he wanted to get at least some kin
d of compensation for the lost time.

  “I didn’t know she was so much into computers. Never mind. Is a check okay?”

  “You don’t have to ...”

  “You earned this money. I’m sure my mom would like me to pay you.”

  “A check will do,” Frank said, thinking about the best way to cash it.

  “Let’s go into the house, it’s hot outside.”

  Frank crossed the doorstep, staring at the girl’s ass in short shorts. He was lucky with mothers and daughters. This one was about thirty-five, blonde, slightly overweight, but only slightly. She still looked good.

  “It’s a pity you didn’t know about her death and couldn’t attend the funeral. The service was so nice. Everyone spoke good words about my mother.”

  “I’m sure. Mrs. Dolores was a wonderful woman. What’s your name? You look just like her. The same energy.”

  “Tiffany.”

  She nodded to his compliments, but didn’t say thank you. She walked to the table where Frank ate only once when Dolores fed him homemade cookies, took out her checkbook from the bag hanging on the chair, and sat down to write the quoted amount.

  “Mrs. Dolores talked about you.”

  “We didn’t communicate much in the last few years,” Tiffany said without looking up. “I just graduated from medical college and was looking for work. I was just so busy.”

  “It’s not easy to get a medical degree,” Frank said. “My grandmother was a pediatrician and she said she didn’t know any profession that would be more gratifying than that.”

  “Really?” Tiffany raised her head this time and tore the check from the checkbook.

  Dolores’s dog ran into the room out of nowhere and began yapping at Frank. He wanted to strangle her.

  “Hello, little one,” he said kindly. “You poor thing, lost your mommy.”

  Tiffany picked up the nasty animal and kissed it on the muzzle.

  “It’ll be you and me,” she said.