The Wrath of Dimple

by Lucy Woodhull

  I burst into the apartment, saying, “Sam! The horror has happened! He’s trying to get me!”

  As one, the two special agents standing in my living room swiveled to face me. “Horror?” they both said, Hertz and Anastos.

  Regret stabbed at me that I had no scoring card on me—simultaneous speaking was a nine-point-five at least.

  “Hi, FBI people.” I snaked around them to find Sam sprawled on the sofa, displaying for the esteemed agents his level of respect for them. He was practically scratching his balls. I set my purse on the arm of the couch and said, “Yeah, today… Lydia Adams, you know—starlet, blonde, idiot—totally ripped the biggest fart in the middle of the table read. It was a horror. Don’t share that, of course. But you two are in the secrets business, am I right?”

  They declined to nod, but they did it in sync.

  Sam sat up and waved me over, pulling me into his lap, which earned him a smack on the shoulder. I chose a spot beside him.

  “The dynamic duo here have been grilling me about my injuries some more,” my adorable husband said in the most smart-ass way he possibly could. “It’s déjà vu, which I appreciate, as my bad memory doesn’t give me a lot of that nowadays.”

  Agent Anastos stepped up, her hands clasped behind her back. “If you sell any information you may have discovered, we’ll know. We’re watching you. We’re watching your bank accounts, your credit cards, for activity on your passport.”

  “Oh, good,” I said, snaking Sam’s clammy fingers through my own. “I’m glad you’re watching the victim of a brutal, near murderous attack instead of trying to find out who tried to kill him. A-plus, Feds! Go USA!”

  Hertz made a deep noise of exception. “We are investigating who attacked Mr Ballitch. However, there are few leads and no witnesses.”

  “What about security cameras on the street? I know you can use those—I watch Scandal. Should we call Kerry Washington? ’Cause I know her, and she’d handle this shit.”

  “You know Kerry Washington?” said Sam with entirely too much joy. Who could blame him—I’m pretty sure everyone’s sexuality includes Kerry Washington.

  Anastos bent her limbs into the semblance of a human person and deigned to sit beside me. Ugh—now I’d have to de-Fed my couch.

  “Sam, you have a week to deliver to us what you found. If you don’t, our next discussion will be in a government bunker, and you will not leave it again.”

  I shot to my feet. “Be reasonable! Is this seriously how you treat your operatives?”

  Sam’s hand landed on my arm.

  I shook it off. “You think he’s just plain lying about the amnesia, don’t you? Well, he’s not.” That’s when my voice broke, and I fell back onto the couch, tears flowing like Niagara Falls. “He doesn’t fucking remember anything! Not me, not anything!”

  My husband stayed deathly still now, looking out of the window to the dreary gray afternoon, his throat rigid, his jaw working.

  Anastos rose and joined her partner. “You know, for a comedy person, you really are quite the little actress, Samantha.”

  I went cold, rage filling me to the point I thought that laser beams would spill from my various orifices. This ‘little actress’ would see her in hell. Sam put a hand on my shoulder, stood, and said, “It’s my turn to throw you out. You have three seconds before I start doing it physically.”

  I didn’t watch them go. I didn’t care. My palms began to hurt, and I realized I was balling my fingernails into them. The door slammed shut, and soon Sam had taken my fists to begin un-bending my fingers. “Stop that—you have nail imprints.”

  My tears had dried of their own accord, or perhaps they’d burned away in my fiery anger. “First,” I said in a tone that made his head snap to attention, “we’re filling in my lawyer. She is amazing, and will make sure these two assholes’ next post is in Siberia.” I took a deep breath then let it out. “Second, we’re breaking into Taylor’s house again tomorrow night, and going into that painting room, and getting the goods no matter what. He and Billie are attending some all-night art installation in which some famous yahoo is going to paint with her own period.”

  “Wow. Sorry to be missing that, but I guess we’ll go with your plan.”

  He said it with cautious humor. I think he was afraid of me. I didn’t go quietly nuclear very often, but I positively vibrated radioactive waste right now. The unholy waves of my righteous indignation had broken me into a sweat, and I ran a hand across my forehead. When my eyes could focus again, I looked up into his face, a mask of worry and frustration. He practically had a unibrow situation happening.

  I smoothed a finger between his eyebrows, and they settled themselves into their proper places. “I just don’t get why they won’t help you. Why they won’t tell you what the target was.”

  We sat again, and I pulled a throw pillow into my lap to ball my hands in. “If you’re lying about the amnesia, that means you know what they want, so not telling you is pointless. Which means—”

  “They’re not sure.”

  “No, they aren’t. If you do have amnesia, which you do, then what’s the reason they don’t want you to know what you were hunting for? I mean”—I turned to the side to face him—“would you have gone searching in the first place without them telling you about the target?”

  He ground his bottom lip in his teeth. Letting out a breath, he said, “Probably. Look, if I’d given up thieving, then after a while, I was probably raring to do some state-sanctioned illegal shit, not too many questions asked. Another mystery just adds to the allure for me.”

  I nodded. “I’m sorry if you felt stifled. You must have. You must be bored even now, home all day, me at work.”

  He slid the pillow out of my lap, tossed it, then took my cold fingers in his own. “Don’t apologize for an emotion I’m not even sure happened. That’s silly. And I wasn’t lonely here today just because I was alone. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

  A bubble of laughter burst up from my gut, and I had to hide my face. “Been listening to my Kelly Clarkson?”

  “I couldn’t find the box with my own CDs, and my iTunes has been screwed up and needs an update since I think I fell on my phone when I was attacked, and I don’t know what my fucking Apple password is.”

  I fell onto my side laughing, and he flopped back, shaking his head and smiling. “Okay, so I’m a mess. But Kelly’s words are wise. Besides”—he shrugged—“you keep me amused at home. I’ve been thinking of little but you all day.”

  Well, if he was gonna compliment my sex prowess, then I guess I’d forgive Old Sam for careening off to misadventure.

  He settled into the couch. “So what horrors happened today?”

  “Oh!” I put his hand back in his own lap, because I couldn’t think while he was doing that. “Taylor has cast my mother in the film.”

  Sam let out a half shriek, half moan and reared back.

  “My reaction entirely, but I also got queasy.”

  “Check.”

  “Yup, she didn’t get the sitcom role, so Taylor somehow cast her in this movie. Not a big role, but one that will apparently require her to drive me out of my mind. That bastard Taylor did this on purpose! I—”

  My phone chirped. Text. From Mom. “Ah, good. My mom would like to give me notes about my character, since I did so poorly today.”

  “What?” asked Sam, his eyes getting wider.

  “Yeah, that’s the next part. So the reading started off okay. I didn’t interact personally with Taylor, but he smiled at me. However, as the morning went on, he kept nitpicking my every freaking line reading. To the point where the other actors were starting to look at him weirdly. And yes, I know what you’re thinking—maybe I just wasn’t doing that well—”

  “I would never think that. You’re my very talented meal ticket.”

  “And I appreciate that. Then, when it was done, and Taylor had nearly henpecked me into bloody pieces of sub-par actress, he gave a long, weird speec
h about loyalty.”

  Sam’s face went still, and he shifted onto his hip to peer at me more thoroughly.

  Chirp chirp chirp! I read the missives from my mother aloud— “Mom text one: ‘Have you thought about giving your character a limp? It would help the audience feel sorry for her, since it’s not coming out in your portrayal.’

  “Mom text two: ‘The camera adds ten pounds. Surprised no one has told you that yet.’

  “Mom text three: ‘Maybe I should have a limp? But then again, I’m too sexy for a limp. No one would believe that.’”

  It had begun. Not only was she being obnoxious to me, but to the disabled as well.

  My breath caught in my throat, and I carefully set my phone down instead of smashing it against a table. It would do no one any good for us to have two broken cellphones, and I didn’t know my fucking iTunes password, either.

  “Uh, sorry,” I said to Sam. “So, yeah. He began talking about how Hollywood was a family. A family like the Mafia that played by its own rules. And how everyone needs to be loyal, or else.” I squeezed my unsettled stomach. “Every time he said ‘or else’ he grimaced at me. By the end, he’d just started pointing.”

  “Okay, okay.” He wrapped me in a hug and pressed my head against his chest, inside which his heart went thump-a-whump.

  Chirp!

  Sam leaned toward the phone. I stayed his hand. “Don’t! That phone is dead to me now.”

  “It might be important.”

  “It’s my mother calling me fat and untalented.”

  “Leave the phone here, then. I’m going to take you out to dinner.”

  My head lifted of its own accord upon having heard the magic word. “Food?”

  The dimple took a peek at me. “Hot food. Rich food.”

  “The camera adds ten pounds.”

  “Don’t cuss at me.” He hauled me to my feet, pointed me in the direction of the bedroom, and slapped me on the butt. “Now put on a slutty dress that flaunts that ass and those glorious tits. I’m gonna feed you and make ’em even bigger. Go!”

  I went. It’s easy to follow directions when they’re so self-serving.

  Chirp chirp chirp chirp!

  I got dressed in record time then ran from the nefarious chirps of Suzie.

  * * * *

  We strolled right into a quiet, expensive bistro that one can only walk into when the lady at the front knows your name already. There were perks to being a famous actress. Not sorta-famous anymore, but actually known. Impostor syndrome still fluttered in my chest from time to time, and I hoped it always would. Once you believed the bullshit stories in Glamour about you, you ran the risk of turning into a cartoon of yourself who created things like ‘lifestyle brands’ that recommended three hundred dollar fly swatters to fans with more money than brains.

  As soon as we sat, Sam ordered a bottle of Pinot Noir and a cheese plate, thereby ensuring his ‘getting laid’ status for the evening. As if that was up for question, anyhow. Sex was the thing we had now—not memories, not love, but sex. Brutally hot sex. Not love. Sex. Not love. Notlove. Notnotnotlove.

  Sam touched my hand on the table. “What’s wrong? You didn’t bring your disapproving phone, did you?”

  “Nothing!” I took my digits back and forced them to mess with the napkin. “So, should we plan this break-in?”

  “I’ll plan it. I’ll get it done.” He swallowed and wouldn’t look at me suddenly. “I still have skills. I’m useful.”

  My eyes sought his. Eventually, he met them. A sliver of hurt furrowed between his eyebrows. “Of course you’re useful.”

  “I’m a professional. I’ll break in.”

  “I know!”

  He ran a hand behind his neck. “Just because I got busted up one time doesn’t mean that I’m not still really fucking good at what I do.”

  I sagged in my chair. “I know that, Sam. I just worry about you.”

  “I get it! But I don’t need a mom.”

  Where the hell had this come from? The FBI visit had clearly unnerved him, and I fretted that his pride would make him reckless. He’s lost a lot—I had to remember that and try not to smother him. I bit my lip at the ‘mom’ comment, but forced myself to shut up and nod.

  Having a tiff on a date is the worst because you’re all dressed up. It makes you feel three hundred percent stupider to fight in a push-up bra and too-tight dress, like you put on the wrong costume.

  I steered the conversation to other things, trivial things, but the mood did not improve. Not with the cheese. Not with the mushroom pot pie. Not with the gluten-free red velvet cake, which lacked gluten to my taste. At least we didn’t seem like strangers right now—strangers couldn’t possibly swaddle themselves in a blanket of mire this way.

  We finished, we paid, we left. We walked along the street toward home, and after a block or so, he took my hand. “You look really pretty tonight,” he said.

  “Thanks.”

  My dress was trying to strangle my ovaries, which were trying to claw me from the inside. The icy night wind cut right through my sexy stockings, and these shoes hurt. Some nights were just made for sweatpants the size of Ohio. “Can we take a cab home?”

  “It’s such a nice night.”

  “It’s January in New York. They have balmier temperatures in a snowwoman’s vagina!”

  He vibrated with an annoyed male noise, and the PMS monster inside my soul prevented me from letting his attitude slide. “It’s easy to have a nice night in pants and flat shoes. I’m teetering on skyscrapers, and my bra’s boning is trying to pry one of my ribs out.”

  “Okay, we’ll get a cab.”

  I yanked my arm away and walked a few paces. Oh, good, a hot flash was now solving my being-cold problem. My flesh was going to melt off my face and run into the stinking sewer. “I don’t think you’re useless or, or bad at what you do. I’ve tried everything to help you feel—”

  “Feel what? Like I’m not a brain-damaged fucking freak? Like I don’t have a giant hole where my life used to be? Like I didn’t wake up one day with a wife and a life I don’t remember choosing?”

  My lip started to tremble. I bit down on it and crossed my arms. “You have resources, Sam. If you need to be alone to figure this shit out, do it. I’ll… I’ll divorce you if you want. I won’t challenge it. I want the best for you. I—” My voice broke, and I knew the fight with my tears—always eager to ruin my makeup like meanies—was rapidly being lost.

  A honk sounded close to us, and we looked up as one to see a cab. The cabbie rolled down the window and said, “You hail?”

  Possibly my flapping arms had attracted this enterprising fellow. “Yes!” I said, stomping toward it. I swung open the door, slid all the way over, then yelled, “Are you coming, or do frozen testicles help you think?”

  He slouched beside me then slammed the door closed. “That was rude.”

  I gave the cabbie our address. “I have been doing my damndest to not push you, and to tell you how I care about you.”

  “I know that. I appreciate that. But can’t you imagine how weird this is for me? I don’t want you rushing home every day to change my brain diaper and humor me with pity sex.”

  “Wh—what?” I shook my head, which hurt. It hurt so much. It and my right ovary were having a contest that I would lose. “Brain diaper is a really gross way of saying bandage.”

  “I was being metaphorical. I remember what metaphors are.”

  “Metaphors use like or as.”

  “That’s a simile! Where the hell are we going?”

  “I don’t know where we’re going, Sam!” My shriek angered my own ears in the small space. “I thought we were working to build a new life out of our old life together. But I’m apparently smothering you with my affection. Oh, it’s so terrible, having this person who loves you that you don’t love anymore!”

  He grabbed my arm, hard, fingers slicing into my muscles. I reared away from him, and he followed, his face close to mine. He whispered in m
y ear, “This cab is not taking us home.”

  Chapter Nine

  Do You Love Me? One Punch for Yes, Two for No

  I blinked and actually viewed the street outside. Wrong way. This damn cabbie was driving the opposite way of home.

  My mouth closed, and I made a little gesture to Sam, fuming beside me— ‘Handle it.’

  The uncertainty in his eyes faded, and he put on his game face. “Please stop here,” he said. “We feel like walking again.”

  The driver closed the talking hole in the separator between passenger and kidnapper. We sped up.

  “That answers that question,” Sam muttered. We were still well in the city, but obviously heading for the Brooklyn Bridge. Our driver took a call on his cellphone. “We can’t let him take us to Brooklyn,” I told Sam. “Taylor’s hipster army is there.”

  “Stop the fucking car!” Sam pounded on the window.

  We turned into an alley, and the car screeched to a halt. A bored, greasy-looking man leaned against a dumpster beside us. The bulge in his pocket was not boring in the least. A bulge like that from a goon like this always meant ‘gun’.

  Our kidnapper threw his phone on the seat beside him. “Her—get out.”

  “Yes.” Sam leaned across me and opened my door. “Out.”

  I shoved his arm away. “No!”

  “Yes,” said the annoyed-sounding cabbie.

  Oh, how sorry I was to have inconvenienced his felony. I’d be sure to send some flowers to his cell at Rikers.

  “Yes,” said Sam as he pushed against my shoulder to no avail.

  Ha! My center of gravity was all ass. Nobody could move me off my glorious bottom. I poked him in the chest. “You realize you’re agreeing with the kidnapper.”

  “He just wants me. I only want him to have me. You get away. The end.”

  Yup, it was the end of this that bothered me the most. Because this time Taylor would kill him—I understood that as sure as I knew Taylor used organic deodorant. The man stank to high heaven on many levels.