Cornered

by Brandon Massey

  Their poor bodies were gaunt and trembling. He felt a pang of anguish.

  Drawn by the scent of the hot dog, the three canines approached. He broke it into pieces and shared the treat amongst them. They devoured the meat, licking their chops, drooling.

  “There you go, now, girlies, there you go.”

  Leaning on the cane, he knelt to the ground, and the dogs crowded him. They licked his fingers and his cheeks, poked their wet snouts into his grizzled beard as if searching for more food in its tangled knots. He stroked them behind the ears, his chest so full of joy he felt he might burst.

  God Almighty, he lived for this.

  “You two beauties are going to come live with Ed, too. Come now, girlies.”

  He slowly got to his feet. He noticed a flicker of yellow light beyond the trees. He squinted, looking.

  It came from one of Their houses.

  “Oh, no,” he said.

  He walked closer, to the edge of the woods, but he dared proceed no farther. The dogs followed, but remained behind him, as if sensing the danger.

  A couple hundred yards ahead, a white van was parked at one of the residences. The light glimmered inside the garage. Two dark figures were lugging items out of the van’s back doors and into the house.

  Ed chewed a fingernail. He didn’t like this, not at all.

  Someone was finally moving in.

  12

  For Simone, Wednesday began like every other normal weekday morning. She awoke at seven to the buzzing of the bedside alarm clock, groaned in protest to no one in particular, and rolled over and fumbled it off.

  “Morning, babe,” Corey said.

  Blinking against the gray morning light, she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. Corey stood at the dresser mirror buttoning his shirt, nearly completely dressed. An early riser, he typically would be up and out the door while she was still dragging out of bed. She’d never been a morning person and would have slept in till ten o’clock every day if she could get away with it.

  “Morning,” she said, throat scratchy from sleep.

  “Sleep well? I know I did. Like a baby.” He winked.

  The memory of last night brought a smile to her lips. They hadn’t gone at it like that since they were newlyweds. Corey had been insatiable, and his desire had lifted her to a feverish height of passion that, afterward, had shuttled her into a deeper sleep than any sleeping pill known to man could have provided.

  She’d been pleasantly startled by his ardor. Yesterday, after that sleazy old friend of his, Leon, had shown up at the gas station, Corey had gone in to a funk, and when she’d confided to him that Leon had run in to her at lunch, he had sounded furious-reinforcing her decision to refrain from mentioning Leon’s offensive remarks to her and possibly send him over the moon in rage. She had expected Corey to be moody all evening, and though he had been quieter than usual, he had been especially attentive to her and Jada.

  She wasn’t certain how to interpret his mood swings, but the end result had been good. Memorably good.

  He came to the bed and took one of her hands in his, kissed it. “All right, I’m off to make the donuts.”

  “Got any lunch plans?” she asked.

  “I don’t think so. Why?”

  She took his hand and placed it on one of her breasts, molded his fingers to its fullness. “I think I want a lunch date.”

  “Oh? I think that can be arranged.” He squeezed her.

  In the early days of their marriage, they’d often enjoyed “lunch dates.” She couldn’t recall why or when they had stopped having them. Perhaps they had merely allowed life’s tiresome demands to get in the way.

  “How about noon?” he asked.

  “Noon it is. Be there or be square.”

  “I’ll be there-and I’ll be straight.” He smiled, bent to kiss her on the lips.

  She put up her hand to block him. “Hey, I have morning breath.”

  He kissed her anyway. “Call me when you get to work.”

  She didn’t normally call him when she arrived at her practice each morning. Although he’d tried to make his request sound casual, she thought she detected a trace of concern in his gaze.

  Is he worried about that Leon guy? She suspected he was, but she was reluctant to ask. She didn’t want him to shut down on her or get angry, not when they were enjoying a playful resurgence of some of their old passion.

  “I’ll be sure to call you,” she said. “Love you.”

  “Love you, too.”

  He left the bedroom. She heard him go upstairs, where he would kiss Jada good-bye as he always did each morning before he left for work. A few minutes later, she heard his car pull out of the garage.

  But not before she’d heard the beep of the security system, indicating that he’d activated the perimeter alarm again. If she asked him about it, she could bet that he’d repeat that dubious comment from last night about running “diagnostics.”

  What was going on? His reticence, so unlike him, was unnerving.

  Glancing at the clock, she calculated that she had about half an hour before she’d need to get Jada into gear for summer school. She climbed out of bed and padded to the shower enclosure in the master bath.

  As she showered, she tried not to think about Corey, but of course, he remained at the top of her mind. In her opinion, they had built a genuinely strong marriage. While they’d experienced occasional arguments like any normal couple, they’d been able to successfully navigate the potholes in the road by virtue of their willingness to communicate respectfully, openly, and honestly with each other.

  She didn’t want to worry too much about how he’d been acting lately, but she had a gut feeling that his apparent bad blood with Leon was only the tip of the iceberg, and that a much more troubling problem lurked beneath the surface. She didn’t know what it might be. She wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know.

  But try as she might to ignore it, her uneasiness had a lot to do with the question of why Corey had ever been friends with a clearly shady individual like Leon in the first place. Not merely acquaintances. Best friends, as Corey had confessed.

  Your hubby C-Note and I were thick as thieves back in the day.

  She wasn’t naive. She knew Corey had grown up in a rough area of Detroit; she could understand if he’d skirted the law a bit in his youth. Hell, her big brother, college-degree mechanical engineer that he was now, had experienced a couple of brushes with trouble as a teenager.

  What disturbed her was the possible severity of Corey’s misadventures with this Leon character. Those were the thoughts she was most reluctant to entertain-and were why she hadn’t pressed Corey for more details. She preferred the comfort of willful ignorance.

  Counselor, counsel thyself, she thought ruefully.

  After about fifteen minutes under the shower, she dried off with a bath towel and began to apply a generous lather of cream to her skin. Her complexion showed ash easily if she didn’t use lotion every day, and growing up, the threat of ashy knees or elbows being pointed out derisively by her classmates had made her obsessive about moistening her flesh.

  She was in the midst of rubbing down her legs when she thought she heard the security system beep. It was the quick, five-chirp signal the alarm emitted when it was deactivated.

  Had Corey forgotten something and returned home? Or had Jada turned off the system for some reason-unlikely given that Jada, like Simone, loved to sleep in?

  “Corey?” she called out. “That you, honey?”

  No answer.

  Her skin glistening, she went into the bedroom, pulled panties and a bra out of a drawer, and slid them on. As she dressed, she checked the security system control panel mounted beside the doorway. The green “Ready” light shone, which meant the alarm had been disengaged by someone entering the PIN.

  She wrapped herself in a terry cloth bathrobe and opened the bedroom door, Corey’s name on her lips.

  On the threshold, she froze.

  Leon was com
ing toward her down the hallway. Unlike yesterday at lunch, he wasn’t wearing sunglasses. His deep-set eyes held the predatory intent of a wolf eyeing fresh prey.

  “Good morning, good morning, Miss Thang. My goodness, ain’t you lookin’ scrumptious?”

  Upstairs, Jada screamed.

  13

  When Jada awoke and discovered the giant sitting on her bed, she screamed.

  She’d been having a fantastic dream about her all-time favorite movie, Shrek. In it, she was best friends with Shrek and Donkey, and they were traveling all over Duloc together getting involved in thrilling adventures. When Daddy had come into her room to kiss her good-bye, she’d smiled at him sleepily, reluctant to let the dream fade, and sure enough, she sank back into the marvelous cartoon fantasyland as soon as he went away.

  It was the smell that woke her up for real.

  It was the unmistakable scent of chocolate. She loved chocolate, especially Snickers bars and her Grandma Rose’s double-chocolate cake, would have eaten it for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and every snack in between if her parents had allowed her to, but they were strict about the foods she ate and let her have candy and desserts only every now and then, because they didn’t want her to get cavities. She could never remember waking up to the odor of chocolate in her bedroom, not even on her birthday, which was in September, three months away yet.

  The smell came from right beside her.

  She opened her eyes and found a giant man sitting on her bed beside her. He had light brown skin, a humongous head with puffy hair, and the biggest hands she had ever seen in her life-hands as big as shovel blades resting on the legs of his jeans.

  Unlike Shrek, who was a funny, nice, giant ogre, this giant man was scary.

  It wasn’t his smell that frightened her, though the smell, she realized upon waking, was not just chocolate. It was the aroma of chocolate mixed in with something foul, like the way the poor man who asked her and her friends for money during their third-grade school trip to the aquarium had smelled, as if he hadn’t taken a bath or used deodorant in ages. Combined with the chocolate, it was a disgusting, sickly-sweet scent. A putrid smell.

  It was the way the giant looked at her that frightened her.

  It was a flat stare, like he was a stone statue in a park. He didn’t blink. He didn’t move from beside her.

  He just stared at her, as if he were in a trance.

  A chill flashed down her spine. She immediately sensed from his odd stare that something was wrong with him. Daddy would have said the man’s elevator didn’t go to the top floor, but Mom said it wasn’t nice to use that expression. Mom would have said that the man was “disturbed.”

  His mouth and chin were covered in dark smudges, and when he stuck out his fat tongue and licked his lips, she knew he’d been eating chocolate candy.

  But the strange look in his eyes made her fear that he wanted to eat her.

  She realized that she had opened her mouth to scream, but she didn’t hear herself screaming, because she wasn’t wearing her speech processor and couldn’t interpret sounds without it. But she felt her frantic heartbeat pounding in her head like a drum, and she thought she was screaming, because her tight throat vibrated with words exploding out of her.

  Mom, Daddy, help me, please! Daddy! Mom!

  Across the room, Mickey went wild in his cage, wings flapping, the cover sliding to the floor.

  The giant bounced off the bed and clapped his hands to his ears. He shouted at her, ropes of saliva flying from his mouth, but she didn’t know what he was saying. She couldn’t read lips, had never had to learn.

  Why was this man in her room? Where were her parents?

  She sat up, to try to run away. The giant thrust out his huge hand and shoved her in the chest.

  She slammed against the headboard, striking her temple, and literally saw stars spin in her eyes, like in some of the cartoons she liked to watch.

  Dizzy, she slumped onto the bed.

  She wanted to scream again, if she could get enough air in her lungs, but she was afraid. She imagined the giant might flatten her with one blow from his powerful hand.

  Where were Mom and Daddy? Did they hear her scream? Where were they?

  The giant turned away from her and lumbered like a robot to Mickey’s cage. Mickey was frantic, darting back and forth.

  The giant opened the cage and stuck his hand inside. Mickey tried to escape his thick fingers by fleeing to the far corner, but there was nowhere else for the bird to go.

  No, she said. Leave Mickey alone.

  The giant’s hand swallowed Mickey whole.

  He’s only a bird, he won’t hurt you, leave him alone, mister, please, she begged.

  But the giant ignored her. She wasn’t sure that she was speaking loud enough for him to hear her.

  Or maybe he heard her fine, but didn’t care. He’d almost knocked her out when he’d pushed her, and hadn’t seemed concerned at all that he’d hurt her.

  The giant brought his hand out of the cage. He squeezed it into a fist for a few seconds, and then opened his palm. Mickey dropped like a stone to the floor, loose feathers fluttering in the air.

  Tears of anger flooded her eyes.

  You didn’t have to kill him! she shouted. She was suddenly so furious she wished she were bigger, so she could teach this terrible man a lesson.

  The giant studied a few of the feathers remaining in his palm, as if surprised to find them there.

  Taking advantage of his fascination with the feathers, she jumped off the bed. She felt sort of woozy, and her head throbbed, but she was okay.

  She balled her hands into fists and raced to the door.

  But the giant was fast-he reached out and caught the sleeve of her Goofy pajama top. She automatically started to scream again, but quickly bit her tongue so hard that blood flooded her mouth.

  If she screamed, he would hurt her bad. Those enormous hands of his would crush her.

  Please don’t hurt me, she said in what she hoped was a soft, calm voice. Please, please. I’m sorry I screamed, mister.

  He stared at her with his statue eyes. His lips moved.

  She thought he said, We have to go. But she could have been wrong. She hoped so much that she was wrong.

  She didn’t want to go anywhere with him. She would rather stick her hand in a beehive than go anywhere with this awful man.

  Then he plucked her off the floor and slung her over his shoulder as if she were a stuffed animal he had won at a carnival, and she realized, to her horror, that she had been right.

  14

  As Jada screamed upstairs, Leon swaggered down the hallway toward Simone.

  Poised on the threshold of the master bedroom, Simone would not have been more shocked to see this man suddenly in her house if he’d materialized in a cloud of mist from a genie’s bottle. But Jada’s terrified shrieks made the questions of why and how he’d invaded their home irrelevant.

  She had to protect her daughter. At the moment, nothing else mattered.

  As Leon strutted toward her, grinning that gap-toothed Cheshire cat grin, limbs loose and cocky, she hissed, bared her teeth like a feral animal, and charged him.

  It didn’t matter that he was a man, taller than her, stronger, or that he might also have a gun. Her need to protect Jada was as imperative as the need to breathe.

  She went to kick him in the groin. When she was a kid, her big brother had taught her that if she ever found herself in a fight with a guy, to call him first-and if he wasn’t around, to kick the guy in the nuts and run like hell. A blow to the family jewels tilted the scales in a woman’s favor.

  Leon saw the kick coming and began to turn, but she still landed a solid blow with the ball of her right foot, and the feel of her foot smashing into him was savagely satisfying.

  He grunted and doubled over. “Fuckin’. . bitch!”

  She dashed past him, but he snagged the hem of her bathrobe and yanked it. The front of the robe flapped open, and her legs got tang
led in the folds of cloth. She lost her balance, windmilled her arms, and crashed against the hardwood floor on her shoulder, a cry of pain bursting out of her.

  Upstairs, Jada was still screaming, and Simone immediately forgot her own agony.

  Oh, God, what’s happening up there? Please, God, help us.

  Heart swollen in her throat, she rolled over onto her stomach. She crawled away, the robe coming free, dragging behind her like a tail.

  “Back here. . bitch.”

  He grabbed her calf. She jerked her leg upward, and his fingers slid off her lotion-slick skin.

  She got to her feet again.

  My baby, I’ve got to save my baby.

  She started running. She got no more than three paces before Leon roared and tackled her.

  Together, they slammed to the hardwood. The breath flew out of her lungs. She tasted blood, and vaguely realized that she’d bitten her bottom lip.

  It meant nothing to her.

  “Get off me!” she screamed hoarsely. She squirmed beneath him, his weight crushing her. “Jada. . Jada!”

  Snarling like a rabid wolf, Leon was trying to get his hands around her neck. His eyes burned with fury. He was panting and swearing.

  “Bitch. . fuckin’ bitch. . ”

  She clawed at his face, went for his eyes.

  He pulled his head back, dreadlocks swinging. Her nails scraped down his cheeks, gouging red trails, and her fingers got lost in the coarse thicket of his beard.

  “Bitch!”

  He backhanded her across the face. Her head rocked sideways. Pain fanned across her jaw, and the world swayed and briefly went dark.

  As if from a great distance, she heard Jada’s anguished cries.

  Jada. . my baby. . no. .

  Fear reined her away from the brink and brought her vision back into sharp focus.

  Grunting, Leon was attempting to turn her over, but was having a hard time getting a firm hold on her oiled skin.

  “Let me go!”

  She snatched her arm free of him and mashed the heel of her hand into the base of his throat. His teeth clicked in the back of his mouth, and he emitted a strangled gasp.