by Joseph Souza
“Please call nine-one-one. I’m bleeding.”
“You should have thought of that before you abused Clarissa and took advantage of Mycah. You deserve to die for what you’ve done.”
“Sleeping with Mycah was Clarissa’s idea.”
“Do you think I’m that stupid, Russell?”
“It’s true. Clarissa and I have an open relationship. I never wanted that arrangement, but she insisted we see other people. She gets off on that kinky shit.”
“I don’t believe a word you’ve said. Clarissa is a good woman and doesn’t deserve a husband like you. You frighten her.”
He laughs. “I frighten her? How so?”
“You threatened to expose her past.”
“Her past?” He laughs through the pain. “Bear with me, please, because this bullet in my gut hurts like hell. But what past are you talking about?”
“You knew she grew up in a middle-class white family. You threatened to expose her real identity if she didn’t do exactly what you wanted.”
“She told you that?”
“We’ve become close friends, Russell. She tells me everything now.” I lower the gun. My arms are tired and he’s not going anywhere in his condition.
“Then she lied to you.” He squeals in agony. “Her parents live in Baldwin Hills out in LA. You know what they call that neighborhood?”
I have no idea. My head is spinning and feels out of control.
“The Black Beverly Hills. And trust me, her folks want nothing to do with her. In fact, they cut her out of the will.”
“She told you this?”
“I went out there and spoke to them myself. This was a few years after we got married.” He winces, pausing to let a few seconds of pain pass. “Clarissa and I eloped at her insistence. A Vegas wedding. She didn’t want her folks there and now I can see why. Because they wouldn’t have gone anyway.”
“Why?”
“’Cause they know she’s a manipulative bitch who uses people like toilet paper. Took me a while to find this out. Of course, I never expected her to convince someone to kill me.”
“But I saw you beating her in your bedroom.”
“What you saw was us role-playing. She likes it rough. If I don’t play by her rules, she’s threatened to turn me in to the administration.”
“For what?”
“For sleeping with Mycah Jones. I’m starting to believe that Clarissa and that girl made some sort of pact.” He coughs up more blood. “We been played, girl.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Chadwick instituted strict rules against professors fraternizing with their students. Seems they once had a big problem with it. I should have known better, goddamnit, but that girl got the best of me.”
“Are you absolutely sure Clarissa’s not white?”
“Hundred percent. They showed me all her childhood pictures. Told me she had work done to become lighter. Like Michael Jackson.” He lifts his hand and examines the warm blood, and I can see the perfectly round bullet hole funneling into his belly.
“She said you would lie to me.”
“Wouldn’t anyone manipulating you say that?”
I reflect on his words for a moment, trying not to let doubt creep into my head. It starts to make sense. I remember Russell turning around and pointing at me when I filmed them having sex. It was Clarissa who tipped him off.
“Please call an ambulance.”
“I’ve been sneaking into your house during the day and reading her diary. She wrote that you were becoming increasingly violent toward her.”
“Please, lady, I’m in pain and losing lots of blood.” He presses both hands against the wound. “It’s bad.”
“What about the diary?” I ask.
“She insisted we install a security monitoring system in the house a few months ago. I had no idea why, seeing how we’re the only ones living in this shit hole. It requires one of us to turn it off whenever we go inside.”
“A monitoring system?” I say, trying to connect the dots. “Could she see me the entire time? Even when I was standing on your porch?”
“Everywhere. She had a camera installed in the peephole so she could see who was at the door.”
“Then it had to be Clarissa who sent me that letter about my sister?”
“What letter?”
“Forget about it.”
“Clarissa was watching you from her computer screen at work. Whenever you came onto our porch or snuck inside our house, an alarm went off on her phone and she could see what you were doing.”
“I can’t believe it. She knew what I was doing the entire time?”
“Of course she knew. She saw you sneaking inside and doing whatever you were doing. Then she obviously scripted her diary in order to manipulate you. Turn you against me.”
I try to process his words. Thinking back, it all seems to make sense. I feel like such an idiot. She planted the diary and used it to trigger my most vulnerable emotions. Of course, it was my own fault. I never should have gone inside and snooped around in the first place. In many ways, I got what I deserved.
“What about the wife swapping you proposed at dinner?”
“That was humiliating. She insisted I talk about slavery and get you two all hot and riled.”
“You really seemed like you wanted to sleep with me.”
“I won’t lie. You’re an attractive woman, and I’m a man with strong urges. You know as well as I do that marriage is a compromise.” He grimaces and lets out a groan. “Do you believe me now?”
I remain silent.
“She fucked us over. Get it through your thick head.”
“But why?”
“Money, celebrity, who the hell knows with that evil bitch?” Sweat beads up on his forehead. “Please call nine-one-one and get me some help before I bleed to death.”
“How can I be sure you’re telling the truth?”
“You need to trust me.”
“She said you’re a persuasive man and she’s right. I need more proof.”
Russell shakes his head and sighs. “Then how about this. Chadwick’s alumnus offers every tenured professor a three-million-dollar life insurance policy. I die, bitch gets to cash out. You want someone that evil getting three million bucks and raising my kids?”
I grab my cell phone, call 911, and report what happened. Will I go to jail for shooting my neighbor in cold blood? In my defense, I’ll say that I feared he might attack me. The dangerous black man preying on an unsuspecting white girl. The black man as sexual predator. Rapist. But how will this play out if Russell dies? He is, after all, a well-regarded professor at Chadwick.
In contrast, I’m your average, overeducated housewife with nothing better to do than shoot her next-door neighbor.
I stare at the carnage. A large puddle of blood pools along the floor. There are red handprints on the wall as well. My kids will be home soon from school and I don’t want them exposed to this horrific crime scene. Russell’s eyes close and he appears to be slipping into unconsciousness. His breathing is labored and he’s making a wheezing noise out of his mouth.
I place the gun down on the kitchen table and grab the nearest towel. I moisten it with some iodine and then press it against his wound, praying the medics will arrive soon. He glances up at me and smiles, too weak to move. Thick beads of sweat bubble up on his forehead. Gently, I guide his head to the floor so he can rest. Then I go into the living room and grab a pillow off the couch and place it under his head.
“I’m sorry for shooting you, Russell.”
“She fooled us bad,” he says under his breath.
“I should have known better.”
“Black-on-black crime.” He laughs, which turns into a bloody cough.
“I only wanted to be her friend. I wanted so bad for her to like me.”
“Same here.”
“Who knew she could be so evil?”
“And I’m the sorry son of a bitch who married her.”
> “She’s going to think I killed you.”
“Let’s pray to God she’s wrong.”
The ambulance pulls up outside the house. Russell gestures for me to lean down. Once I do, he whispers in my ear, “If I make it through this, we need to give Clarissa a taste of her own cooking.”
“Yes,” I say as the police and medics rush inside and shout for me to freeze.
CLAY
Monday, October 26, 10:48 a.m.
I OPEN MY EYES AND SEE A FOREST OF GREEN SHAG. I’M LYING FACE down and staring into the kitchen. From this angle, it resembles some bizarre jungle terrain deep in the South American rain forest. A daddy longlegs lumbers past my nose and disappears. A blistering, pounding juggernaut fills my head. I know from experience that no hangover could ever produce such thundering torture. So what did?
Where am I? I blink my eyes. Where is Leah?
I pull myself up to a sitting position, groaning in agony. I close my eyes to manage the pain ricocheting through my head. It feels like protons smashing in a Hadron Collider that had been installed in my brain. Tidal waves of blood crash against the seawall encapsulating my skull. I try to remember the events that led me here, but I can’t recall a single thing. I reach up to my head and feel a golf-ball-sized lump of wetness. Shit, it hurts even to the touch. I bring my hand back down and open my eyes and notice that my palm is covered in blood.
What the hell happened? I close my eyes again and try to remember something. Anything.
I’m afraid of opening my eyes, but when I do, my worst fear is confirmed. Ten feet away a woman’s body lies sprawled on the carpet. She’s situated between the living room and the kitchen, which are separated by a common dividing wall. From where I sit, I can see up to her waist. I push myself up and stagger over to the corpse, half expecting to find Leah’s bloodied body. But it’s not Leah. It’s Mycah, and there’s no question she’s dead.
The horror of this scene hits me on impact. Was I the one who killed her?
Mycah stares vacantly up at the ceiling. A large pool of blood encircles her head. There’s a pea-shaped hole between her eyes. I look around the living room until I see a handgun lying on the carpet. It’s right next to where I passed out. Something tells me my fingerprints are on it.
Do I flee the crime scene? Call the police? Then I think: what the hell am I even worried about? I don’t own a gun. Never was allowed to, thanks to Leah.
I look at my watch and realize that I was out for at least fifteen minutes. Suddenly the events of the last hour begin to trickle back. I remember Mycah texting me. I remember leaving the brewery to come here and save Leah. I remember walking through the front door. Then I remember everything segueing to black.
Sirens cry out in the distance. I pull the dingy curtain aside and notice that a crowd has gathered down on the street. I debate whether I should run out the back door and make a getaway, but realize that would be pretty useless now. My car’s parked on the street. It would make me look guilty as sin if I took off running, especially since I’m fairly certain that I didn’t shoot Mycah. I can’t say I’m disappointed she’s dead. In some ways I’m ecstatic. Her death has wiped away a myriad of problems. On the flip side, it has also created many new ones.
I try to rationalize my predicament. I know I’m not a killer. A cheating asshole, yes. A drunken louse, for sure. But I don’t have the fortitude to kill another human being. I don’t possess the mental toughness and go-for-the-jugular mentality that killing takes. My weakness is that I’m a weak man. Those who can murder another person in cold blood are a rare breed.
I fall back on the couch and laugh at the absurdity of my situation. The police will be here any minute and I don’t even have the balls to wipe my fingerprints off the gun. A life in prison seems abstractly pleasant at the moment. Three square meals a day, time to read and relax, plenty of respite from all that is Leah. Isn’t that pathetic? Prison suddenly seems more appealing than spending the rest of my life with Leah.
A car door slams. I hear footsteps coming up the concrete stairs. I push the coffee table out of my way and fall to my knees, then to my bloated stomach. I place my hands behind my pounding head and scream into the shag carpet. Someone shouts something vaguely policey. The door swings open. Cold steel closes around my wrists and cuts deep into my leathery skin. A cop reads me my rights. Then another cop pulls me up by the cuffs and leads me down to the awaiting car. I see people below taking pictures and pointing at me. Laughing. They shout my name as if I’m a movie star or famous Bavarian brewer.
This is the American way.
I’m a reluctant crime celebrity.
LEAH
Monday, October 26, 12:23 p.m.
BUT IT DOESN’T GO THE WAY WE PLANNED. RUSSELL FALLS INTO A coma at the hospital and is immediately put on life support. The police question me endlessly about every pointless detail that happened during the ordeal. I envision the crime scene—my bloody home—being analyzed and photographed from every angle. Lightbulbs popping like in one of those old detective movies. They can’t charge me with a crime. For all they know, I was a defenseless woman shooting a black man who barged into my house to rape me. Any jury in these parts would believe this scenario. I’m white and he’s black. He walked into my house practically naked. I tell the police half-truths. I tell them some of what Russell and I discussed after the shooting. I’ve incriminated myself—but in a good way.
Try as I may, I can’t get in contact with Clay. I call the day care and ask if they can pick up the children from school and keep them until five. I try to call Clay again, but to my disappointment, he doesn’t pick up. No one is answering at the brewery either. Where is he?
“So you shot Mr. Gaines in self-defense?” Detective Armstrong asks me.
“Yes.”
“But then after speaking with the victim, you realized that this whole crazy scenario was set up by his wife?”
“Exactly.”
“And you’re telling me that she was the one who advised you to kill her husband?”
“That’s correct.”
“And the reason she asked you to kill him was because he was abusive to her and having a sexual relationship with Mycah Jones.”
“Not quite. She said I needed to protect myself in case he came after me. She believed he killed Cordell.”
“You believed your life was in jeopardy?”
“Yes, but why are we rehashing all this? I told you everything that happened over an hour ago.”
“I just want to make sure we have your entire story down.”
“I can tell by your tone, Detective, that you don’t believe me. You’re testing me. You’re trying to see if there are any discrepancies in my story.”
“Of course. We need to be thorough in our investigation.”
“What other reason would I shoot him? I was genuinely scared for my life.”
“There’s the matter about the gun you used to shoot him. You claimed that the victim’s wife gave it to you.”
“Yes,” I say, trying to make him understand. “Look at me. I’m a white, middle-class housewife. How in the world would I know where to get a gun?”
“You’re assuming that just because she’s black she knows where to get a gun?”
“No, but it’s the truth. She gave it to me.”
“A lot of people in Maine own guns, especially out here in the country. It’s not that hard to get your hands on one.”
“Guns disgust me. I’ve been advocating for gun control my entire life. In fact, I hadn’t even considered using one until my family was placed in danger.”
“We talked to Mrs. Gaines and she’s visibly upset about her husband’s condition.”
“Of course she’s upset; that’s because he’s not yet dead.” I pound my fist on the table. “She’s faking it. She set this whole scenario up for her own benefit.”
“We sent some officers to check out the surrounding homes. They reported finding bullet holes and broken windows in your neighborhood.
A bullet was lodged in the plywood of one house and it matches the gun you used to shoot the victim. In addition, the victim’s wife claimed to have heard gunshots out there.”
“That’s because she and I went back there to practice. She was teaching me how to shoot.”
“Again, because all black people know how to use a gun?”
I laugh. “Please, Detective. Don’t you label me a racist.”
“Did you know that Clarissa heads the local chapter of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence?”
“It’s all a pretense. The woman’s a cold-blooded liar. First she told me she was white and grew up outside Boston. Then her husband told me she grew up in a rich black neighborhood in LA.”
“Baldwin Hills, just outside LA.”
“I know that now.”
“She called the station that day and reported hearing gunshots. The police even went out to your neighborhood and checked everything out.”
“She’s playing off stereotypes for her own benefit.”
“You say she told you she grew up white?”
“That’s what she claimed, and at the time I believed it.”
“Take a look at these,” he says, pushing a pile of photographs across the table. “She claims that you were obsessed with her husband and extremely jealous of her and her family.”
“Jealous? That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Well, we have security videos of you breaking in to her home and reading her diary. And drinking her wine and stealing her art. The only reason she didn’t report the crime was that she felt bad for you.”
“Yes, but . . .” I don’t know what to say to this. This information deeply embarrasses me and puts me in a bad light. Because the truth is I was jealous of her.
“She believes you were the one who killed Cordell.”
“Oh, that’s so silly. Why would I want to kill Cordell?”
“You were in the restaurant with him the night he was murdered. You admitted to taking an unusual interest in the case.”
“Yes, but I was merely a concerned citizen looking for answers to a racially motivated crime. I wanted to help find the girl before something bad happened to her.”
