Colour My Ugly

by A. Giannoccaro

  Sixteen years ago Mick came to Ireland to bury his mother, a lady whom I had loved since I was a boy. It was on this trip I met his fifteen year old daughter Lauri. She was stunning. She had his hazel eyes and her mother’s beauty I couldn’t help but notice her perfect fair skin and dark hair; she made me think very bad things. I mentally scolded myself. She is Mick’s girl and she is, just a girl. I had to sit and endure her teenage flirting for a few hours while we waited for Mick to arrive, he was too paranoid to fly with her. I am sure babysitting is below my pay grade but I cannot tell my boss that spending hours with a teenage girl is not my idea of a job, he would just shoot me. So I just sit here tapping my foot trying to ignore her staring at me and the annoying childish questions that flow like a waterfall out of her pretty mouth. Mick has very concrete plans that should anything ever happen to him I was to watch her until I was sure she was safe and happy and could care for herself.

  I stopped watching eight years ago when she got married. I had watched her grow from pretty girl to beautiful woman. I had watched her study and reach her dream of becoming a chef. She was a brilliant one and could have her pick of jobs I knew she would go far. She had her perfect little life, she had married a wealthy business man and was provided for well. I really needed to work more. Having a real job, a fake, job and a person to stalk isn’t easy at all. I also couldn’t watch her be with another man it may sound stupid since I was fucking anything that walked my way but I watched her so long it felt like she as mine. She never would be, Mick would come back from the grave and trust me it would be no accident when I died. He did not want our world for his baby. She was meant to be happy.

  Six months ago a husband hired me to arrange his wife’s accidental death. He claimed she had hidden her fortune from him and he stood to get the money if she died. Easy enough it was a typical job for me and shouldn’t require too much time or effort on my part.

  Or so I thought.

  He sent me the money and the information I required. I never ever meet with a customer. Ever. I don’t need to see them to do my job. I actually choked on my scotch when I opened his file. He was HER husband. I had been hired to kill my mentor’s daughter by her perfect husband. Oh fuck. What went wrong? Mick I have screwed up.

  Needless to say I had a sinking feeling about this. There was no way I could kill Ellia that’s who Lauri became when Mick died, but if I said no to the job he would hire someone else. There are a few of us out there. Murder is easy to buy in this shitty country. Two bottles of scotch later I hatched a little plan. I had watched her so long, I stopped and now something horrible was happening. What had I missed? I decided I had to take the job, Ellia would die but that asshole would not get her money and he would die too. By my own hand no accident this time, he would die. I wonder what I missed, how is this even possible? I continue to drown the trepidation that is growing by the minute as I go over the pages and pages of information he has sent about her. I swallow my fears with the whiskey and reply to his mail accepting his job and setting a time line over the next month or so. I will need some time and careful planning to pull this off. I feel sick, not sure if it’s the whiskey I consumed too much of or the fact that I was hired to kill Lauri Spillane that has me wanting to wretch. I sit there just tapping my foot thinking about this for a long time before I drag my tired, drunk ass to bed.

  I told you I am a bad man. I am a worse watcher. I should never have stopped watching her, she was Mick’s angel and I have failed him.

  Fuck.

  ELLIA

  “The tragedy of life is not death, but what we let die inside of us while we live.”

  ~ Norman Cousins

  Past, Sandton, Johannesburg, South Africa 2004

  I got married today, I was so happy but so very sad at the same time. My new husband Renzo has a huge Italian family enough to fill the whole church. I have no one. My dad is gone and he was the only family I had. I had my best friend stand up for me and walked down the aisle all alone. The happiest day of my life and I was all alone. But I was so happy. I love Renzo and we were going to have a future and babies together.

  My long dark hair is styled up so that my neck and shoulders are bare above the strapless lace gown that feels as if it was painted onto my body and pools at the floor around my feet. Renzo kisses my neck as we dance our first dance. My heart is racing from the whisper of his lips against my bare skin mixed with my own nerves. I am a terrible dancer and I don’t want to embarrass him on our wedding day I need to concentrate but his touch is so distracting.

  I saved myself for this day. Something I did for my Dad. He had told me how that was one of his biggest regrets and that a husband would treasure and love me more if I saved myself for him alone. Renzo has tried, trust me he has tried, but I insisted we wait. I think that was one of the reasons he didn’t want to wait long to get married. We have been engaged for only five months but I know he is my forever.

  We celebrate with my new family most of whom I have met for the first time today, but as the night wears on Renzo’s touches become a little more insistent and he decides it is time for us to go. We are spending the first night of our honeymoon at a local hotel and leave for our honeymoon tomorrow, I don’t know where are going but I need a passport.

  Renzo carries me into the suite like a real gentleman and my breath is truly taken away by the candles and rose petals. I couldn’t not notice the vases and vases of roses all over the room. He is such a romantic. My stomach has been in knots all day in anticipation of this. Renzo has waited for me but tonight I know I can no longer deny him what is now his. He told me when I first said I wanted to wait that he would wait until today but then he would take what is his. The raw lust in his eyes now tells me he is going to do exactly that.

  He leads me to the huge king size bed covered in white linen and he stands me in front him. I feel so small next to his six foot plus body, he is a full foot taller than me and I have to look up into his dark brown eyes that are almost black with desire now. He steps forwards and turns me around and unzips my dress letting fall to the ground. I remember thinking it was such a tender act from him. It was the last tender moment I ever saw from Renzo. He lifted me onto the bed that night and brutally beat my body careful not to mark my face or legs and then raped me repeatedly with no regard for my virginity at all. He simply stated when he was done that I should not have made him wait for what was his and that he intended to take what was his…me, whenever and however he wanted. Tears stained my face as I sobbed and cried myself to sleep. I had married the devil, an evil man that he had no heart at all. I stopped feeling that night.

  Present, Franschoek, South Africa

  Yesterday was my birthday and I had an accident. I think I might just be dead because when I woke up the view from the window next to me is one I remember very vividly from my childhood. Is this heaven? I wished to die so many times the last eight years could my wishes have come true? I can almost feel my dad in this place and that makes me happy. Happy for the first time in eight years. Have I really escaped the devil?

  I have no recollection of how on earth I may have ended up here; I think I may really be dead. I woke up in the clothes I put on for my birthday party, I remember leaving home and then it is a black hole of absolutely nothing. I may know where I am but I don’t know how I got here. I close my eyes and try to remember a little more detail, nothing but blackness. It feels like a have just woken up from a panic attack again.

  There is food and a newspaper on the table in front of me, the paper is open on a page where the details of my accident and subsequent death are described in great detail. I was blown up in an ATM bombing, a daily occurrence here these days except they don’t usually blow people up with them they just want the money. Whoever arranged my accident had a great imagination I will give them that. Maybe a little over dramatic but very effective there was very little body to identify if it is blown to bits. They used my bank card and
hand bag to identify me. The newspaper labelled it a botched ATM bombing as I was killed and all the money was blown to shit as well. I know better, I know there are no accidents. I am meant to be dead or I am dead and God thinks he is funny telling me in the newspaper. But I feel very much alive, in fact more alive than I have in years! I am laughing now from my belly at irony of it all I am dead.

  I know it’s not really funny but right now all I can do is laugh. There is nothing else to do and I don’t feel like crying because I am not sad at all I am relieved.

  ROWAN

  “I have nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion.”

  ~Jack Kerouac

  So far my somewhat stupid half assed plan has worked out and the job is done. I had paid more to do it than I had got from her husband but I needed educated morons to pull this one off not the usual criminal for hire that are a dime a dozen here. It’s so easy to get away with murder here literally. Accidental deaths are not investigated. They don’t have time with all the actual murders and rapes going on in this shit hole.

  I can see her on the security system here at the estate I know she knows exactly where she is. She grew up here. When her father died she left and I took over the “business” and the estate he had willed it to me but she never knew this. She had a plan to disappear and she had followed it to the letter. She was a good girl. I needed to stop seeing her as that fifteen year old; she was a grown woman now. I am watching her again and it feels right, so right. This is all sorts of wrong.

  She has tried the door at least ten times and the windows too. I had made some security upgrades in anticipation of her return. She has eyed the food on the table very sceptically but not taken a bite at all. Her father taught her to trust nothing ever. He taught her well. She had never questioned his plan for her, no whys or buts she just did it, she had trusted Mick and never questioned him. Now she was here and I had no clue as to what to do next. I need to move her but I don’t want to. I want to keep her.

  She is sitting on the bed with newspaper that details her “accident” on the front page. I can see her face clearly she reads the article and the cogs are turning. A smile tugs at my mouth as I watch her understanding of what she is reading. She knows what an “accident” really means and I can tell she is wondering why she isn’t dead as a door nail right now. Then she surprises me and begins laughing hysterically at the paper. She laughs so hard I can see the emotion in her eyes as her whole face lights up and her body shakes as she laughs from her belly, the tears roll down her cheeks she is laughing so hard. The smile is wiped off my face pretty fast, well that was not the reaction I was expecting. Not at all. I drink from my scotch glass the ice has melted and it’s watered down and quite frankly tastes like piss now but I swallow it anyway while I watch her laugh. I love watching her I always did. Watching is the one part of my job I always enjoy, I like to watch and learn about the lives I am going to snuff out. I don’t always watch them myself; I keep some of South Africa’s many criminals gainfully employed watching people for me. They earn a legitimate wage from a wine farm and simply do whatever I need them to do. She really is a breath of fresh air in here, I can’t remember the last time someone, anyone laughed in this house. It was probably her as young girl.

  I watch her set the paper down, stalk over to the bed, climb up and stand on it and look right into the camera. All I can see are those eyes, Mick’s eyes looking right at me on the screen. It’s like they are looking into me. I wait for her to rip the camera down or smash it. But she doesn’t. She has self-control that could rival my own this woman. I like being in control of things, I like that nothing can change or undo murder what I do is final.

  “Thank you” she yells into camera smiling so hard you can see it in her eyes. She is way too happy about being dead for this to be real. I am confused, in fact dumbfounded, or gobsmacked would describe me right now. I tempted to go in there and shake her to see if this is real. But then I would have to face her and I am not ready to stop watching just yet.

  I expected a number of reactions. Fear, anger, rage, running away but never in a million years did I expect laughter and a thank you. I even fired my maid in anticipation of her acting like a mad woman screaming and going all nuts. It’s making me wonder why she is thankful. She had the perfect life. A husband, a home, love, and a job she had clearly loved doing. Why is she happy to be dead? Does she think she is dead?

  I never thought much further than this part of my little plan which is uncharacteristically careless of me. I usually only complete a job when the plan is complete from start to finish. Watch, plan, and murder it doesn’t get simpler, but this time I just acted. I used my criminal resources and moved all her funds to the other trust that was set up in her real name and I made her “die” so she could start over when I explained what happened and let her go. I don’t want to let her go. I really don’t. I told you before I am a bad man. I am a nice guy, but I am a monster inside, you see no one suspects the nice wine farmer of murder, no suspects the nice man in the bar buying you a drink of murder, no expects the nice guy to be a murderous monster underneath. Being nice works for me, I am so used to being nice on the outside and letting the killer fester inside it is comfortable. Having her here in my house, is making the monster a little harder to hide, I am uncomfortable in my house and in my skin. I itch to get control of myself. I need to kill someone. Anyone will do.

  I want what I cannot possibly have. I want her. I want Mick’s baby girl. I want her so bad it hurts. I want to keep her locked up here just for me. But I am no good for her I am a monster, a murderer a cold hearted killer.

  I can’t tear myself away from the monitors. I have missed watching her. She was so much like Mick in her ways. But oh was she a beauty. It had always surprised me how few men I had seen in her life up to meeting her husband she somewhat avoided them completely. They were there looking but she never cared to notice. I didn’t mind at all in my head even then she was mine. I was there looking always then I stopped! She has her father’s bright mischievous hazel eyes and a body that I would kill to get my hands all over. OK that’s not funny considering my current job description. Also I’m pretty sure Mick would kick my ass from his grave if he even thought I might have imagined his daughter naked. Ever. No, he would just make sure I had an accident. I’m eleven years older than her for Gods sake’s I should not be thinking of her at all. She is a job. A never ending job it now seems. Mick told me I was his family does that make her family? I don’t like that idea so I push it aside pretty fast. I could live with just a fantasy of having a woman like her, but I have her here now locked in her room with nowhere to go because essentially she was dead. I am all she has and I like that. The thought returns the wicked smile to the corners of my mouth and I tap my fingers on the rim of my glass.

  I wonder if she even remembers me. We only spent two hours together and she was just a silly teenager. She had flirted with me the whole time I thought it was so funny. She still looks the same, yet different she grew into a woman somewhere along the way. Yesterday was her birthday and she “died” going to her party. I should feel bad about it, but I don’t, I get a sick satisfaction sitting here watching her. Her dark hair is messy from her drug induced sleep and her makeup is smudged all over her face, the dark run of her mascara actually highlights her eyes. Her movements are fluid as she paces the room in her bare feet. I am not sure where her shoes ended up in the chaos of getting her moved here overnight. I twist my glass in my hands and just keep watching, I cannot tear my eyes away from her.

  I need to get her away from me away from this life and quickly. I know she knew what her father did for a living and he never wanted her to be a part of it. I will send her off and find her a good watcher. Lord knows I had clearly done shit job of it so far. My head is swimming with scotch and I need a break I switch the monitor off and turn the music on the house system up high, hope she likes my taste in music. I close my eyes and get lost in the
sounds of the songs I love for a while. Lounging in my office chair I get lost in a fantasy where I could keep a good woman like her. Run my hands through that mane of dark hair. The nice could have a pretty woman by his side, but the monster doesn’t have such luxuries.

  I needed to get lost. I am a bad man. She is a good woman.

  ELLIA

  “I look alive. I’m dead inside. My heart has holes and black blood flows.”

  ~Hollywood Undead, A Knife Called Lust

  “Thank you God, thank you Dad, thank you whoever did this.” I whisper to myself.

  The last eight years have been hell on earth; to an outsider looking in they were perfect. Dear God they were hell, I prayed to just die last week. I wonder again if I am dead and this is heaven. I dreamed of coming back here so many times over the years. I can see the valley sprawling out for miles out the window. I am in my childhood bedroom. It has been redecorated over the years but I know where I am. My Green Day posters are all gone and my pink and black walls are now pale green and my hello kitty bedding has been replaced with sensible adult stuff. It’s very tasteful almost guest house looking. Whoever took me has good taste in music as it fills the air around me I can sense they have my liking for melancholy songs that stir the soul. What’s bothering me is why I am here? I read the paper whoever it was that brought me here left on the table. They wanted me to know exactly what happened to me, well what didn’t happen I think. Maybe I am Dead? My head is foggy and a little unclear.

  According to the paper report from the town where I lived with Renzo, I am dead. I smile. I died yesterday on the way to my own birthday dinner party. I stopped to draw cash to pay the hire company who insisted on cash at the last second. Clearly now not such a coincidence. The ATM I was using blew up in one our notorious weekly/ daily ATM bombings. There is a photo of me inset into the picture from the blast site. And a long article on how the young wife of prominent local business man dies. Even in death he stole my identity. I loathe my husband with every fibre of my being. He has robbed me of myself for eight long years. Tortured and punished me behind closed doors and made us seem so perfect to anyone on the other side of those doors. I wish he would have an accident. Fucker.