by Jeff Strand
I get in the car, start the engine, and drive away.
* * *
It takes about half an hour to get there. During the drive, my anxiety level is high but manageable. Terrence’s girlfriend is probably fast asleep. Maybe she’s not. Maybe she’s worried. Maybe she called one of his friends, who told her when he left the bar. Maybe the friend didn’t say a word, covering for Terrence in case he was off with a mistress, but is now worried about his drunken buddy. Maybe.
But however it worked out, the cops aren’t going to be actively searching for a forty-four-year-old who hasn’t come home after a night of boozing it up. It’s possible his girlfriend or friends reported him as a drunk driver, but not likely.
I’m not concerned.
We get to the storage unit. I pull right up to the sliding metal door and put the car into park. I doubt that Terrence will be dumb enough to pound on the trunk and cause a ruckus, but it won’t matter if he is, because nobody is around to hear.
I get out of the car and unlock the sliding door. The storage unit is a huge one, big enough to comfortably store four automobiles, so I’m able to raise the door, get back in the car, and drive right in.
I turn off the engine. We wouldn’t want to get carbon monoxide poisoning, right? I get out of the car, then pull down the door, casting us into complete darkness.
I used to love the dark.
There’s not much in the storage unit, so I don’t have to worry about tripping as I walk to the far corner and turn on the lamp. The light is nothing more than a soft glow; creepy and appropriate.
I unlock the trunk and raise the lid.
“Get out,” I say.
He climbs out of the trunk. Then he falls flat on his face. I’d laugh at him, but of course his legs would have fallen asleep after being confined in such a small place for so long, and it’s not his fault. I don’t help him up, though. I wait for the feeling to return to his legs, then force him to sit down in a wooden chair.
He says nothing as I tie him up. Handcuffing him to something would be quicker and easier, but I like the old-fashioned feel of tying up a captive. I feel a rush of satisfaction with each knot.
I’ve got him. Finally, I’ve got him.
“Do you know who I am?” I ask.
He shakes his head.
“No idea?”
“No, sir.”
He’s being polite now. Adorable.
“I don’t believe you.”
“I swear, I have no idea. You’ve got the wrong guy.”
“No. I do not. Trust me. I’ve spent a lot of time staring at a picture of your ugly face.”
“Then who are you? What did I do to you?”
“Where were you on July twentieth, 1988?”
Terrence’s eyes widen. He may not remember the exact date, but he sure as hell knows what happened in the summer of 1988.
“I don’t understand,” he says, sounding confused and panicked. “I don’t know you. I’ve never met you.”
“No, but you took everything from me.”
“I didn’t do anything to you!”
“Bullshit! Bull. Shit.” I’m starting to become too angry. I can’t let this become about rage. It’s supposed to be calculated. Diabolical. A perfect revenge.
“You’ve got the wrong guy, I mean it!”
“Say that again. See what happens.”
“I didn’t hurt anyone!”
“You know who I am, don’t you?”
“No!”
He’s lying. He has to have figured it out by now.
But I force a smile. I walk over to a small shelf, which is empty except for one item.
I hold up the axe.
Suddenly he understands everything.
This son of a bitch, this worthless hog of a man, knows exactly what he did. He remembers being amazed that his homemade fake ID got him past the bouncer and into the club. He remembers convincing a sweet young girl named Amber to leave with him. He remembers that Amber was more than a little tipsy, and up for anything he had in mind. He remembers his frustration when she said they couldn’t go back to her place, because if her roommate heard them fooling around, she’d tell Amber’s boyfriend. He remembers wishing he didn’t still live at home with his parents.
He remembers telling the police all of this.
He remembers driving around, trying to find a place where they could park. He remembers getting the idea, and not thinking Amber would be okay with it, and being happily surprised when she’s not only okay with it, she’s enthusiastic.
He remembers going to the storage facility where he makes minimum wage. He remembers thinking how naughty and dangerous it feels to unlock somebody’s private storage unit (he could get fired!) (this was so illegal!) and take a willing girl inside. It’s completely dark. It’s so exciting.
He definitely remembers fucking her, though he described it as “being intimate” to the reporters.
And no matter how long he lives, he won’t forget her fumbling through her purse for a postcoital cigarette and flicking on the lighter flame. He won’t forget discovering the bodies.
I killed those eight people with an axe, but I didn’t chop them up. I used the blunt side to bash their heads into unrecognizable muck. It’s why the press dubbed me the Flatside Killer, easily one of the worst nicknames ever given to a serial killer.
Terrence called his boss, and then the police.
I’d rented the storage unit under a fake name, of course, and I’d made sure there was nothing connecting my victims, who ranged in ages from twenty-two to sixty-four. Some were men and some were women; I didn’t care, as long as they broke when I hit them.
No matter how cautious I’d been and how carefully I’d tried to cover my tracks, the big loose end with my murder spree was that I’d kept the bodies. Sure, I’d embalmed them to eliminate the smell, both to avoid detection and for my own benefit, but they were right there on the canvas, all eight of them, bodies arranged in my own obscene little attempt at art.
I couldn’t very well hang around in the United States with the FBI investigating a pile of corpses, so I paid a ridiculous amount of money and got myself a new identity in Mexico.
It turned out that either I was really good at what I did, or the authorities were really bad. I was never identified as the killer, at least not in a way I ever heard about.
But I spent twenty-five years keeping my head down and being afraid.
Not anymore.
I gently prod his nose with the blunt end of the axe. “Figure it out yet?”
“You can’t hold that against me!” Terrence insists. “I didn’t know you! I didn’t do anything!”
“Did the Flatside Killer ever strike again?” I ask him, prodding him again, harder this time. Not hard enough to break his nose but hard enough to leave a red mark. “Do you know what it’s like to have to give up that kind of euphoria? Do you know what it’s like to spend every waking moment worrying the police are going to break down your door?”
“But why me? Why not the cops? Why not the lab guys? Why do you have to come after me? I had nothing against you! I didn’t even know who you were!”
“I can’t kill everybody who was involved with the case. That would be ridiculous, Terrence. You’re the one who started it all. You didn’t have to say anything. You could have just left.”
I feel like I’m starting to sound a little bit insane. I understand it’s not really his fault, and it’s crazy to think he wouldn’t call the police. But I despise him. I don’t care how irrational it is; if my mind worked normally, I wouldn’t have killed eight people for the fun of it.
“What are you going to do to me?” he asks.
“I’m going to bash your face in with this axe. Eventually I’ll break through your skull into your brain, but I’m going to start with the lower half of your face and keep hitting until you have no jaw left. If I had some kind of injection that would keep you conscious through the whole process, I’d use it, but fortunately for
you I don’t, so you may get lucky and pass out at some point before you die.”
Terrence vomits all over his chest and the ropes.
He coughs and sputters, and for a second I think he’s actually choking on it and I’m going to have to do something, but finally he speaks. “Why now?”
There’s no reason not to tell him, since he’ll be dead within minutes. But I don’t want to. He doesn’t need to know I had a heart attack—a minor one, it turned out, but scary as hell—and that as I lay on the floor of my hovel, unable to breathe, I thought about how I’d wasted the last quarter-century of my life.
That makes me sound weak.
Terrence is going to think many things about me in the moments before he dies, but none of them will be that I am weak.
I raise the axe and take a slow-motion practice swing to make sure the blade will strike him directly in the chin. It has to be a downward angle. I don’t want bone fragments shooting up too far and ending my revenge too soon.
There are quite a few things I could say right now, such as “Any last words?” or “I’ll see you in hell,” but there’s really no need to say anything. This is going to be the most satisfying moment I’ve experienced in twenty-five years. I may even get emotional afterward, but that’s okay, there’s no shame in that.
I can’t wait to hear the way he—
Somebody knocks.
I freeze.
We both turn our heads toward the metal door of the storage unit, as if looking at the door would provide any clue about who was knocking on the other side. I glance back at Terrence, and I can tell that he’s trying to decide if he should shout out.
He shouldn’t. He really, truly should not.
“Don’t make a sound,” I whisper, lowering the axe. “If they go away, I’ll let you go.”
It’s a completely inept lie. No way will Terrence believe that. Still, if he thinks he can extend his life just a while longer…
“Help me!” he shouts.
I curse and slam the axe into his head.
Not only is the trajectory wrong, so that I strike him right in the temple, but the axe is turned the wrong way, and the blade sinks several inches into his skull.
His mouth drops open. A thick trickle of blood runs down the side of his head.
I let go of the axe. It pops out of his head and falls to the cement floor with a loud clatter.
Whoever is outside knocks again, more vigorously this time.
I want to just drop to the floor, curl into the fetal position, and cry for a while. But that would be pointless. Though I’ve been screwed out of a worthy revenge, I’m not going to give up and go to prison over this.
There’s too much dead weight to get him into the trunk of the car quickly. Instead I shove the chair onto its side and throw a drop cloth over him. Somebody who is specifically looking for a dead body will immediately figure out where Terrence’s corpse is hiding, but maybe this is just a nosy security guard.
I wedge the gun into the back of my pants. Not a safe place for it. I hope I can talk my way out of this.
I slide open the door.
A woman is standing there. Her silver car is parked in front of the storage unit. She’s blonde, cute, and way too young for a repulsive cretin like Terrence. I’ve never actually seen Mindy in person, but I’ve seen a couple of pictures.
She’s been crying and she looks scared.
As far as I can tell, she’s not armed, though anything could be in her purse.
“Where is he?” she asks.
I decide to respect her intelligence and not pretend I don’t know who she’s talking about. But first I need to make sure I don’t get shot. “Put down the purse,” I tell her.
She drops the purse without hesitation. Obviously there wasn’t a weapon in there. She didn’t come here expecting to do battle with an axe-wielding maniac.
No way does she know who I am.
“Where is he?” she repeats.
Her eyes dart to the drop cloth, then back to me.
How much does she know? Did she see him driving at gunpoint? Did she see me force him into the trunk? She was pounding on the door when Terrence shouted; is it possible she didn’t hear him?
It’s no great tragedy if I have to kill her. She looks like a perfectly good victim. But I really dislike the idea of murdering somebody just to compensate for my carelessness. Back when the Flatside Killer was actively slaying, there was never any collateral damage. I only killed my intended prey.
“He’s not here,” I say.
“I heard him.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I heard him shout ‘Help me!’ I know he’s in here.” When she wipes a tear from her eye, her hand is shaking, though quite honestly she seems more angry than upset. I feel that if I underestimate her and let my guard down, I could end up with an axe in my skull.
“You heard wrong.” Obviously, I’m attempting to buy some time while I figure out a way to get out of this that doesn’t involve a second bloody corpse.
She looks directly into my eyes. “I won’t say anything.”
The tone of her voice and her pleading expression surprise the hell out of me, because I believe her. She’s not just trying to save her life.
“Really?” I ask. “You think I’ve got your boyfriend in here with me, and you’re not going to say anything?”
“That’s right.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean, why? Did you think I just happened to be driving by this place? I was following him. I know what’s going on. I know what Terrence was doing. It was only a matter of time before he fucked the wrong man’s wife.”
I like that. As far as incorrect assumptions go, it’s one of the best ones she could have come up with. Of course, I’m not wearing a wedding band, so…
“Girlfriend,” I correct.
“Can I see him?”
“You don’t want to. Trust me.”
She points to the drop cloth. “He’s under there, right?”
“Yes. He’s not waking up. You don’t need to know more than that.”
Mindy walks into the storage unit. The axe is underneath the drop cloth with Terrence’s body, so I should probably tackle her or something, but instead I just watch carefully. If she lifts the cloth, I can count on at least a couple of seconds of shock, and I’ll tackle her then.
She walks up to the drop cloth. Then she kicks it. Hard.
She kicks it again and again, and I start to worry that she’s going to kick the axe and break her foot. I can see a couple of red blotches starting to form on the fabric.
Finally she lets out a sob and steps away. She stumbles over to the side of the storage unit and leans against the wall.
I really don’t know how to respond. Should I try to comfort her? Should I kill her?
“How did you do it?” she asks.
“Axe to the head.”
“For real?”
“Yes.”
“Shit.” She wipes her eyes and chuckles. “Wow. I assumed you shot him or something.”
“You would have heard a gunshot.”
“They don’t make silencers anymore?”
“I’m not a professional assassin. Just an angry boyfriend.”
“I guess. You’ve got to be pretty damn angry to whack somebody in the head with an axe. Saved me the trouble of killing the son of a bitch myself, but I couldn’t have used an axe.”
“What would you have used?”
“I don’t know. Poison, maybe.”
“So, what, you would have followed him and thrown poison on him?” I’m trying to be funny, but it doesn’t really come off as a joke.
“I wasn’t going to kill him tonight. All I wanted to do was catch him in the act. When I saw you in the car with him, I knew exactly what was happening.”
“You’re pretty good at following cars.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you’d been riding with me. It was pure luck, I promise
you.” She lets out a sudden hysterical giggle and quickly slaps her hand over her mouth. She takes a few quick, panicked breaths through her nose, then lowers her hand again. “God, I can’t believe he’s dead.”
“Do you feel bad about it?”
“I feel like I should feel bad about it.”
“Don’t shed any tears. He deserved what he got.”
She shakes her head. “Not really. Not for screwing around. He was a cheating, woman-slapping bastard, but he didn’t deserve to have his head chopped in half.”
“It wasn’t chopped in half.”
“What did you do to your girlfriend?” she asks.
“What do you mean?”
“Did you kill her?”
“No.”
“Are you going to tell her what you did?”
“Hell no.”
“So what’s going to happen?”
“Why are you asking so many questions?”
“Why wouldn’t I ask questions?” She puts her hand on her belly. “You just murdered the father of my baby!”
“Oh.” I should probably say something more profound than that, but suddenly my vocabulary has dropped to almost nothing. “I didn’t know.”
“Neither did he.”
When I opened the sliding door, I knew things would be tense. I hadn’t imagined that they might also be socially awkward.
“Would you have done things differently if you’d known?” she asks.
“Maybe.”
“Then it’s good you didn’t know.”
I’d like her to leave now. I’m the axe murderer, but she’s creeping me out. And it’s not very intelligent for us to stand here with the door open and a dead body lying on the floor, even if it’s covered.
“I have to shut the door now,” I say. “I’ve got to get him into the trunk and bury the body.”
“Where?”
“You don’t need to know that.”
“That’s fair. But we should get our story straight.”
“You’re not my accomplice. We’re not here to provide alibis for each other. Just pretend you didn’t go out tonight and don’t say anything to anybody.”
“I want to help you.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“I need more closure. I can’t leave it like this.”
