by Zoe Blake
Kristi’s head whips around. “Coffee?”
“Yeah, I didn’t have any this morning. I was running late, and I’m dragging.”
“I always grab a coffee after class. The caffeine helps your muscles.” She flexes her arm, and I want to yank her dumb ponytail and bash her head into one of the rocks scattered about the park. “Want to come with me? There’s a Starbucks just around the corner.”
“That’d be great, thanks!”
“Sure thing.” She tucks her pink mat underneath her arm, and we head out across the park. The sun’s rising above the Manhattan skyline, its light creating a blanket of welcomed warmth.
“Are you in school?” she asks once we hit the sidewalk.
“Yep. I’m at NYU.”
“Oh, cool. My boyfriend goes there, too.”
“Really?” I have to stop the laugh threatening to seep from my lips. Boyfriend? Does she really think he’s her boyfriend? Oh, Gage, what kind of lies have you been feeding this poor girl?
“Yeah, he’s in creative writing.” She blushes and, dammit, she is pretty.
Gage, she is fucking pretty. Naturally, girl-next-door pretty. I bet she looks like that when she wakes up. I bet her cheeks flush that prissy little carnation when you get her off, don’t they? I can’t blame you for fucking her; I really can’t. “Huh, really? Who is he?” Bile rises in my throat again, and I swallow it down.
“Gage Tyler.”
Cha-ching. “Oh, I think I’ve had a class with him, maybe art history or something?” I pull my phone from the small pocket on my workout pants and type out a quick text to the man of the hour: I miss you. I need to fuck you. “Yeah, I think it was art history.”
Adrenaline shoots through me when the Sherwood Forest horn blares, announcing the lying sack of shit’s next line.
Manwhore: I’d like that. What exactly do you want me to do to you?
Me: Fuck me like a dirty slut.
Some sick, twisted part of me gets a real kick out of the fact that I’m talking about sex with Gage while I’m standing next to Kristi.
“Small world, huh?” I ask.
“It is.” She opens the coffee shop door, and the little bell jingles.
So small, my dear Bombshell Blonde Kristi, that you and I are sharing the same man. The sad part is, I’m aware of it, and you are not. And all I have to do is get you to tell me that I’m better than you, and then Gage and I can go on about our happy, fucking lives without you and your Crest-white smile.
Chapter 4
The indicator beeps while I wait for the elevator to come to the fifteenth floor. I utilize the time to pick at the tiny specks of green paint underneath my nails.
For the past week, all I’ve done is paint. During our coffee date, I brought up the fact—or rather the lie—that I had been looking for a painting class in the city. Kristi, being the sweet, helpful little thing that she is, suggested I join her for class. And seeing as how we just have so much in common, I, of course, agreed.
I bought one of those pay as you go phones with cash; I’m no dummy. The police track that shit. And Kristi and I have texted throughout the week about yoga and books and pop culture bullshit. It seems like we’re becoming fast friends.
Kristi’s so very trusting. She trusts me. She trusts Gage.
She has bad intuition…
There’s a nervous flutter in my stomach when I step off the elevator and right to her door. I take a breath and knock. But I’m not greeted by Kristi when the door swings open. No, instead, I’m face to face with a very tall, very thin woman whose blonde hair is pinned into a loose French twist. The pink and orange floral smock she’s wearing nearly blinds me.
“Come in,” she says with a smile as she lifts a wine glass to her lips.
At first, I panic a little. I never intended to meet Kristi’s friends. I never wanted them to have my face imprinted in their memory. But as I cross the threshold, I think maybe it’s okay that she introduces me to her friends. It makes me less suspicious.
I scoot past Miss French Twist with nothing more than an uneasy smile, a little disappointed at how unrewarding this first visit to Kristi’s apartment feels. When you’re invited in, it sucks all the thrill out; plus I can’t as easily go through her belongings. I can’t find that hidden drawer she most likely keeps and judge her by how many toys she has.
All the furniture has been scooted against the walls to make room for the drop cloth, the line of easels, and metal folding chairs. But even though the living room is in disarray, I still spot the vase filled with wilting, purple roses on the mantel.
“Oh, Violet!” Kristi’s chirpy voice lifts above the hum of conversation.
I catch her tying a white, paint-splattered smock around her waist as she quickly weaves through the cluttered space.
Her hair looks perfect, her face—even in that hideous apron, she’s a ray of fucking sunshine. “So glad you could make it,” she chimes and gives me a tight hug. She smells like amber and vanilla, pretty. Everything about her is pretty, pretty, pretty and petite and feminine. And so very fucking blonde.
“Thanks for inviting me.” I smile back in a way that makes my face hurt.
She leads me through the living room and into the kitchen where she immediately grabs a bottle of chardonnay and pours two glasses. She hands me one and then takes a too-quick sip from her own. “So the instructor, Liz”—she points at Miss French Twist—“studied at NYU. She has this amazing little gallery over in Soho. Very well respected. I’m certain you’ll totes adore her. She’s a bit, um…you know, what’s the word?” Her brow scrunches as she rolls her hand through the air over and over. “Ex—ex—sutintric?”
I cringe. I chew at the inside of my lip, waiting to see if she corrects herself, but she doesn’t. “Eccentric?”
“Yes!” Bouncing on the balls of her feet, she claps her hands. “That’s the word! Eccentric.”
I eye a pair of scissors lying on an end table, wondering what kind of noise they would make if I plunged them right into her eye. I take a sip of my wine, deciding it would probably have that suction sound, like stabbing a cantaloupe.
“You know.” Kristi tilts her head to the side and places a fist on her hip. All cute and slightly reminiscent of a Stepford Wife. “As much as we’ve been talking, I never asked if you’re single?”
“Oh. Well. Um, I mean…” I shake my head. “It’s complicated.”
“I just ask because I don’t have many girlfriends, and Gage has this cabin that he is taking me and some of his friends to in a few weeks. And his friend Jake is just hilarious, you know, a bit eccentric. We keep saying we should hook up Jake with someone, but we just don’t…”
We. We. We. We. Her rambling fades in to the background, muffled by the rush of blood pulsing through my ears. I thought Kristi was a fuck buddy who was more invested in some type of relationship than Gage, but, with all these “wes” and the cabin and his friends—she knows his friends—my hope quickly fades.
The clock is ticking. What if he knocks her up, what if— “Do you think that’s normal?” Kristi frowns. “You know, the entire locking yourself away?”
I blink and take a gulp of wine, trying to piece together what she said. Luckily for me, she’s a talker, and she just picks right up with the conversation. “Gage just goes through these phases where he’ll disappear. He says he needs to find his chi.” She rolls her eyes. “I don’t know what chi is.”
“Well, I think everyone kind of needs a little chi time.” Whatever the fuck that is.
I follow Kristi to a table and take a seat next to her. I sweep my brush this way and smudge my brush that way, painting jagged buildings and a psychedelic sunset while pretending this is the grandest time I’ve ever had. Every once in a while, I’ll glance over at Kristi and remark about how great Liz is, and she agrees. It doesn’t take long for me to see that most everyone here adores Kristi. And, why wouldn’t they?
An hour and a half later, Kristi is drunk on wine, and my
bladder is about to rupture. I excuse myself to use the restroom, and she makes sure to slur, “Oh, make sure you get a good look at the tub. It’s why I rented the apartment in the first place.”
Nodding, I slip down the hall and into the tiny room, nearly giggling with glee when I notice the window by the toilet. I wait until I flush the toilet to pop the lock, in case it makes a bang—which it doesn’t, then I push onto my toes and peer out. Spinning around like the girl from “The Sound of Music,” I grin. Big. So big my cheeks ache. This is fate. This is absolutely fate, and I’m—my gaze stops on the tub. Oh, the tub. The perfectly pristine, clawfoot tub that sits against the wall. I drop to my knees, and I laugh as I run my fingers over the smooth, cast iron body.
Oh, Kristi. I am so very glad you appreciate a good, sturdy tub.
Chapter 5
Fifteen flights of a rickety, metal fire escape would leave anyone winded. Even fit little Kristi. I drop my backpack to my feet for a minute while I catch my breath, then I shoulder it again and jump, my fingers curling around the brick ledge underneath her bathroom window. One quick shove and the window pops up, lifting just enough that I can stick my arm inside to get a better grip.
Maybe I should thank the yoga for how easily I’m able to pull up onto the narrow ledge. Carefully, I slip one leg through the opening, then the other. I lower myself down until my toes touch the toilet seat, and then—I’m inside her dark bathroom.
I pause and wait, listening for any clue that she may have heard me, but much to my delight, the apartment is shrouded in silence. Excitement fires through me, and I nearly walk into her hallway with my backpack still on. Shaking my head, I stop and shrug out of the straps and then gently place it next to her perfect, cast iron, clawfoot tub. It’s a little bit of a shame Kristi won’t get to appreciate how this tub played into her untimely demise—nothing eats through cast iron. With a sigh, I unzip the bag and pull out the rope before I step into the hall. My heart bangs ceremoniously in my chest. Sweat pricks its way across the back of my neck.
It’s not far down the hall to her room. Not at all. And I find myself humming in an attempt to control the excitement crackling through me like a live wire.
One, step. Two. Watch that shoe.
Three steps, four, open her door.
Five then six, look at that bitch.
Seven and eight, I’ll tell her it’s fate.
Nine, ten… “I’m better for him,” I whisper when I lean over the bed.
Kristi barely startles, so I tuck a piece of her blonde hair behind her ear. “Wake up, sleepy head.”
Her eyes flash open, and I cup my hand over her perfect mouth, shoving that damn scream right back down her pretty little throat. Pinning her against the mattress, I crawl onto the bed, and I straddle her.
She thrashes, lifting her head and bucking her hips. Pity for her, all that does is make it easier for me to slip the ready-made noose around her neck. Her eyes go wide, all tear-filled and panicked, and I shake my head while clicking my tongue. “The more you struggle, the tighter it gets.”
Kristi stills. Her nostrils flare, and a few tears track down her cheeks.
“Gage Tyler is my boyfriend, Kristi,” I say, and her perfectly arched brows pinch together. “And while I see the attraction he has to you, you aren’t right for him. I am. I am better than you.”
The confused expression fades into one of sheer terror, and she flails around again. At this point, it may be a struggle for me to hold her, but luckily, all it takes is one quick yank on the rope, and she chokes, coughing against my hand.
“Be still, and I won’t kill you.” I leave off the “yet” because really, that’s not important.
Her face crumples from the inside out, and now she’s crying. God, I hate when they cry. “He doesn’t love you, Kristi. If he did, do you really think he would be fucking me?”
I shake my head in pity. Keeping one hand on the noose, I grab my phone from my pocket and press play on the video already on the screen. “See,” I say, turning the device around so she can see the close-up of his cock entering me over and over while he says my name like a prayer he’s practiced his entire life. “And if you love him, you want him to be happy. I’m sure.”
I pull on the noose, and she gags, the way I bet she’s gagged on his glorious dick a hundred times. Well, that ends tonight—as long as she tells me those four magic words that will erase all the suffering Gage has caused me.
She’s mumbling “please” underneath my hand then screaming. Crying. Begging. Clawing at the rope. A garbled “I’m sorry” comes out when I tighten the noose a notch more. But I just shake my head with disappointment.
“If you just tell me that I’m better than you, I’ll set you free.” I make a crisscross over my heart, and I’m not lying. I have every intention of freeing Bombshell Blonde Kristi tonight. “I promise,” I say, smiling as sweet as apple pie.
She gives a frantic nod, still tearing at her throat. “You’re better,” she says, her voice hoarse from the tension.
Growing ever so tired, I huff. “You didn’t say it right! I’m better than you, Kristi. I’m better than you, you slutty bitch!”
“You’re better than me!” Ah, she found her strength with that proclamation, shouting it so loudly that I almost wouldn’t know she was being strangled. “You’re so much better than me!”
Tears sting my eyes, and I nod. “I am, aren’t I?”
Then I grit my teeth, my hands shaking as I tug and tug and tug until she’s choking and gagging…until blood surfaces in the whites of her eyes, and a final breath escapes her perfect, pouty lips. Until she’s still and dead and gone.
And a dead girl is never better than me. Ever!
Chapter 6
The afternoon sun streams through the window, the hazy rays warming my feet at the end of Kristi’s bed.
The research I did said it would take three to four hours to dissolve her body. Drain-O and lye make a potent mix that can’t eat away at the metal, and that cast iron tub of hers is sparkling clean. I didn’t account for the five it would take to do something with her remains.
Her phone chimes with that annoying, heavenly harp strum. A text from Gage flashes across the screen.
Gage: Miss you.
Bombshell Blonde Kristi: I know you’ve been seeing someone else. I hate you.
And then, she blocks him—well, I block him, but if her body hadn’t been turned into brownish-red sludge and canned in over two-hundred jam jars, I might have just taken her dead finger and jabbed the message out. In her honor, of course.
With a sigh, I crawl out of bed and stretch. All that work has left my muscles rather sore, but there’s still work to do. After all, I don’t want to go to prison, so I make a few posts on Kristi’s social media about her needing to find herself. Something about her traveling to Bali to hang out with the sacred monkeys of the temples. I book a flight—I’ll worry about handing over her ID and the plane ticket to some random, homeless woman I find later, just in case the police want to follow up on that story. Then I pack two suitcases full of Kristi jam, and I leave through the front door. Only guilty people climb through a window. And really, when we get right down to it, Gage is the only guilty one here.
Later that night, Gage invites me over. As tired as I am, when he begs me to cook dinner, I run to the store and grab tomatoes, garlic, and onion, and I make him Bolognese from scratch. I clean the dishes and the counter, and I manage to laugh at his jokes. I don’t even bat an eye when he farts.
And when he retires to the bedroom, I follow, curling up on his chest and listening to the thump, thump, thump of the heart that now belongs only to me. Not Amanda or Katie or Bombshell Blonde Kristi or that Hailey girl. Just me.
“Babe,” I whisper, trailing my fingertips over his muscles, up to his chin, to his lips. He jerks away a little. It’s not that he finds me annoying, it’s just that he’s really into this show.
I tap his chest.
“Huh?” He’s still
focused on the TV, and I have to crunch my teeth together to keep from choking him.
“What do you want for breakfast in the morning?” I make sure there’s a sugary-sweet tone to my voice. That gets his attention.
“Whatever you want to make.”
“I brought some homemade jelly.”
A slow smile curls his lips, then he leans over and presses his warm mouth against mine. “Fuck, I have it bad for you.”
“I wish I didn’t have it as bad for you as I do.” I bat my eyes. I play the coy, wounded fawn limping through the meadow just begging for a wolf to come along and devour me.
A soft laugh rumbles from his chest. “Why do you say that?”
“I just don’t know that I can trust you.” I’m trapping him, and I know it, but I just want him to know that I’m not stupid. That I won’t tolerate one more girl.
He rolls onto his side, propping his head on his hand. I watch those gray-blue eyes of his narrow. And I swear, I can almost see a flicker of worry pass over them like an electrical current, sparking and threatening to set a fire. He brushes a tendril of hair from my face. “Why wouldn’t you be able to trust me?”
“Oh, come on, Gage. I’ve seen women practically throw themselves at you.”
“I mean, would it bother you if I was seeing someone else?”
My heart. Oh, my heart! I can feel it grabbing ahold of my ribcage and pulling the bones apart in a desperate bid to escape the burning hell he wants to send it through.
His eyes widen, then close. “Shit. Maybe I haven’t been clear with you.”
I can’t breathe, but I pretend I can. I lie there and stare at him and pretend I’m not dying on the inside.
“Violet, I care about you, but… I mean.” His brow creases, and he smooths the sheets a little like he’s trying to buy some time. “Do you think we’re in a relationship?”
