CLANK: A Book of Madness (Psychological Satire Novel) Unsettled Office Worker Loses the Last Screw (2 page)

2

It was Thursday. My boss, Mr.
Wilmer Cromwell, retrieved his lunch and returned to the office and shut his
door as usual. He rarely closes it completely. There always remains a small gap
allowing sound to leak out into my area.

Another thing about
Wilmer
Cromwell… Say that name to yourself.
Wilmer. Wilmer. Wilmer.
Sounds like
some kind of farm animal. Well, this farm animal happens to control my life.
He’s the head honcho. The big man. The chief. The overseer. The top dog.

He possesses a very strange,
peculiar personality. The accompanying traits are as bizarre as expected. His
disposition is one of unknowing arrogance and pedantry. Put simply, he’s a
patronizing twit. Allow me to describe his appearance a bit. Wilmer stands
about five-foot nine and weighs in at around one hundred and ninety-five
pounds. A solid figure. Muscular. Beefy. Sturdy. He has perfect hair that
glistens marvelously in any lighting. It looks poofy, yet stiff. Sometimes he
slicks it all over to one side and on those days it reflects the glare like a
veritable mirror.

His face is attractive. You
know the type. He has that certain look of importance. The kind of guy you’d
want running a billion dollar company or leading the country. A presidential
look, yeah, that’s it. Maybe even a baronial or magisterial look. In any event
you don’t imagine the man wearing that face to be calling himself
Wilmer.
You’d think he was a Reginald Fairbanks or Thaddeus Wilkerson. Anything but
Wilmer
the farm animal. Yet, he manages to play that detestable name to his advantage.
Clients find it endearing. “Oh Wilmer, is it? How quaint. How cute.” I find
their saccharine tones of praise sickening.

Mr. Cromwell is an immaculate
dresser, always arriving in the finest of clothes. There’s never been a blemish
on his coat or a scuff on his shoes. Some days I come to work and discover that
he’s wearing a gold pocket watch. How ostentatious! Made all the more revolting
when he comes by my desk, sits on the edge of it, making sure he has my full
undivided attention before whipping out the resplendent watch and announcing
the time. Nothing more. A little announcement of the time and off he goes.
Honestly, I am extremely impressed by the timepiece. Though I’d never let it
show. That Wilmer is already so full of himself, I fear even the slightest
compliment would cause his head to burst… Which is not all that bad of an idea,
actually.

His body, as I mentioned, is
what you might call needlessly large for our line of work. There’s no purpose
for it! And to maintain his unsightly bulk – Wilmer is forever downing these
rotten muscle shakes. You can see him, many times throughout the day, yank out
his thermos or whatever it is, pour in the nasty powder and gulp the substance.
When finished, he will exhale with a loud, satisfied (quite annoying)
Ahhhh!
Disgusting…

I digress yet again. As I was
saying, Cromwell retrieved his lunch and ensconced himself in that spacious
office of his. Over twice the size of my little area. Well, actually, it’s not
even
my
area. True, there’s a desk in the room that I sit at. However,
the other half doubles as our waiting room. Which makes me seem a bit like a
receptionist, doesn’t it? Great. Another feminine role being associated with my
job. I’m a lawyer’s assistant G-D-it!

Anyway, Cromwell is sitting in
his office. The door is slightly ajar and that’s when I begin to hear it. That
God-awful sound. That high-pitched, grating noise. His infernal clinking and
clanking!

Every day the nitwit stuffs
his lunch into a large glass bowl. Usually it’s soup, salad, or something like
that. However, on occasion I’ve seen him toss hamburgers, hotdogs, and chicken
breasts into it, which in and of itself is highly odd. Who eats a hamburger out
of an oversized glass bowl? You’d expect to see some helmet wearing morons
doing that. I guess Wilmer isn’t far off from the description, though. He just
lacks the headgear. Then there are the ever-present utensils. Forks, knives,
spoons. Each time he reaches down to extract a bite, his utensil slams against
the side of the bowl, making a harsh, dissonant sound. A ringing clank. A
clangorous clink. And these aren’t your ordinary clanks and clinks everyone
makes. They’re extra. Extra loud and extra often. The only conclusion I can
draw is that he does it on purpose to annoy me. In the past I’ve made several
comments regarding the clanking (only to myself of course – I didn’t have the
courage to confront him personally), all to no avail. He remains in his office
clanking away with what seemed to be extra to his already extraness. It hits me
like a slap in the face.

I feel my ears begin to bleed
as the noise permeates the room. Not literally, of course -- although sometimes
it does feel that way. I can just imagine the blood trickling out, ever so
slowly at first. Then as the clinking continues, the blood becomes a stream,
then a gushing mess, until finally the liquid explodes out of my head like a
bursting fire hydrant. Here I am prone to having out of body experiences,
envisioning my corpse lying on the ground – the blood beginning to quickly pool
around my head. And even in death I have no respite, as that confounded
clinking continues. Cromwell sits in his plush leather chair (with additional
padding on the armrests) and clinks, and clanks, and clashes, raining down blow
after blow upon the bowl!

There hasn’t been one day that
I’ve been able to work through his lunch. It’s all I can do to keep myself from
going berserk and storming his office with a little hammer. I’d like to slap
him across the face before ripping that bowl from those well moisturized hands
and smashing it to bits! See all the shattered glass litter the floor. Ahh yes…
An entirely satisfying moment.

After he finishes his
prolonged eating period, I am able to rest easy as the blissful sound of
silence fills the room once more. My heartbeat slows. My shaking hands, cupped
over the aching ears, are lowered with a sigh of relief. My teeth stop
clenching. And then I hear the ringing. The beatific sound of total silence.
But only a moment passes before the din of dull chatter coming from adjacent
offices filters in. Everything returns to normal and my near outlandish
outburst is quelled…

3

One of my greatest joys is the
reading of stories. Remember that kid in class who always had a book tucked
behind some boring textbook or trivial assignment as his teacher prattled on?
That’s me. Great stuff, books. I am especially fond of mysteries and murders.
The kind of bone chilling, titillating, horrific tales that keep you up late at
night clutching your blankets, pulled up to your nose. Many a moonless evening I’ve
lain awake in bed shrouded in darkness, too afraid to close my eyes or get up
and flick on a light. I lay there with the covers snugly wrapped around my nose
and listen. Just listen.

Is there someone in my closet?
Was that a noise I heard coming from the bathroom? It sounds like someone’s
prying open the window! The creaky hallway floorboards catch my attention and I
become certain someone is stalking down the corridor, fast approaching my room.

Then all is silent again. The
only noise I can hear is the beating of my heart. A dull, rapid vibration.
THUMP,
THUMP, THUMP.
I hear this and nothing more.

I’m sure everyone has
experienced such feelings. To think that a burglar has sneaked into your home
and is creeping throughout the house. Who knows what these lunatics are after?
They could be toting a gun. Heck, they might have an actual butcher knife!
Imagine waking up in the middle of night and catching a glimpse of some
slack-jawed hooligan right before he brings down a butcher knife across your
throat. That’s only if you’re lucky. The psychotic might hack you bit by bit
just so he can hear your screams… These are the kinds of thoughts that keep me
up at night.

Many of the stories I read are
based on actual cases. They call this genre true crime stories, I believe. You
should read some of these grotesque, macabre offenses. Let me give you an
example.

One man, a guy in his
thirties, lived at home with his parents. A real antisocial, loser type. He was
a verifiable morlock. His entire existence consisted solely of abiding in his
parent’s basement and playing online video games all day, day after day. A nice
life, huh? He would sit down there in darkness, playing for hours in the dimly
lit room. Fingers pecking away at the keys – his hand wildly reaching out for
candy bags on the desk. Wrappers strewn about the room. The typical gaming
addict… or so they thought.

He possessed many of the same
characteristics of an addict and exhibited many of the well-known traits. For
instance he rarely changed his stained (at one time white) undershirt; there
was a perennial can of soda on his computer desk; and he always wore a bathrobe
and boxers, never anything more, except for a pair of socks if it became too
cold. Anyway this loser, a grown man remember, sat down there all day zoning
out on the video games. He didn’t work, he didn’t socialize.

Naturally his parents grew a
bit tired of his mooching lifestyle. They attempted several interventions, all
to no avail. They spoke candidly to him, but sadly these tête-à-têtes were
rebuffed immediately. Their leech of a son simply continued on playing games,
showing no signs of slowing down. One day the father thought of an ingenious
plan… He cut the son’s network connection.

Problem solved, right? Wrong.

The portly, pathetic son
became incensed. He was furious. “You can’t take my games away!” he shouted in
the most stereotypical child-like manner. But the parents remained obstinate
and refused to give in. They gave him an ultimatum. Either get out and find a
job or no internet. Pretty rough, huh? As it turns out, junior had another
solution. He lasted only one day before snapping. Which some consider to be a
great feat in and of itself for such an ardent gaming addict. Anyhow, three
days later the police came to check in on the house when neither the mom nor
dad showed up for work.

Upon entering the home, they
discovered the mother first. Her body sat propped up on the sofa setting flush
against the living room wall. She had a replica fantasy sword stuck through her
heart which pinned her corpse to the couch. On the wall behind her, written in
blood, was the gaming term:
PWND!

Next, the police ventured into
the kitchen where they found the father’s cadaver. He’d been shot in the head,
supposedly with the .45 pistol lying beside him. On the large white fridge
behind him were written the words:
BOOM! HEADSHOT!

A noise coming from the
basement alerts the police. They head downstairs, guns drawn. And what do they
discover? Junior sitting at the computer playing his video games like nothing
ever happened. They hauled him into jail, but not before roughing him up a bit.
The lead officer had been so repulsed by the crime that he’d beaten the son
pretty badly before cuffing him.

It turns out he’d stolen his
dad’s wallet and paid for one month of internet connection. One was left to
guess why he killed his parents. Perhaps it was done in his game withdrawal fit
of rage. In which case, perhaps his crime was justifiable.

Now I ask you this. What kind
of psycho kills his parents over an internet connection? You’d have to be
pretty mentally unstable to murder for a reason as asinine as that. His story
is a bit more lurid than I like. It’s more sensationalistic, less intriguing. I
prefer reading about methodical murders. The kind that puzzles the police and
even goes unsolved. The perpetrators plan the slayings with such meticulousness
and punctiliousness that it boggles the mind.

The murderers or murderesses
are of high intelligence. You’d have to be. How many goons do you see getting
away with the perfect murder? Not many. Unless they luck into a favorable
circumstance and have Stewey the country bumpkin sheriff as the sole detective.
Otherwise it requires a sharp mind to concoct the perfect murder. You must
leave no trace. Or if you do leave a trace, make it appear to be pointing at
someone else. A diversion. A framing. A setup. In my opinion it’s best to avoid
that all together and simply circumvent suspicion. Leave no traces.

You’ll find those killings are
a rarity. Most murders are done madcap and slapdash. Hasty, you know. Some loon
comes home and finds his wife with another man. He snaps and shoots the
ruffian. A redneck cuts off some gang member on his way into town. The ruffian
follows the redneck, pulls up alongside his car and puts two rounds into the
toothless moron. A disgruntled cashier received one too many miswritten checks
and blew his top, along with the elderly woman’s head who tried to pay for her
groceries with it. Some persnickety boss passes over a faithful employee on a
promotion. The employee shows up to work the next day with a sawed-off shotgun
and sends his boss flying through the third story window with a hole in his
chest. A man insults his wife’s cooking. She prepares him a special dish laced
with poison and he winds up dead, falling face first into a plate of mashed
potatoes.

Murders such as those.
Unplanned, hurried, impetuous.

Any goon of low intelligence
can commit
those
murders. It takes a true virtuoso to execute the
perfect murder. Jack the Ripper. The Zodiac. Those guys were good. Not that I
condone their behavior. I simply use
good
here in the sense that they
performed untraceable, unsolved crimes. And that’s how it should be done.
Either do it right or not at all.

Back to my crime stories. I
rather enjoy being frightened. Aside from preventing me from sleeping at night,
that is. But I do take pleasure in the suspense and mystery. In fact I could
tell you, right now, how to commit the perfect murder in a dozen ways or more.
However, I myself could never carry out such a heinous crime. I’m afraid my
docile nature is far too squeamish.

Here I now find myself lying
in bed, terrified. My eyes are glued open. I’m listening for the slightest
sound of a break-in. Will I be killed in my sleep like so many of the victims
in my crime stories? I hope not. And what are the chances of it occurring?
Pretty good!

So far no one has actually
broken into my home. But that doesn’t rule out of the possibility of it
happening. And I’m no less comforted by that fact. According to statistics 1 in
5 homes will experience a home invasion. That gives me a 20% chance of being
chosen! Another strike against me is that I live in a secluded, quiet
neighborhood. The type of a place a burglar dreams about. There are no vantage
points to see from. Hardly anyone can see their neighbor’s doors. Each of my
doors has three deadbolts and one standard knob lock. My windows are doubled
pained and secured with custom locking devices.

But there is my skylight… I’ve
never gotten around to fixing that blasted thing. There’s only one flimsy latch
keeping it shut. A burglar could flip that baby open in a matter of seconds.
Then he’d lower himself down into my kitchen, grab a butcher knife from the
drawer and come stick it in me while I slept. A slow gutting is in store for
me…

There are roughly 6,000
unsolved homicides a year in the U.S.A. alone.

Murder is on the rise and I
fear my time may be arriving shortly. These are the kinds of thoughts that keep
me awake at night.