Journalstone's 2010 Warped Words for Twisted Minds (17 page)

“We sit here. Quietly. And wait until dawn.”

“Oh, God, Bruce. Are you crazy?”

“You have any other suggestions?”

She didn't say anything, which was answer enough.

*   *   *

I sat at the bar in Kelly's for hours the night I managed to get myself kicked off the BAK account. Clarke never showed. I did manage to get really drunk, though – the barkeep took my keys, and I took a cab home.

I was braced for a tongue-lashing from Becca, but instead she was sitting on the couch, reading a magazine. The TV set showed the local news. She looked up when I came in, accepted a kiss, and went back to reading while I went to change.

There was something odd in the bathroom, I thought, but in my alcohol-dulled senses it took me a while to figure it out.

The toilet seat was up. I went back into the living room, anger beginning to boil up inside me. “Who was here?” I demanded.

Becca looked at me, alarm on her face for a moment. “Why do you think anyone was here?”

“Because unless you haven't taken a piss in the four hours since you've been home a man has used the toilet.” I said.

“Uh, it was the cable guy,” she said, after a couple of moments. “It was out when I got home. I called, and they had a guy in the neighborhood, so he came right over. He asked to use the bathroom while he was here. It only took him a few minutes to fix whatever it was. He just left right before you got home.”

“I see,” I said, settling onto the couch next to her, picking up the TV remote and flipping through the channels, deciding to let the matter drop for the moment.

“I was watching that,” she said.

“No you weren't. You were reading. I'm sure there's a game on here somewhere.”

“You've been drinking.”

“No, I haven't. I'm just tired,” I responded.

It was almost word-for-word the conversation we'd had for the past few years every night. She got up and went into the bedroom, taking her magazine., I knew she'd be reading until she fell asleep.

Instead of moving to the bed, this one night, I dozed off on the couch and stayed there until morning. When Becca woke, she said nothing, not even waking me as she got herself ready for work.

I waited for her to leave before beginning my own morning, making sure the toilet seat was down when I left the house.

*   *   *

It had been dark a couple of hours. Becca and I both settled onto the floor, backs against the wall, as far away as we could get from the door and the windows. The shotgun lay across my lap.

Suddenly, I heard six rapid pops. It was probably Clarke's gun going off. Then, silence.

“Do you suppose he killed it?” Becca whispered to me.

“He'd try to come back if he did,” I whispered.

“It's dark out there, and he's probably lost in the woods,” she said. “Maybe we should call for him or something. Maybe that's why he's not--”

“Why do you care so intently anyway?” I asked. “What's this man to you?”

“Bruce, he's in danger out there!” she whispered. “He's your best friend! Aren't you worried about him even a little bit?”

“Sure,” I said. “But why are YOU worried about him, Becca?”

“What the hell are you say--”

She never finished her sentence. The window on the other side of the room shattered, and she screamed once, briefly. Then, she was gone, dragged several feet through the air and outside in less than a second.

I could see in the moonlight blood on the jagged shards of glass still left in the window pane. Glass littered the floor, along with more blood. I heard her scream a couple more times, each time further away. I took a deep breath and let it out, slowly, feeling calmer and more content than I knew I should. I just sat there quietly, waiting for dawn.

*   *   *

It was another after-work night at Kelly's. Clarke made an appearance this time, joining me at the bar.

“Sorry about the other night, Bruce,” he said, slapping me on the back when he got there, settling onto the barstool next to me. He held up a single finger at the bartender, who put a glass of beer on the bar in front of him without a word. “New guy at BAK has started in on me already. He's not letting the grass grow, let me tell you.”

“Keeping you busy, are they?” I asked.

“Sheesh. Demanding bastards, aren't they? They want this, they want that, and they want it now. I've come close to telling them to stuff it more than once. I don't know how you put up with them as long as you did.”

“Thinking about asking Nick to put somebody else on the account?” I asked.

“Not yet,” Clarke said. “I think I can get a handle on their new rep. He seems to know what he's doing, and we speak the same language. I'm just blowing off steam, you know? How are things with you? We never get the chance to hang out anymore.”

“Okay, I guess. Becca and I are--”

“Oh, speak of the Devil, there's Clyde. I'll be right back.”

He got up and left me sitting there, going to talk to the new BAK representative who had just come in.

It was okay, though, because I had my gin martini to keep me company.

*   *   *

Quiet. The silence outside was almost a physical thing. Like a big, hulking monster in and of itself, sitting out there, daring anyone to bother it.

I wasn't about to make a sound. Anything – even a hastily drawn breath – would probably be as loud as a cannon shot.

I sat on the floor, back against the wall, shotgun in my lap, as far away from that shattered window and the door as I could get. Of course, there was another window on the wall above me. But it wasn't shattered. It was closed, and I was willing it to protect me against whatever was out there. It needed to protect me against whatever had taken my wife. Becca was gone.

We had been married for about eight years. No children – Becca had miscarried during the first year and hadn't gotten pregnant again. It was a hard time for her and for me, too. I don't think we'd ever gotten over it.

Clarke had always had better luck with women than I did. He also had more friends than I did – meeting people, talking to them, making them feel at ease, was always easy for him. He should have gone into politics. He never did.

Sure, he had his faults, but who doesn't? He more than made up for them with his virtues. I mean, yah, he would take things without asking, sometimes returning them, sometimes not. He would get drunk and hit on my girlfriends. But I always remembered that when I’d needed him, he'd been there for me when no one else had been. That more than offset the problems.

Even if Becca had . . . the image of that raised toilet seat came back to my mind. Cable guy. Right. Like that ever happened.

Still, Clarke and Becca? The idea was ridiculous. Even though Clarke had never made it to our little after-work get-together, things like that happened, right? I knew better than anyone the stresses of that job, of dealing with BAK and those other clients. Things have a tendency to come up at the last possible second, even when you're heading out the door. It happens all the time.

It was so quiet outside, but I wanted to hear a noise, anything, anything at all, to give me something to focus on besides the turmoil in my mind.

I didn't get my wish. The quiet went on for a thousand years it seemed.

*   *   *

When I got to work that fateful day, the door to my office was locked. I tried my key, but it wouldn't work.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Clarke.

“Nick needs to see you,” he said.

“Okay,” I said. I knew right then that it was going to be bad. But for the life of me, I couldn't figure out what I'd done.

Nick's receptionist told me to go right in. Nick was sitting behind his desk when I opened the door.

“Come on in, and close the door, Bruce.” he said.

I did as he asked, settling into the big, comfortable chair. It was so much bigger and more comfortable than the visitors' chairs in my own office. Nick looked at me a long while, his eyes narrowed almost to slits. He rocked back and forth, holding a pen in front of his chest, toying with it in his fingers. I could hear the antique clock he kept on a shelf against the wall ticking away.

“There's a problem, Bruce,” he finally said. “A big problem. With the BAK account.”

“What sort of problem?” I asked. “And why aren't you talking to Clarke about it? He's the exec on that account now.”

“This is from your time handling it,” Nick said. “There are . . . irregularities.”

“What kind of irregularities?”

“The accounting kind,” Nick said. “Did you think we weren't going to notice?”

“I'm sorry, Nick, I don't know what you're talking about,” I said.

Nick snorted, and I realized then that he was really angry. I'd never seen him angry before.

“It's too late for you to play dumb with me. You're caught. You got greedy your last day handling that account, Bruce, and that's what nailed you. You were embezzling from that account, and when your access was being revoked you decided to triple your usual take. It was too big to hide. All I can say is thank God we put Clarke on that account before you bled it dry.”

“Nick, I still--”

“Oh, for God's sake, shut up, Bruce. You're only insulting my intelligence and making yourself look bad. Now, we're not planning to prosecute, but you're fired. We'll ship your personal belongings to your house from your office, but as of now you are no longer welcome here. Turn in your corporate ID at the security desk and leave the premises. Now.”

“But that last day---” I remembered, right then, turning, seeing that I hadn't logged off of my computer, Clarke standing there, smiling at me.

I remembered Clarke not showing up for our after-work get together.

“Please, Bruce, don't make this worse. Go home. I'm sure you'll turn up something. Plus, you get to keep the money you stole from us. It's a sweet deal, I'd say.”

There really was nothing else to say. I got up, a bit shakily, and made my way out of the office.

I was in the parking deck, getting into my car, when Clarke slid up behind me in his own new car, a really huge SUV.

“Hey, Bruce, I heard what happened,” he said. “Let's meet down at Kelly's for a burger and a beer, okay? You can talk to me about it.”

“Sure,” I said, not really knowing why.

*   *   *

We sat in a booth, me nursing a beer and a burger, Clarke slurping down some oysters on the half-shell. I thought over my suspicions about him and, then, dismissed them as ridiculous. There was no way Clarke would submarine me. He just wouldn't do that.

The mostly likely scenario was someone hacked my password and accessed the accounts that way. It happens all the time. At least that’s what I kept telling myself.

“Man, that sucks,” Clarke said, taking a sip of his own beer after gulping down yet another mollusk.

“It came out of nowhere,” I stammered. “What the hell is going on?”

“Anybody who would accuse you of embezzling obviously doesn't know you,” Clarke kept going. He gulped down another oyster after dousing it with hot sauce. “You've been my best friend since eighth grade. All through college. You looked out for me; you were always there for me. You helped me get this job. Without you I don't know where I would be, Bruce, and that's a fact. It really pisses me off that someone would treat you like this.”

“I'm thinking of suing,” I said.

“Hmmm . . .” Clarke muttered, chewing a mollusk while he thought. “I don't know about that. They can terminate anyone for any reason, you know. Plus, they didn't make their accusations public, so you can't accuse them of slander.”

“But they aren't right!” I said. “I didn't steal anything! Nick thinks I have all this money when I don't! I have no idea what happened to it!”

“Shhhh!” Clarke patted my arm. “Maybe there is some legal recourse, I don't know. But I feel pretty sure that if you pursue it, Nick will press charges, and you'll find yourself arrested.”

“Damn it,” I felt like my hands were tied behind my back. “You're probably right.”

“I know I am. I think I know Nick pretty well. He's a vengeful little bastard. I think you'll find yourself a new job pretty quickly. You've got a good reputation on the street; lots of people out there know you. Someone will snap you up as soon as they hear that you're available.”

“They're going to want to know why I'm available,” I said. I took a bite of my hamburger--it was cold and a little greasy.

“You can tell them that your former boss was a real SOB,” Clarke just kept going. “He's got a reputation, too, you know. People who work for our clients know what he's like. Hell, I get people telling me all the time that they can't see how I keep working for him. I had lunch with Clyde at BAK just today and he said . . . . sorry. I guess that's a sore spot right now.”

“Don't worry about it,” I said.

“You're my mentor, Bruce, don't you ever forget that. I'll tell anybody who asks. Everything I learned, I learned from you.”

“So I can use you as a reference?”

“Sure thing, buddy. Sure thing.”

The waitress brought our check, and he grabbed it.

“I'll take this,” he said. “After all, I'm the one who's working, right?”

*   *   *

I heard something moving around outside the cabin.

It didn't sound like it was getting closer or even further away. It was just something rustling through the underbrush. Casually moving around out there, not worrying about being noisy.

It went on for some time before my curiosity overcame my fear and I got up, as quietly as I could, to take a peek through a corner of the window.

At first I could see nothing at all. I’d never seen darkness so complete before – the moon wasn't even visible now, going down behind a distant mountain.

At last, my eyes acclimated, and I saw something move, just inside the tree line. I watched it for a long time before it started to take shape, and I could make out details.

It was a deer, grazing on something a few feet away. I guess it was a doe – it didn't have horns, and I think that time of year the bucks all have horns. She didn't notice me as she stood there, chewing on something tasty she'd found growing on the ground, just a few feet away.