Post by nrt on Feb 27, 2014 13:19:35 GMT -8
A short story about getting even
NRT
So there it was; no doubt this time, a ring of chromatography pretty much in the middle of the pale blue bed sheet and that unmistakable odour.
She shrank down and crashed back against the washer, clutching the sheet to her face to cover her shame and a convulsive explosion of tears.
Her boy; brave, loyal, smart… a bed wetter.
Utter failure gripped her, shook and tortured her, as she expressed the months of loss, endless work, suppressed guilt and lonely helplessness, her face buried in the stinking sheet.
Then, from somewhere, like an internal alarm, an unconscious jolt forced her to break back to that moment.
He, the man responsible for all this, was coming back - that very afternoon.
Using a corner of the sheet she quickly wiped her eyes and nose, before screwing it up and tossing it into the washer.
Unable to find the space in his diary to get to an inter-school soccer game, a parents' evening or basically anything at all for his son, he was coming here today to collect an ancient stereo, left untouched for years in the storage space under the eaves.
The plan popped into her head with the speed of a slap - 11:30, plenty of time to get things prepared.
Stooping slightly in the back corner of the spare bedroom, she knelt at the hatch. A thin, flexible rectangle of painted ply, it was stiff, or wanted to jam up at stupid angles, always taking several attempts to open it enough to get her head inside.
The space beyond was hot. Dry dust invaded her nose as she breathed in, like an army of ants in stilettos.
Despite her squinting, there was light enough to see, because of ventilation channels that ran around the roof's perimeter. In this triangular twilight, sitting abandoned on an offcut of chipboard, was a sad collection of boxes.
First baby clothes, some unwanted books, then her motorcycle gear, stuffed into a storage crate.
Finally, bound with string and tape (the latter hanging in stained ribbons, its adhesive reduced to brown tracks over the cardboard) his stereo.
More shoving on the hatch allowed her upper body in to clear a channel wide enough for her the reach in and haul it out.
Much heavier than she had anticipated, the stack of boxes resisted and wanted to slew and tumble. She strained, instinctively fighting to save it from falling; 'til she remembered what she was really there for.
With an effort, she willed herself to let it crash over.
When the resulting cacophony of thuds and tell-tale tinklings subsided she said, “Oh dear! Still, if it’s worth coming all this way for, it will be worth repairing...”
The boxes were, with some effort, transferred down through the house to the edge of the porch, where he had asked her to leave them.
He was coming today, she guessed, because, despite her otherwise irregular hours, she always worked Thursday afternoons.
“Just get it down and leave it on the porch will you, Mand’, it’ll give you more space...”
As usual, his request had the tone of a demand, “I'll pick it up Thursday. I’ve got'ta be close by there then.”
She already knew he was close by most weeks. A girl friend, waitress at the coffee shop, had seen him more than once in a new convertible, held up at the crossroads in town; more than once with a blonde in the passenger seat.
But Mandy had not seen hide nor hair of him for 18 months; when he last came back for stuff.
Jay, her beautiful, brave and loving 5 year old son, hadn’t seen his dad for over two years.
She replaced the receiver; Juan, her boss had bought the story about a delivery she needed to stay home to sign for. She would make up the time, double.
Returning to the bedroom, Mandy sat down at the mirror. Immediately, her reflection mocked her, almost knocking her right off her course:- "Who are you kidding... This? This untidy, frumpy, dusty, abandoned mum... she don’t have the guts to go through with this plan!"
But, inside, she told herself that the ‘her’ in the reflection was just a little behind the curve, she has already been superseded.
So, before she could change her own mind, she quickly got up from the dressing table and went straight to the bathroom to shower that old look away.
Back in the bedroom, sometime later, she slid open the bottom drawer and took out a lacy top and a bra she had never worn. Then, having arrayed some makeup in front of the mirror, she sat down again.
This time it was the mirror that needed to be adjusted, Mandy was sitting so much taller.
When a throaty rumble and the spray of tyres on the stony drive announced his arrival, she was waiting out of sight behind the side door.
The ‘38, now warm in her hand, was still cold against her cheek. Her breath struggled to part ribs trying to knit themselves together and she felt her heart wanted to escape up through her gullet, but she was more excited than afraid.
When she heard Larry come up onto the porch for the second box and head back to the car with it, she crashed out, the hand gun exploding above her head into the still, blue sky.
“Stop right there you thieving bastard,” she shrieked.
The box thumped into the ground; cardboard split and disgorged a turntable whose Perspex cover and other assorted parts, scattered in a state of advanced disintegration.
“Mandy, you crazy bitch, it’s me!” he retorted half turning around though his hands, instantly above his shoulders, betrayed his submission.
“Oh shit! Larry, sorry. I didn’t recognise you, that's not your car… is it?” she made herself sound as shocked as possible then added, “So that’s where the child support went!”
She stepped off the porch and her shoes crunched into the gravel. The sound made her shrink back, expecting him to turn around, to explode, fight, argue. At the same time she really wanted him to see her looking victorious and proud with the gun in her hand.
But he didn’t do either.
Suddenly his hands, from above his head, shot down to his crotch and he hunched over, as she walked a few steps towards him. Quickly, hysterically, he shuffled away, with most ungainly gait, into the open car and, door swinging wildly before he could close it, roared away.
As she approached where he had stood, she realised she didn’t need him to see her.
That odour, even mingled with the car fumes; unmistakable.
