Leaning against the building, the guy looked cool, calm. He wore a clean black three-piece suit, with a dizzying red tie pulled loose and the collar opened a button or two. Black hair hung over one eye and he eyed the pedestrians passing him appraisingly. He had a cigarette in one hand and as I watched, he raised it to his mouth and took a drag.
Yeah, smoke that baby.
#
The office building was stark, glass, modern, and cutting edge. Walking past cluttered cubicles and secretaries, I stepped quietly through a door set in the corner.
A fat man sat in his desk chair, huffing and puffing into the phone, his face turning beet red. He looked like he was about to have a heart attack. His heart must be two or three times oversized with a belly like that. He couldn’t get more than twelve inches closer to the desk. That blubberous fat waved and jellied with each thunderous shout. Something had gone wrong at the accountant’s office and it seemed the jig was up.
I felt like reassuring him that he had no need to worry about what the accountant would tell the police…almost.
#
The bedroom was airy, open, cheery. Obviously a woman had free reign here. Fluffy pillows, lacy table covers. A dresser covered in jewelry boxes, mirrors, and perfume. On the bed, moaning and groaning, a man and a woman thrust and pulled, jabbed and screamed at one another. As I watched him thrusting deep, hard into her, she reached up and grabbed him tight, dragging her nails down his back. She rolled him over and her breasts were bare, hard nipples jutting out. She bounced up and down and the man groped her, feeling her everywhere he could at once. I looked around once more, seeing a picture hanging on the wall.
Hmmm…well, the woman fucking in the bed certainly wasn’t the woman in the picture.
#
The bell rang and kids rushed out into the playground, screaming and laughing, chasing and playing. I watched them race to the monkey bars, to the slide, or just around. A few started a game of tag. One girl sat alone, enjoying the shade beneath a tree. She held a book and her glasses slid down her nose. Reaching up obliviously, she pushed them back up.
Enjoy that book, sweetheart, because it’s going to be the last one you ever read.
#
I am never noticed, blurred, as I am, at the edges.
I am indistinct, vague, hidden, kept secret. From you, from them, from everyone. From everything.
But I’m here.
Waiting.
#
“At 2:25pm this afternoon an earthquake raged through California. It registered 9.7 on the Richter scale, the worst earthquake in history. The San Andreas fault is crumbling to pieces and emergency services are rushing to evacuate the western half of the California sea board along the San Andreas fault. Sea water is rising and the land has become unstable.
If you live in that area, please for God’s sake, get out of there!”
#
College students walked sedately across campus. Little groups formed where kids conversed and joked and bragged. The guys ogled the girls, and the girls giggled at the guys. College life was so simple, such a transitive place. Not quite grown up, not quite a child.
The child walked alone ahead of me, his arms wrapped carefully around his books. He had his pack on his back. Corners jutted out and the pack was obviously full. He kept his head down, watching his feet. I listened closely as a girl group made a snide comment as he passed. There was just a subtle flinch, the only sign that he’d heard.
He reached the center of the commons. He stopped, stared at his feet then lifted his head to turn around in a circle, still holding the books, pack on his back, and look at everyone. He paused for a second on the insulting girls and then moved on.
After he completed his circle, he looked at the sky. A single black bird flew overhead, stark against the grey clouds.
He dropped his books and took the pack off. Silence fell over the commons as people watched him, staring like cattle, their mouths moving listlessly but making no sound. One girl only kept going. She was at the far end of the square, her head down, and moved quietly around the crowd. Within a second she ducked into a doorway and was gone.
For now.
The cattle watched as the lonely boy, teased and tortured his entire life, pulled two fully automatic 9mm black guns out and aimed at the girls who had teased him.
This was more fun than California. Much more.
