Inside My Shorts: 30 Quickies Read online

  "Stupid is as stupid does, I guess." She had switched into injured, suffering spouse mode, knowing it was a more effective way than simply yelling to drive him crazy.

  "I don't know what I did to deserve this. I wouldn't wish this life on Tonya Harding, that's the truth. I swear, if you were to get up one day and do something right, I'd just about have a heart attack and die from shock, Jesus forbid."

  He never knew what she was talking about when she got like this, but he hated it. Over the years she had accused him of crucifying her, pissing in her lemonade (and don't think he hadn't considered doing just that on a number of occasions) – she once even said he was a kind of cancer.

  "I can see you're just tripping all over yourself to clean up this mess. Jesus on the cross had it easier than I do. I swear, if the Lord had known you for 10 minutes, he'd have kissed Judas on the mouth and the planted a tree in Israel to thank the Jews for bleeding him."

  Stanley kept his eyes closed. He knew if he saw her, he'd never do it. His hands found the frying pan's handle as he listened for Janet to come a little closer. For once, Janet did what he wanted.

  Can you say "Amen"?

  In his mind, he shouted with rage, turned, and swung the frying pan into Janet's flapping maw. He heard the satisfying "thwack" as it connected and she fell to her knees, her mouth spewing blood instead of insults. He saw himself standing over her, screaming at her -- swinging the pan over and over, shutting her up forever.

  "Is that my Costco drinking glass on the floor?" Janet shrieked. "I just --"

  Stanley screamed but it came out more as a high pitched squeal. He turned; eyes squeezed shut and swung as hard as he could. The handle of the heavy frying pan, slick with soapy water, flew out of his hand and smacked her right dab in the middle of her fleshy forehead. Janet, big as she was, spun around as gracefully as any dancer, and collapsed to the floor.

  He stood there for a long time, not so much shocked by what he had done as by the new sensation of a silent Janet. A thought struck him as funny and Stanley laughed out loud -- something that was implicitly verboten until tonight. "I guess maybe there's a God after all." When Janet didn't stop him, he laughed harder.

  * * *

  Stanley was not a strong man, but tonight he had the strength of the righteous. He used his righteous strength to drag Janet's body into the garage. He’d intended to roll her body up in a rug but righteous strength only went so far these days and he couldn't handle the extra weight.

  He pulled her across the kitchen and into the adjoining mud room, where they kept coats and such. There was a half step between the two rooms and Janet's head made a soft, slightly sickening thud as he dragged her over it, but her capacity for patience had increased dramatically in the last hour and little things like broken glass and smacking her head against the floor didn't bother her anymore.

  He planned on putting her body in the trunk of the Cadillac and driving it out into the Pine Barrens, like he had seen on that "Soprano's" episode. Then set the car on fire and bury the license plates somewhere in the woods. It would be a long walk to somewhere he could call a car service from, but nothing a righteous man such as himself couldn't handle.

  Their garage was attached to the house and off the mud room, so he didn't have to worry about being seen. He paused for a moment before opening the garage and grabbed the car keys off the hook. He saw a light smear of blood cutting a trial across the kitchen's white floor. He'd have to do something about that before he left. "First things first," Stanley muttered. He put the car keys in his mouth and grabbed Janet's feet with both hands.

  Ten minutes later he was sweating buckets and panting like Lassie at a Rin Tin Tin bachelor party, but Janet was in the trunk. He took a few moments to catch his breath. It felt like hours had passed, but his watch said it had only been about 40 minutes.

  He was going over the plan one last time when the phone rang. Should he answer it or let it go to voice mail? Ideas about establishing an alibi tickled at the back of his mind, but in the end, he didn't trust himself to have a telephone conversation with anyone right then. Stanley had been active enough for one evening. He let the phone ring. The answering machine in the TV room picked up but he couldn't hear who was speaking or what they said.

  He shut the trunk and went back into the kitchen for the final clean up.

  It took him longer to straighten up than he thought it would and by the end his back ached something awful. The strength of the righteous was well and good, but a few Advil might be a prudent idea. He got some pills from the medicine cabinet and downed them with a diet coke that was in the fridge. Everything looked ship shape and he gave himself a mental pat on the back for a job well done.

  He hit the voice mail, more to stop it from beeping every ten seconds then out of any curiosity. The message was from Janet's only friend, Edith. Edith wasn’t as mean or loud as Janet, but she was a close second.

  "Hiya hon. Just got this month’s mahjong card. I’ll make a copy and walk it over. Don’t forget –" There was a loud thud. "What the hell? – Hold on a second."

  Stanley did not hold on a second. Ignoring the machine he turned and looked vaguely around the room, searching for what, he didn’t know and didn’t find.

  "Time to go," he said to the room. "Job's only half done."

  Back in the garage, he got inside the car and fished out his keys…. except his keys weren't there. He had put them right in the passenger seat, hadn't he?

  No. He hadn't. The keys, he recalled, were resting somewhere on the great bosom of Janet, in the trunk. They’d fallen out of his shirt pocket when he’d bent over to move her feet and he’d made a mental note to grab them before he closed the trunk – a mental note that he’d ignored. Incredibly, he didn't panic. Even when Janet stated banging weakly against the trunk, he didn't panic.

  Laughing so hard that tears started streaming down his face, he got out of the car and walked to the back of the trunk. He laughed so hard he could hardly breathe.

  Janet kept banging away and Stanley kept laughing. He went to the corner of the garage where they kept the lawnmower. Next to it was a 2 gallon gasoline can with about half a gallon of gasoline in it. He took the canister and made the short journey back to the trunk, where Janet had added a little moaning to her thumping routine.

  Someone knocked against the garage door. Probably Edith with mahjong card in hand. This too, he found hysterical and redoubled his laughter. When he was finally able to catch his breath, he started spilling gasoline over the car. A lot of it sloshed onto his pants, but that hardly mattered now.

  "You know," he wheezed between laughs, "you were right, Janet." He took out a match book, retrieved a match and struck a light.

  "I can't do anything right."

  CHAPATER 21

  ZOMBIES

  I am emotionally well assembled.

  The phrase swam up out of nowhere, playing over and over in her mind. She had no idea what it meant or where, if anywhere, she’d heard it before. It simply refused to quit her.

  I am…

  His hands manipulated her legs, pushing and prodding, but she took no notice, silently moving her lips, repeating her mantra, even as he slid effortlessly inside her.

  Emotionally

  So quiet, in fact, that she forgot he was there until his face loomed before her, blocking her view of the ceiling.

  well assembled.

  She shifted slightly, hoping to remove the obstruction, but the mask of his face, horrifyingly familiar after so many years, followed. A carnival mirror.

  His weight and his length pinned her to the bed, pressed her into the soft mattress. Nevertheless, she felt pieces of herself fly away each time he withdrew. Like mercury, she scattered no matter how hard he grabbed and prodded. He kept pushing into her, grunting quietly, and she kept getting smaller.

  I am… I am… I am…

  At the end, he whispered and she answered. She was so far way by then, she doubted he heard.

  By the
time he came, she was gone.

  * * * *

  He continued, driven by habit, memory of lust and the ghost of desire. Sweat rolled down his nose and silently dropped to the sheet. Even now, with his hard cock and wet sheets, he felt like more husk than man.

  Marriage.... [thrust]

  Masturbation.... [withdraw]

  Marriage.... Masturbation.

  The mantra of the near-dead, repeated with each shove. Images of other women, real and imagined, tugged briefly at him and disappeared, giving up.

  He came in a torrent of hate disguised as a soft grunt and generic whisper. By the time he rolled over, there was nothing left.

  * * * *

  They drifted off, discarded in each other's arms. The remains of dead screams and unvoiced regrets rustled against each other in an empty world. In the end, not even the darkness bothered claiming them.

  CHAPTER 22

  SPIDER

  "JAY!!"

  Just the sound of her voice made him want to hit something. Lately, it seemed Wanda had only three ways of yapping -- loud, bitchy and irritating. When it came to pissing him off, Wanda was a multi-tasker.

  "Jayyyy!! Get up here!" It had been one grade-A bitch of a day. Triple digit temperatures and a dying air conditioner at the office left him moist, stewed, and raw. Receiving his first paycheck reflecting garnished wages for the ex was the cherry on the fucking sundae.

  He trudged up the stairs, cursing himself for trading jerking off to the playboy channel for shacking up with the built Harpy.

  Wanda was standing in the bedroom doorway. Jay had a few seconds to appreciate her finer aspects, mainly a sweet ass framed in black and white polka dot panties, and a perky set of titties that defied gravity just fine. If she could just keep her mouth –

  "JAY!! Get up here!"

  "Jesus, Wanda --"

  Wanda whirled around in surprise and he marveled at the effect she still had on him. Even when he wanted to kill her, he wanted to fuck her.

  "Just kill it!"

  "What are you talking--?"

  She grabbed his hand and half pulled, half twirled him into the room, at the same time putting Jay between her and the bed. His foot caught on the door jamb and he stumbled the rest of the way. Being the proud owner of a recent ex with a decent lawyer, Jay's bedroom, like the rest of his life, was sparsely furnished. There was the queen bed directly in front of him, flanked by two IKEA end tables, and that was it.

  Completely off balance, he had little choice but to let inertia carry him to the bed. He hit it, arms outstretched, the frame catching him just below the nut sack, thank Christ.

  Just before arms and head met goose down, he saw it. Smack dab in the middle of the bed; a big, hairy, alien-looking spider. It had lots of brown hair, gray spots and legs, legs, legs. He let out a small yelp which was drowned out by a screeching Wanda.

  Jay hit the bed, and the Spider flew into the air. He saw it pull its legs together, getting ready to tuck and roll, for Christ's sake. And then he thought he heard –

  No, spiders don't scream.

  It landed on his hand and, while spiders may not scream, sometimes a 230 pound divorcee with a thumper of a headache and a dwindling hard-on screams like a little girl.

  He snatched his hand away like he'd leaned on a hot grill. The spider began its second flight of the night, this time landing at the beautifully pedicured feet of Harpy Wanda, who let out a scream that made her previous yelling sound like a lover's whisper. Jay would be lying if he said he didn't enjoy that one.

  Wanda kicked at the bloated bag of legs and tried to back away at the same time, screaming the whole time. The spider, now air-borne for the third time that night, made a bee-line for Jay's chest. He jumped back in revulsion and smacked his head a good one against the window air-conditioner beside the head of the bed.

  He woke up some time later. In fact, he jumped up, swatting at his chest and legs and -- well, not screaming; definitely not screaming. Satisfied he was spider-free, he took a few seconds to catch his breath. His head felt like someone had taken a hammer to it.

  How can something so fucking big disappear so fucking fast? He asked himself, rubbing the back of his head and grateful to find no blood.

  "Wanda?" Jay called out. Where the fuck did she go?

  "Wanda?"

  He swatted instinctively at his arms again, sure he felt soft, alien legs skittering across his skin.

  He found Wanda when he went to look for a frying pan or a howitzer to take care of the spider. She was lying at the bottom of the stairs, her left leg twisted at a funky angle, eyes staring up at nothing. The spider was nestled between her breasts, which were no longer defying gravity.

  Jay stood there, transfixed, for how long, he didn't know. But it was light out before he moved. He slowly made his way down the stairs, his eyes never leaving the spider and, he imagined, the spider's eyes never leaving him. To Jay, it looked like it had staked its claim and was willing to die defending it.

  He nearly pissed himself when he had to jump over Wanda's body, expecting the thing to leap at his crotch. He'd call 911 and tell them -- tell them what? A Spider had murdered his girlfriend? Well, never mind. He'd call 911.

  The phone sat on the kitchen table. A fat, bloated wasp crawled back and forth over the receiver, its soft, alien buzz filling the room.

  "Fuck."

  CHAPTER 23

  TOUGH LOVE

  Jerry woke up suffocating, face pressed against burning leather, sunlight and sweat stinging his eyes. Something obstructed his mouth, forcing him to breathe through his nose, and his nose was clogged with snot, forcing him to breathe through his mouth. He tried to reach for his mouth and couldn't. His hands were bound behind his back.

  Wha…?

  What little air he was able to take in felt heavy and stale. He was able to move his head a bit. Enough to see –

  My car. I'm in my car.

  Outside the driver’s window, he could see the cool green leaves of the corkscrew willow waving gently in a soft breeze.

  In my driveway.

  The window was open half an inch, but if it was making any difference, he couldn't tell. The heat in the car was a living thing; a malevolent cat, all hot fur, sitting on his chest. It clung to him – hugged him.

  It's a typical July morning in Scottsdale. I should be driving with the air conditioning on.

  It was hard to think. Everything’s so hot. He felt like 170 pounds of sweat and phlegm.

  He tried to call out, forgetting about his mouth –

  Duct tape.

  His throat was dry as dust. Even without the tape, he doubted he’d be able to manage anything more than a croak of a whisper. He struggled to sit up.

  Back seat. I'm in the back seat of my car and I'm going to die 10 feet from my front door.

  He finally managed to wedge himself against the corner of the driver's door and the seat, achieving a respectable slouch. From there he saw salvation. Sitting in the cup holder between the bucket seats, a bottle of water, lovingly decorated with beads of condensation. As with so many, however, salvation remained just out of reach for Jerry.

  When he came to again, there was a note on the windshield.

  “I left the window open for you.”

  Sometime after that he saw the boy standing outside the car.

  Richie?

  His son stood there, tears streaming down his small face.

  Please God, please let him be ok. Don't let them hurt my boy.

  Everything was sweat and blur now. Jerry’s world was looking like a wet painting left in the rain. It took him a few minutes to realize Richie was talking, his hands pressed against the window.

  Open the door, son, for God's sake.

  “...killed him.”

  Jerry's throat closed up, cutting off what little air he was getting.

  “...my dog. You left him and he’s dead. You killed him.”

  CHAPTER 24

  PLAYTIME

  Her head w
as free from restraint, but her eyes remained fixed on the paring knife that lay on the edge of the kitchen table. Jon Tanner had done this enough to know that, right now, she only had eyes for the knife.

  He felt an absurd moment of jealousy. He was the threat, not the knife. She shouldn't forget that. He reached out and ran his fingers through her hair, eliciting a soft whimper. An exquisite sound, it always got him hard. It was electric! For the briefest moment, he lost control, his fingers tightening their grip on the woman's hair. Another moan, more electricity. Too soon. He forced himself to withdraw. The sweet pain of righteous self-denial soon overshadowed the sweet pain in his groin.

  He reluctantly let go of her hair and adjusted the mask. Man, it was hot under there! He pulled Casper’s friendly’s face an inch or so away from his face, relishing the feeling of fresh air.

  It was a pleasant sort of kitchen, he thought. Painted in soft yellow, it was quite cheery with the morning light streaming in. Cozy, but not too small. He didn't much care for the clock -- the face of some cartoon cat with a tail that swished back and forth like a pendulum, certainly not something he'd ever choose for his happy little home.

  “To each their own.”

  Jon had learned a thing or two about women over the years. The poor woman was terrified. Duct tape covered her mouth, but her eyes gave that particular secret away, and held on to others, he had no doubt. A woman's eyes always concealed more than they revealed, and a pretty woman's eyes always kept her mysteries, yes they did. Not even he could tease them out. No sir.