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Post by Emtedroni on Jun 26, 2008 20:44:47 GMT -5
Cynthia’s Men
Sunlight glinted off the drop of dew that slid gently down the snowy, velvet petal. It mingled with another drop at the base, and held suspended for a moment before falling to splatter on the ground.
“This one,” said the barrel-chested man in the dark three-piece suit.
“Are… Are you sure, senor? It’s already blooming,” said the gardener. “It won’t live long, once it’s been cut.”
Charles Banister glared at the plump man and turned to walk back inside. The woman closed the glass door to the patio behind her, stepping from the house into the cool, spring morning.
Charles stopped when he saw her. She was wearing one of his button-up shirts, and looked like a waif from Le Miserables trying to wear an off-white tent. She traipsed across the patio; her ebony skin contrasted by the pale sandstone. She reached towards him and the sleeves slid down, falling over her fingertips.
His expression softened as he approached her.
“Let’s have breakfast out here, Charles,” she said in her soft, thick voice.
Standing at the base of the stairs, Charles raked his meaty hand through his thick silver-gray hair.
“Out here in front of God and everyone? You’re not even dressed, Cynthia.”
She breezed down the stairs towards the low-cut grass. His eyes drifted down to the smooth, brown skin of her legs. He began to feel feverish, disconnected from the ground. Her grace was as breath-taking as the first time he had seen her in the ballet.
“There’s no one here but Julio--” she leaned towards him, and lowered her voice “--and he won’t tell a soul that I’m half naked with my husband on the patio.”
Charles turned, blocking his wife from the gardener’s view and summoned him with a sharp jerk of his head.
“The Lueders up front need attention.”
“Si, Senor Banister.”
Julio collected his gloves, hat, and two pruning shears before heading off to the south side of the stone-walled mansion. He knew better than to remind his employer that he had attended those roses two days ago.
“Thank you, Julio,” said Cynthia. She waved.
He stopped and removed his hat. “De nada, Senora Banister,” he replied, and quickly rounded the corner of the house.
Charles’ expression darkened.
“You shouldn’t be so familiar with the help, Cynthia.”
“And you shouldn’t be such a bully. Julio works hard for you, and you treat him like a dog. And the way you snap at Douglas--” he sighed; she was on a roll, “--he’s worked for us for seven weeks now and I’ve never heard you call any of the staff by their names. You just look at Douglas and say ‘Tell the cook this,’ or ‘Let the maid know that.’ If he wanted, he could have the cook poison you or the maid electrocute you in the bath and you’d never know what happened,” she said, poking his chest.
Charles snorted. The butler wouldn’t dare.
“He wouldn’t get paid that month.”
She laughed lightly, her scolding forgotten, and stood on her toes. He bent slightly so her lips could find his.
A gentle cough came from the patio.
A thin man stood in the open door to the house. His dark, pressed suit and white gloves matched his dour expression, and gaunt face. How long had he been standing there? One glove had a small smudge on the tips of the fingers. Charles looked beyond the butler to see one of the housekeepers slink behind him. That smudge of dust had probably earned that maid a scolding from the butler during his morning inspection.
“Will Sir and Madam be served breakfast on the patio today?” he asked in a soft British accent.
Charles glared at the interruption.
“Yes, Douglas, please,” Cynthia said before Charles could speak.
The butler nodded and spun about to re-enter the house.
Alone again with his wife, Charles lifted his hand and presented her with the chosen rose. She took it gently, avoiding the thorns, and breathed in the scent. She smiled with delight at the daily breakfast gift.
“…Charles…”
“Yes?”
“…About Thursday, I…”
“No. We are not having this discussion again.”
“We never finished this discussion, and we’re going to finish it now.”
“I will not have your sister in this house." Then, more softly, "God knows what she’d leave with.”
“I can’t believe you said that.”
“It’s the truth, Cynthia. She sold every gift you’ve given her since we married. We stopped giving her money, because all she does with it is feed her problem. We’re doing her no favors by throwing more wood onto the fire she’s staked to.”
“She’s my sister and I need to help her.”
“She had our help. She left the clinic, remember? She won’t help herself; there’s nothing we can do.”
“There has to be something, Charles. Even if it’s just an occasional dinner. I have to do something for her.”
“For her or for you? You can’t salve an unwarranted guilt, Cynthia.”
She looked stricken for a moment before she turned and walked past the table on the patio. Douglas, his hands full with a silver platter, stood aside as she strode into the house.
“I take it breakfast will be inside after all, sir?”
* * *
The looming, obsidian and misty marble slab in front of the office building read Banister, Canton, and Associates, Attorneys at Law in prominent, brass letters.
Charles Ulysses Banister’s office door read Senior Partner. Frederick Canton’s door, directly across the open space of the fifth floor, was the only other door similarly labeled in the five-story building.
The senior office assistant, Grace Wills, sat in front of an excellently made copy of Van Gogh’s Starry Night, and a large plaque that announced her thirtieth anniversary with the firm. Her gray hair was rolled into a bun atop her head like an iron diadem. Her large wooden desk faced the elevator, and was exactly in the middle of the back wall between the two offices.
“Good morning, Ms. Wills,” Charles moved towards his office.
“Mr. Banister, your wife called a few moments ago. She said she’d be visiting Victoria in the city tonight, and not to expect her home until late.”
Cynthia had been visiting a friend from high school more and more in recent months. At first it was because she was pregnant and asked Cynthia to be the baby’s godmother. Then, she had lost the baby and Cynthia had tried to comfort her.
“Thank you, Ms. Wills. I’ll be in my office.”
“Very well, sir. I expect Mr. Canton will be in to see you shortly.”
Charles was hunched over his desk, rifling through the few cases the two senior partners didn’t leave for the associates or junior partners. These cases didn’t make any sense. Four civilian plaintiffs that had addresses in the harbor warehouse district and a business defendant that had no employees were all represented by his firm in various cases over the last month. Frederick had agreed to take on these cases. In fact, Charles' senior partner had accepted several more cases over the past three months than he had in the previous twelve. How many of them were like these? Charles was startled when Frederick knocked on his door.
He was an average-sized man in his middle years, dressed in a light gray suit. His thinning blond hair was combed back, giving him his slightly severe appearance. His boyish smile no longer softened the effect as much as it had when he was younger.
“Hey, Charlie,” he said with a smile. “How’s that butler working out for you?”
Frederick had heard through a friend of a friend about Douglas, and offered the name to Charles when he and Cynthia decided to hire a butler; something also done at Frederick’s urging.
“Douglas, you mean? He’s certainly adequate. I’ve never seen the housekeepers jump to dusting so fast as when he enters a room. Why did his old employers let him go?”
“Actually, he left them." Frederick moved into the office and took the burgundy leather chair in front of the left corner of Charles' desk. "To hear Julia tell it, their estate was huge. You’d need twice the staff as they had, if you wanted to take care of the place properly. Well, the butler, -‘Douglas’ you said?- was tired of doing the work of three servants as well as his own duties, so he resigned as soon as he heard of anyone with an open position. Say, have you had a chance to look over that case from downtown?”
“Yes, I have. I’ve also done some research.” Charles sighed. This was going to be difficult. Frederick was one of Charles’ oldest friends. He put down his papers, and returned them to their folders.
“Frederick, we don’t work for the mob. We never will.”
“Charlie, I don’t know what you’re talking about? Bill Williamson has a perfectly good claim against Pacini Shipping.” Frederick Canton was sweating lightly around his temples. It was always cool inside Charles’ office.
“Did you really think I wouldn’t notice? Businesses that neither employ people nor have tax records can’t be sued by people who used to work for them and never lived anywhere. I know you think we need the business these cases will bring us, but I own half this firm, Frederick, and I will not allow this. Not ever. The mob is quicksand and it will be all we can do to get away from them as it is.”
Ms. Wells swiftly crossed the Persian rug to close the door on what promised to be a very long and very loud argument.
* * *
Douglas Crane sat in the foyer of the servants’ quarters, fidgeting with a half-read tome. For Whom the Bells Toll was a fair book as far as so-called American Literature went, but he’d prefer to read Lord Byron. They said they’d keep Banister at the office late, but it was nearly eleven. Or Shakespeare. He could stand to read Shakespeare if Byron wasn’t available. Where was Banister? He looked out the window again and this time stood as he saw the approaching headlights. He fingered the small paper pouch in his jacket pocket with it's white powder inside. He had his orders, and a role to play.
Douglas saw Charles punch in his security code to briefly cut off the alarm system. Douglas, feigning sleepiness, received him with a glass of brandy, his own scotch was half empty in his other hand.
“Will you require anything, before retiring, sir?”
“No. It’s been a long day. Did Cynthia say when she’d be back?” Charles took the glass, as Douglas set his own drink aside to take his employer's over-coat.
“She has been waiting upstairs for some time, sir. Though, she did say she would need to leave shortly after seeing you.”
“That’s new. Alright, I’ll see what she wants.” Banister headed up the stairs, brandy in hand.
Douglas sneered at his back. The pompous wanker deserves every bit of what he’s getting.
* * *
The empty bedroom was nearly devoid of illumination. The only light came from beneath the closed bathroom door.
“Cynthia? Did you need something?”
She didn’t answer.
The door opened and she stood silhouetted. In the dark, it was hard for him to tell, but he thought she was wearing one of his favorite negligees. The lace and frills were placed to emphasize her lithe figure.
She reached to the side of the door, lifted a small, crystal bottle and ran perfume across her neck and breasts. Charles was short of breath as he watched her turn out the light and glide towards him through the dark. She straddled his lap in the dark and took his glass of brandy. She drank the last sip he had been nursing. He was lightly dizzy as the fruity scent of her filled his senses. She dropped the glass to the floor, grabbed his head in both hands and brought his mouth to hers.
She didn’t speak a word except in the heat of passion. He was fast asleep when she quietly slipped out.
* * *
Bright crimson and azure lights strobed and flickered across the red brick buildings, revealing logos painted on every glass window, and a small crowd of busy people swarming around the gaping maw of an alley between two delicatessens. It was 1:13 when detective sergeant William Lance arrived in front of the Radu's Deli in the heart of Greenwich Village. Patrolmen stood at the mouth of the alley where they had found the body.
“Who’s the victim?” Lance sounded bored and sleepy.
“Black female. Kinda rich judgin’ from her clothes. No purse. Near as we can figure, she was walkin’ down the street, got yanked inna the alley, resisted, got shot.”
Lance stepped around the car to get a closer look. “What’s with the flower?”
“Huh?”
“The white flower by that trash can. It’s crushed.”
“We didn’t figure it’s important. Just trash.”
“How long've you been outta the academy?”
“Sorry, sir? What was that?”
“You, sure it wasn’t attempted rape?” he asked loudly.
“No. But no purse says robbery.”
“That huge rock still sittin’ on her left hand says otherwise.”
* * *
The room was far too small, and it was much too early in the morning for Charles’ taste. He had been alarmed that Cynthia hadn’t come back last night, and called the police shortly after waking up at 4:27. They asked him to come to a downtown precinct near Greenwich Village.
He’d woken from a nightmare. He couldn’t remember it, but this little room was becoming a nightmare all its own. It was now 6:34 and he’d heard nothing from Cynthia. He called her cell phone several times and still got no answer.
The door opened and a fat, sweaty man in a poorly made gray suit stepped through. He was carrying photographs, a cell phone that looked like Cynthia’s, and a bra with a few small smudges of paint on it.
“Hello, Mr. Banister. I’m detective sergeant Earl Lance.”
“What have you found out about my wife?”
The phone buzzed once on the table. It probably had a missed call or a voice mail. The detective ignored it.
“You’re not going to answer that?”
“Nope. Came in on a Jane Doe last night. Maybe a hooker.”
Lance was deliberately looking away from Charles. He was lying.
“Let’s see…” Lance looked into a folder. “It says here that you called us this morning asking about filing a missing persons report for your wife.”
“That’s right. She never came home last night.”
“When was the last time you saw your wife?”
“Late last night, at about twelve. When I got home she said she’d have to go back out. Look, detective, I’ve told four other people all of this already. What do you know about my wife?”
The phone buzzed again.
“Nothing so far. We’re still gathering information. You know, usually we don’t open a missing person’s case for 24 hours, Mr. Banister. But I understand you’re a friend of the D.A.” Charles noticed the pause. “And we’ve been told to cooperate.” Another pause. “So here we are. Uh, let’s see… do you know where she had to be? Your wife, I mean.”
“No, but she’s been spending a lot of time with a friend of hers in the City.”
“Do you know who this friend was, or where they lived?”
“Victoria something. Cynthia mentioned something about the Village, but no, I don’t know where.”
“I see.” Lance scribbled something into the folder. “Have you tried calling this friend?”
“I don’t have that number. Look, what are you doing to find my wife?”
“Everything we can, I assure you.” The fat detective was trying to stare Charles down.
The phone buzzed again. Charles grabbed it on impulse, the detective made no move to stop him. He opened it, and his own cell phone number glared back at him from the ‘missed calls’ menu.
“How long’ve you known your little black wife’s been having an affair, Charles? Is that why you killed her?”
Charles’ arms and legs felt slack and he could no longer feel the floor.
* * *
“The husband says he was screwin’ her in his house at the time of death in the Village. There’s no way she made it from the house at quarter-‘til midnight, to the Village at twelve-thirty. His alibi doesn’t wash, except for the butler, who we suddenly can’t get a hold of,” said first sergeant Carter, a lean man on the verge of retirement.
The two detectives sat at their desks in the open-floor office they shared with two dozen other detectives. Everyone else on the crowded, noisy level was either moving across the room at high speed or handcuffed in a chair. Two rookies who weren’t paying close enough attention to where they were going collided and papers fell to the floor, jumbled.
“I still think it’s the boy,” replied detective Lance, an open bag of Cheetos on his lap. “Even if we can’t find this Douglas, Banister probably will. What jury’s not gonna believe a bona fide English butler? Besides, he’s also got a record of punching in his personal security code for that alarm system. And he’s a trial lawyer. That means he’s smart. He knows better than to off his wife himself. He’d have someone else do that. And Brown,” he added with finality, “was nearby and had just as much motive as the dope that married her. She wasn’t ever gonna leave all that money. No way.”
“Nah. The flaky artist doesn’t have the stones to kill. And you saw the paint on her bra. The guy can't undress her without making a mess on her panties, he sure couldn't kill her without getting blood all over himself,” said Carter. “So what are we left with? A much older, white husband who knows better and has a wishy-washy alibi, and the younger, black man who was bangin’ her on the side; a man that doesn’t have it in him to be a killer.”
“But does have it in him to lay pipe to a rich, white man’s pretty, black wife,” said Lance. He popped a Cheeto into his mouth. “Y’know, if Brown did kill her, then Banister was probably pulling the strings. Maybe he offered him money. A couple thousand would sound pretty sweet to a dumb young boy like him. And you know the whole starving artist type just as much as I do. He’d be a perfect patsy.”
“So, we follow them both.”
* * *
Douglas slammed into the thin wall and slid to the floor. The thin, cheap sheetrock cracked behind him. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. His left eye was badly swollen.
Charles had been roaring the same thing again and again.
“Who was she?!”
It had taken two weeks for Charles’ investigators to track the butler to a second story room in a seedy motel off the Jersey turnpike. The ordered cleanliness of the stained, smelly room hadn't lasted long upon Charles' arrival.
The frail looking butler’s shoulders slumped. After being beaten for the better part of an hour he finally spoke.
“Corinne.”
Charles felt numb.
“Whatever they paid you, you’d better pray it was worth spending the rest of your life as someone’s prison pregnant dog, you arrogant bastard.”
As he left the motel, Charles heard a single, muffled gunshot from the second floor.
* * *
Victor Brown was cold, sitting in the passenger seat.
He had asked the big man driving the fancy car to turn off the A/C, but had been ignored.
“Why’d you want me here?” asked Victor.
“Because you didn’t kill her. And you’re the only one I know that about with any certainty,” said Charles Banister.
Cynthia’s Charles.
Victor Brown was unsure about his dead lover’s husband. The man could easily be hauling him to some dark, hidden place in an elaborate ploy to kill him; either to revenge himself, wrongly, for the death of his wife, or because she had been seeing Victor behind his back for months.
“You don’t know me, man. How…?”
“Because, I know… knew Cynthia,” he interrupted. “She chose you because of your loyalty. Because, she could make you love her. She could make anyone she chose devote themselves to her.”
That had certainly been true enough for Victor. He remembered the first time he had seen Cynthia Banister.
* * *
Victor Brown’s big gala opening off Fifth Avenue was littered with boring socialites. His agent had insisted he mingle with these potential patrons. Victor was frustrated at how all these people could stare blankly at these works of art, his art, and not be moved.
A very big man in a yellow suit that did horrible things for his complexion entered the side hall of the gallery. Victor was staggered that any man with skin like that would dare to put on such a garish color. Then he saw a black woman enter the room behind him. When she took his arm, it was obvious the choice in color was not to give the man a hideous color tone (which it did) but to compliment the beautiful girl on his arm. The big man was engrossed in talking to one of Victor’s patrons, a wealthy lawyer named Canton who was dressed rather sharply, the artist thought, in a black tuxedo.
The girl spoke briefly into her escort’s ear, and when he nodded his assent, she slipped away. Victor watched her as she drifted from one room to the next. After a few minutes of browsing she stood in front of a painting he had titled ‘Dark Moonlight.’
“Do you like it?” She looked startled at his question.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure what it means. All the silver and black make the heart of the image difficult to see.”
“I think that’s kind of the point.”
“Where do you think he got his inspiration for this piece?”
“The artist? Well, I’m not sure, but if I had to guess I’d ask if you’ve ever seen the moonrise at about fifteen minutes before the sunrise; just a night or two before the new moon? The sunlight seems to reach around the whole moon and it looks like the moon itself is a clear disk ringed in light.”
She scrutinized his face for a moment before they continued. She had seen right through his oldest trick. He switched to his second oldest and gave her a tour of the gallery.
At the end of the night, Canton saw Victor and Cynthia, still together, moving around the gallery and had given a warning shake of the head to tell Victor something was wrong.
His affair with Cynthia Banister had begun a week later.
* * *
Charles’ silver Renault pulled off the highway and entered a neighborhood where it seemed garishly out of place among dilapidated buildings. Victor saw the children who had been playing barefoot in the street as they stopped to stare at the beautiful car. Banister parked the Renault in front of one of the weathered, red brick structures. The two men exited the car and Victor let the other man lead him into the four-story apartment building. The smell of sour urine inside permeated the dimly lit stairs, and crept incessantly from the yellowing walls. On the third floor they found a partially opened door.
A dead black woman lay in the middle of the floor of the apartment. A syringe was nearby, and rubber tubing was tied loosely around her left arm.
“Who was she? Did you know her?” Victor asked.
Banister stood in the doorway, unable or unwilling to enter.
“Her name was Corinne.”
Corinne? Victor knew that name; but why in God’s name would Cynthia’s sister be involved in this? And who would kill to keep her quiet?
* * *
“So you found her like this?” asked detective Lance.
“Yes, detective,” said Charles.
Detective Carter, was questioning Brown down the hall.
“You haven’t touched anything?”
“We stayed in the hall.”
“Why’d you call me?”
“It’s the same people who killed my wife. She,--” Charles pointed to the covered body in the middle of the one bedroom apartment “--was in on it, somehow. They wanted her quiet.”
“She was a hooker, and a druggie. I looked it up before we came over. She just overdosed. How is that murder?”
“Corinne was left handed. That tube is on the wrong arm, and the needle’s on the wrong side of the body.”
“Ok. You’ve piqued my interest. Her file says her pimp’s a scumbag who’s in with the mob, and you should see the file on that guy. But how’s this connect to your dead, trophy wife?”
Charles was growing to like this detective less and less.
“She was the one Douglas let in. The one I thought was Cynthia, the night she was murdered.” Brown and Carter joined them at the doorway.
“Detective,” one of the on-scene forensic investigators held up a business card and a pregnancy test, each in its own plastic bag.
“That’s my firm’s card,” said Charles with a quick glance. “Cynthia must have given it to her.” He moved to take a closer look at the pregnancy test.
“Wait,” said Victor. “That’s not your card. Here.”
He presented a nearly identical card. Charles took a closer look at the card in the bag. How would she have gotten his card?
“My God,” Charles said. His voice was almost too low to be heard.
* * *
Fred Canton entered his office on the fifth floor to find Charles sitting at his heavy, oak desk.
“Charlie? What are you doing back at work?”
Charles looked up with sad, drooping eyes. His hair was unkempt, and he looked like he hadn’t slept in the last week.
“You killed my wife, my wife’s sister, and my unborn, bastard child.” He pulled a pistol from beneath the desk.
Fred froze in place. His mind could only focus on the nickel plated hand-gun in front of his partner. He stammered, “Not me, Charlie. I tried to tell them. I tried to stop them. No one liked Cynthia more than me.”
Charles’ voice came out as a growl. “I did.”
“So did I,” said Victor Brown from behind him. “You were going to let them use me as a scapegoat for the police. Her death was supposed to scare Charles and make him agree to take on their cases.”
“But I’m not the type to intimidate, Frederick. Now you, Victor and I are going to talk about your testimony.”
“And your plea, and sentence. No bargains for you,” said the young man in the doorway.
Fred tried to back out of the office, but Brown blocked his way and closed the door.
* * *
Two months after the trial was over, Charles Banister sat in his house’s library. Three empty, glass bottles sat on his desk next to another, mostly empty bottle with an inch of light brown liquid left in it.
On his third try, Charles managed to stay standing. He wobbled out of the room and into the office at the end of the hall. Cynthia’s office. She ran charities in here. He set his glass down on an end table. She had planned social parties and surprise dates. Had she let Brown have her in here, too? He tried to fight off the image of her bent over the desk, Victor Brown standing behind her, thrusting.
Charles nearly swept the lamp to the floor. His massive fists ached to hit something. But Cynthia had picked out that lamp. She had chosen this desk out of all the desks in the house. He wanted to scream; he needed a drink. Where was that d**ned glass?
Charles waddled towards the library, catching himself on the wall twice. Victor was standing at the table, his back to Charles, looking at the nearly empty bottle of brandy. Charles reached towards him, but began to fall forward. He had to catch himself on one of the antique chairs, and Victor heard him.
“What do you want?” He tried to sneer, but he could only slur the words.
Victor pointed to a wrapped painting leaning against a leather chair. “She commissioned it a month ago. I think she wanted it for you.”
Charles squinted at the painting before looking at Victor with glassy eyes. “What is it?”
“It’s her.”
Charles stumbled across the room until he could reach the painting. He almost touched it before he remembered the artist. “What do you want? Money?”
“No, she paid me in advance.”
“Then go.”
Victor nodded and walked from the room with his head high.
Charles tore open the plain brown paper, but the image was not finished. It was definitely Cynthia, but the details were too fuzzy. The background was completely sketched out, but only partly painted. In the painting’s left hand was a hollow sketch of a rose. Charles cheeks felt hot, then cold, then hot, again. He touched them, and his hand was wet when he pulled it away.
The next morning Charles stepped out onto the patio. Julio was working on the second rose bush to the right of the stairs. Charles wanted to retch, but that would have to wait until this was done.
He looked at the first rose bush. He found a beaten rose with petals withered at the tips. “Julio, would you cut this one for me?”
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Post by Emtedroni on Jun 26, 2008 21:18:25 GMT -5
Screaming
They’re screaming again, demanding to be heard; I won’t.
I rock forward onto my knees, reach to the on/off knob, and twist. The volume rises, again. My hand strays to the upper knob. I spread my fingers and stretch to the fine-tuning, plastic ring around the base. I can barely reach it with the knob pressing into my palm. I move to the lower knob and the same thing happens. The one on top says "VHF," has a slot that says “U” and thirteen channels. The other one says "UHF," and has a lot more channels, but the top one has to be on "U" to watch any of those channels.
Her voice shakes the house; his voice hurts my ears. I reach again, twist again, settle back to sit on the rug. The volume, which now hurts my ears, is louder than I’ve ever heard it. They stop screaming at each other, and say my name louder and louder three times. “Turn it down!”
I turn to look at them. They're both angry, but at least they're not yelling at each other. I know it won't last long, just as I know they aren't really mad at me for making it hard for them to yell at one another. I watch them for as long as I can, hoping to keep their minds on me instead of their fight, while I reach up to the knob and twist the other way.
I don’t know what’s on the TV. I don’t think it’s a show I like. It’s dark outside. Only grownups like the shows that are on now. I look down. “Turn it back down!” I let out a huff. It doesn't need to be quieter. It was louder than this before I turned it up the last time. They want it quiet so they can hear each other; so they can yell at each other. I rock up onto my knees again and twist, not as far as I had turned it before, and sit back down for the second time; my ankles crossed. They’re a little quieter for just a second before they’re screaming again.
I stretch left to touch the rug as far as my arm can reach. The rug is like one long rope looped around itself again and again in an oval. My fingers trace the lines between the ropes across my front and to my right until I can’t reach where it starts to turn again. I wonder if the rug is one rope or two or more. I try to count the number of ropes in a row, but I keep losing my place at around seventeen. I don't know what number comes after nineteen.
I look past them to the kitchen. She hasn't made dinner yet, and nothing's cooking. It looks like we won't be eating tonight, since it's almost my bedtime. They'll stop yelling in a few minutes and tell me to go to bed, and then they'll start yelling again. I don't know what to do. I sit and watch the next t.v. show; I know this one, but I don't really like it. I know the opening music and hum along with it.
The show ends, and another begins. They still haven't sent me to bed. They're still yelling. They've never forgotten to send me to bed after that last show before. Her voice suddenly comes from everywhere at once and my head whips around. His voice follows hers.
"Stop." My face is hot.
They scream more.
"Stop!" Two lines down my cheeks are burning even hotter.
They can't hear me. They won't hear me. I'm too small, too quiet. My stomach hurts. My head hurts.
I stand. I have to beat them. They're huge; I have to be louder than them. I breath in until my chest hurts. My voice comes from everywhere at once.
"SSSTTOOOOOPPP!"
There is silence. They're both looking at me.
"No more yelling!"
He opens his mouth.
"NO! No more yelling!" I have to breathe in. "None!"
She opens her mouth.
I try to breathe in again. My legs are shaking. Why can't they understand? Why can't they be quiet? Why can't they stop yelling?
"No." It's weak this time.
"Honey..."
"NO." It's as loud a whisper as I can make it. My hands shake at my sides. There's no more air. I can't breath in again; I don't know how.
"We'll just talk. We won't yell." He's letting her talk, and looking at me like he's never seen me before.
Somehow I find air. "You'll yell."
"We'll try not to, sweetheart." She moves towards me.
"That's all you do. You yell. You want to talk, but you just yell."
"We won't, honey. Go on to bed. You can listen and if we get too loud you can tell us. OK?" She squats down so her face is only a little above mine.
"And you won't yell?"
Grandma taught me how to pray. Please, dear God, don't let them yell. I don't want them to yell. I don't want to go to bed and have to come back out here. I can't scream like that again. She wipes tears from my face. I wonder where they came from. My face is still hot. My head hurts.
"We won't yell. We'll just talk."
I nod. I don't believe her, but I walk around the corner and into my room.
They don't yell. They're quiet. I'm afraid. I know what the yelling is. I at least know that they're there when they're yelling. This is different. It's not hot, it's cold. What are they doing? Why can't I hear them talking?
I get out of bed, and move to the door. I can't hear them both. Only her voice comes through. I open the door and walk through the hall to the living room.
She's sitting at the table by the couch. "Mommy, where's Daddy?" She blinks at me; she doesn't know how to answer. He's not at the table, and he's not on the couch. I look to the kitchen as the back door clicks shut.
Daddy? Did I do that?
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