Excuse the Outburst

When it comes to getting rid of your wife and best friend in one night, timing is everything. So many things can go wrong. So many threads need to align. But the truth is, I could have been an actor or director in another life. I recognize, unlike most, that everyone has their roles to play and we’re playing them all the time.

I spent months writing and editing the script for the coming night in my head, marking time until the perfect moment arrived. I’d practiced making my voice shake while I showered or drove to work, miming the two calls I’d have to fake in quick succession. I even found out by doing it myself how long it would take to drive emergency-quick from the heart of town by the police station all the way down my long driveway to the mansion on twenty acres me and my sweetheart bitch wife Clarissa built on my brains.

Timing. Rules. Sticking to the script. That’s the key. See, professionally, I’m a number cruncher. A “paper pusher,” Timothy, my business partner and best friend always called me with a smirk. He acted as lead contractor on all our construction sites, yelling orders and overseeing operations. But my strict accounting practices are why our business kept coming out ahead. I knew how to make the numbers add up when it counted.

I knew the day had arrived because that evening the sky turned a shade of broody gray green like it always does before a slow storm rolls in to hover over town for hours. A Tuesday. Marvelous. My son-of-a-bitch best friend Timothy would stay home after leaving the job site and not jet off to the beach or to gamble in Vegas like he does a couple weekends a month. Clarissa was upstairs in her room, where she retired nearly every day after noon not to emerge until the next morning for her green smoothie and a walk with a couple of her friends so they could bitch about their nail ladies and their Botox wearing off and their husbands. We haven’t slept in the same bed for years. We rarely ate together. Even before our daughter left for college, we’d begun drifting. Now an ocean roiled between us.

Whenever we attended an event together “for the optics,” Clarissa parted with me at the door, searching for some luckless fool to ensnare and force them to bear her endless prattle until we were forced to dine together, another opportunity for her to whisper my shortcomings from the side of her mouth. (“I wish you’d use your knife properly, Kelly. You eat like a child. God, Kelly, could you not slouch for one fucking hour of your life?”) She often trapped Timothy, the best man at our wedding, my college roommate, and half owner of our firm. The guy had it all. Success, brains, good looks, money—and no wife. I envied him for one of those things.

I knew I had to plan all this because of what I discovered one night after a charity event. Clarissa begged off early, leaving me alone with the oxygen tank crowd. She’d been doing it a lot lately, faking stomach troubles or a sore throat. I was all too happy to stay without her. Happy and blind—for a while. Then I began noticing Timothy was never around after she left. I didn’t think much of it until six months ago, after she left the Christmas Snowball early. We said our goodnights and I watched Timothy—the man could really stuff a tux—from the back end of the cavernous ballroom. A few minutes after Clarissa walked out, he slurped off his champagne and called for his Porsche. I followed him to a hotel in the next town. Clarissa was waiting on him in the lobby. They didn’t even care enough about me to be sneaky.

I cared, though. Enough to leave as little as possible to chance.

Evenings I usually stood with a glass of pinot grigio taking in the sunset at our west-facing fifteen foot windows. Clarissa hated when I drank PGs. A woman’s drink, she called it. Why couldn’t I drink scotch or bourbon or even brandy for Christ sake? I don’t know, Clarissa. Why do your panties fly off for anyone but your husband? Why can’t you shut your fat whore mouth once in a while?

Sorry. Excuse the outburst.

That night, though, staring out of the tall windows, I didn’t drink. The sky clouded and I heard my cue: the first rumble of distant thunder.

Roll film. Take one. Action.

I called upstairs to Clarissa. “I’m going out for a bit.” I don’t think she heard me, but routine is important.

We have four vehicles: an SUV, a town car, an impractical sporty two-seater, and an old silver truck for knocking around our property. I drew on my leather gloves and started the truck, which was already loaded with everything I needed, and drove toward the storm. A mile from the house and just off our property, I turned right into one of our firm’s subdivisions in mid-development. Our newest gold mine. The pavement ran a hundred feet then dropped to dirt amid a parcel of half-finished houses on half-acre lots. I parked behind one of the construction sites, hopped out of the truck, grabbed the heavy mallet from the truck bed, and listened for any approaching vehicles. I’ve got great hearing, better than most. Because I care, see.

No sound but the thunder closing in. I walked around to the front of the truck, picked a spot on the right side, and went to work. The first swing shattered a headlamp. The second bent the grille. The third went low on the front bumper. Keeping in mind the script, the vision, the timing, I stopped after five blows because there’s only so much damage a deer can do to an old truck. My hands were throbbing anyway, and I still had to smear the deer blood I ordered from a tracking-dog website on the grille. Most people wouldn’t think to get the blood—without it, questions would be asked later—but I’m not most people.

I stashed the mallet with some other tools at the house construction site, got in the truck, and drove home, careful to toss the extra deer blood in the woods and back the truck in the driveway so the damage was easily visible to the two guests that would arrive soon.

More thunder clapped overhead. I saw the first visible blue whip of lightning touch down to the west.

Inside, I called up to Clarissa. No answer. I had a hunch what she was doing.

Routines. So important. So predictable.

In her room, I stripped naked. Preventative measures. The bathroom door was shut but the aroma of her bath products singed my nose. I hated the scent. And why not? It reminded me of Clarissa.

Animal calls from inside the bathroom masked my approach. She loved to bathe to the sounds of the Costa Rican rainforest. I slowly opened the door. She wore a bath mask over her eyes. A howler monkey whooped. The room was steamy, misty even, just like the rainforest. I tip my cap: she could set the scene to be transported. She was probably off in her head fucking Timothy right then, in their bungalow on a tropical beach, coconuts and papaya on the bedside table.

Too bad for her. If she wasn’t so relaxed, maybe she would’ve seen me coming.

It wouldn’t have mattered.

I moved quietly, first taking a hand towel from the rack, then folding it over a few times, and finally creeping silently up to the tub. More monkeys whooping. Birds chirping. My skin already wet from the room’s heat.

“Kelly?” Her mouth hung open in question.

I stood at the edge of the tub, looking down at my wife of twenty years, my true love, the mother of my child—and jammed the hand towel into her gaping mouth.

She flailed, gagged, and splashed soapy water everywhere. She tried to scream but I kept the towel in place with a firm hand. The mask slid off her panicked eyes and they met mine. First horror, then hatred. I knew the second look well. Had seen it every time she how pathetic I’d become. I couldn’t bench press two hundred pounds. I had a high pitched voice, so unlike Timothy’s baritone. I didn’t come from a good family like they did, and, yes, liked white wine instead of bourbon.

But you didn’t marry me for my looks or my family, did you, Clarissa? You married me because I was smart. Maybe you should’ve married someone with a lower IQ.

I thrust her head into the water with both hands. Over and over. Held her down. More flailing, more splashing. I only held her under for a few seconds. She couldn’t find footing in the enormous, slippery tub. She simply couldn’t fight back. I let her up but forced her under again before she could open her eyes. I never wanted to see them again, but I wasn’t going to kill her.

A few more dunks and she went limp. All according to plan.

I laid her out on the floor like the catch of the day and gently extracted the towel from her mouth. The pills in my pocket slipped easily between her slack lips. She mumbled but I poured water down her throat and covered her mouth and held her until she passed out.

It's funny, now. That was the most intimate moment we’d spent together in years.

I inserted the towel back in her yielding mouth, wiped my naked body completely dry, combed my hair, and dressed. In my room, I found the giant black gardening bag I’d taken from our shed months ago. Clarissa is diminutive, petite, only about five feet two. I slid her inside and tied the bag off with a double knot. Moving her gently down the stairs and into the backyard without bruising her proved a little harder, but I managed. Amazing what a little adrenaline, a flattened cardboard box, and two sofa cushions can do for a weak guy like me, right Clarissa?

I checked my watch walking back inside to replace the cushions, keeping one eye on the black bag through the back window. The clock was ticking. Things were set in motion that had to coincide. I only had one take to get the shot right. Time to make the phone calls.

First to Timothy. I took ten fast breaths to get into character before I called. He answered on the second ring.

“What, Kelly?”

“Tim, thank God. Something bad happened. I need your help, please, please Tim, you got to help me.”

“Slow down, breathe, what is it?”

I let out a little yelp like I’d been crying. “God, Tim. I hit something out on the road tonight. A deer. I was driving the truck and it just jumped out.” I sniffed again, let myself whimper. All those sessions in the shower paid off.

“People hit deer all the time. Was it a big buck at least? You could mount it and tell people you shot it.” He laughed at his own joke.

“Tim don’t laugh. It wasn’t big. Just a small buck.”

“So what?”

“It didn’t die,” I said. “The deer’s alive, Tim. Oh, God.”

“Alive?”

“I don’t know why but I had some garbage bags in the truck and I, I—”

“You what, Kelly?”

“I bagged it up and put it in the truck and brought it home.”

“So, what do you want me to do?”

“We have to do something with it. I don’t know how to handle these things, Tim. You hunt. Don’t you know what to do?”

“Jesus, Kelly. Why did you bag it up?”

“I don’t know.” My voice scratched, high and squeaky. “I panicked. I thought I’d get in trouble if someone saw me hit it then drive off. Isn’t it illegal not to dispose of it? Now Clarissa is mad, telling me to get rid of it and I don’t know what to do. Come on, Tim. I’m lost here. Please help.” I knew the next line would hook him, give him another chance to show off his mettle. “Clarissa’s so mad at me.”

“Good God.”

“She keeps yelling and telling me I need to be a man. But I can’t do it.”

He sighed, so I sniveled like a whipped puppy until he said, “All right, Kelly. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

“Thank you, Tim. Thanks buddy. Hurry, please.”

He hung up. One more call to make. Exactly six minutes later, I dialed the police station and reported a dark figure like a man moving around my backyard holding something long, maybe some kind of gun. I didn’t recognize him and had no idea why he was there, but I’d just come home to unlocked doors, and my wife was nowhere to be found, and I was scared.

Thunder rattled the big windows of my house.

They said they’d send someone to check the grounds.

I ran back upstairs and scooped some suds from the drained tub, rubbed it dry on my hands, and waited. My good bastard pal Timothy parked one minute later.

I met his headlights in the driveway. He got out and motioned to my truck and said, “Banged the front up good. Lot of blood there, Kelly.”

I let myself shake, reaching out for his hands, making sure to grab both of them so the dried soap residue could be found on him later. “Thank you so much, Tim. I knew you would help me. Clarissa will be thrilled. What should we do?”

“Put the thing out of its misery. Then we’ll find somewhere to dump it.”

“Out of its misery?”

“We’ve got to kill it, Kelly.”

I stepped backward in horror. “But, but… Tim, I can’t kill it.”

“This is exactly why your wife gets on you all the time, Kelly. You need to man up. The deer is suffering.”

“I guess…”

I let my hands fall. That’s Kelly. A weak guy. No spine.

Give me my Oscar.

Timothy sighed deeply again to show his agitation at my weakness. He reached into his SUV and came back out with a shotgun in his calloused, manly hands. “Just show me the thing.”

I led him into the back yard. More thunderclaps but still no rain. The storm was taking its time. I checked my watch and turned an ear to the sky, listening for my second guest.

The black bag lay in the grass, still knotted. A twitch made the plastic crinkle. Her foot? A hand? Don’t fight, Clarissa. No need to wake up. What have you got to live for? But she was waking up. I’d miscalculated something in the dosage or hadn’t accounted for her anti-calorie diet. Mistakes.

Timothy said, “You should’ve hit it harder, Kelly. Killed it outright.”

“I wish I had. It’s so sad.”

“It’s the circle of life. Quit whining.”

“Are you going to—”

“Shoot it? Yes, Kelly. That’s why I brought the gun.”

“Right here?”

“Yes, right here.”

I turned to mime horror, but when I spun back around Timothy was crouched beside the bag, fumbling at the knot. My skull burned. He’d ruin it all. It took all I had to keep control and not lunge for his hands.

He said, “Help me get the bag off.”

“No no no, wait.”

His hands didn’t stop. He’d already untied the first loops of my double knot.

I shrieked a high pitched wail. “I can’t look at it again. Please don’t.”

This time he turned his head but kept working the tight knot. “But I don’t know where the head is. That’ll kill it quickest.”

“Right there,” I said, pointing frantically. “Right by the knot. That’s the head end, I remember.”

He grunted disapproval, kept loosening the knot to expose Clarissa and shatter everything I’d planned for.

I had to touch him. Had to touch the degenerate. My hand went to his shoulder.

I said, “Please don’t, Tim.”

His fingers stopped pulling but he didn’t stand. He shook off my grasp and actually moved his hands over the plastic, over Clarissa’s head, smoothing her hair through the thin black bag. Maybe the asshole could feel compassion for some things. Just not me.

“You know something, Kelly? I thought you said this was a little buck. But I don’t feel any antlers.”

My breath caught. I had said buck. Stupid stupid stupid. Not in the script.

The plastic moved again, the shift of a leg, perhaps. The pills were wearing off too quickly. She’d be moaning soon.

“I guess it’s a girl,” I said, too quietly.

Timothy cupped his ear. “Speak up.”

“I said, I guess it’s a girl.”

He shook his head disdainfully. “Doe.”

“What?”

“A female deer is called a doe. You really don’t know much that doesn’t come on a spreadsheet, do you?”

Ingrate. “Sorry,” I said.

“Guess if we leave it in the bag, it’ll be less blood in your yard, anyway.”

Timothy stood, stepped back, raised the gun to his shoulder, and aimed.

But I still hadn’t heard the police cruiser. The officer should already be speeding up to park. They weren’t driving as fast as I’d driven the route for some reason. Incompetence. Like they were intentionally trying to mess up my timing.

“Wait.”

“What now?” he said.

“Can I go inside?”

Timothy lowered the gun. “No. I think you need to see this. Learn something that isn’t number crunching.”

I stiffened, felt my palms grow clammy. Some people are so ungrateful. I know my voice changed when I spoke, but I just couldn’t help it. I broke character.

“That number crunching keeps our business successful, Timothy.”

He paused. Squinted at me. I never called him Timothy. Only Tim. He sensed something was off. He knew. He could see my soul.

“I never said it didn’t, Kelly. But right now? This is another kind of business.”

My throat cinched. I dare not speak, stalling for as long as I thought safe. I almost ruined everything. That’s what emotion will do for you.

“You’re right,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

Then I heard it. The sound of a police cruiser lightly in my ear. Not on cue but close enough.

See, while I spent all my time in our office, pushing papers, Timothy walked construction sites with all the machinery, always forgetting his ear protection because he was brash, ruining his hearing day by day. I knew he couldn’t hear the distant engine hum.

I said, “I should be saying thanks.”

“Yes, you should. You think I like coming out here at night to take care of problems you aren’t man enough to do yourself?”

“No. I’m sorry.”

I took a cautious step backward toward the porch. I wouldn’t run inside and lock the door and quickly wash the evidentiary bath soap from my hands and dry them before winding myself into a fake panic for the coming officer until the blast sounded.

“Please, Tim. Go on.”

I heard the police car quietly reach the house before another rumble of dry thunder rattled the world.

He pursed his condescending lips, said, “You really are a wimp sometimes, Kelly.”

But we all have our roles to play, Timothy.

He raised the shotgun to his shoulder.