This appears in a pre-2010 issue of Down in the Dirt magazine.
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Todd Maxwell unzipped the leather purse. Glancing through the hallway where his lovely wife went to fix her makeup in the bathroom, he took three hundred dollars, in large bills, from the fancy handbag. Before Lisa Maxwell walked back into the room, he stuffed the three crispy bills quickly into his back pocket. Slowly, as not to alarm his wife, he lifted the telephone receiver. He began to dial the number that would welcome his favorite houseguest. Before he could press the first button, he listened to his bride yell for approval. Craning his head, Maxwell nodded slowly.
“If I understand properly,” said Todd, “you will not return until midnight.” Trying to sound dejected, he said, “How will I spend the time?” Lifting a bushy eyebrow, he said, “I just don’t understand. Why Shelly needs you on her trips, I will never know. She will convince you to spend money on Blackjack, like always, and you will feel obligated. Most people can spend money by themselves. As you know, I wasted a lot of money, pointlessly, like Shelly, but I stopped when I met you. I would have no money without you—none at all. I would live without a job, without a house, without you.” With a tilted smile, feeling the bills in the jeans, he said, “How would I live without you?” He shook his head. “Your budget saved my job, my house, and my sanity.”
Giggling, Lisa said, “Shelly spends wildly, like you, but Shelly spends purposefully, unlike you. She has needs, like you did, to fill an empty void. Whenever she looks at you and me, she yearns, passionately, for a husband.” Lisa walked into the hallway. “When she yearns, she yearns like kids do for Christmas Day. The Gold Dust Casino brings that type of happiness. Truly, she looks like a child behind the Blackjack tables. She just looks for men at The Gold Dust Casino, but plays Blackjack to wait for them.” Todd told her that men don’t just come to women, but flirt at tables. Lisa said, “Men spend money there, and always walk around. Until she finds worthy men, she fills the void with Blackjack. To spend money fills the void of loneliness.” She shrugged. “Truthfully, she finds boyfriends rarely, but she makes money. Maybe she just looks forty years old instead of thirty.”
Todd agreed that Shelly didn’t look young and beautiful, unlike Lisa. That brought Lisa into the hallway, with a makeup brush in her hand, looking starry-eyed at her husband, and then Lisa vanished back into the bathroom. By the look on her face, she saw the light around Todd that he noticed in his bride. “Immediately when I looked at you,” he said, “I understood how Romeo felt when he looked at Juliet on the balcony. That play reminds me of you.” Still, Todd Maxwell imagined another individual wrapped loosely in silk pajamas and furry slippers.
With his hand just off the telephone, Maxwell yelled toward the bathroom to keep Lisa ignorant, “Gambling can become addictive. Maybe she has the addiction.” Todd looked around the first-level of the house, listened briefly to the near soundlessness. “Nobody wants Shelly to live here, not with you and me. I need privacy.” He shook his head sharply. “Maybe she should find men in barrooms.” He laughed lightly. “She might start another addiction.” Laughing curtly, he said, “The addiction that she has currently will waste her money. Alcohol will just kill her liver.”
Lisa yelled while she applied lipstick, “Men don’t worry about money around women. They want them to blow on dice, hold their drinks, and throw the dice for them. Shelly just wants to blow on dice. When men lose around ladies, they behave nonchalantly, to not offend. Otherwise, the ladies walk away. Everyone hates an addict.” He yelled back affirmatively. Lisa said, “Shelly plays nonchalantly, to impress, not to repulse.” Quietly, she said to her image in the mirror, “I hope anyhow.” She sprayed just a hint of perfume, shook her head, and said to her husband, “Addicts indulge alone. They never need friends to indulge. Besides, she spends just her money. Never has Shelly borrowed from anyone, not from me, not from anyone, just to play Blackjack.”
Quickly, Todd dialed the number. He had memorized the ten digits before he had married Lisa. They seemed bright in his brain as his address. His houseguest, who usually stayed just one hour, knew the street by now. Mumbling, he said, “I require Bobbie.” Looking back at Lisa, he said quietly, “Exactly—that Bobbie. Whenever I call, I request Bobbie.” It took a pause for the telephones to pass information. When they did, Lisa had begun to brush her curly blonde hair. Her snaky locks flowed seductively around her shoulders. Todd said into the telephone, “Bobbie—Todd Maxwell—we spend many hours together.” Nodding to the voice, Todd said, “Not fifteen minutes—thirty minutes will work perfectly.” With the price arranged, Todd replaced the mouthpiece. Then he rubbed his hands together in anticipation, but stopped when his wife appeared.
In her high-heeled shoes and skirt, Lisa looked as stylish as anyone, with her full breasts that bulged the blouse, narrow hips tied tightly with a leather belt, and shapely thighs and calves below the black nylons. Quickly, she grabbed her handbag, kissed Todd on the forehead, and told him, “I will lock the doors.” He nodded and she added, “Nobody should come here until I return. Anybody breaks into the house and you should feel confident to defend the house with the handgun kept on the table.” Blowing a kiss back at her husband, Lisa ran to her Ford. Three minutes later, the Mustang vanished loudly, with just a puff of black smoke behind.
Ten minutes later, the bushes rustled behind the house. Bobbie shouldn’t arrive for fifteen minutes yet. Pulling the handgun from the wood table, he walked through the house, peered suspiciously into the backyard, through the moody dusk, and eyeballed a burly male in a black leather jacket, with buzzed hair, and black leather boots. Somehow, the body looked familiar. Maybe a neighbor stood outside. Why would a neighbor arrive by back door, and rustle bushes instead of knock properly? No prowler would break into his house, if Todd could help it, not after Lisa had told him firmly to keep trouble away. One option remained—thus the handgun.
Opening the window quietly, he poked the muzzle into the fluffy bushes that stood by the windowsill. Steely blue eyes looked plainly at him but the body didn’t run and made no attempt to leave. Reluctantly, he squeezed three bullets at the body. Immediately, he heard the shriek, and blood splattered like a juice bottle broke. The thud echoed eerily as the well-built body touched the porch. Blood pooled thickly by the head. It looked black in the early nighttime.
Moments later, Todd walked into the backyard, looking through the pallid moonlight, holding tightly to the firearm. Crickets added rhythm to the nighttime. He ignored them easily. Their noises vanished to those accustomed to the repetitiveness. “What brought you to my house?” Todd said, “Did you want to steal, injure, or just kill like a lunatic?” Furrowing his brows, he said, “When I walk back into the house, I will call police. You will spend time in jail. You cannot stop it now.” Waving the handgun aggressively, Todd turned to walk back into the house, just before the bloody man yelled.
When the male in the leather jacket responded, just before he died, painfully, his bellow sounded familiar. The thin moon illuminated gloomily. It added shadows that obscured the leathered male. Todd bent to examine the body in the military-style hairdo. Only then did his eyeballs widen. His jaw dropped and his throat parched. With his lover, Todd had bellowed lustfully in bed about thirty times. He recognized the throaty yell. The motorcycle attire had fooled him completely. Usually, Maxwell preferred the stately beauty of shiny silk pajamas. Always, Bobbie had arrived as preferred, until today.
Dropping by his illicit friend, Todd said, “Bobbie, Bobbie, Bobbie,” and emptied the handgun into his heart. Maxwell slumped awkwardly, wide-eyed, onto the bloody wood porch, unable to breathe anymore. Then he joined his lover eternally.
