Tom Simpson - Sink

Terry DeAngelo pushed the grocery cart slowly down the wide aisle of the super market scanning the many varieties of potato chips and other non-perishable snacks. She randomly picked items of the shelves that caught her attention and tossed them into the buggy. She wasn’t particularly hungry, she just wanted to stock up on road trip goodies so the long ride to Florida wasn’t totally boring. She hated going on trips. Especially trips that took over two hours. The only reason she could deal with this one was the money. It was always the money. She stayed broke most of her adult life and she hated it. Terry probably could have gotten a real job and maybe even put a little nest egg away, but that wasn’t her. She sponged off everyone. Her parents, her friends, her many boyfriends, anyone who had a sympathetic ear. She had a million excuses for not working. Her back was misaligned and hurt all the time. She was born with a defective digestive system and she had stomach cramps constantly. Migraine headaches were one of her most popular ailments. She could invent a new disease to a perfect stranger in about two seconds flat and sound completely believable. Terry was not destined to work.

Terry was pretty ecstatic when her cousin Stretch had called and offered her five thousand dollars for less than one hours work. The downside came when he told her they had to go to Florida to pull off the job. The money was great and what the hell, she had never been to Florida. She settled it in her mind that even with the long trip it would really be worth it. Stretch told her he would be picking her up in a really nice car and they would be stopping in Kentucky to see a friend of his and then head straight to Florida. It would probably do her good to get out of Indiana for awhile. She was really sick of Indianapolis. Stretch was due to pick her up the next morning and she wanted to get home from her shopping and take a nice hot bath and get to bed early so she was fresh as a daisy when he arrived at her door. Terry at thirty four had a well shaped body and a very cute face. She had thought of being a model in her early years but, it required getting up early and working long hours and she liked to sleep till noon and hang out by the pool at the apartment complex she had lived at when she was in her early twenties. She always had a constant flow of boyfriends and sugar daddies that kept her supplied with alcohol and drugs and always managed to supply her with rent and grocery money. Her life of leisure suited her just fine and she didn’t feel the need to have to go to work. Sure she had to sleep with a lot of men, young and middle-aged and sometimes older but, it kept her from the drudgeries of punching a time card. She stayed out late at night, hitting all the popular clubs, to keep her supply of men constant, so she felt the need to sleep in everyday. Now in her mid thirties her life style was getting old and she felt the need to do something different. This offer from Stretch came at just the right time. She could start a new life with the money and maybe actually get a real God forbid job. Things were going to be different after her trip to Florida and what the hell she might even stay in the sunshine state.

The honking of the horn woke Terry from a very deep sleep. She sat up and tried to remember where she was. Suddenly, she shook her head violently in realization and everything came into focus. Stretch, must be outside, she murmured to herself. “Shit, she shouted. “I overslept again.” She jumped nude off the bed (her usual sleeping garment) and ran quickly over to the front window and threw it open with a mighty shove.

“Hey Stretch!” she yelled out into the street. “I’m sorry. I must have overslept. You want to come in and have some coffee while I get ready?”

Stretch, usually a very impatient person, would normally have been very pissed but, after seeing Terry’s great body from the waist up framed angelically in the window he was very mellow.

“Sure Terry. I’ll be right in.” I know she’s my cousin Stretch thought to himself but she sure has a great bod! Stretch moved the electric seat of the Cadillac back, opened the door, and got out. Nice ride, he thought, I’ll buy me one of these when we finish the resort job. I think I will get a bright color, like red or maybe even yellow. I want people to really notice me when I drive up.

Stretch walked into the little house that Terry had rented three months ago and walked through the living room and met his cousin in the hall way as she hurried out of the kitchen.

“I put the water on to boil and laid out cups and sugar and creamer with a jar of instant coffee. Sorry I didn’t have time to brew some real coffee.” Terry stated as she rushed past Stretch on her way to the tiny bathroom. “I took a couple of Valiums last night cause I was real nervous about this job and I guess they zonked me out.”

“Don’t worry about a thing Terry, we have plenty of time.” Stretch managed to squeeze out with a shortness of breath as he watched his cousin squeeze past him wearing nothing more than a very pleasant smile. “We have all the time in the world.”

Stretch tapped the fingers of his left hand to the beat of the song on the car’s CD player on the leather-covered steering wheel as he drove down the interstate. His mind kept recalling visions of his cousin’s lovely body. He was really pleased with himself that he had stayed in total control, especially when he could hear her singing to herself in the shower with the door wide open. The steam had rolled out the doorway along with the pleasant scent of her shampoo. He could feel the hardness in his loins but he resisted the temptation of making a fool of himself. He knew his cousin was a big showoff and if he had tried anything, she would shut him down quickly. He was thankful that he had spent most of the money Frank had sent him and a lot of the money he had gotten from the dancing queen on prostitutes. He had been very horny after all the time in prison but he had managed to satisfy most of his cravings on bought for stuff. Still, his cousin sure looked good with or without clothes.

Stretch pulled off the interstate into the first rest area after they crossed the state line into Kentucky. He reached behind him and pulled the road atlas off the back seat. “I’m going to see exactly where we’re going Terry, I haven’t been to Long Neck Luther’s place in a couple of years so I have to refresh my memory. You can stretch your legs for awhile if you like.”

“Thanks, but when I come back I want you to tell me how you pulled that great con on that old lady that thought she could dance.”

Stretch laid the atlas back on the seat after studying the route he was going to take and got out for a few minutes to smoke a cigarette. He was just grinding the butt into the ground with his heel when Terry walked up.

“Ok sport, tell me how you won over the blue-haired old lady.”

They both set down on the front seat and Stretch began explaining how easy it was to take advantage of lonely people.

“The whole idea was Frank’s,” Stretch began. “All I had to do was modify it a little bit.” He told her how he had approached several women with the idea that they were great dancers and a couple were skeptical of his plans and one was gung ho but she was leaving for the west coast in a week to visit he son in California. He finally found the right pigeon in the fifth dance club he had visited and reeled her in like a hungry fish. He had told her that word couldn’t get out that she was becoming a charter member because her friends would think that she had bought her title so everything had to be done under the table including her membership fees. She had quickly passed him five thousand dollars cash under the table at the restaurant they had met at that night and she had squeezed his hand under the table and whispered thank you. He had told her it was her talent not his acknowledgement of it and that he should be thanking her but, she had said no, it wasn’t the dance thing. It was because he was being so nice to a lonely old lady. He had tried to reassure her that it was her ability but, she had shushed him. He had written out an itinerary that would begin in six weeks and she would then start showing off her new crown. He walked out of the restaurant feeling pretty glum because he had a strong gut feeling that she knew that it was a big con but, she was lonely and liked the attention of the younger man. The feeling lasted about a block until the weight of the envelope with five thousand dollars in it pressed heavily against his suit coat and he greedily pulled it out and fanned it in front of his face.