Victor Methos - Arsonist

A clink of glass behind her. She glanced back to her dining room. A man was sitting at the table. A linen napkin was tucked into his shirt. He was handsome and his head looked like it had recently been shaved. He cut into a steak with a fork and knife and then dabbed at his lips with the napkin before taking a sip of red wine.

He noticed her, and smiled.

“Headache?”

She opened her eyes fully, taking him in. Then she immediately looked away. He needed to know that she couldn’t identify him.

“Wha…what?” she said. She felt lightheaded, as if she were floating in space.

“I said, do you have a headache?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll get you some aspirin.” He finished his wine and rose, coming into the kitchen. He walked past her and stood at the counter. “Um, which cupboard?”

“In the bathroom.”

“Oh.”

He left and came back a moment later. He filled a glass with water and handed it to her with a couple of ibuprofen. She kept her eyes closed, refusing to look at him. He giggled.

“Open your eyes.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to see you.”

“Am I really that hideous? I apologize. I haven’t seen a mirror in a long, long time.” He opened her mouth gently and put in the ibuprofen and then put the glass to her lips. She drank a few sips and washed the pills down. “Oh…I see. You think if you don’t see me I’ll think you can’t identify me to the police. Is that it?” She didn’t answer. “Well, you’re incorrect. But if I was going to kill you, identification wouldn’t matter to me. Most sociopaths do what they do because it’s an uncontrollable urge. Like the pedophiles that grab a child in the grocery store in front of ten people. If I was that type of sociopath, which, given the circumstances, is a good assumption to make, it wouldn’t matter one bit if you saw me or not. So please, open your eyes.”

She didn’t respond and closed them even tighter, the urge to scream and cry piercing her as she pressed her wrists apart to break the ties.

“Open your eyes or I’ll nail your lids to your forehead,” he said, his voice flat and emotionless.

“No, please,” she cried. “Please don’t hurt me.”

“Open your eyes.”

Slowly, painfully, she opened them. Before her the man knelt, the glass of water in his hands. He smiled as he stood up and placed the glass down on the counter.

“Are you hungry?” he said.

“There’s money,” she said hurriedly. “My parents left a bunch of money here for emergencies. I’ll give it to you if you let me go.”

“Money, money money money. That seems to be the prime motivation for people today, yes? Although how the hell would I know? I’ve been locked in a room since I was a child. You hear that little rasp in my voice? I noticed that yesterday when I spoke to someone. It means my voice box has atrophied from disuse. I used to have a beautiful voice. I sang in a choir when I was young. But, that’s not what you’re interested in.”

“Please, please, just take whatever you want.”

“Whatever I want? What if I wanted to rape you? Do you give me permission to do that? Then again, it wouldn’t really be rape, would it?”

“Please,” she cried, tears flowing down her cheeks now, “please don’t hurt me.”

“Hurt you, hurt you…now that is a good idea. I hadn’t thought of that.” He reached behind him on the counter and took out a kitchen knife from a drawer. He brought it down to her breast and pressed the tip deep enough that it cut the skin. “Should I cut your tits off?”

“Please…please-”

He removed the knife, throwing it behind him without looking as he let out a sigh. “You know, I think you’ve really hit on something with this rape you and hurt you stuff. Maybe we’ll get to that later? For now, I’d like to finish my meal. You would be just shocked as to what swill I’ve been forced to eat these last years and call it food.”

He walked into the living room and she heard her stereo turn on. It was turned to a classical station and he walked back in the kitchen and stopped. His eyes were fixated on a spot on the ceiling. “Anybody else live here?”

“No,” she stammered.

“I disagree.”

He smiled, his eyes refocusing on her, and blew her a kiss. Then he went back to the dining room and sat down, tucking the napkin back into his collar and taking a bite of steak as if she wasn’t there.

Stanton heard the pounding on his door but didn’t move. He hoped that whoever it was would go away. One of the perks of living on the eleventh floor of a secure high-rise was that people couldn’t drop in unannounced. He wondered who it was that had made it past security without having to buzz up.

The knocking got louder and he pulled the covers up over his head, staring at a spot on the sheets, holding his breath and waiting for the next knock. It didn’t come for a long time, but when it did, he took a deep breath and rose to answer the door.

Stephen Gunn stood there with two coffees in his hand.

“What the fuck? It’s like one o’clock. What’re you still doin’ in bed?”

“I just wanted to sleep in today.”

“You been sleepin’ in a lot these past few weeks,” he said, brushing past him and into the apartment. He placed the coffees down on the table. “Brought you some joe.”

“Thanks,” Stanton said, sitting down on the couch.

“Don’t you want it?”

“No, I can’t drink coffee, Stephen. You knew that.”

“Oh, yeah, guess I forgot.” He came and sat down next to him. “Still gettin’ used to the Mormon thing. Weren’t any Mormons in East Brooklyn when I was growin’ up, I can tell you that.” He took a sip of coffee. “So what happened with that arson expert you were gonna bring in?”

“She cancelled because of some emergency. I’m meeting her at the Yazzie’s house tomorrow afternoon.”

“What’s she look like?”

“Why does that matter?”

“Don’t be a fag, come on. What’s she look like?”

“She’s hot.”

“No shit. How hot?”

“Out-of-your-league hot.”

“Pss, you forget who you’re talkin’ too, son.”

Stanton yawned. “She’s too smart for you, Stephen. She wouldn’t be interested.”

“Yeah? And how the hell would you know?”

“Because I know. She wouldn’t be interested.”

“You, my friend, have never seen the attraction a bad boy has over shy nerdy types. I will bet you dinner I can get her to go out with me tonight.”

“She might just do it out of pity. Although I think you’ll be revolting enough to her that she won’t even do that.”

“Bet?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, cool. Now get your ass dressed we got a meetin’.”

“With who?”

“CI. She’s got some info on that homie we found in the dumpster.”

“Michael Cisneros.”

“Whatever. One junkie’s just like the next to me.”

Stanton got up and walked to the bathroom and started the shower. He went to his closet and took out jeans and a button-down shirt with a sports coat. “How’d you hear about this CI?” he shouted as he undressed and stepped into the shower.

“She called me. It was an old one I was usin’ back in Narcs. They called her Super BJ Jones.”

“Why?”

“Seriously?”

“Nevermind.”

“If you want, I could give you two some privacy and you can find out why they called her that.”

“I can do without gonorrhea, thanks.”

“You can’t get gonorrhea from a blow job, man.”

“Of course you can. It can infect the throat and can be passed to the genitals of another person.”

“Well, I’m tellin’ you. It’d be worth it with her. I had a sample back in my Narcs days and Super Blow doesn’t begin to describe it.”