Paul Cleave - The Killing Hour

He tugs at the edge of the duct tape, but it’s fastened down, and he wishes he had put some padding beneath it first because now the wound will smile open when he pulls the tape away. He squeezes his hands across his ears. Never in his life has he suffered from headaches, not until Monday. Feldman will have to pay. He’s going to pay in more ways than one.

Cyris pushes himself up from the bath and moves down the hallway. He wonders how Macy would react if he were to take her into the basement and show her his investment. He wonders how both women would react. Of course Macy would forget all about it after a little while. He reaches the doorway to the basement. He’s light-headed and the walls and the door are spinning in time with his mind, but in the opposite direction. He reaches out and balances himself. The room starts to spin faster. He holds his breath and the need to vomit slowly fades.

He thinks of Charlie. He thinks of Charlie plunging the knife into him, and at the same time the pain in his stomach flares up as though the knife is back in there, twisting around and around. He doubles over and collapses to his knees. No amount of money is worth this. When he gets back to his feet he unlocks the basement door and heads downstairs. The woman looks up at him and he can see she’s been crying. He hates it when women cry. It’s their way of making men feel guilty. It’s a weapon they use to make men feel like crap. Macy never did that to him. Macy was an army chick. She was tough.

He hates Charlie Feldman for being such an asshole.

He hates the world for being the way it is.

From the bench nearby he picks up a knife and moves toward Feldman’s wife.

I stare at the phone, looking to take back the words I just said to Cyris, wanting to reach through the dead air and pull them back, but they’re no longer mine, they’re his, and he’s going to do with them what he wants to. That’s the thing about Cyris. He’s all about setting the rules.

The car windows are slightly fogged over from my heavy breathing. It feels like fifty degrees in here and the air tastes stale. I wipe a hand over the glass, smudging a path through the moisture and creating a gateway to the outside. Kathy and Luciana are standing only a few yards from my door. I stare at them, waiting for Jo to appear, but she doesn’t, and perhaps she won’t until I know for a fact that my words have killed her.

I squeeze my eyes shut, hold them closed for a few seconds to give the two girls a chance to disappear, and when I open them back up and see them still there I start to doubt that they’re only in my mind. They look happier since I saw them last, as if somehow at peace. My skin tingles as my arms break out in goose bumps. A cold chill blasts its way down the back of my neck as if the air-conditioning in the Holden has just been cranked to some mystery arctic setting. I try to open the door, but my arms won’t move. I can barely breathe. The world sways and I can hardly stay conscious.

Kathy is wearing a long, white dress, shoulderless, the material thin and whispery. Luciana is wearing a summer dress covered in small, red roses and yellow daffodils. She’s wearing a hat too. She looks tanned. None of these clothes I saw them wearing, so why would I see them dressed like this now? They’re holding hands as they stand there smiling at me. I get my arms moving jerkily and manage to roll down the window. Their mouths open and close, but I can’t hear what they’re saying. Kathy takes a step forward. Her hair is blowing in some invisible breeze. Luciana follows. My eyes are starting to sting, but I’m too frightened to blink, too frightened that in that split second they will disappear. Something is going on here that can’t be controlled by either my imagination or my conscience.

That’s when Jo appears. She fades into view, like somebody sneaking out of the shadows. She’s wearing the same dress she wore on our first date. She offers a sad smile, the kind of sympathetic smile you have when you’ve just found out one of your friends has been hurt by bad news.

“Jo,” I say, and seeing her is confirmation that I fucked up, that my words have killed her.

“It’s okay, Charlie,” she says.

I tell her I’m sorry. I try the door handle and just then the phone rings. I glance at it. In that instant Kathy is gone, Luciana has gone with her, they’ve taken Jo, and I’m alone in my car looking back at an empty street. My window is still rolled up, the smear mark on the glass from my hand is still clear. My face is covered in a film of sweat and the lump on my forehead is throbbing. As I scramble for the phone it slips in my fingers and bounces off the passenger seat onto the floor. I reach down, grab it, and open it while I’m still hunched over the gearshift.

“Cyris?”

“Charlie, it’s me.”

“Jo!” I say, and hearing her voice serves not only to make me feel relieved she is still alive, but also proves the ghosts are not ghosts at all.

“I’m okay, Charlie.”

Thank God. Thank you, God. “Has he hurt you?”

“I’m okay. He wants me to tell you he’ll see you tomorrow night.”

“I know.”

“He says don’t try anything, Charlie.”

“I won’t.”

“He’ll let us go.”

“You don’t believe that, do you?”

She hesitates, and then, “I have to go. Be careful, Charlie. Promise me that.”

“Jo,” I say, but I’m already talking into a broken connection.

Jo is alive and so is my hope. I will either die in hope or live in despair. I drop the phone onto the seat and get back to the very business I came here to do, which is waiting. Waiting to see what Kathy’s husband does.

Cyris told me he was busy tonight. I know from experience he’s been busy the last few nights so I’m thinking if there’s a payoff to take place there’s a chance it’s tonight.

I stare out the window as the minutes pass. The night gets darker. The number of people walking by thins out and then there are none. Lights are turned on as people settle in for the evening. An hour passes. Two hours. I’m starting to need a bathroom. Lights start to turn off. People are going to bed. I have nothing to do but run my theory over and over in my head. The problem is it looks bad. Looks worse every time I glance at my watch and see another block of time has gone by. I was wrong to think the payment would be tonight and the passing minutes prove this to me. Wrong to think the husband is involved.

Wrong about everything.

I reach toward the ignition. I’m going to have to pay Cyris and hope for the best. Resort to Plan B, which I’m still working on. I hear a car start before I start my own. I let go of the keys and lean forward. Could this be it? I wait and watch as the Mercedes reverses down the driveway and onto the street. Frank. Frank the cheating husband. The car straightens and heads away from me.

I start the Holden and begin following. I don’t turn my headlights on. When he turns the corner I keep fifty yards behind him. The full moon and streetlights provide more than enough light to drive by, turning the roads pale blue except for the road markings, which glow white. Stars twinkle in the sky, their light coming from millions of miles away and centuries ago. I wonder if people like Cyris lived on those long-lost worlds. A few people coming toward me flash their lights, but Frank the cheating husband can’t see that, not from fifty yards ahead. Before I take the next corner, I turn on my lights.

The theory I’ve been playing with is once again starting to look good. I wonder how much money exchanged hands to end two women’s lives. In a fair world I should be getting a cut of those funds. Was money the motive? I’ve seen Frank’s house. I’ve seen his car. He was cheating on his wife. He wanted a divorce and didn’t want to give her half of everything. Instead he took everything she ever had.