Stephen King - Needful Things

The kitchen door banged open, and Pete’s alarmed voice carried across the yard: “Wilma? Wilma, are you all right?”

Flapping from behind her-a nasty sound, like a chuckle from vocal cords clotted with dirt. In the next yard the Haverhills’ mutt began to bellow hysterically in its high, unpleasant voice-yark! yark! yark!-and this did nothing to improve Wilma’s state of mind.

She got to her feet and saw Pete cautiously descending the back steps.

“Wilma? Did you fall down? Are you okay?”

“Yes!” she shouted furiously. “Yes, I fell down! Yes, I’m okay! Turn on the goddam light!”

“Did you hurt yourself-”

“Just turn on the goddam LIGHT!” she screamed at him, and rubbed a hand across the front of her coat. It came away covered with cold goo. She was now so angry she could see her own pulse as bright points of light before her eyes… and angriest of all at herself, for being scared. Even for a second.

Yark! Yark! Yark!

The goddam mutt in the next yard was going ape. Christ, she hated dogs, especially the mouthy ones.

Pete’s shape retreated to the top of the kitchen steps. The door opened, his hand snaked inside, and then the floodlight came on, bathing the rear yard with bright light.

Wilma looked down at herself and saw a wide swath of dark brown across the front of her new fall coat. She wiped furiously at her face, held out her hand, and saw it had also turned brown. She could feel a slow, syrupy trickle running down the middle of her back.

“Mud!” She was stupefied with disbelief-so much so that she was unaware she had spoken aloud. Who could have done this to her? Who would have dared?

“What did you say, honey?” Pete asked. He had been coming toward her; now he stopped a prudent distance away. Wilma’s face was working in a way Pete jerzyck found extremely alarming: it was as if a nest of baby snakes had hatched just beneath her skin.

“Mud!” she screamed, holding her hands out toward him… at him. Flecks of brown flew from her fingertips. “Mud, I say!

Mud!”

Pete looked past her, finally understanding. His mouth dropped open. Wilma whirled in the direction of his gaze. The floodlight mounted above the kitchen door lit the clotheslines and the garden with merciless clarity, revealing everything that needed to be revealed.

The sheets which she had hung out clean were now drooping from their pins in dispirited, soggy clots. They were not just spattered with mud; they were coated with it, plated with it.

Wilma looked at the garden and saw deep divots where the mud had been scooped out. She saw a beaten track in the grass where the mudslinger had gone back and forth, first loading up, then walking to the lines, then throwing, then going back to reload.

“God damn it!” she screamed.

“Wilma…” come on in the house, honey, and I’ll Pete groped, then looked relieved as an idea actually dawned. “I’ll make us some tea.”

“Fuck the tea!” Wilma howled at the top, the very tippy-top, of her vocal range, and from next door the Haverhills’ mutt went for broke, yarkyarkyark, oh she hated dogs, it was going to drive her crazy, fucking loudmouth dog!

Her rage overflowed and she charged the sheets, clawed at them, began pulling them down. Her fingers caught over the first line and it snapped like a guitar string. The sheets hung from it dropped in a sodden, meaty swoop. Fists clenched, eyes squinched like a child doing a tantrum, Wilma took a single large, froggy leap and landed on top of one. It made a weary flooosh sound and billowed up, splattering gobbets of mud on her nylons. It was the final touch.

She opened her mouth and shrieked her rage. Oh, she would find who had done this. Yes-indeedy-doodad. You better believe it. And when she did-"is everything all right over there, Mrs. jerzyck?” it was Mrs. Haverhill’s voice, wavering with alarm.

“Yes goddammit, we’re drinking Sterno and watching Lawrence Welk, can’t you shut that mutt of yours up?” Wilma screamed.

She backed off the muddy sheet, panting, her hair hanging all around her flushed face. She swiped at it savagely. Fucking dog was going to drive her crazy. Fucking loudmouth doHer thoughts broke off with an almost audible snap.

Dogs.

Fucking loudmouth dogs.

Who lived almost right around the corner from here, on Ford Street?

Correction: What crazy lady with a fucking loudmouth dog named Raider lived right around the corner from here?

Why, Nettle Cobb, that was who.

The dog had barked all spring, those high-pitched puppy yaps that really got under your skin, and finally Wilma had called Nettle and told her that if she couldn’t get her dog to shut up, she ought to get rid of it. A week later, when there had still been no improvement (at least none that Wilma was willing to admit), she had called Nettle again and told her that if she couldn’t keep the dog quiet, she, Wilma, would have to call the police. The next night, when the goddamned mutt started up its yarking and barking once more, she had.

A week or so after that, Nettle had shown up at the market (unlike Wilma, Nettle seemed to be the sort of person who had to turn things over in her mind for awhile brood on them, evenbefore she was able to act). She stood in line at Wilma’s register, although she didn’t have a single solitary item. When her turn came, she had said in a squeaky, breathless little voice: “You stop making trouble for me and my Raider, Wilma jerzyck. He’s a good little doggy, and you just better stop making trouble.”

Wilma, always ready for a fight, had not been in the least disconcerted at being confronted in the workplace. In fact, she rather liked it. “Lady, you don’t know what trouble is. But if you can’t get your damn dog to shut up, you will.”

The Cobb woman had been as pale as milk, but she drew herself up, clutching her purse so tightly that the tendons on her scrawny forearms showed all the way from her wrists to her elbows. She said: “I’m warning you,” then hurried out.

“Oh-oh, I think I just peed my panties!” Wilma had called boisterously after her (a taste of battle always put her in good spirits), but Nettle never turned-only hurried on her way a little faster.

After that, the dog had quieted down. This had rather disappointed Wilma, because it had been a boring spring. Pete was showing no signs of rebellion, and Wilma had been feeling an endof-winter dullness that the new green in the trees and grass couldn’t seem to touch. What she really needed to add color and spice to her life was a good feud. For awhile it had seemed that crazy Nettle Cobb would fill the bill admirably, but with the dog minding its manners, it seemed to Wilma that she would have to look elsewhere for diversion.

Then one night in May the dog had started barking again. The mutt had only gone on for awhile, but Wilma hurried to the telephone and called Nettle anyway-she had marked the number in the book just in case such an occasion offered.

She did not waste time on the niceties but got right to the point.

“This is Wilma jerzyck, dear. I called to tell you that if you don’t shut that dog up, I’ll shut him up myself.”

“He’s already stopped!” Nettle had cried. “I brought him in as soon as I got home and heard him! You just leave me and Raider alone!

I warned you! If you don’t, you’ll be sorry!”

“Just remember what I said,” Wilma told her. “I’ve had enough.

The next time he starts up that ruckus, I won’t bother complaining to the cops. I’ll come over and cut his goddam throat.”

She had hung up before Nettle could reply. The cardinal rule governing engagements with the enemy (relatives, neighbors, spouses) was that the aggressor must have the last word.

The dog hadn’t popped off since then. Well, maybe it had, but Wilma hadn’t noticed it if so; it had never been that bothersome in the first place, not really, and besides, Wilma had inaugurated a more productive wrangle with the woman who ran the beauty parlor in Castle View. Wilma had almost forgotten Nettle and Raider.