Percival Everett - Damned If I Do

Sincerely,

R.H.R

P.S. — I don’t care what you or anyone else thinks, I am NOT a “troublemaker” and want a peaceful home just as you no doubt do. I DO try to be alert, however, because there have been several burglaries in the 27 years Claudia has been here and the 16 years that I have been here. And of course the Osco drugstore was broken into again last week.

Randall folded the letter and sealed it in an envelope. He waved it in the air in front of his wife’s face as if to say, “This should take care of it.”

“It’s not such a big deal, Randall,” Claudia said.

“What if I were breaking the rule?” Randall asked. “What if it was me? You think it would just be let go? No, it wouldn’t.” He sat down at the kitchen table and scratched at a chip in the Formica. “No, it wouldn’t and I’ll tell you why. It’s because she’s a young woman and Pluckett’s a dirty old man.”

Claudia slapped a skillet onto a burner of the gas stove. She laughed.

“Shut up.”

“I bet old Pluckett is down there right now having a little party with Miss Diehl.” She melted butter in the pan while she opened the refrigerator.

“I only want one egg this morning,” Randall said.

“Bacon or sausage?”

“Sausage.”

“We’re out of sausage,” Claudia said.

“Then why did you ask me?”

She put the bacon on the counter next to the carton of eggs. “I wanted to give you a choice.”

“But I didn’t have a choice.”

“You chose, didn’t you? You just made the wrong choice.” She cracked an egg into the hot skillet. It sizzled.

“Well, I don’t want bacon,” Randall said.

“Then I won’t make you any.”

He looked at her in her lavender robe and cream-colored slippers. She was dressed in street clothes, but still she wore that robe over them and those slippers. He hated the way the heels of her feet looked, hard and callused, white, porous.

“Do you want toast?”

“Is there any bread?”

“Yes.”

“Then, yes, I want toast.”

Claudia flipped one of the eggs. “I broke your yolk,” she told him. She lit a cigarette and put the lighter back down on the sill above the sink.

“I want to put plastic runners down over the carpet in the front room,” Claudia said.

“Plastic runners?”

“To protect the carpet from wear.”

Randall laughed. “Wear? Oh, yeah, from all the visitors we get.”

Claudia fell silent as she slid the eggs onto the plates. She pulled the bread from the toaster and put breakfast in front of Randall. She sat with him at the table.

Randall buttered his toast. “This neighborhood is going to hell.”

Claudia tore her toast and dipped a corner of it into the yolk of her egg.

“Gangs and drugs,” Randall said. “Punks.” He watched Claudia eat for a while. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing’s wrong with me.”

“Something’s wrong,” he said.

“I’ll tell you what’s wrong. I don’t have anybody to talk to. That’s what’s wrong.”

“Here we go again,” Randall sighed it out. “I’m talking to you right now.”

Claudia continued to eat.

Randall put his fork down. “Listen, I’m going out to get my medicine. Is there any money in the house?”

Claudia looked up at him. “In my purse.”

“What?”

“There’s some money in my purse,” she repeated.

Randall went into the front room and grabbed Claudia’s pocketbook from the buffet. He brought it back to the doorway of the kitchen and found the money in it. “Do you need anything while I’m out?”

“No.”

“I’m not going out again, so tell me now if you need anything.”

“I don’t need anything.”

“Okay, but I asked. You can’t tell me I didn’t ask.”

Randall walked out, pulling the door closed behind him. He went down one flight of stairs and stood at number 41. He slipped the note under the door of Holly Diehl’s apartment. At that moment the door opened and there was Holly Diehl, a small woman with short blond hair and she was looking at Randall.

“Just delivering a note to you,” Randall said.

Holly Diehl bent and picked it up, looked at the envelope.

Randall realized that he had not put her name on it.

“How do you know it’s for me?” she asked.

“It’s for you,” he said and he turned away and started walking toward the stairs.

“Is this from you?” Holly Diehl asked.

But Randall was gone. He walked down the stairs and out onto Wayland Avenue. The cold wind blew open his jacket and he pulled it closed, zipped it as he walked. He looked in through the window of the Oriental rug store where none of the salesmen spoke English, at least pretended not to speak English. Randall had gone in when the shop first opened, but when he figured out how much they were trying to tell him a rug sold for he got mad. He turned his gaze away when one of the mustached salesmen waved to him.

A blast of heat pushed through Randall when he entered the Osco drugstore and made him too hot. He unzipped his jacket and let out a breath.

“Morning, Mr. Randall,” the young clerk, Susie, said. She was setting up a display of blank videotapes.

“Hi, Susie,” Randall said. He liked her, liked to look at the way her makeup curved up at the corners of her eyes. He had always thought that Claudia would look good like that, but had never said anything, knew she would take it the wrong way. Claudia could try something, he thought, more makeup or wear her hair differently. She didn’t even try. All she ever did was complain about her knee. Susie always smiled at him, so he knew he was still an attractive man.

At the back of the store, the druggist, a fat man named Willy, was in his booth. Randall hated looking up at the an. He didn’t like Willy, was sure that the man was cheating him somehow, maybe putting less medicine in each capsule.

“How’s the pressure?” Willy asked.

“Under control,” Randall said. “How’s yours?”

“Oh, I don’t have a problem. I watch my diet and walk to work.”

Randall nodded as Willy turned away to collect his medicine. “Sure you do, you fat bastard,” he said under his breath.

“Excuse me?” Willy said.

“Nothing.”

“Oh, I thought you said something.” Willy reached through the window and handed down the vial of pills in a small white bag. “There you go.”

“Thanks.”

“You ought to get some exercise,” Willy said. “Gotta stay in shape just to run from the thugs in this neighborhood nowadays.”

“You can’t outrun them bastards,” Randall chuckled.

“Don’t need to. Not now.”

Randall nodded and walked away down the aisle of foot-care items. He remembered once when he had athlete’s foot and how good that spray had felt. It was funny he had thought then, and thought now, that his feet didn’t usually feel good, bad, or otherwise. It was something when that spray had felt good. He met Susie at the checkout.

“Is that it?” Susie asked.

“That’s it.” Randall looked at her eyes. “I like your eyes,” he said. “The way you paint them.” He had never mentioned them to her before. “How’s school?”

“Stopped going.”

“Oh. Are you still going out with that guy? That cook guy?” Randall remembered his white clothes from when he would pick up Susie from the drugstore.

“No. He thought he was hot stuff because he was going to Johnson and Wales.”

“Oh.”

“I’m trying to get a job as a cosmetician,” Susie said.

“You’ll be good at it. You always look really pretty.” He paused, watching her nails on the register keys. “I hope you don’t mind me saying that.”

“No, I don’t. Thank you, Mr. Randall. That will be twelve forty-seven.”