Five Uneasy Pieces

“What you should’ve done,” Jenny’s sister held up a didactic finger, “is not make her feel like a freak because she was a lesbian.”

“I never ... I didn’t ...” he sputtered.

“Now, now, Doc-tor Fein,” she said with exaggerated formality. “You did. You made it pretty clear that you didn’t approve of her sexual orientation. From what she told me, you didn’t take her very seriously as a person at all. Like you don’t take women seriously at all.”

“No, no!” Dr. Fein’s protests grew louder, and he could feel his face redden. “That’s not true.”

“Oh, but it is. In fact,” she continued, her voice getting louder as she spoke. “You went so far as to suggest her lesbianism might be the cause of her depression and other problems.”

“I just ... thought it was a shame.” He hung his head. “She was so beautiful. Like you.”

The woman frowned, and a deep line formed between her eyebrows. “Nice try, doc, but no dice. No one here is buying. Especially her lover.”

“C’mon over, sis,” the shorter man said with a wicked grin to someone Dr. Fein couldn’t see. “Say hello.”

“Her lover ...” Dr. Fein’s voice was faint.

He heard the click of the gun being cocked before he felt the barrel against his right temple. “That’s right, Dr. Fein. I was Jenny’s lover.”

The voice was unusually cool and steely, but he knew it all too well. Dr. Fein glanced toward the woman who had quietly taken her place beside him. “You can’t be serious,” he rasped, feeling ready to vomit again.

“I’d say it’s only fair. An eye for an eye. A life for a life. You understand.”

“Please ...” he whispered. “Don’t.”

“Plus a little monetary compensation from you—like an informal wrongful death settlement.”

“I ... don’t believe it,” he mumbled.

“I know you don’t, Dr. Fein,” she said in a mocking tone. “You simply couldn’t imagine it, could you? That you might be dealing with a woman who thinks. But you’re a believer now, aren’t you, Dr. Fein? Aren’t you?”

Lila gave him a cold smile before she pulled the trigger. And in the moment before the bullet hit his brain, Dr. Morris Fein’s head was filled with the sound of Sarah’s voice, berating him once again.

THE PEOPLE NEXT DOOR

It started with that weird pounding.

I live in an apartment, you see. The walls are so thin, you can almost hear your neighbor’s thoughts. Well, almost ...

That’s the nice thing about thoughts. You don’t have to share them. Even if you do live in a cramped apartment.

I couldn’t help but be concerned when I began to hear banging from the apartment next door. Plus, I could swear I heard the whine of power tools.

Gerald, as usual, had an opinion. He ridiculed me.

“Ridicule all you like, Gerald,” I said. “Your words can no longer hurt me. And neither can you.”

My husband can be rather annoying sometimes. (And more annoying other times.) He tells me I’m too high-strung and worry too much. Perhaps.

But those peculiar noises got on my nerves a bit. And made me wonder what the people next door were up to.

Gerald said they were probably hanging pictures or putting up a bookshelf. Well, maybe they were. But, I had to wonder, could they be doing something worse?

I mean, how many people use a power saw to hang a picture, anyway?

Gerald dismissed my concerns (and urged me to “chill out and smoke a bowl,” which I did). Undaunted, I was determined to find out what was going on.

After a while, the noises subsided. Over the next few days I noticed that Mrs. Simon, a short, middle-aged mouse, was no longer coming and going from the apartment. Yet I kept bumping into Mr. Simon.