Peeling back the plastic curtain, ten people—five women and five men—all stood naked as they cut up the white powder. Coke was on one side and was meth on the other. Everyone wore surgical masks to cover their faces…after all, we couldn’t have them getting high on the job.
“Well isn’t this a surpr—” Sadly before he could even get finish his sentence, Mel shot him right in the kneecap, causing all of the idiots to scream and jump back.
“Surprise? Yes, I know,” Mel smiled.
Sighing, I turned to our staff.
I guess one us had to be the mature one.
“If you would like to live, I suggest you get back to work. This part does not concern you, and please remember, we chose you all because we know you. We know where you work, where you live, how many goddamn times you take a piss,” I called out, as I waited for them to get under control. “Thank you all so much for your cooperation as we deal with a transition in personnel.”
And on cue Mel shot him through the wrist.
Damn she was good shot.
“Roy. Roy. Roy. You stupid little man. I really thought you understood me the first time we met.” She sighed, walking closer to him as I looked over the product and pull out the prepared test tube from my jacket.
“I didn’t do anything!”
“Lying to a woman with gun? I thought you said he was smart, wife,” I called out to her, not bothering to turn around from what I was doing at the table in front of me.
“See what you did? Now my husband thinks I can’t judge a person’s character—”
“Okay! Okay! Okay! Please don’t shoot. My daughter got sick. I didn't have any choice, neither of you were around—”
“So you’re saying it’s our fault you stole from us?”
Oh he was surely an idiot.
“It was only a couple hundred. Swear I will pay you back double…no triple. Anything you want…”
Staring at the tube, I waited for the liquid to turn blue. That’s how we tested if was pure or not…It turn yellow instead. The weakest form. Someone had added shit to our fucking product goddamn it. The moron.
I turned back, I held up the test tube, telling her to kill him with my eyes. I stared as she put her gun away shaking her head at me.
What do you mean no?
“Fine. We need to discuss certain things, and by the time we come back, you’d better have an explanation. A bloody good one,” she stated.
Walking past the blood soaked floor, we stepped beyond the plastic curtains. She didn’t pause to explain, instead she kept walking until we reached another door.
“My father used to say ‘an apology isn’t an apology until you get a gift,’” she said as she opened it for me.
There sat our favorite police officer with two women; all of them were strapped down to their chairs, covered in their own urine, and coughing against the duct tape that covered their mouths.
“Oh, you are too kind,” I whispered to her, as I resisted the urge to thank her more thoroughly.
As she handed me my brass knuckles, all our favorite officer could do was stare at us helplessly.
It was my turn to be a little immature.
ELEVEN
“If someone puts their hands on you, make sure they never put their hands on anybody else again.”
—Malcolm X
LIAM
Pulling up a seat in front of my old friend Scoot, I leaned back before I turned to my darling wife who stood against the brick wall to my right. I noticed a red gallon tank of what I hoped was gasoline sitting beside her. She grinned and it was as though she could see into my mind.
“I know who this fucker is,” I said, as I rested my foot on his hand, which was taped to his thigh. One of the greatest gifts given to man had to be duct tape. “But I am not acquainted with these lovely women.”
“Meet Lacey, Scooter’s wife.” My own wife pointed to the woman on the left with dusty blonde hair. “And to the right is Shelby, Scooter’s prostitute. How he had so much time on his hands is beyond me.”
“Which one do you think he loves more?” I asked as I tilted my head to the right to stare at the brunette. They both seemed simple enough to me.
“I couldn’t figure it out,” Mel sighed dramatically, as she pushed off the wall and walked behind the blonde. The woman’s tears rolled past her taped mouth and dripped off her chin. “His wife has the house and he always comes home to her. She was his high school sweetheart. Right Scooter?”
Mel pulled his head back roughly before letting go, and he didn’t struggle or speak. Instead he sat there with his head hanging so low that he tipped forward. Had it not been for the tape, he would’ve fallen to the floor.
He was broken on the inside.
If only he hadn’t pissed the hell out of me, that would’ve almost been enough. But it wasn’t. I wanted him broken on the inside and destroyed on the out.
“Yet, he’s put up the prostitute in his old childhood apartment, she also has a stake in his will.”
Scoot’s wife’s head snapped over to him as her eyes went wide.
“So, it’s hard for me to say who’s number one, I thought I’d let you figure it out,” Mel whispered as she moved over to me.
With a sigh, I look to them both. “What did King Solomon do when he wished to find who was the true mother of the baby?”
“You want to cut them in half.” She gasped in mock horror. “So messy.”
“You’re right, but the suspense is killing me.” I dropped the brass knuckles as I pulled a razor tooth knife from my boot. Cutting the tape from his mouth, I held the blade to his nose and said, “You’re going to tell me who you love more, or I will start cutting off their fingers.”
He didn’t speak, he didn’t even look as though he were breathing.
Sighing once more, I moved over to his mistress and ran the blade over her thumb. Her breathing became rapid and her tears fell faster.
“You know what separates man from beast?” I asked her as she closed her eyes. “Our thumbs.”
I slammed the blade down and started sawing off her thumb. She wailed so loudly that her body began to shake. Scooter watched the entire time, as tears fell from his face.
“Who do you love more?” I asked him again, as I wiped the blood on his jeans and walked towards his wife.
“I…I…”
“Too slow.”
Holding the hilt of the blade, I drove it into her ring finger. She screamed as loud as her reluctant competitor, but the truth of the matter was that those kinds of wails no longer fazed me. Grabbing her dismembered finger, I held it in front of his face and tilted it ring-side down, he watched as the ring he’d given her dropped to the ground and nestled itself into the pool of her blood.
How poetic.
“Eighteen fingers left between them both. I’ve got nothing but time, and this is a very sharp blade, Scooter. Just pick one. I promise I won’t kill her.”
He swallowed and his head turned to his wife, then to me, and then back to his wife again. It seemed that he’d lost the ability to speak.
With a sigh, I moved to another one of Lacey’s fingers. “I’m so sorry, Lacey.”
Moving to her thumb, I paused, and looked at Scooter who only stared back at me. This time I didn’t look away from his eyes as I once more pressed the knife into her other thumb. She screamed over and over again.