The Subtle Art of Brutality

“Grew him up? He Bean’s kid?”

“Might as well been, way I heard it. Don’t really know the details of that shit, I got eyes other directions.”

The gun hesitated. “Is he still in Barefield?”

“Gangsta...please, the Judge don’t run his schedule through me. I got no clue about when exactly.”

A tired sigh. “Yeah, wrong answer, Gracie.”

Back to TOC

Here’s a sample from JB Kohl and Eric Beetner’s Over Their Heads.

1

CLYDE

If Madeline didn’t go into labor we’d be eating steak tonight. In a restaurant. Because I would have enough cash to take her out for a change. I’d have money for dinner and clothes and a vacation and enough left over for the baby’s college and graduate school—anything else our kid could want.

I rummaged through my sock drawer for a pair that matched. A wife at nine-and-a-half-months pregnant didn’t feel the best. In the past Madeline had been meticulous about organizing my sock drawer, folding and pairing them in neat rows. Those days were gone now, along with the days of creased khakis and starched shirts. My kind and beautiful wife had changed to someone pasty, swollen, and, yeah I’m gonna say it . . . bitchy.

For now, at least, she was asleep, hand resting over her protruding belly, mouth slightly open. In these moments, before she woke up and started to cry over her swollen ankles and nag me about the long hours I spent at the rental lot, before she opened her mouth and swore at me and the dick that happens to reside between my legs, which was clearly responsible for getting her in this predicament in the first place, marriage vows or no . . . in these moments when it was just me digging in my sock drawer for a mate to the only one I could find, when I picked up my khakis from the floor and shook out yesterday’s wrinkles . . . I would watch her sleep and she was just my wife, the woman I fell in love with.

I saw this movie once. It was one of those chick flicks I took her to on our last anniversary. Normally I don’t go in for that sort of thing, but it was our anniversary and that’s a time she tends to get sentimental and I’m almost always guaranteed sex. So I figure on those nights the least I can do is take her to a movie she wants to see, even if I have zero interest in it. I don’t even remember what the movie was about. Well, it was about a couple, that’s for sure, but the thing I remember is that the woman was pregnant. I mean hugely pregnant. And in one scene, the guy in that film bends over his just-about-to-pop pregnant wife and kisses her stomach. When that happened on the screen, next to me, in the theater, Madeline sighed and put her hand over her heart, and her breath hitched just the tiniest bit like it does when she is just about to cry or like when she watches those dog food commercials. That scene really got to her. I always remembered that moment, the moment in that movie when Madeline was moved by something so simple. We didn’t know it at the time, but she was already seven weeks pregnant and when we found out a week later and realized it was really, really real, I remembered that scene and played it out a hundred times in my head. I knew there would come a time when I’d lean over her and kiss her belly because it would make her happy. And, I don’t know, I guess I imagined myself whispering something profound and kind to her. So I had been biding my time, waiting until she was tired and heavy and hating being pregnant, because all the books told me that was exactly how it was going to be. I wanted it to be perfect. I guess the time never seemed perfect.

Because today I watched her with my socks in my hand, and just felt . . . tired. So I turned and walked out. I tiptoed so she wouldn’t wake up and I shut the door behind me as quietly as I could. Hollywood and that damn movie could kiss my ass. And so could the goddamn actress with the rail thin legs and a belly with no stretch marks. Madeline was a real woman. Despite it all, despite being Misery’s Deity at the moment, she was a real woman, the mother of my child. She was mine. And while this filled me with pride and gratitude, mostly these days I was filled with fear.

I toed through

the pile of shoes at the front door, settling on a pair of bland loafers, and mentally ran over the day’s plans in my head.

ONE: Get to work, open the rental lot. If I was honest, this was my favorite part of every day. I liked the lot. It was mine. I had named it after myself, hadn’t I? Clyde McDowd Rentals was, in a way, my first kid. And now, after marriage and with a real, actual kid on the way, it was the one thing that was entirely mine. It was clean, organized, filled with files and the smell of the pink cleaning solution the janitor used late at night. It was white tile floor and fluorescent lights. It was the roar of airplanes taking off and landing at Richmond International. It was business men and families. And somewhere along the way, it started to bring in a lot more money than it should have. Which is why I really, really needed to be at work on time today.

I looked down at the scuffed loafer I had pulled from the pile of shoes. How could one couple own so many shoes? Even my shoes were something Madeline picked out for me. The house. The carpet. The paint. The towels in the bathroom. But Clyde McDowd Rentals? Not so, baby. Not so. I drifted into the kitchen and sank into one of the rickety wooden chairs at our vintage table and pulled on a sock.

TWO: Check to make sure the Chevy Tahoe was ready to go. The ceiling seams needed to be perfect, the packets had to be laying right, behind a soft, thin layer of sponge. I always put a pack of Winstons in the glove compartment for the driver. Never hurts to kiss a little ass, just in case. I froze with the sock halfway on. Shit. I forgot the Winstons.

THREE: Stop and pick up Winstons.

The mattress in the bedroom groaned as Madeline pushed herself up. The giantess hath awakened, I thought, not unkindly. Hell, if Madeline had been her normal, petite, good-humored self, she would have laughed too. And some day, I was sure I’d tell her my vision of her at nine months pregnant—an angry, towering woman crushing all in her path, and she would laugh and punch me in the arm and say she loved me.

I’d tell her about all of this one day and not just how grouchy she was. I’d tell her about everything I’d done for her, about everything I sacrificed, the risks I took, the plans I made for us, for our family.

Today was not going to be that day.

Today I shoved my feet in my shoes and popped a piece of bread in the toaster. I heard her approach from the other room and pasted a smile on my face. She opened the door and shuffled into the kitchen, her legs swollen, beautiful dark hair cascading down her back. My smile became a real one. No matter what, it was easy to love Madeline. All of it for you, I thought. “Want coffee?” I asked.

She didn’t answer but reached to the cupboard above the coffee pot, stomach resting on the counter, hands fumbling for filters and coffee beans. “Let me do that,” I said. “You sit down. Put your feet up.”

“It won’t help,” she said. “Nothing does. I’m a house.” She turned to look at me and I caught a glimpse of the clock on the stove at the same time I caught the look on her face. 7:45 on the clock. Worry on her face. Car lot opened at 8:00. I had been told to expect the driver any time after 8:10.

Christ on a cracker.

“You’re not a house,” I said, moving to hug her. She allowed the touch and rested her head on my shoulder. Her hair smelled like that really good shampoo she uses. 7:46.

FOUR: Move Chevy Tahoe to the back part of the lot under the maple that tended to shit sap on cars all day long. No one ever wanted to drive a sap-speckled car. It was another reason I put the Winstons in the glove box.

Madeline lifted her head from my shoulder and tried to smile. Then she burst into tears. I walked her to the table and sat her down. 7:47.