Occasionally I write a short story. This is one of them.
He Came At Her With
An Axe
Michigan, 1989
He came at her with an axe, so she shot him dead.
That was an hour ago. Now she sat on the kitchen floor, as far away
from his body as she could position herself, and watched his corpse
and wondered what to do next. The panic had subsided, the trembling
had ceased. Now she was becoming methodical.
The gun had immediately been dropped in the empty sink. It had been
the first time she had fired the damn thing. It had been loud – so
damn loud – but there hadn't been as much blood as she's thought.
Lot of spray on the walls, yes, but nothing that couldn't be wiped
away. She'd clean soon, although she now realised that she should
have done it straight away because blood was tough to shift when it
dried. 'Coca-Cola works', Mom had told her once, but she didn't drink
Coke. It tasted like robot piss.
She'd been quick to mop up what had pooled around his body.
Fistfuls of kitchen paper towels, thick and glistening with red,
were clumped together in a bucket by his body. A blood-stained pair
of Marigolds hung over the tap. He'd stopped leaking now. She'd have
to bleach the floor later and she hated the smell of bleach.
Could she go to the police? Would they believe her? Perhaps. Most of
it would be truth. It had been self-defence. It had. She had invited
him round. He'd had the axe hidden in the coat folded over his arm,
and the bastard had only revealed it when the latch had clicked
behind him and he was in the living room and being offered a drink.
All that was true. Yes. Yeah she could tell them that. The living
room would corroborate that. Now that the door had been hacked off
its hinges she could see straight through to the splintered coffee
table, and the stuffing and springs popping out of the couch. He'd
swung wildly to scare her at first, reciting the Lord's Prayer as he
smashed into the china hutch and the TV and the stereo. Fucking
weirdo. The Lord's Prayer? She could tell the cops that too.
Religious nutjob. She'd emphasise nutjob – 'Nut. Job' - and then be
sure to point to the crucifix tangled round his neck. The first time
she'd seen it was when she'd been clearing him up.
The gun. No. The gun. She couldn't account for the gun. They would
charge her for possession and she'd be taken in. There'd be photos
and statements and CCTV. No, she couldn't do that. She couldn't go to
prison. She'd only bought the damn thing for this kind of home
invasion shit that Patsy had told her about. She never thought she'd
have to use it. Why would Patsy have one? No one would invade fucking
Patsy and her cats. Now she could see the shell casing lying just under the
refrigerator. Oh thanks, Patsy.
No, she couldn't go the cops. There was a bucket of his soaked-up
blood lying next to him and that wouldn't look good. She'd have to
move him.
Shit.
He was a tall guy and he looked heavy, and he would leak while she
dragged him. More bleach. Where could she put him? The spare room?
No. But...the chest freezer in the basement was big enough for him.
She might have to snap some parts of him, but yeah...yeah he would
fit. She had a good hammer. He'd break up easy. She'd bag all the
food and put it in the garbage and then she'd wrap him in trash bags
and drag him downstairs and break him up. She'd throw the gun under
him too. She wished she'd never listened to Patsy. Fucking Patsy.
Jeez, but he looked heavy. She didn't know why she'd said yes to him
in the first place. She wouldn't want that lurching up and down on
her. But he'd been so charming, with his 'watching you for months,
been dying to introduce myself' shit. Bastard. She should've read the
signs. Mom had taught her how to spot the predators, but this flash
prick with his coffee and his beard and his mountaineering stories
and his hidden crucifix...he'd slipped under her sights. Well, fuck
him and his 'art in Heaven' and his fucking carabiners. His axe was
still under his hand. It looked like the kind of thing you stabbed at
mountains. She'd use that to fit him in the freezer, better than a
hammer, and then toss it in with him. Mountain fucker.
Now here was a list of things to do and she was happy. She realised
how hungry she was. The dinner she had made for the two of them had
burned and congealed in its pan on the stove. It smelled terrible and
it still didn't cover up the smell of the blood. Hunger pulled at her
stomach. Hunger like she had resisted for years now. She had been so
good for so many years, but now that rich metallic stink was in her
nostrils and she could feel her heart beating faster and faster...
She crawled forward and pulled the bucket of blood and kitchen paper
close. She sat back and pushed her hand in – it all still felt so
surprisingly soft and warm - and pulled out a hunk. It glistened in
the kitchen lights. She held it there in her hands, feeling the wet
and weight of it. Then slowly, gently, she pushed her lips against it
and began to suck out the red. And when that wasn't enough she
stuffed the kitchen towels in her mouth and ate them, blood and paper
running down her throat as a pink mash. The endorphin rush hit her
and she felt her fangs break through. Saliva dribbled down her chin.
Her upper lip curved over her sharp new teeth in pleasure. She'd
missed this. Oh sweet relief! She had been so good for so long and
she had missed this. Fuck, it tasted good. It had been years and it
tasted so fucking good. Her hands plunged into the bucket.
