“Oh, I’m not going to regret a thing.” Then she bent over and stabbed the blade as hard as she could into his front left tire. The whistle the air made coming out was impressive. It reminded me of the bottle rockets we shot off every summer by the lake.
“Ho-ly…” I trailed off and blew out a bomb-whistle. This girl was unreal. “My dad always said you and Sophie would charge hell with a bucket of ice water.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
I might’ve tried to take the knife from her, to save her from herself, if I was confident she wouldn’t come after me. I wasn’t. At all. The craziness permeating from her was something that I’d never seen before and, quite frankly, I hoped I never saw again. Was it impressive? Absolutely. Hardcore? Undoubtedly. But this wasn’t Clem, and the amount of hurt she must be going through to pull something like this out of her hat was unprecedented.
Once that tire was completely flat, she yanked the knife out, walked to the next tire, and shanked that one too.
Billy shot out the door in his tighty-whities and the whitebutton-down shirt he’d worn to the funeral. His eyes flicked to me and then ricocheted, looking for Clem but she was on the other side of the truck, kneeling. “Baby, come on, let’s talk about it. I messed up, okay?” His calling her baby made my fists curl and my chest tighten.
He saw the flat tires and ran around the front bumper. I headed around the back to protect Clem if she needed it.
“Are you crazy?” he screamed.
Hate burned out of her eyes. “What did you say?”
He backpedaled. “I’m just kidding. You know I didn’t mean that.”
“Oh, no. I am crazy.” She sliced a five-inch gash into the first dually tire on that side. “But you don’t get to call me that.” She wiggled the knife free, ready for the next one.
“Lem!” He yelled and ran toward her.
I stepped in front of him. He dodged and tried a shake and bake to get around me. I stepped out and cut him off. He slipped, scraping his knees on the gravel. A string of curse words came out of his mouth that would’ve put a sailor to shame. He got up, gripping his thinning blond hair, gravel sticking out of his knees, and blood dripping down his shins.
Once that tire was completely flat, she walked to the last tire and sliced a five-inch gash into that one as well.
“I hate this truck,” she said to me while she waited for it to deflate. “He ordered it three months in advance, custom made, and never told me. Just pulled into the yard one day, saddling us with eighty thousand dollars in debt, and never once asked what I thought about it. There went the home renovations.”
I guess now that all the tires were ruined, Billy didn’t see the need to placate Clem. That was a mistake.
“Do you have any idea how much new tires will cost us?” he screamed again.
She waved the knife at him. “You,buddy. How much new tires will costyou."
“You always did have a temper to match your hair. You are freaking crazy!” If I hadn’t known he was stupid before, I knew it then.
She shoved the knife right in his face. “Don’t you ever say that to me again!”
If she killed him, would I be considered an accomplice?
“Clem,” I said in a warning tone, trying to get her to back down. At least a little.
“Don’t worry, Silas,” she said, never looking away from Billy. “I have never felt more clarity in my life.” She waved the knife haphazardly until she had him backed up against the barn. Billy shrank down, sweat beading along his receding hairline.
“You’re the one who’s lost their mind,” she hissed. “Throwing away a perfectly good wife on that trash.” The knife was close enough to shave scruff, and I wondered if Billy’s life was flashing before his eyes. I sure hoped so. “And don’t even think of trying to press charges. I have pictures, remember? I will ruin you if you so much as say a word to anyone. Yours will be the deadest doctor’s office in five counties.”
Even backed up to the wall, with that knife practically in his sinuses, Billy didn’t know when to shut up. His mouth started moving, but in an unprecedented turn of events, no words came out. He literally couldn’t speak.
Clem’s eyebrows kissed her hairline. “This divorce is going to be quick and uncontested. Got it?”
His only response was a whimper and a nod. Just then his co-adulterer came out the door fully clothed in baggy jeans with holes in the knees, and an oversized faded AC/DC T-shirt that looked like her grandmother had bought it at the band’s first concert and hadn’t washed it since.
“Now take your high school hussy and get out of here.”
“I graduated last May,” she had the nerve to say. This girl was even stupider than Billy.
Billy yanked her toward her pathetic car, his knees knocking as he got inside.
