I take off all my clothes, fold them neatly on the couch in the living room where there’s no blood, and get to work.
When dismembering a body, a common mistake is to hack away at it in haste and hope for the best. Bones will fracture this way, but without a saw they won’t sever in the way you need them to. It’s much cleaner to feel for the joints and hack away at the cartilage. A few sharp, swift swings of the butcher knife and I’ve detached his arms at the shoulder.
If I had more time, I’d hang him over the counter with his headtoward the floor, slit him from ear to ear, and let the blood drain into a basin. The human body can hold approximately one and a half gallons of blood—10 percent of his body weight—and getting rid of it makes dismemberment a hell of a lot easier. But without the heart to pump the blood to the wound, it would trickle out slowly, and we don’t have the hours to squander.
I move quickly. It’s arduous work. We’re moving against the morning, and there won’t be time to clean thoroughly before disposing of him. I’ll clean the visible blood with dish soap and hot water, get all the detached pieces wrapped securely in bags, and come back to clean the cabinets and floor properly once Tim is laid to rest. Most domestic murders are committed in the kitchen or the bedroom, and if Tim’s family reports him missing, the police will be here with luminol and cadaver dogs before the ink can dry on the warrant.
Dara takes a long shower. The water must be ice-cold by now, but I don’t go to check on her. She needs to work through the shock of what she’s done, make her peace with it, and then compose herself, because I’ll need her help getting rid of him.
Torso, head, arms, shins, thighs. Everything is laid out and wrapped by the time the shower stops running. I glance at the clock above the stove. Nearly four o’clock.
I stand to wash the blood from my arms, and dizziness pounds at the inside of my skull. Before I realize what’s coming, bile burns at my throat and I vomit into the sink. The tang of blood has never smelled so strong. My muscles have never ached like this. Sweat drips from my face in heavy drops.Pull it together, Sissy.
Plans and logic come to comfort me as they always do. Get back to work. Stay organized. I put my clothes back on.
Dara comes downstairs just as I’ve rinsed the last of the vomit down the drain, using the hose attachment to direct the last of it. Sheheard me, and sympathy joins the blend of traumatized emotions on her face. This concussion and my unexpected condition have afforded me an advantage—Dara mistakes my illness for revulsion at what she’s done and what I’ve been made to clean up.
She stands at the edge of the kitchenette as though the floor beyond the threshold might burn her, and she stares at the grim packages wrapped in solid black garbage bags on her floor.
“What do I do now?” Her voice is hoarse. She’s pulled her wet hair back into twin French braids that stop at the nape of her neck, out of her face, ready to get to work. There’s sadness in her dark eyes, but a renewed sense of calm as well.
I hope she realizes how practical she is—how mighty. I wonder how many times she’s thought about this night, wondering if it would ever come, laying out the details in her head. Terrified as she was when she called me, she didn’t panic. She didn’t call the police or tear out the knife and stab him over and over. She did only as much as it would take to kill him, and then she waited for me.
“Do you have a box?” I say. “A really big one.”
We load Tim’s body into two fifty-gallon storage bins that Dara was using to store spare blankets in the hall closet. We haul him down the steps to the laundry room in two shifts, and then into the back seat of her car. The car that I’ve never seen her drive because Tim always takes it to work.
I tell Dara to wait in the passenger seat while I go inside to clean up the blood. She wants to come and help me, but I’m not convinced she’s aware of what she’s volunteering for. It was gruesome enough for her to carry the weight of him in those storage bins. If she has to look at his blood again, really look at the colors that were once inside him, she might break down again, and I need her to stay strong for what will come next.
The clock on the stove reads five o’clock. Sunrise is in one hour, and before that, the sky will start to lighten.
I’m ashamed of the rushed job I do cleaning up. I use the white kitchen towels to clean most of it. What a gift that they’re white, because I’m able to pour bleach into the washing machine. Bleach isn’t my favorite. It’s conspicuous, but it’s already here, which will work in Dara’s favor, since it wasn’t a recent purchase and it’s formulated for laundry.
When we return, I’ll launder them again with regular detergent, toss in some of Dara and Tim’s other laundry for good measure, and instruct her to put the clothes away. Then I’ll wash her pajamas. It will be okay. Time is wearing thin, but there’s enough of it.
My vision roils with dark spots, and I clutch the edge of the washer as it rattles and whirs.It’s almost over and then you can sleep,I tell myself. I’ve already done the hard part.
I think of Edison for the first time in hours. He won’t call me because he thinks I’m resting. And—oh, how I wish I were. My entire body is starting to remember that it was in a car accident, and new pain flares every time I move.
When I climb into the driver’s seat, Dara is shivering, hugging her arms tightly to her chest and soaked through with rain. Without saying anything, she hands me the keys, and we drive off. I don’t turn on the headlights until we’re well out of the parking lot.
“You look awful,” she finally says, when we’re a mile out.
“Ran my car into a ditch,” I say. “It’s nothing.”
She nods. Shock is shifting, taking new shapes and colors within her. “Where are we going?” Her voice is hollow.
Edison and I have hiked all the mountain trails within a ten-mile radius. But they’re lush with rivers and breathtaking views. Even the most barren parts of them run the risk of someone spotting a body.All the worthwhile hiding spots are higher up, more treacherous to reach, and I’m operating at half capacity. He’s going to be found if I leave any piece of him in the more accessible wilderness. I know that. The plastic bags in this desert heat will create a greenhouse effect that accelerates decomposition, but it only takes a hair of DNA from a willing family member to compare against the remains. And while I’ll be long gone by the time his corpse may be found in the brush, Dara will forever be linked to him. She has the most to lose, and I’m doing this for her.
Dara is starting to panic. She’s breathing faster, clutching the hem of her shorts in her fist, and we only have about thirty minutes before people start waking up for their morning commutes.
Think, Sissy.
“I know a place,” I say.
The head will be the most important identifier. Although I’ve removed his teeth, a sketch artist will be able to draw a facial composite from his bone structure long after decomposition sets in. If I can make sure his head is never found, the other pieces won’t be as damning.
I pull up to the playground behind the elementary school that’s attached to Sadie’s junior high. I already know there are no cameras here; I checked the day I picked her up. Tim’s head goes into the trash barrel that’s painted with a landscape and stick-figure children holding hands below a sunny sky. I paw through the existing trash and bury him under juice boxes, candy wrappers, wadded paper, and various other types of pedestrian trash. The barrel is almost full, which means the janitor will tie it off and carry it away first thing when the building opens. It will be on its way to the landfill by noon.
