In a swift motion, I snatch the kid’s wrist in my hand and jerk it to the side.His grip on the gun slackens and it drops directly into my own hand.In a quiet room full of the dead, his gasp is loud.It bounces off the walls, making it seem like they themselves are breathing one final breath.Once, then twice, the gun goes off with a deafening roar.I pinch my mouth and eyes shut as a hot spray of blood douses my face.
My eyes pan around the room where five bodies now lay sprawled out over the quickly dampening carpet.Limbs are splayed.Heads are caved in and leaking brain matter.It’s disgusting, honestly.The shaggy, cream-colored flooring is tie-dyed with various shades of red and brown.My shirt is similarly patterned with warm, soggy, red splatter.I rub my hands over my face, wiping away as much of the blood as I can before transferring it to the thighs of my jeans.
A frustrated sound rumbles in my chest as I stare at the scene around me, realizing that the amount of cleaning I need to do far surpasses what I had expected.The gunshots will likely have alerted the neighbors, so there’s no time to take this slow.The only method left is full-scale destruction.
* * *
My car rumbles.Its body rocks from side to side as the sounds of an explosion ring out through the quiet streets of Wilmington.I watch from my rearview mirror as the little yellow house is engulfed in flames.Maybe a little bit of red will color their beige existence.But how else was I to get rid of the evidence other than a manufactured gas leak?It’ll look like an unfortunate accident.The citizens of the single-colored town will cry, impressing each other with their faux grief.Will they give out a prize to those to bawl the hardest?Will they award a metal to those who fall to their knees in anguish?They’ll call it a terrible tragedy where a man and his friends perished in a horrible way.But it’ll all be bullshit.
The knotted anger squeezing my chest calms at the sight of embers shooting skyward above the house.The ash flutters back down to the ground like snowflakes.Somewhere deep inside of me, the child I used to be smiles.Let their cream-colored lives burn, he seems to say,the way they let us burn.
“Call Shawn,” I yell to the interior of my car.
I suppress a chuckle when my ever-diligent assistance picks up after the first ring.
“Hey, did you?—”
I cut him off before he finishes.“Something was off about this one.”
His voice lifts an octave.“What do you mean, ‘something was off’?”
“The guy had hired protection; four bodyguards, to be exact.Shit was such a mess that I had to blow the house up.”
“Crap,” he drags the word out like he’s savoring it.“What kind of a low-level thief thinks to hire protection?”
“I don’t know, Shawn,” I hiss through gritted teeth.“Just figure out what the fuck happened here.”
I smash my knuckles into the touchscreen, abruptly ending the call.I’ve encountered a lot of thieves in my career, but rarely ever smart ones.There’s a nagging feeling inside me.It tightens my lungs and wraps my stomach in knots.There’s more to this story than we know.We’re missing something, and in this line of work, that can be a death sentence.
As I drive, my mind wanders, or maybe it goes nowhere.I’m not really sure.Half-formed inklings seem to materialize in my head and quickly evaporate into nothing.None solid enough to leave an imprint.I just drive.I drive until the rain-soaked pavement of suburban streets evolves into the dark asphalt of busy highways.I drive until the lit roads darken and the asphalt is replaced by gravel paths.I drive until the reflection of my headlights glint off of a familiar metal mailbox on a slanted post.I drive until I find myself parked, staring at patchy wooden siding and a poorly repaired porch.
I press my fingers to the temples, massaging away the dull ache behind them.How did I end up here, in front of her house?Is already she so ingrained in my mind that I would find myself here instead of at my own home?Home.The word comes to me unbidden.It screams inside of me.It glides through my veins like water.It douses the flames of violence burning inside them.She is home.
