Rubber marks where Lucas’ Audi made its escape ran up into the thick ivy next to the driveway where he swerved to avoid the strange car parked at the end of his property.
I followed her down the driveway, impotent to stop her but curious nonetheless. She pushed on the tiny door to the gas tank and unscrewed the cap.
“What are you doing?” I asked, a rising panic in my voice.
She fed the hose down into the gas line and started sucking on the other end. Three big inhales and I got a sour taste in my mouth. She leaned over and spit a fine spray of gasoline, gagging as she did. I tasted the gas in my mouth and dry heaved, powerless to make the phantom taste go away.
I stood by, swallowing and gagging, as she filled the can and then marched back to the house.
She started in the office, splashing the gasoline around, me following and yelling out, “You can’t do this.” and “Stop it!”
Spoiler alert: She didn’t stop.
The can empty, she went to the living room and opened the small Indian carved box that held the fireplace matches. We bought that box together at an indoor flea market on a weekend away. We talked about going to India someday, how it would be much more exciting and dangerous than a suburban flea market. Excitement and danger were low on my list anymore.
I was helpless. I could scream, I could yell, but I couldn’t grab her. Couldn’t punch her, couldn’t raise my old .38 and shoot her. My God it was the worst feeling in the world, watching a woman—watching myself—preparing to burn down my fiancé’s house.
She stepped out the front door and waited for me to follow. Burning me alive wouldn’t exactly work with her plans. I had to stay alive for her to stay alive.
“Please,” I said. “You can’t do this.”
“I’ll find him y’know.”
I knew. She lit a match, tossed it over her shoulder with a smile. As the gas ignited she walked back down the steps to her stolen car.
She didn’t need to burn down the house. There were no files about the case there that weren’t at the DA’s office as well. This was spite, maybe revenge for Lucas punching her.
Why had she taken the deal? How could she do this to us? I guess I assumed if she shared half of me, she would love him too. Then again, love might have all sloshed over to my side of things. She could see Lucas as nothing more than an obstacle to her payday. And if she consisted of nothing but evil, her loyalties would side with the criminals, right?
Anyway, damn her. Damn me. At first it was easy to deny Sam as a part of me. If I really thought about it, she was the part that took the deal way back when. No, okay that’s not true. That part was fear. Fear for my own life. She was the part that kept on taking the money, though, even after Duane SomethingPolish got spread all over a concrete floor. She was the part that put the money in a safe deposit box until she outgrew the beginner size and sprang for the double wide. And she was so much easier to ignore when she lived inside and I could easily shut her up by buying a new pair of shoes.
I stood at the bottom of the steps watching her go. Behind me the flames grew and began to roar, warming my back. She revved the engine, turned to me and smiled again.
She was pure evil, and evil had my face.
CHESTNUTS ROASTING ON AN OPEN FIRE—MINUS THE CHESTNUTS
I turned and watched Lucas’ house burn. I kept a few clothes in there, a toothbrush, but the big move-in together was supposed to happen next month after I gave my landlord the proper notice to get my deposit back.
Where there’s smoke, there’s fire and where there’s fire there are firemen, so I knew I had to get the hell out of there. The garage hadn’t caught yet and I thought of the Vespa. Lucas bought it in what he called his pre-midlife crisis. He’d ridden it about a half dozen times since. The garage door was wide open, Lucas didn’t bother to close it on his exit. I ran in, grabbed the keys from hook next to the workbench and had no choice but to grab the helmet. There are laws y’know.
The heat from the burning house was intense as I fired up the tiny little engine and puttered away into the night.
I had no idea where to go. I also had no idea where she would head next or what damage she might do, but right then I was too exhausted to care. At night there wasn’t much she could do to the targets on her list. The other members of Lucas’ staff at the DA’s office were work friends so I, which meant she, didn’t know their addresses and likewise my coworkers at the DEA. We all kept a nice professional distance from each other. Comes with the job, I think, to keep a very private private life.
A few miles away from the burning house I pulled in to a parking lot in front of a mall. I parked far away from the entrance in a spot you’d be pissed to settle for if the mall was open and you had to walk. It kept me in the shadows mostly and that suited me fine.
I dismounted and sat down on a grass patch where I leaned back against a tree.
I shut my eyes and tried to tap in to Sam’s eyes. I got nothing. I could have been out of range or she could have been asleep. Or I could have been crazy and this whole mess played out inside my concussed brain while I still lay at the bottom of that brick pile. If so, I’d wake up to a brand new old world where there was only one of me. If I was lucky I’d be in a hospital bed with Lucas standing over me and quite possibly some internal affairs dicks from the agency. If I wasn’t lucky I’d be inside a body bag, which is kinda how I felt as I lay back on the grass, my helmet still on.
Sleep overtook me so fast I’m tempted to say I passed out.
WAKE UP, SLEEPYHEAD
I jerked awake when the dumpster I’d parked next to was hauled up by an angry garbage truck. I finally knew what it was like to live in Africa and be woken by a charging rhino.
I woke thinking, is it over? Am I a solo act again? I sure didn’t feel any different. If anything I was more sore. The bruises and cuts from the explosion the day before were left to stiffen overnight while sleeping like a drunk on a grassy median in a vacant parking lot.
I cranked the engine on the Vespa and looked at the digital clock on the panel. 8:45. I immediately thought back to what I witnessed of Sam bargaining with Calder and Rizzo. Part of the deal was to eliminate my entire office. Shit, I wanted to say.
If I was her that would be the first place I’d start. And hey, what a coincidence, I am her!
The DEA opened for business at 9 a.m., but some people arrived by eight-thirty. I was at least twenty minutes away. If Sam planned on taking out anyone in the office, I hoped like hell she put it on tomorrow’s agenda.
I slammed my eyes back shut and scanned the frequency. Please, please let this be the moment when I realize everything the night before had been a fever dream after I crawled away from the burning wreckage of my car. My head clear again I could return to my life and go meet Lucas at his non-burned-down house and dive into all the wedding planning I’d been putting off.