13th Hour Page 5

  "It's a common wound. Probably kids testing out their Christmas presents. Do you have money?"

  "I got enough. Focus on her."

  "I never took you for a bird lover."

  "I don't even know what it is."

  Cole looked at his brother. He never understood how one of them ended up in veterinary medicine and the other in petty crime. Arno was in a low patch, but he'd soon find some scam to bring himself back up. His brother the roller coaster.

  "Even the worst ornithology student can identify a heron. The color is gorgeous though. Unusual."

  "She'll be okay?" Arno asked.

  Cole dropped the tiny metal ball into the tray. The ping echoed through the room.

  "Why do you care? I'm surprised you didn't take it home for dinner."

  "I run a few cons; I don't kill."

  "It's just odd for you to care about something other than yourself."

  "I just saw her there and—" He couldn’t explain his concern. The bird was too beautiful not to love.

  "I'll have to turn her over to Audubon for rehabilitation tomorrow morning."

  "I can't keep her?"

  "She needs to be in the wild."

  Arno watched the bird's deep rhythmic breaths after Cole put her in the barred cage.

  ***

  The phone woke him.

  “You took her.”

  “Took who?” Arno said, trying to sound awake.

  “Don’t tell me you don’t know. I knew you were desperate, but you said you’d never hit my place.”

  “What're you talking about?”

  “The clinic was broken into last night. Only the bird is missing. You’re going to tell me you have nothing to do with it?”

  “Thanks for the trust, Cole.” Arno snapped the phone shut.

  Too irritated to go back to sleep, Arno dressed to go out. He knew who to question. Only a couple guys in town forged the permits and supplied the animals for Portland's lucrative exotic pet trade. He bolted out of the apartment building and papers went flying as a body slammed into his. He moved to shrug past. Whoever ran into him could get their own damn—

  “Sorry, I’m such a klutz,” the blonde woman said. His urgency vanished at the sight of her.

  He stooped down, flustered by the switch from anger to lust. “No, my fault." He picked up the papers while she continued blaming herself.

  “I wasn’t paying attention. You really don’t need to— Oh please, don’t look at those,” she pleaded as he looked at the drawings.

  “You're an artist?”

  “Trying to be.” Her blush made her even more desirable. “I just flubbed another interview by being late.”

  “Do you want to have breakfast?” he blurted, certain she would say no. But she agreed and breakfast turned into a stroll leading back to his place where he kissed the round scar on her paper white breast as they made love.

  ***

  Within a week Hera moved in. Although apologetic - video surveillance outside the building proved Arno's innocence - Cole believed his brother a fool. “She could rob you blind.”

  “She’s worth the risk, besides don't you think I might be the worse influence.”

  Her drawings showed a detail and precision he’d never encountered. She could duplicate any image to the point where it was impossible to tell original from copy.

  “Can you do money?” He handed her a twenty-dollar bill. “This perhaps?”

  She gathered up her papers and pens and went to the bedroom.

  “Where are you going?”

  “You know I'm embarrassed to work in front of you.” A gorgeous blush flashed over her cheeks.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know, but that’s the rule if you need a counterfeiter.”

  “I didn’t—" he started to protest.

  “Hush,” she kissed his lips. “You go out at all hours after muffled phone calls and come back looking like the cat who ate the canary. I don't mind. I’d like to help.”

  “Can you fool a bank?”

  “Foreign currency would be better.”

  He turned and dug a twenty-euro note out of a drawer. “Like this?”

  In less than an hour she emerged with five bills.

  “Which is the real one?” Arno asked.

  Hera shrugged coyly.

  He couldn’t tell the difference and neither could the banks.

  Four bills an hour was her limit. Her exhaustion grew along with their stash, but he urged her on. Rather than produce more bills, she asked to copy a hundred-euro note instead, but he worried the large bill might draw notice. Arno sulked over her inability to work harder.

  Every day behind the bedroom door she crafted a stack of money. Dark circles formed under her eyes and she could hardly eat from weariness. Her hair lost its glowing shine and she couldn't keep warm. Still, she never asked to quit and his greed became too insatiable to make the offer.

  One day she shuffled into her room, sweater hanging loosely off her thinning frame. She failed to notice the door didn’t latch. Passing by the mirror in the hall across from her work room, Arno caught his reflection. And hers. The temptation to watch her work was irresistible and he remained glancing at the reflection over his image’s shoulder.

  Her form shrank as if the sweater was swallowing her. He didn’t trust his eyes and looked over his shoulder into the room. There it was. The brilliant white heron he found. Or was it? It looked similar, but this creature was a tattered patchwork of feathers like a dog with mange. The head bent down carefully as if fearing pain and plucked out a pile of feathers. The sweater formed again into human shape. Hera brushed one hand over a feather, each stroke transformed it until the feather resembled the money she held in the other hand.

  He stepped in. “How are you doing that?”

  She stared at him, her mouth gaping as the bird’s beak had done on that dripping day.

  “I wanted to live that day you found me. You gave me what I wanted. I thought you loved me for what I was, not for my magic, and swore if I lived I'd give you what you wanted most,” her voice rasped. “I thought you loved me, but you demand more and more. I fear I'll never make you happy.”

  She collapsed into her sweater, reverting into a half-feathered heron once more.

  His throat clenched with emotion. He scooped up Hera and once again wrapped her in his jacket. He sped to Cole’s.

  “Help her, please.”

  Cole stared at the once beautiful bird.

  “I’m so stupid. I believed you.”

  “What?”

  “You broke in that night. You couldn’t just do the right thing and let Audubon take her.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “I suppose she walked out and followed you home.”

  “Help her.”

  Cole put the stethoscope to the bird’s chest. The faint, off-kilter rhythm proved what he knew.

  “She’s dying. She’s obviously been malnourished or stressed for some time. Her heart is giving out. Couldn't you figure out how to care for her, to give her what she needed? You ruined this beautiful thing.”

  Arno's head drooped. He knew.

  “I’m turning you in. I trusted you all these years. Instead, you’ve screwed me over and killed her. You’re worthless.”

  He knew.

  Hera breathed once more, then her blue eyes faded.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Feeding Suspicions

  "FEEDING SUSPICIONS" HAD been in my head for years after seeing how much mayo and butter my mom would put on my stepdad's sandwiches or toast. I thought of turning the idea into a novel, but there just wasn't enough complexity to the story – believe me, I tried. I gave it up for a couple years and then eventually had to get it out of my head. I eventually came up with this short story.

  ***

  Why won’t he die? He deserves to die and the fact that he’s still alive isn’t for my lack of trying. I’ll tell you one thing, once he goes I’m never marrying again. I’ve played the fo
ol enough for one lifetime.

  Michael and me. It’s the same old story. We met each other and believed the circumstances much too fortuitous to be chance. It had to be destiny

  Good lord, we took the same bus to work.

  We commuted with fifteen other people at the same time everyday. Was it fate that we should meet them too? Of course not, but Michael and I believed the universe brought us together and our lives, our thoughts, our dreams and our hormones revolved around our Couple Kingdom for several months of infatuation.

  We moved in together and once we discovered we could stand the sight of each other every morning, we planned to be married.

  At the wedding Michael’s mother cried over his dad missing the event. He’d been taken down by a heart attack days before he reached his fiftieth birthday, the same age Michael’s grandfather died when he too was claimed by a bad ticker. My mom, never one to be subtle, pulled me aside at the reception with her eyes indiscreetly focused on Michael’s mother and sister, both grossly overweight and both shoveling large scoops of cake into their mouths.

  “You need to keep tabs on the weight of your new husband,” she advised with scorn, “or he’ll end up like one of them.” On the final word she jerked a nod toward the nibbling, bulbous duo.

  I, the glowing bride, rolled my eyes, “It won’t happen, Mom. Michael watches what he eats and works out daily. He’s quite buff." I cringe now remembering the pride in my voice.

  “Regardless, you can never be too sure.”

  She shot another judgmental look across the room as Michael, carrying a plate mounded with cake, joined his mom and sister.

  Despite my mom’s prejudice against my husband’s pudgy maternal side and cardiovascularly inferior paternal side, Michael and I were happy. We cavorted through the honeymoon stage for a couple years during which everything the other did was fascinating. I’d watch him shave and do the dishes; he’d watch me put on make up and fix dinner.

  I can’t say exactly when I noticed, but after a couple more years we’d gotten used to each other. My mascara application became a lonely affair, we did more things on our own that we once insisted on doing together and sometimes I didn’t even know where in the house he was or bother finding him.

  I took this as a normal part of marriage.

  Until he started working late.

  The flags instantly unfurled in my mind. That was the standard line, wasn’t it? He was a network engineer, meaning he kept the computers for a multi-branch bank talking to each other, updated and virus-free. He didn’t have a set office where I could, oh say, just happen to drop in and check up on him. My only contact was his cell phone. I rang with the pretense of being unable to find a screwdriver, to ask what he might want for dinner (often met with his response to not bother, he didn’t know when he’d be home) or some other trivial matter that I hoped would remind him of me. Or at least distract him. My suspicion skyrocketed as my calls went straight to voice mail more and more often.

  Out of habit, I read over Michael’s pay stubs when I could find them. The more recent checks were larger than his old ones and recorded a good number of overtime hours so perhaps he wasn’t lying about working late. Still, with all those cute female co-workers who understood his techie jargon and Star Trek jokes, his fishing off the company dock wasn’t unimaginable.

  Last year’s holidays confirmed everything.

  The week prior to Christmas as I sorted laundry – and yes, inspecting his shirts for lipstick stains and checking pockets for evidence – I found it. In his pants’ pocket hid a piece of paper crimped tightly from his habit of folding any scrap in half as many times as possible. I pried the paper open, expecting a love letter or phone number, but instead revealed a receipt.

  From a jewelry store.

  And it wasn’t a minor purchase.

  Handwritten in enviably elegant script were the words: Nine-inch diamond bracelet. Paid in full. Cash.

  At the bottom a bold outlined box emphasized the total: $1,264.

  Had I been a cartoon character my eyes would have bulged out of my head two or three times as my tongue lolled out of my mouth. I didn’t know what to make of it. Was this the reason for the late nights? This would be our fifth Christmas together. Perhaps he wanted to surprise me with something special. It was completely beyond what we could afford and I would have to insist he take it back, but the promise of his thoughtfulness forced me to cast aside the suspicions that had raged through me day and night for the past several months.

  During the following week whenever I encountered a mirror I practiced my you-shouldn’t-have and I’m-so-surprised faces. When five presents greeted me on Christmas morning, I pictured those feigned reflections in my mind. I tore through wrapping paper and yanked the top off the first four gift boxes hoping my searching and digging through tissue paper for the nine-inch diamond bracelet wasn’t obvious. Where was the damn thing?

  Opening the last gift, a box too small to house a nine-inch diamond bracelet, the tissue revealed a pair of glittery butterfly earrings.

  “Do you like them?” Michael had the nerve to ask.

  Visualizing jabbing the posts on which those little insects perched into Michael’s pupils, I forced a half-smile - nothing like the enthusiastic grins from the mirror - and hissed out a “Yes.”

  The rest of the day my mind raged. It was all I could do to not lash out over the clove-studded ham and bubbly scalloped potatoes. I ground the food in my mouth and swallowed without tasting a bite of the meal.

  I knew the truth now.

  What doubt could I have that he was cheating on me? I nit-picked through my recollection of the past few months and the signs glowed like the Vegas Strip – his lack of attentiveness, the canceling of the detailed cell phone bill (which he said they were doing to save paper) and the increased infrequency of our lovemaking.

  As I watched Michael eat egg rolls, deep-fried cheese and ranch dip at our New Year’s Eve party, a certainty spelled itself out more plainly than a cake box recipe: I wanted Michael dead.

  He deserved to die. Someone else was wearing my $1,264 nine-inch diamond bracelet and I didn’t even merit a proper guilt gift from the jerk.

  I took to the matter rationally. This wasn’t going to be a crime of passion bash-him-over-the-head-with-a-lamp scenario. No, he made a fool of me and deserved everything coming to him.

  Divorce wasn’t an option. Not in my mind. Why should I embarrass myself and have people think I wasn’t good enough, that I couldn’t keep my husband in line? Why should someone else – the nine-inch diamond bracelet-wearing Wife Number Two - be subjected to this kind of treatment? Doesn’t she realize he'll do the same to her as he did to me?

  My plan? Simple. Kill him with food. No, not poison, I’m not a power hungry fourteenth century queen, and I’m not talking about foie-gras style force-feeding until his system overloads (tempting, but too messy).

  No, all it would take was simple genetics, the human ability to pack on fat. And time. Not a problem; I'm a patient woman.

  Before we married, Michael maintained a good level of fitness, but his increased hours and lack of motivation on the weekends already meant he was having a hard time keeping the scale on his good side. So far it didn’t show through his clothes, but when he undressed his paunch puffed out like a soufflé.

  The table was set for my payback.

  Michael’s weakness for all things porcine made breakfast an easy place to begin. Bacon started appearing regularly in the shopping cart and frying pan. His three eggs crackled in the residual fat and I used a heavy hand in the butter crock for his toast.

  Healthy packed lunch? Not anymore. I bought the fattiest cuts of lunchmeat and painted a thick coat of mayo on both pieces of his sandwich bread. Potato chips, two candy bars instead of one, and a soda topped it off. The paper sack always returned home empty.

  For dinner I made frequent use of the Fry-o-Lator – a wedding gift I thought I’d never have a use for. When veggies were present I en
sured they swam in cream sauce or drowned under bleu cheese dressing.

  I might as well have injected a pound of lard under his skin. Michael hefted on twenty pounds within a month and thirty more over the next two.

  He tried to eat less, but the habit of indulgence was tightly seated. If I cut back the lunch snacks, he craved “a little something” and lumbered to the vending machine or mini-mart to purchase the lacking items with change I dropped into his lunch sack. When he’d ask for less mayo on his sandwiches I’d comply, but was sure to place butter and irresistible fresh rolls on the table at dinner.

  By late April, he’d lost ten pounds, but gained seventy overall. Even resting, his breathing rasped in and out as if his whole system struggled to deliver oxygen to his bulk. The railing along the staircase started to pull loose as he used it more and more to pull himself up the stairs. Our already infrequent lovemaking came to a stop - he didn’t have the energy for it. I didn’t mind. The sight of the overhanging belly and dimpling on his rear were more than enough to put me out of whatever mood I fancied myself to be in.

  May brought another ten pounds and a Northwest heat wave - a sudden jump from a chilly sixty degrees up to eighty-five. Michael’s body, unaccustomed to the insulating weight gain, sprawled and flushed like a beached walrus. I saw him check his pulse a couple times and began to hope. Could the weather be the final ingredient to complete the deadly mix of a fat-laden diet and poor genetics?

  I couldn’t resist expediting the blend.

  “It’s nice out, we should go for a walk,” I said.

  “It’s too hot,” Michael mumbled from his shaded lawn chair.

  I looked to the thermometer. The red climbed to eighty-two. “It’s only seventy. C’mon, you keep saying you need to get some exercise. Let’s go.”

  “Not today.”

  “You need to start somewhere,” I said with a cheerleader's dose of enthusiasm.

  His jowls quivered as he mumbled something else, but he hoisted himself out of the creaking chair. “Fine, I’ll walk.”

  I marched him up every slope in our hilly neighborhood. Up and down for forty minutes in the heat of the day. I ignored his wheezing, ragged breath and chided him when he wanted to slow down. Finally he leaned over, hands on knees, to catch his breath.