Deadly
By: Brandon Talbot
Tags: Short Story, Brandon Talbot, Short Fiction, Thriller

Deadly

Chad stands in the shower, hot water from the shower head spraying onto his hair, and dripping down his body. He has the hot water turned way up, trying to burn away his worries from the day. Stupid work. Stupid coworkers. Stupid stupid stupid.

He hates his job with the same passion with which some men love their wives. He disdains it. He despises it. He keeps it only because it affords him opportunities to move around mostly unnoticed.

As the stresses of the day wash away down the drain, the water turns cold. Ice cold, like a mountain spring as the snow begins to melt. “Damnit, Mom!” He spits out the words as he jumps backward out of the flow from the shower head.

“Ma! Hey, Ma!” He yells. He hears a mumble from outside the bathroom door. Assuming its a response to his yelling he shouts, “Turn the water off! I’m trying to take a shower!” He hears another mumble and holds his hand under the water waiting for the warmth to return. A moment later, the water begins to heat back up. “That woman! I swear!” He says, as he resumes soaking under the hot blast of water. It didn’t take long to calm down and let the water do its job.

Chad stood under the hot water for a long time. His head tilted up to look at the ceiling. He thought about his mother, about how she was withering away to nothing, cancer eating her from the inside out, like some kind of alien parasite. He wanted his own place but he stayed to help his mom. He was told she wouldn’t live for more than two years with stage 4 lung cancer. It had been almost four. She was clinging to life, although he couldn’t understand why she would want to continue on with the immense amount of pain she lived in every day. A dark cloud hung over everything she did. The pain, a constant companion, was with her every moment. No amount of painkillers could even begin to alleviate it. She was living in hell, and he felt it.

He thought about what would happen when she passed. Would she leave enough money from a life insurance policy to pay off her medical bills? Would there be any left over for him? Did she even have a life insurance policy? He hadn’t spoken to her about these concerns. She didn’t like talking about it. She liked her privacy. He had tried a couple times but she had shut him down and they’d never picked the conversation back up. He knew the in-home care would be expensive and he was worried about being stuck with all her hundreds of thousands of dollars in bills she’d racked up during her unexpectedly long time fighting this disease. The chemo hadn’t helped. She quit receiving treatments months ago, against his wishes. She said it made what little life she had left almost unbearable. He argued that it could help her beat it, or at least prolong her life by years. She decided to take what ever life God would give her and be happy about it. Apparently God was going to give her much more time on this earth than the doctors expected.

After his shower, Chad walked out into the living room. His mother was sitting on the couch, watching TV. Tubes were coming out of her everywhere, feeding her drugs and God knows what else. One was feeding her drugs through a portable IV bag, another delivered a constant stream of oxygen into her nostrils. Other tubes fed various fluids into various veins, all with their own bags of whatever to match, all hanging from a rolling IV cart that she dragged with her from room to room. The sour stench of ammonia mixed with some sickly sweet perfume assaulted his senses.

“Mom, what are you doing out of bed? You’re supposed to be laying down. Doctor’s orders.” He reprimanded her as he grabbed the remote from the coffee table and switched off the TV. “Come on. Let’s go.”

She looked at him as if deciding whether or not to put up a fight. She apparently decided it wasn’t worth it right now. Maybe she was just tired of arguing, or maybe she didn’t physically have the strength. Either way, she got up and let him help her back to bed without a fuss.

As he was putting her back in bed, he looked at the bags hanging from the IV cart. He grabbed one of the bags of fluids and looked at it. Some white, milky fluid. “What the fuck are they giving you?” He said in a hushed tone. He felt a slap on the back of his hand and looked down at his mother. She was giving him a stern look and waving her finger at him as if to say, “Watch your mouth.” She’d given him that look before. He knew exactly what it meant. He looked back at her apologetically. He knew she didn’t like that language. The least he could do was curb his swearing when he was around her. She wouldn’t be around much longer.

“Sorry, Mom.” He leaned down and kissed her on the forehead because that’s what loving sons do. He turned her TV on for her and handed her the remote before leaving the room.

Out in the hallway he breathed out a sigh. He stayed outside her room for just a moment, thinking, then walked down the hallway to his own room. Once safely behind the door, he sat down at his computer. He wiggled the mouse to wake up the , monitor and he connected his phone to it via a usb cable.

He had photographs from his latest outing that he wanted to get off his phone and safely onto the external hard drive attached to his computer. Once all the photos were transferred to the computer and deleted from his phone, he went over to his bed and laid down, looking up at the ceiling.

He reflected on his latest hike. The bliss he felt. The trees, the scent of pine, the chirps and chatters and cries of the woodland animals. The sun beating down on him. The sadness as it ended. He took photos to remember it, but it wasn’t the same as being in the moment. He laid there for a while as his mind wandered. He turned on the TV and started watching some nature show. He kept the volume low, not so that he didn’t bother his mother, just to allow his mind to wander and not really see or hear what was happening on the show. It was a sweet spot he enjoyed on these nights.

A few minutes later, like clockwork, he heard his mother call for him. “Chad?”

“Yeah, Ma.”

“Would you hand me the remote?”

“God damnit! You just had the remote!” He said, quietly enough that she couldn’t hear him. “Okay, Ma!” He said, louder.

He went down the hallway to her bedroom and saw the remote lying on the floor. He bent down and picked it up. When he stood up to hand it to her, she motioned for him to come closer. When he leaned down, she whispered, “I heard you. Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain.” He thrust the remote into her hand and left the room without saying a word.

Damn woman has Vulcan ears. He thought this comment. She definitely wouldn’t hear that, unless she had ESP. He wouldn’t doubt if she did. He went back to his room and heard the murmur from the TV. He shut it off and laid down, attempting to sleep. It took a while but he finally drifted off to the memories of his latest hike and the beauty he saw there in the woods.

Part 2

Chad woke up early the next morning and got ready for work. His mom was still asleep. She slept a lot these days. The cancer tires her out. He grabbed the coffee pot and poured most of it into his thermos that he carries with him. It’s a big, green Stanley thermos. One of those that’s damn near bulletproof. He’d had it for years. It had the dents to prove it. But it still kept his coffee hot all day. Things aren’t built this well anymore, he laments as he walked out the front door and shut it quietly behind him.

He’s not looking forward to the day, and to the ribbing he’ll most likely receive from his coworkers. They always tease him. He hates it. He tries to take it good-naturedly but sometimes it’s hard not to lash out at them. He keeps to himself so they don’t know about his mother’s illness. They only know that he lives with her, which is a constant well from which they draw most of their supposed humor.

He parked his car in the shop lot, next to the other employee’s cars. Walking into the shop, he paused just inside the door, letting his eyes adjust to the sudden change in light. He saw the rest of his coworkers standing together at the end of one of the aisles. He can’t get to his locker without walking right through their gauntlet. Perfect. They’re the reason he’s dreading the day already. He tapped his thermos with his finger, still hot. It’s going to be a very long day.

He steeled himself against the coming assault and walked around the group of men standing in a half circle. They were laughing amongst themselves. As he passed, no one said a word. No one even looked at him. What is going on? He wondered.

He walked past them and into the break room where he placed his lunch — a hoagie, chips, a can of soda, and a cookie — into the fridge. He could see them through a big glass window set in the wall that divided this room from the shop area. There’s something wrong. The looks on their faces. There’s something wrong. He continues watching them. They’re still laughing. None of them acknowledged that he’s there, that he walked past them. This is unusual to say the least.

He walked into the dispatch office and grabbed his assignments for the day.

“Hey Jill, why are the guys acting so strangely?”

“Someone told them about your mother. Why? Were they nice to you?”

“No. They completely ignored me. Acted like I wasn’t even there.”

“Well that’s something. Sorry, Chad.”

“No worries.”

He wasn’t entirely honest. He was absolutely furious that someone had shared his business with the guys. How did they even find out? He hurried to his van, with the words Happy Day Electric And HVAC written on the side in big, bold letters along with a stupid looking smiley face emoji beside the words. Only three assignments. He’ll have those knocked out in no time.

Part 3

He finishes up with the last customer and calls dispatch to see if they have anything else for him. “Hey, this is Chad. Anything else lined up?”

“Not yet. We’ll call you if something comes up before you clock out.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

He disconnects the call and begins driving around to kill time. He’s driving his work van down the freeway trying to decide where to go when an idea hits him. A hike. “That sounds great!”, he thinks. He turns his van toward one of his favorite hiking spots. Hidden, quiet, and rarely are there other people.

He parks at the trailhead and takes off his button-down work shirt. He slides into an old gray t-shirt for the hike. He turns off his phone and leaves it in the van. He takes his radio with him, though. Don’t want to miss a call.

He jumps out of the white work van and begins tromping down the trail. He doesn’t mind the summer heat. The hike is easier to tackle when his shirt is wet with sweat. He walks down the gravel trail, surrounded by tall pine trees, quaking aspen, and other smaller trees. Breathing in the cooling evening air and the scent of the pines is relaxing. He listens and hears nothing except the sound of small critters scampering through the undergrowth of the forest.

He utters a disgusted chortle at the ridiculousness of the company he works for. Chad likes to be alone. He has a quiet demeanor and an observant way about him that unsettles others. None of that matters out here. He tries to let go of his frustrations. They haunt him almost constantly. His coworkers, his mom. He just can’t seem to get away from it all. Except out here on the trail. There are a few times when he forgets about his troubles. Being surrounded by this grandeur is one of those times.

“This is heaven!” He exclaims in a subdued tone.

He hits the top of the mountain, sweating, panting, legs and lungs burning. He drinks deeply from the bottle of water he brought with him and lies down in the shade of a giant pine. He’s staring up at the sky. He focuses on his breathing. Part with calculation, part on instinct he begins to zone out. He lays there amidst this beauty with nothing but the sound of wind rustling the large branches over his head and the occasional call of a bird in the distance.

After an hour or so, he begins his trek back down the mountain. As he gets further down the trail he begins to hear a voice. It’s distant but he can tell it belongs to a man. A young man. As he gets closer, he can tell the young man is in some kind of argument. But he can’t hear the other person. Either they’re whispering, or he’s on the. phone.

“Oh please let him be on the phone.” He muttered to himself and maybe partly to a deity who may or may not exist and who definitely wouldn’t condone his next actions.

As he got closer, he began to triangulate the location of the voice. It wasn’t difficult. The person was shouting. He stepped off the trail, far enough that he wouldn’t be noticed but still close enough to see the trail clearly, and began pacing the young man. He stayed hidden in the trees but he’s so close he can smell the young man’s cologne. He hoped he didn’t step on any leaves or twigs that might betray his presence. He moved stealthily along, keeping his eyes on this young man yelling at someone on the phone. Whoever this is, he’s pissed at them. He wondered what betrayal or injury would precede a tongue-lashing like the one this person was receiving.

“God damnit! I told you already, bitch! We’re fucking done! Why can’t you accept that?!” The young man yells into the phone. “I even fucked your friend! I thought that would do the trick. You’re pathetic!”

“Perfect!”, Chad thinks. “He’s. alone AND he’s a shitbag.” Chad isn’t a moral beacon by any means but he understands basic respect and doesn’t believe people should be talked to like that. His anger began to boil in his veins. He felt an instinctual urge arising in him. Chad continued trailing him, listening to the endless barrage of profanities, insults, and slurs this young man lets fly at his, presumably ex, girlfriend on the other end of that phone call.

“I would’ve gotten the shit slapped out of me if I’d talked to someone like that! This new generation is out of control.” He whispered to himself as he stalks the young man. Staying out of sight, waiting for the moment to present itself.

The young man stops, his back to Chad. He’s only about fifteen feet away. Now’s the time. Chad pulls out his Milwaukee work knife. The blade is four inches long and pretty wide. It’s perfect for what’s about to happen. He waits for just a moment as he scans the area. Not a soul in sight. The young man continues yelling at this young lady, unaware of his surroundings. Unaware that someone has been trailing him for the better part of a mile. Unaware of anything in this world except his own stupid, pointless existence. Only concerned with himself and the current moment in which he resides. Not worried about anything else.

Chad lunges out of his hiding spot, knife in hand. The young man hears the scuffle behind him as he’s in the middle of calling his ex-girlfriend a bitch for the umpteenth time. He begins to turn around, lowers the phone from his head, as a look of complete surprise relaxes his features into a blank stare. He sees a man barreling toward him with complete fiery rage on his face, eyes burning as if consumed with fire. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s frozen with fear. Chad has seen that look before. Many times. Sometimes on a human, sometimes on a deer when it’s about to be struck by an oncoming vehicle. Either way, the end is the same.

The young man begins to say something, “What the f…” but he’s cut short as the first blow lands in his abdomen, just to the left of his navel and just below the ribs. The phone hits the ground and shatters into several pieces.

The young man gasps for breath as the knife is pulled out of his body and plunged in again, this time in his back. The young man’s face twists from a blank stare into surprise and pain. This is the part that Chad loves more than anything. Watching the features on the victim’s face as they realize what’s happening, what’s going to happen, and that they have no control whatsoever over the situation.

Chad continues plunging the knife into the young man’s body, over and over and over. Releasing all his pent up rage, all the times when his coworkers made fun of him, all the times his mom annoyed the fuck out of him by not dying, for all the control he didn’t have in his life. “WHY WON’T SHE FUCKING DIE?!” He realizes he’s screaming into the young man’s face. He stopped stabbing and slid his knife out of the young man’s body. He must’ve stabbed him about ten times. He regains a little control over himself, just enough to draw the moment out. Maximize his pleasure. He’s made sure not to hit any vital organs or blood vessels. Just opened the young man up to allow his blood to come out. It’s seeping through the new holes in his shirt and dripping down his pant legs.

The young man begins to get weak and Chad helps him to the ground and straddles his midsection. “What the fuck was that for, man?” The young man coughs out in between ragged breaths.

Chad replies, “You’re an asshole. And whoever you were talking to on the phone doesn’t deserve that kind of treatment. That’s the kind of shit that drives women to commit suicide you fuck!”

With that, chad drags the razor-sharp blade across the young man’s throat. From left to right, making sure to sever every artery and vein he can in the process. Blood spurts out at first and then begins to pour as the young man’s heart gets weaker and weaker.

Chad doesn’t say another word to the young man. Just watches as his breathing gets more and more difficult. The young man keeps asking him “why”, keeps begging for mercy, but Chad just keeps his steely glare on the young man’s eyes. He wants to watch the light leave his eyes. He wants to see the moment this young man leaves this world.

A few minutes later, it’s done. The young man lets out his final breath and all his muscles relax. Chad, however, is in a state of complete ecstasy. His nerves are thrumming and vibrating, his heart is pounding and pumping adrenaline through his system. Everything around him looks brighter and more clear. He breathes in the cooling afternoon air as he stands up.

He pulls his other phone out of his pocket. This phone, unlike his main phone, has no SIM card. He keeps the wifi shut off. This phone cannot connect to the outside world. Cannot betray him by sharing its contents with the internet. He unlocks the phone and navigates to the camera app. He snaps photos from all different angles. Some close up on the young man’s face, some from above. He makes sure to frame the puddle of blood just so in the photos. He’s very particular about his photos. They have to have the lighting just right, the exposure just right, and they have to be framed perfectly. He wants to remember these moments. Remember them as if he was still in that moment. It helps him relive the fleeting feelings he gets from these events.

Once he’s satisfied with the photos he’s taken, Chad looks around at the woods in the area and sees a broken tree trunk where the tree fell and left a stump with multiple sharp, jagged pieces of wood sticking out. He drags the young man over to it, easily because the young man only weighs about 150 pounds and Chad is strong, and hefts him up. He throws the body onto the jagged edges of the tree as hard as he can. Hopefully that’ll hide the knife wounds. He takes more photos. “This is great!” He says to the lonely trees.

He goes back to the spot on the trail and cleans up the puddle of blood he left there. Looking back at the body impaled on the tree stump, he smiles. “This will go nicely in my photo album.” He grabs the young man’s phone and hurls the pieces off the trail the other direction, down a steep cliff and into oblivion. No one will ever find it.

Once he’s satisfied with his cleanup, he strolls back down the trail toward his van. Whistling as he passes other hikers just starting out on the trail. He tells them that the trail is amazing with lots of beautiful scenery. They don’t realize he’s talking about the body he left on the broken tree stump. They tell him thank you and smile as they walk up the trail to see the sights.

Back in his work van, the radio comes to life. “Chad! Are you there?”

“I’m here, dispatch.”

“I tried calling your phone but it went straight to voicemail.”

“I turned it off for a few minutes to have a break from the notifications. What do you have?”

The dispatcher is telling him about an HVAC problem as he turns his van toward the location of the issue.

“Thanks, dispatch. I’m headed that way.”

“Thank YOU Chad! You’re always so pleasant.”

Chad chuckles as he drives away, reveling in the thoughts of his most recent hike, and feeling pretty self-righteous about the scumbag he removed from the earth. No one will be harmed by this asshole ever again. No young woman will have to be berated and beat down emotionally by him ever again. Chad drives off toward his next assignment with the knowledge that he’s made the world a better place. His thoughts turn toward his mom. Maybe there’s something he can do to help her along.