The One Percenters Read online

  She tried to acquaint me with them on several occasions so that we could all go out as a unit, but I resisted. I felt they were her friends, her independence.

  She didn’t need me horning in on that out of self-pity.

  There’s nothing worse than a slob husband who leeches onto his wife’s social life.

  There was another reason I kept my distance.

  One of her friends in particular was especially attractive. Jessica Solsberg. Jessicas are almost always beautiful—kind of like the anti-Marge. Miss Solsberg is the only woman I can recall ever looking at with a sexual eye after I met Jill. It wasn’t intentional, and of course I would never have fooled around with her or anyone else. I knew what I had in my wife. Mine was the one for which that Commandment was written.

  Jill had Jess over occasionally to tan in the yard. Jessica would wear a turquoise bikini—always the turquoise bikini. Jill wore red. I made sure I happened to be repairing the roof or mowing the lawn or otherwise engaged outdoors on those days. Hey, you can’t blame me for being a man. Jill was the angel, not me. Yin, yang, right? Anyway, I never cheated on her, like I said—not so much as a kiss or a pat on the bottom.

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  If I had been married to Jessica, you can bet shine-to-shit that I’d have been checking out Jill from head to ass. Just a natural thing is all, the desire to kiss, to touch, and to tie up. But, hell, I don’t have to explain myself to anyone, especially you, Doctor. And it felt good to get the tingles when I saw Jess laying out.

  Turquoise still warms my loins.

  I experimented with suicide. I downed a few pills, but I knew they wouldn’t be enough to do the trick.

  I tried the razor routine, but couldn’t bring myself to break the skin. In the end, I found that I’m not very good at committing suicide. If I had really meant it, I suppose I’d have gone straight for the gun, but it’s not as easy as you might think. You have to give those people a certain credit for their persistence.

  Death is one hell of a scary concept. You have to be hurting pretty badly to off yourself, especially if you believe in a heaven-and-hell type god. I happen not to.

  Funny. . I feel I almost have to offer an apology for that.

  “Atheist” is right up there with “terrorist” in our society.

  Mother used to tell me that a religion is a cult dressed in a pretty little hat.

  Anyway, God—or at least the belief in Him—

  wasn’t what stopped me; I just got yellow. Besides, I didn’t think it right that I should die before Mr. Simons.

  Thinking of that made me want to live to see the man rot away. Rot. A. Way.

  I kept myself in excellent shape for a bit after my suicide adventures, trying to up my life force to outlive him—one of the stages of murder recovery, I suppose.

  I toned my muscles up nicely, and my back seemed to straighten itself without my effort. Eventually, though, I slipped backwards and gained twenty pounds to the fifteen I had lost. In the end, I regained my love for cheeseburgers. Life is all about progress and regression, and when the former loses out to the latter, you can be sure that before too long, birds will be using your headstone for a hopper. We are all carcasses waiting to happen, and that’s strangely reassuring to me.

  I wish I could tell you that my meeting Jill came at a dramatic moment—changing her tire in the rain, an encounter at the Grand Canyon, etc. Sorry to say, Page 11

  it didn’t. Life rarely works the way the movies make it seem. She was wearing a fuzzy, orange shirt. It had a V-neck and ran all the way down to her thighs. Man, did she look incredible. We were in a stationery store; I had gone in for cigarettes. I later gave up smoking altogether (for a while), but at that point in time, I hadn’t even worked my way down to lights. Giving up cigarettes is a lot like giving up eating or breathing, or like losing your best friend. You feel like you’ll die if you don’t get another drag, and sooner or later you become jealous of everybody you see with a butt in their hand.

  Dangerous as smoking is, the chances that any one smoker will die from it are not all that great, considering. So there they stand, those damn smokers, puffing away, most likely without retaliatory measures awaiting from the man in the black cloak. And you get very jealous. Most especially, you get jealous of smoking athletes. These people smoke a pack-plus daily and still run six-minute miles like nobody’s business. I mean, what’s that about? I halfway hope to develop diabetes or something like that just so I can smoke and smoke and smoke to my heart’s content. You can’t die twice, and you only live once.

  Jill was standing in the card aisle looking at Mother’s Day cards. I was on my way out when I noticed her. I was twenty-two, and had never before approached a woman I didn’t know. Most of my dates had come as a result of friendships gone awry. Something was different in this case though. I’m not saying it was love at first sight; I don’t believe in such a thing. That’s just the groin talking.

  Anyway, it wasn’t love at first sight. It wasn’t a psychic thing or an issue of fate. I’m also not a new-ager. I don’t name my pets after minerals. I just felt from a practical standpoint that should I get rejected, I could quietly walk away and never see her again. I guess I had never realized that before. Up to that time, I always felt that women held all the power in this life.

  Ah, let’s face it, they do.

  I just walked over to her and said, “Mother’s Day.

  The cards come out earlier every year.” Page 12

  Certainly not the wittiest or most profound comment, but it broke the ice, and hey, I was nervous, so fuck off.

  “I suppose they do.”

  I tried several other openings, but each elicited a similarly curt reply. At the time I thought she was playing the part of a cautiously standoffish woman. I later found out that her mother died when Jill was young. Jill looked at the cards to live vicariously, if only for a moment, and she had been reminiscing when I approached. Her distraction was understandable; I hear her mom was a terrific woman.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, really I am. It’s just that I’m new to the city and I don’t know anybody here.

  I need someone to show me around, and I. .was hoping you might do that.”

  I was afraid of her reaction, and took the desperate and pathetic route.

  “I’d pay you, of course.”

  Not my finest moment, certainly, but I hoped to sound disarming.

  After a brief question/answer period, and to my utter shock, she agreed to my request. (No payment necessary, of course.) I don’t guess I came off as a particularly threatening man. I don’t guess I ever did.

  Samantha might disagree, out there in the forest.

  We hit it off. Jill admired my honesty and openness, and we had our first kiss on Farmer’s Bridge, down by the lake. We married nine months later. Very quick for people so young, I’m aware, but we knew it was right. We always knew. It was a small wedding, and my brother was my best man. We’re not especially close, but I felt it only right. This was before he found the love of his life—her initials are P.C.P. My dad’s not in the picture; I’ll leave it at that.

  So we walked the aisle on a very pleasant day, and thus began a lifetime of utter bliss. Until that prick took her from me.

  It should have been someone else. My eighth grade teacher was a real conservative, volatile fuck—the type to send you to the principal’s office if you showed up twelve seconds late, even if your pancreas hung Page 13

  out of your ass. It should have been his wife who was slaughtered. He deserved it, not me. People like him—

  assholes—never get the bad stuff. They just keep on. .

  existing so they can pull the rug out from under another misguided child. Little viruses they are. Repugnant, vile parasites condemned to miserable lives.

  Edwards—that was his name—had a real skinny wife. She’d meet him down at the school each afternoon.

  If they’d been fanciful, carefree people, I’d presume it was so they could go fuck somewh
ere and reaffirm their eternal, undying love. Not these two, though. A couple of heartless, soulless, gutless Antichrists. God knows she should have had her throat cut. I might do it for her.

  Now that I consider, she’s probably already dead. I can’t help but smile, though I promise you it’s a small smile.

  I remember feeling tremendously lonely during my drunken stage—not just for the love a woman provides, but for basic human companionship.

  Loneliness comes and goes with your situation in life, and nobody likes it. You show me a happy loner, and I’ll show you an attractive scrotum.

  The actual feeling of being alone is not so bad. With a few beers and a good western flick, you can shake it off. At times, you feel lucky not to have someone nagging you at every commercial break. The real horror is the vulnerability you assume. People who are lonely can be exploited for favors and for money.

  The lonelier you feel, the harder you try to dig out of the hole, often spending too much money and getting yourself into awkward or even dangerous situations.

  Believe me, I know. Before I was married, I was beaten and robbed at a bar by some girl with an attitude. By a girl. She wasn’t a brute or anything. She caught me from behind, and her hand was packed with something, I’m sure. So I know what loneliness can breed.

  I know all too well.

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  Chapter Three

  I started to crave conversation. I ran out to the curb to get my mail, but Tom was no sucker, and after the coffee incident, our conversations were brief and cold. I can’t say I blame him. Tommy Jefferson. Poor bastard had a lot to live up to. Might as well name your kid Christ or some such.

  I began to go out in an effort to make friends, something I hadn’t tried to do since high school. I discovered something very interesting: there are a lot of pricks out there. A lot of people who aren’t very interesting, as well. Once in a while you find a good apple, but usually they have busy lives and your relationship with them ends when one of you walks out of the bar, or stumbles out, depending on just how good a conversation we’re talking about.

  I remember one night in particular when I walked spontaneously into a Goth bar. I must admit, I loved the atmosphere. Plenty of black curtains, red candles, dried wax, and circular glass tables. Music was piped in at immeasurable volume. It was dark, depressing, and at times downright scary. If it were possible to smell heroin from five feet, I would have keeled over, I’m sure.

  The place was filled with potential nodders. Axioms (as the bar was called) was also rather interesting. There were some good freaks there with all the piercings, tats, and zoned-out looks. I highly recommend going to one of these places at least once in your life, especially if you don’t consider yourself the type. Just be sure to take an open mind. A can of mace wouldn’t hurt either.

  I was feeling rather lonely and sad that night. I met a tall blonde named Alisha who had an expression on her face to match my own. We talked at the bar for two hours, and we must have been quite remarkable sight—a thirty-something guy in a cheap suit talking to a twenty-two year old girl with streaks of blue in her hair and multiple piercings. Anyway, it turned out that she was going through a rough patch in her life as well.

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  She was originally from Jersey, but her parents had kicked her out when she was eighteen; apparently they had never seen eye to eye. After struggling by herself in the East Coast grind, Alisha made her way out here.

  She had run out of money six months earlier, and had lived on the streets until taking a job six weeks prior to our meeting. She wanted to go home to her friends (she still had no use for her family), but that was 2,000

  miles and many bad memories away. We’ve all heard the story before. Thankfully, most of us haven’t lived it.

  The conversation did wonders for our moods, and the liquor did wonders for our sex drives. We ended up screwing in the club’s ladies’ room. Somehow I don’t think I was her first. Despite the fact that I was still in mourning for Jill, I didn’t feel an ounce of guilt at the time, and I certainly don’t now. Sex is sex. I don’t imagine I was any good, though—drunk, tired, and out of practice.

  It’s funny what you remember. The stall we were in was filthy with graffiti. Mostly it was just “I was here” and the “Jeff sucks dick” kind of stuff, but there was one message I remember well. On the door in black ink was scrawled “It’s too late for Linda.” I had no idea who Linda was, but I sure hope it turned out okay for her. A lot of lonely people live and die on the doors of bathroom stalls.

  I stuck a twenty in Alisha’s purse when she wasn’t looking. I wanted to help, but didn’t want her feeling like a whore. Maybe she did anyway. Oh, well, at least she wouldn’t be a hungry whore. Not that night.

  I got myself involved in a once-a-week poker match. I had played some with my dad, the asshole, as a lad, and I remembered loving it. That had been a long time ago, though, so I bought myself a refresher book.

  I found an ad in the classifieds looking for a fourth.

  Three losers, no doubt, looking for a fourth. I was their man. The next weekend, I showed up at a ranch that had some of the most spectacular landscaping I’d ever seen. Turned out the homeowner was a horticulturist.

  Not a bad person to know on the “got pull” scale. If there’s one thing to remember in life, it’s this: make Page 16

  friends with a carpenter, a dentist, and an attorney.

  There’s nary a crisis one of those three gents can’t fix, and free is damn cheap, if you get my drift.

  Three loser friends greeted me at the door: Don, Terry, and Reynolds. I don’t know if Reynolds was his first or last name; I didn’t care, so I didn’t bother to ask. We were at his house and I remember it smelled of cheese.

  I played okay and actually came out a few dollars ahead, but I was bored out of my skull. I guess poker’s not really about the cards, but the company. That’s why solitaire is the finest game: you get to spend some quality time with your best friend.

  Anyway, there I was with three idiots who were sitting around talking about the nagging tendencies of their wives. That was not my idea of a good time, especially as my own wife was currently serving as a soup kitchen for earthworms and earwigs. One of the guys had a fat wart on his cheek —Don, I think. I kept wanting to stick it with a pin to see what came out. The beer was bad, though, and bad beer’s good beer when you’re playing cards. Makes you feel like more of a man, I guess. I needed to feel masculine that night.

  It wasn’t too long after Poker Night One-andOnly that I decided it was time to bail. The city was eating at me. The media wasn’t all over me anymore, but there were reminders everywhere. For Christ’s sake, I don’t know how I stayed there so long, being that my wife was killed across the street. A lot of alcohol, I guess. I also felt obligated for a while, like Jill would have wanted me to stay. Then I realized that was just a bunch of horse shit people say when they’re despondent.

  Jill had been out planting flowers, of all things.

  At least I think that’s what she was doing. My mind is hazy, and now that I think of it, autumn isn’t a planting season. I don’t think it is, anyway. Fuck. Regardless, she was out doing some kind of planting/weeding/

  digging thing when she was murdered. It wasn’t even on our property. She was prettying up the curb area across the street. Town property. That’s the kind of person Jill was.

  I was sick that week, and was watching game Page 17

  shows when she was killed. Fucking game shows. That little fact gave me quite the guilt complex later on. But I didn’t do anything wrong, damn it. I realize that now.

  Just because I didn’t happen to be outside at the time doesn’t mean I did anything wrong. Time of death was set at 6:30 p.m., give or take. I fell asleep around 8:00, and didn’t wake up until midnight. I was concerned when I didn’t see Jill by my side, so I threw on my jacket over my pajamas.

  My Jill lay there for five and a half hours in the rain, body exposed to the wo
rld. It took me a half-hour after finding her to compose myself enough to call the police. Detective Morris and I actually had our first chat while I was in my pajamas. I’m sure he gets that all the time though. Cops and priests, I guess, have the most entertaining stories.

  Priests can’t share their tales of course; that’s got to be a bitch. No, I take it back. They must tell other priests. No one could resist that kind of temptation, I’m sure of it. No one could resist a good laugh, even at the expense of someone else. Especially at the expense of someone else. They probably trade stories like some people trade baseball cards.

  When I proposed to Jill, there were no nerves. I felt completely at ease, which some people might say is a bad omen. “No fear, no future”—that’s what I’ve heard.

  But Jill and I were right for each other, and marriage was only an afterthought. I gave her a ring. She made me take it back, almost angry at the fact that I had given her it. Jill wasn’t into pretense or love-proving or hokey traditions.

  We spent the money from the ring on our honeymoon—a hokey tradition, for sure, but a damn fine one. I wouldn’t have thought there was a woman in this world who would turn down a diamond ring, but I found living proof that I was mistaken. We ended up buying her a faux-silver serpent ring which she wore in a sarcastic fashion, poking fun at normalcy. There’s no fun in normalcy.

  I remember a guy at work once telling me he fell in love with his wife because she was sane and had good moral values, whatever that means. Those things Page 18

  make for a good coworker, but should be assumed in a life partner. You don’t marry someone simply because they’re not evil fucks. And maybe your spouse should be a little crazy. Just a little though.

  My coworker—the one with the moral wife—

  was a real animal. I mean a total slob. He left a trail of dirt behind him at all times. It was like he’d never evolved. Probably had himself an os bone. You know what that is? It’s a penis bone, and apparently all the other mammals or primates or some crap have ‘em.

  People argue why we lost the damn things, but I figure it’s all a conspiracy by those erection people in the lab coats. Couldn’t be selling their little pills if we were all walking around with bones in our dicks. I need a bone like that. Some days, anyway. More now than then.