The One Percenters (3 page)

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
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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 somewhere 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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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
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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
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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 world. 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
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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.

I moved three states south. The particulars aren’t important; I just wanted to go warmer. Here’s the kicker. When I went, I really went. I needed a new start, so I put my house on the market, and before it even closed I rooted through all my stuff, threw out anything that wasn’t completely essential, and packed my car. I told myself if it didn’t fit in the car, it wasn’t going. I pulled into a new town with a packed car and a fat wallet. I had taken out a substantial amount of money so that I wouldn’t have to fool with the bank for a while. As a life rule, I avoid banks as much as humanly possible. They are soulless institutions. I cheer when they get robbed. And why not? My money’s insured.

I’ve always wanted to rob a bank before I die. To shove one of those little notes into some mousy teller’s face and scare the shit out of her. I’d love to feel that kind of power just once. Hell, I’d give the money back. Who needs money when you can make people shit their pants? The first thing I did in my new town of Clefton was go to the park. Not a bad gauge of a place. The cleanliness of the parks is a reflection on a city’s integrity. I’d swear by it. The only thing about parks, though, is you have to keep an eye out for the pedophiles and flashers. Parks are like their second home. It’s all the kiddies there, I suppose. It’s like raw meat to them.

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I was quick to get an apartment. Those southern apartments go for the cheap and easy. I bought a bumper sticker. I’ll spare you its witticism; suffice to say it was dirty-minded. I’m not the kind of person who would display such a thing on his car, but it sure looked good on my footlocker. I unpacked, and got the bachelor pad into decent shape within hours.

Then I slept the good sleep. It’s my hope that death is like sleep. Best eight hours you’ll ever spend on this planet, and you get to do it every night.