Something Fierce (36 page)
Authors: David Drayer
The buzzer on the dryer went off shattering what was left of the moment. It reminded him of a buzzer at the end of a basketball game signaling that the game was over and it was time for everyone to go home. There was a God, he thought, and He just spoke through Tina and Mark’s dryer.
“What are you smiling at?”
He shook his head. “Life, I guess. I’ll get your clothes.”
“We’re not done here yet.”
“Yeah, we are. It’s time for you to go home.”
He went into the laundry room and pulled her clothes—hot and snapping—from the dryer. “I forgot to put in a dryer sheet,” he said walking back into the kitchen, “so there’s a lot of…” The sweat pants and t-shirt he lent her were crumpled on the floor; she was naked except for the high-heeled boots.
“Are you sure we’re done here?”
Nothing she could have done would have made him more sure. This was Kerri. Manipulative. Conniving. And—he realized for the first time—desperate. Brazenly playing the only card she believed she had to play. “Yes. I’m sure.” He handed over her clothes. “Get dressed, Kerri. Go home.”
She slapped the clothes out of his hands. He expected some tears, maybe some awkwardness, but it was all anger. Rage. This was yet another Kerri he didn’t know. She pounded her fists on his chest and told him she hated him in one breath and begged him not to leave her in the next. He grabbed her arms to keep her from hitting him. “Let me go!” she screamed. “You’re hurting me!”
She broke free of him then, swooped up the clothes that had fallen on the floor and clomped to the front door. Red splotches had broken out like rashes across her chest, her face was flushed, her eyes pure hatred. She went off again, telling him that he was crazy. That she should have known better than to give him another chance. “You will regret this the rest of your life!” she screamed, adding that he was getting old, that he would never make it as a writer, that he’d in fact, never write anything good ever again. That he would never find love, never find peace.
These, he realized, were fears lifted directly from his journal, summarized and fashioned into a weapon she thought she could hurt him with. But he was no longer afraid of those things. At least not as afraid of them as he was when he first met Kerri Engel, that wild, beautiful girl who was now the shrieking, naked maniac standing in his sister’s kitchen. As she seethed, “loser…nobody…sex addict…penniless…lonely,” he felt a calmness come over him. He was outside of this ugly, bizarre scene, an observer of it, and yet, he was fully in himself able to be here in this moment without absorbing the pain and madness that spewed from her. He’d never been this calm during their fights. Something in him had changed. What, he couldn’t explain, but it was a difference he could feel and he was thankful for it.
Kerri went out the door then, slamming it so hard he was surprised the glass didn’t break.
Everything was quiet then.
Quiet.
He gathered their mugs and carried them to the sink. “Things are going to be okay,” he said. Then there was a scream. “Oh, no.” He grabbed the mop and ran to the window.
Kerri’s car was still in the driveway but she wasn’t in it. Her clothes were scattered across the ground. He ran outside.
He knew that there were many images of Kerri Engel that would be forever imprinted on his mind. However, this one of her running naked—but in boots—down a dirt road, chased by a turkey named Devil, and screaming, “Get off of me, you motherfucker!” would surely trump them all. It was a nod from the universe telling him he’d made the right call earlier and asking, “This is the woman you thought you were in love with? The one you let break your heart? Seriously?”
“Stop running,” he shouted. “You have to face him! Show him you are not afraid!”
But it was no use. She was afraid. So much so that she couldn’t find a single moment of courage, which is all it would have taken to get Devil off her ass. A single moment.
Mop in hand, Seth ran after them and charged the turkey. Their showdown had gone much as it had earlier. By the time the crazy bird had retreated back to the woods, Kerri was pulling out of the driveway. Still nude and visibly upset, she whizzed past and threw something out the window at him. His journal. He picked it up and dusted it off.
Seth turned then to watch her drive away. Clouds of dust billowed up behind her. She was like a tornado tearing through the valley and he was relieved to see her go, knowing they’d shared something he may never fully understand, something terrible and beautiful, something sexy and sad, something fierce.
David Drayer is the author of the novel
Strip Cuts
. He was born and raised in the small town of Rimersburg, Pennsylvania. A playwright and screenwriter, he has an MFA from the University of Iowa and has worked across the country as a ghostwriter, college professor, and government contractor. Drayer has a penchant for open-ended motorcycles trips, long hikes, and good food. Currently, he lives in the Washington, D.C. Metro Area.
