Myrtle Bendicutt roared. She did this every morning, or rather early afternoon, when she awoke, usually after brushing the thin, powdery-white layer of dead skin from her mattress but before she emptied her bladder of the previous evening’s generous portion of light beer. It was a roar which had a history of upsetting the neighbors and frightening any children who might be playing nearby, yet it was imperative to Myrtle’s fragile health that she impel the spirits which had consumed her slumbering body out with such force and volume that it would serve as a warning to other evils who might be hovering about that she would not put up with them or their like and would rather suffer a slightly sore throat and strained vocal chords than have to deal with invasive demons. On average, Myrtle could tolerate guests for only a minute or two and, as she hadn’t had a houseguest in over fifty years, she thought it would be damned contradictive to allow ghosts to invade her soul, so she began the day with a roar and a shake of her arms, then plodded to the bathroom in her faded pink slippers to relieve her withered body of its liquid burden.
By the time the coffeemaker spat its morning joe into the glass jar that waited under it, Myrtle had donned her brunette wig wrapped in large pink curlers and been outside to grab the newspaper from the dirt driveway. She sat in her colorless sofa chair and read the previous days’ football scores while chugging down the jar of coffee.
Crapper, Myrtle’s overweight tabby, limped into the room and stopped to rub her side against the leg of the kitchen table. She had at one time been called Petunia, but Myrtle had renamed her after the house adopted the cat's consistent odor. Had Crapper possessed the ability to speak, she would have explained to her caretaker that the wonder of opposable thumbs gave Myrtle the advantage over her and that she, as a feline, was not able to clean her own litter box and it was therefore not her fault for causing such foulness to invade the household air. No matter, though, for Crapper couldn’t speak and truly didn’t care what the house reeked of anyway. She had grown accustomed to it just as Myrtle had. Besides, she was a housecat and didn’t have to worry about other cats judging her by her odor as other humans did with Myrtle.
The local news section of the newspaper was open on Myrtle’s lap when Crapper began clawing at the torn fabric covering one corner of the chair. The other corners had already been shredded and gutted, revealing the wooden base and leaving behind traces of yellow foam clinging around the edges. “Knock it off, you dirty rodent!” Myrtle cried as her arm swiped at the retreating cat.
“Listen here, cat. Paper says a guy raped some poor girl in the park last night, says it was a date gone wrong. Sonofabitch!” She threw the paper to the floor and downed three gulps of coffee. “No decent girl can find a decent fella anymore, they’re all getting raped every time they go out for dinner and a movie. Where do these kids meet these men anyway? Probably in porno theaters or down ‘round the Greyhound station. Poor girl.”
She rose and plodded to the kitchen to make more coffee. “Law doesn’t handle men like that. If they catch him, they’ll just let him slip through so he can go out and rape some more dates. They won’t ever catch him anyway. I’ll bet he’s vice-president of something. Un-touch-able!” She looked out the window and saw three kids walking through her garden toward the park. The garden was mostly dirt and weeds, but her one baby tomato plant was still clinging to life and it upset Myrtle to see harm come near in the form of the failed abortions who now trod through.
The screen door cracked open and the children knew they’d been caught. “You motherfuckers get outta my rose garden!” they heard as they ran. A glass jar shattered at their scurrying feet and their tennis shoes were stained with steaming coffee.
Myrtle spat at the dust clouding the air around her and retreated into the safety of her living room to watch Court TV.
* * * * *
The subject of rape is a heavy burden to bear on the mind, and by the time Myrtle made a conscious effort to relieve her thoughts of the matter, it was far too late. The words from the newspaper article courted and seduced her judgment until she could concentrate on nothing else. They invaded and raged and plundered through her. They violated and forced and ravaged their way into the dark recesses of her being. By six o’clock that evening, Myrtle’s blood pressure had risen to 180/120, her gums had begun to bleed, and the bathtub was overflowing because she forgot that she had intended to bathe.
It was rape that finally sent Myrtle to the coat closet by the front door. Decades of tolerance blinded by helplessness were put to rest this evening when she made up her mind to act and struggled momentarily to jerk the closet door free from its snug housing caused by too many coats of paint. The door was freed like a disgorged Jack-In-the-Box and vibrated in her hands from the force. A moth gasped for air as it flew from within and Myrtle dove in between the musty coats and the faded and frayed sweaters and clawed her way to a back corner, where her hands combed the darkness until at last they found their target. She seemed to flex every disrepaired muscle in her body as both hands struggled to free all sixty-two inches and twenty gauges and double barrels of the shotgun from the corner, although the clothes in the closet seemed not to want the gun to part, as they grasped and clung and fought to keep it within. After much struggle and panting and carrying on, Myrtle popped from the closet, victoriously wielding the weapon and determined as hell to use it if only she could find the strength to lift it.
From this moment forward, Myrtle would no longer turn away when confronted with reports of late-night muggings. Never again would she offer defenseless excuses when faced with moral turpitude. The moments of rusty latitude were over; her hands were freed from their binds. Myrtle was suffering from Howard Beale’s disease…she was as mad as hell and was not going to take it anymore.
The screen door was shoved open by the barrel of the shotgun and Myrtle struggled through, awkwardly trying to balance the gun while straightening her red, pigtailed wig over her disheveled and thinning hair. Her housecoat caught on the latch handle and yanked her back, momentarily slowing her determined flow, but soon Myrtle had torn the frock free and continued on her way to the park, oblivious to the fact that the rip in her dress exposed a portion of her drooping buttock.
At this time of the summer evening, the park was aglow with the golden light of the sun as it dropped toward the skyline. Children spent their last remaining energy running and playing before heading home for dinner and sleep. Parents lay on the grass, sweaty and panting after hours of watching their kids run and play. The Bucking Broncos practiced their soccer skills before the big Friday night game in the junior league against the Rangers, and dogs frolicked with each other and chased after tennis balls and Frisbees while trying to surreptitiously mount each other. It was a grand evening in MacGillicuddy Park.
Myrtle clambered through the bushes with great difficulty and finally emerged onto the park’s open field, but not before using her face to unintentionally break an enormous and intricate web which had been finished not twenty minutes prior by an exhausted Labyrinth spider. In fact, Myrtle was grousing and cursing the bush as she struggled through and happened to walk into the web at the moment she spoke the word, “motherfucker,” which left her mouth open to engulf the poor, resting spider, who found himself trapped in a moist and dark place that no creature should ever have the misfortune of being captured in. Myrtle coughed and swallowed the spider and tore the web from her wretched face and was made even more annoyed by the whole situation. Her face was red with boiling blood.
Almost a full minute passed before anyone noticed the frumpy woman in the sexy wig carrying a shotgun that was almost as tall and heavy as it’s bearer. Janet Bly was waiting for her beagle to finish relieving himself on a barbecue grill when Myrtle stumbled toward them. Janet and the dog saw her at the same instant, and the dog’s stream of urine stopped just as Janet’s started. Myrtle walked by and was even further annoyed by the intensity of Janet’s scream so close to her ear.
Myrtle’s yellowed eyes scanned the area for potential criminals. She saw only blurred masses of various sizes and shades, as she had lost her glasses in the bushes, but she studied each mass with equal judgment before deciding that the low and long blur thirty paces to her left was a rape in progress. She heaved the barrel of the gun up and aimed it in the direction of the slithering lump as she approached.
Tom Bennett had met Suzie Farrow at the Greyhound station the previous week and had thought her attractive enough to try her on a date. It had only taken a large pizza and four wine coolers to reveal that she was a sexual dynamo, and they had spent the past two days either in bed or on the kitchen counter or in the shower or against the living room wall. They were now slowing down by having a hot and heavy make-out session under the oaks of the park and were quite astonished when the scratchy and aged voice hollered out to “get the fuck offa her, you filthy beast.” Tom looked up to find two barrels of a long and mean shotgun pointed at the protruding lump in his trousers and reacted accordingly. He scrambled up from atop Suzie and backed into a tree, his hands outstretched to stop whatever buckshot might come his way. Suzie crawled back and out of the way and began to blubber.
“You lousy rapists, you can’t do like everyone else and get yourself off at home, you gotta date these poor, innocent girls and take ‘em to the park and force yourself on ‘em! No more, I tell you!” She pulled the fore trigger and the hammer hit its mark, although the primer was slow to react and it took a moment before the powder ignited in a small patch of flame which burst from the chamber and momentarily blinded Myrtle. The cartridge shot failed to project from the barrel, however, as the shell had cracked from age and spilled its harmful elements onto the floor of the coat closet long ago. Tom saw his chance and bolted.
“Goddamnit!” Myrtle cried. “You wait a minute! Get back over here!” She swung the gun around and was knocked to the ground by the opposing force created by the intact second shell’s buckshot as it sped out of the chamber and flew toward Tom’s fleeing back.
Suzie screamed as Myrtle used the shotgun to clamber to her feet. She looked about and saw that the park was empty. Wailing sirens approached. Myrtle had failed to consider an exit strategy, but in her youth she had been known for her ability to evaluate a situation and react quickly. She dropped the gun and tossed her wig into the branches of the nearest tree, then peeled her housecoat over her head and threw it into the minor evening breeze. She scurried away as fast as her swollen ankles would move, her naked body flopping fiercely with every step. Passing Tom, she spat at his twitching body. “Don’t mess with me, bucko!” she cried. With that, she roared and shook her arms and hobbled away into the copper of a summer sunset.
No comments:
Post a Comment