Deadly Rage
by Denise Johnson

He collapsed into the chair next to the open window and muttered, “What have I done?” He rubbed his hand on his forehead and felt something wet. He looked at his hand and noticed it was bleeding. “I must have cut it with the knife,” he thought to himself as he grimaced.
    He needed to wash off, so he stumbled into the bathroom. “Damn, there’s no soap in here,” he remarked to himself, shaking his head in disbelief. Could anything else go wrong, he thought, as he rubbed his hands together under the cold running water. The blood did not come off easily, staining the towel as he dried his hands. He shoved the towel into the hamper of dirty laundry, as deep as he could, and covered it with a sweatshirt.
    He quickly ran upstairs to their bedroom to change. “I need to get out of these clothes and clean up the mess downstairs before they get here,” he thought to himself. He threw on a pair of tan slacks and chose a black long sleeve dress shirt that he rarely wore. “It still fits,”  he murmured, as he looked at himself in the mirror.
    Realizing the time, he ran downstairs and quickly scanned the room. Thinking of the knife, he decided to backtrack into the kitchen to get a paper towel to pick it up with. Nearing the window, he noticed a car pulling up into the driveway.
    He dropped the knife into the dishwasher and started the wash cycle. “Just a little more to do before I let them in.” he whispered. Sweat was beginning to run down his face. He wiped it off with the back of his hand, hoping they wouldn’t notice. The perspiration stung the cut on his hand causing him to wince with pain.
    Noticing her purse on the table, he picked it up and shoved it behind some boxes. He turned off some lights hoping they wouldn’t notice the mess. When he heard the doorbell ring, he combed through his hair with his fingers and opened the door.
    “Happy Birthday, son!” his father sang. His mother pushed past him, carrying containers of food. How am I going to get through this, he thought. “Where’s Cheryl?”
his mother asked, looking up the stairway to the second floor. She knew they were not getting along.
    They hadn’t been for months, not since he had found out about the business trip. The business trip where she had gotten drunk and fallen into bed with her boss. She hadn’t told him for months and when she did, it was because she had lost her job. Later, on a subsequent business trip, she had refused to do so again and she was fired on the spot. So, not only did he have a lying cheat for a wife, but a jobless one at that.
    Eventually, bills began piling up-she didn’t seem to be making an effort to look for work. They argued incessantly, and increasingly the fights were becoming violent. He began to avoid coming home, and instead went out to the bars with his buddies. He looked for solace in other women’s arms, and time after time, he couldn’t find it.
    He hated Cheryl for changing their lives so drastically with just one stupid decision. He asked her why she did it, and every time she blamed it on too much wine. There had to be more than that, he thought. He asked her if she was unhappy before that night, and though she denied it, she never looked him in the eyes when she responded.
    They were childhood sweethearts and had gotten married very young. They had forgotten to use protection one lust-filled night and their lives changed forever. They decided to keep the baby and he did the only honorable thing he could. They married when she was 17 and he was 19, with her parents’ permission.
    They were young and naďve, and when their baby girl was born they thought they had everything. Allison was the apple of his eye, as all little girls should be to their daddies. They enjoyed every waking moment with her when they were not working and just couldn’t imagine what wonderful future was in store for her. They started saving for her college fund, making sure she would not make the mistakes they had made by not finishing school.
    Then, when she was three years old, she developed a cough. The doctor thought it was  just a cold and told them to put Vick’s vapor rub on her chest. Overnight her cough became explosive with sputum, her temperature rose to a 107. They sped to the hospital, called her pediatrician, and waited in the lobby. Finally, the pediatrician came out with the most somber expression and said, “I’m sorry”.
    “For what?” he said, not understanding. Cheryl began to cry and he looked at her and thought why is she overreacting? The pediatrician explained that Allison developed pneumonia and had died. He stood there, speechless, and then he said “Are you sure?”
    Maybe they were talking about the wrong kid, he thought to himself. Yeah, she was fine yesterday, just a little cough. We talked about going to the park when she felt better. Her birthday was in two weeks, for Christ’s sake. The doctor didn’t answer and he asked again, “Are you sure?”
    “Stop” Cheryl told him. We were led to her room where she lay like she was
sleeping. She looked like an angel. When he grabbed Allison’s hand, it was limp. He looked at Cheryl and watched her turn white as a sheet. As if in slow motion, it seemed, she fainted. Luckily, the doctor caught her. He didn’t think one could ever truly get over losing a child. We grow numb and we find something, anything, to fill the void. Months and years go by and you can barely think about it, for fear if you open that door, the feelings will all rush out, uncontrollably, forcefully, crazily; he thought to himself. Day by day, everyone goes on but there is no mistaking the growing numbness inside.
    His mother’s voice brought him back to the present. “When is she coming back?”
    “Who?” he questions, still not sure what she are talking about.
    “Cheryl, for goodness sake, what’s wrong with you?”
    “Nothing, umm, I’m not sure”, he responds.
    “What do you mean, you aren’t sure? She’s coming back, isn’t she? It’s your birthday!”
    “I think she left, mom.”
    “For good?” his mother asks.
    His dad gives her a look and she wanders off into the kitchen.
    He looks out the window and realizes her car is still in the driveway. I have to get
rid of it, he thinks to himself.
    “Cake’s ready,”  his mother yells from the kitchen. They sit down at the kitchen table as his mother slices the cake and hands him a plate. He looks down at the cake his mother made. It is vanilla with chocolate frosting. He bites into it and it tastes familiar. He realizes that he has had this cake every birthday for over 30 years. He slowly licks the creamy frosting off of the fork. He wonders if he will ever have cake again and whether they allow it in jail?
    He begins sweating profusely as he recalls the events leading up to this moment–how the blood had gotten on to the knife. What am I going to do with the body, he wonders. Omigod, what have I done, he screams inside.
    His mother, seeing that he is not well, walks him to the couch and instructs his dad to get a wet washcloth for his head. He lays down on the couch, hearing them speak, but it sounds muffled, like they are in another room. He wonders if he is going crazy.
    He didn’t have a plan. He had just gotten so mad when she said she was leaving him. He couldn’t take it. What right did she have to do that? I am the one who can leave, he thought, as he grabbed the knife and plunged it into her chest. He plunged it in her body over and over. He drug her lifeless body to the basement and gave it a push and heard it thump against every stair.
    The lights flickered. Damn fuse, he thought. Through the fog in his head, he heard his dad say he would check the fuse box. Before he had a chance to register what this meant, he heard a scream and then thump, thump down the stairs. Then, silence. His mother became hysterical and startled him out of his stupor. He leapt from the couch and ran to the basement and realized there must have been blood on the stairs. “Dad,”  he screamed, “Dad!”
    His mother urges him to go down the stairs but he couldn’t, wouldn’t. “I don’t have a flashlight,” he tells her.
    “Your father isn’t answering, go downstairs,” she pleaded! She pushed him, but he wouldn’t budge. She looked at him as though he were an alien and ran to the phone.
    He ran past and pushed her against the counter. “Don’t,” he growled.
    “What’s wrong with you?” she cried. She looked in his eyes, and frightened, she ran down the hall and locked herself in the bathroom.
    He slid down the wall and sat on the floor and started to cry. He realized she had taken her purse and she had a cell phone. Suddenly, he heard moaning. But it wasn’t his father’s voice. It was a female’s voice. His mother came out of the bathroom and heard it, too. “What did you do?” she cries.
    He heard the roar of the fire truck first, then the police sirens. The firemen rushed in, his mother pointed to the basement and told them the electricity went out. They brought flashlights in and two of them descended the stairs. One yelled, “We got two.”
    His mother looked at them and said “Two what?” 
    “Two bodies, ma’am,” one replied.
    “Two bodies? Is my husband, is my husband dead?” she whispered, barely able to stand.
    The police arrived and the firemen talked to them. “One male, DOA, and one female, shallow pulse, bleeding profusely, multiple fractures and contusions,” he heard them say.
    His mother looks at him, and then pointed and said, “He did it, he killed him.”
    The police officers pulled him up off the floor where he was still sobbing and handcuffed him. As he is led out, he saw his mother look at him as though he were poison. No more cake he thought to himself.
    As he sat in the back of the squad car, he watches the ambulance personnel carry the stretchers to the waiting ambulances. One body is in a body bag and the other is covered with a blanket. A tear rolls down his face as the police car pulls away.

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