Fiction Short Story

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Fiction Short Story

by Marshall Bye

Murder Impetuous

I bounded up the stairs to my front door, glad to be home early for a change. The week-long business trip half way across the country had left me anxious to get home to the loving arms of my wife of nearly a year.

I unlocked the door and entered. The quietness overwhelmed me. Usually Paula had the radio blaring.

"Hi honey," I called. "Paula, I'm home." There was no response. I set the box of Godiva truffles and special birthday card for her on the hall table. I had crafted the card on the computer the previous evening -- a card expressing my total devotion.

I took the steps two at a time up to our bedroom and flung open the door.

The sickening scene flashed before me. Then it all registered in slow motion. Two naked bodies were writhing on the bed: a dark haired man on top of my wife. I saw her slender pearly-porcelain legs entwined around his thick waist. His black hair and full beard blocked out my wife's face showing only her long blonde hair splayed across the pillow. They were both moaning and completely enthralled in each other.

They never heard me.

The next I knew, I was stabbing the animal on top of my wife. In a frenzy of shock and hate I stabbed and stabbed. I stabbed my precious white princess too; blood splattered over the white walls, across the white sheets, and across the bodies.

Suddenly I stopped, and in a trance dropped the knife and stumbled downstairs. Breathing heavily I leaned on the kitchen table. My eyes, blinded with hate, fear and tears, slowly cleared. Through a fog of confusion, I saw a note sitting on the kitchen table.

It read, "Sweetheart, Cindy is using our house today. She's entertaining her boy friend, Ward. I'm working late so be a darling and pick me up at Moe's Hamburgers. Love, Paula."

My gut contracted as if struck by a cannon ball. My knees turned to jelly, and I slumped into a heap on the vinyl floor.

All the hate dissipated. Fear started to pump through my arteries. Fire ran rampant through every nerve of my body.

"I killed Cindy!" I yelled to my own ears.

Cindy, Paula's twin sister was in town for a week while I was away. Ward, her lover, wanted a legal separation from his wife, Gloria, who refused to any such agreement.

I threw myself prostrate on the checkered floor and screamed again and again. "I killed them for nothing!"

The magnitude of what I had done slowly seeped in and I was overcome by the enormity of it all. I lay there for sometime. Lethargically, my mind started to work again. I realized I had to take counter-actions. I rose slowly, first to a sitting position, then on one knee, and finally by the time I was upright and steady on my feet, I was drafting a plan.

I was sure no one had seen me arrive. I worked quickly to erase all signs that I had been in the house that evening. I removed my bloody clothes and donned a new shirt and suit. The bloody clothes I put in a plastic bag for disposal after I left the house. I polished my shoes anew. I wiped away my fingerprints and placed the bloody knife on the floor beside the bed. I grabbed the extra house key and this I inserted and left in the front door. I knew Paula had given Gloria a key for emergency purposes. They'd think Gloria, the betrayed wife, had been there.

Once in my car, I called Paula on my cell. "Hi dear," I calmly started, "my plane's landed and I'm in my car."

"Oh Vince," Paula exclaimed, "You're early. Have you been home yet?"

"No, I'm leaving the airport now."

"Don't go home. Cindy is there, entertaining her lover. I told her we wouldn't be home until nine-thirty. Come and pick me up at Moe's Hamburgers; I'll be finished with my shift in an hour."

"Is our house a den of iniquity now?" I joked. The irony of the question hit me hard. "I'll be there in about 45 minutes. Bye, love." I hit the end button.

As Paula and I walked across the parking lot to where I had parked my blood-red Camry, we joked about my weekend away.

"I hope you haven't forgotten my birthday," Paula chided, for I had been known to do just that. For the second time in one day, my knees buckled and I slumped to the ground.

"What's wrong? What is it, Vince?"

I placed my head in my hands. I had left the box of truffles and birthday card on the table in the hall.

The End

© Copyright 2002 Marshall Bye

About the Author:

Marshall Bye is a retired educator with over 30 textbooks to his name. During his first five years of retirement he edited and published an eight-page four-color newsletter for the local Trout Unlimited Chapter. He is now fulfilling a lifelong ambition to write in the creative field. He has had an item published in his local newspaper, The Calgary Herald. His work has appeared in Back Home Magazine and in Birdwatcher's Digest. Tickle by Thunder selected one of his stories for The Years' Best. He lives with his wife in Calgary at the foot of the Rockies where they enjoy being near their family.