19
19
ATTACK THE ATTACKER
M rs. Dubois was a rail thin artist who chose a curious shade of burgundy for her severe bob. She also had a suspicious shade of emerald for an eye color and a penchant for wearing jewel toned tunics with statement necklaces. She felt herself to be very hip and, therefore, was very “down” with me sticking around a little bit to get ready for my “bangin’” college party. She even offered up some wardrobe choices from her walk-in closet. It came complete with chandelier, rotating hanging rods that I thought were only for dry cleaners, and beaded bags displayed like works of art in their niches. A prominent artsy photo of her in the nude, with one hand thrown above her head a la Kate Winslet in Titanic , greeted me.
I politely declined, citing college casual. She argued with me until I removed my peasant shirt to reveal my real ensemble: cashmere navy tube top on top of my skin tight white jeans. They’d become so tight I could barely bend over to pull on my gold heels I pulled from my backpack. I stuffed Pete’s favorite shirt inside and paused, but Mrs. Dubois still wouldn’t leave the room, I guess vicariously living through me while I got ready. While I worked, she made suggestions for colors from her “personal palette” that would “bring out the blue in my eyes.”
Like that would help.
Finally, she offered to mix us some “organic cranberry slammers,” so I readily agreed, needing her to skedaddle so I could rifle through the pharmacy she had going on in her top drawer. I thought one of her anti-anxiety drugs might be a little safer for my victim than Bob’s crushed up Percocet. Sure enough, I found the little orange squares that Mrs. Dubois used to “stave off panic attacks” and noted they “easily dissolved,” so I peeled back the foil and stuffed it into my front pocket. That would sure be a lot easier to work with than a suspicious-looking white powder carried around in a plastic baggy.
Hopefully, Nick Attacker would be one of those big drinking partiers, and I wouldn’t even need to use a sedative. Mrs. Dubois and I traipsed down the stairs together, sipping our very delicious cranberry slammers and chatting about our favorite subject: how “smokin’ hot” my boyfriend was. But suddenly my nerves attacked my stomach, or else the cranberry slammer didn’t agree with me. I excused myself to call my “hotty,” and dumped half my freshly juiced cocktail down the drain. I informed Pete the Dubois had taken off for their evening on the town, and I was cuddled up on the couch with their Pomeranian, Pinky, getting ready to watch a movie.
In reality I found myself on the couch, wedged between a Mr. and Mrs. Dubois, who were vying for my attention like their kids did, only more immaturely. They were in the midst of another one of their endless and pointless debates. This one was about whether or not their family would benefit from a gluten-free diet, even though none of them were actually allergic. I perched there uncomfortably sipping and swiveling my head back and forth as they both tried to sway me to their side. I would’ve considered myself to me Switzerland, except for the amount of heavy perspiring I was doing.
It was rounding on nine now, and I heard the Uber car pull into their driveway. I jumped up, so ready to get this over and done with and get back home to Pete. After a peck-peck on each of Mrs. Dubois’ cheeks and after telling Mr. Dubois, for the third time, that I really didn’t need him to drop me off anywhere, I managed to make my escape.
Fifteen minutes later, I was in one of those older neighborhoods bordering the university that was slowly renovating itself. I paid the Uber guy and told him I would need him again in two to three hours, if he was in the area. Then left him with a huge tip, even though he was already falling over himself to accommodate me.
I faced the skinny clapboard house already fat with milling coeds in various forms of partying and party prep. There was a truck backed up with two guys unloading what looked like a huge metal barrel. One of them hopped off with his plaid shirt, pierced eyebrow, and goatee to come greet me.
“You got a bomb stashed in there?” He nodded at my leather backpack.
I laughed and shook my head and moved to move on when he stepped in front of me. “Here,” he said, relieving me of it. “I’ll just stash this upstairs for you in one of the bedrooms. I live here, by the way.” He finally offered a smile and stuck out his hand. “My name is Stan.”
“Ha! Stan from Stanford,” I joked, shaking his hand.
“Nah. Stan from San Fernando Valley. My roommate, Stupid over there”—he nodded towards a white guy with a red afro, wearing jean shorts and tube socks—“is your Stanford guy.” Pause for me to take him in. “The one who’s trying to unload a keg with a sling he engineered from a hammock.”
I just nodded and smiled. He smiled back.
“Go on in.” Stan waved me forward. “There’s a keg already set up in the kitchen.”
“Fabulous,” I said, slipping my phone into my back pocket before sallying through the door. I already had my pill stashed in my pants and didn’t want to walk around all night with my backpack anyway. And I had no ID or credit cards to worry about. But I did have other things . . .
About a half hour later I found myself with a plastic cup of foamy beer, chatting with two girls, one of which had a mushroom hairdo the color of . . . well, mushrooms, and the other had the wingiest cat-eye I’d ever seen outside Halloween. She kept staring a little too long at me in between her clever remarks. She and her friend were going on about how feminism was dead. I nodded along, keeping one eye out for Nick Attacker while trying to avoid eye contact with other guys. At one point one of the guys, I’d returned a half smile to, came up and asked me if I’d rather have a Jell-O shot. Apparently, I’d been doing more holding than sipping my beer.
Fine. That sounded like something I should try, and my cranberry slammer half buzz had buzzed off anyway. And I was feeling both bored and apprehensive, like a girl who snuck out to go to a party her parents forbid her to go to. Only like, times a thousand, because I also felt like I was cheating. Not to mention I was feeling out of my depth with the in-depth conversation about liberal versus socialist feminism in the new millennium.
So I said goodbye to my new friends, who seemed annoyed but resigned that I was leaving with a guy. Mushroom cap shouted something at me, but I couldn’t hear it over the alternative music blaring through the speakers. I followed the mystery guy back outside to the backyard to freeze in my tube top while I sucked cold Jell-O out of a tiny plastic cup.
Hmmmm. Not bad. A little medicinal tasting maybe, but otherwise just like orange Jell-O. I was just about to thank the guy and scour the party before he attached himself to me, when I heard some hooting that seemed like it was aimed at me. My suspicions were proven correct because right after a loud voice announced: “There’s the hot stalker.” The voices were wafting from above, so I tilted my head up to where a packed balcony had a little VIP party going on.
“Hey, Harley!” One of the guys (not Nick) greeted me. “You made it!”
I recognized Nick Attacker leaning between a couple of his lacrosse buddies with his chin-length hair blowing in the wind. They were up there, smoking cigarettes. I raised eyebrows at this, not sure why. And then I knew why—my Academy was showing.
“I know . . . it’s a filthy habit,” Nick Attacker commented before flicking the butt over.
“Are you attackin’ me with your cigarette?” I started on my offense right away.
His buddies laughed and laughed like I was so funny. Is it bad that I was having a little bit of fun?
“Why don’t you ditch your friend and come on up and join us?” This from the burly black friend who greeted me.
The guy I was with took his cue: “Are you with those guys?” He appeared to be shrinking in size by the second.
“Sorta,” I said at the same time they yelled out, “Hell yeah, she is! Move it along, fella!”
I thanked orange Jell-O for my shot, and he shot off with his tail between his legs.
“Are you comin’ up or what?” was thrown down at me.
I spied a couple of hot girls—one blonde one brown, both in black—up there already but still felt like it was a wrong move, if for no other reason than he hadn’t made a move towards me. Or any gentlemanly move at all, which was a weird thought since this was a one off. It’s not like I wanted the guy to fall in love or anything. I wanted him to think this was a hook up, so we could go back to his place. So I could steal his identification for my boyfriend.
But still . . . I just couldn’t help myself. “Are you comin’ down here or what?” I challenged, legs splayed out, hands on my hips.
Quite a bit more hooting followed this.
Nick Attacker looked both amused and miffed. “The view’s better up here,” he came back with.
Lazy I thought. Used to girls being easy for him. I shook my head.
“Come on, Harley,” he coaxed with an enticing chin nod. “Meet me halfway?”
Now it was my turn to look both miffed and amused. He followed that up by brushing his chin-length hair back, so much the better to see his dazzling smile.
I rolled my eyes and pursed my lips. “Fine,” I said, reminding myself again of the end game—get his license and get out.
“Alright then,” he began walking backward, “I’ll meet you on the stairs.”
I cut through the crowd of beer drinkers on the patio, bypassing some guys getting stoned on the couch, and a couple making out on the stairs, and met him on the landing with a fresh cup of “brew” and a smile. “Here.” I handed him his cup. “I come bearing gifts.”
He laughed at that one and offered me his hand. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to everybody . . . and regift your gift.”
“Why would you do that?”
He gave me a sheepish smile and tucked a piece of his hair behind his ear, a move that looked a bit effeminate, if I’m being honest. “I’m a recovering alcoholic.”
“Oh.” Cue the: whunh, whunh, whunh.
“Don’t look so upset,” he said. “I’m not on a liver transplant list or anything.”
“Good to know” was my clever comeback. I was mentally scrambling. “Just alcohol . . . or drugs too?”
He let a hard look pass over his face. “I’m a slave to only one master.”
“Good.” I nodded my head stupidly, breathing out a sigh of relief that I wouldn’t have to put a drug into a guy who had been drinking alcohol. Or a drug into a guy that was a recovering drug addict.
I remembered in my cadet training that a mission almost never goes according to plan. I recalled something called Triple A: You have to be able to Adapt and Adjust accordingly to Accomplish your goals.
I rallied quickly. “Sorry, for the inquisition. It’s just my ex-boyfriend kinda had a bit of a drug problem, so, yunno . . . I’m a little skittish about that kind of thing.”
“Well, I’m all clean now, I swear,” he assured me, smiling. He grabbed my hand, and I let him, even though I knew he was lying. About what I wasn’t sure. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to the crew, Harley . . .”
“Quinn,” I provided, going along with my Harlequin Romance theme and thinking myself quite clever.
He did a double take and paused on the stairs. “Did you just say your name is Harley Quinn?”
I nodded, my face catching fire.
“Would that make me the Joker then?”
“Right, I guess it would.” I mentally kicked myself. I forgot Harley Quinn is the name of the Joker’s girlfriend. In my defense, out of all the Batman books I read to Mikey, none of them featured Harley Quinn.
He narrowed his eyes while I noticed how flat the brown was compared to Pete’s. “Is Harley Quinn your real name?”
“Actually, P-Peters is my last name, and Quinn is my middle name.”
He looked at me weird before nodding and offering me a thin smile. “I guess Harley Quinn does sound cooler than Harley Peters.” He began pulling me up the stairs again.
Man oh man . It was almost eleven already. I didn’t have time to shoot the breeze with him and all of his friends. Pete’s last text said he would be keeping the bed warm. I had to work faster. Swallowing down some icky guilt, I tugged him back down a couple of steps. And put my hand on his arm, the only place I could dare touch him without my hand burning off.
“You know what?” I said. “This whiny music’s kind of a buzz kill. Do you wanna go someplace else and sip a soda together?” I followed that bit of boldness up with some eyes.
“Nirvana’s a classic” was what he had to say to that.
Dang it! I bit my lip and dropped my eyes to view my pedicure.
“But I do love soda,” he hedged.
“Great!” I rewarded him with a broad smile.
“Well, come on, Harley Quinn, let’s just go let my buddies know and then we’ll be on our way.” He followed that up with a victorious smile.
What he didn’t know was: the victory was mine.
We sped down increasingly quiet streets in his “beamer” to his apartment in some complex apartment complex that I was trying to keep straight in my head. And then just gave up when the tenth building into the maze looked the exact same as the nine others we passed—white stone, metal roof, trimmed with drought resistant plants running the length of the pathways. Hopefully, the Uber guy would be good at his job. I was busy making note of the green back lit number 11 in front of me when he finally parked. He unclicked his seatbelt, grabbed his keys, turned to me, and announced, “This is it” before springing the door and getting out.
I sat in his car while he looked behind him like What the hell is she still doing in the car ? Ohhhhh . You could practically see the neon light go on above his head. And then he came and got me out with a delayed flourish. I wasn’t sure if feminism was dead, but I was pretty sure chivalry was. At least as far as I could tell from Nick Attacker.
Inexplicably, he no longer offered me his hand as I followed him up three flights of stairs in strappy heels. We paused outside his door, and I noticed my footwear brought me head to head with him. And his hair was so long he could, and probably did, ponytail it. I also noticed something flicker around in his eyes. I wondered for the hundredth time tonight whether this was a good idea or not. Or if this would even work out, because Pete was at least three inches taller in height. And head and shoulders taller in every other aspect of his being.
But I resolutely followed through with my plan, following him through the door and into his bachelor pad. It was stuffed with the requisite overlarge flat screen TV and black leather furniture. Some arty pictures, the likes of which Mrs. Dubois and Ranger liked, were framed in hard metal and leaned against the walls, instead of hanging on the walls. His idea of being original? Hated to tell him that’s how I displayed my art in the trailer house.
“Can I make you a drink?” he offered, reaching for a bottle of liquor on the counter and swirling in his hand like a bartender. I wondered how often he practiced and performed that maneuver.
“I thought you didn’t drink,” I countered with a niggle of worry I was in over my head.
“I don’t, but my visitors usually do. It’s relaxing. How about a screw driver?” He said this in a way that let me know it was intended to be sexy, not funny. Ew . After which, he slowly licked his lips. And he didn’t laugh or anything. Double ew!
“How ‘bout just a soda?” I wanted to keep my wits about me.
He pulled a face. “Come on, Harley Quinn. Don’t you want something a little harder than a soda?”
I would’ve burst out laughing, if I weren’t so grossed out.
He yanked on a Coke tab and liquid fizzed out onto the counter. “Aw, shit.” He pulled back his precious hair and bent down and sucked it up with a loud slurping noise, then fiddled around on the counter like he was nervous or something, before finally pouring it into an odd-shaped glass.
“May I have some ice please?”
He swallowed down some aggravation. “Sure.” He spun around and shoved it beneath the ice dispenser, cursing as more soda sloshed onto the floor from the ice cubes plunking in too hard and fast. After he mopped it up with half a role of paper towels, he poured another one for himself, then came at me in the living room. I felt weird immediately and wondered what the H-E- double lacrosse sticks I was doing here.
“Don’t spill on the rug,” he cautioned before handing over my glass.
A Prince Charming the guy was not.
I eyed the zebra stripes beneath my feet dispassionately. “I don’t really think I’m the one you have to worry about,” I pointed out.
He narrowed his eyes at me and lowered himself carefully onto the couch before setting his glass on a black coaster he procured for himself. I was left holding my drink. I took a tentative sip and made a face. I forgot how sickly-sweet soda could be, preferring ice tea these days.
Gah. I deep breathed. Focus on the goal. Keep it together . “These are cool glasses,” I tried.
That perked him up. “Yeah. They are, aren’t they? I ordered them from Gumps. Hey, you ever been there . . . to the store in San Francisco?”
I shook my head, wondering how I could slip the pill into his drink, and how soon thereafter I could steal his license.
“Oh.” He seemed unduly disappointed.
We sat in awkward silence for a little while. He even cracked his knuckles through the silence. It’s like neither one of us knew our next move. Could it be that Nick the Attacker had no game?
“Cool pictures,” I finally said. Cool seemed to be the only word in my repertoire tonight. Worked for him though.
“Yeah. I’m really into modern art. Cezanne, Matisse . . . and yunno, just art. I dabble in photography too. I took those.” He swung his head to indicate a couple of close-up nudes behind us. The only art hanging in the place, and it was next to the bathroom.
“Crap!” burst out of me. I just remembered I left my backpack, with my peasant shirt, my sneakers, and makeup at the party . Double crap. And my crushed-up Percocet.
“What?” He looked defensive.
“I just remembered I left my backpack at the party. I’m sorry.” I rose to me feet, inexplicably relieved I had to abort the mission. “I’ve gotta go back and get it.”
He grabbed my arm as I made to leave. “Whoa. Slow down. Those guys won’t let anything happen to it. And you still have your cell phone, so like, no worries, right.” He nodded to where it was lying on the coffee table, like a lifeline.
I had a mad urge to snatch it up and run out of there. Gah. I was super-sucking at this. I tried to refocus on my goal: nabbing Pete an ID. I sank back down while he clicked on the flat screen. “Those pictures you took are cool,” I came up with.
“Yeah. Yunno . . .”—he eyed me speculatively—“I would love to take your picture.”
I think my face grimaced a little before I could commandeer it.
“Not like all the way nude,” he backpedaled, “if you’re uncomfortable with that. Just . . . maybe take your top off for me.” Pause to tuck a piece of hair behind his ear and dazzle me with his best smile.
I stared at him a hot second, then it just dawned on me: Nick the Attacker hadn’t tried to attack me with his stick. He hadn’t scooched closer to me on the couch. Hadn’t put his arm around me, or any moves on me since we were around his friends, whom he was in no hurry to leave to be with me—a girl.
Ohhhh. The light bulb went on above my head.
Acclimate, accommodate, adjust. How did I adjust for this? Guy didn’t drink. Guy didn’t like girls. One thing I learned from Bob and our poker nights: know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em. It was that time. This was mission impossible tonight. Maybe I could come back and break in? Although that would be hard to do without attracting attention, since the front door and windows faced the parking lot. And I couldn’t go in the back way, because I wasn’t a cat burglar and was afraid of heights. And of getting caught by Pete, the best boyfriend in the world. I needed to get a move on.
“Hello? Hello? Earth to Harley.” Nick began waving his hands in front of my face. “How’re you feeling?” He slid over slyly.
“You know what, Nick? I’m actually pretty tired. I need to be going now.” Hint-hint. “Thanks so much for the soda.” I set it down, sans coaster.
“But you didn’t even drink it,” he stated, trying to force it back into my hand.
I ignored this, but not my intuition, which had started to shimmer weird feelings up and down my spine. I physically shook, like I could fling the heebie-jeebies off my back. “Do you think you could drive me back to the party to get my backpack?” Was that even a good idea? I just desperately didn’t want Pete to catch me walking through the door like this. I was starting to feel sick, like wormy, green-around-the gills sick. I stood up.
Nick Attacker looked aggravated. He tried to mask it with a forced smile. “Hey!” He splatted the leather with his hand, a little harder than necessary. “Sit back down. You just got here.”
I stared at him and watched something I didn’t like dart in and out of his eyes. He leaned back and smiled like I was staring because he was so dang hot.
“Can you take me home please?” I asked, not so politely.
“Not yet . . . at least finish your soda, then I will. You’ve hardly had any of it,” he added, quite pointedly. He stood up too. “Cheers.” He forced a glass clink. “To making beautiful, new friends. Come on, Harley. I wanna get to know you better. Five more minutes.”
“And then you’ll take me back?”
“And then I’ll take you back.”
“Five minutes,” I emphasized, perching uneasily on the end of the couch closest to the door.
I took a sip of my soda while he eyed me appraisingly. “Yunno, you really are beautiful: interesting cheekbones, full lips, luminous skin.”
I snorted. If I wasn’t sure he was gay before, I was now.
He gave me a hard look before smiling affably. “Seriously, I’m not being cheesy.”
No, you’re being weird, is what I wanted to say. Instead I said a curt, “thanks,” and swallowed back a yawn. I really was tired all of a sudden and just wanted to go home and cuddle with my boyfriend and pretend this night never happened. I leaned my head back on the couch and closed my eyes.
I felt him get up and go into his bedroom. I snapped my eyes back open. Should I spike his drink now? Nope. Too risky. Too little reward. He seemed to be relaxed enough. Gah! I needed to get out of here. And I was suddenly in a hurry to do just that. I went to reach for my phone when I saw that it was missing. Crap!
Calm down. Calm down. “Um, Nick.”
“Yeah,” he called from his bedroom where I heard him rummaging around and unzipping something.
Oh man. I sincerely hoped it wasn’t his pants! “Can I get my phone back? I wanna call Uber to pick me up.”
“Just hold on a minute, Harley. Hey, why don’t you finish your drink and then I’ll take your picture? Then I’ll take you home.” He stuck his head out the door, and he was wearing a camera necklace.
I stood back up with intent and purpose, not planning on sitting back down. “Listen, Nick. As flattered as I am, I’m really not in the mood to have my photo taken. I’m really tired.” I paused to assess why he smirked at that. And then I knew. Dagnabbit! My mark just drugged me !
He took a step forward, and I took a step back. “Whoa.” Head rush.
He smirked again and came at me with his loaded camera.
I started backing to the door. “I also feel a little sick at my stomach and can feel a headache comin’ on. Will you please just give me my cell phone back, so I can leave?”
“Oh, come on, Harley! All girls love to have their pictures taken, and I make them all look like supermodels. I’m a professional; I even make money doing it.”
“I don’t want my picture taken!”
“Why did you even come here tonight?”
“I’ve been askin’ myself that since I walked through the door,” I sniped back.
“You’re a little prick tease bitch, aren’t you?”
“Wow,” I said, turning my back on him in preference of the door. “I’m outta here.” I made it to the door and paused to fumble with the lock a second. I’d just snapped it open, when I felt my hair yank back so hard a few roots ripped out with the hand grab.
I didn’t even hesitate long enough to scream. Using the force of his momentum, I added my sharp elbow to the impact of his yank. It landed somewhere in his midsection. But the guy was pretty hard and compact, so it only stunned him long enough to let go of my hair. He still had one hand on my shoulder, and he used it to push me down, so that I was on all fours. I countered with a fist to his shin before crawling for the door.
“Come back here, Harley!” Nick Attacker grabbed my foot, and I kicked at him with my other one.
“Let me go, you weirdo!” I kicked again, but I was losing momentum on account of me being low on energy.
I would never take another drink of a drink I didn’t pour myself, or that didn’t come from a corked bottle—an Academy lesson learned the hard way. “I can’t believe you freakin’ drugged me, you freak!” I hissed. Never mind the fact that I was gonna do the same thing to him. But still . I wasn’t a freak. Just a love-addled regular girl, who was sometimes gifted and who sometimes used incredibly bad judgment.
“Come on, Harley.” Nick Attacker continued dragging me back to the couch by my foot. “I just wanna take your picture. I swear. Just one. Then I’ll give your cell phone back.” He paused his dragging to stare at me through his camera. “Come on. Just pull your top down for me and show me your titties while giving me one of those cute smiles. One snap. Then I’ll drive you home . . . I’ll even pay you a hundred bucks. And I won’t even touch you. I swear.”
I didn’t even have to read his face to know he was telling the truth there. And do you want to know what I was doing during his monologue? Well, I was busy sticking my fingers down my throat. After a tonsil scratch and some severely blurred vision, I finally retched up the retched cranberry, orange Jell-O, sickly soda all over that zebra rug he told me not to spill on.
“Fucking hell! You bitch!”
My bad.
He went for me then, but I was ready. I snatched one of those Gump glasses from the coffee table and hurled it in his face. It thunked him pretty good on the head, spilling spiked soda all down his face. I sprang up and jabbed him in the eye socket while he howled with his eyes were closed. He blindly swung at me and got a hit to my shoulder. I crashed onto his coffee table and came up with his marble coaster in my hand.
“Jesus Christ!” he hollered , one eye slit the other closed and swelling.
“Is not gonna save you,” I heaved. “Now listen up.”
He blinked hard with one hand protecting his face and the other one out, like I was going to attack him again. I had half a mind to do it.
“Tell me where my cell phone is . . . now !” I shook his marble coaster at him before picking up a second one.
“Okay, okay.” He flung his hands, ready to deflect. “Jesus. I was just gonna snap a titty pic.”
While he was wiping his watery eye, I kicked him hard in his soft part for that lie.
He went down, his hands flying from their current positions to south of the border.
“ Where is it?” I repeated in a deadly voice.
“ Mmoooph ,” he choked, pointing to the bedroom before rolling around on the floor.
I lurched in there and saw it on his filthy, neatly-made bed. I picked it up, and was getting ready to leave, when that feeling creeped up my spine. I scanned the room for the source and noticed a desk drawer I knew would be locked. I lurched over there and rattled it, just in case. Then lurched into the living room where Nick Attacker was currently bawling like a baby. I was really gonna give him something to cry about. I gimped my way over to him and blockaded his next roll.
“Whatdoyagotsquirreled away in that desk, Nick?”
“N-nothing. Jesus!” he shrilled. “Will you just freakin’ leave? Please !”
I kicked him in his soft part again—good measure. The sound he made—made me even feel a little sorry for him. But I was in mission mode now, boy. I strode into his kitchen like I owned the place and grabbed some electrolyte enhanced bottled water from his fridge and sucked it down. Then I yanked open a couple of kitchen drawers until I found what I was looking for.
I felt a little refreshed after vomiting on his rug and rehydrating with his water. When I came back in, Nick the Attacker scrabbled back from me like I was wielding a chainsaw. In reality, it was only a little ole steak knife. He started yelling and begging for his life.
“Shhhhh!” I hissed, pressing the tip of the knife against my lips like a crazy person, or like Harley Quinn. I shook my head at him. “I ain’t gonna kill ya unless you don’t stop screamin’.” I said this in the scariest way possible.
Nick Attacker quit screaming and went back to moaning and rolling around on the floor. While he was otherwise occupied, I commenced to jimmying his lock with his knife. What I found inside was a bunch of nudies—girls and guys were about evenly represented. And I found a manila folder filled with memory cards. And another filled with hard cash. After further investigation, I found his social security number, bank accounts, pin numbers, and a whole bunch of other personal records meticulously jotted down and tucked inside a folder. I took a long moment to memorize them. I had some time, because last I peeked on Nick Attacker, he’d also thrown up on his zebra rug and was splayed out next to it like he’d passed out after a night of partying. Finally, I put the sensitive intel back where I found it, taking only the photos, memory sticks, and cash with me.
Then, in a final pièce de la résistance, I relieved him of his camera, which was still hanging around his neck, and shattered it on the floor in front of him.
“It’s time to get a new hobby, Nick,” I concluded, then slammed out the door.
After pausing by a perfectly sphere-shaped fountain to hurl, I soaked the dirty photos and memory sticks in chlorine water. Then I hurled them into a green dumpster labeled recycling . By the time I made it to the front entrance I’d thrown up again. By the time Pete made it to the front gate, I was shaking like a leaf and could barely stand up.
The look on his face when he jumped from his Jeep to come fetch me—murderous.