Chapter 59
No less than one week has passed, and my spider-dick and I have become the unofficial mascot of Oyster Pit High.
I do my walk of shame off the bus, then hobble down the street to get home.
Clint's back in his pin-striped suit, slouched on the couch with another bottle of whiskey.
“Where's Dinah?” I ask.
“She's been locked in the bedroom for two hours and hasn't made a peep,” he says.
I head over to her room and give three light knocks. “It's wedding time,” I sing half-heartedly into the door.
After ten minutes of her ignoring us, I play “Queer Crocodile” on my phone, and place it next to her door. It opens quickly.
She steps out in a daze, without looking at me. “Why are you so weird, Wade?” I follow her into the living room, where Clint stares her down as he takes a swig from his whiskey bottle.
“Are we doing this for the second week in a row?” Clint asks. “What's really happening? And don't lie to me.”
Dinah blinks. She takes a moment to breathe, then faces him. I've never seen her look this disoriented before.
“I need some time”—she pauses—“some time to think.”
“I knew it. You're still in love with that guy from the restaurant.”
She shakes her head.
Clint leaps out of his seat, as though he's figured it out. “It's that Russian guy! Have you been sexting each other behind my back?”
“Don't be an idiot,” she says.
He throws his arms up in the air and kicks the coffee table. “Then why? Why won't you marry me?”
She stares at him with fear and reluctance in her eyes.
He gets closer to her. “You're not getting out of this. Tell me now.”
“Because… because…” She looks down, clasping her hands together, and looks back up sheepishly. “I can't marry a man who's scared of spiders.”
I am screaming on the inside. Shaking. Crying.
Dancing. Streamers and confetti fall around me in Times Square as the ball drops and the giant words “BYE BITCH” light up the sky.
Miracles are real and I am now declaring a national holiday.
I realize I'm grinning without any effort and immediately drop my cheeks back down.
Clint, however, is a statue of despair. He doesn't move, blink, or breathe for a minute. Maybe if I poke him, he'll shatter into a million pieces on the floor so I can sweep him up and toss him in the trash forever.
“So you're never gonna marry me?” he finally says.
Dinah falls on the couch and stuffs her face into one of the pillows. “I don't think it's a good idea.”
Like a busted dam that can't hold still any longer, Clint's eyes well up and a waterfall of tears cascades down his cheeks. Clint Holtz, the man himself, is sniffling so hard his nose twitches like a rabbit.
“Because of spiders?” he asks. His voice is light and cracking now.
“Yes.”
“Dinaaaaaaaaah! I thought we were gonna grow old together.”
“Probably not.”
“Don't you love me?”
“God, Clint, I—” she says. “I'll tell you what I don't love: that suit. Why are you dressed like Beetlejuice?”
Clint falls to his knees, his hands strapped to his face. It's strange to see a grown man with gun tattoos up and down his forearms sobbing like this.
“I thought you loved me.”
His sobs grow louder over the course of a minute. Dinah takes the pillow off her face and studies Clint's tantrum with disgust.
“Christ alive, cut the pity party. It's so not like you. And would you smell yourself? You are lost in the sauce right now. Go take a walk… or a bath.”
Clint, moping in a puddle of his own tears, gets up and runs out of the room.
Dinah stares blankly at the ground. “That went well, I think.”
He returns to the living room with a rifle in his hands. She flies off the couch and grabs my shirt, clinging to me. My knees start shaking.
“No!” Dinah yells before the first shot rings. Glass explodes all over the living room.
He shot her biggest porcelain Santa Claus.
“My grandma gave that to me!” she cries.
Clint looks at her without any expression and picks his gun back up, firing another round into another decoration.
Dinah screams at him to stop. My hands are shaking too much to grab my phone. After the third destroyed ornament, Dinah rushes at him and grabs the gun.
“Stop it, for Christ's sake!” she says as they battle in the tug-of-war. She can't pry the gun out of his hands, so she lets go and slaps Clint twice across the face.
He drops to his knees and hangs his head as he sobs and chokes on his words. “You're my soulmate!”
Dinah crawls over the floor, crying over the shards of her ornaments. They're like a pair of kindergarteners blubbering over a toy they can't share. It's the most pathetic thing I've ever seen.
Somebody starts banging at the front door. I make a run for it while they're distracted.
I swing the door open, screaming for whoever's there to call the police. The person barges through me so quickly that I do a backward cartwheel into the wall.
When I get back to my feet, I see Brandon Barton Buckley squeezing Clint in a chokehold, Clint's eyes ready to pop out of their sockets while he gags so hard his tongue juts out.
“Give it back to me now,” Brandon says in a voice that seems way too calm for somebody who's about to corkscrew another guy's head.
“What are you talking about, you dumb fucking ape?” Dinah cries.
“You stole it,” he continues. Dinah pounds his back like it's a punching bag and begs him to let Clint go. Clint lets out a series of unintelligible grunts as his face turns almost purple-red.
I run to their bedroom and dig through their drawers and closet until I find Bundy. Back in the living room, I shake the loose Sasquatch arm at Brandon. “Is this what you want? Come and get it, you big pedo!”
As soon as he sees the costume in my arms, he drops Clint hard on the floor and pursues me all the way out the front door. I leap into the van and lock the doors just before he crashes against the window and pounds his fists.
“I'm telling the police everything about you,” I shout through the window as I start the engine.
“Who's gonna believe you? I own everybody, cowboy,” he says with a wink and two clicks of the tongue. He throws himself onto my windshield while I put the van in reverse and hit the pedal.
“Thief! Thief! Thief!” he screams. I can't see past him and have to crawl forward.
I flip the switch for the windshield wipers, which slap Brandon hard enough to knock him off the van.
As he rolls down the asphalt behind me and crashes into a mailbox, I speed out of the neighborhood and head for the interstate.