XIV
A Friendly Conversation
with Chester
A six-foot-eight-inch forty-two-year-old corporation of blubber and muscle that weighed three hundred and twenty-four pounds shoved a small silver-haired Mexican-American woman away from the front door. Uncaring, the bulldozing mass that was Chester Fredericks entered the foyer of the shoddy apartment building.
“You can’t just come in here,” complained the tenant. “I’ll call—”
Chester snatched the small woman’s purse and jerked her sideways until the strap came loose.
“Hey!” shouted the tenant. “Give me—”
“Fetch.” The redneck tossed the bag outside, where it flopped on the street and spewed its insides. “Be a good Chihuahua before you get kicked.”
Frightened, the small woman departed.
Chester walked to the stairwell and began his arduous climb. The wooden steps upon which he set portions of his bulk complained often and loudly. He accepted (though did not like) the fact that most of the people who needed to borrow money in Great Crown lived in places that lacked elevators.
Half a minute later, the redneck arrived at the second-floor landing, shifted his mass, and endeavored the next long flight of stairs. According to his first ex-wife, exertions such as this climb gave him heart attacks all of the time—small infarctions that he never even noticed—but if that were true (which he doubted), his tolerance for such traumas must now be so great that he was functionally immune.
Chester arrived at the third-floor landing. Proceeding along the concrete hallway, he wiped the sweat from his small face, hiked up his black sweatpants, and removed his favorite tool from the baby blue gym bag that depended from his left shoulder.
The redneck hammered a door.
Somebody yelped and whispered, “Shit.”
“Open up, amigo.”
A thump and some rapid footfalls sounded within the apartment. “Coming, man—I’m coming.”
“Now.”
A bolt snapped.
Chester bulldozed the door.
Retreating into the small apartment was Miguel, a wiry young Cuban in running shorts and a sleeveless t-shirt whose drug and gambling problems had put him underneath a pyramid that had ten thousand stones.
“You got your tennis shoes on,” the redneck remarked while locking the door. “You’re goin’ out?”
“Yeah. I— I wasn’t expecting you.”
“There wasn’t an envelope from you in my post office box, so you should’ve been.”
Miguel did not say anything.
Chester surveyed the living room.
The place was bare, excepting a shredded old sofa, a tube television, and three tall stacks of cardboard boxes.
Something occurred to the redneck, and suddenly, he was frowning. Pointing the hammer at the far side of the room, he asked, “What’s that?”
“Boxes.”
“Now what kind of answer’s that? ‘Boxes.’ You think I’m too stupid to recognize boxes?”
Miguel did not know whether a “yes“ or a “no” was the desired answer to this question.
“Well?” prompted Chester, who then walked toward the cardboard enigmas.
“It’s my collection. My records.”
The redneck swung his hammer. Iron slammed into a box and sank deep.
“Be careful with that—”
“Shut up.”
Chester jerked the tool loose, and white packing peanuts drained from the hole. Using the claw of the hammer, the redneck punctured a different side and tore out a large hunk of cardboard.
Records spilled from the opening and onto the floor. All of them appeared to be pop albums from the eighties.
“See man,” Miguel said, “I told you—”
Chester hammered and rended a box at the bottom of a different stack. The peanuts flowed, and inside the cardboard lay more records of a similar type.
Snorting, the redneck turned around. “When you get high, you must really like to dance.”
“I told you it was records.”
“Let’s sidestep the matter of the gay music you collect—’cause that conversation would end in your death—so you can tell me why you’re packing up all your shit.”
Miguel paled.
“Are you moving?” inquired Chester, whose eyes and tone were cold.
“No, man, no. I swear I’m not.”
A big hand gestured at the record collection as the redneck advanced toward the debtor. “So then explain these boxes.”
“My cousin’s gonna DJ a wedding, and he needs my records.”
“This is a thousand-hour wedding?”
“I wanted to give him a lotta options.”
Frowning, Chester shoved Miguel backward.
Fear shone brightly in the debtor’s big, dark eyes.
“I didn’t see addresses on any of those boxes,” remarked the redneck. “Mailmen tend to find those helpful. Much more efficient than you just dropping shit off, saying, ‘Give these to my cousin. These one thousand gay records that he needs.’”
“They’ve got the form you fill out at the shipping place. I swear to God, man, I—”
“Show me the address.”
“What?”
“You’ve got it written down somewhere, right? Your cousin’s address? The destination for the barge of records?”
“Yeah.”
“Show it to me or I’ll hurt you.”
Miguel scrambled into his bedroom.
Chester walked to the doorway and filled it with his magnitude. From there, he surveyed the messy area in which the debtor slept.
No suitcases or suspicious boxes or road maps or bus schedules were visible in the bedroom, which was strewn with clothing and empty wine coolers (as was usually the case). It did not look as if the young Cuban were planning to skip town.
Miguel opened one drawer and then another and then a third. In this last one he found a scrap of paper, which he held aloft as if it were a winning lottery ticket. “Here! Here’s his address.”
The debtor gave the piece of paper to the redneck, who then backed under a living room light that contained a few dead bugs.
Written on the crinkled scrap was a Connecticut address for a guy named Marco Perez.
“Connecticut?” asked Chester.
“Yeah, man. That’s where he lives.”
“You don’t look like the type who’d know people in Connecticut.”
“That’s where he went—works for the city up there. Sanitation.”
“When he’s not too busy playing a thousand gay records.”
“Doing that’s just a hobby for him.”
Chester returned the address to Miguel. “If you ever try to skip town on me, I will find you.”
“I won’t, I swear.”
“If you ever want to take a vacation—go out of town for a few days or even one day—you need to ask me if it’s okay before you go.”
“I don’t go anywhere, man. Ever.”
“Good. So let’s get back to the reason I’m here.”
“The money.”
“You’re a mind reader.”
A pathetic look came to the debtor’s face. “I don’t have much.”
This response did not surprise the redneck. “Get everything you have.”
“It isn’t much, but I—”
“Get it now, amigo.”
Miguel returned to the bedroom and went into his nightstand while Chester withdrew a two-liter bottle of orange soda from his gym bag and drank a swig
“You want the change?” the debtor inquired while gathering bills.
“Nope.”
Clasping two paper bushes, Miguel elbowed the drawer and returned to the living room. “Here.”
Chester screwed the cap onto the soda, wedged the bottle under his armpit, and took the cash, which he then counted in five seconds.
The sum of the proffered ones, fives, and crinkled tens was ninety-eight dollars.
Frowning, the redneck pocketed the two-figure payment.
Miguel was anxious. “It’s all I got.”
Chester drank the remaining liter of orange soda and discarded the empty plastic bottle. “Looks like you’ve been partying with money that ain’t yours.”
“No, man. It’s—”
A fist pounded Miguel. His nose snapped, and his head flew back. Blindly, he stumbled and fell onto his bed.
Wine coolers clanked.
“Owww, man.” The debtor sat upright and cupped his bloody face. “That shit hurts.”
Chester turned around and strode toward the record collection. “Hope they like orange soda in Connecticut.”
“No, man! Let me take another punch.”
“Too late.”
Urine hissed upon the two-dimensional face of a smiling teenage girl who had been famous for exactly one month during the year nineteen eighty-two. Chester then distributed crackling piss to the upbeat visages of some very color-coordinated black fellows and a plump shrimpy dude in a turquoise suit who had tried to hide the fact that he was going bald by giving himself a perm. Emptied out, the redneck shook some lingering drops onto the full lips of a black lady who wore a lot of blue make-up.
“I’ll be back in two weeks,” Chester announced while tucking his phallus into his sweatpants. “And if you don’t have at least five hundred, you’ll get the hammer.”
“I’ll get the money.”
The redneck left the apartment, walked down the stairwell (which taxed his legs but did not at all strain his infarction-proof heart), and went outside. This Tuesday morning was unpleasantly hot, even for Great Crown in August.
Chester drank soda and burped as he approached his four-door, baby blue, off-road truck.
A small and reddish-orange rectangle sat on the windshield of the distant vehicle.
“Better not be a goddamn ticket.”
The redneck quickened his strides and soon recognized the anomaly.
Lying upon the tinted windshield was a clay brick.
Chester reached his sixty-eight-thousand-dollar automobile and looked around.
The nearby streets and sidewalks were empty, and nobody suspicious stood in any of the visible doorways or windows.
“Fucking joker.”
The redneck held his breath, steadying himself, and gently lifted the brick from his windshield. A few pieces of reddish-orange grit lay upon the tinted glass, but there were no cracks or scuffs.
A cellphone buzzed in his pocket.
Ignoring the call, Chester hurled the brick across the street. The projectile clanked into a garbage can, which fell over, spilling bottles and wrappers onto the sidewalk. This act was not exactly retribution, but it was something.
The redneck heaped himself into the driver’s seat and shut the door. Starting the engine, he eyed his cellphone, which was no longer buzzing. The name of the recent caller was Pete Johnson—the same guy who had pestered him twice on Friday. This time, the fellow had not even bothered to leave a message.
“Pussy.”
Chester visited two more debtors, collected one thin envelope from his uptown postal box, and ordered some Vietnamese food, which he told the takeout girl to wrap in three plastic bags so that his truck would not smell like the ’Nam. Afterwards, he took Long Avenue toward Cicada, the vast Great Crown suburb in which he lived. Most of the black and Hispanic people in this area were menials.
It was early evening by the time the redneck parked his truck next to his girlfriend’s ultramarine two-seater in the driveway of his white and cobalt one-story house. Carrying the takeout bags, he walked across the gravel and stepped onto his concrete porch, which had a wooden bench and an American flag.
The redneck undid the locks, entered the living room of his air-conditioned home, shut the door, reset the alarm, and turned the bolts. Inside his sunken den, he set down the food and tossed himself upon a baby blue recliner chair.
“You got some takeout?” Dora asked from the bedroom.
“I got some.”
A door creaked, and a shuffling sound echoed in the hallway.
“Pick up your feet when you walk on the wood,” said Chester.
“Sorry.”
The scuffing noises were replaced by individual footfalls as the redneck retrieved and popped a can of orange soda.
A shape appeared in the dark hallway and became Dora, a chubby twenty-two-year-old redhead who was wearing socks and Chester’s oldest concert t-shirt, which had a picture of a metallic alligator that may or may not have been a cyborg.
“You’re just getting up now?” asked the redneck.
“I did some things before—research for my paper and that workout video.” The girl yawned. “That’s Thai food?”
“Gook.” Chester withdrew warm paper bags from layers of sheer red plastic. “You’ve got some underwear on under that?”
Dora raised the hem of the shirt, revealing the smooth bump of her clean-shaven pubic mound. “Guess not.”
“You couldn’t tell without flashing me?”
The girl let the curtain fall on her anatomy. “After going with you for so long, I don’t have as much feeling down there as I used to.”
“Flatterer.”
Four years ago, a stupid fellow who went by the name Rick Haglund borrowed eleven thousand dollars from Chester Fredericks. This loser made decent wages as a cook in a fair restaurant, but he had a serious gambling problem (as did half of the redneck’s clients), and the hole that he had dug for himself was moving toward the center of the earth rather than in the other direction. Two things had kept this idiot from having his limbs broken: He had a cute (albeit chubby) eighteen-year-old daughter, and he was amoral.
For five months, Dora had performed ever-improving acts of oral sex on Chester whenever he visited the Haglund household. This arrangement kept Rick’s arms and legs working, which facilitated his career as a maker of mediocre food at a mediocre restaurant that served mediocre people. Feelings had developed between the redneck and the young fellatio adept, and when the former divorced his second wife, he had asked the latter to move in with him. The girl came over the very same day, carrying all of her stuff in trash bags.
Dora was chubby and somewhat lazy, but she was cute and had a brighter future than did the gambling cook who had raised her (or her mother, who had committed suicide on the first night of the new millennium). Recently, the girl had started attending classes at the local junior college, which demonstrated to the redneck that she had at least some level of ambition.
Chester liked Dora more than half of the time, which was not something that he could have said about either of his ex-wives. What he felt for her might not have been love…but it was powerful enough to cancel out her father’s debt.
“Give me a kiss…”
Leaning over, Dora pressed her lips to Chester’s mouth.
The redneck shot his right hand into the t-shirt and clasped a hanging breast. A squeal escaped the girl, and she twisted away, reclaiming her tongue and mammarial property.
“They’re sore from all of your groping.”
“So then I’ll leave ‘em alone tonight and visit the outhouse.”
Chester squeezed Dora’s plump buttocks.
“I’ll go put on some panties for dinner.”
“Learn that in junior college?”
The girl flashed a grin and her rump as she returned to the hallway.
Shifting on the recliner, Chester turned on his sixty-inch television and tore open a greasy bag that contained fried spring rolls. A very handsome black weatherman who looked like a politician told him that some bad weather was heading toward Great Crown.
“Goddamn nigger news.”
Thunder rumbled, awakening Chester on Wednesday morning. Heavy rainfall crackled upon the roof, snapped against the windows, and disturbed gravel.
Hearing this proof of the black weatherman’s prophecy, the redneck shook his head. “That fucking guy.”
Folding three hundred and twenty-four pounds into a perpendicular shape, Chester sat. His hardened phallus and lower back were sore from the things that had occurred inside of his girlfriend’s colon during the previous night, and the redneck swallowed two painkillers with spit to dull the aches.
Wednesday was a big day for collections, and he would not let some physical discomfort and a thunderstorm interfere with his business.
Chester showered, donned a t-shirt and jeans, stepped into his sneakers, grabbed an umbrella, reset the alarm, and walked onto his porch. Beyond the overhang, the thunderstorm roared, turning all of the neighboring houses into strips of colored tinsel.
This would not be a good day for one of his debtors to come up short.
Chester traversed the sheltered porch. Gravel crackled beneath his sneakers and rain rattled against his umbrella as he walked along the driveway. Through the hissing deluge, he saw his off-road vehicle.
His stomach sank.
“No.”
Sitting in the gravel at the end of the driveway on its fully exposed rims was the baby blue truck. All four of its tires had been removed.
“Holy shit.”
Staring, Chester continued toward the crippled automobile. Gravel crunched under his sneakers, and feelings of anger slowly replaced those of astonishment.
“Fuck.”
The redneck knew that there was a connection between this prank and the anonymous brick that he had earlier found on his windshield, even though these incidents were separated by nineteen hours and twenty-five miles.
Rain crackled upon the umbrella, clicked upon rocks, and pinged upon the hood as he walked up the long driveway toward his truck.
On the far side of the windshield sat a big dark shape.
Chester paused. Gripping the umbrella with his left hand, he withdrew a revolver from his inside his waistband holster and closed the remaining distance.
The redneck stopped and peered through the rain that danced upon the windshield.
Sitting in a neat stack behind the steering wheel were all four tires.
A cellphone buzzed in his pocket.
Rain crackled, clicked, and pinged. Chester holstered his gun and withdrew the device, which was again buzzing.
Upon the touchscreen was the name he had expected to see—‘Pete Johnson.’
The redneck accepted the call and put the receiver to his ear. “You’re the one doing all this hilarious shit?”
“Do you feel like having a friendly conversation?”
“When I find out who you are—and I will—I’m gonna rape your head with a crowbar.”
“That’s a no?”
“Fuck you.”
Chester killed the connection, opened the door, and tossed his cellphone, keys, and wallet onto the dashboard. Resigning himself to a wet future, he abandoned his umbrella and claimed one of the tires. A stainless-steel jack was then exhumed from the back.
Setting an iron sheet atop the gravel so that the lifting device would remain stable, the redneck began his four-part undertaking. His progress was as relentless as the thunderstorm.
Ninety minutes later, the sodden behemoth took a warm shower (which seemed redundant, but felt good), donned dry clothes, and left for work. His anger was a chewable substance by the time he drove into the vast urban sprawl of Great Crown.
Chester parked outside of the apartment building in which lived Eldon White, a debtor who had first taken out a loan in the late nineties. This educated and fairly reliable fellow gave the loan shark three hundred dollars, which was his usual payment, but received two cracked ribs because he had bad breath.
Jaw clenched in anticipation, the redneck returned to the storm and eyed his baby blue truck.
The vehicle had not been harmed.
His next visit was to Luisa Diaz’s apartment, which was in the garment district. Like a lot of single mothers who were under a pyramid, this twenty-one-year-old Puerto Rican trotted out her hungry children whenever the redneck came over to make his collections. This ploy never altered his itinerary.
“This is what I have,” said Luisa, who then gave Chester half of her minimum monthly payment. “I hope it’s enough.”
The redneck pulled three plastic bags that smelled like Vietnamese food over the mother’s head and suffocated her until she wet herself and passed out. At present, he uncovered her face and pitched her unconscious body onto the sofa. Her children had watched everything while hiding underneath the living room table.
Concerned about the baby blue truck, Chester hurried downstairs and walked outside.
The vehicle was intact.
Gathering money and committing acts of violence often made the redneck feel better, but today, his mood proved immutable. Rain and angry thoughts hissed as he drove to Pudgy Boys, bought two roast beef-and-bacon submarine sandwiches, and laid claim to a big table by overturning the other five chairs.
Seated, Chester took out his cellphone and called a high school friend who had some affiliations.
“Hey there,” said Smart Paul. “Enjoying the storm?”
“No. Some guy’s fucking with me. Yesterday, he threatened to break my windshield with a brick, and this morning, he took the wheels off of my truck so I’d have to put them on in the rain.”
“To what end?”
“He wants to talk to me about something.”
“About what?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care. I don’t respond to acts of terrorism.”
“These don’t sound like ‘acts of terrorism.’ More like demonstrations.”
Chester squeezed his submarine. “I don’t give a fuck what they are.”
“Whenever people say, ‘I don’t give a fuck,’ they actually mean, ‘I do give a fuck, but will do my best to pretend otherwise.’ Nobody uses the work ‘fuck’ when they’re feeling apathetic.”
“Well…he’s trying to force me to do something, and I won’t. Period.”
“But he’s not stealing or damaging anything—even though he obviously could—which tells me that he wants to keep things from getting ugly.”
“I won’t talk to him. Ever. I just want to find out who he is so I can do what I need to do.”
The redneck violently chomped his submarine sandwich. Somebody nearby yelped, startled.
“It would be safer for you to talk to him,” said Smart Paul. “He might be a consortium guy or have affiliations.”
“Two more reasons not to talk to him.” Chester swallowed a hunk of his sandwich. “But I’m calling for assistance, not advice.”
The affiliated guy sighed. “What’ve you got?”
“The caller ID says his name’s Pete Johnson, but I don’t think that’s real.”
“Sounds like a porn star. Anything else?”
“I’ve got his telephone number—the one he uses to call me on.”
“Text it to me.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll ask around.”
“Thanks.”
The call ended.
Before the redneck finished the first half of his second submarine sandwich, he received a text message from his high school friend that read, ‘No info on this guy. Talk to him.’
Chester cursed Smart Paul, whom he had not liked all that much since graduation day.
Soon, the redneck returned to his truck and rolled through the storm. The fourth and fifth debtors whom he visited that day paid him sufficiently but he broke a television and turned over a bureau in an effort to make himself feel better.
These actions did not elevate his mood.
Thoughts of ‘Pete Johnson’ distracted Chester as he thrust his phallus into Dora, whose upraised buttocks and pendulous breasts echoed every ungentle impact.
“I think you need to lose some weight,” the three hundred-and-twenty-four-pound redneck said while withdrawing his limp member.
“You’re in a shitty mood.” The girl got out of bed, pulled on a kimono, and walked toward the doorway. “Don’t put the blame on me.”
Chester did not say anything. Abed and naked, he eyed the cellphone that lay upon his nightstand and then peered through the window at his baby blue truck, which he had parked behind the house on the grass instead of in the driveway.
It took him a long time to fall asleep.
Two days passed without another incident. Chester started to wonder if he would again see the handiwork of “Pete Johnson” or if the guy had lost his motivation to be a secret asshole.
On Saturday night, the redneck ordered sausage-and-onion pizzas and ate them while watching a wrestling pay-per-view event. His girlfriend came home late from her philosophy study group (which got together twice a month), but he did not wonder at the cause of her delay.
Sunday came and went, and on Monday, Chester woke up early, donned a gray sweatsuit, and drove into the urban sprawl. His first collections were effortless endeavors (though a mouthy spouse had earned herself a slap), and after he finished his lunch, he spread his baby blue truck across two spaces in the post office parking lot. The vehicle’s rearview mirror now contained a surveillance camera, and if the secret asshole tried something, there would be some video.
A large part of the huge redneck hoped that “Pete Johnson” would expose himself by pulling another prank.
Chester slapped the post office door and walked into the dingy (but well air-conditioned) interior.
Behind the front counter, a meek Asian guy in a blue uniform avoided making eye contact with the massive southern mammal that had just entered.
The redneck passed a long line of grumpy customers and strode into the wing that contained the postal boxes. At the north wall, he slotted his key directly below the number 522, but when he tried to turn the lock, nothing happened. The mechanism was stuck. He rechecked the box number (which was the correct one), pinched the brass key firmly between his thumb and index finger, and tried once again. The lock did not yield.
Frustrated, the redneck applied more force, involving his biceps and triceps in the struggle against unwilling metal. The brass started to bend.
Something cracked within the lock, and key spun one hundred and eighty degrees.
“Finally.”
Chester opened the metal door.
Filling the postal box was a slab of hardened concrete.
“The fuck?”
The redneck put the palm of his right hand against the coarse gray surface and pushed all of his weight forward, but achieved nothing in so doing.
“Crud.”
At present, Chester noticed two tiny white triangles sticking out of the concrete. These appeared to be the corners of envelopes, each of which would contain a payment from a debtor.
“Motherfucker.”
A cellphone buzzed in his pocket.
The redneck hastened to the front window so that he could check on his truck.
On the far side of the glass sat the vehicle, hogging two spaces and unmolested.
The device buzzed a second time.
Chester accepted the call and put the receiver to his ear. “Yeah?”
“Do you feel like having a friendly conversation?” asked the secret asshole, whose voice was as calm as it had been during both of the previous conversations.
The redneck had imagined this moment many times, and thus, he already knew exactly what he was going to say. “I’m open to it. Let’s meet up somewhere and talk.”
“We’re never going to meet in person.”
“That’s the only way I do business.”
“I recommend that you make an exception in this instance.”
“I don’t talk business on the phone,” stated Chester. “Ever.”
“Too bad.”
The secret asshole hung up.
One second later, the redneck’s cellphone shattered against the post office wall, where it had been thrown in anger.
“Sir?” prompted the meek Asian, who was flanked by a womanish guy. “Is there something that we can help you with?”
Ignoring the inquiry, Chester returned to the open postal box, unzipped his gym bag, grabbed his hammer, tightened his grip, and swung. Iron clanked against concrete, and grit fell to the floor.
“Sir!”
Again, the redneck raised his arm.
“Sir!”
The hammer pounded the gray slab, chipping off a few small bits.
“You cannot—”
Iron arced through the air and clanked against concrete. A small fissure appeared, and Chester picked a piece of grit from his right eye.
The postal workers tentatively approached the big mammal.
“Sir, you can’t—”
“Do you guys have a security camera for this area?” asked the redneck. “So we can see who put all this concrete in here?”
“It broke,” said the meek Asian.
Metal clanked against concrete, and the fissure widened into a crack.
“Recently?” surmised Chester.
“Saturday.”
The redneck did not doubt that the secret asshole had disabled the camera prior to pulling this prank. “Figures.”
The hammer pounded the crack. Pieces of concrete the size of hard candy rattled upon the floor.
“You can’t do that in here!” shouted the womanish assistant. “If y—”
“This is your screw up—letting this happen on government property—so now I’m doing what I need to. Don’t get in the way.”
Iron clanked against concrete. Bits of artificial stone fell, revealing the narrow profile of the upper envelope.
“But y—”
“Shut up.” Chester glared at the meek Asian. “Get me a box cutter and some tweezers.”
“What are you going t—”
“Now!”
The postal worker fled.
Targeting the remaining white triangle, the redneck swung the hammer. Iron clanked against concrete, and grit fell. Rapidly and forcefully, he pounded the area until the linear profile of the second envelope was completely visible.
Sweat stung Chester’s eyes, and he wiped the moisture away.
“Here,” the meek (and chastened) Asian said while extending the gathered tools.
The redneck thumbed the box cutter blade from the handle and sliced open the sides of the envelopes. “Give me some privacy.”
The postal workers joined the small crowd of curious oldsters who had gathered at the wing entrance.
Chester poked tweezer tips into the side of the upper envelope, pinched his fingers together, and withdrew a thin collection of bills. Repeating this operation in the lower slit, he removed more money.
Somebody in the crowd muttered something.
“Shut your bitch flap,” the redneck said to whomever had said whatever.
At present, the big man pocketed the payments and returned to the main area, where he cut the line, threw some nasty looks, and filled out the paperwork for a new postal box. The meek Asian offered an apology.
The sun was diving at the western horizon when Chester entered his suburban home. Standing in the living room, he reset the alarm and twisted the bolts.
The house was not quiet. Whirrs and thuds came from the washing machine on the far side of house, despite the fact that Dora had just done a comprehensive laundry on Sunday.
The redneck wondered if perhaps the secret asshole had done something to the appliance, but when he considered the house alarm and the sight of his girlfriend’s car in the driveway, this suspicion seemed like the result of paranoia rather than clear thinking.
Chester hated how “Pete Johnson” was affecting his psyche.
“Dora? Is that you?”
This inquiry received no response.
The redneck withdrew his revolver from his inside waistband holster and quietly discarded his gym bag. Watchful and wary, he sneaked through the living room and den and then entered the rear hallway. His heart was starting to move uptempo.
Twenty feet ahead of him and to the right stood the closed laundry room door. A chilly feeling crept into his stomach as the unseen machine whirred and thudded.
“Dora…?”
A woman screamed.
Chester froze.
The door opened, and into the hall stumbled Dora, wearing sandals, shorts, and a frayed beige bra. “You scared the living shit out of me!” Her hazel eyes flickered down. “Why’re you holding the spixterminator?”
Holstering the firearm, Chester considered the situation, which still did not seem quite right. “Why’re you home so early today? And doing laundry? You just did it on Sunday.”
“Some guy spilled food all over me in the dining hall.”
“So you’re doing a whole new laundry? Seems like you should’ve waited till next laundry day instead of wasting so much water.”
Disbelief widened the girl’s eyes. “Since when’ve you ever cared anything about wasting water? It was new jeans and my shirt with the cockatoo that got spilled on, and I didn’t want them ruined by chimichurri sauce.”
Inside the laundry room, the washing machine went silent, clicked, and resumed whirring at a higher pitch.
Dora approached Chester and caressed his left arm. “You had a bad day?”
The redneck realized that he was hassling his girlfriend for no reason. “Yeah. That guy’s still—”
A cellphone chimed in the bedroom.
“Who’s that?” asked Chester.
Dora shrugged.
Again, the device sounded.
“Keep doing laundry,” the redneck said while turning around. “I’ll get it.”
“Okay.”
Chester entered the bedroom, walked across the carpet, and picked up Dora’s pink cellphone, which then rang for the third time.
Upon the touchscreen was the word, ‘Anonymous.’
The redneck accepted the call and put the receiver to his ear. “Hello?”
Nobody responded to this salutation.
“Hello?” repeated Chester. “Somebody there?”
The line clicked and went dead.
“Faggot-ass nigger.”
The redneck killed the connection, and suddenly, some basic arithmetic happened inside of his brainpan. Holding the slim pink device in his big hands, he entered the passcode and checked the list of recent activities.
The anonymous individual had called four other times.
Chester’s mind darkened.
“Who is it?” inquired Dora.
Brooding, the redneck walked across the bedroom and into the hallway.
“Who is it?” the girl asked while adjusting her shorts.
“He hung up.”
“What’d the caller ID say?”
“How come you were home so late on Saturday?”
Confused, Dora wrinkled her face. “Why’re you asking me about that now? Who called?”
“Answer my question,” suggested Chester, who sounded atypically calm.
“I was at study group. I told you.”
The redneck closed the distance between himself and his girlfriend until only two feet remained. “But you came home later than usual. A lot later.”
“We got an exam coming up. Why’re—”
An index finger touched Dora’s lips, silencing her, while Chester’s other hand turned into a fist.
“And then today,” the redneck continued, “you came home early. To wash stains out of your clothes because—”
“I’m telling you—”
Chester grabbed Dora’s neck with his right hand. “Don’t interrupt me.”
Wheezing, the girl nodded her pale head.
“And just now,” the redneck resumed, “you got a call—which you hardly ever do, except when it’s me or if your father wants something. But this caller was anonymous, and when I answered, he hung up.”
The washing machine thudded.
“Please let—”
Chester dug his fingers into Dora’s throat, and her freckled face started to turn red.
“You came home late Saturday night for some bullshit reason, and you came home early today to wash stains out of your clothes. You’re also getting anonymous calls from some guy—I looked and saw that he’s called before.
“A buncha times.”
The girl was terrified.
“In four years, I’ve never given you more than a slap,” the redneck stated, “but if you don’t give me an authentic, nonfiction explanation for all this, we’re going into some rocky terrain.
“Real rocky.”
Chester shoved Dora’s skull against the wall and squeezed her neck. Tears ran from her eyes as she choked, struggling to free herself, and drool dripped from her gaping mouth.
The redneck tightened his grip.
A weird gurgling noise came from the girl’s throat, and her scarlet face turned purple.
Chester released Dora.
Gasping for air, the girl raised her hands and shook her head.
“Talk,” said the redneck.
“There ain’t nobody, I—” Dora coughed and then sucked some oxygen. “I fucking swear to God there ain’t.”
“I want details. Nonfiction.”
The girl stuffed air into her lungs while massaging her reddened throat. “I was late on Saturday ’cause there’s a test coming up, and I’m doing laundry today ’cause a guy spilled food on me at the dining hall. You can look at the clothes if you don’t believe me—probably still some chimichurri on them.”
“You could’ve spilled that on purpose to cover things up.”
“I didn’t.” Dora cleared her throat and wiped her eyes. “You can call Lisa and ask—she was there when it happened.”
“You could’ve coached her—told her what to say.”
“Chester…come on…I swear to God I didn’t. And the janitor saw, too—you can go ask him if you don’t believe me and Lisa.”
“And the caller? Mr. Anonymous?”
“I don’t know. I picked up once when he called a day ago, and he hung up on me.”
“You said, ‘he.’”
Dora was confused. “So?”
“How do you know the caller’s a ‘he’ if you don’t know who it is?”
“I’m saying ‘he’ because you said ‘he’! Jesus Christ! I never talked to him once—he could be a woman.”
“He isn’t.”
“I’m not cheating. I swear to God.”
The washing machine thudded a few times while the unconvinced redneck considered what to do next.
“Do you believe me?” inquired the girl. “I promise that—”
“I’m gonna need to smell you.” Chester pointed at Dora’s groin. “There.”
“Are you serious?”
“One thousand percent.”
“What’re you gonna smell for?”
“Lubricants and anonymous come.”
Astonished, the girl laughed humorlessly. “You’ve really lost it. This guy who’s fucking with you is making you crazy. These are just coincidences.”
“I’m gonna find out what they are.” The redneck pointed up the hallway. “Get in there.”
In tandem, the couple walked through the doorway and into the bedroom.
Chester elbowed the light switch, and the ceiling fixture glared.
Dora kicked off her sandals, removed her clothes, and climbed onto the mattress. “I woke up late this morning and didn’t have time to shower…”
“If it smells like dead squid, I’ll be satisfied you didn’t let anybody visit. Get on your back.”
The girl rolled over.
Chester parted Dora’s knees and lowered his nose toward her shaven pubic mound. The smell hit him on the way down, and he stopped short of his destination.
“Jesus. You weren’t exaggerating.”
“I told you.”
“It’s making my eyes dilate.”
The girl kicked the redneck in the stomach, and he started to laugh, relieved that his suspicions were unfounded.
No more pranks occurred during the following week. An anonymous person called Dora on Sunday night, but she answered her cellphone directly in front of Chester, who then witnessed the unknown individual hang up without saying a word. The redneck no longer doubted his girlfriend’s fidelity.
Early Wednesday morning, Dora gave Chester a giant bowl of peanut butter cereal and told him that she was going to go over to Lisa’s place after classes.
“Why don’t you guys study over here?” the redneck asked while digging a big soupspoon into his mountain.
“She’s not very comfortable here.”
“Why?” Chester gestured expansively. “The air conditioning’s first-rate, and so’s the furniture. Got plenty of beer and orange soda.”
Dora looked conflicted.
“What?” The redneck’s eyes hardened. “Talk.”
“You remember that argument you were having on the phone when she was over last time? Trying to find that Haitian girl who was hiding from you?”
“So?”
“Well, you were real loud. And you said some words.”
“So?”
“Bad words…including ‘nigger,’ plus the worst one you can say…”
“Which? Cunt? Who gives a fuck? I didn’t say anything bad to her.”
“No…but she heard you shouting that stuff through the walls for, like, ten minutes. And after you were done, you came out and gave a good long look at her tits.”
“They weren’t so great.”
“Well…so…Lisa’s not comfortable coming here anymore.”
“Cunt.”
“Don’t say that. Even joking.”
“I will, and I wasn’t.”
“Well, I’m going over and’ll be back by eleven.”
“Ten.”
“Fine.”
Chester and Dora ate their crunchy peanut butter cereal without saying anything else to each other. The meal sounded like two avalanches.
Afterwards, the redneck showered, drove into the urban sprawl, and flipped his itinerary so he could menace his clients in a novel way.
Ivan worked in an uptown store that sold fine suits, and Chester visited him at this establishment at nine a.m. sharp. Inside a private fitting room, the debtor came up short and received an elbow in the stomach that catapulted a partially digested spinach, Fontina, and mushroom omelette upon the mirror, where it sat for three seconds like a piece of modern art.
The remainder of the collections went smoothly, and as the sun dove toward the horizon, Chester headed home.
Nestled in the recliner that sat in the exact middle of the sunken den, the three-hundred-and-twenty-four-pounder ate sausage-and-onion pizzas, drank orange soda, and turned on the pay-per-view wrestling event that he had ordered one week earlier. The first few matches were good, though not exceptional, and the promos were tolerable, but not especially convincing. There was an announcement for a women’s bout, and rather than watch yipping cheerleaders perform low-impact moves and painfully unfunny comedy, he went to his computer and downloaded some pornographic videos.
A bell rang for a title match, and Chester hurriedly pulled up his pants and returned to his plush recliner chair to watch the action. The bout was acceptable, and immediately followed by the highly anticipated main event. At the end of this fifty-six minute contest (which he thought was pretty good, but had too many fancy high-flying maneuvers and not enough real mat wrestling), he looked at the clock.
It was ten thirty-seven.
Dora was late.
“Bitch.”
Chester unlocked his cellphone and made a call. Holding the receiver against his right ear, he heard two rings and a small click.
“This is Dora Haglund,” said a prerecorded voice. “Please leave a—”
The redneck pressed the disconnect icon and redialed. Again, there were two rings and a click.
“This is Dora Hag—”
Chester killed the connection. Suspicions that he had dismissed during the previous week were now returning.
The redneck reopened his contact list, scrolled down to the letter ‘L,’ and thumbed a connection. In his right ear, the line rang twice.
“Hey, this is Lisa Gordon. I’m not in right now, so please leave a mess—”
Chester killed the connection. A thousand thoughts crowded into his percolating brain.
“Okay, think. Think what to do…”
Some of the thoughts got out of the way, and he organized an itinerary.
“First…”
The redneck thumbed a connection and put the receiver to his ear.
“This is Dora Haglund. Please leave a message after the beep.”
A brief tone sounded.
“Call me when you get this. You were supposed to be home forty-three minutes ago.”
Chester killed the connection and then made a different one.
“Hey, this is Lisa Gordon. I’m—”
The redneck cut the line, said “Gordon,” and kept the surname that he had just acquired in his mind as he bounded into the kitchen, pulled a phone book out of a high cabinet, and slammed the tome upon the counter.
“Gordon. Lisa Gordon.”
Chester flipped to the letter ‘G,’ turned some pages, and scanned the small print until he found the college girl’s name and address.
“Pay Miss Cunt a visit.”
The redneck tore the information out of the phone book, donned his camouflage clothing, put on black boots, grabbed his hunting knife, snatched his gym bag, reset the alarm, exited his house, and locked the door. Hastening across the porch, he looked up the driveway.
His stomach sank.
“No.”
The baby blue truck was gone.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
A cellphone buzzed in his pocket.
Myriad thoughts crowded into the big redneck’s little head.
“No…”
Again, the device vibrated.
Chester surveyed the street and the nearby driveways as if the missing truck were a pet that might have wandered off.
The absent vehicle was not in the vicinity.
For the third time, the cellphone buzzed. This little sound filled up the night.
Raising the luminous device, the redneck saw the name “Pete Johnson,” accepted the call, and put the receiver to his ear. “Yeah?”
“Dora is with a man right now.”
Chester was overwhelmed. His woman was gone and so was his truck. No words emerged from the electric static that filled his skull.
“Do you feel like having a friendly conversation?” inquired the secret asshole.
“Where the fuck is—”
“Profanity isn’t part of a friendly conversation.”
It took the redneck a moment to wrangle his anger. “Where’s Dora at?”
“You’re being brusque.”
Furious, the redneck kicked a porch post until the wood cracked.
“Do you know how to have a friendly conversation?” inquired the secret asshole.
“I know.”
“What do you know?”
“How to talk friendly.” Chester clenched his left fist. “Like you want.”
“Terrific. Shall I tell you some things about the man who’s with Dora?”
“Go ahead.”
“I sent him to the GCU dining hall and had him pretend to be a student so that he could meet her. He’s a good actor because he’s a prostitute.”
The redneck felt cold all over.
“He’s also a hunk,” continued the secret asshole. “In his twenties, good teeth, thick hair, a little bit ethnic—shaves his body so that you can better see his muscles, which are splendid. You’d never guess from looking at him that he has hepatitis C and AIDS.”
The redneck felt sick. Gripping the arm of the porch bench, he sat down and stuffed some air into his lungs. “Has…has he fucked her yet?”
“Profanity.”
“Have they been together? In bed?”
“At this point, they’re just friends. But if I send him a text message that has seven letters—‘G-o,’ space, ‘f-o-r,’ space, ‘i-t,’ period—he will consummate the relationship with Dora. She’s been feeling very vulnerable ever since you choked her.”
“And my truck?”
“It’s in a place. Maybe a safe place. Maybe not.”
Chester knew that he could no longer combat the secret asshole. “What do you want?”
“You have a client named Erin Green.”
“Yeah.”
“Never again are you allowed to visit her in person or send anyone else to collect money from her. From this point forward, she’ll send all of her payments to you in the mail. If she falls behind for some reason, you’ll just have to wait. Do you understand?”
The redneck wiped sweat from his stinging eyes. “I do.”
“If you approach her, directly or obliquely, I will find out. Then, there will be no more phone calls, no more demonstrations of what might happen, because it will happen:
“A consortium guy with seventy-eight associates, ruining your life.
“You can get a new girlfriend and install a dozen cameras in your truck, but I know a thousand ways to hurt you, and will do so, again and again and again, until you wrap yourself in a Confederate flag and put a gun in your mouth. Do you understand?”
“I’ll leave Erin alone,” said Chester, whose voice was small and unrecognizable as his own. “You’ll stop that guy from taking advantage of Dora?”
“I will. And I’ll make him disappear for good.”
“And the truck?”
“I’ll let you know where it is after you apologize to Dora, give her some flowers, and perform cunnilingus on her every day for the next two weeks—regardless of whether or not she’s taken a shower.”
The line went dead.
Relief and shame filled Chester, and for the first time in more than twenty years, he wept.