First Class Killing

She was loud and noisy and clumsy with rage, wild to get to me. Every frenzied whack came with a roar that started in her throat and ended with the sound of splintering wood or shattering glass or the thudding of objects raining down around me. My only hope was that all the flailing and swinging might be wearing her out.

I had to get to my feet. There was no shot on my hands and knees. My elbow was hot and throbbing and swollen massively, but it seemed to still work as a hinge. When I tried to straighten it, the pain was dizzying, but it responded. I crawled on my belly under a side table. She whacked the Stiffel lamp that was sitting on it, pulverizing the lightbulb and sending the shade flying across the room. The heavy base of the lamp crashed to the floor in front of me, then twitched as it reached the end of its electric cord. I reached out for it, grabbed hold, and tried to reel it in, but she had come around. When she saw what I was trying to do, she stepped on the cord. I barely pulled my hand back in time before the sharp end of the poker came down, spearing the hardwood floor. This time, when I grabbed the tip, I pulled it up and toward me, yanking it with my entire body. She didn’t let go. The side table, my shield, tipped back as her countertug yanked me out into the open.

Goddammit, she was strong.

I strangled that poker, knowing what would happen if I let go. I tried to climb the ladder, hand over hand, but she kicked at my head and tried to stomp me. When she hit my elbow, I screamed. She screamed back. I rolled over to protect the arm, still holding onto the poker, still co

She would kill me if I did. She would beat me with that poker until I looked the way Robin Sevitch had. I kept my eyes open…and saw my chance. The lamp. It was right there, the base of it staring me in the face. To grab it, I had to let go of the poker. I had to let go with one hand, grab the lamp, and swing it all at once, because she would use the chance to raise the weapon over her head, and bring it down hard enough to crack my skull open.

My brain was telling me to move, to movefast andmove now, but my body wouldn’t respond. I felt drugged. She made the choice for me when she twisted the poker hard and jerked it away. I grabbed for the lamp. It rolled away. I lurched after it. The poker came down, hit the arm of a chair and then my shoulder. I couldn’t feel anything now. I couldn’t hear anything. All I could see was the brass lamp. She saw it, too, and tried to kick it away. I grabbed at it again and got it this time. I swung it at the most vulnerable part of her I could reach-her knees. Nothing ever felt so good as the sickening collision of brass against bone when I made contact. She teetered but didn’t fall. I got to my knees and swung again with more leverage. Her shriek punched through the cotton that filled my head, and I could hear again.

She dropped like a bag of stones and rolled over on her side, one hand resting lightly on her devastated knee. Just for good measure, I hit it again and heard it crack. When she saw me moving toward the poker, she made a disturbingly strong grab for it. I got to it first and pulled it away. She didn’t go after it.

I tried to get up, staggered against the couch, and didn’t make it. I tried again and this time my legs engaged, and I was upright, standing over her with the poker swinging from my good hand.

She was on her side with her upper body twisted facedown on the floor. Her hair had spilled across her face, so I couldn’t see whether her eyes were open. Even with one leg cracked and bent beneath her, she looked lethal. I wasn’t sure about getting so near, but I wanted to see if she was conscious. I inched close enough to nudge her damaged knee with my foot.

She jerked violently and let loose with a long, loud scream that was raw and disorganized but powerful enough to make me feel that this wasn’t over.

“Stoppushing at me, you wicked bitch. It’s not enough for you to break my goddamned knee?” She rolled over and stared up at me. “Now you’ve got to stand over me and poke at me like I’m some kind of a dead dog in a ditch.” She tried to leg-whip me with her good leg. I was slow, but she was slower and clearly in agony. I shuffled out of her range and left her lying on her back, face twisted and eyes squeezed tight. She tried to control the pain through her breathing-long, deep breaths sucked through her nose and exhaled steadily through her mouth.

“Surprised to see me, weren’t you, doll?” She had to stop for a few breaths. “Old Sluggo, he’s not much of a liar.”

I stared down at her. I couldn’t think. I didn’t know what to do. I knew I couldn’t get close to her. The gun.Turn on the light, and find the gun. But then I started to feel sick.

“You should see yourself, sugar.” She let her head roll from side to side as if she were enjoying the feel of a feather pillow beneath her. She could barely talk, but she could still smile. “The way you’re looking at me.”

The poker felt slick in my hand. I looked down and saw the blood ru

“You want to kill me. I know you do.”

Her voice was hypnotic, the only thing that made sense. The sound of it, the tone and the texture were familiar. The way she said certain words. She had been the center of my world, the first thing I’d thought of in the morning and the last before I closed my eyes to sleep. Now her voice was the only thing I recognized, the only thing to hold on to as I started to disappear.

“You’d better kill me, too, because I swear to almighty God, after you pass out, you will pass from this world, because I will take that poker from you and run it straight through your heart. Then I’ll sit down and smoke a cigarette over your body.”

I backed away from her. I felt as if I were backing up a mountain. Why was it so hot? I had to sit down. Couldn’t sit down. She was coming. Why was I so…heavy? She’d rolled over and started to pull herself across the floor on her belly. A sick, twisted cry pushed out every time she moved. She was looking up at me, saying something. She was reaching toward me…she had it. She had the poker in her hand. Had I left it…it was supposed to be…it had been in my hand.

I staggered back and fell into the couch. I sank into…glass. There was glass on the couch. Huge, heavy chunks of it. It was under my feet. It was under her. I heard her moving over it. Everything was slowing down.

I had to get up. She couldn’t walk. If I could get up, all I had to do was get far enough away from her and…and what? Lie down and wait for someone to find me and save me? My feet wouldn’t move. She was in front of me now, using a chair to pull herself up. I heard the effort. I saw the way her body shook, every muscle engaged, every shred of her will lasered in on getting in position to kill me. I knew she would do it.

When she was up, she was towering again, her head swimming high above me. She tried to set her feet but could barely stay upright. She held the chair with one hand and raised the poker with the other. She held it like a dagger, aimed at my chest.

“Wait.”

“For what, darlin’?”

“Kiss me.”

Her right hand, the one that held the poker, dropped slightly. I looked at her face.

“Kiss me once. Please, Angel.” Every word felt like a lead weight that I had to lift, one at a time, to form into a sentence. “You said…”Breath. “You said…you wanted to. I wanted it, too. Please.”