After Midnight

16
KILLING JUDY

As we made our way down the slope, I reached into the front pocket of my cut-offs and took hold of the pistol. With my thumb, I flicked its safety off.
“Tony?” Judy called softly. “Are you there?”
I slipped the .22 out of my pocket, but kept it by my side, out of sight.
“Tony?” she called again. “It’s Judy. Are you down there?”
I didn’t want her to know what was coming, so I slowed down a little. She was about one stride downhill from me and two feet to my left when I brought the pistol up and fired point blank at the side of her head.
That should’ve done it.
But on the way up, the muzzle of the pistol snagged her ear.
I must’ve been standing too close. Probably because of the darkness.
She yelped, “Ow!”
The pistol spat out a bright, quick flash. In that instant, I saw the tilt of Judy’s head and the angle of my pistol.
And I couldn’t tell if I’d gotten her.
But she cried out, grabbed her head above the ear and fell, tumbling crookedly.
On her way down, I took aim but decided not to fire again.
For one thing, I didn’t want the noise. If you haven’t been around a .22, you might think it just makes a tiny bang like a cap gun, or something. But it’s more like a strong firecracker.
BAM! My ears were ringing from the shot, and the sound of the blast must’ve carried for a mile.
I probably could’ve heard it from my room above the garage, if I’d been there.
My prowler must’ve heard it, unless he’d left the woods entirely.
He’s the other reason I didn’t put a few more rounds into Judy. The fewer I used on her, the more I’d still have in the pistol in case I met him on my way back home through the woods.
Him, or some other creep.
(What about the guys in the Cadillac? Were they gone for good?)
So instead of using Judy for target practice as she tumbled down the slope, I thumbed the safety on and hurried after her. She rolled all the way to the bottom, her arms and legs flopping around. When the ground leveled out, she rolled over a couple more times and stopped.
She came to rest in a patch of moonlight.
Her white blouse had come unbuttoned. It was wide open, leaving her bare to the waistband of her skirt. The skirt had gotten pushed up around her hips.
Except for the patch of white fabric between her legs, she looked like somebody who’d just gotten herself raped and murdered.
Raped and murdered.
An idea suddenly leaped into my head.
A brilliant idea.
I slipped the pistol into my pocket, then picked Judy up by the ankles and dragged her toward the picnic table. Along the way, she groaned a couple of times.
Still alive.
But she didn’t struggle at all, just remained limp.
I stopped dragging her when the backs of my knees met the edge of the picnic table’s wooden bench. I lowered her feet to the grass.
With such deep darkness, I couldn’t see any blood on her. But her head had to be bloody. So I took off my shirt—Tony’s shirt—and put it near the end of the bench, out of harm’s way.
After that, I straddled Judy, squatted down, grabbed her sides just below her armpits, and pulled her up to a sitting position. Then I hugged her against me and stood up.
A good thing I’d taken off the shirt. Her face was so slippery against my shoulder and breast, it must’ve been covered with blood.
Though Judy felt awfully heavy, she didn’t weigh nearly as much as Tony. I managed to seat her on the bench and lean her backward against the edge of the table. Then, keeping a hand on her shoulder so she wouldn’t tip over, I climbed on top of the table. I crouched down, grabbed her, and hauled her up.
Then I stretched her out so she was lying lengthwise on her back.
By that time, I was sweating like a hog. I wanted to get it done, though, so I didn’t waste any time resting.
First, I pulled the blouse off her shoulders and about halfway down her arms. Which made her bare all the way down to the top of her skirt. It also pinned her arms against her sides, in case she might wake up and try to struggle.
Second, I rucked her skirt up around her waist. I was tempted to take it off her entirely. Some guys do that, preferring their victim naked. But most of them, when it gets to a certain stage, are in an awfully big hurry to get in. They’ll just shove the skirt up and go for it. Some guys even like you to be wearing clothes when they screw you. It turns them on.
I know all about this sort of stuff.
When you’re built “like a brick shithouse,” you learn plenty.
I’m what you might call an expert.
Anyway, never mind.
After I’d shoved up Judy’s skirt, I spread open her legs about as wide as they would go, so her feet hung over the sides of the table.
Next, I had to rip her panties off. A guy who wants to rape you will hardly ever just pull them down. He has to do it with violence. If he has a knife, he’ll cut them off you and maybe cut you a little bit in the process. Some guys will tear them off with their teeth. That can hurt, too. Accidently on purpose, they’ll bite more than your panties. Usually, though, they rip them off you with their hands. That’s how I decided to do it.
On my knees between Judy’s legs, I slipped a hand inside the crotch of her panties. The flimsy fabric was moist. I jerked it sideways hard and fast. Half the crotch panel ripped away from her waistband. One more tug, and it tore completely off. I let go, and the tattered flap fell against the table top. She still wore the narrow strip of elastic low across her belly, but there was nothing in the way.
Then I went to work on her.
Coming to my senses afterward, I found myself sprawled on top of her. I was completely naked. She was slippery underneath me, and still alive. I felt the slight rise and fall of her chest, the thump of her heartbeat.
Suddenly, a hot sickness rushed through me.
What have I done?
Blown everything.
All I’d wanted to do from the start was clean up after myself, make it impossible for anyone to suspect me of killing Tony—destroy every link to me, wipe out every trace.
What’ll I do?
For starters, I pushed myself up. Our bodies came apart with quiet, wet sounds. I climbed off her, got down from the top of the table, and sat on the bench. Leaning forward, I put my elbows on my knees and tried to figure a solution.
I must’ve looked like that statue, The Thinker.
The famous one by the sculptor, Godzilla.
Just kidding. Rodin, right?
The Thinker, but a female version and built like a brick shithouse.
Thinking, How the hell do I get out of this?
What a mess.
If only I’d kept things simple! But no! I had to get clever and tricky. Make them think she was murdered by a rapist. Brilliant idea!
In the process, I’d turned her into a petri dish of Alice samples.
So clean her up!
Sure thing, I thought. What about the marks. I’d put on her body?
The Thinker returned to thought.
Suddenly, I sat up straight and blurted, “Yes!”
First, I had to find my clothes. I slipped into my shoes—Tony’s loafers. Then I hunted for my cut-offs. I found them on the ground where I’d thrown them during the frenzy with Judy. I put them on the bench so they wouldn’t get lost again.
Carrying Tony’s shirt, I went to the creek. Though I could hear the quiet gurgle and see bits of moonlight glinting on the water, the embankment took me by surprise. It was like stepping off a stair in the darkness. I gasped and fell and hoped like hell I wouldn’t go down on a sharp rock.
Luckily, I hit nothing but water. It was about a foot deep. It splashed up cool against my face and underside as my hands and knees punched through the surface. The rocky bottom hurt my knees a little, but not much. The shirt protected my hands.
I eased myself all the way down into the water so it covered me and glided gently over me. It felt wonderful. It probably wasn’t very clean, though. Not like the swimming pool.
Thinking of the pool, I couldn’t help but remember the prowler. I pictured him floating on his back, and how he’d gleamed with moonlight. So beautiful and dangerous. Then he was out of the pool and squirming against the glass door, throbbing and spurting.
If they find some of that stuff on Judy…
That’ll cinch it for sure.
My brilliant idea was suddenly more brilliant than ever.
But it would require a trip to Serena and Charlie’s house.
It’ll be worth it.
Not wasting another moment, I pushed myself out of the water. With the sodden shirt in my hands, I climbed the bank and hurried to the table.
Judy was sprawled on top, the same way I’d left her.
Sitting on the bench, I dumped the water out of my shoes. Then I put them on again, climbed the bench and bent over her. Starting at her face, I washed her with the shirt. Water spilled off her, running onto the table, dribbling through the cracks between its boards and hitting the ground under the table with quiet splattery sounds.
I thought the water might wake her up, but it didn’t. She stayed limp.
I mopped her neck, her shoulders and breasts, then decided I needed more water. So I hurried back to the creek. This time, I didn’t fall in. With the shirt sopping again, I returned to Judy and worked my way lower down her body.
I made two more trips to the creek for water.
By the time I was done cleaning Judy, I’d drenched her from head to ankles and scrubbed every inch of her with the shirt.
Every inch of her front, anyway.
I didn’t turn her over, or see any reason to.
She gave me no trouble at all, just stayed limp except for a few times when she squirmed. Now and then, she made soft moaning sounds.
I washed the shirt out a final time and put it on the bench with my cut-offs.
It took a while, in the darkness, to find a good stick. There were plenty to choose from, though. I finally came up with a piece of branch about four feet long. At one end, it was just about the right thickness to wrap my fingers around. From there, it tapered down to about half that size. It had a few small limbs along the way, but I snapped them off.
Then I knelt on the table and went back to work on Judy.
Right away, she flinched and cried out and tried to sit up.
I clubbed her down with the heavy end of the stick. Four or five blows to the head and face, and she was limp again. After that, I focused on the places where I might’ve left bruises with my teeth and hands.
Really laid into her.
The heavy end made thunking sounds when it struck her. The other end whistled each time I swung it down, and whapped her skin like a switch.
She never flinched or cried out. Those early blows to the head had done her in.
At least for now.
Exhausted and drenched with sweat, I went down to the creek. I rolled in the cool water, then lay on my back for a while with only my face in the air. It felt great. But work still needed to be done.
Not quite ready to get going, I stayed in the water and made a list in my head:
1. Make sure Judy is dead.
2. Wipe my fingerprints off her car.
3. Run back to Serena and Charlie’s house.
4. Collect the sample off the glass door.
5. Run back here.
6. Add the sample to Judy’s body.
7. Go home.
It all had to be finished before sunrise. How much time did that give me? Two or three hours, probably.
Plenty of time.
But not if I spent the rest of the night relaxing in the creek.
So I climbed out and returned to the table. Kneeling on the bench, I put my ear close to Judy’s mouth. She didn’t seem to be breathing. Nor could I find a pulse at her neck or wrist.
She seemed to be dead.
But I’m no expert on that sort of thing.
I had to be completely sure.
The best way, I decided, was to cave in her head with a rock. Why use a rock? Because I didn’t want to fire my pistol again, I had no knife or saber, strangling or suffocating her seemed iffy, and drowning her in the creek would’ve been too much work. With a good, heavy rock, I could crack open her skull and spill her brains out and know she was dead.
To get one, I returned to the creek.
Standing in the water, I reached down between my feet and plucked out a rough-edged rock the size of a baseball.
It should do the job fine.
With the rock clutched in my right hand, I climbed onto the bank and took a couple of strides toward the picnic table.
And stopped.
The top of the table was speckled with moonlight.
A flat, empty surface.
Judy was gone.