The Standoff

The Standoff By Justin Wildman

Rising up off of the couch, Joe knew it was time to cash in his chips. The last few days were the most miserable ever. He slipped his chapped feet into his fuzzy slippers and stretched long, exhaling a tired sigh.

He was a young man, lean and tall. His hair was shaved and he had earlier trimmed his beard into a foomanchu. Joe had numerous tattoos that were amateur in style and unoriginal in nature. He wiped the greasy sweat off of his forehead and was annoyed at the stink his skin had smothered him in. He rubbed the sweaty oil off his hand on to his boxer shorts and casually scratched his boys whilst marching to his bedroom.

The room was in disarray, and filthy. The personal items that were out of order had previously comforted his slothfulness but now angered him as his conscience rebuked his ill behavior. He kicked a pile of stale laundry mixed with a damp pillow and stepped up to his sloppy dresser. He slipped on some tattered jeans and stretched on a wrinkled tshirt, careful not to snag his earrings. He tied on a spent pair of sneakers and went to his closet. He opened the door and spread the hanging shirts to reveal the small shelves in back of the clothes. There on the shelves was a gun and ammunition. Joe grabbed the pistol and three loaded magazines then shut the closet door. He put the magazines in his

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back pockets and tucked the gun into the front of his pants. He was sweating profusely. Before he left the room he looked in the mirror and stared into his own eyes. He worked to focus and to calm himself in his resolve. His own cowardice had let the standoff last too long. Now it was time to go and try to kill his best friend and rescue his girl. That’s all there was left to do.

Across town Reggie was fixing to make a trip to the store. He walked into his kitchen and opened the fridge, pulled out a carton of milk and drank deep. Coming up for air, he winced hard as the cold sap stung his teeth. He then wiped the spillage from his thick purple lips and deposited the carton on the rack and shut the door. He looked at his gold watch. Time to check on da brat. He walked across the kitchen to the landing that led down the stairs and into the basement.

Reggie was a tall and thick black man in his prime. He sported a vintage afro, comb like a flag stuck in it at all times, gold earrings with diamond studs, and big buck teeth he had capped in gold. He wore a Nike t-shirt, baggy jean shorts and Simple shoes. He started down the stairs slowly, stomping one foot after the other with his arms outstretched like a black Frankenstein (“hey brotha, maybe Frankenstein was black” he thought to himself) and initiated deep throated monster moans. This skit brought a series of muffled cries from somewhere below that tickled Reggie’s ears. He jumped off the last step and walked to a door.

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Knocking he asked, “Any mother fucker be home?” The reply was a series of garbled cries more fearful than the last. He opened the door gently allowing the hinges to creek for an eerie effect. “It’s the big black mother fucking wolf!” More cries and sobbing. He stepped into the room with a wide smile on his face that seemed to wrap all the way around his head. The bedroom had the carpet torn out of the center of the room to reveal the concrete slab floor.

Inside the room was a train wrecked woman who was chained to the ceiling and handcuffed at the wrists. She was blonde, her hair dirty and stringy. She was dressed in shorts and a tank top, her feet bare. Her skin was pale white and slick with running sweat. She had been crying for a while and her mascara ran to the bottom of her jaw. Under her feet was a plastic “Sit and Spin” that Reggie had fastened to the concrete floor with epoxy. In turn he had super glued the innocent toy to the bottom of her bare feet.

At the sight of Reggie she began a desperate rage but the sounds were muffled by her crude duct tape and old cloth gag. All she could do is grunt and spin wildly on the toy that her feet were adhered to, round and round she goes! Reggie burst into laughs, for it was his favorite part of the game so far, the fear that really got the woman on a roll, or rather, spun.

“Shit bitch, I always knew you were a freaky ho, but damn, dat some funny shit!” Reggie had brought a dorm fridge (not that his ass had ever been in college) out of his detached garage and installed it in the room shortly after capturing the girl. He strolled

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over to it, opened the door and pulled out a Mickey. He cracked the tab, tore it off, took a deep swig, and then pitched the tab at the girls head with a snap of his fingers. His aim was right on and the tab stung her square in the eye. Now she really started to spin, jerk, and grunt with one eye clamped shut.

“Damn! I fuckin’ twanged you right in your fuckin’ eye! Dat got to hurt like a mudderfugger!” Reggie sucked down the rest of his beer in a quick chug. “Damn, these be the good times, ain’t they?”

Reggie strutted over to the woman and upon his approach, she uttered stifled curses and thrashed around on the toy, sending her spent body into another wretched tailspin. Reggie laughed riotously and said, “Pretty fuckin’ fun ain’t it? Let’s kick it up a notch, huh?” He began to kick the rim of the sit and spin over and over, faster and faster, like a super speed sadist style ballerina. He let her spin out on her own until she was exhausted, eyes rolling in her sockets, and hung limp to one side. In despair she softly cried.

“Don’t cry baby, we ain’t far enough along in this drama for dat shit,” Reggie said in his own comforting way. “’sides, the real crying is yet to come, so save your fucking energy.”

He stood next to her menacing and motionless for a moment. Then he lifted his hand and softly stroked the tears from her cheeks. The woman hung limp and sniveled. “I finna go out for a bit. I know you’ll miss me so I won’t be gone too damn long. Don’t be

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gettin’ no squirrelly ideas spinnin’ round in dat pretty head, ‘cause if you do, and I catch you…” Reggie took a hard shot at her and sunk his fist deep into the dough of her stomach. She reeled in agony, spinning around several times while moaning and crying. Reggie waited until her body stopped spinning and hung limp before he said, “Cause if you do, dat will be the least of what you gonna’ get. Got it?!” Reggie used his hands to nod her head up and down, then said “Good.” Reggie turned around and left her hanging all alone and in total despair.

Reggie walked back upstairs whistling a made up tune. He knew this game would end sooner than the woman thought, but he was damned to tell her that. Better she thought her situation hopeless. Hopeless is what he was beginning to think Joe must be feeling (Joe, that motherfucker). It was two days since Reggie grabbed his girl, and he was a bit surprised that Joe hadn’t come knocking yet. Joe knew he had her. Maybe he felt it was easier to write her off than face ole Reggie and make amends. Joe hadn’t called the cops, either, which was smart for Joe. Otherwise Reggie would blow them all to hell. He didn’t care any more. He was out on bail but not for long. He had to take care of this shit soon ‘cause his ass was in a sling. No one believed his side of the story no how. Joe had put a bad hurt to him and Reggie would do anything to hurt him back, even die, because he was never going back to jail again.

Joe sped his truck down the road on a B-line to Reggie’s house. The gun was on the seat beside him. He tried to think of a plan to get Susan away from Reggie but it was impossible because he had no idea what hell was waiting for him. The only thing he

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knew is that they would be there, and that Reggie was expecting him. He slammed his fist on the steering wheel and cursed himself for getting her involved in this. Reggie was a bad dude, and Joe had known better to cross him, but he took a chance and lost big time. His mistake was about to cost them all their lives if he wasn’t careful. How did things get so fucked up? It didn’t matter now. He had to clear his head and think about what it was he was going to do once he got to Reggie’s pad. Park the truck a couple of houses away, walk slowly up to the door, kick it in, and start blasting. What else? As good a plan as any he supposed. And what if he died? Oh well. It was better than jail, which is where he knew he belonged. But he had made his mind up long ago that he would never go back to jail again.

Reggie grabbed his keys and headed to his front window, pulling the curtains slightly back. No Joe. He wondered if no show Joe would show up while he was gone. Probably not, the chicken shit. Reggie needed to get some food and more beer, maybe some gin too. It was going to be a long night again and he was planning to have plenty of fun with his new plaything. Besides, if Joe’s weasel ass did show up while he was gone, Reggie had a big surprise for him. He laughed out loud and headed for the door, deliberately leaving it unlocked.

Joe was turning the block and Reggie’s house was in sight. He picked a discreet spot to park and drove in that direction when to his surprise he saw Reggie strutting out the front door and skipping towards his car. Joe thought that Reggie would see him any

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moment now and would either start shooting, or run back in the house and kill Susan. No time to think about what to do next, so he just gunned the V-8.

Reggie was whistling again, deep in thought of what he was going to do to Susan when he heard a truck’s engine ramp up and come alive. He turned in the direction of the sound and thought to himself, Joe? Nah, can’t be that stupid fuck. And yet to his surprise, it certainly was. Reggie saw Joe through the windshield of his beat up truck, his body pressed against the steering wheel, knuckles white, and teeth barred. He thought Joe looked like Fred Flintsone hopped up on PCP, peddling his ass off at break neck speed in order to crush his nigger nemesis. Joe’s truck broke sharp to the left then to the right and hopped the curb. Reggie tried to run to his car but was too late and the truck bumper punted him in the side of his ass (Reggie thought in that split instant “Dat cracker run over my ass?”), and realized he was spinning sideways through the air. Then his body spanked the sidewalk and his melon bounced even harder against the cement and it was lights out for Reggie.

Joe skidded across the lawn and came to a stop, killing the engine. He fumbled for the gun and jumped out of the truck and ran toward Reggie, sight on target. When he got there, Reggie was unconscious and bleeding out of several areas of his body and head.

“Hot damned, I really did it!” Joe looked around the street for witnesses and saw there were none. His next thought was to shoot Reggie right then. But that would surely bring the cops. Joe thought there was still a chance to get out of this without getting the police

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involved. He looked back at the bleeding Reggie and kicked him hard in the face, smashing his nose with a crunch. Reggie did not make a peep. Satisfied that he had time, the extra boot to the face perhaps adding a few minutes to his schedule, he ran toward the front door and into the house to rescue Susan.

What transpired next made Joe wish he had stayed home on his cozy couch in his sticky underwear. When he launched himself through the front door, it was so fast and belligerent that before he realized his mistake, he was already standing in the middle of the living room. His error was that he did not know Reggie had a new dog. A really big motherfucker called a Doberman. And it was about 8 feet in front of him and instantly pissed that Joe failed to knock before he entered. The dog stood ground growling and barking as Joe nearly pissed himself. Then the dog lunged.

Joe shot once and missed (he just bought the damned gun and had no practice shooting it) then the dog was upon him sinking its teeth into his forearm. The pain was insane. He could feel the dog’s teeth on his bones scraping back and forth as it shook its head wildly. The dog tore on his arm in agonizing jerks that felt as though the beast might pull the meat right off his arm – he could feel his flesh stretching. Joe cried out and tried to pistol whip the dog to get him to let go. Over and over he hit the animal but a couple of times he missed and crushed his own hand. Joe finally brought the butt of the gun down on the dog’s eye. There was a terrible sound, like a quick wet fart, and the Doberman’s eye popped. It howled and released his arm but it instantly latched on to him again, its teeth

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gaining access to his arm through new puncture holes. That is when Joe put the barrel of the gun to its head and pulled the trigger.

The dog’s head blew apart and splattered all over the wall, staining the cigarette stained paint with a mixed palette of blood, bone, and shiny pelt. The dog died instantly but the muzzle was still sunk in Joe’s arm. He put the gun in his pants (careful not to blow his peter off – he hoped) and pried the jaws off of him. His arm was bleeding badly and he was in shock. So much so he nearly forgot about Susan until he felt thumping under his feet and heard faint noises coming from the basement.

His mission renewed, Joe pulled the pistol from his pants and sped through the kitchen, grabbing a dirty dish towel to bandage his shredded arm, and down the stairs he flew calling her name. He could hear her muffled pleas and stifled cries which led him to the room she was bound in. When he saw her he skidded to a halt and gasped at the despondent state of his girl. My God, why have I waited so long, was his first thought. “Oh baby…” he whispered to her.

He ran to her crying and held her, trying to lift her to slacken the taut chain. The hand cuffs had dug through her skin at the wrists and were rubbing the bones and gristle. She cried out to him as he clumsily tried to work the gag off of her face. Once free of it, she coughed, choked, and gasped for air. Then she said, “You gotta get me out of here Joe! He’s gonna kill us both, pleeeaase!”

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“Ok, ok!” Joe stepped back to take a quick look at her bonds. No key for the cuffs, and no telling where they are (in that big black mother fucker’s pocket, I’ll bet). He raised the gun and shaking like a leaf, he pointed it at the chain.

“Oh god, what are you doing?” screamed a frightened Susan. She tried to get out of the way the best she could, but all that did was launch her into a jerky spin making it hard for Joe to shoot the chain accurately.

“Hold still Susan! Fuck!” and he shot. Not once and not twice. He damned near emptied the clip trying to shoot that chain. With Susan screaming while bullets punched holes all around her, her frail body spinning all over the place, Joe felt like he was in a carnival shooting gallery hopped up on a lot of really bad acid. Finally he hit the mark and Susan dropped like a sack of wet sugar to the ground.

“You stupid fuck!” she screamed at him.

“Susan, let’s get out of here!” he said.

“I can’t! That cocksucker super glued my feet to this fucking Sit and Spin!” she pointed emphatically at the toy.

“He did WHAT?!!!” said Joe in amazement.

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“He glued my fucking feet to this thing! See? I’m stuck!” she exclaimed.

“Holy shit,” he said.

“Get me the fuck off of this thing, hurry!” she said, her tendons webbing out the sides of her neck from clenching her teeth.

“Sure, yeah.” Joe stood up and over Susan and tried to pull her off of the plastic platform, but it would not budge.

“It’s no good! What are we going to do? That bastards coming back Joe!” she said in desperation.

Joe had temporarily forgot about the black mamba unconscious outside and wondered how much time he had before he woke up. First thing first, he had to get Susan off this contraption and away from this place and Reggie. But how?

“Joe!” she cried.

“Hold on, let me think!” Seconds passed, then a revelation. “I got an idea!” and he took off running up the stairs.

“Where are you going! Don’t leave me here!” she exclaimed feeling abandoned.

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Joe yelled back to her “Hold on a second, I’ll be right back!”

“Joe – you sonofabitch! JOE!!!” she yelled in hysteria.

Joe ran into the kitchen and went to the cabinets. He rummaged through several drawers until he found what he was looking for. He turned and ran back down the stairs, and suddenly wished he would have taken a second to see if Reggie was still out cold on the sidewalk. He cursed himself for not doing so. The uneasy thought of Reggie coming in the house turned his flight to fright and he rushed to Susan’s side.

“What the fuck is that?” she asked, bewildered.

“It’s a spatula,” he said.

“What the fuck are you going to do with that?” she asked though she had a pretty good idea.

“Take it easy Susan, this is probably going to hurt,” he said.

“Oh no you’re not…” she said eyes wide.

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Before she could resist him, Joe stabbed the metal spatula deep and hard under one of her feet and pried up, the metal handle flexing. The foot popped off the toy with a tearing sound like Velcro and Susan uttered a shriek that nearly deafened Joe. He didn’t wait a beat and stabbed the newly lubricated spatula under the second foot. She shrieked again, only this time when Joe pried on the foot, it still stuck. So Joe rapidly chiseled the spatula around under her foot until the skin released and Susan fell backwards in agony. Joe looked at the bottom of her feet and at the dripping spatula and cringed. She had lost nearly all of the skin off the bottoms of her delicate soles.

“Oh baby, oh baby, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry!” he said trying to console her.

Susan howled and writhed on the carpet. Joe grabbed her and tried to get her to her feet but she would have none of it. Joe grabbed his girl and picked her up, cradling the broken woman tight. His heart burned deep within and he wanted desperately to kill Reggie for this. Reggie. Shit. I’ve got to get her out of here.

“Hold on baby, I’m gonna get you out of here!” he declared and tried to run her up the stairs. Once in the kitchen he looked out the window to where Reggie lay. He was gone. Joe stopped dead in his tracks. “Oh no…”

“What? Joe?” She said through her sobs.

“Reggie. He’s not laying on the sidewalk any more.” Joe’s face paled.

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“Joe, what are you talking about? Is he here?! Joe, get me out of here!”

“Quiet!” he hushed her.

“Joe, get me the fuck out of here, nowww!” she screamed. Suddenly, Joe had no idea what to do.

Reggie woke up. The world was sideways and it took a moment for him to realize he was lying on the pavement. A moment later he realized his head felt split in two and he remembered what had happened to him. He slowly moved his limbs, and to his surprise, he didn’t think anything was broken, except of course his nose. Dumb motherfucker can’t even run down a nigger right, he thought to himself. He was left alive because the dumb white boy thought he killed him. He sat painfully up and realized his ass probably had a bruise the size of a basketball in it and he cursed Joe. His face was soaked in blood and when he turned and looked where he lay on the pavement he was shocked and then angered to see the large pool of blood mixed with his drool.

He stood up, a bit wobbly at the knees, cursed Joe and stumbled toward his front door. Shaking his head intermittently, he reached out for the door knob and froze. Joe had been in his house, but for how long? And was he still in there? His truck is sittin’ sideways in my motherfuckin’ yard, I think the crackerass is still in there. Maybe in pieces on my floor or in little bits in my dogs guts! Time to find out. But first he walked back to his

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car, opened the door, and pulled a pistol out of the glove box. It was a big one. He left the car door open and turned to the house again. Time to die Joe.

Joe was trying to calm Susan down when he heard Joe walking up the stairs to the front door. Joe told Susan Reggie was coming in and he showed her the gun he used to free her. He then reminded her that if she did not keep quiet Reggie would know exactly where they were. At that thought he changed his mind and asked her if she could make it out the back door. She said she could not, her feet hurt too bad. Joe looked down at her feet and saw the blood and clear fluid leaking from them. He wondered if he carried her out the back if they could make it and then dismissed the idea knowing as soon as the the knob creaked Reggie would be on them. Better to stay put a little longer and see how things played out. He looked into Susan’s eyes and felt the agony that dwelt there, and then he hugged her.

“We’ll make it out of here. I promise.” She said nothing and just stared back at him with desperate hope, tears streaming down the canals of her mascara. Then Susan looked over his shoulder to the living room and saw the dog’s carcass for the first time and her jaw dropped. Joe turned to where she was looking in time to see Reggie’s shadow creep across the floor and then lie frozen in place. Joe froze like a rock and Susan grabbed his thigh so hard her nails dug into his skin. His finger was on the trigger.

“Hey Joe, nice to see you finally made it to the party. Glad to have you here brotha’. You know you put a hurtin’ on your bro, dat for sure. Not good. Not good. In fact it

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down right got me really pissed off. You should have finished me off out there. But I can forget about dat for a bit, if you come out and talk this shit out wit me. What choo say?”

Susan’s nails dug in deeper but Joe didn’t move. He knew Reggie was packing heat, and he knew if he made another mistake it was going to get them both killed. He was afraid of what to do next.

“Damned nigga, you fucked my dog up real good! I liked that dog. I just got him a couple days ago, you know, right after you fucked me over, remember?” Silence. “Yeah, funny fuckin’ shit, ain’t it? First you fuck me, then you fuck my dog, and let’s not forget how well you been fuckin’ your old lady, huh? Fuckin’ her real hard ain’t ya’? Left her to party with the Black Mamba for three glorious days while you sat around like a spineless shit wonderin’ what you gonna do? I fixed her up real nice though, thanks to all that time you gave me. Shit, I figure I had at least another couple a days, easy, to mess her up real good. How that make you feel Susan, to know your man could have stopped this shit days ago. DAYS AGO. And you would have been home right now instead of waiting for the boogey nigga to come in there and blow your fucking head off? Well?”

Joe turned to Susan with guilt in his face and he saw the doubt and then the condemnation in hers. Joe mouthed the word QUIET to her and focused his attention on

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Reggie, who was still on the other side of the kitchen wall standing in front of the front door.

“Hey buddy,” Reggie chided. “How did you like the rig I shackled your bitch too? Pretty fuckin’ ingenious I’d say. You know what I call it? My “Little Black Sambo Sled”. I spun your bitch so fast and so many times I thought she would start squirting butter from her ass and syrup from her tits! Every time I finished with her I was in the mood for fuckin’ flap jacks! No shit!”

Susan held Joe tighter.

“Why don’t you tell your bitch how you got her up to her eyeballs in this chit, Joe. Bet she’d like to know, wouldn’t you suga’? How bout I tell her for you buddy? We both know you ain’t got the balls to do it, do ya?” Joe took a step into the entry and closed the front door but moved no further. His shadow was like a ghost.

Susan tensed and Joe nearly pulled the trigger but hesitated because he wasn’t quite ready for a gun battle. Maybe there was a way to talk him out of this ordeal. Maybe Reggie wasn’t signed up to die any more than he was so just maybe they could figure out a truce or something.

“Hey fuckface. I know you’re there. I can smell your fear from here. I can smell all that bitches blood leakin’ out of her too. Or maybe it’s just her cunt? What you think?

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Tell ya what I think. I think you ought to tell us both the truth how you got us all together like this. What do you think Suzie?”

Susan could take no more. “Fuck you you mother fucker!” She started to stand, delirious from exhaustion and Joe had to drag her down to the floor.

“Shut up! Please!” Joe said.

“Oh go screw yourself!” she rebuked Joe. “You got me into this shit, now get me out! I’ve been here for days with this crazy fuck and you knew it? Fuck you! Why didn’t you call the cops! Why? Why?” Joe said nothing. She was in pain and steaming with hate. She looked absolutely terrible.

“Tell her why pal,” Joe said. “I’m dying to know as well.”

“Fuck you! I needed the money, alright!” Joe blurted before he even thought about it. Too late to take it back now.

“Oh, I see. So you rob your girlfriend’s parents, beat them with a stick until they be better off dead, and then you blame it on your nigger friend. Does dat about sum it up?”

“Joe, what is he talking about?” Susan asked dumbstruck. She scooted back a space on the floor, confusion rippling through her mind.

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“Nothing. Don’t listen to him, he’s just trying to fuck with your mind.” Joe explained.

“You would know. You are the master of the mind fuck, ain’t ya Joe? Go ahead and look your brave man in the eyes and ax him suga’. Ax him if he put your mom and pop in the hospital. Ax him if he was too afraid to get caught, too much a coward to face his old pal Reggie and try to get you back home? Ax him, baby, I know you wants too. Ax him if he’s the one who dropped the dime on his nigger friend, cause after all, who here believed the black man? You sure fuckin’ didn’t.”

“Joe?” Susan asked.

“Shut the fuck up Reggie!” Joe threatened.

“Ax him, bitch!” Reggie demanded.

“Joe?!!!” Susan questioned.

“No! Alright?! He’s full of shit!” Joe said.

“Ax him how he knew you were here Suzie, and ax him why he didn’t call the cops!” said Reggie.

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“Joe?!!!” she screamed, accusatorily.

“Susan, shut the fuck up, will ya?!” Joe said trying to silence her.

“Yeah, yell at her Joe. That will convince her. It always works with my bitches.” Reggie commented chuckling.

“Fuck you Reggie!” yelled Joe.

“That’s the spirit you jackass! Now we gonna end this, or are we gonna end this?!”

“I’m not going to jail fucker! You are!” screamed Joe.

“Wrong, sucka. You gonna die!”

With that Reggie opened up his pistol at the wall between them, firing three rounds from his .40 cal. The rounds whizzed passed their heads so close they could smell the gun powder sizzling as the slugs zoomed by and exited the exterior wall on the other side of the kitchen.

“Jeezus!” Joe cried and flew himself backwards to the floor and opened up his pistol at his side of the wall. Four 9mm rounds blasted through the wall, missing Reggie who dove past the kitchen pass through to the other side of the living room wall. Joe fired

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three more rounds as Reggie’s body blinked past them, less than ten feet away. He dropped the clip and inserted another, jacking a round in the chamber and held his gun ready. Susan was screaming, everyone nearly deaf by the gunshots.

“Joe, shut that bitch up, will ya?” yelled Reggie.

“Shut the fuck up Susan!” agreed Joe.

“Fuck you! You mother fuckers are crazy! Let me go!” Susan was hysterical and tried to stand up on her gooey feet.

“Sit the fuck down, damn it!” Joe reached up and grabbed her wrist trying to pull her down, but she was wild with adrenaline.

“Nooo! Let me go!” she yanked her wrist free.

“Joe, I said tell that bitch to shut the fuck up!!!” yelled Reggie.

Susan began to pull her own hair out while screaming. That’s when Reggie emerged in the doorway and pumped three quick rounds into her chest and face and disappeared like a cyclone to the other side of the wall. Joe froze in horror as Susan’s body was yanked off the ground by the projectiles and thrown backwards like a rag doll into the kitchen table. She landed on the tabletop and crashed through the dirty dishes and stale

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pizza boxes. Her chest heaved a few times, she spit out a fountain of blood that dropped back on her partially missing face.

“Susan!” Joe exclaimed as he leapt to her side.

She turned her face to his and garbled, “I fucking hate you for this.” And then she died.

“Yahoo, yippeekieh and all that sheeite! That was fucking awesome!” yelled Reggie. “Did you see that shit, my nigga?”

Joe was speechless. His arm was still bleeding, and now he was covered in Susan’s blood and chunks of bone. She was dead. Joe panicked.

He reeled like a cat and hissed at Reggie, “I’m gonna fucking kill yooouu!!!” and opened up with his pistol. One shot after the other blew through the wall as Joe screamed at Reggie his homicidal intents. Reggie took a round to the shoulder as he tried to drop to the floor for cover. He rolled over and started crawling toward the bedroom, sheet rock and splinters raining down on him. Reggie fired over his shoulder trying to suppress Joe as he scrambled to the bedroom door for cover, wounded. Reggie heard Joe drop his empty magazine and insert a fresh one still shrieking his fury. At the door he spun around on his back and kicked it wide open with both feet. Joe was crossing the kitchen

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and still firing – screaming at the top of his lungs. Once inside the bedroom, Reggie spun on his back again and fired the last of his bullets through the wall in the direction of Joe.

One of the rounds struck Joe in the neck spinning him into the wall and knocking him down. Joe clapped his hand on the spurting wound and jerkily climbed to his feet firing two more shots. Reggie was out of bullets and had no where to go. His arm was useless and bleeding badly. Only one way out. Reggie jumped to his feet and flung himself out the window. Joe heard the crash and knew what had happened. Reggie flew through the window, opening his skin in half a dozen gashes and landed in an unkempt evergreen bus. Joe rushed into the room and saw the enormous hole in window and ran over to look through it. Reggie exploded off the bush covered in blood, twigs, and cobwebs and was about to run when Joe fired 3 more shots at him through the glass. One bullet struck Reggie in his limp arm’s hand and sheared off two of his fingers. The other two shots were wild and punctured the next door neighbor’s house. Reggie was shaking his crippled arm like he had a viper latched to it, spraying blood all over the lawn and the neighbors siding.

Reggie sprinted toward the street trying to make it to his car. Joe turned on his heels and raced through the house to the front door. He flew out the door and onto the porch just as Reggie was almost to his car. Joe hollered in triumph and fired the last two rounds into Reggie’s back. Reggie slammed into the open door of his car and sprung backwards like a pinball into the concrete where he lay writhing and spurting blood. Joe was racing

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down the steps in celebratory madness when he heard the neighbor’s front door slam with a bang.

As he turned his head to the neighbor he also heard another noise that was familiar. He had never heard it before in reality but thought he recognized it from TV. It sounded like a shotgun loading a shell into the chamber. In the split second he turned his head to the neighbor, in mid stride, he knew he had fucked up yet again. Standing on the neighbor’s porch was THE NEIGHBOR, and he did indeed have a shotgun. It was a very big shotgun with a rather long barrel. The man holding the shotgun was covered in blood, crying, and seriously pissed. Joe was still running toward Reggie when the neighbor pulled the trigger and shelled the shit out of Joe on the run. The concussion of the impact yanked Joe out of his shoes and launched him about 10 feet where he landed just inches from the dying Reggie. Joe was face to face with his old pal for the first time in days. Joe heard the neighbor eject the spent casing and pump the chamber with a fresh one.

“You stupid son of a bitch!” The neighbor said as he marched toward them. “You fucking shot the wrong motherfucker today!”

Joe looked into Reggie’s eyes. Reggie began to laugh at him while bubbling blood and foam over his lips. Joe had lost his pistol when he was buckshot and saw that Reggie’s .40cal was within his reach. He grabbed onto the barrel and brought the butt of the gun into the air that he may bring it down on Reggie’s skull once and for all.

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Reggie’s eyes opened wide at the judgement about to come upon him when he witnessed Joe’s head evaporate off of his neck and shower himself and the inside of his car with crimson shrapnel. Joe was vaporized before he even heard the shot. Joe’s headless corpse flopped onto Reggie’s legs and quivered sporadically.

The neighbor came running over to Reggie, wounded, but not gravely. “That crazy some bitch! I fucking fragged him! You ok Reggie! Carol called a ambulance. It’s on its way. Hang in there buddy!” The neighbor grabbed Reggie’s good hand and squeezed it trying to comfort him. Reggie was smiling. The neighbor supposed he was happy to be rescued. Reggie was fast turning drowsy when he heard the siren coming and the tires screeching around the corner of the block. If he held on, he just might make it.

The End

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