‘
By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes. (Macbeth, 4.1)’
by Saira Viola
Selwyn was a simple man. He liked simple things: the colour blue, beer, beef steaks and chopping people up.
He was short with a squat rot complexion pitted with scars and bad memories. Selwyn had sand-coloured hair and a pencil-thin moustache with mustard colored teeth. He smelled of paint thinner and rotting cheese. He spoke in a slow stutter so people were always trying to finish his sentences for him, rolling their eyes wide and impatiently wrapping up his thoughts with their own endings. This made Selwyn boil up inside: his mind a cesspool of hate.
Selwyn lived alone in a rented apartment on the East Side of LA. He worked long, frugal hours as a truck driver and listened to bouts of thrash metal and Albanian rock on the road. The kitchen sink lyrics and skidding guitars amplifying the spiking thoughts pounding his brain. Selwyn was thirty years old but his girlish falsetto voice and his child-like fascination with troll dolls made him seem much younger. He’d been collecting the freaky figurines since he was eight years old. Every single one had a name and at last count he’d amassed around thirty. His favorite he called Ondska. Selwyn would often see messages in Ondska’s glass eyes, then brush its wool hair. Ondska was special to Selwyn. They shared an unspoken connection.
It was a balmy October evening, sea salt spray bouncing off the pier and the excited babble of a party crowd. One hottie stood out. She wore a black skin tight latex jumpsuit draping every curve. She had soft beach head curls, a kitten eye mask and full crimson lips. She was sexy magnetic and spoke in a semi-French accent. She sauntered over to Selwyn standing alone by the large Ferris wheel. He was in heavy disguise, his face smoothed over with make up, mascara kohl rimming his eyes. He wore a shaggy hot fro hairpiece and lifts in his shoes. He looked like a tv personality, the kind who do reality shows and popularity contests.
‘Hi. My name’s Marie.’ Her voice was teasingly seductive, low and misted with intrigue. Her eyes peeking through the mask were satin blue with subtle tones of teal green. Selwyn said nothing.
‘So you’re the mean moody kind?’ Selwyn nodded. She laughed and took his hand, circling her long fingers around his palm. He looked down as she traced her ring finger across the lines of his palm and slowly worked her hands down towards his shirt. She looked up at him, as she inched forward.
‘Want to go somewhere a little more discreet? I know a place under the boardwalk.’
All around them was a giant diorama of human life. Selwyn viewed them as one monster circus act : chimps, jugglers, magicians, and sweet Marie she was the star attraction.
‘You know it’s kind of cool that you don’t say much. You’re not a crazy axe man are you?’
Selwyn shrugged in apology. Technically, he wasn’t an axe man. He was a smooth clean knife cock, and he knew how to cut square bone and dice everything from loin shanks to ball tips.
Bloody rare tender.
He flipped her over on her side, his hands mapping the shape of her round full breasts, her tiny waist and tight behind. She half-parted her lips, her jumpsuit was unzipped flashing rose pink flesh in the moonlight.
He gazed at her as shimmer strobes bounced off her body and hit the sea . He could hear the waves lap the shoreline and something else. A whisper: blunt cold devoid of emotion
Do it do it now Selwyn. Selwyn sacrifice her now.
He leaned back. The voice was getting louder, more needy, urgent, in tune with the breaking crest of the surf.
His eyes became red and stone hungry. He reached down for his knife and kissed her long and slow on the lips, his tongue cradling hers, then he parted her thighs and with his right hand plunged the steel blade into her heart. Choke. Red. Burn.