Blue Smoke

moaning from the bedroom.
    Ignoring it, Joey drank some wine with Wheel. “Buy a vowel, you asshole.”
    He got a sudden, vivid image of his father, kicked back in the living room recliner, drinking a beer and telling some stranger on the game show to buy a vowel, you asshole.
    It pushed him up, pushed the fury through him, fresh and bright.
    He wanted to punch his fist through the TV, slam his foot into it. Nearly did as his brain screamed with the rage.
    Buy a vowel, you asshole, his father had said, and sometimes, sometimes had shot his son a wide grin.

    “When are you gonna get on the show, Joey? When you gonna get on and win us some money? You got more brains in half your head than these cocksuckers.”
    He murmured the words, remembered the words as he paced the tiny living area, calming himself again.
    They’d’ve been all right, he thought. They’d’ve come out of the slump and been all right. They’d just needed a little more time. Why didn’t they get the time?
    Because that little bitch had gone crying to her old man and ruined everything.
    It shook his body for a moment. The fury and the grief stormed through him so that his body vibrated and hummed until he got it under control once more.
    He picked up the wine, took another long sip.
    “All right. Time for work.”
    A man who loved his work was a prince among men, Joey thought as he flashed on the lights in the darkened bedroom. He smiled at the woman in the bed whose eyes blinked, then widened with terror.
    His pal Nick mouthed off about never taking it personally, about remembering it was just business, but he didn’t buy that crap. He always took it personally. Otherwise, what was the damn point?
    He strolled up to the bed while her eyes wheeled toward him. “Hiya, Deb. How’s it going? Just want to say that for a woman pushing toward sixty, you’re not in bad shape. That’s going to make this more pleasant for me.”
    She was shaking, her body jerking with shudders as if with small electric shocks. Her arms and legs pulled and twisted against the clothesline he’d used to bind her. He was tempted to rip off the duct tape from her mouth, pull the wadding out, just to hear that first bubbling scream.
    But there was no point in disturbing the neighbors.
    “Well, why don’t we get started?” He put his hands on the button of his jeans, watched her head shake frantically, her eyes fill with tears.
    God, he loved this part.

    “Oh, wait, where are my manners? Let me introduce myself. Joseph Francis Pastorelli Junior. You can call me Joey. Your cocksucking husband dragged my father out of our home, put handcuffs on him and pulled him out in front of all the neighbors. Put him in jail for five to seven.”
    He unbuttoned his jeans now. She was rubbing her wrists raw with the struggles. There’d be some blood in a minute, and that was always satisfying.
    “That was twenty years ago. Now, some people might say that’s a long time to hold a grudge, but you know something, Deb, some people are assholes. The longer you hold it, the better it feels when you make the fuckers pay.”
    He unzipped, released himself. Stroked. The sounds she made now were tinny, high-pitched shrieks held in by the wadding and the tape. “The cocksucker you married? He’s got to bear part of the blame for all this. Since he’s dead—oh, condolences, by the way—you’re going to get what was coming to him.”
    He sat on the side of the bed, making her leg jerk and twist when he patted it. He removed his shoes. “I’m going to rape you, Deb. But you’ve figured that out already. I’m going to hurt you when I do.” He boosted up his hips, pulled down his jeans. “That really adds to it for me, and I’m the one in charge here.”
    She struggled and wept and bled. He watched her face as long as he could, the bruises and bleeding he’d caused. He saw Reena’s face. He always did.
    He came hard, with that tinny shriek in his ear.
    She was down to mewling whimpers when he rolled away. He used her bathroom, emptied his bladder, cleaned himself up. He didn’t care for the smell of sex, that whore smell women coated on a man.
    He went out, drank a little more wine, surfed around, found the ball game and watched an inning while he snacked on some Wheat Thins.
    Goddamn O’s, he thought as they went down in order. Couldn’t find the ball if you rammed it up their ass.

    When he went back into the bedroom, she was struggling weakly against the bonds. “Okay,