Created By Read Online Free PDF Page B

they’ll let this go for nine twenty-five. The owner just bought in New York and he needs to be there full-time for business.”
    He looked through the dining room window, at the wood floor. Tried to detect nail marks: holes or nicks, spaced far enough apart; spread-eagled scars on hardwood.
    “I remember hearing about a murder,” he said, not looking at her. Drawn once again to the floor; the sacrificial trauma sponged in cracks and grooves.
    “Would you rather look at something else? I have a couple listings up on Broad Beach that are to die for.”
    To die for.
He folded the phrase into smaller and smaller sizes until it disappeared.
    “But I remember you saying anything beyond Zuma was too far north.”
    He went back inside, trying to decide if he could live in a house where something so ghastly had happened. His mind saw things; that was always the danger. His feelings and perceptions could shift for no reason and inexplicably imagine terrible prospects in anything.
    A mother pushing her baby on a sunny park day could suddenly change, in his mind, to a crying woman whose selfish husband was leaving to take the baby to another state, where it would be molested; murdered.
    A smiling cashier at McDonald’s would become a crumpled statistic, victim of a gang drive-by which would strike exactly at the moment Alan was being handed his McNuggets. Exploding blood would puddle on the shiny metal counter.
    The times he imagined people pulling alongside his own Porsche and shooting him. Or the times a windy night sounded like footsteps. Or the moment a neutral face at a mall became an abhorring glare that would follow him out to the parking lot and beat the shit out of him until he was bloody; begging for his life.
    It was everywhere.
    A voice on the phone, soliciting for Vets of Nam, who didn’t like him saying no, he “already gave six months ago.” The way he could see the voice break in to his apartment and wait, and he would open a closet late one night and it would plunge a knife into him.
    The mention of his mother making him imagine her alone, inside her casket, pounding to get out, ripping at puffy satin, screaming helplessly, nails torn off as she struggled to claw free.
    “Broad Beach is too far,” he said.
    “Well, we can keep looking. There’s always new stuff coming out in listings.” She was looking at Alan like he scared her a little. Like something about him was changing. She was studiously measuring what he needed to hear, watching carefully for reaction.
    He looked at her.
    Saw her getting old. More desperate than she already was. Saw diseases rooting. Saw all those who ever cared about her, pulling away and despising her frantic demands as she sat alone in a corridor in a depressing nursing home. Saw the sheet being pulled over her face, covering carefully bleached hair.
    “Can I tell you something … don’t buy if it doesn’t feel right.” She smiled, teeth pressing brown lipstick. “We’ll find you something you’ll love.”
    Alan watched waves spread champagne on sand, as the sun passed out. He felt overwhelmed, knew somehow, despite the house’s nightmare history, this was home.
    Where he could create.
    The wind came up, strumming chimes that hung on the deck, and he told her he wanted the house. It was the right atmosphere. He could be himself here. Was somehow even fascinated by residues of terror and helplessness that stared up at him from the floor. He didn’t know why. But he imagined himself kneeling on the wood, staring at it until blood seeped from the peg and groove; surfacing welcome. He imagined placing an ear to the dented wood, hearing tiny pleas.
    She seemed surprised Alan wanted to go ahead with it and smiled quickly. “That’s wonderful,” she said. “I’m sure we can get this.” She touched his arm; financial foreplay. “We better write this before someone beats us to it.”
    He said nothing, moving onto the deck, sounds of torture drenching his