crazy.
Mary walked in, closed the door behind her, and said, “Okay, sweetie. Let’s get this over with.”
Timothy stood up and smiled. “Change of plans.”
Mary listened as Timothy Horn explained what he wanted to do instead of putting that ugly creature under the bed while they fucked. She hated to admit it but Betty was right. That crazy prick Timothy had to leave a happy man. That still didn’t make her any more comfortable with what he had planned.
He said, “See what we’re going to do, we’re going to pretend this here is Lincoln and you’re going to be Lincoln’s wife. You’re going to sit next to him here.” He patted the bed where he had laid the dead animal down on the quilt. “Now, I’m going to be the assassin, see, and I’m going to shoot him.” He smiled. “Let me ask you, do you know where Lincoln was killed?”
Mary said, “Was a theatre, right?”
“Yes. Good girl, good girl. It was a theatre but we’re going to do it differently, see. We’re going to make believe we’re in an open-topped stagecoach and I’m going to be over there on the other side of the room making believe I’m hiding behind a fence or a bush or something.”
“You know you can’t shoot your gun in here. Betty’ll have a fit.”
“I’m not going to use a gun, Mary,” he said. “So just come and have a seat on the bed next to the President here while I go prepare for the assassination.” Timothy got undressed and walked over to the corner. He crouched down and gestured for Mary to sit on the bed next to the creature.
Mary looked at the thing and felt bile rise into her mouth. It was such an ugly animal: dark pink and slimy with all those legs draped over the bed. It reminded her of the time she and another prostitute had explored each other’s pussies. Everything was so weird and wet. That experience had been disgusting and arousing at the same time. How can something so ugly like a pussy cause so much pleasure? Mary wondered if it was going to be the same type of experience.
She pointed to the creature. “Wait, what the hell is that thing, anyway?”
“Called a squid. My uncle got it from a friend of his who lives back east. New Jersey, actually. That’s where my family came from originally.”
“Is that what passes for a pet? They don’t have dogs in New Jersey?”
“Don’t know. This guy my uncle knows, he’s a judge over there, name’s Judge Kinski, maybe you’ve heard of him?”
Mary shook her head.
“Anyway, Judge Kinski liked to walk along the beaches there and one time he came across an Indian who was sitting with this thing on the beach, holding it like a baby. The judge asked the redskin what the hell he was doing and you know what the redskin said?”
Mary shook her head again.
“He said that he was trying to wake up some sort of god that lives in the sea. Those Indians are pagans, you know, devil worshippers.”
“So that judge decided to just take this squid thing?”
“Yeah. After he shot the Indian, that is. Shot him right in the mouth. He said there were teeth everywhere. I think he even gathered a few of them up, too. My uncle said the judge took those teeth and made them into dentures. I think he gave a few to my uncle, too.”
She rolled her eyes. “That judge sounds like a real nice fellow.”
Timothy Horn stood up from his crouch, stretched, and then went back into position. “So are you ready?”
“Guess so.” She sat next to the creature and hung her feet off the bottom of the bed. “What do you want me to do exactly?”
“I’m going to assassinate the bastard and you just go on screaming like if it was your husband being shot dead right in front of you. You can imagine what that’d be like, can’t you? Pieces of his brains and skull all over the place and you just get all crazy and shocked so you try to