48 Hour Short Story Contest

Whenever Randy told people he was a rodeo clown, most of them either laughed out loud or smiled and waited for the punch line. He wasn’t sure what they imagined – a clown with big goofy shoes making cartoon animals out of balloons, maybe – but when he pushed his hair back over his left ear, which had been partially torn off, and told them about the two concussions, the dislocated jaw, and the eight broken bones he’d suffered through the years as a result of his career, it was enough to erase the condescension from their faces.

After a moment of silence, they’d invariably ask, “Why do you do it?” It was a reasonable question, but one he found almost impossible to answer.

At first, he had been intrigued by the danger. Rodeo clowns worked hard to entertain both children and adults in between events, but they also had to be ready to protect bull riders at the first hint of trouble. If riders got thrown off, the clowns would distract the bulls to protect the contestants. If riders got stuck on the bull and were being dragged by the angry creatures, the clowns would have to separate the two before the rider was seriously injured or killed. Even with the protective gear underneath the colorful costumes, rodeo clowns were constantly being hurt and maimed.

But lately, Randy had been grateful for his job for other reasons. Three months ago, he and Caroline had buried their son. It had all but ended their marriage. Adam was exactly one month shy of his seventh birthday when he died, and what had once been manageable had become intolerable. Caroline barely spoke to him anymore, and no matter how he tried, Randy always felt empty and restless.

In the arena, Randy was one of the good guys, doing whatever it took to protect the riders. But he never had a chance in the real world to save his own son. Caroline had taken Adam to the mall to buy clothes for school and had eventually returned home alone. What kind of world would let a grown man wear clown makeup and a ridiculous outfit and be considered a hero, yet let a child be tortured and murdered because his mother wanted to buy him clothes?

When he was working, he didn’t think about things like that. It was easier there. At home, he had to go through at least a half a case of beer before he’d start feeling numb, and even then, the questions that plagued him were only diminished, not erased. But in the arena, there were long stretches of time when he actually forgot.

Randy had no idea how much longer his marriage would last. One night, after a few beers with Keith at a local bar, he admitted to his friend how bad things were going. Keith was astonished when Randy admitted he hadn’t had sex in months.

“How the hell can you go without it?” he asked. “If Carol won’t put out, you should hook up with one of the groupies that would. Hell, I bet you could get one of the Buckle Bunnies if you wanted, especially if they’ve seen you rescue one of their pretty boys.”

Randy thought about it for a few minutes, then realized not only did he have no desire to cheat on Caroline, he had no interest in having sex with her either. His sex drive had completely shut down, which should have been impossible at twenty-eight. He had been on autopilot for a while now, going through the motions, only interested in working, drinking and sleeping. The concept of sex felt alien. And the thought didn’t bother him at all.

Today had been a good day, however. He had some sores and a couple of bad bruises, but nothing that a few Ibuprofen and a steady stream of Bud Light couldn’t fix. Whiskey would be quicker, but Randy had never been into alcohol, just beer. He was sitting back in his recliner, watching Wheel of Fortune while his wife washed the dishes in the kitchen, and he couldn't help but wonder if maybe the holding pattern of his life was ending soon. It was hard not to feel anything.

Caroline had made pork chops, mashed potatoes and green beans for dinner. That alone was a good sign, since she knew how much he loved pork chops. Lobster tail was his all-time favorite, but it had been a long time since they had enough money to afford something that expensive, and in all honesty, pork chops were a close second.

She had even spoken a few words to him, and while their conversation was barely ten sentences long, it was more than they’d said to each other in a while. Even when they had retreated into silence – which pretty much defined their relationship anymore – it wasn’t as uncomfortable as it could have been.

A grasshopper jumped off the window sill near the TV, then stood motionless on the floor below, checking out the room. Randy thought about throwing a shoe at it, but couldn’t remember if grasshoppers or crickets were the ones that brought good luck. He didn’t want to risk jeopardizing his luck.

The weirdest thought occurred to him. “What if Adam came back as an insect?”

The question bothered him. It was stupid. Randy didn’t know if he believed in heaven and hell and all the crap his dad used to feed him, but he sure as hell didn’t believe in that Indian voodoo stuff about reincarnation. But the question bothered him anyway. What if his son came back as a grasshopper, and Randy killed him because he didn’t realize the truth?

“Fuck it,” Randy said out loud, trying to convince himself. “My boy wouldn’t come back as a damn bug.”

Just then, a dish broke in the kitchen. It startled Randy. At first he thought Caroline had heard what he'd said, but the dining room separated the living room from the kitchen, and he hadn’t said it very loud. He stood up in time to hear another dish break, this one much louder.

“What the hell?” Randy asked himself, running toward the kitchen. As he entered the kitchen, a serving dish crashed into the wall near him, and some of the fragments cut into his face and right arm. “Are you okay, baby?” he shouted as he slammed into the refrigerator, unable to stop himself in time.

Caroline was standing at the sink, arms buried in dishwater, staring straight ahead. As Randy recovered from his collision with the fridge, she lifted a plate out of the water and got ready to throw it down on the floor. Randy almost slipped and fell on the detergent bubbles that had slickened the kitchen floor, but he was able to stop her from breaking another dish.

“What the hell are you doing?” he asked his wife, trying hard to make sense of the mess.

“I broke a plate,” Caroline answered in a small, unsteady voice.

“Yeah, I heard,” Randy replied, puzzled by the cold tone of her voice. “So what, you decided to break everything else too?”

“It was a set,” Caroline said, as if that would explain everything.

“Yeah, you broke one of our plates. Big deal. It was an accident.”

“It was a set,” Caroline repeated. “I dropped one of our plates. It’s not a set if you’re missing pieces. It’s not anything.”

“We can get more plates, baby,” Randy said, still trying to figure out why she was so upset. “It’s not a big deal.”

“I hate you,” Caroline said, looking at him directly. Then she walked through the kitchen, past the pantry shelves, out into the garage.

Randy had no idea what to do. She had told him she hated him a few times before – hell, he had told her the same in the heat of a fight – but this time her voice sounded so lifeless, so final. It was easier to ignore things like that when screamed with passion, but when spoken quietly with an eerie certainty, the words took on a power that hurt him more than he would have thought possible.

Instead of following her, Randy surveyed the damage to the kitchen. Fortunately, while the floor and counters were a danger, covered with sharp pieces and ceramic fragments, no damage had been done to the walls or linoleum. A thorough cleaning would clean up the mess.

The door to the garage reopened, and Caroline walked back in, holding something in her right hand.

“Caroline?” Randy asked tentatively, but she didn’t answer.

Instead, she began breaking the dishes drying in the drainer with the hammer she had brought from outside. Randy grabbed her and she struggled at first. For a moment, he actually wondered if she was going to hit him with the hammer. But finally she calmed down, letting the hammer fall to the floor.

“Why don’t you care?” she asked him, suddenly angry. “I broke the plate and you pretend that you don’t care, but I know you do, I can see it in your eyes, and it’s not fair, it’s not fair, it’s not right! I broke the plate and you keep blaming me and I didn’t mean to, I would never have, I shouldn’t have, I don’t know how it happened!!!”

“Caroline,” Randy said, grabbing her arm, concerned and suddenly extremely afraid. “What are you talking about? I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“He raped him! He raped our little boy, he raped him and then he cut his throat, and you won’t talk about it,” Caroline gasped, hot tears streaming down her face. “You don’t care. It was my fault, so why should you care?”

Stunned by her unexpected accusation, Randy found it hard to breath. “How can you say that?” he asked, trying to understand how everything had become so impossible to understand. “How can you say that? I was his father. I loved him. God damn it, I loved him! How can you say I didn’t care?”

“Because you won’t talk to me!” Caroline replied, spitting out the words. “Why won’t you talk to me?”

“How?” Randy asked, starting to cry himself. “How can I talk about that? How can I talk about what he did? I can’t even think about it, I can’t even, I’d go fucking crazy, I can’t think about it! That man – that thing – what he did to Adam. I can’t talk about it, I can’t think about it, I can’t do that, why do you want me to do that?”

“Because I’m tired of this,” Caroline said, starting to fall to her knees before Randy caught her. “I’m tired of trying to pretend this isn’t real. Adam’s dead because of me, and you won’t talk to me, you won’t even look at me, you just drink your beer and ignore me.”

“What the hell?” Randy said, completely overwhelmed. He didn’t know what to say, what to think, but he knew instinctively that if he didn’t find the right answer immediately, everything would fall apart. “Caroline, I can’t talk about this. I can’t think about this. It’s too hard. I need to figure this out.”

“If you hated me, I could understand it,” Caroline said, starting to calm down. “If you forgave me, maybe we’d have a chance. But you won’t do anything. You just let me keep hanging. And I can’t live like this. I can’t keep waiting for you to finally tell me if we can survive this or not.”

“You did nothing wrong,” Randy replied, finally starting to realize that Caroline blamed herself for Adam being kidnapped. “You didn’t know. You didn’t do anything!”

“I have to leave,” Caroline said, stumbling past him. “I have to get out of here.”

“Please!” Randy begged, knowing it was too late, knowing it had been too late the moment he got home and found the police talking to his wife in the living room. “I don’t understand!”

Caroline paused for a moment, looking back at him, the oddest expression on her face. “It was ten seconds. Fifteen at the most. I looked away for ten seconds. How can so much happen in ten seconds?”

“Caroline,” Randy said, his voice breaking. “It wasn’t your fault.”

She smiled sadly and said, “I’m not coming back.”

Randy stood in the kitchen while Caroline went into the master bedroom to pack some clothes. He thought about getting the broom and dustpan out of the garage, but it was too much effort to move, so he just waited until Caroline had gone out the front door with two suitcases filled with what was left of their marriage. He remained still until he heard her car back up and leave the driveway.

Then he opened the refrigerator, took out a can of beer, and walked back to the living room, where the television was still playing. The grasshopper was still in the room, standing guard in the corner. A rolled-up Sports Illustrated killed the damn thing with one blow.

Tomorrow he would clean the kitchen. Tomorrow he would begin packing the rest of her things, so she wouldn’t have to deal with that. Tomorrow he would take care of everything he needed to take care of.

But tonight he was going to watch television and drink beer. And when he reached the point that he was numb – if he reached the point that he was numb – he would consider himself lucky.

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Comment: My entry is 2,245 words according to Microsoft Word. Thank you for allowing me to participate!