Charades

He rose, woken as usual by a radio alarm clock which had been set to go off at 6.45am every morning for the past seven years – walking up to the window and rolling up the grey colored blind, he let the fierce light of day pour in as he held his hand up to his eyes, then took a deep breath through the nose and fell forward to the floor. He managed to do thirty two press ups, instead of the usual thirty, then slid off his pajama bottoms, folded them into a cube and put them away inside the sofa along with the white bedsheets. Running his hand over the folded up bed to even out the folds, he then put on his pants and socks.

In the kitchen, he poured ground coffee beans into a cafetiere and set it on top of the cooker. Using a match to light it, he then went into the bathroom and from a glass cabinet pulled his shaving kit out, listening the radio broadcasting a program about the Chopin Year celebrations. Whistling gently, he applied soap to his face, sharpened the razor blade and pulled a mirror out of the cupboard, which he then set on a shelf. It took him a while to look at his own reflection, then he slowly, methodically removed the soap from his skin, wiping the blade on a paper towel. Once he was done, he flossed his teeth, applied two different types of paste to his toothbrush and spent a long while brushing while strolling about his apartment.

Once the coffee was ready, he poured it into a transparent glass without a handle, returned to the bathroom, washed off his face and realized this evening was the one he was scheduled to shower. Wiping the mirror clean and setting it back in the cupboard, he glanced down at the unused shaving brush – trying to remind himself to buy shaving foam later on, an item he had been avoiding buying to save cash. Slapping his cheeks with his open hands, he went into the kitchen, rolled up a cigarette, but did not light it, sipping on some coffee instead – black, with three teaspoons of sugar.

He went out, but didn't put his shoes on until he was outside his own front door. Walking slowly. He was not imagining it – everyone was looking at him... He decided to put his shades on – the city was getting ready for the summer, tree pollen getting up allergy sufferers' noses. The noise of birdsong kept on waking up the hung-over homeless using local parks to sleep in. Children ran through the city, their school backpacks slung carelessly over their shoulders. Overfilled thrash cans were starting to stink. The dogs taking their elderly owners out for walks were out and about sniffing for the feces they had deposited in the fall, now emerging from beneath melting snows. A baker set yesterday's produce out in front of his store, while a newspaper seller smoked a cigarette, greeting him with a cool, yet clearly respectful, nod of the head.

He passed by the restaurant he frequented – they were just about to open, and he looked in to see if his favorite waitress was on duty that day. She was busy wrapping cutlery in napkins, her lips coated in light pink gloss, her white blouse revealing a little decolletage. He drew her gaze by staring, then bowed to her from the sidewalk. Politely, yet firmly. She smiled right at him, revealing rows of even teeth he so very much liked the look of, then returned to polishing knives and forks.

He was approaching the square with the bank he had robbed right after it closed the night before – stopping for a moment, he listened to the gathered crowd chattering on about rising crime in the area and the uselessness of federal government responses, which was only interested in upcoming elections. Hearing that the police had no leads as yet, he nodded in appreciation – apparently, the closed circuit cameras were not working properly, which of course was once again the fault of useless politicians.

The brief monologue he presented to the crowd went something like this: “If we could feed our families from the meager wages we get paid, no one in their right mind would think of robbing banks!”, something he meant to sound like a joke, yet made him feel like he was on some sort of political campaign trail, just as his neighbors starting to chant his name. He had no idea what that comment about feeding families was about, or why he might have said anything of the sort, seeing as he had been alone for so many years.

“I ain't surprised someone done gone and robbed the place!” the newspaper seller shouted from the corner of the street. “If I had the guts, I would have done it myself!” the baker joined in. The cops milling about tried to calm the crowd, announcing the bank would be making an official statement within the hour. The waitress, with her low cut blouse and pink glazed lips, came out of the restaurant to light a cigarette at the very moment someone shouted: “Kilgore Cod for president!”

The crowd took up the “Kilgore Cod for president!” chant, while Kilgore noticed two cops studying a brown leather glove he had evidently forgotten to take with him the previous afternoon. Stuffing his hands into his pockets, he began backing away, glancing at the pink lipped waitress who was looking at him, holding a cigarette, its filter end now tipped in pink.

On his way back home, he stopped for a moment by the river and whistled, stuffing his hands deeper into his pockets. Workmen were bowing to him even more than usual. The day before he had finished working on this particular building site, so he passed by his former colleagues having their second breakfasts, prepared by women waiting for them back home any time they returned exhausted from work. The difference between him and them was that he always knew what his lunch box contained as they unwrapped their sandwiches during the half hour break. Now some of them extended their hands high up in greeting:

“Howdy, chief!” one of them called out. Kilgore Cod nodded with a friendly smile.

Two weeks earlier, on the first day of spring, he set off – as he liked to do after work – to his favorite restaurant in the Antique District for a glass of porto and some grilled trout. This was the second year he had been working as a fitter of aluminum window frames and security gratings, feeling he had gotten lost down some sort of narrow alleyway in life – it was high time to lift his feet and get moving on.

“Damn moving, time to run,” he said as the waitress was placing an clean ashtray before him. “Do you, madam, know that in French 'impasse' simply means being unable to walk past, get around something?” he said, then stopped. She said nothing in response as she kept wiping the table top before him. “From 'passer' which means 'to cross, pass by'...” he went on.

“I had no idea...” she said, her white teeth gleaming in a broad smile. That particular day, she was wearing a checkered blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up, the two top buttons undone. Kilgore had to take care not to be caught staring.

“Impasse is simply being caught in a situation without a way out. Are you also trapped in that sort of scenario?” he asked, rolling a cigarette he then did not light, chiding himself silently for failing to hold back and having a good look after all. He dropped his gaze as she burst out laughing in a most melodious and sweet fashion, then said:

“I thought impasse meant seeing lower cards in a game thinking the others don't have nothing higher to match them with.”

“Oh yeah? I've never played cards,” he said to her back which was now turned towards him, and sighed. Watching her walk away, he decided to hand in his notice at work. As she returned and set before him a plate of steaming hot fish smelling of aromatic herbs, placing next to it a set of cutlery wrapped in a paper napkin, he grabbed her by the hand.

“What is your name?”

“Bill,” she said calmly without pulling her hand back.

“Bill? But that's a man's name,” he said, feigning surprise, seeing as he knew exactly what her name was.

“Yeah.”

He loosened his grip, holding her by the wrist, then moved his hand down inside her palm, noticing a band of gold on one of her fingers.

“Billie Parker from Texas,” she added, taking her hand back, then bowing before him like a schoolgirl.

“An excellent name for a saleswoman,” he joked. “I now get why you use the masculine variant.”

“It's a fine name for any old whore,” she said assertively. “Something I wish I could myself be,” she said, giggling, and turned on her heel.

“Wait!” he shouted and she stopped, letting him know with a sweeping gesture that she had lots of customers to attend to. “One last question and then I'll let you get back to work.”

She slid the chair opposite back and sat down facing Kilgore.

“Make it quick. You see that guy over there?” she asked, looking around and pointing at a table on the other side of the restaurant, to where a huge man wearing a well-worn graphite grey suit was sitting. “His tips are like one third of all my wages.”

Kilgore nodded once more, then thought about how his meal was getting cold.

“That ring on your finger. You married?”

“Separated,” she said with a deep sigh, then looked at the ring. “I got married when I was sixteen...”

Kilgore looked at her to show he was listening, so she went on.

“He was the prettiest boy in high school. Name of Buck Thornton, might have been the love of my life. Could be he actually was.”

“How is it possible that he let a lady like you go?”

“That is an additional question, sir...” she answered, shrugging her shoulders. “I guess it's way best I remember him from the days we loved one another than we get to hatin' each other just cause of ragin' boredom,” she said, getting up.

That evening, the first one that felt like it really was springtime, he listened to a radio broadcast about Béla Bartók, his favorite composer. Unable to gather his thoughts, he kept on finding himself staring at a single point on the floor for longer than usual. The host of the radio show said Bartók, like Bach, had composed many of the most renowned musical inventions, then spent a long time with an invited expert discussing the similarities between inventions and fugues. About how they are – like fugues – polyphonic. And also about how inventions often involve answers, internal connections. And that they are chromatic.

Chromatic – he jotted down in a notebook he had pulled from his bed, using a sharpened pencil.

He had been planning the bank robbery for over a year, wondering what he would do with the money, though this wasn't all that important. What mattered most was to build up the courage, to endure his life's impasse, the dragging days of living stripped of meaning, even though life itself was meant to have value.

He lay back in bed, wondering about the part of her body Bill had revealed, sinking into the mattress as if lying between her breasts; that little portion, a mere couple of centimeters – a planet he would have to set off for. Be the first man to claim it for all time. He was thinking of bodies as if they were bits of food, morsels he had to secure to survive, being aware that he had never before desired to have anything for himself. Well, just that sliver of her flesh.

Cats and drunk youths were howling outside the windows. March had never been his favorite month, exhausting him with the end of winter blues, making him sleep less well at nights, often forced to get out of bed and write down individual words, before climbing back under the sheets to pretend he would soon fall asleep again. His ulcers were always an extra pain in March and he curled up in bed, battling bouts of acute belly pains. Putting out a cigarette, he remembered his plan to stop smoking and masturbate less after the robbery, both things making him distracted and lethargic.

His long standing plan was to go through with it in April, which was his favorite month – the weather wasn't yet too warm, but the better half of the year was about to unfold. It was exactly a year ago that he was hired to fit the windows and steel bars in a bank close to his own apartment in the antique district. He was decisive and prepared. Nothing for it then, but to lie in wait.

He had spent the whole previous year poring over maps of the city, some dating back to the 19th century, attending the local library on a daily basis. He felt the city was becoming more and more ugly, something driven by the rampant urbanization of the 1970s. He discovered the city name came from Homer's Troy, but – which was most important – he also discovered how to disable the closed circuit cameras for 18 minutes of time he needed to work in.

Just as he had suspected, the day after the robbery left him feeling great – having often imagined how the ensuing self-assurance would feel. “This year has floated on by, unconnected to the river currents, like a radio wave,” he thought to himself while shopping for shaving foam.

And yet, all the excitement was exhausting. Trees were turning green, some blossoming all in white, a calm joy visible on the faces of people passing by. He was heading home from his favorite restaurant where, as usual, he ordered and enjoyed the grilled trout. Feeling like he had once again lost his aim in life, the money hidden beneath his bed would not give him pleasure...

“Planning is better than dreaming, a lot more interesting than the vision that I would do something. Making a plan into a reality is more wonderful than the minute after the task is accomplished. More of that old aimlessness...” he thought.

He had the impression Bill was being nicer to him than usual; he desired to share with her something he could not tell anyone else. Wanting to be with her all alone, but also lacking the courage to ask, mindful of the ring upon her finger. Watching her bending over the table occupied by the large man wearing the worn-out, graphite grey suit, he realized he could now give her the tip she always dreamed of. But would she not become suspicious then? Would she accept the gift? Ask questions? “Would I be able to answer?” he asked himself.

Seeing her only a few steps away, her backside, wrapped in a pale skirt, revealed the line of her panties beneath the flower-pattern fabric. She was bending over a customer, lifting one of her feet to make it easier to reach the sugar bowl – he could think of nothing else now.

Walking home, he was certain this was the best day of his life, but then the local butcher emerged from around the corner of a building – the man's posture always made an impression on Kilgore... The sun was slowly setting behind the buildings, a warm breeze blowing. Sasha the butcher, dressed in a cotton shirt and an unbuttoned, blood-stained apron, looked like a crazy mix of sage, pastor and serial killer.

“Maybe all butchers are closer to actually touching the absolute?” he thought, seeing a strange sort of insightfulness in the man's eyes, something he liked the look of. Sasha looked at him with unusual concentration and they spoke a little about how the price of pork was on the rise. Kilgore was about to set off for home when the butcher grabbed his by the arm and said:

“If you want to make an offering to god, do it in a way which pleases him. It does not matter if it is a goat, a ram or a calf. By burning upon a pyre something which has value to you, it becomes a real offering.”

The blowing breeze was making the blood stained apron flutter as they stood alone on the sidewalk. Kilgore felt Sasha's grip grounding him, pinning him to the sidewalk. He had no idea what the man was trying to say; distracted and off-balance, he replied:

“How could anything like that possibly bring anyone pleasure?”, then snorted derisively.

“Think about your shepherds,” Sasha drilled into him with his dark, intense eyes. Kilgore felt a little dizzy due to the smell of fresh blood.

“I don't get it.”

“For them to kill, to incinerate a calf, was a great sacrifice. I am a simple butcher, performing my humble tasks,” Sasha said, smiling. “You eat it up,” he said, poking Kilgore with his index finger, then laughed a little louder than usual: “Simple, right? A shepherd back then had to first catch a lamb, get it? When it ran, he'd have to chase it. Not out of hunger, he'd deliver it out of generosity, understand? It's about a cult,” Sasha's hands rose in the air, palm outstretched towards the sky. “Then he set it on fire.”

“Destroying dinner,” Kilgore said, utterly lost.

“Not just that, get it?” Sasha looked at him, hoping his old drinking buddy would be able to read into his stare.

“Not so much...”

“I mean the sacrifice. Don't you get the meat bit? You don't eat meat, am I right?” his voice tinged with ridicule. “Imagine a fish. A tasty fish.”

Kilgore shook his head, bit his lip and nodded at Sasha, indicating that he though he understood, all the time thinking “What is his problem with me today?”

“Yeah!” Sasha boomed, delighted, parting his hands as if performing a blessing, looking at Kilgore with admiration. “See you tonight in the Horses?”

“Yeah, see ya.”

Having gotten home, he didn't so much as look at the money, even though he had planned to count it all over again.

“Burn it all?” he thought to himself. “All that planning effort for nothing?”

He got the fireplace going and sat down in his armchair – the coal crackling pleasantly, the room turning lovely and warm. In another week, he would not have to heat the place at all any more. Looking into the fire, he recalled that the trout was tastier today than ever before. “Must have been the herbs. Did I tell her how tasty it was? Or maybe it's just that today everything has a stronger flavor? Intensified, slowed down, the days drawn out, I can see it all more clearly, maybe even talking more clearly than usual?”

He fell asleep in an instant, dreaming of entering a little house made of plastic, home to a young man and his two kids. It was Christmas, the mood mean and miserable, as it is every year. He brought them some clothes – used, but good enough to wear. Feeling like a madman, rather unwanted, leaving behind two jumpers, small little sweater things – one yellow and one brown. He then left the plastic house which was outside a shopping mall and noticed everyone, except for him, were naked even though it was winter time. Fat, bloated, huge men. He stood there all troubled and lost.

He dreamt that the years were flying past, various holidays marking out time, while he had paused the meaning of life in a wooden cottage, far from city limits, in the middle of absolute nowhere. Each year, people would come visit and admire that it was possible to live that way; telling him how much they envied his inner peace, then once again screaming and rushing back into their hectic, everyday realities... He saw himself sitting by a fireplace, Bill with him, moving about in the kitchen. He has more and more possessions, sacks full of clothes. Each December he leaves his wooden contemplation and heads for plastic empathy, filled with kids and adults who do not want his help. So why impose?

He woke, surprised by the dream – was there really something he was keen to get rid of? But who was interested in his sacrifices...

“Would setting the money alight be an expression of ascetic principle or cowardice?” he asked himself. “What is it I need the money for? I took such a crazy risk...” he said out loud, making himself a drink.

Having consumed one too many, he left his apartment to meet Sasha. The evening was warm, the air fragrant with the musky smell of freshly growing grass. He had put on his best clothes – a corduroy blazer and black linen pants – walking along the streets of Troy like a warrior, very calm, ready to take on all comers in a simple, pragmatic way – ready to face his own death. He laughed to see a group of kids running past, wearing yellow and black sweaters.

The barmaid looked at him from afar, before he had a chance to sit down. Kilgore and his buddies had been meeting at The Horses for years: an ordinary sort of joint, lots of them about in town, punters sitting down in old oaken chairs. Kilgore and Sasha always sat at the bar. He usually arrived around noon, when the shadows fell evenly over the bar's polished surface. The Horses only had one window – a young couple was sitting in it right now, kissing passionately.

Sasha entered just as Kilgore was about to get the drinks in, wearing his unbuttoned, filthy apron. Kilgore turned around and realized just how ridiculous Sasha looked in all that bloody get up – then started giggling.

“We are who we are,” Sasha quipped, sitting beside Kilgore to order two beers. Gary the baker called out from the other end of the bar:

“Who we wanna be!” and paid for Sasha's order.

“What it is we all do,” the barmaid added and they all laughed.

They talked a while about the bank robbery and the arrival of spring. New customers kept on coming in, a long night ahead of them all.

“The cops still haven't come up with any suspects,” Gary said. “I damn hope they make a clean getaway.”

“I thought about what you said... about sacrifices,” Kilgore said, turning towards Sasha.

“A good thing too,” the butcher replied gently, in a way which seemed extraordinary for a man wearing blood-stained clothes.

“Rewards are valuable to us when we stop longing after them, when they no longer matter. Then we really get to deserve such bounties.”

“It's all about him,” Sasha Wilson said, pointing at the ceiling. “To give up something valuable to the man upstairs, not to deny ourselves something in the name of...” Sasha paused to take a sip of beer, “Nothing.”

The barmaid listened in on their conversation, pouring beers and keeping a close eye on Sasha's arms. A large group of students came into the bar and things instantly got crowded. She worried the shift would be a hard one. “Looks like the people of Troy, moved by the coming spring and the bank robbery, are in need of a drink...” she thought to herself.

“What... you think I wouldn't want to give all this bread to the hungry?” Gary barked. “What about the taxes?! What do they go on?!” he cried, slamming his tankard on the bar. “It costs me less to throw old bread out than giving it away! That's unreal!”

“That's the government for ya...” the young man who had just approached the bar chipped in. The bar then quickly filled with loud talk about politics as the men drank faster and thirstier than usual.

The barmaid joined in the conversation – no one knew if it was her imposing size and shape, or just the fact that she was approaching retirement age, made the drunken customers respect her opinion. She carried herself with a self-confident air, rooted in the fact that she was still a fine looking woman. Not too tall, but she always wore high heeled shoes – for all of the thirty years she had been running The Horses, her breasts had been spilling out of her corset, hair shining, tied into a smooth bun. The bow she had tied round her apron accentuated her waist, while her voice was strong and had a certain charming rasp to it.

“Who would have thought such big old men would be sitting here, talking about sacrifice?” she mused, still staring at Sasha's arms. “You should be in charge of this whole town. Decent, law abiding...” she came out from behind the bar and grabbed Sasha by the balls. “Real men.”

Things went quiet in the bar as the two of them stared at each other.

Without another word, Sasha put his tankard on the bar and lifted Kristin – just as she was thinking that no one had done that to her in decades – then carried her out back. She screamed as he carried her, to the merriment of the applauding crowd. She screamed when he pulled up her skirt and bent her over a beer barrel. She screamed when he penetrated her, though the punters didn't hear that bit, busy again with their conversation. She screamed as they were close to orgasm, and once they were spent, she thought about the queue which must have been growing ever longer out by her bar.

And indeed, that night The Horses was packed, though it wasn't just the question of weather. For some strange reason, the bank robbery had moved the locals to start discussing the city authorities – before everyone went their separate ways to think about what was going on, they first got high on booze, as was the way with all revolutions.

Kilgore kept on wondering what to do with the money, which was starting to weigh heavy on his mind. Without getting too involved in the conversations at the bar, the political opinions he had expressed were turning him into some kind of folk hero. As if everyone there was emboldened by his new found confidence. They wanted to trust him. He thought about burning the money in his fireplace once he got home, and tried to visualize himself doing so, but couldn't quite see it. “Maybe I will give the cash to Bill? Leaving her huge tips for a whole year...”

He even considered taking the money back to the bank and handing himself over to the police.

Kristin smiled when a quarter of an hour later she handed him another beer. Placing it before Kilgore, she sensed something really sweet in the air that particular day, and said:

“The city council meets every first Thursday of the month at 7pm in the town hall. All the meetings are open to the public, and they start with a debate involving local residents, did you know that? In the town hall chambers, on the second floor...” She went on about this, now focusing her gaze on Sasha, whom she asked: “Do your best to make him attend.”

The other guys were patting Kilgore on the back, buying him drinks. He nodded, and smiled humbly at Sasha. Soon after, they left the bar. Walking back, they popped into the butcher shop for some tobacco. This was the first time Kilgore had ever been inside. The lights were off, but he could smell the sweet air filled with all sorts of aromas.

“How do you stand this place?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” Sasha asked back.

“The smell.”

“What is it you think you smell of?”

“Someone who is still alive...”

They laughed, rolling their cigarettes. Kilgore wandered round the back of the store, looking at the corpses suspended from the ceiling to dry out. They made him gag and want to throw up, but they also piqued his curiosity.

“Can I look in there?” he asked, pointing to the chiller cabinet. Sasha didn't reply.

“Kristin was right, we should attend the meeting on Thursday.”

“Leave it out, she's got to you today...”

“Now she got this smell going on!”

Then they both said goodbye...

The next morning, Kilgore was woken by loud knocking on his front door. He got up, feeling pained, and looked at his watch – a quarter to nine.

“They've come...” he thought to himself, feeling relieved. “Please wait!” he called towards the door, then dressed in a brand new shirt and equally elegant linen pants. He thought about which blazer to pick, then splashed some water in his face, fuming at the boiler which wasn't working properly.

Once he was ready to hand himself over, he opened the door – shocked to find Bill standing there, looking rather shaky, instead of the crowd of blue uniforms he was expecting. His throat tightened so hard he was unable to utter a greeting. Thoughts crowded round his head, whirling round like mad trying to work out what to say – had she been waiting long, how did she get his address... finally, why are you here? Yeah, I am ready to confess...

“Hey there,” she finally said, looking him up and down, her eyes focusing on his unbrushed hair. “Are you always this elegant around the house?”

He said nothing, feeling stupid to have taken this long to answer the door, making himself all elegant, keeping her waiting.

“Am I interrupting?” she asked, breaking the silence. He shook his head. “Will you let me in...” she asked in a way which was not a question, but more of a demand, then looked around his apartment. “Are you...”

“Yeah, sorry, I'm sorry...” he kept on repeating, feeling fazed. “Do come in, welcome.”

She smiled a little, so he offered her a seat and some coffee. She sat down, but declined the offer of a drink – asking him to sit with her instead. Considering he had been expecting to be in cuffs by now, this new turn of events seemed much worse, leaving him feeling a lot less sure of himself. Bill was in his kitchen, facing him, sat at his dining table, a place no one else had ever sat at before.

“I heard... about what happened yesterday.”

He had no idea what she could possibly mean. Did she know he was the one? Maybe they all knew! Had she come to liberate him from the cash? “Let her take it!” he thought to himself. Seeing his eyes wandering all over the place, she almost screamed:

“You know, in the bar!”

“What?!”

He still had no idea what she could mean, wondering if she had especially chosen not to wear a low cut blouse today, recalling how he had been staring the day before. His gaze once again sought out her breasts; they perked up beneath a yellow t-shirt, pressing up against the material from within. He tried to lift his gaze and focus on her neck, or to be more precise – between the fourth and sixth spinal disc. Her lips and eyes were making him feel very tame and timid.

“I will come out and say it straight. You might think I am imposing, and if so, I do apologize, but I just had to come here. I have been writing speeches for local politicians in my spare time, and it's going real swell, so... where the hell is it?” she asked herself, opening her handbag and pulling some pages from it. “I was sitting in the restaurant, thinking to myself: Bill, just go and tell him. But if you're not ready... sir.”

“Just call me Kilgore,” he said, surprised to suddenly find himself sounding all nonchalant.

“Cool,” she said, laughing. “If you wouldn't mind casting your eye over it, you know, Kilgore...” she stressed his name as she put the pages on the table between them, “If you'd be so kind...”

Instead of focusing on the pages, he kept looking at her lips and hands as they fiddled with the catch of her handbag. Her top lip was clearly trembling. Baffled by what she had been trying to say, he dreamt of taking her in her arms and...

“I've written a speech, which is more like bullet points, right... I was writing it at night. I couldn't sleep. It was so warm. I think I was feeling feverish. If you wouldn't mind reading through it.”

Keeping silent, he made it seem like he was listening to her intently as she went on,

“I think you should try, even if it seems foolish of me, and you don't need my help, which I am sure you do not, but I wanted you to know that I... and the others, they too... We'd really like you to... represent us, see.”

Watching her struggle to get the words out, he lifted his hand and touched her forehead, checking for a fever.

“You seem hot, really, are you feeling ok?”

She nodded and their eyes fully focused, locked in a mutual gaze.

“Not everything in life can be planned, Kil,” he thought to himself. “Love can't”. Then said out loud: “Please, stand up,” and stood up himself. They were now facing each other. “Lift your arms...”

She did as he asked, not sure if he was planning to examine her pulse or if the foreplay had already began. She stood there, arms aloft, but they kept looking at each other and he allowed his gaze to linger a little longer upon her lips. Then, he pulled her t-shirt off to touch, lick and caress her breasts. It was just as he had imagined it would be as they moved towards the bed. He lay down upon her as she began unbuttoning his shirt and began kissing him passionately. It took him just a second to whip her tights and panties off. He then threw her legs over his shoulders. The money was stacked beneath them, waiting. They made love for a long time, and her moans and strong grip made him feel he was going to go crazy.

Once it was all over, they lay next to each other, smoking cigarettes as Bill touched his shoulder.

“Let's be kind to each other,” she asked. “So much evil in this world.”

He nodded without saying a thing.

“This is it, the moment you been waiting for, just give her the money, tell her to take it all. You gotta come clean, stop them all thinking you some kind of hero...” he kept talking to himself in his own thoughts, yet ended up saying nothing and a little while late they kissed goodbye.

That was the first and last time they ever made love. He never went back to his favorite restaurant, spending the whole summer giving speeches he didn't believe in, engaged in conversations which bored him. Twice, he ate steak and liked the taste. Admitting to Sasha he had missed eating meat.

Each and every morning he handed out the left-over bread Gary put out into the street. Stopped smoking all throughout September. By October, he could do fifty pushups without breaking sweat. At the start of summer, the roof in a local school collapsed, killing countless kids, and the whole of Troy was in mourning, looking to Kilgore for consolation. The heat around the bank robbery died down. Bill sent her two letters – the first said she was very happy, while the second said she did not understand and asked for a meeting.

Come the 15th of October, he was elected Mayor... the worst time of the year for him. His savings were starting to run out, and he still didn't dare spend a penny of the stolen loot. He poured himself a glass of drain cleaning acid and wrote down “Dissociative fugue” in his notebook, right beneath “chromatic”, before donning a brown leather glove upon his left hand and downing the contents of the glass in one, single gulp.

He lay down on top of his bed, the money crackling as it burnt up in the fireplace, heating up his home. Not all of it. He sent some of it to Bill without saying who it was from so she wouldn't become a suspect. He'd written some letters, though didn't put any of them into envelopes. They too were now crackling in the fireplace. “I love you Bill” was quickly incinerated. He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and unbuttoned it at the neck. Then he lit a cigarette and wrote down a line of verse from the Iliad:

“Redeemed are those who marked this day with their own death.”