Enlightenment

Joseph Roger Curd leaned back in his office chair, slackassedly typing up his last email of the day. One more refund request for a faulty thermostat cover. His heart pounded as he tediously filled in the form email rejecting the angry customer a refund for the unwarranted item. Joseph's mind raced between the tasks on the honey-do list left for him by his demanding bitch of a wife, Jennifer Rene Curd.

Jennifer the Bitch would gripe and moan until 1) the grocery list a mile long was purchased, 2) the lawn was mowed, and 3) the dog Kimmie, a 12 year old Labrador who only came when called, was walked. His hands shook as he anxiously sent out the last email. All Joseph wanted was a crisp Miller Lite as he plopped down in front of the big screen TV, which he had paid for in cash with money he scrimped and saved. For months, all the personal spending money Jennifer the Bitch graciously allotted him from his check was saved for the 50 inch, hi-def, flat screen television with surround sound.

He shuffled together his papers and stuffed them haphazardly in his briefcase, grabbed his lunch box, walked briskly down the long corridor of cubicles leading outside. He scanned his ID fob to exit through the heavy glass door, the July air like a hot bath after his day in that meat fridge of an office. His car was so hot it felt like burning in Hell. He turned the ignition and the car hotly coughed to a start, then he rolled down the window, lit a Pall Mall, and backed out of his designated parking space in the black tar desert. The air conditioner in the 2000 Toyota Corolla had long since croaked, so the heat engulfing him immediately made sweat drip from his bald head and stress lined forehead, and flowed like a river out his armpits, further exacerbating the staining on his once-white dress shirt.

But he liked the warmth. Sweat was a sign, he thought that, No, I wasn’t born into this world as a salty, dried up peanut shell to be tossed when its innards were consumed. I am a majestic hurricane, powerfully whirling through life, affecting those around me and destroying anything that stands in the way of my dreams. As he exited the parking lot, fighting and cursing his way into the far lane, he deeply sighed with relief from being free from that concentration camp of a workplace.

A thought crossed Joseph’s mind, What if I don’t get the groceries or mow the lawn or walk the dog?

So, instead of driving seven more blocks down the road to the grocery store, he cut through three lanes of traffic and made a spontaneous right turn. He pulled into the hardware store parking lot, got out of the car and removed his sweat-stained shirt which he wadded up and threw into the back seat. He went into the hardware store and made his purchases. Then he drove across the street to the gas station, where he bought six packs of Pall Malls and a Hustler magazine, then filled his car’s tank and a red, plastic two-gallon gas container. He normally used this canister to fill the mower.

He made his way back into traffic and onto the interstate, which he took 16 miles east to the suburb where he resided. He pulled into the garage, turned off the ignition, and sat for awhile in the sweltering heat of his metal box, sweating and smoking with a vague smile of calm contentment plastered on his face. He stubbed out the cigarette then gathered his purchases and locked the car. With the bags hung over his arm, he dug through the drawer of his garage tool cabinet and pulled out a drill, which he tucked under his arm with the bags so he could unlock the house with his free hand.

Upon entering the house, he dumped the heap of parcels, except the drill, onto the kitchen floor. Jennifer the Bitch wasn’t home from her daily shopping spree, funded by his servitude to Thermoplex Corporation for over 20 years. Every day for the past 20 years, she procured new clothing, jewelry, make-up, and other products meant to diminish her age and increase her appeal to the other men she was fucking, because she certainly wasn’t giving him any. Anyhow, Joseph lost his attraction to that shallow, demanding cunt a long time ago. It was hard to love her, since she only loved herself. She didn’t clean or cook or do errands; many tasks were left to Joseph himself, and the house remained in a state of disarray until the 70 year old cleaning lady came on Saturday mornings.

He placidly stalked from room to room, making sure the windows were locked. Check. Then, at the front door, he removed the screws from the door knob, shimmied it from its hole, and wiggled the new one in place. He drilled it in. He repeated this process on the back door and the patio doors. Check.

Joseph took several trash bags from the kitchen cupboard and went into the Bitch’s dressing room. Over the years, he had learned, from being held hostage by Jennifer the Bitch for her white-wine induced rants, which wardrobe pieces were the most expensive, treasured, and coveted by the other shallow wives in the neighborhood. Any with labels he recognized were thrown into the trash bags. Any with expensive fabrics or kept in garment bags were trashed. He filled the bags quickly, but it wasn’t enough, so he retrieved several more and continued purging Jennifer’s closet. When he was satisfied that every stitch of her over-priced fashion facade had been bagged up, he grabbed her jewelry boxes and the jewelry scattered about her vanity stand and threw it all in the last bag. Check.

He had gathered up 10, 40-gallon bags of clothes and jewelry. He carried the bags, five per hand downstairs and out the back door, adrenaline rushing to his muscles and offering extra strength. A couple of the neighbors were walking by, their meddlesome, penetrating eyes staring. Feeling their burning stares, he avoided eye contact, dumped the bags in a pile, and went back inside the house. He obtained the gas can and went back into the backyard. The neighbors were gone now and the only observers in sight were two standard poodles confined by an invisible fence down the block of backyards.

Joseph poured gasoline over the pile of trash. He lit a cigarette, and coolly puffed it while staring at the thin streaks of clouds. Then he tossed the butt onto the pile and it wooshed in flames. For a moment, he watched the flames cutting through the plastic bags. Then he went back into the house and turned the newly-changed lock on his way in.

He grabbed the Hustler, which had been his sole source of sexual gratification for 20 years, off of the kitchen floor and took it into the bathroom. He ritualistically rubbed one out as he did nearly every day. Then he washed his hands and dried them on his slacks.

Joseph whistled the dog over to accompany him as he cracked open a Miller Lite, plopped down on the couch, and flipped on the TV.