Beneath Cruel Waters by Jon Bassoff

Author:Jon Bassoff
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Published: 2022-03-23T20:02:25+00:00

Vivian kept the gun, the one that Mike Brandt had given her, beneath her mattress. It was a lousy place, she knew it was a lousy place, but she couldn’t think of anywhere better, at least nowhere where she’d have quick access to it. She should have gotten a gun safe, maybe, but she didn’t think she’d be holding on to the gun for that long, and it would have been a waste of money, especially on a teacher’s salary. Besides, she was responsible enough to keep the bullets away from the gun. She kept them buried, beneath papers and jewelry and knickknacks in her nightstand drawer.

Growing up, she’d been the one who’d been comfortable around guns, not Bobby. They made him nervous. “Don’t like death all that much,” he would say. “Don’t like guns.” So when she was thirteen or fourteen and was outside target practicing with her Chipmunk .22, Bobby would usually remain in his room painting or singing or playing the guitar.

“What’re you going to do if some maniac breaks into our house when Mom and Dad are gone?” Vivian had asked her older brother.

He had just grinned. “I’ll be hiding behind you, sis. ’Cause I know you’ll shoot the fucker dead.”

Of course, nobody ever did break into their house when they were children, and Bobby never did have to hide behind his diminutive sister. But now as an adult, as a mother, Vivian found herself reaching beneath that mattress and pulling out that little pistol. She would lie on her bed, touch the cold metal to her cheek, and picture placing it against Ruben Ray’s temple. Then, she would imagine squeezing the trigger, imagine the earsplitting explosion, imagine the blood, the skull, the brains.

Her thoughts were becoming more and more morbid, and somehow she knew that someday she would have to use that gun.

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