Evil Eye: Four Novellas of Love Gone Wrong by Joyce Carol Oates

Author:Joyce Carol Oates [Oates, Joyce Carol]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9780802120472
Amazon: 0802120474
Publisher: Mysterious Press
Published: 2013-09-03T04:00:00+00:00

THE EXECUTION

She’d said You will have to speak with your father. I can’t intercede for you any longer.

He left the Delt-Sig house at 1:20 A.M., which was later than he’d planned. Half the house lighted like some weird kind of lopsided birthday cake, which didn’t mean that all the guys were awake or fully conscious but only that scattered lights were left on including lights in the front foyer, the kitchen, and the steps to the grungy basement.

All this was planned. He’d given her the one final chance.

Shutting the cell phone on her shrill rising voice Bart? Bart? Don’t you dare cut me—

Placed a call to DeMarco’s. Pre-ordering eight large pizzas for 10 P.M. the following evening, deliver to the Delt-Sig house at 3992 Stadium Way. Party time!

He’d be paying with a Visa Platinum card, which, by that time, 10 P.M. of the next day, he would have in his possession, he was pretty sure. Or, by then—(he was vague about this)—his own Visa account might be reactivated.

Eight large pizzas for an estimated fifty to seventy-five guests.

The Explorer was parked in the alley behind the frat house. A prominent sign DO NOT PARK HERE VIOLATORS WILL BE TOWED had been bent and twisted and rendered harmless.

Can’t intercede for you any longer didn’t I tell you this would happen.

Your credit has been cut off. Your father warned you.

Gloves! Almost forgot the damn gloves.

Not a good pair of his own just a—this kind of cheap black faux-leather gloves he’d found jammed in somebody’s parka hanging from a peg somewhere on campus.

So they would marvel No fingerprints! Not a single fingerprint has been recovered at the crime scene.

Black gloves tight-fitting at the knuckles. Black hoodie, black T-shirt, black jeans, black Nikes. Dark-tinted glasses, his eyes were freaky-dilated from the Ritalin and light from oncoming headlights could give him a headache.

High on Ritalin he’d planned each minute. Nothing impulsive about the I B S—code-name for the Execution.

Every minute he’d planned. Fuck, every second.

Every nanosecond.

And no witnesses!

That was crucial to the execution: no witnesses.

Planned the drive. Every exit he’d pass on the drive east.

Exits from Syracuse he knew by heart. Set the Explorer to cruise control seventy miles per hour but sometimes he drove faster, passing in the left lane. Christ, he loves this SUV! Like his actual soul is outside him, and he can climb inside.

Held the road steady as a tank. Bulled past eighteen-rigs like they were compacts.

Three hours and twenty minutes east on the thruway to the Rensselaer exit then into the Village of East Rensselaer to the stone Tudor house at 29 Juniper Drive almost invisible from the narrow road beneath the massed foliage of trees impenetrable as a wall.

Just the place—showy fake-Tudor, “cul-de-sac” and lots of evergreens—home invaders would target.

He was excited, which was a good feeling. Like at the start of a new game—like, Brink or Day of Doom—before you know what the terrain is, how fast it’s going to rush at you, and how you will fuck up.

I B S is Bart’s (secret) game.

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