Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Vol. 40, No. 6, June, 1995

The Wicked Stepcar by Linda Evans

I read all the current books about blended families before I ever said yes to Donnie. I may have been past thirty, not a beauty, and well aware that single women in my town outnumbered single men by three to one, but I wasn’t about to commit to hell on earth just for a gold ring and a new last name. Donnie has two kids, and I mean has them. Lorene, his ex, ran off with a trucker from Wichita. Donnie said the last he saw of Lorene was her hanging out the window of a yellow eighteen-wheeler, yelling, “Bye, Donald. You keep the kids.”

The stepfamily books were a help, but I’d have fallen in love with Sherri and Little Donnie anyway. Those kids are sweet as they can be. Besides, I never wanted to actually physically birth kids, so Lorene had saved me the trouble and given me an instant made family. My cat Arthur got along fine with Donnie’s bloodhound Frisky, so things should have been perfect. But they weren’t.

It was my stepcar that was troubling my marriage. Every day Donnie drove to his construction job in an old Ford pickup. Pieces could have fallen off onto the road and Donnie wouldn’t mind so long as it got him to work and back. It was his car, a red ’57 Chevy he kept housed in the garage, that he babied like he’d birthed it himself. But that car rolled over my foot all by itself the first time I went near it. Donnie tried to claim he’d accidently left it in neutral. That didn’t make my foot feel any better. While I was still hopping around and whining, that Chevy squirted oil on my new pastel pants suit.

“You hateful car!” I moaned, slapping the hood. “Oil won’t wash out of polyester, I just know it won’t.”

Donnie leaped across a spare tire and grabbed a clean rag off his workbench. He gently polished the hood where I’d touched it while I tried to wring the oil out of my outfit.

“Shoot, Corrinne. You got to be careful about touching the Princess,” Donnie said, concern furrowing his brow.

“Yeah, I know. I might leave fingerprints,” I spat out. I whirled around and stomped into the house. Donnie took me out later and brought me another pants suit, but I was still not over it. That car, a.k.a. the Princess, had to go.

The first thing I did was to communicate with my spouse the way they tell you to do on all the talk shows. I waited a few days till Donnie was all relaxed and in a good mood. After supper I gave him a few beers and put the kids to bed early. Sherri, who’s three, and the baby hadn’t had naps, so they were ready. Then I put on my new black nightie, the see-through one I bought with my bonus from my job at the bank. I’d opened the most new accounts.

The nightie billowed around me like a dark cloud as I clumped down the hall and back into the living room. I looked fine. I knew I needed to lose a few pounds, but then so did Donnie.

“Donnie,” I said, plopping onto the couch next to him, “we have to talk.”

“Now, sugar? The sports is coming on.” He put his feet up on the plastic coffee table and just about knocked over the fish-shaped ceramic ashtray I’d made him.

I grabbed the remote off the floor and powered down the set. “Now,” I said grimly.

Donnie grinned. He’d just noticed my nightie. “You feeling romantic, sugar britches?”

I shrugged. “Maybe. What I wanted to say, honey, is that you’re spending too much time in the garage.”

Donnie looked perplexed. But then he usually does. “Honeypot, I got to. That’s where I keep the Princess.”

“I know. That’s what I mean. You spend too much time and money on that car and not enough on me and the kids.” My voice got whiny. I didn’t add that I was convinced the car was out to get me.

“A man’s got to have a hobby.” Donnie poked his lower lip out so far it almost reached past his beer gut.

After that he clammed up. Well, it’s useless to argue with someone who won’t talk. I felt like braining Donnie with the nearest frying pan. I settled for flouncing into the bedroom and locking the door. Donnie had to sleep on the couch.

We argued about the Princess off and on for the next month. Actually, I did all the talking. Donnie continued childishly refusing to argue.

I marched out to the garage one day to have it out with the car. Donnie was still at work, and I hadn’t yet picked up the kids from Shirley’s World of Fun. I stood in front of that Chevy with my hands on my hips. I narrowed my eyes down into a mean look and let my cigarette dangle out of my mouth.

“It isn’t over yet, sister. You’re just an overrated pile of tin. I’ll find a way to get you out of my life.” My cigarette fell. I grabbed for it automatically and burned my fingers.

The car sat innocently staring at me, unmoving in the half dark of late afternoon. I sucked on my burned fingers and called that Chevy names. Still no reaction. But as I walked past on my way to the door, she bopped me on the knee with her bumper. I swear that car attacked me.

A huge blue bump rose up on my knee. I had to lie to Donnie and tell him that Frisky had jumped on me and knocked me down. Sure. That bloodhound’s about as lively as a sloth. All the while I told my story, my heart kept thumping inside my chest like a trapped rabbit. I guess that was when I first decided to kill the Princess.

But I am not stupid. I read, watch TV, go to movies. I know that whenever someone gets murdered, the first suspect is the one with a motive. Since I’d already let Donnie know how much I hated the Princess, he’d know it was me the minute the boys at the body shop gave him the bad news about his car’s fatal accident. Then it would be no more marriage, no more stepdog, and no more children.

It seemed clear that the first thing I had to do was to eliminate myself as a suspect. I started by fixing Donnie’s favorite dinner. I had my sister-in-law Reva come get the kids for the evening. She owed me one after I’d straightened out her account down at the bank and saved her a lot of financial embarrassment.

“What’s that you’re cooking?” Reva asked the moment she stepped into the kitchen.

“Donnie’s favorite dinner. Blackened roast beef.”

Reva bent down to peer nosily into the oven. “Looks burnt to me, Corrinne.”

“It’s not burnt. It’s supposed to look that way,” I stared her down.

Actually, I’d invented the recipe by accident one day when I got talking on the phone too long with my sister in New Orleans. Donnie was mad to find supper burned, so I made up the story about it being a real recipe. It turned out he loved it fixed that way.

When Donnie got home, he slid his lunchbox down the countertop, and it splashed into the sink. I smiled and didn’t say a thing about him being clumsy.

“Where’s the kids?” he asked.

“At Reva’s. Honey, this is a special evening just for the two of us.” I pointed dramatically toward the dining room end of our kitchen, at the real tablecloth and the table set with glass dishes and metal silverware instead of paper and plastic.

Donnie’s eyes, his best feature, seemed to get bluer and even sort of round. Usually they’re almost square like his face. “Corrinne, you’re a sweet doll.”

Donnie went to wash up while I lit the candles. All I’d been able to find were the ones left over from Little Donnie’s birthday last month, but I’d arranged them strategically in little groups, so it wasn’t too dark. Then I put on Donnie’s favorite music, the soundtrack from Oklahoma. We could dance after dinner.

“Donnie,” I said as he came in and started sawing the roast beef apart. “I’ve been wrong about the Princess. If you love her, then I... I love her, too.” Good thing he can’t see my eyes, I thought, ducking my head.

Donnie put his knife down and tried to rub the circulation back into his hand. “Gosh, sweet sugar, I don’t know what to say. I sure am lucky to have a woman who knows how to compromise.”

Obviously, Donnie’s idea of compromise was for me to do what he wanted. But that was okay. I waited a month, making sure to talk nice about the Princess every day, before I started in on the second part of my plan. The actual murder.

The first thing I did was to take the Princess out for a little spin. I had an awful time unlocking her door. It was like she knew what I was up to. She drove fine, though, until I deliberately started her across the Oak Street tracks ten minutes before the freight train was due.

I got out and fluttered all helpless and slow in my red high heels to a gas station. “Help! My car is stalled on the track!” I flapped my hands up and down and made damsel in distress sounds.

The station attendant rushed to a phone and called the police. Unknown to me, they notified the train conductor in time for him to stop the train. Meanwhile, the helpful station attendant roared down the street in a tow truck and yanked the car off the track. I hadn’t counted on that. It cost me, too.

Naturally, I didn’t tell Donnie. He had no clue I’d actually driven his precious car. After that, I took the Princess out twice more. Actually chuckling with delight, I left her parked in front of the post office with the keys in the ignition. No one took her. I tried to push her down a hill and off a cliff. She kept stopping, as though someone was mashing the brakes hard. On the way home she bucked and snorted like she wanted to toss me out.

The unaware Donnie, now under the impression that he’d won the argument, spent even more money on that heap. And he practically lived in that garage when he wasn’t at work. Spare car parts littered our house like stadium debris after a football game.

Little Donnie said his first sentence —“Where’s my daddy?” Sherri said she wished she was a princess. As for me, I spent a lot of time hunched in front of the TV, cramming handfuls of stale popcorn into my mouth when I wasn’t sucking on cigarettes. My anger kept building up in me like a tree growing.

One night Donnie kept busy polishing the Princess while I watched a gangster movie. That was how I got the brilliant idea to hire a hit man. How professional of me, I thought, wishing I could reach back far enough to pat myself on the back.

I told Donnie I was working late for the next week and got Reva to come over and mind the kids.

“Working late? Hah!” She put her hands on her ample hips. She looks a lot like Donnie — curly red hair, dimpled chin, square and stocky build — only on him it looks better. “Guess I won’t tell my dim-witted brother. Maybe if another wife runs off on him, he’ll figure out to leave that car alone.”

“You’ve got it all wrong, Reva,” I said primly.

“Hah!”

Lake Boulder’s a small town. The gold rush and the lumber rush are long over, and the town fathers are talking about starting a gambling rush. But it was big enough for me to find what I was looking for in just three days.

Bull Don’t-ask-my-last-name was a scrawny down and out type. He said he lived in the bad half of a duplex across town, but he didn’t tell me exactly where. We settled on a hundred and fifty down and another hundred and fifty when the job was done. I had a secret stash I’d been saving to surprise Donnie next summer at vacation time. This would be a slightly different kind of surprise. I already felt relieved at the thought of seeing the last of the stepcar.

I wanted Bull to get rid of the car as soon as possible, and he said he would. Two weeks later the Princess still ruled, serene and shiny, in her garage palace behind the house. I resolved to hunt up Bull and prod him a little bit before I went crazy.

I found my hit man at his usual evening location — a bar sporting the Statue of Liberty in green and pink neon on the roof. Bull had deteriorated since our last meeting. He had a fresh black eye and assorted scrapes and bruises, and his left arm was in a cast.

“What happened to you?” I held out a pack of cigarettes and he took six, plus my new lighter.

“Lady, that car hates me. I been by your place three times. You see what happened.” He pointed out his visible wounds. When he started rolling up his pants leg, I figured I’d seen enough. I held up my hand in warning.

“Look,” I said firmly, “I paid you to do a job. I don’t care if you crush it, bum it, or put it down a garbage disposal one piece at a time. Just get rid of the car.”

“Okay, okay. But maybe this is worth a little more than we figured.”

“We’ll talk about it.” I made my voice icy. I stood up. I tapped my watch to let him know the interview was over.

Donnie and I and the kids drove over to his mama’s for her birthday two days later. Donnie’s mama is a confused woman in polka dots who insists on calling me Lorene, so I don’t go there often. But this was an occasion for Bull to make his move. I swallowed my pride.

He made his move, all right. Cop cars and fire engines blocked both ends of our street when we got back. Flames were roaring up from our garage and coming awfully close to the house.

“Oh, honey,” I said, turning tenderly to Donnie. “The garage! Your Princess must be all burned up.”

Donnie clamped his right hand over his heart. He started gasping for breath. “Sugar, tell me it ain’t so,” he whispered, as though he were breathing his last.

Little Donnie and Sherri started crying in stereo from the back seat. I told them to take care of their daddy and patted Donnie’s head.

“Stay here. I’ll run up the street and talk to the cops.”

Run? I practically danced down the block. My troubles were over, the tormenter melted to scrap. However, my glee turned to gloom when I saw the wicked stepcar squatting untouched at the curb. An interfering neighbor bragged loudly to one and all about how he’d heroically braved the flames to roll the car out of the garage to safety.

Donnie walked up with a kid tucked under each arm, his face a mask of pure joy. I instantly went into my “I love this car” act. I went so far as to lean over and kiss her shiny red roof. I was immediately sorry about this because a hot ember had landed right where I kissed. My lips blistered up.

But that was nothing compared to the condition of the incompetent hit man, as I found out the next day. He was now minus his eyebrows and had a new hairstyle that I’d call blackened stubble.

He pounded the table. “Don’t ask me to go after that evil tin monster again. She’s too smart. Besides, I done figured out a better moneymaking plan.”

“What’s that?” I squeaked, suspicion dawning.

“Well now, you wouldn’t want your insurance company finding out how that garage fire started, would you? From now on, lady, you’ll give me a regular paycheck to keep quiet.” He picked some crud off his cast and flicked it my way.

Bull smirked, ignoring my tears and protests of poverty. He stood up. He tapped my watch to let me know the interview was over. I drove home in a sick daze.

That was before I had time to think. Bull’s expecting his first payment next week, and he’ll get it all right. Only it figures to be his last payment, too. I have a new hit man. Or should I say, hit car? You see, the Princess and I had a little talk, and we’re the best of friends now. Bull will be fatally struck by a red ’57 Chevy. After that, I won’t go into the Princess’s garage and she won’t come into my house.