Joe Victim

Chapter Thirty-One

If Raphael had known he would be having guests, he would have tidied up more. He feels embarrassed and hopes Stella doesn’t think he always lives like this. He actually does live like this pretty much all of the time these days. For a while there he used to care about how badly he lived, how badly he ate, then, thank God, he just stopped caring.

“Sorry about the mess,” he tells her, but she doesn’t seem to mind. He suspects her own house is in a similar state after she lost the baby and her husband left. She rubs her belly as if she were still pregnant. He remembers his wife doing that all the time when she was pregnant with Angela. He remembers lying in bed beside her at night with his hand on her stomach, feeling the baby kick, his wife smiling and amused, him being somewhat freaked out by it all. Back then he wasn’t seeing too much difference between a kicking baby and what happened to that poor bastard over the dinner table in Alien.

“Can I get you a drink?” he asks.

“Just water.”

He goes into the kitchen. The dishes from breakfast are still scattered over the counter, along with a week’s worth of toast crumbs and splashes of water around the sink. He grabs two fresh glasses and fills them and gets out to the lounge. Stella is looking at the photographs on the wall.

“This is Angela?” she asks.

“Yeah.”

“And these are your grandchildren?” she asks, looking at a photograph of the kids.

“Adelaide is six,” he says. “She started school this year. She goes to school in England and keeps hoping her school is secretly like that school in Harry Potter. Hoghoofs, or whatever it’s called. Vivian is four and wants to be a ballerina,” he says, “and a pop singer too.”

“Cute,” she says.

“I don’t get to see them,” he says, and he’s angry at his son-in-law for that, which is why there are no photos of him on the walls, but at the same time he can’t blame him for moving away. Can’t blame him at all. “I get to speak to them once a month if I’m lucky.”

Stella hands him a plastic bag full of clothes that’s been riding in the car with them all day. “Try it on,” she says. He pulls out the light blue shirt and the dark blue pants. “Should be your size,” she says.

“Where did you get it from?”

“It’s a rental costume,” she says. “Try not to damage it otherwise I won’t get my deposit back.”

He isn’t sure if she’s joking. He unfolds the police uniform and looks it over. “It seems real,” he says.

“Of course it does. That’s the entire point of costume-rental shops. Go ahead, try it on.”

“You really think this part is necessary?”

“Hopefully not, but I imagine it will be. There’s going to be a lot of confusion and a lot of people running around. Wearing this will stop you from being arrested.”

He takes the uniform down to the bedroom. His bedroom, like the rest of the house, isn’t a mess, but it isn’t exactly tidy. The bed hasn’t been made and there are clothes on the floor, but it’s not like the carpet is stained with food or the windowsills with mold. He lays the uniform out on the bed and quickly changes. It’s a little loose, but not bad.

“Well? What do you think?” he asks, walking back out into the lounge.

Stella smiles. It’s the first time he’s seen any positive emotion in her. Even her eyes are sparkling. It must be true, what they say about men in uniform. If he were twenty years younger, hadn’t lost his daughter, wasn’t still technically married, and if Stella weren’t a rape victim seeking out revenge for the loss of her unborn baby, well, maybe things would happen while he was wearing that uniform.

“It fits pretty good,” he says. “You must have a keen eye for sizes. I’m impressed it even comes with the belt,” he says, and fiddles with the compartment holding the handcuffs. “And it even has a radio. All this stuff looks genuine.”

“The radio doesn’t work,” she says. “But aside from that, you’re right, it almost is genuine.”

He moves over to a mirror in the lounge. He studies the way he looks. If he pauses to think about what’s going on, he risks coming to a grinding halt. He has to keep moving with it. He’s going to be killing Joe. He suspects the next few days are all going to be about momentum, and if he doesn’t keep pushing forward then none of this is going to work. He’s sure the Red Rage will help him.

“Are you sure we’re going to be able to get away?” he asks, tugging at the uniform. In theory it’s just as good a part of the plan as the rest, but it still gives him a bad feeling. He stares at her in the mirror and catches her eye.

“Would it matter if we didn’t? she asks. “If somebody right now gave you the option of putting a bullet into Joe’s head, and in return you had to spend ten years in jail, would you take it?”

“Yes,” he says. He doesn’t even have to think about it. And it wouldn’t be ten years. No judge would give him ten years for shooting the man that raped and killed his daughter. Although perhaps that’s just hopeful thinking. Other judges have given people longer for doing just that. “You?” he asks.

“In a heartbeat,” she says.

Knocking at the door. They both freeze.

“Are you expecting somebody?” she asks.

He shakes his head.

Stella moves over to the window and peeks out from behind the blind. “It’s the same car from last night, the one with the cops.”

“Shit,” he says, and starts to unbutton the shirt. “They can’t see me like this.”

“Just don’t answer the door.”

“It might be important,” he says, tugging the shirt over his head to speed things up, half the buttons still clasped. “Plus my car is in the driveway. They’ll know I’m home.” He kicks off the shoes and tugs off the trousers and is down to his underwear and socks when the knocking is repeated.

“Hang on a second,” he calls out, and he looks left and right for something to put on, but there’s nothing. “Shit,” he says, then moves to the bathroom just off the hall and grabs a towel. He wraps it around his waist and heads to the door.