William Hertling - Kill Process

WILLIAM

HERTLING

liquididea press
Portland, Oregon

Kill Process

A liquididea press book / 2016

UUID# 2C9C571B-7E30-410D-BE5F-FB7079B6DD1E

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Copyright 2016 by William Hertling
Cover Art by Mike Corley

Please Note: This novel is about a survivor of domestic violence. I have minimized explicit abuse in the novel, but the story deals at length with the aftereffects, including post-traumatic stress disorder.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

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PRODUCED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Definitions

Tomo: noun

1. The worlds largest social network, with more than two billion users.
2. Japanese for friend.

T HE THING YOU have to know about me, to understand everything thats coming, is that I kill people.

Its ten-thirty at night, and Im hiding in the bushes across the street and two doors down from a two-bedroom, two-story home. Its midsummer in Portland, and the temperature dropped after sunset, but its still too hot for the dark, long-sleeved hoodie Im wearing to reduce my visibility. Tomorrow morning Ill pay the price for crouching for hours on forty-five-year-old knees.

Inside the house are Cathy and Dave. According to their Tomo profiles, Cathy is twenty-four, and Dave is twenty-nine. Theyve been together for five years. Six months into their relationship, Cathy dropped out of college in Boston and they left together for the West Coast. They rent. Cathy takes temp work, and Daves in construction.

Learning these details is painful, ripping open old wounds every time. Echoes of the same story, my story, recurring with consistent frequency, like a drumbeat punctuating life. I want to bury my head in the sand and drown out the sound, but I cant escape it, no matter how hard I try. Every case is different in the particulars, the same in the patterns.

Cathys been on Tomo compulsively, visiting her best friends profiles. However, shes not updating her status like she usually does. She goes through periodic gaps in posting, and when she manages a small post now and then, text analysis shows negative sentiment.

In the social media frenzy of the last twenty years, the tech industry invented dozens of new ways to analyze tweets, Tomo posts, and blog posts to determine the mood of the poster. Originally used by corporations to measure their customers perceptions of their brands and products, the profiling tools now help me find the depressed.

I wonder what my own sentiment scores would be, although I dont possess much of an online profile these days. I keep my thoughts in my head. Theyre too dangerous to let out. Fortunately no one has invented the mind police yet, although the day is coming.

The lights upstairs blink out, and suddenly I cant take a breath. Im clenching my hand so tight Ill find lingering fingernail bruises in the morning, but right now I dont feel a thing. Terrible things happen in the darkness.

It takes a long minute before my body forces me to breathe, and with a sharp inhale, the spell breaks. Im not in the house. Dave is not my demon, even if he is Cathys. Im an independent agent, in charge of my own self.

The black nylon bag weighs heavy against my right side, the tools inside enabling me to do my job, and in the worst case, take personal action.

I know better now than to consume liquids less than an hour before the stakeout. I dont chew gum, smoke cigarettes, or carry anything I could leave behind or forget. I wait another hour to be sure theyre deeply asleep. Everything is quiet in the house.

Im wearing mens Nike sneakers (20 percent market share) I bought at FootLocker (most popular shoe retailer). Im wearing mens Levi jeans (best-selling brand, and a different material makeup than womens jeans). Sticking to the most generic possible shoes and clothes reduces the chance the police will profile me. At 56, I fit into a lucky middle ground: a bit taller than average for a woman, still a passable height for a man.

DNA evidence is the kicker, of course. So I did the usual before I came out tonight: thorough shower first, clean clothes that went through two rounds of extra hot wash in a public laundry. My exposed skin got a liquid bandage product that helps prevent skin cells from flaking off. My shoulder length dark brown hair, courtesy of my Italian parents, received an extra-sticky spray that decreases the number of loose strands Im likely to drop. The residue each product leaves is still better than shedding DNA.

At the back door, I withdraw my lock picks from a shirt pocket. A geek rite of passage with a long history in computer science departments dating back to MIT, lock-picking was something I mastered in my first year. Of course, its considerably different with one hand instead of two.

Amputees can be divided into two types: those that measure themselves by what theyve lost, and those grateful for what theyve got.

Who am I kidding? Every amputee is both.

Me, Im grateful for my stump. In fact, Ive got everything up to but not including my elbow, and thats enough to apply pressure on the torsion wrench to hold the lock in tension, while I work the pick with my left hand. With a subtle click I feelnot hearthe last pin lift into place, and the wrench shifts. I grab with my hand and complete the turn. The deadbolt opens.

I take a deep breath and try to ignore the growing pit in my stomach. Time for the real work.

I SCREAM. Not some girly scream. A full-tilt, blood-curdling yell like Im being murdered.

Theres movement to my right, and someone touches me. I lash out, my fist hitting something hard.

Theres a cry of pain, then a groan. Angie, it was a dream.

I shake my head, trying to make sense of the world. I reach for the lamp, miss, and knock the alarm clock to the floor with my stump. Damn it.

Light blossoms as Thomas turns on his lamp. He slept over. Shit, that was Thomas I hit.

Hes lying on his back, holding his face.

Im sorry, I say automatically, still focused on the night terrors.

Its my fault, I shouldnt have touched you.

His tone, carefully even, plainly disguises inner frustration. I glance over at him. Maybe Im reading too far into it. He could merely be in pain.

I curl my arm around my knees and rock back and forth. I want to take it all back, starting with the years leading up to my mistake. Sweat covers me and my muscles tremble from the adrenaline rush. Five years and still the nightmares come.

I dip my head onto my knees and close my eyes. I wish I could be unbroken. I wish these dreams didnt come. If I do nothing, I have nightmares about being the victim. If I kill an asshole, I get nightmares about what Ive done. I dont know which is worse.

The bed shifts as Thomas sits up. May I touch?