Black Waves

I crept upstairs, having sealed the wall of tools that hides my secret lair, only to hear the sounds of obvious lust. Moving quietly by stepping on the edges of the carpeted hall, I saw my wife Lisa busy getting railed by some cretin from her job that I had met at their office Christmas party. Of all the damn things to sabotage an operation... or not, really. There was nothing I could do.

Sure, you say, the man standing there with a silenced pistol could do something. He could kill the cheating slut and her gigolo. Then what? Then I have to hide these bodies myself, and that's outside my contract. That's only important because if I screw up in my private life, I endanger my employers. No one professional hires one hit man. He hires two, one to do the job and one to clean up if necessary. Had Lee Harvey Oswald escaped, LBJ would not have had to make that second call, but he did. Oswald was a classic by the way: drifter, trained by the Reds, but basically suicidal and adrift. Easy to replace.

Instead I reached a gloved hand into the room and removed the mark's wallet. I stored it carefully back in my lair and crept out to do the job. They knew when they saw me coming: three guys in a florist that was the watch for the whole street. We had it timed to the minute. I took out the watchmen, they went into the van, and then others in the employ of our benevolent client went to carefully identified doors in the neighboor. Thirty members of the Russian mob became anonymous missing persons that day, and my clients -- maybe from even farther East, you might think -- moved in and set up business within hours.

I got home a few days later. The best thing to do after a hit is to go cool your heels in a no-tell motel for a few days subsequent to ditching all evidence. You want to merge with your cover story, which for me is as a traveling salesman for remote industrial controls. The job is easy, and if I make a few sales a month, it looks like I'm gainfully employed like my wife, who works as a social media consultant for a bank downtown. That is where she met Jim Keefe, an account manager a.k.a. glorified loan salesman, and presumably started her affair.

From what I saw, this was far from the first time. They moved like a (sorry) well-oiled machine, him plunging away like a piston while she slid under him like the return tray on a steel press. This was not love-making, or intimate moments or whatever happens in Harlequin novels, another fantasy for people still believing the illusion of this modern world, but F.U.C.K.I.N.G. like they were high on the thrill of being naughty and pulling one over on the clueless husband.

I could read the signals because in the military, business, or crime, they are the same. If you respect your business partners, you don't cheat on them for a dime. You give it back and say, "I'm sorry sir or madam, but you dropped this." You show your respect every day because there is one other option: that you don't respect them, you're on the make, and they have to treat you like an enemy. That means your removal, I am sorry to say, because there is no "I" in "TEAM." You are either 100% on board or a disposal waiting to happen.

Lisa, if she respected me, would not have given this dickhead even a friendly smile that suggested the possibility of something happening. Girls signal it, you know. There's a smile for your fellow worker that says he's harmless and you will go no further with him than water cooler chat. There's a smile for your parents, chaste and formal. And then there's the come-fuck-me smile that says that if he presses his luck and charms you, you will hand out the one favor that really tells you the worth of a person, their body. Kind of funny since I'm in the body removal business!

One of the old guys -- a Pole, came over here after Communism did what it always does in Poland, makes everyone poor and shifty-eyed -- told me that the best wife was one who never gave it out for free. If you were dating her, she might suck on your pole (I'm killing myself with these puns) and let you feel her up, but she doesn't give it out. If she does, it's usually her first love, and she learns that business is business, and until you have the ring, nothing's sealed and delivered. She then sticks around for The One. Anything else is moron-tier normie behavior.

Lisa was sort of like that. I came out of a house where obedience to mother involved religion and obedience to father meant hard work. People worship work, but I learned in the military that "working hard" is a substitute for working well. You work well when you get the job done right the first time, whether it takes you ten seconds or ten weeks. People at jobs work hard, meaning spend all their time filling out the paperwork in detail, but the people who get ahead work well and are effective. That's true in my line of work too.

I mean, I knew a guy once who was tasked with removing a bigshot mark. He could have gone out there and studied all twelve cases that could have been the kill, but instead he spent a half-hour observing the guy. The bigshot liked to drink and rail whores in the anus at the top floor of his mansion in a special room that you reached through these narrow wooden stairs. My guy put on his delivery uniform, went up to the room, and dumped lube on the second stair from the top. Marked tripped, fell, and the case went down in the books as an accident caused by his lifestyle, which no one wanted to talk about, especially the obvious pink tube of cherry-flavored anal lube sitting on the landing.

My dad on the hand was a day-jobber who never got the big score despite working hard all the time and being paid well. The guys who got ahead at the auto plant went out and talked. They talked to the unions, suppliers, and clients. They made handshake deals and then fudged the details. They got big accounts, promotions, and big houses. My dad just got a desk and a gold watch. But if he came home and I wasn't slaving away over whatever dumb crap they made me do for school, I got to feel the willow switch he kept behind the television.

My mom was a classic narcissistic manipulator. She made me read a Bible verse every day and recite it to her. If I didn't seek her out to read it, the atmosphere was tense in the house. If I screwed up, I was a nobody -- no words, no food, no attention -- until I came crawling to her on my hands and knees with a new memorized Bible verse. As I stood on those stairs hearing my wife rut like a wild boar that ate too many apples off the ground, I felt an urge to hold the firm leather of that Bible in my hands.

You wouldn't think that a spouse could be an abuser without hitting you. But here it was the same thing: do what I want, and come crawling back to me, or I'll stop loving you and do nasty things to you. In this case, my wife wanted something -- who knows what, she never told me -- and since I didn't provide it, she was going to stab me in the back. If some bigshot said he was going to have me whacked, would she tell him to go ahead? Possibly. She no longer wanted me as an honest husband, which is why she was finding her loving elsewhere; her love for me had died somewhere along the way.

Lisa came into my life when I was back from overseas. My first task was to find an apartment and she was managing a little complex that I liked because it was quiet so I could hear the voices in my head more clearly. Just kidding, the voices make themselves heard like my mother. But, she was quick to say that although I probably wouldn't pass the financials check, I could if I had a certain credit card in good standing. A few hours of bank activity later, I got the apartment and saw her around there about once a week until I finally just asked her out to cut the tension.

She was on her first divorce at that point, which was the only warning sign that I got. She said she married him at college and was a virgin. I didn't know him and her college was a thousand miles away. Maybe I should have done my research. This was before I got cynical about everything, I mean really cynical as only experience can make you. I figured she had no incentive to lie. Seven years later, we were happily married, I thought, and thinking of having children, I thought. In the back of my mind I knew I was attracted to her beauty and the rest followed, which made me suspect my own reasoning.

Lisa was the classic Norwegian-Irish beauty. Flowing red hair, freckles, a trim figure, and a full rack. I have never understood the sizing of women's clothes, but my guess is more than a handful but not so much that it whacks me in the face when she does the cowgirl position. Her smile lit up a room, as the cliché says, and she had a natural charisma that made people want to notice her, even if she was only a lowly apartment manager at the time.

With my first six kills, I paid for her training so she could get certifications in social media management. Little did I know that I was not the staircase but merely a step that Lisa wanted to climb! With her job at a big bank, and her new boyfriend who was on his way to being an account executive, she was on her way to the big time. No more camping out in our little house in a neighborhood beneath notice. She would have herself a fashionable neighborhood, flash car, and spending money. I couldn't compare and I knew when I saw her faked orgasm that I was getting replaced.

Of course, I didn't want the corporate lifestyle. It reminded me of my mother and father, slaving away only to realize that when they hit their sixties, the dream was useless. They had traded away their young years for a dream that, like everything else in this modern world, is an illusion. They ended up doing quite well for themselves, worked out on the treadmills, were well-known in their community and then, retirement dawned. Suddenly they were nobodies, just nobodies with enough money to use, but never enough to be famous or desired as friends. They split and are probably in retirement homes now, anonymous and alone.

We had an expensive wedding, half-funded by her parents, with lots of her college friends. I should have noticed how carefully she steered me away. Was she at my side out of love, or to keep me from hearing about her ambitions and streetwalker-level morals? Everything was doubt. As I thought about her infidelity, I had none of the rage that many men report, only sadness, and I realized that I was mourning something I thought was beautiful that had died. Even if she came crawling back to me with a Bible verse, I knew what she was made of inside now and I didn't want it. I felt loss and emptiness but nothing more.

Before you get judgmental here, think about how little we know about anyone. We move around as kids while our parents chase that next big job. Then we get bundled off to school or training to get the certifications we need to have a solid career. But if the company goes bust, merges, moves, or changes things around? We're moving again. We know almost nothing about the people that we meet in daily life except their behavior. Who have they slept with, who knows? But that would tell us whether they are closer to "whore" or "keeper" on the marriage scale.

If you had a fighting chance of having a marriage which would not self-destruct, you would get something like the report you get with a used car. You could talk to his or her childhood friends, teachers, and first love. You could hear from the people who knew them at college. But no, this society is designed by some very greedy and cruel people to hide bad deeds, just so that they can get away with their big scam. You know nothing about her except what she tells you, and in my case, believing her was a mistake.

At this point, she presented more of a practical problem. I had to extract myself from this disaster of a marriage while keeping my cover story intact and my activities private. Ideally, she would just leave me and let me file for abandonment, but now that I knew she was a narcissist, I suspected that she would want more. People like that thrive on humiliation because it keeps people afraid of them. Up-and-coming mafiosi often work this way only to find out that you get no loyalty that way, and as soon as someone can trade up on you, they will just as you did on others. It's a good way to end up as fish food.

Right then, however, I had a job to do. I figured I had another three or so in me before it was time to change cities anyway, and I was thinking about making a clean break. I had a second set of papers, since you need that as your bail-out plan, and all of my earnings from my nightwork went into bearer bonds in a safety deposit box. However, I had to deal with Lisa right away. My house was not clean. If the people in your house are not all-in with you, they're going to start snooping around, and maybe find something they should not.

I went to my agent and explained the situation. It is bad to have screwed up, but worse to hide it or lie about it, since that endangers everyone above you in the hierarchy.

"That's too bad," he said with the Old World voice of his. "She seemed like a nice girl. I guess it would be convenient if she would disappear, no?"

You might say I am a moron for not noticing my cheating wife had a soul of plastic instead of gold (arguable) but I knew a test when I saw one. "Hell, no. We don't cross the streams. I'm going to be gone and cut off funds so she leaves me, then file for abandonment."

He tapped his head. "I like the way you are thinking. But, my old friend, you are one of the best. So I propose... an arrangement... with an understanding."

And so it was that instead of cutting her off, I bounded home with my best souped-up fatuous normie smile on my face. "Honey, I got promoted! We're taking a cruise!" She pretended to be overjoyed but the instant my back was turned she was texting.

"Just a short one," I said. "Down to the Caymans for a few days. It won't cut into your job at all, I swear."

"How could you do that?" she said.

"Buddy of mine, old Polish guy, he's got a yacht," I said. "They're going to Dubai afterwards. We can fly back on standby, save our money for some dinner and dancing, maybe you'll need some new clothes."

That did it. And so, there we were, boarding the yacht at a fancy club. My friend always said to go top-flight because no one guessed you were doing anything on the edge when you paid big money and had no problem being seen. "It's like security lights," he said. "All the research says they don't work for shit, but this stupid human animal" -- he tapped his head -- "thinks that if everything can be seen and people are around, nothing bad can happen. They're all livestock."

He had a point. My wife wanted to tame me, to control me, and to domesticate me. She wanted me cucked and neutered. Like my mother, she wanted me to engage in an arbitrary activity (my mother was a secret atheist, but wanted to be known in the church so she could get invited to all the fancy dinner parties) to show my loyalty. The more random and ludicrous the activity, the better because it showed even more what a domesticated slave without a will of my own I was, so these women could control me, just like politicians and celebrities lead the voters around by their nose-rings. It'd be funny if it weren't pathetic.

Our first night at sea began when the cocktails came out. My friend -- you'll understand if there aren't any real names in this story, and pseudonyms are just so consumer-level -- came out looking like a million bucks. Rolex, gold chains, fitted suit, fat Cuban cigar, and whisky older than me in my hand, he asked in his salesman voice what the lady would like to drink. After that, he monopolized her time, telling her war stories from an invented past. I realized how much I would miss him someday. He was a colleague more than a friend, but also a friend or friend-like object, at least.

Later that night as I settled into our cabin, I checked my watch. Just about time. The door opened and Lisa entered, reeking of his cologne. Without a glance at me, she freshened up in the gilded mirror in the tiny bathroom. Then she came out and made her pitch.

"I want you to do something for me," she said. "I haven't had much experience with men." She looked down demurely. I didn't know acting classes were part of social media consultant training! Training... such a normie word... makes it sound like toilet instruction, or domestication. Anyway.

I answered as I knew, from all the movies, I was supposed to answer. "Of course, darling," I said. "I'll do..." -- I stretched out the syllable, making her wait for it -- "anything, for you."

That was the magic word.

"Your friend is very charming," she said. "For this one night, and this one night only, I want to share his bed. I want to be his woman, to be part of his world. It's just an experience for me. After this, I'll come back to you and be your everything. It's just one night, just sex, a need I have like food or sleep, and then I'll come back to you and be yours forever."

I guess her account executive hopeful was not looking so good, maybe because his wallet was found at a known drug house, so she was trading up. Word to the wise: a person on the make will never stop with you. They'll keep trading up until something stops them. My friend had told me that his actual pitch was going to be "leave the loser and we'll see the world together." She could be his personal assistant, with benefits, and get her own Rolex and forty-year-old bourbon. But I had to be an actor too.

"Lisa, I can't... we can't... remember our vows? Forsaking all others, to death do us part?"

She smiled coyly. "I'll make it up to you," she said in her sultry sing-song voice, the one that promised lots of good things (and with her, they were quite good, to be honest; she could have been a sultan's courtesan, and maybe that was part of her plan, I reflected). "I'm doing this for us. I just need to experience this, for once. I never have done anything like this!"

"It'll break my heart," I said. "If it's just one night, why does it matter? Come to bed, you'll feel better in the morning." Suppressing laughter, thick with sardonic bile, was hard at this point.

She pressed together her sweet little lower lip with her teeth. The sound that came out was almost a hiss. "I need this," she said, adding the "darling" perfunctorily. "If you love me, you'll let me go. You know the old saying, 'If you love something, set it free, and if it comes back to you, it's yours forever.'"

"It doesn't feel right," I said, nodding my head like a normie. Signaling yes, but saying no. "It'll break my heart, honey." I looked out the window at the black waves of the ocean in the night, churning alongside us. Life went on, after all. We are just passengers.

She slid an arm around my shoulder. "It'll be fine, I promise," she said, sounding just like my mother. Just read the Bible verse... don't challenge me, and I won't change anything. You can always be my little abused boy, suffering PTSD of a subtle kind even before you go kill other people in faraway lands. Nothing would change, if I just obeyed. If I did not, there would be conflict, and I might lose everything. That's the abuse cycle. But I was too cynical to do anything but fake it like a starlet. I even blubbered a little.

"He's right down the hall, in room number two," she said. "You'll even be able to hear it. I'll come back in the morning and you can have me after he has, feel the semen of that powerful man around your little boy penis. We'll be stronger than ever before. You got this," she said in a bright voice like springtime.

The bloom was off the rose, and in fact, all I saw was a worm turning in serpentine coils within the rotted flower. It was time to cave. "Aw, I dunno, honey, this seems weird, and it's like you don't respect me anymore..."