Diane’s Bio:

I was born in NYC across from Yankee Stadium, which might explain my great love for the Yankees. I grew up in the Washington DC metropolitan area, which certainly explains my great interest in politics. I have spent the last almost 40 years living near the foot of Pikes Peak, which definitely has helped inspire my writing. I have published several short stories and an occasional nonfiction piece, as well as placed in a number of contests. Most recently, one of my short stories placed in the Saturday Writer’s contest and was included in the Cuivre Anthology.  At the age of 67 after undergoing a complete hip replacement, I decided to learn karate.  I now wear a blue belt, which in our system puts me right in the middle.  Our four grandchildren think this is the coolest thing.

Coffee Break

By Diane Hoover

 

Dense black clouds roiled in the afternoon sky. The air hung hot and still.  From the window in her kitchen, the slender, fortyish woman shifted her gaze from the threatening weather, to a gruff looking man and a stringy-haired teenaged boy getting out of a dirty, brown pickup. She had never seen them before. Fear mingled with fury. She had to get rid of them before the storm hit. She prayed they weren’t friends of her husband.

A spike of lightning followed by crackling thunder propelled the man and boy to her front door. She heard the door creak open. Living in the middle of nowhere, she’d never thought to lock it. Before she could react, they were inside, facing her.

“Boy’s scared of storms,” the man said. “Lightning struck his mother dead two years ago. You’d think almost sixteen now, he’d get over it.”

The boy smiled tentatively at her.

The man sniffed the air. “Is that coffee you got brewing? D’ya mind us waiting out the storm over a neighborly cup?”

She shook her head, but they’d already plunked themselves down at the kitchen table. Reluctantly, she set two mugs filled with coffee in front of them. Soon as the storm let up, they would leave, she told herself, in an effort to quell her rising panic.

“You live here alone?” the man asked. “Looks like a lot of land. Nobody to help out?”

“Husband’s in town,” she said, her voice louder than she’d intended.

“Road’s closed ’cause of the storm. Tree fell acrost it. He won’t be back soon.”

Lightning sizzled in another room; a light bulb exploded.

Noticing her purse by the back door, the man asked, “Was you plannin' on goin’ someplace?”

She stood mute, knowing no answer would be right. Lessons learned from her husband.

“Any money in it?” the boy asked, excited, as he grabbed her purse.

They’d come to rob her! Dumb struck, she watched him dump the contents on the table. 

The boy held up three bills, two ones and a five. “Know’d we shouldna’ stopped here. Nothin’ but a rundown shack and a poor woman.”

Thunder rattled the dishes on the shelves. The man said, “Gotta have more stashed someplace. Look in them cupboards. Check them other rooms.”

The refrigerator quit with a thunk. Electricity had gone out.

The boy said, “I ain’t goin’ no place, till this storm quits.”

“Drink your coffee before it gets cold,” she said, willing her hand steady as she set the sugar bowl on the table. The boy scooped up a couple of spoonfuls. The man one.

They’d picked a poor day to do their mischief. If she had understood irony, she might have laughed, but twenty years of isolation and beatings by her bastard of a husband had hollowed her out. Him poisoning her beloved dog had been the last straw. Watching these two no good robbers drink the sugar-laced coffee calmed her.

The kitchen turned as dark as the outside, except for jagged flashes of lightning. Please no rain, she pleaded.

She was startled when the man pressed up against her. The storm had distracted her.

The boy said, “I don’t feel good.”

The man licked her ear. “Boy don’t like to watch me poking the women. He…”

The boy grabbed his stomach, bent over, and vomited.

The man lurched upright, freeing her breasts, freeing her. She moved out of the way and watched him heave up his guts.

It was over quickly. Just like with her husband. She gazed at the two intruders lying still on her floor a long moment before she picked up her purse and retrieved her money. Found the truck key in the man’s pocket and a wad of bills. Looked like they’d been on a spree.

She walked outside, glanced at the sky, the burgeoning clouds, still without issue. Smiling, she lit one of her husband’s cigarettes, first she’d had in ten years, and inhaled deeply, before tossing the match into the brush she’d piled against the house, a shack, actually. Son of a bitch never built them a decent place.

As she drove away, flames shot skyward, gobbling up her tinderbox prison. She pictured the scumbag robbers on the kitchen floor and chuckled. She pictured her husband’s body stuffed in the same tiny closet he’d locked her in and laughed out loud.

Sometimes dry storms came in handy. Surely people would blame the fire on lightning.

***