Posted 6:55 PM by Alfred

Sweet freedom. Dick loved little Nell, really, loved her to death, but four hours of uninterrupted rest sounded like heaven, especially in light of the shit he'd gone through the last few days. The combination of security and relaxation was almost too good to be true. The security of knowing that psycho BITCH was locked up, at least for now.

As he pulled into the driveway of the two story house, he couldn't help but focus his eyes on the burnt remains of the balcony. The contractors were scheduled to come out tomorrow and clear it away and put in a new one, but he didn't think he'd ever set foot on it. Actually he might call Ace Construction and tell them, you know what? Fuck the balcony.

He turned off the ignition and stared at the closed garage door. Just stared away, zoning out in la la land. His thoughts turned to Morgan. Good ol Morgan, always there with his slippers in the morning, always ready for a walk around the block. He'd known Morgan longer than that BITCH and now Morgan was no more. Now Morgan was charcoal.

Dammit. Why was he doing this? He had specifically told himself he wasn't going to think about this stuff today. He'd gotten the afternoon off from his piece of shit boss, Larry. (Actually Larry had been pretty cool the last couple weeks.) Nell, bless her heart, was playing pin the tail on the donkey at Joey Clarington's house on Mayfield, and he had a date with a cup of tea and a bottle of Jack Daniels.

Dick managed to pull his gaze away from the garage door and stepped out of his Acura Integra, the car they'd bought together, him and Jane. Now that he had the clarity of hindsight, that may have been the first day he'd seen her dark side. Jane had gotten just a little too animated during the negotiations with the car salesman. He remembered her actually saying "do you think we have the word dumb motherfuckers printed on our foreheads?". She had blushed when she said it, and she generally never used language like that, but the whole talk had stopped at that point. Dead in the tracks.

And you know what? They had gotten a hell of deal on the thing.

FUCK. He still loved her, didn't he? That was the most pathetic goddam part of the whole trip. He still loved this psycho fucking BITCH that had trapped his dog on a balcony that she'd soaked with lighter fluid and threw a match and closed the door. Poor Morgan never had a chance, the ledge was too high to jump over. He must have just burned to death, wondering "what the fuck?? Where's my master now? He married this bitch and left me in her care and now I'm burnt doggie toast."

Fuck it Dick. Go have a drink. Actually go have about seven.

He turned the key in the front door, and right when he opened it, he got a vibe, a bad feeling in his gut. Maybe he was just tired.

The preceding was my response to a writing exercise in Stephen King's book On Writing

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