"Too Much Rope" #Fridayflash

Photo credit: seriousfun from morguefile.com




"Give any one species too much rope and they’ll fuck it up." – Roger Waters


It was one hell of a party. Laurie stood by the homemade punch with Don Rivers, the CEO of Fargo. Don was one of those guys you didn’t forget. He was so overdone with cosmetic surgery in his sixties that he made Kenny Rogers look mild in comparison. He baked his skin golden in the tanning bed and wore a silver-link watch with the brand name so curly it was illegible.

Laurie wore fuchsia lipstick, which made Stein grin. One night at the office, he had Laurie on all fours on his desk. She had the most gorgeous moan he’d ever heard on a woman, and could go for days. She loved the paddle and—

Don glared in his direction, and Stein ripped his gaze away.

Ice floated in his drink, watering down the Skyy Vodka someone’d slipped in it. If they meant to be stealthy, the blue bottle next to the gigantic punch bowl definitely served as a distinct warning. Besides, it unbalanced the fruity taste overpowering it and shifted it into a teenage slumber party concoction created by slipping shit out of dad’s liquor cabinet to impress friends. Stein rubbed his nose, and glanced back at Laurie. He took an extra few seconds to appreciate her long legs in that minidress and headed for the mens’ room.

He engaged the lock and unrolled a baggie of white crystalline powder from his dinner jacket pocket. In the roll was a short straw and a razor blade.

“Did you see the way he looked at you?” Don said, his extra-white dental bleach job nearly blinding his date. Don had a way with women even though none of them could hardly stand to look at him. His wallet proved to be an aphrodisiac, and if that wasn’t enough, his penile pump made sure the lucky lady would never slip away unsatisfied. Laurie was fairly unchoosy about who was paying her car note. The big stiff one was merely a bonus in the situation.

“Let’s take a ride in the Beamer,” Don said, brushing his hand over Laurie’s. She jumped as if startled, and agreed eagerly. Being seen with the old codger in public was more humiliating at times than she could stand. Besides, he’d fuck her and leave her alone.

Stein emerged from the mens’ room, put back together nicely with a nice zing to his pace to boot. Don and Laurie were missing. He grit his teeth. Don made his moves like a cobra, and Stein figured it was about damn time somebody acted as the mongoose.

The parking garage shuddered in shadows as cars exited and entered the towering structure. Don popped the locks on the little tuna-blue Z3 Convertible and opened Laurie’s door for her. Her legs folded in, and she opened her tiny purse for a hair band. Don didn’t like the wind to mess up his hair, but he had a convertible. He often compromised by driving with the top down and the windows up, which Stein always felt was a douche bag trademark.

A long, low black car met Stein out of the garage elevator, and he got in. The earthen-dead scent of distressed leather rose up to meet him, smell of dead cow, his dad had always said. Yet dad always got those goddamn Mercedes with leather seats. If this was cow, Stein'd eat the steering wheel. The coke twisted in his veins, and he grinned at his eyes in the rear-view mirror. He pulled out of the parking space, just as he heard the Goodyears squeak on Don’s BMW.

Don drove fast after they’d broken out of the garage space, and Stein had to work to keep up. Then the damn car would slow down, and Stein would have to drop back to give his quarry a little more rope. He snickered at the memory of Roger Water’s song. It was after Pink Floyd had dethroned their rock-star egoist bassist. Something about rope and fucking shit up.

Out on the freeway the little convertible ahead of him rocketed away, opening up more lead. Stein cursed and stomped the gas pedal to the floor. His car, bless good ol’ Demonic steel, picked up the cues immediately, and within a few seconds he could see Don’s tail lights again. Instead of slowing to a content follow, Stein kept the pedal all the way down and sped up to run alongside the BMW.

Fuck Don. Fuck Laurie, that corporate whore. Stein sidled alongside the BMW. Don glanced, did a double take, and started shouting angrily at the tinted windows of the considerably larger sedan violating his space.

“What the fuck is your problem?” Stein heard faintly in the silent cockpit.

“Fucking lunatic! Get the fuck over!” Don shouted again and accelerated to lose the maniac that somehow decided he wanted to be in his lane while he was still in it. Stein sped up along with him. Don was rich, but he wasn’t stupid. He’d opted for the lower optioned model that gave him the looks, but had none of the horsepower. Had Don opted for the fucking Z4, he might’ve at least shaken Stein.

Don bared his teeth, white-blond hair whipping around his reddened face. Stein could see Laurie peering around Don, trying to see what’d pissed her date off so much. It was probably the most excitement she’d see all week until Don took that overseas trip to Japan. She never had fucked a Japanese man before. It was worth dealing with Don just for—

“What in the fuck is wrong with you?” Don screamed again. Stein cackled behind the deep tint and massive chrome grille of his ride. Yeah, he’d premeditated. Somehow he usually did. It was this kind of luck that kept him in business. Being Death had all kinds of perks.

They crossed over onto a bridge, and Stein jerked the wheel hard to the right.