Killing Tina - 1. Story

Killing Tina

By Jfalkon

Jim’s problems with Tina started when he moved into his new neighborhood. He had been dreaming of owning a home since he had moved out of his parents place. A recent change in the housing market had suddenly made his dream possible and he took the opportunity. He found a comfortable suburban house in a quiet neighborhood and made an offer.

A few months later he was unpacking his belongings from a rented moving van to the sound of 1980’s pop music. Meanwhile, a few curious neighbors watched him from their windows. In the house to one side of his, a sharp-eyed woman watched him move boxes and speculated on what was inside. On the other side a couple glanced out their window and commented on their new neighbor’s age. Almost everyone in the neighborhood was close to retirement age making thirty-two-year-old Jim stand out. Across the street a man watched from the window of his living room wondering if he should introduce himself.

As Jim stopped to rest next to the moving van, the man from across the street made up his mind to come over and say, “Hello.” Jim saw the man approaching and was relieved to see that there was someone close to his own age living on his street.

“Hi,” said the neighbor as he crossed the street, “I’m John. Welcome to the neighborhood.”

“Hi, I’m Jim,” answered Jim shaking John’s hand.

“How are you liking the neighborhood so far?” asked John.

“It looks pretty nice. You’re the first neighbor I’ve met though.”

“On the whole, everyone’s pretty nice but I wouldn’t change my cloths with the blinds up,” said John with a smile.

“Will someone be watching me?” asked Jim slightly unnerved.

“These people get bored sometimes,” John shrugged, “I think I got the worst of it, being the only single young guy on the block. It gives the old farts something to talk about. I make a point of keeping social events and dates out of the house so they wonder about me. Half of them think I’m a playboy. I’m sure some of them think I’m gay but as long as they don’t torch my house I really don’t care.”

He was about to say something more when his phone rang. Jim gathered that the call was important when his neighbor quietly excused himself and went back across the street. Jim continued unpacking with his mp3 player keeping him company. He could not help feeling a little paranoid as he walked by the windows. He promised himself that he would get some curtains that week.

Besides the uncomfortable feeling of being watched Jim spent the next few afternoons enjoying his house. Within a week he had some curtains in his bedroom and in the living room. This helped with the sense of being watched and the neighbors seemed friendly enough, though the thought of them burning a house down did not completely leave him. One of his next-door neighbors, Ms. Davis, had brought him a pie and had invited him to visit her any time. A couple from down the street had come by as well.

By the weekend Jim was almost completely unpacked. As he arranged a few last items in his bedroom he thought he saw the nice lady next door looking out her window and into his. To prevent any awkward moments he drew the curtains and continued arranging his possessions. Ms. Davis, momentarily discouraged, went to make some coffee and Jim continued his work. As he unpacked a cardboard box he found an old manikin. It was only a partial figure intended for displaying wigs. The wig on it was of the sort that had been popular among rock musicians at one time.

Jim smiled as he placed the bust with its wig on a small table between the window and the bed. He had worn that wig to a Halloween party and had gotten many complements. Then he went back to arranging his belongings, Ms. Davis returned to her window. She observed what looked like a man’s shadow walking about the room and a woman’s shadow sitting by the window. Ms. Davis knew who the man was but she wondered about the woman.

A few days later Jim was taking his trash out when Ms. Davis saw him from her yard and asked him how he was doing. She asked if he had been inviting any friends over and was surprised to hear that he had not.

“Is something wrong?” asked Jim in response to the look on her face.

“Well, its just that I thought I was a woman’s silhouette when I glanced over your way one evening. You don’t have a wife and…” she trailed off wrinkling her forehead.

Jim was about to tell her that he was single and it was not her business to look in his windows but then he remembered his other neighbor across the street saying that the neighbors though he was either a playboy or gay. Jim did not want to have any labels attached to him so with visions of an angry mob in his head he lied. “Actually, I am married. I just wasn’t wearing my ring. I didn’t want to damage it moving the boxes.”

“Oh! I understand,” said Ms. Davis, “I would love to meet your wife some time.”

Jim froze for a second and then gave an excuse. “She has been suffering from a migraine and has gone to bed.”

Ms. Davis said that she was sorry to hear it and asked what the poor woman’s name was.

“Tina,” answered Jim choosing the name of a singer whose album he had been listening to.

As soon as his conversation was over he went inside and asked himself what the hell he was thinking. Then he started laughing. He decided that he would have to tell Ms. Davis the truth the next time he saw her. A few days later Ms. Davis brought over some cookies especially for Tina but Jim felt too guilty to tell her that Tina did not exist. Instead Jim just told her that Tina was not well enough to come down.

After Ms. Davis left he sat in his kitchen nibbling on a cookie wondering what he was going to do now. If he confessed after a week he would certainly look like the town nut case. He tried to think of a way out of his situation but felt stuck when he heard a knock at the door. It was John from across the street. Jim invited him in thinking that maybe he could confide in his fellow bachelor but John had already heard about Tina.

“I guess I’m the only single guy on the block after all,” sighed John.

He was a little disappointed since he had briefly considered that his neighbor might be available and interested in men.

“I’m sure that will change soon enough,” answered Jim looking at John’s handsome features.

John smiled and after a short and awkward conversation went home.

As the weeks went by, Jim took to arranging the manikin in his window so that Ms. Davis and others could have a look at Tina’s shadow. He was very careful about putting the manikin out of sight when he opened the curtains. He even pretended to talk to her. As word spread about his wife, Jim even bought a wedding ring. He knew he was acting crazy but he had gotten strangely comfortable with his playacting.

There were times when he tried to quit the habit and put the manikin away. Then the neighbors would ask about Mrs. Jim and he would tell them that she was sick. It happened so many times that he had to tell the couple next door that Tina was a sickly woman and was often unable to get out of bed. Jim could get away with the lie because he did most of his work from home and could play the role of caregiver.

The news spread and pots of home made chicken soup started to arrive at his home. He ate the soup guiltily plotting his next move. Seeing that he was slipping quickly into a fictional world he gave up on the truth and bought a full manikin to put in his window. He drove it home in the trunk of his car and stealthily brought it up stairs to his bedroom. He put it together on the bed and was about to stand it next to the window but then he realized that it was naked. What would the neighbors think of that?

He dressed it in his bathrobe and put the wig on its head. He played with this doll every day. Sometimes Tina sat be the window. Sometimes she napped on the bed. Other times she was in the hospital. John often asked about her, and Jim put on the best performance he could. He began to take a perverse pleasure in his fictional wife’s illness. Every time she was particularly sick, John would come over and ask if there was anything he could do and Jim loved the attention. John was not like the other neighbors who only cared to satisfy their own curiosity. John really seemed concerned.

As they sat in the kitchen one day while Tina was understood to be sleeping upstairs Jim asked John if people took as much interest in his life.

“Not really,” John said, “It used to be a running bet whether I was gay or straight but since you and Tina moved in it’s become old news.”

“Did you try to convince them you were straight?” asked Jim.

“No,” smiled John, “They enjoyed the mystery and I was not about to spoil it for them.”

“But weren’t you worried they would do something to you?”

“No. No one here really cares. If I were dating anyone they wouldn’t care if it was a man or a woman as long as they could look in the windows. These people are just bored,” explained John.

Jim smiled and asked with a mischievous grin, “So which is it, men or women?”

“Why would I spoil the mystery for you?” asked John but then changed his mind, “I like guys.”

“Your secret’s safe with me,” smiled Jim.

After John left that evening, Jim sat in his bedroom feeling lonely. Everyone thought he was a devoted husband but really he was a pathetic computer nerd who played with a doll. He looked at Tina as she sat by the window in a frilly dress he had bought especially for her. “Can we have a divorce?” he asked.

Receiving no answer from the manikin, he considered his options. If he divorced his wife he could ask his neighbor out, but who would want to date a man who had dumped his extremely sick wife? Then another thought entered his head. Sick people sometimes die. Maybe he could kill Tina. He gave her a guilty look that quickly morphed into a smile. He would kill Tina.

He sat in his home plotting against her. He decided that she would die in an out-of-state clinic. That would be convenient for two reasons. One was that no one would visit her. He had previously had some explaining to do when some of his neighbors wanted to visit her in the hospital but found that no one by the name Tina Bryce had been admitted.

The other advantage of his plan was that she could be cremated and only an urn would be present at the funeral. It could be filled with any kind of ashes and no one would know. The funeral could be a private event and then the memorial service could be open to the neighborhood. Jim immediately put his plan into action.

He started by telling Ms. Davis that he was looking into taking his wife to a special research hospital in Nebraska. Then he told the same story to the couple who lived on the other side of him. Then early one Saturday morning he packed Tina into his car and covered her almost completely with blankets in case anyone would check. He drove her out of town and went camping. He camped in a tent while she stayed in the car. At the end of the trip she went in the trunk and he went home.

For the next few weeks he spent as much time as he could away. He went to the beach and worked out of libraries and coffee shops. He became well acquainted with several motels over the course of a few months. He bought a pretty floral urn and began to collect ashes from campfires and ashtrays and added baking soda to kill the smell.

By the end of three months he was ready to make his grand entrance. He had a body’s worth of ashes in the urn and a manikin in the trunk of his car. With his facial expression well rehearsed, he drove slowly into his neighborhood with tears smeared on his face and caught the eye of every neighbor. He put the urn on his coffee table and waited for visitors. He was not disappointed. Ms. Davis was the first to arrive. Then the couple next door arrived with their friend from down the street. John came next and they sat around the urn drinking coffee. Jim started to cry as he described how quickly his beloved had slipped away and soon had the whole neighborhood in tears. John put a comforting hand on his shoulder and Jim had to reach for a tissue to cover his smile.

Though the mourning went on all week, Jim gave Tina a proper memorial service at their home on a cold Saturday afternoon, which gave way to a dark evening with a weeping rain. When everyone had finally gone Jim went outside on his porch and took a breath of fresh air. It felt like the first breath of fresh air he had in months. Full of the scent of freedom and rain he went back inside. He took Tina out of his trunk and hid her the attic. The urn would have to stay in the living room for a few more days until the private burial.

A week later he buried the urn in the basement and waited for the grief to subside. He tried to be friendly to John but it was awkward. Jim soon realized that the urn was much easier to bury than his conscience. Despite his best efforts to forget the ridiculous episode he could not relax. A year went by and he and John began to date but he still was not able to rid himself of Tina’s ghost. Finally he decided to tell John the truth. After a night at the movies he invited John in and asked him to sit down.

“John, I have to tell you something,” he said with mounting anxiety.

“Ok.”

“You know, I did something that I feel really guilty about,” he said looking at the ground, “I did something horrible.”

“What?” asked John doubting that it could be as bad as Jim said.

“Its about Tina. She didn’t die like I said. She didn’t even live like I told everyone,” he said not sure how to phrase his thoughts.

“What do you mean?” asked John feeling a twinge of unease.

“I um…she’s...,” not sure how to go on he thought that the show and tell approach might work better, “Can I show you something?”

“Uh, Ok.”

Jim led John up stairs and then into the attic. John’s eyes got wider with every step. Then Jim took him to a corner and lifted a tarp off a manikin.

“This is Tina,” announced Jim.

“What?”

“I had the wig in the window and Ms. Davis thought I had a woman here and I told her I was married,” Jim confessed miserably, “I know how it sounds. I just didn’t want people talking about me like they talked about you. I didn’t want to have something to hide and I didn’t want them coming after me with pitchforks.”

“Yeah,” said John scratching his head, “That would be bad.”

“I was going to tell Ms. Davis it was all a joke but then she brought Tina cookies and I felt bad.”

John stared at the manikin and Jim sated at John.

“So what happened to the urn and who’s ashes were those?” John asked breaking the silence.

“The urn is in the basement and the ash is from a camp fire.”

The ridiculous nature of the situation finally got the best of John and he burst into a fit of laughter. Over the next few days John alternated between feeling annoyed at the deception and amused by it all. Eventually the amusement won out and John kept Jim’s secret from the rest of the neighbors. The story never got out but Jim and John did get a reputation for being gay. It was impossible to avoid when everyone had seen them kissing on either Jim’s or John’s porch.

© 2009 Jfalkon

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