The House on the Right

He was a rather average man. His name, John was as common as a name could get. His size was average, his face was plain. His age was the population average of thirty something. He was mild mannered and went out of his way to avoid confrontation. The only thing in which he wasn't average was his shyness. Technically he wasn't a virgin but he was so shy that he couldn't approach a woman to ask her for a date. He lost his virginity to a chewing gum prostitute who told him from the start that she didn't do anal and didn't kiss and who looked bored with his fumbling attempts. The two other times when he visited a professional lady the results weren't much better.

He lived in a small two stories house side by side with two other identical ones. The house on the left was occupied by an elderly, almost deaf lady. On the right was offered for rent for ages. The houses were painted in different colors and had small different details but inside had exactly the same division: a small living-room and a kitchen downstairs, a bedroom and a bathroom on the second floor. The living room window opened at the front of the house on the small porch and the kitchen had a door to the tiny backyard. The bedroom upstairs had the window over the backyard.

John lived from his job as house telemarketer. He had a computer and a list of names and telephones which were updated every time he finished the previous one. He spent most of his day on the telephone. He had a nice routine which he followed every day, making a call, striking the name from the list or making a tick for calling later and making an occasional sale. He separated a part of his day to walk to the shops, supermarket or restaurant, all in walking distance.

Until three months ago he dedicated the rest of his lonely day to his only two hobbies: television series and classical music, well, he probably wasn't average in his love of classics.

He listened to his CD's during his working hours and on his free time he watched series on the TV. Occasionally he used his backyard where he had a small table and an easy-chair. His backyard and the backyard of the deaf lady were paved, while the backyard of the third house had a small abandoned garden.

Three months ago the house on the right was rented to a young couple. He peeped on them through the blinds of his living room and judged them to be in the late twenties or early thirties. He almost died from fright when they crossed his porch, ringed his bell and introduced themselves as Mr. and Mrs. Bill Jones. The husband was a big guy and explained that he worked as a foreman on the nearby rail line construction team and would work there for the next couple of years, hence why they moved to a house within walking distance. She was a housewife. Penelope, Penny to her friends.

One glance at Penelope and John fell in love. Desperate, first sight love. It was not the fact that she was beautiful, or that her long blonde hair shined like halo around her angelical face, or that her simple short summer dress molded her curvaceous body into a sculpted perfection, or that her melodious voice recalled Chopin's nocturnes, or that her soft golden skin invited the most delicate touch, it was the assembly, the aura, the whole. John was so taken by this inhuman apparition that he almost couldn't answer any of couple's questions. Probably disappointed by his aloofness they cut the visit short and went to the next house on their courtesy tour.

From than on John had another hobby: spying on Penelope and worshipping her from a distance. Pe-ne-lo-pe... He rolled the syllables of her name on his tongue like sweet candy. He spied on her behind the blinds of his living room in the morning when she was giving her husband a goodbye kiss in her pajamas or dressing gown. He spied on her from his bedroom window when she was tending to her garden in the backyard, dressed in her summer dress or in her cut-off denim shorts and skimpy halter. He changed his routine to cross with her when she made her short walks to the local market or the post. On those occasions he always exchanged a shy smile or a quick wave, but he never had the courage to stop and speak with her.

At nights he would dream of her. Dreams of heroism and gallantry with her in the role of a damsel in distress and he as the heroic rescuer. A gallant rescuer requiring nothing from his lady and often dying at her feet imagining her words: "Ah, who was that gallant and handsome hero who lost his life to defend my honor. Oh, now I'll never know his name!" But sometimes he didn't die. Instead she throws herself in his arms and in halting voice surrenders her purity to his ardent love.

Then came that fateful night, a few weeks after they moved to the house on the right of his, when while changing the CDs he perceived a strange noise coming from his neighbors' house. First he couldn't recognize the sounds, but straining his ears he could distinguish high pitched cries and lower register noises like something striking something. Then it downed on him. His princess was being beaten up.

He didn't know what to do. He thought on calling police but he had a natural dislike of exposing himself, he thought on barging in and rescuing her, but her husband was twice John's size and would probably beat on him as well. He ended on his bed crying from hate and frustration with his head under the pillow to drown the sounds.

Next day, he spied on them in the morning and their goodbye looked the same as any other day. He looked carefully at her face and there were no signs of beating. It was morning and she wasn't using any make up. Was it possible he dreamed the whole thing?

But in the afternoon, when she went out to nurse her vegetables and flowers, using a very short dress, he could easily note how red her thighs were near the hem of her dress. He whipped her! Thought John, and she probably was using such a short dress to show him her marks and ask for help.

But what could he do? It wasn't like he could come to her and ask her. She didn't look that she was suffering, although once she brought her hand to the back of her skirt and rubbed slightly her bottom. In the evening she greeted her hubby in the same way as always: with a kiss and a hug. And the beast returned the hug. His hands at her waist, when suddenly in plain view of the spying neighbor one of his huge hands gave her a solid, meaty and certainly stinging spank on the back of her cut-off denims. The slap was so sudden and solid that John blinked and jumped behind the blinds. She also jumped and protested, taking her hand to the offended part. John couldn't see anything else because they entered and their front door closed.

That night John didn't turn on his TV nor listened to his CD. He spent it with his ear glued to the wall that separated his house from the house on the right. But nothing happened. He couldn't hear anything more than the faint sound of the TV. Then nothing. He ran upstairs to his bedroom, but there was nothing indicating that a beating was taking place. He went to sleep alleviated and frustrated at the same time.

Two nights later the beating happened again. This time, with his ear glued to the wall he could hear at times disconnected cries of distress. Several "no's" and a clear "hurts" and high pitched crying. Her husband's low pitched and unintelligible growls could be heard to the sound of meaty blows. John slept on his knees, crying against the hard wall of his living room, long after the sounds quieted on the other side.

At the end of three months John knew the pattern. The beatings happened always at night, mostly after the night news on the TV, at least once a week, sometimes twice. He purchased a medical stethoscope and could hear better her cries and protests and the grumbling cold commanding voice of her tormentor. And of course those meaty sounds of the beating. John imagined what he used to hit her. His fists? A rubber hose? He knew from his TV series that there were methods to hit a person without leaving too much marks. He knew also that she was beaten on her body. Her face and arms didn't show signs of abuse the next day. Probably she was hit on her legs, buttocks and belly. Possibly on her back and breasts. John cringed inside at this last image.

John was immersed in self-loathing despair for not being able to do something for Penelope. Also his productivity was at all-times low. He even got an inquire from his company about what was happening. He almost didn't turn his TV on and he hadn't purchase a classical CD for two months. He spent most of his nights trying to hear what was happening and slept during the hours he should be working.

He had to do something. One day when he went to the market to replenish his supplies he passed in front of a new sport gear shop. His eyes caught a small weapon display case. He went in. After half an hour he was the owner of a 38 snub nosed black S&W revolver and a small case of high speed bullets. He resisted the salesman pitch about the advantages of pistols and trying to sell him more bullets. He needed only the bullets that would fit inside the gun. The salesman promised him that in a week he could pick the gun and munitions, a standard time to process his application for gun ownership. John wasn't worried. He never had any kind of brush with the law, not even a speeding ticket as he didn't drive.

One week and one beating later he had a gun in his house and a firm plan how to use it. He noted that Penelope didn't lock the kitchen door. He would enter their house through the backyard, would surprise the brute during the beating, would pump the bullets into his body and would wait for the police along the weeping but grateful widow.

John had no plans to escape detention. He would go to jail proud of his deed. And just possibly his goddess would testify in his favor during the trial. He loaded the revolver and waited for the next beating.

Two days later, three months to the date his neighbors moved in the house on the right, he heard Penelope crying.

He didn't hesitate. He went to his backyard, jumped the low fence that separated both houses, opened their kitchen door and with the revolver firmly pointed in front, followed the cries stepping into their illuminated living room.

What he saw would be imprinted in his mind to the rest of his life. The brute was sitting on a chair with Penelope draped on his knees, her beautiful buttocks bare and upended, offered for his caressing hand. At the moment that John entered the room, Bill was caressing his wife's offered red bottom and she was looking at him over her shoulder with such an unrestricted, unmistakable and devoted love, that it shattered John's heart. They both looked startled at the invading armed man.

Mumbling something inane about having seen a thief, John retreated hastily through the kitchen and jumping back over the fence ran into his house.

He waited a while in his living room, but they didn't follow him. He turned on his CD player, chose a Chopin's polonaise played by Rubinstein and sat on his easy chair, his mind completely blank.

At the sound of the last beautiful accords he put the gun inside his mouth and pulled the trigger.

The End

Alternate End

He waited a while in his living room, but they didn't follow him. He turned on his CD player, chose a Chopin's polonaise played by Rubinstein and sat on his easy chair, his mind completely blank.

At the sound of the last beautiful accords he started to pack. At two o'clock in the morning he was walking along the river carrying a small suitcase. He would send for his belonging after he would find a new place to live. Passing a bridge he threw the revolver and the bullet case in the dark water and went his way towards a new beginning.

The End