Serene silence fills the room as Morgan and his wife absentmindedly stare at each other, both too weak to speak.
"Honey," Nancy starts, her voice coming out as a low whimper.
"Yeah?," Morgan answers, his voice as weak as hers, but still carrying that affection reserved only for her.
"You look like crap"
"Ha ha, you don't look like Cinderella either Missy"
Both of them give hearty laughs, for a moment it feels like they are not restrained by chains. What they feel for each other can find freedom in the darkest and vilest of places, it can become oxygen in a vacuum and can make worldly troubles perish. It is an ever shining flame which dispels darkness.
"You look hot when you're filthy," Nancy continues their banter, a mischievous yet weak smile on her face.
"Must be the filth giving my skin a godly glow" Morgan answers his wife, a genuine smile upon his face.
The man keeping guard on them listens with intent, wondering how they find humour in their current predicament.
"Jeez! Get a fucking room!"he finally bursts,false anger evident in his tone.
" But they're already in a room" Sam points out.
"Shut up you bag of filth!" the man barks at Sam, his anger now genuine.
"Must be a lot of filth to be able to fill a bag, surely you'd need a lot of people to scrub it off fr......." Sam doesn't get to finish, the man charges at him with great fury and determination, a venomous look upon his face. He tackles him, along with the chair to which he is strapped, to the ground.
"I submit! I submit!" Sam cries out before the man can harm him any further.
"This ain't no wrestling match boy, this is me givin' ya a real,painful beating you hear me? Now feel my wrath!"
Just as the man prepares to feast upon him with his fists, Morgan's words stop his first punch amidst its journey to Sam's terrified face.
"Yeah?, I wonder if your wife feels your wrath with your inactive cucumber"
He fumbles for words for some time before he responds:
"That's what they call it these days huh? Cucumber? Wow, next thing they'll be calling it the jerkpipe. That's a convenient name right? Jerkpipe?"
"Nah, I think scientists should give it one of their taxonomic names, you know something like, I don't know...... pipus jerkus?"
The two then keep on throwing at each other absurd suggestions until Nancy shuts them both up by saying that they're being gross.
*************
"Oh my God man, I'm so excited!"
Christian Adorn gushes at his cynical friend, "I can't believe we are going to kidnap the fuckiiing p-r-e-s-i-d-e-n-t. This is an unpresidented event, see what I did there!"
"Yeah I see what you did there," his friend responds with a worn out tone," You've just made this awkward. "
"Lighten up man, this is going to be soooo easy, plus we work for the asshole, we're always with him, sometimes alone with him, we can snatch him anytime. It could be the toilet, just as he comes out, or it could be....."
"OK, ok, I get your point, we have home advantage"
"Don't make this about football, cause it sure as hell ain't f.."
"I'm not, I'm just tryna understand it better."
"Well good, cause seriously, this ain't no game man."
The two then quickly change the argument to one of sports just as a nosy comonner sits within earshot of them, dragging out the words as he orders himself a Martini. He gives the bartenderess a tired yet flirty smile.
"Why don't you guys just do it at the dinner table, excuse yourselves and come back from the bathroom with thick accents and balaclavas, make it look like a terrorist attack or something" the man suggests, confirming their suspicion, he has been eavesdropping on their conversation. They ignore his suggestion.
"Oh the perks of having an actual brain, I doubt you two idiots would have come up with such a brilliant idea."
Chris Adorn gives the beer-bellied man a murderous look before yanking him by the collar of his shirt. Their faces are inches close to each other.
"Look man," he starts, " I don't know who you are and I don't give a rat's nest, but if you so much so as to utter a single word to anyone, I promise I'll murder you with my bare hands. I'm sure you have a family, a wife and kids. Within a blink of an eye I could have them all decapitated and dismembered, and have you in the same freezer with their heads, like a little family reunion."
The man's eyes go wide in horror.
"I never saw or heard anything, you guys were never here."
"Good, now laugh out loud as if I've just told you the funniest joke you've ever heard."
The man does as he is told.
*******************
"A rather hopeful turn of events for investigators handling Brad Michael's gruesome murder. Four weeks after the father of four's death, an anonymous source has come forth with images he confirms as that of the killers. The images will be displayed on your screen shortly. If you have any knowledge pertaining the individuals on the picture, please contact the police immediately, your identity will be kept discreet." the Curly haired, fair-skinned news reporter announces as Darla Martins sits on the dining room couch, dressed in her pajamas. The image shown on the screen is that of a short, muscular, blonde-haired man who looks to be in his late thirties,next to a woman whom Darla, upon seeing, feels her heart pang violently against her chest, bile rise up her throat and all moisture in her mouth dry up. Her very mother smiles at her from the TV screen.
