Life Slices

Myst Morgan

Update: They’re still both alive.

I’m actually pretty surprised this time. He was sure his plan would work, and in all honesty, I thought he was finally about to succeed. Whether or not you agree on the morals and ethics of such a situation, you can’t deny that this particular stunt was rather ingenious. It’s common knowledge that Ms. Greenhat cannot function more than five minutes into her day without coffee. Now you may be thinking that this is another classic “make the person coffee and put poison in it” situation. But for Mr. Beigeshoe to make Ms. Greenhat coffee would be an act of extreme suspicion in of itself. Any act of kindness between them was practically unimaginable, except of course in their Times Magazine cover photo of their wedding picture. Even then their smiles seemed extremely strained, but any affection between them, even purely for show, was rare enough to make me wonder if their grins had been photoshopped when I first saw the cover. I knew it had to be real though, from the time that Ms. Greenhat had found the copy I had hidden in my closet and used it as kindling to start a fire (coincidentally, in one of Mr. Beigeshoe’s cars). She would’ve never been so disgusted by it had it been edited. I suppose that was one good thing about them. They were both very open about their emotions towards each other, although these emotions consisted entirely of hatred and jealousy. Neither enjoyed even attempting to hide their dislike for the other, which, I assumed, is why Ms. Greenhat had burned the magazine. That photo’s existence was a huge blow to her ego.

I do apologize, that was quite a tangent. What I was saying was that Ms. Greenhat quite enjoys her morning, midmorning, noon, afternoon, late afternoon, dinner, evening, late eve - ning, and midnight coffees. And Mr. Beigeshoe was well aware of this. It would be difficult not to be. However, Ms. Greenhat had trained herself to detect the taste of most common (and some uncommon) poisons, so the classic coffee with arsenic or cyanide wouldn’t work against her, though Mr. Beigeshoe had certainly tried it. But this time his plan was different. Mr. Beigeshoe had woken up at 3AM that day, just to make sure everything was properly prepared. Normally, I would’ve been asleep at this time as well, but I had a science test at school that day, so I had stayed up to study. And when I noticed Mr. Beigeshoe sneaking down the gold-laced staircase, I decided it would be best to stay and observe, just as a precaution that I wouldn’t accidentally stumble into one of his deathtraps instead of Ms. Greenhat.

I crept after him, through the ballroom and into the equally extravagant kitchen. Looking back, he probably knew I was following him. He’s always been an observant man (he had to be, to survive this long in a house with Ms. Greenhat), and I don’t think I was as sneaky as I remember myself being. But if he did know, he paid me no mind. He trusted that I wouldn’t tell Ms. Greenhat about his plan and that I knew better than to try to interfere. Mr. Beigeshoe opened the cabinets carefully, avoiding the one that creaks, and pulled out Ms. Greenhat’s 46 pound bag of coffee grounds. He buckled under its weight, swaying back and forth across the silver-tiled floor, desperately trying to steady himself. He was not a man known for his upper-body strength.

Eventually, with a few muffled grunts, he managed to lift the bag onto the kitchen counter. I almost wanted to applaud. From there he began the painstaking task of picking the three locks that kept the bag sealed shut. A padlock, a combination lock, even a deadbolt lock, though I still am not sure how that was attached to the bag. One by one the locks slipped off, placed gently down on a painfully pink dish towel, as to avoid unnecessary noise. I assumed he would just slip some poison into the bag as usual, and while he did indeed do this, he snuck in a small pouch as well. I didn’t think too much of it at the time, he played his cards well there. Ms. Greenhat immediately noticed the poison, of course, but after that, she seemed to stop paying much mind to the coffee grounds. Probably assumed that the arsenic was all he had done, since who would be stupid enough to mess with the same murder weapon twice in a row? I never did find out what was in that bag, but a week later I saw the now dirt covered sack of beans lying out on the front lawn, coated in the scent of pesticides and with some rather unpleasant words about Mr. Beigeshoe scrawled out in red ink across its face. I remember finding the whole situation a bit amusing if anything. Another close attempt (a casual miss wouldn’t have warranted such anger from Ms. Greenhat), but still a failed one. I could practically hear Mr. Beigeshoe cursing to himself and Ms. Greenhat already plotting her revenge strike. This was more entertaining than any TV show I had seen, though the inability to change the channel was beginning to wear down on me. But there didn’t seem to be much point to pondering it. I had a math quiz to study for anyway. It was supposed to be a pop quiz, but word gets around.