The Dangerous Kind & Other Stories by Robert Chazz Chute Page A

do both!”
    He stepped close enough he could smell bleach. “It’s just you and me out here, ATA 667. Go ahead and call the police. Then when they let me out, I’ll wait. I could wait a year, maybe two. All the time I’m waiting for my time, you’ll be sweating and wondering. All the time you’ll be checking your back seat and looking over your shoulder. Anything could happen. Your car could blow up or I could come by for a visit over a long weekend when the kids are off on a sleepover. I could just show up with a big screwdriver one day.”
    “My husband—”
    “Your husband is a minor factor in the equation. Guys who marry women like you? They’re used to taking orders. They don’t get an opinion. They get told. You’ll have beaten him down every day long before I start in on him. I could bend your husband over and do him in the ass while I watch you burn in battery acid. He and I could both enjoy that.”
    She made a choking sound. She turned white.
    “See, what you don’t know about me is, not so deep down, I’m a pretty angry guy. The world is full of us. I’m the postal carrier you stiffed on a tip last Christmas. I’m the homeless guy with the sign you pretend you don’t see. I’m the miserable poor slob you married who can never do anything right. Right now that poor bastard is surfing porn and dreaming of the freedom he’ll get after you’re dead. At this very moment he’s dreaming of the day you are paralyzed by a stroke so he can have the joy of parking your wheelchair by the remote control and slapping you across the face every time you drool. He doesn’t have the balls to divorce you. Men who marry women like you never leave, but he’s hoping every morning that you’ll fall and hit your useless head and drown in the bathtub. I’ve watched a guy drown in a bathtub. It’s slower than you might think and very interesting to watch.”
    Her mouth moved but she made no sound.
    “Do you read me?”
    She nodded.
    “I said, ‘Do…you… read …me?’ ”
    “Y-yes.” 
    He glanced at the crowd. They were watching but he was satisfied there was no way they could hear anything he said.
    “I said you have two choices. You want to know what the other one is?”
    She said nothing. He didn’t need her to reply to anything he said now. “You can run to old doddering Chief Rose and he’ll come talk to the sweet coach who’s great with the kids —everybody says so — and it will be a he said, bitch on wheels said situation. Then, I can assure you, at some point, something really bad is going to happen. Something so bad you can’t even imagine it yet. Something so bad, I’ll have to take some time to think it through to make sure it lasts a long time when I come calling.”
    She was bug-eyed and mouthed the word “Jesus.”
    “The second choice — and I bet you’re going to love the second choice — is you turn around and sit back down and let me coach your kid. It’s a long season ahead and I don’t want to hear another fucking peep from you.”
    “Okay…okay.” She was shaking. A single tear slid down her cheek.
    “Wipe your face. I won’t hurt you as long as you keep your mouth shut. You are a burden to all who know you. I suggest you call Dr. Circe Papua. Call her and make an appointment. She’s an excellent therapist who helps people like you. In fact, I insist you go see her or bad things will certainly happen. If you fuck up and fail to turn your life around, I’ll find out about it. I really hope you do fuck up, ATA667. I want to show you things you’ve never dreamed in your worst nightmares. I’m talking horror movie-level shit storms and rope that bites your wrists. Read me?”
    She turned around and began walking back when he hit her with, “Oh, yeah, and clean up your driving. Maybe you should take a defensive driving course to remind you to be courteous to other drivers.”
    She slunk toward the stands, her head down.
    The rest of the practice went smoothly. He