Dolores Tyler returned from the local library on a particularly windy evening. She opened the door of her Chevy just as a gust of wind whipped by nearly wrenching her arm out of its socket. The wind ripped the door from her hand and slapped the Chevy’s full weight into the passenger side of the big black Explorer beside her. She sat there for a moment pretending not to notice the huge dent in the Explorer. Her heart was beating wildly.
Her first instinct was to move her vehicle immediately to another location in the parking lot of the apartment complex. No one would suspect her as the psychopath who would hit someone’s car and run off. After all, she was treasurer of the condo association. Dolores considered herself a pillar of the community although it did seem deceitful not to leave a note at least. Dolores, a tiny sparrow of a woman, easily intimidated, was dismayed to learn that she, indeed, could have a dark side. She moved her car some twenty yards away and didn’t look back.
Dolores told her husband, George, about the accident. He lectured her in his blustery way about the “right thing to do.” He was always pontificating about the importance of morals and ethics and justice and transparency. “Transparency” was a term neither Dolores nor the five year old twins fully understood no matter how many times he explained it. Dolores watched her husband’s lips move noticing for the first time how enormous his head was. His whole body seemed to spill over the brown recliner like a rich chocolate pudding. She wondered why she’d ever married the man. She allowed even darker images to emerge. How would George look with a colander on his head or hanging from a rafter in the family room?
The next morning, George opened the door to his new Lexus. He couldn’t miss the huge gash and red paint residue on the driver’s side door. The car to his left was a ruby- red Honda, red as George’s face. He picked up a large river rock and bashed the windshield. He slashed one tire, lit a cigar, smiled and drove to his office where his new law clerk greeted him. “Good morning, Your Honor,” she said.