Page 11 of Conri

“You’re finally getting it.No one should be above me in attention getting.I’ve worked really hard on that, and when people get in my way like Margaret did, I just take care of it.But since you didn’t die when I wanted you to, you’re going to do what I say and make sure that everyone will feel sorry for me for having such a fucked up father.I might even have to tell them that you abused me when things wind down a bit after you’re dead.”She didn’t understand the look on his face, so she thought that he was still finally understanding what she wanted.“When do you think you can get started on Cass and her boyfriend?You’ll have to plan things perfectly so you don’t get caught before you take care of yourself and Mommy.Oh, and Howie.Don’t forget to take care that he’s dead as well.I’ve never forgiven him for telling me that Margaret’s death wasn’t all about me.Well, you’ve no idea how much I wanted to tell him that I’d done it.But I didn’t.Daddy—where are you going?You’ve never answered me about when you were going to start on Cass being dead.”

“I don’t know you anymore.You’ve killed our daughter-in-law and our grandson.”Daddy backed away from her more.She didn’t understand why he was upset.“You’re not right in the head, Cynthia.There is something so…so…I don’t know what to call it, but that you’re a murderer.”

“Well, duh.I’ve done it before.And think about it, Daddy, we’ll be the same, you and I.I can’t believe that you and I will be the same thing.Murderers.I already know how you’re going to go down.They’ll blame it on your tumor.They’ll tell me how sorry they are that you did this to my entire family.Don’t you see?It’s going to be the best gift you’ve ever given me.I love you, Daddy.”He jerked back when she reached for him.She didn’t know what was wrong with him all of the sudden, but she was going to make sure that he understood this was for him, too.“You won’t have to be killed by me if you do this right, Daddy.Like I said, they’ll blame it on your tumor, and that will be what people talk about to me.How the thing in your head made you a monster.But we don’t want too much of the attention on you.That will just make me mad, and no one wants me to be mad at them.Just do what I tell you, and you’ll make me—”

“I’m not killing anyone.I don’t know where you—I don’t understand you at all.I mean, I knew that you liked to be the center of attention.That’s why I had Cassidy move out, so that—you’re not right in the head.”He seemed to come to some kind of resolution then, and she knew he had thought it through and was going to give it all to her.“No, I’m not going to kill my children or my wife.I don’t know where you got the thought that I’d do something like that.No.Just no.”

He left her there.No matter how much she yelled for him to come back, he wouldn’t do it.She told herself that he needed to think about it for a little while before he committed himself to giving her the best gift of all.She forgot to ask him about insurance money.She was going to need some cash before too much longer.Yes, he’d do it because he liked giving her things that she wanted.And this would be the best of all presents.

She must have dozed off or something because when she woke, she was alone in the room.Remembering her Daddy and what he was going to do for her made her giddy with excitement.There might even be something on the news about it.When the nurse came into her room, she asked for a newspaper or a television.How else would she know that he’d started already but by seeing it or reading about it?After another shot in her arm, she really was going to have to do something about that.She started to doze off again.

Daddy was going to do it.He was going to make this happen for her.She just knew it.Thenshe’d be so happy.Making sure she looked her best, she didn’t want the police, when they came to tell her about the murders, to be appalled at her appearance.She let the drugs take her under.

Waking up again, making sure that she was alone in the room again, she smiled when she thought of her Daddy making things happen for her.He should just want to do things for her as she’d been his beautiful daughter.She didn’t count Cass, hoping by now that she was dead.

Trying to move around on the cot, she realized she was still chained up.It was frustrating for her that she had to continue on this ruse to make people here think that she was insane.She wasn’t and realized that she should have had her Daddy make sure to tell them that she was as sane as anybody else.She would get out when the time was right, she supposed.But the waiting was going to be hard on her.Cynthia liked to have her plans all laid out in a neat row before she could start on them, like the thing with her Daddy.He’d do it even if it was only for her.She was and had always been a daddy’s little girl, and now was no different.Her door opened, and she saw it was one of the male attendants.

“It’s time to eat your supper, Ms.Warmer.”She held up her hands for him to remove the cuffs.Her legs would have to be loosened, too, because she had to pee.“No, I’m going to feed you today.You have to go to the bathroom?If so, I need to get a bedpan for you.”

“I’m not pissing in the bed.Let me up so that I can do it by myself.”He told her she wasn’t going to be released, if ever.“What’s that supposed to mean?I have to be released.I’m as sane as you are.”He laughed.

“You’re going to be locked down for the rest of your life after the stunt you tried to pull.By the way, I’m to tell you that none of your family will ever come to visit you.Your father told the head administrator what you told him to do.He said he’s not going to do it, but he wanted to give us a heads up about you never leaving here.I think that’s a safe bet now.”She told him that was told in confidence.“You’re being recorded twenty-four/seven now.Everyone is.I guess it sucks to be you.”

When he started shoveling in her food, she didn’t get to say anything else.She wanted to spit it in his face, but she’d learned not to do that the last time she was here.They held her food, and being on the restrictions like she was, he might not come to her when she needed to pee, like she did now.

It was humiliating to have someone lift you up so that you could get on a bedpan.He was making sure that she didn’t get her gown wet, so he had it pulled up to her breasts.And since she was chained up, he had to wipe her, too.She’d never felt so embarrassed in her life as she was at this moment.When he finished, he actually praised her for having so much urine.Christ, she was going to kill this mother fucker as soon as she was released.There was no point in her being chained up like an animal.She was a grown assed woman.

When he finally left her, a nurse came into her room telling her it was time for her medications.This time, she was able to ask why they were keeping her drugged up when she was so obviously fine.She told her that she was to take her medications every six hours until she heard differently from the doctor.

“But I’d not count on him changing things up for you.Your father said you wanted him to kill your family so that you can be the center of attention.”Cynthia said that was made in private.“There isn’t anything you do or say that is private anymore.You’re being recorded, voice too, all the time.But especially when you have visitors.But you’re not likely to get any more of those now, are you?Your father said that none of them were coming here ever again.We’ve been told about your plot to have him kill off your brother and sister.Even your mom.He won’t do it.Just so you know.He’s a nice man and wouldn’t do that kind of thing ever.”

Surely, her daddy would do it.He agreed that he would.Well, maybe he didn’t agree, but he didn’t tell her that he’d not do it.But the more she thought about it, she came to the realization that he had told her that he’d never do it.Did that mean that he didn’t love her anymore?She for sure knew that it meant that Cass would still be around.And getting all the attention that she could get for herself.Damn it all to fuck and back.Why were they all treating her this way?

~*~

Conri put the phone back on the cradle.He looked at Cass and decided that he wasn’t going to keepanything from her.Starting right now with telling her about the things that happened with her dad today.The man was distraught and angry.And he didn’t know that he’d be feeling the same way if it had happened to him.

“Before you tell me, I want you to know that I’m not as fragile as I looked.I mean, I might be small—though I think everyone is small compared to you—but I might be small, but I’ve been dealing with Cynthia all my life.So that being said, what did she do to my dad?”He told her everything.Including the part where he was to kill them both so that she’d be the center of attention.“Okay, that’s a bit more than I think…did she really ask my dad to kill us?”

“Yes.And I forgot to mention that she’s claiming that she killed Margaret and her unborn son, too.I think that has your dad the most upset.That she’d killed an innocent child.”The tears were streaming down her face, and he so wanted her to not be upset about her sister anymore.“I’m sorry, love.I truly am.I can’t believe that she was ever released in the first place.”

“Something about her being a model patient.I think she was planning on getting out so that she could harm me.She’s not liked me since I got boobs.”The burst of laughter had her glaring at him.Then she laughed, too.“I’m sorry.I could have said that differently, but that’s when it all started with her not liking me.She used to hurt me, too.Then, when Dad came to me about moving in with my Grandma, I leapt at the chance.So when I turned seventeen, and grandma died, I just stayed in her house with plans of staying there until I got out of college.”

“What sort of things did she do to hurt you?I mean, you were just a kid when she got out the first time, weren’t you?”She told him that she was just shy of being sixteen.“Not a child at all.I’m sure it must have been hard on you.”

“She cut my hair once.If I’d not been paying attention to things going on around me, I might well have been bald.I was taking driving lessons, and she cut the lines to the brakes.That was scary and would have been dangerous, but the driving instructor was driving at that time.She confessed to that by being pissed off because I wasn’t killed.She tried to set fire to me once.The things she did to me never hurt me all that much because I’d learned to be on alert around her.I was never relaxed when she was pretending to be nice, either.She couldn’t fool me.”He told her he was sorry.“So am I.We could have been such great friends, I think.Maybe not.It’s hard to tell with her.Mom would come and see me at Grandma’s just to get away from her.She was constantly wanting her to take Cynthia out to lunch at the county club in Newark.She didn’t even have a membership there.The funny part is, she just wanted mom to crash the place so that it would be all over the news at how this deranged mother wanted her daughter to be seen by country club people.”

“And now she’s been put away indefinitely.Your dad is to be notified if they think about releasing her.I would imagine that it would take a lot for her to be getting out now.What with the things that she did to the house and wanting to kill your family.”Cass told him that she’d killed before, and they let her out.“I guess that’s true.I never heard of her until now.I mean, wouldn’t it have been in the newspaper?”

“That was Dad.He didn’t want to hurt my brother’s chances at becoming Mayor.Howie would have been good as Mayor of his town, but after Margaret was killed, he just never recovered.I don’t know what it’s going to do to him when he finds out that she killed his wife and child.Margaret was almost eight months pregnant at the time.

He held her in his arms when she began crying again.It was all he could do not to shift and go find the other woman.She’d done so much to her own family that he found it hard to believe that she was part of the Warmer family.There was no doubt that she had a few screws loose, but he’d not say that to Cass.She was hurting badly enough.

Opening his eyes, not sure when he’d fallen asleep, Cass was still in his arms, but his brother Yanick was in the room.Asking him through their link how long he’d been there, he said it had only been a couple of minutes.Then he asked him what he could do for him.

“I have three of those projects that you asked me to look into.One of them is going to be a bust.There aren’t any volunteers who work at the hospital that are under the age of seventy.While they more than likely could dothe job, I don’t know that many of them would want to go around delivering meals to people, too.Who suggested that?”

“The hospital administrator.He said it would cut down on the need for trained task assistants who get paid to do that.”Yanick said it figured.“I didn’t think it would work either.There isn’t a lot of the volunteers there in the first place, and like you said, they’re not young people who have the energy to do that sort of thing.What about the other two jobs?”

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