3. Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Clara

H atred painted my vision red.

I wanted nothing more than to wrap my hands around this bastard’s fat neck and squeeze until the light left his eyes.

Too bad Hogan Humpries was still built like a linebacker even though his high school football days were long gone. And his diet that consisted of 60% honied ham really had a way of packing on the extra pounds.

Meanwhile I was 5’2, and he could snap me in half. When we’d first started dating in our junior year of school, the size difference had made me giddy. Now it just made me sick, knowing I’d never be able to fight him off.

He’d never done more than hit me a few times, but there was a look in his eyes I’d never seen before. Hogan looked at me like I was nothing but a bug, and he wanted nothing more than to crush me beneath his boot.

Which was insane, considering I’d never cast more than a few lingering looks in Bastion’s direction. This didn’t have anything to do with jealousy though. This was about Hogan doing anything within his power to feel bigger than the insignificant, chicken-shit man that he was.

“I’m not going to just get over my mother’s death, you fucking asshole.”

I wasn’t exactly a stranger to tense domestic situations. Cussing out the man that just threatened to kill you wasn’t exactly a wise move, yet I couldn’t seem to make myself care. The typical surge of fear wasn’t hitting like it usually did. It was like something inside me had finally snapped.

The only thing pumping through my veins now was visceral rage, wound tight with adrenaline. Then cold hard reality slammed into me. This wasn’t the man I’d fallen for in high school. He’d turned into a violent drunk, and he wasn’t coming back from that. If I didn’t get away from this man, one day, he’d kill me. And if I left him, he’d kill me.

What else was there to do?

Clara saves herself.

Hogan struck me, his hand smacking my cheek so hard I saw stars, and my eyes swam with tears. I didn’t allow them to fall as I composed myself. I refused to let him see me cry.

Instead, I forced another of my signature smiles. “I’m sorry. Please. Just let me make you dinner, baby. I’ll make your favorite.”

Hogan glared at me for several barbed seconds before turning to retreat back into the living room. “Fine. Bring me a drink while you’re at it. Some of that boozy eggnog I like.”

“Sure babe.”

I stood frozen in the middle of the kitchen until I heard the spring of Hogan settling back into his La-Z-Boy and sounds of the football game filled the living room. I opened a drawer, pulled out my apron—with the words “Christmas calories don’t count” and a picture of a gingerbread man biting the head off another gingerbread man on it—and tied it around my waist.

Placing my phone on the counter, I flicked on some cheery Christmas music to drown out all the horrifying thoughts bouncing around in my brain. I smiled when “Carol of the Bells”, my mom’s favorite, came on.

“Turn that shit down!” Hogan roared from the living room. “We listen to that fucking trash all god damn day.”

I turned the volume down with a poisonous smile, the movement making my cheek sting.

Heading into the attached garage through the door attached to our kitchen, I went to the chest freezer shoved against the far wall in search of Hogan’s favorite: ham steak.

When I pulled out the ham wrapped in white butcher paper and shut the lid, the utility shelf behind the freezer caught my eye. Dozens of plastic bottles—all various auto fluids and cleaning supplies—sat there, but a bright red bottle in particular struck a chord with me.

Antifreeze.

I stared at the bottle for what felt like forever as “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” played from my phone in the kitchen.

Clara saves herself.

The words from Bastion’s note played in my head on a loop.

“Clara saves herself,” I whispered beneath my breath as I reached for the antifreeze, tucking it in my apron pocket and retreating back to the kitchen with the ham I didn’t intend to serve.

For the first time in a long time, I enjoyed making Hogan dinner. I knew by the time the night was over, he’d be dead. And I’d be free.

I unwrapped the ham steak in the sink and stood over it for a moment. It was like I’d finally unlocked the box at the back of my brain where I’d carefully tucked all my trauma away for the past two years and allowed it to spread through me like poison.

My hand slipped in my apron pocket, fingers teasing the lid of the antifreeze.

Dark images played in my head as I imagined Hogan’s dead body slumped over in his La-Z-Boy… A cold smile curved my mouth.

If I went through with the dark thoughts whirling in my head, Hogan wouldn’t have a chance to enjoy his ham. And after this nightmare was over—if I could escape it—I’d never eat ham again, even if there was a gun to my head.

“Where’s my fucking eggnog?” Hogan’s drunken roar pierced my murderous thoughts wrapped in cheery Christmas music.

The smile crystallized on my lips.

Whatever hesitation I had before was gone.

Tonight I was going to kill the monster. Fuck Hogan. Fuck the consequences.

Even if I got caught, freeing myself of Hogan would be the best Christmas present ever.

“I’m making it now, babe! Just had to put the ham in the sink to defrost.” I went to the fridge, pulled out the bottle of boozy eggnog to find it mostly empty. Of course. Hogan downed this shit like water. I went to the pantry and pulled out a fresh bottle among the stock I’d learned—the hard way—to always keep on hand.

I made him drinks every night and just like every other night, I grabbed a glass, poured the eggnog, added an extra two shots of brandy, a sprinkle of cinnamon and an ice cube shaped like a candy cane.

The only thing new was the half cup of antifreeze I added to the glass. Hopefully it would be enough to kill him. I’d watched enough TV and read enough dark books to know antifreeze didn’t have much of a taste and it didn’t take much to kill a man. Making it the perfect poison.

The only thing was that it gave the drink a faint green hue. Hogan was probably too drunk to notice.

I walked into the living room, approaching my fiancé from where he sat in his chair beside the Christmas tree with that bright smile like I always did; playing into the role of the good, obedient spouse he wanted me to play. Meanwhile, I imagined how he’d looked minutes from now, slumped over his chair, the light gone from his eyes.

My smile grew as I offered him the glass. “Here you go, babe. Made with love.”

The hog farmer eyed the liquid inside, his ruddy nose wrinkling. “Why’s it green?”

Fuck.

“Uh… I added some food coloring. Thought I’d make it more festive since Christmas is right around the corner.”

I forced my hands steady, refusing to let my nerves give me away. A single bead of sweat slipped down my brow, but my smile stayed on as “Last Christmas” carried from the kitchen, filling the tense silence.

Relief swept through me as he finally took the offered drink with a grunt.

I stood there, watching him take a drink with my breath latched in my throat. An eternity passed while I waited for his reaction. Would he notice something was off? If he so much as suspected that I’d tampered with his drink, he’d be the one killing me.

“Why are you standing around staring at me? You’re like that fucking Bastion,” he snarled after downing half the poison, cinnamon clinging to his upper lip. “Always staring like a fucking creep. Get the fuck back to the kitchen and make that ham, Clara.”

“Sure, babe. Coming right up.”

I practically skipped back to the kitchen. He hadn’t detected anything was wrong. Now to wait.

In an attempt to calm myself, I sat at the breakfast table and flipped through old pictures from past Christmases, back when my mom was alive. Before Hogan had turned into a completely different person.

An older picture buried deep in my camera roll caught my attention and I paused to admire it for the first time in what had to be years. I was sitting in my mom’s lap beside the tree, giggling as I held up Barbie and the Nutcracker on VHS. I was seven at the time, and my only problem in the world was that I couldn’t marry the Nutcracker from the movie. That was back when we still lived at the cabin my parents owned in the mountains.

I’d begged my dad not to sell it after mom passed. It was old, and the one road leading to it through the pass often got snowed in, so dad had put it in my name. I’d kept it a secret from Hogan, who thought that my dad had gone through with putting it on the market.

I still hadn’t brought myself to go up there yet. Not when there were so many memories there. So many good Christmases. I still wasn’t ready to deal with just how cold and empty it was now.

An angry, pain-laced scream followed by the crash of furniture had me leaping out of my chair, doing a sweep of the counter to make triple-sure that I’d hidden the bottle of antifreeze. On the next breath, Hogan stumbled into the kitchen.

“What did you do?”

If I hadn’t just spiked his eggnog with a cup of antifreeze, I would have figured he was drunk. All the signs were the same. He was swaying, like he could barely hold himself up. His face was bright red, his eyes blood-shot and filled with violence. His breathing was labored, and the veins in his brow looked fit to explode. Any moment he’d pass out. Only this time, he wouldn’t wake up.

It would be so easy to blame his death on alcohol poisoning. It wasn’t exactly a secret that Hogan loved his booze. No one would question it. They especially wouldn’t question his sweet, obedient fiancée and high school sweetheart.

I turned the faucet on, pretending to brush the frost off the ham like the good little wifey I could have been—If he hadn’t turned into the monster he was today.

“I—I don’t know what you’re talking about, babe,” I smiled sweetly before humming along to the Christmas music. “Are you alright? Having heartburn again?”

“This isn’t heartburn, you stupid bitch.” He was frothing at the mouth now.

Fear started to set in as I questioned the dosage of poison I’d given him. A cup should have been plenty.

“Babe, w—why don’t you go lay down? You’ll feel better in the morning.”

He stumbled toward me, arms outstretched, a black sort of hatred in his eyes that told me if I let him get his hands around my throat, he wouldn’t let go until I was dead.

“What did you put in my drink?”

My feet shuffled backwards. “N—nothing! Just some food coloring, everything else is your usual drink—”

“Stop lying you fucking cunt! You put something in it!”