Open Windows

Photo by Ed Vázquez on Unsplash

This is my submission for the Soaring Twenties Social Club monthly symposium. This month’s topic is Windows.

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This is not a funny story. It contains explicit language. You've been warned.

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I hate windows.

Windows are like useless doors. You can close them but it doesn’t do much. Then you have to put blinds or curtains over them to block them. Why bother? Just put a door you can close. Better yet, board them up.

Apparently the eyes are the windows of the soul but I like to think of it the other way around: windows are the eyes of a house and not only do they stare at you but they also reveal the soul of the house and, by extension, the soul of the lives of the people inside.

The windows look at you. People look out their windows and look at you.

Unfortunately for me, my job involves looking in a lot of windows. Peeping in windows, if you prefer the vulgar expression.

I work as a private investigator. A private eye, like they’re called in the pulp novels.

And yeah, I do have a dingy little office so clients can walk in, if they want. And no, it doesn’t have any windows. I hate windows. I thought we’d been over that?

I got a call about a job one day. Lady wanted me to come up to her house to talk. More private that way.

Fine by me.

“Will I just be meeting with you?” I said. My voice trailed off, leaving the additional lingering question unsaid.

“Yes,” said the soft voice on the other end. “My husband is at work.”

So the job was probably about the husband.

“What time?”

“Are you able to come now?”

I checked my watch. It was just after nine in the morning.

“Sure. What’s the address?”

It was a place on Mulford Ave.

There were big houses on Mulford. A lot of my clients had money. Not that people under the upper class didn’t have problems that might be helped by hiring a PI but rather you need money to hire a PI and rich people like when you’re private and discreet and quiet and confidential. It helps the aldermen and the doctors and the bank VPs and the housewives on the PTA board solve their problems while keeping up appearances and status.

“No problem. I’ll be there in about ten minutes.”

I’d had clients living on Mulford before so I knew the way and knew just about how long it would take. Traffic in a big little city like Rochester, Illinois is very predictable and never that bad.

I locked up my office door, then through the little waiting room to the outside door which I also locked. There was a mail slot if anyone needed to drop notes or mail.

My office was in the back of an ancient row of brick buildings from the early days of Rochester. Probably a hundred years or more the building had been there. I never bothered to look for a year on the facade like you see on some buildings. It was two stories with somewhat nicer businesses on the front side and distasteful little half underground hideaways like mine in the back under the fire escape.

I wheeled my rapidly aging Ford Taurus out onto State Street and headed east.

No, I don’t have a cool car. Sorry to disappoint.

It was one of those warm February days where you can taste the end of winter and the new spring in the air but there’s still piles of dirty snow on the ground here and there.

The road started narrow in the older part of town with old trees and old houses in pretty good condition facing onto the narrow two-lane road then it widened out farther from downtown into four lanes then six with modern suburban junk sprawl on either side with the ubiquitous big box stores, home improvement warehouses, restaurants, and at one intersection two mattress stores of the same exact company facing each other on either side of State.

There had to be a story there, some kind of money laundering going on.

I got off State, drove for a bit, then turned right on Mulford.

Most of the plots on Mulford were unusual because the neighborhood was fairly close to downtown but the plots were huge, an acre or more and the houses were set far back from the road which was always busy.

Despite the traffic, the neighborhood was fashionable and homes did not come cheap.

I immediately recognized the one I was looking for. I’d seen it many times and, although I’d never had occasion to stop and check it out for any reason, it stood out from the rest of the houses on the street.

It was a geographic anachronism, if I can coin a phrase.

It was like someone had picked up a mansion from 1920s southern California and set it down in 2020s northern Illinois.

It was a Spanish style house set back from the road and up on a hill. It had a white stucco exterior, red terracotta roof tiles, large windows, and three sweeping arches at the front porch supported on columns. Two eight-tiered pillars that looked like Cubist pagodas flanked the driveway.

I parked in front of the garage and walked up to the front door which was dark ornately carved oak.

I knocked and after a polite pause the door opened.

“Mrs. Hammond?” I said, handing her my card.

She took the card and nodded. “Come in.”

The entryway was dark, not because of excessive drapery, but only because the sunny Spanish exterior did not translate to a sunny Spanish interior. The glimpses of adjoining rooms I got as she led me into the living room showed that the more traditional divided design of the home meant little light from the large windows made it very far.

She indicated a chair which I took and she sat across from me and I got a good look at her for the first time.

She was blonde and it looked natural. Probably around fifty, maybe pushing sixty, with fading movie star looks: thinning lips, a small nose, arching eyebrows, and two of the bluest eyes I had ever seen. Along with her looks went an air of exhaustion and desperation that deepened the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and blended with the stale air of the house.

The house was showing its age too. The paint was faded, the carpet worn, though not threadbare, the couches broken in. Everything looked like it hadn’t been updated in twenty years.

Not typically the case for a wealthy client. But then again, I didn’t know what her problem was or if she was even wealthy. Maybe that was her problem though the last time I checked I wasn’t a bank.

“What can I do for you, Mrs. Hammond?”

“Melanie is fine,” she said with a half smile.

“Alright, Melanie.”

“Well, I’ll get to the point, I guess. I think my husband is cheating on me.”

I shifted slightly. These kinds of cases are my bread and butter but I don’t like them. No one to really help, no one to save, no blackmailer to thwart (life isn’t a novel, after all) just snooping and spying and hurt feelings and divorce.

If she was particularly upset, I couldn’t tell.

“Why do you think he’s having an affair?”

“A wife knows these things, Mr. Corvin.”

I didn’t invite her to call me Shane.

“Indulge me, Mrs. Hammond.”

She tossed her head and sighed. “He comes home late. He showers constantly. He says he’s going out with his friends but I know he’s lying and I certainly can’t ask them since they would just cover for him. And,” she paused, “we haven’t been intimate in months.”

“His full name?”

“Rick Hammond.”

“What does your husband do?”

“He’s a VP at First American.”

I nodded. Big regional bank. They had a couple of floors in a big building downtown where my wife worked as a receptionist.

“What’s he look like?”

She gestured to a side table with framed photographs displayed.

Rick Hammond was a wiry, sly looking character with a prominent chin and an almost non-existent mouth who had married up. The three kids in the picture, which, judging from Mrs. Hammond’s appearance was probably ten years old, looked like a mix of their parents although the mother’s genes definitely dominated.

“My rate is two hundred dollars a day, plus expenses. For that I’ll follow him and get evidence of the affair, if any—”

“He’s cheating, I know it.”

“After that, if you want me for anything else, hearings, divorce court, testimony, that’ll cost extra.”

She shook her head. “No, proof will be enough. I’m hoping to keep this between us, as you might expect. Don’t need all the neighbors talking.”

“Of course.”

I suspected that she wouldn’t even know if the neighbors did talk. She didn’t seem like the type to cross the street for a chat.

She got up and returned a moment later with what looked like two hundred dollars in cash.

I folded the bills without counting them and shoved them in my jacket pocket.

“Any other places I should look for your husband?

“He likes the Riverside Tavern downtown. It’s close to his work.”

“What kind of car does he drive?”

“Black Porsche 911.”

“License plate?”

People don’t usually know their license plate numbers but I had a hunch.

“RICK 1,” she said, rolling her eyes.

“Got it. Is it your cell number that I have?”

She nodded.

“Alright. I’ll be in touch, Mrs. Hammond.”

“How long?” she said, putting a hand on my arm.

“Hopefully just a couple days. I’m good at my job and I keep a low profile. The only trouble will be getting proof. People don’t usually consecrate their affairs in the middle of the park.”

I regretted the comment but she just smirked and said, “You don’t know my Rick.”

The way she said ‘my’ made it sound like she was talking about a brain damaged dog rather than her husband.

Unsure of how to respond, I grunted and said, “I’ll find my way out,” which I did, passing the family photographs on the side table on the way out.

They had three kids from a cursory glance at the pictures and judging by the pictures and Mrs. Hammond’s age they were probably out of the house. There was no sign of activity in the house that suggested anyone else was there.

I left, closing the heavy oak door behind me.

Outside the sun was still shining and the air was still crisp. I watched the traffic passing below, feeling high and mighty from the top of the hill. I wondered if that’s how Rick felt every day leaving his house.

What I also felt at that moment was hungry and one of the new bills in my pocket would be well spent on an early lunch.

I figured I’d combine business and pleasure and drive downtown to the First American building and find a bite to eat at a place I knew before scoping out the lot to identify Rick’s car.

The traffic was picking up as I headed back downtown but I got there in about ten minutes and found a parking spot on the street across from the First American building.

It was a newer looking building, ten floors with a brick exterior and large windows.

I was parked conveniently right in front of one of my favorite delis where I often met my wife for lunch and I was soon inside working on a pastrami on rye, coleslaw, pickles, and a Coke.

I watched the building out the window. People came and went. Usual types. Lots of suits. Khakis and polos. Pant suits for the ladies. Nothing exciting. No, I don’t mean it like that.

It was just typical PI stuff. My job is sitting and watching. That’s it. I sit and I watch. I also follow sometimes.

I finished my lunch and went to the light to cross. Never look like you’re in a hurry as a PI. It just makes you stand out. Never run when you can walk.

I spotted the husband’s Porsche quickly. It was in the lot on the side of the building right up at the front in one of the spots reserved for VIPs.

Since just standing around and waiting was a bad idea I circled the block on foot. I noticed there was a back entrance but since I had no way to watch the entire building and I figured he’d take his car to go anywhere I got back in my car and settled in.

I watched the entrance all day but I didn’t see a squirrely sly Rick Hammond leave all afternoon, though I did see my wife leave close to five o’clock. I watched her walk to the parking lot and get in her newer Accord.

I could only guess where he went because his car, which I could just see from the street, was still there in the lot. More than likely he walked over to the Riverside Tavern and I must have missed him out the back.

I needed to get a jump on this case so I couldn’t just let it slide for the day. If he was going to go sleep around, he was going to do it at night. Most people don’t have affairs in the middle of the work day.

As the shadows started to disappear into the darkness I called my wife to tell her I’d be home late.

“Hello?”

“It’s me. I’ll be back late. I gotta stick to this guy I’m following.”

“How late?”

“I don’t know. Probably nine or ten at least.”

“Alright, good luck. There’s food in the fridge. Leftovers. ”

She sounded tired.

“Thanks. See you later. Love you.”

“Love you too. Bye.”

I looked back over to the building, wondering how I’d see him in the dark whenever he came to get his car.

I didn’t have to wait long.

I was on the right side of the street, the First American building on my left , and in my mirror I saw a guy in a suit come ambling down the street, cross at the light, and go into the First American parking lot.

I knew it was Rick for sure when he started up the 911 and pulled out onto the street. I let him go past, waited a breath, then started the car and followed.

I blended in with traffic and tailed him through downtown Rochester.

I wasn’t too concerned about him picking up on me. Only in the movies do people pick up on their tails and I guessed he wasn’t paranoid enough or observant enough to pick up on the fact that I was tailing him.

We went out to State then turned left onto Prospect, heading north in the direction of Mulford Ave. and his house, which I hadn’t expected. Mrs. Hammond had made it sound like he almost never went home.

But then he turned right onto a residential street, Benton, that, according to my mental map, I knew ran east-west, that is, parallel to Mulford and went into a middle-class neighborhood that I knew well.

After a little while on Benton, a wide tree-lined street, he turned left onto Regan.

And pulled over two houses short of my house.

I kept going since I couldn’t very well stop in the middle of the street but as I turned at the next street I saw Rick Hammond walking up to my house.

I don’t know what I had been expecting, but it wasn’t that.

It was like I had been in a dream tailing some guy like every other job and it didn’t really hit me where we even were until I drove past my own house.

I gripped the steering wheel hard then let go so that I wouldn’t crash into a car that had stopped at the next intersection.

I went around the block thinking that there was surely a reasonable not at all lascivious explanation.

They worked in the same building. Maybe she had forgotten her phone at the front desk and he was bringing it to her. Except that I had talked to her on the phone and she was already home.

I turned back onto Regan St. and parked even farther back away from my house.

I locked the car and started walking.

My hands were clenched into fists and shaking. My shoulders were hunched. My chest was tight. The cold air that had felt so good now made me shiver.

The driveway went up the side of the house to the detached garage in the back. I walked up the driveway not even sure what I was going to do, not wanting to look in but knowing I was going to.

The living room windows looked out onto the driveway and I thought I saw movement heading through the doorway in the direction of the back of the house, where our bedroom was.

I went around to the back of the house trying not to make noise but also sure that they wouldn’t even hear or care.

I’m six-three on a bad day so I had no trouble looking in through the window that was only partially obscured by the curtains.

People don’t close curtains when they’re sure they won’t be disturbed.

There in the window was Rick Hammond undressing my wife. In my bed.

I forgot everything in that moment.

Suddenly still, I went back around to the front, up to the little porch where we took a picture together when we bought the house, and inside.

The first indication that they had that all was not well was probably the crash when I ripped off the wobbly leg from the piano bench and the bench tipped over on one corner.

A shriek. Muffled, whispered voices.

I shoved the bedroom door open so hard the doorknob stuck in the drywall.

My wife sat on the bed, half undressed and petrified, her eyes wide and brown curls disheveled.

“Where is he?”

“Where’s who?”

“I’m not stupid. I saw you two through the window. The curtain’s closed now. Did he jump out the window?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You and Rick Hammond.”

The name was like a slap.

“Yeah, I know who he is,” I said. “You screw that guy? That squirrely asshole? What did I do to you? What did I not give you?”

“If you have to ask—”

I didn’t let her finish. I took the leg from the bench that was still in my hand and smashed the framed pictures on the dresser, leaving our wedding portrait for last.

My rage dissipated and I was left feeling absolutely nothing.

“Shane—”

I walked out, not waiting for whatever lame excuse she was going to give.

Outside, Hammond’s car was gone.

I didn’t know what else to do so I got in my car and started driving.

The more I thought about it, I knew that she knew. That Hammond bitch knew. I don’t know how but she knew.

My hands were shaking again so I pulled over rather than crash.

I dialed her number.

“Hello?”

“You knew didn’t you?”

“Knew what?”

Soft. Sensuous. Cunning.

“You knew that your husband was screwing my wife.”

“How could I possibly—”

“What was the plan? That I’d find them together and kill your husband?”

Silence.

“You never wanted proof. You wanted me to kill him. You thought a big ugly PI just might get angry enough to do it. Well guess what? He got away. Crawled out the window like the rat he is. I’m not doing your dirty work for you. You married him. Kill him yourself, you fucking cunt.”

“I’m recording this. I’ll go to the police.”

“And tell them what? I did the job you hired me to do. Get bent, lady.”

An idea popped into my head.

“You know, I saw your family portrait at your house today and it occurred to me that your kids bear a strong resemblance to you but not to their father. I wonder why that is? Are you projecting a bit, maybe? Punishing your husband for exactly what you did all those years ago? He was good enough to marry but not good enough to give you children? You wanted to control him, have his money, but not his kids and he certainly couldn’t go out and sleep with anyone who wasn’t you. You’re a real piece of work. You’re welcome to each other. I suppose in the interest of full disclosure I’ll just have to let slip to your husband that you hired me to tail him.”

Silence, but she didn’t hang up.

“You’re pathetic. Why are you still listening to me?” I laughed. “You really are pathetic. Goodbye, Mrs. Hammond. Thanks for ruining my life.”

I hung up the phone and pulled back onto the road, not sure of where I was going.

So, yeah. I hate windows.

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Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction, strictly a product of the author’s imagination. Any perceived resemblance or similarity to any other fictional works, to actual events or persons, living or dead, and any perceived slights of people, places, or organizations are products
of the reader’s imagination. This fiction is the result of a partnership between a human writer and the character(s) he accessed with his creative subconscious as he raced through the story with them. No generative AI was used in any way to write this story.