Page 25 of Ignite

Henry smiled at his wayward thoughts. If only they knew.

He pushed his thick glasses up on his nose as he walked to his car. The day shift was on their way out, and the night shift was entering. Henry frowned as he spotted the woman who took his place at the shared office space. When he returned to work tomorrow morning, there would be candy wrappers, a dirty coffee cup, and skewed paper stacks at his meticulously kept desk. He’d complained about the mess before, but the woman never paid attention. Henry swore she left the desk in shambles now just to irritate him further.

He drove to his condo, careful to obey all the traffic laws. A few horns blared at him when he paused too long at stop signs, but he never exceeded the 20-kph limit for his neighborhood.

“Rules are rules,” he muttered as he pulled loose the bow tie at his throat. He swept a hand over his thinning sand-colored hair and resisted the urge to give the driver behind him the finger. A friend of his had done that and earned a road-rage beating. Henry was not a big man, barely topping sixty-three kilograms. Any fight he ever engaged in would see him on the losing side.

He pulled into the lot and parked with precision in his spot, backing up twice until the car was perfectly centered and straight. He’d moved to this condo high-rise specifically for the clean lawns and weed-free mulch. Ottawa was an expensive place to live, but he could afford the luxury. His unit was on the top floor and overlooked a large pond. The only eyesore was the shipping yard on the other side, but he really shouldn’t complain about that. After all, they were his employers.

As he reached his front door, the woman who lived in the condo across from him came out with her yappy little Pomeranian on a leash. Henry’s nose wrinkled at her disheveled appearance and the amount of dog hair on her clothes. The animal growled and barked at him, and he backed away from the dirty creature.

“I’m sorry,” the woman muttered and picked up the snapping dog. “He’s just being protective.”

Henry’s lip curled. “You should always keep him leashed and muzzled. If he bites anyone, you’ll have to move. Rules are rules after all, eh?”

She gave him a nasty look and walked to the elevator.

Henry ignored them as he entered his home, traded his shoes for slippers, and placed the black loafers in a cupboard beside the door. The walls were light gray and uniform throughout the place with a darker gray carpet to blend. His furniture was black-and-white, including his bedroom. No pictures hung on the walls, no knickknacks or decorations anywhere, and nothing sat on the gray granite kitchen countertops. The coffee maker and every other small appliance were stored away in the cabinets to keep all surfaces clutter free. Henry liked his place to be squeaky clean. He hated cooking because of potential splatters on the sparkling stovetop and relied heavily on prepackaged meals he could heat and throw the wrappers away after.

He pulled an instant dinner from the stack of boxes in his freezer and put it in the microwave, exactly in the center of the spinning plate. Seven minutes later, he took the hot meal out and placed it on a tray along with cutlery and a folded napkin. He had no dining room table and didn’t entertain in his home. Guests were messy, and he didn’t want that in his living space.

Instead, the dining area held his home computer setup. Multiple screens surrounded him on either side of the bay window, with several towers and other components that were kept neatly stacked in their places. He opened the curtains to let the light in but kept the window closed to keep any bugs out. A small table sat next to him, which he placed his food tray on before powering up his elaborate electronics.

As the machines whirred to life, he raised his eyes to the window and spotted his neighbor walking around the pond with her annoying dog. Again, his lip curled at the prancing mutt. He hoped she was smart enough to pick up any shit it left on the ground. The smell was revolting, and he could almost sense the odor from where he sat. Disgusting.

He turned to his food and cut it into uniform pieces, chewing each mouthful ten times before swallowing. In five minutes or less, he was done eating and tossed the paper container into the lidded trash can next to his massive desk.

He had just opened his browser when a dizzy spell hit him. He was surprised to find himself sweating and gasping for air. The pungent odor was real and not the imagined dog shit from his neighbor. He wondered if she’d brought him a canine present and left it outside his door, and that was where the nasty smell came from. He got up and discovered his legs didn’t work right. His head bounced off the floor as he met the carpet with a thud. The muscles in his legs spasmed, and he gasped again, this time heaving as his lungs rebelled. Everything he’d just put in his stomach came back up to coat the carpet in vomit. He wiped a hand over his mouth and it came away bloody, leaving a big red smear on the light gray.

I’m coughing blood?His heart pounded as if it was ready to burst through his chest.

His last thought was how that would leave a stain.

* * *

One floor up,the maintenance man was finishing a job in that condo unit. The woman who owned it was an artist, and she kept her windows open all the time because of the strong paint fumes. The carpets were toast, but it was her plumbing that was the problem. The paint and other stuff she put down the drains caused the pipes to rot out and be a problem. He’d replaced a number of them, some with ABS, others with copper.

The woman watched him with barely concealed impatience. “Are you almost done? I don’t want to lose more of the light than I have to, eh?”

The man scratched a heavy gray-bearded jowl and hiked up his work pants. “I’ll be done soon.”

He grunted as he pushed his bulk under the kitchen sink to test the connections. “I’ll check the bathroom one more time, and then I should be done, eh?”

The artist sighed dramatically. “You’ve been here for hours already.”

“’Tis a big job, miss.”

She huffed again and crossed her arms. “I hate this. I have all this creative energy flowing, and I can’t get to my stuff with all those tanks over there.” She gestured to the row of cylinders of different gases to help him with the soldering. They were lined up in the main room near the open window like soldiers ready for battle.

“Just leave them alone, and I’ll take care of them soon.”

Another huff came from her painted mouth, and she started tapping her bare toes on the carpet with impatience. The sound was muffled, but it irritated the maintenance man anyway. He took his time, checking the seals, testing the pressure, and cleaning up the newly soldered joints of the pipes. Finally he was finished.

“Okay, ma’am, you can have your space back.”

She sneered a little. The man’s overgrown facial hair needed some serious trimming. “Whatever. I’m getting my stuff from the other room.”

The maintenance man put away his tools in their precise places, then turned to deal with the four gas tanks. He glanced over his shoulder toward the room the artist disappeared into and sent up a prayer that she would stay away from him for the next few minutes. He checked the regulators to see that all four tanks were empty before shutting off the valves. Then he pulled up the carpet right at the edge and revealed four holes drilled into the ceiling leading to the apartment below. Four small hoses connected to the tanks and concentrated the nitrogen dioxide that flowed into the space underneath, making the air toxic to breathe. He might have overdone it a little, but the gas would dissipate now, rendering it undetectable, and the cause of death undetermined.

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