Phil worked for Lynth as her Promotions Coordinator. Anne was a former consultant for Lynth, in the past 24 months a victim to vague assurances. She had moved on from Lynth years ago for money, and the time had not done her justice but for the make and model of the wheelchair she sat in, a beautiful black jalopy. Her face was otherwise pallid, slagging down along her jaw, tired full oval, worn out from loneliness and sexually abusive or otherwise questionable lovers. Never had a good orgasm off any of the puny bastards, she thought, no not her. She was bitter, wounded, too short and smoked too much, complicating the problems aging would already indict by degree on her birth disability.

But tonight, if one looked carefully at her flaming mane of brunette grey hair, waving down her back in a waterfall, held in a pretty velvet hair band, face powered and eyes touched with just the right shade of silver green, the suggestion of her former evocative attractiveness was hinted at: When she was 24 she would fuck hard and fast. Now she was 40. Lynth had a year on her, and of the two women, in far better shape: pale blue eyes in a heart shaped face. She stood, crutches cuffed to her arm, above the wrist, below the elbow, her skin a delicate pale to blush, mouth wide, lips thin, not an ounce of fat on her. Same disability as Anne, but Lynth walked with it, taller, stronger, except in the arms. Their arm strength almost matched, as it had to in women of almost independent and equal will. Almost.

I have done nothing wrong, Lynth insisted to outer space. I have done nothing wrong to you. I wanted you to do well on the interview, but because Anne felt wronged and betrayed, Lynth wrote Anne off. Had to. Didn't need it, the pain, the wounds, the outcry.

"I sometimes wish I had been kinder to you," Lynth had said, after the funeral. "I have always recognized the bond between us." They had gone to the funeral of a friend and Anne stitched these words to her heart, held them fast, until the outrage, the outrage she couldn't get beyond.

"Fuck that," Anne growled. "Fuck that you lying bitch you sold me out for a power play with Carrot Top and the old witch you never told me about." Anne was ready for death; Lynth bit her lip, defiant. Both held, Lynth bowing a little, as if to flinch, face flushed red -- her husband was a hallway down. Anne didn't care. It was her heart bleeding, hers, her loyalty and sunlit dreams bruised off the blossom of a fidelity Lynth had instilled within her long ago, the one young woman loyal, absolute gratitude wedged, not even conscious of it until Judith had died, suddenly, unexpectedly, a loss between former colleagues of mutual admiration. Everyone had felt it, of course. When Judith's respiration ceased the loss was palpable within the community, an invisible lynchpin pulled to throw everything out of balance: rapport, affection. Admired colleagues-- until now, when the flip side of fondness bordered on hatred with the shiny gloss of sable fur.

Phil stood, fascinated by what he almost didn't want to see, didn't want to know in fact, a gentle lanky Frankenstein, with slight purple blotches on the back of his hands, blood missing his kidneys not there since his twenties. Anne irritated him. She was naive, he thought, and had to wear it on her breast like a badge, as if no one had ever wronged anyone but her.

It was all the more so then that no one noticed the black man who had entered from the left, running, sweating, desperate. His heart beat like a caged animal. He nearly tripped on Anne's back wheel and cuffed her face hard with the hand holding the gun, his right. Shiny, silver, big gun. She stifled an anguished scream, but he grabbed Lynth. Who knows why, she was standing maybe. Anne was sitting, strapped, in her beautiful machine. He grabbed Lynth, took her off balance, her crutches clattering to the floor. He held the gun to her temple while his left arm gripped her in a choke hold. Her eyes flashed fear. Muscles went spasmodic, jerking with panic. She was watching Anne's face, mouthing soundlessly "please please no".

"ALRIGHT," the man screamed. "Cops ain't gonna kill me and neither are you, ya hear? First, someone gonna give me a hat, and your gonna put all your money in it for me, and then, when the police pull up, I'm gonna get me a clean car, and me and this pretty woman here gonna take a ride. GOT THAT?" He pressed the gun, hand shaking some. Anne heard Lynth's husband scuffle in his chair; blind, people urged him still.

Phil looked at Anne's face, transfixed. Lynth looked at Anne's face, "no" she pleaded silently, "no Anne", and the man too looked at Anne's face, scared more, sweating. "What you staring at BITCH!" It panicked him. "Get me that hat!"

"Here here!" someone shouted, lifted a fedora.

"Clear a path to me and then toss it. Easy!" The man demanded. Anne had flushed a shade of crimson, bruise swelling on her cheek, eyes red and flaming like a devil's. She was frightening, and Phil was afraid, more afraid of Anne's look than of the man, her flushing outraged face, and it made no sense. "Let her go." Anne hissed, inhuman, spittle flecked from her lips. "Let her go."

"Shut up you dyke shit!"

Anne flared, inhuman, almost solar yet almost demon dark. She threw something black, metallic, square. Aimed at the man, it whistled, and puffed. Anne threw herself, belt off, inhuman, she threw herself, lunged, landed on her knees, lunged forward. She butted her head in the man's groin, tackled him with the brunt of her body and he lost his hold just enough so Lynth could jab her elbow into his body above Anne's head. The three of them fell together and the man screamed. Genuine anguish. Anne had locked her jaw into his balls, arms still clutching him about the waist, gun arm flailed. "Filthy bitches!" Screaming.

Lynth grabbed his arm right below the wrist, smashed his gun hand to the floor. He fired, wild, but the bullet went through plaster. Sirens. Three squad cars converged and the cops stormed in. Guns ready. They could all be dead, they really could. A few voices crying "Don't shoot! Don't shoot!" Phil heard his own. The man released his weapon, game up. He knew it.

Anne lifted her face, flushed, shaking, terrified rabbit. Lynth, over the man's chest, slowly lifting herself. Anne coughed, throat dry, retching. Cops lifted them, held the man down.

"Anne Anne you alright?"

Anne coughed, looking across at Lynth, searching, flushed. "I think so." Their eyes locked, held. "We always did make a good team." She smiled.

"Yes," Lynth said, "we did." She smiled back. They locked, like wolves.

Phil considered running for his life.

Posted May 2, 2004.

Joanne M. Marinelli received her B.A. in English Literature from Temple University. Her poetry has appeared in over 80 little magazines and her first chapbook, Like Fire, was published by Crawlspace Press. Her fiction has appeared in Onionhead Literary Quarterly. She writes for New Mobility magazine.

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