Knock, Knock: Episode 20; Curtain Call
“You’re the last Crusow,” Dennis reminded me. “Your grandfather started all of this and it can end with you.”
“Leaving isn’t an option,” I replied. “I have tried that. They always seem to just find me.”
Dennis seemed to sober up in an instant. His shoulders began to tremble.
“I was thinking of something a little more permanent.”
I assumed he was joking but when his expression didn’t change I told him, “I don’t think that is going to help anything.”
The truth was, I didn’t have much going for me. I had lost everything but still a part of me was attached to breathing.
“Besides,” I went on, “the club succeeded well before without me and I haven’t had much to do with it’s success since. What makes you think my death would make any difference?”
“Without a Crusow around the club would implode. It was close to it before Tabitha found you. That was why she was so eager to bring you here. The fact that she fell in love with you and will be crushed is an added bonus.”
He gave way a wry smile but my enthusiasm was waning so he altered his approach.
“Think of the lives that will be saved by ending this thing.”
“That’s what Julianne overheard? They are afraid of losing me and if they did it would ruin them?”
I thought it was a little selfish of me to live on when I knew I could end it all. Theresa didn’t have that option, neither did Maddy.
“Think of the lives that will be saved,” Dennis repeated. He knew he was getting through to me.
“Fine,” I agreed. “But there is something I have to do first.”
***
A few days passed. Dennis kept his distance from me. He was still grieving the loss of Milo so his morose demeanour drew no attention. When he had fully sobered up he probably assumed I had changed my mind. He didn’t speak to me. In fact, except in the cases of interaction with the club patrons, he barely spoke to anyone.
Tabitha had a keen sense of people. She knew something had transpired between us.
“He’s taking it hard,” she commented after she came off stage the second night.
I was a reporter and damn good at my job. I knew when someone was trying to open me up to sharing more information than I should. I turned the question back on her.
“Wouldn’t you?”
She studied me. Maybe she felt like she had met her match or maybe she just got bored. She swirled the neon pink straw around the glass of gin in her hand and placed the straw between her lips.
“He had a theory,” I told her.
She removed the straw and smiled. She was a pretty girl. She was vibrant and alluring. I felt I had more in common with her then than I ever did with my wife. We were connected on a deep, familial level.
“He reckons you love me. That is why I’m being kept here.”
Her smile didn’t fade but she ran her finger tip along her lip as though she was covering something. She allowed silence to fall between us.
“He said that, did he?” she enquired.
“Is it true?” I pressed.
“We are connected. We always will be.”
***
The following night I stayed in the club. I watched Tabitha’s performance. She sang with a sultry voice and danced with great energy. She lapped up her audiences admiration like a thirsty dog.
I caught Dennis’ eye once or twice. He remained beside the bar with the serving girl named Lisa Luren, supplying him with more drink and cigarettes. I thought at first he would approach me. It had been a few days since we discussed my taking my own life and ending Knock, Knock. What he didn’t know was that I had picked up the gun that he had had that night Milo met his untimely end. I kept it hidden in a wooden panel of my bed frame. I knew my room was searched whenever I wasn’t in it so when I had it on my person that night.
I thought I would have been nervous but to my surprise I was calm. Dennis was right. My death would send the club into turmoil. It would cause Tabitha to lose focus and control. I know Theresa’s mother would be certainly glad to learn I was gone.
Tabitha’s performance ended in a blaze of glory and applause as always. What little food that had been available to serve was used up. The patrons of the club filtered out. As I watched them leave I wondered which of them knew what happened when the Knock, Knock doors were closed. I wonder if they knew the true cost of the food and drink they plied themselves with. Those who didn’t would find out soon enough. Access to the club was by invitation only.
The two large heaps of muscle that guarded to door were the last to leave. Most of the girls stayed at the club and ventured off for their beauty sleep.
Tabitha closed the door and shut the world out.
“It’s been a long night,” she gasped, wiping her forehead with the back of her hand. She had bundled her thick, brunette hair on top of her head in a messy bun. She would have looked quite sweet if I wasn’t aware of how nasty she could be.
That was when I drew the gun. I pointed it at Tabitha first. Dennis stepped forward but said nothing. Tabitha gave him a quick glance before turning her gaze back on me.
“You’re going to kill me?” she asked.
I turned the gun and placed the barrel to my own head.
“No,” I replied. “I’m going to kill myself.”
She reached one of her hands out to me they way one would if a wild animal was bearing down on them.
“Don’t be so dramatic,” she spat.
Dennis still said nothing but his eyes had widened and his lips parted.
“Dramatic!” I cried. “You took everything from me! My friends, my family, my career.” I took a deep breath. “My wife is dead because of you.”
This time Tabitha put both hands up.
“I never harmed a hair on Theresa’s pretty little head,” she stated. She turned to Dennis. “If you would like to know what happened to her ask your friend here.”
I lowered the gun and awaited Dennis’ explanation. He shook his head.
“I didn’t …” he stammered. “They made me…”
It turns out my beloved wife had found comfort when I was not around in the tall, dark, stranger. She had grown to trust Dennis. She grew to love him even. He was the one who had slipped her the poison that took her life.
“I didn’t want to hurt her,” he said. “The things they would have done to her to get to you would have been much worse. I was protecting her.”
I felt a surreal wash of sentiments come over me. I was furious at this revelation. My temples throbbed but the rest of my body was numb with everything I had been through.
“You bastard!” I cried. “I thought you were trying to help me. You put me in this God damned place and had a go with my wife first!”
I waved the gun at him. I had only managed to find one bullet and I fully intended on using it on myself. Thinking of Theresa with Dennis in my own bed made me furious beyond description. They didn’t know that though. I had been so focused on Dennis I hadn’t noticed Tabitha loom closer to me. She put her hand on my upper arm that held the gun and slowly pushed it down.
“I’m here for you,” she said. “It’s just you and me. Together we can build something great. People are so consumed with their own selfish desires. The world is a cesspit. It is a pit Theresa and Madeline and all the other’s couldn’t survive in. Madeline tried to live in it but she didn’t have what it took.
Greed, anger, hunger and a ruthless fight to make it to the top of that pit is all that awaits you out there. We can change that. We can build the world around us the way we want it.”
She pushed the gun down further and pressed against me. Dennis watched on in stunned silence.
“Forget all of them. If there is something you want to change in the club we can change it. Dennis was right about something. When I brought you here I didn’t expect to grow to love you.”
With a sharp intake of breath she pressed her lips against mine. I pulled back.
“Love me?” I repeated. “You only love yourself.”
That was when it happened. The gun cracked. The shot fired. Tabitha fell backwards against the bar clutching her abdomen. Blood was streaming between her fingers. All colour had drained from her face. Her eyes were so wide I caught my reflection on the whites of them still holding the gun as she fell limp to the floor.
“Before you say anything,” Dennis warned. “With her gone we are both as good as dead.”
I was still determined to make my stage exit but it was going to be on my own terms.
***
So that’s what brings me here. The end of it all. I had it all in front of me once. I was climbing the ladder of my career as a journalist, I had a loving wife and although it was nothing special I had a roof over my head which was more than many people in the city could say. I had been fooling myself though. I was only in a job so someone, somewhere could keep a close eye on me. My pretty wife was having an affair with the man who eventually killed her. The roof over my head became the seediest, filthiest hole you could ever hope to find. To top it all off, my wife’s murderer was my only hope. He was the closest thing I had to a friend.
The moral of this story? I guess there is none. I got some of that poison Dennis could make. He assured me that it was as quick and painless a way to go as any. I hope so because all that was left of it was an empty glass. I’m sat now in my room at the top of the club waiting for it’s effects to kick in.
Dennis said he was going to do the same. I quite liked the idea of seeing the look on Theresa’s face when Dennis and I both turn up in the afterlife together to greet her. I was expecting too much though If I expected him to be a man of his word. I saw him heading down the alley arm in arm with the serving girl, Lisa Luren. It didn’t matter anyway. He wouldn’t get far.
I hope my story will be found and the Knock, Knock exposed for the horrors that lie behind it’s doors. It will be my greatest journalistic achievement.
With these final words I find myself becoming weak. If you receive an invitation to the Knock, Knock club, don’t accept.
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Want to follow the story from the beginning?
Knock, Knock (Episode 1): Welcome to the Club
Knock, Knock (episode 2): Don’t Come Knockin’
Knock, Knock (Episode 3): Sleep Tight Sam
Knock, Knock (Episode 4): Take A Bow
Knock, Knock (Episode 5): Big City Kid
Knock, Knock (Episode 6): Picking Up Strange Women
Knock, Knock (Episode 7): A Night Cap At The Club)
Knock, Knock (Episode 8): Just A Quick One
Knock, Knock (Episode 9) The Daddy Of Them All
Knock, Knock (Episode 10): Calling Last Orders
Knock, Knock (Episode 11): A Room with a View
Knock, Knock (Episode 12): It’s not Me it’s You
Knock, Knock (Episode 13): Rollin’ on into darkness
Knock, Knock (Episode 14): Kid’s These Days
Knock, Knock (Episode 15): Down in the Dumps
Knock, Knock: Episode 16 (Shooting the Breeze)
Knock, Knock (Episode 17): Behind Closed Doors
Knock, Knock (Episode 18): No Kids Allowed
Knock, Knock (Episode 19): Getting Backstage
Before you collect your coat at the door, the Knock, Knock club would like to make a final announcement.
Knock, Knock (Episode 21): What’s Your Poison? will be Live 24.12.2017
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