“Dear Jane,
By the time you read this, I’ll be gone, gone forever. I’m so sorry my darling…. I’ve let you down terribly.
Remember when I went to London for 2 days for that conference? Well I ended up having a one-night-stand, and now I just can’t live with myself.
I just can’t bear looking at your innocent face any longer, and knowing how I have betrayed you. This guilt I feel is killing me more and more every single day.”
Jane was sitting staring at her computer, pulling at the fingers on the turquoise latex gloves and chewing on her bottom lip as she always did when contemplating a problem. She liked the first bit, but was struggling on how to finish the last part now. It was harder than she had thought to find just the right words; she didn’t want to attract blame upon herself, did she? She had to carry on this ridiculous façade of the perfect wife right to the very end and knew she wanted it to be like an apology from Mike to her. She took a sip of wine from her glass, cocked her head on one side whilst thinking and then quickly typed:
"Please forgive me, Jane. You’ll be better off without me. So sorry I failed you. I always loved you my darling.
Mike”
Yes, that would do. She pressed PRINT, picked up the cheque he had signed and left out that morning for the milkman, and began fine-tuning his signature. That would be a doddle though, they were always signing forms for each other. She carefully slid the signed note in an envelope, tucked the flap inside (without licking it, you never know….) and placed it in her rucksack along with her practice scribbles. The old git was so pompous, typing up his note and then putting it in an envelope was just the kind of thing he would do, she thought, pursing her lips!
The next step was to create her concoction. She’d got to get a move on, he would be home in exactly twenty-seven minutes – that was another thing that REALLY grated on her nerves, - he was just so damn punctual and predictable!
She had bought two bottles of Jack Daniels yesterday and now opened one, pouring a good third down the sink – disgusting stuff! She then put that bottle back in her rucksack with the envelope for later, took out an identical bottle, measured out thirty millilitres and ditched that also down the sink. She felt a little uneasy when she took the bottle of colorless, odorless liquid out of her rucksack and swilled it around. It had taken her less than five minutes online to research the amount of ethylene glycol needed for a lethal dose and that it was both tasteless and undetectable. Quite shocking really for the information to be so readily available to the general public, she thought. Shocking, but fortunate for her! It had been just as easy to buy it from the supermarket, although she had taken the precaution of going to the huge Tesco’s by the motorway. She would be SO glad to leave this Godforsaken village, with all its do-gooders and curtain-twitching nosey neighbours. The very thought of them suddenly spurred Jane into furious action and she filled the bottle right up to the top again with the antifreeze with renewed determination.
Now for the final ingredient in her special brew. She had decided on the powerful Tramadol pills Mike had not wanted to use after his bike accident and now hastened to break open both blisters of tablets into the mortar and began crushing and grinding them down to a fine powder. Into the whisky this went too, but even after turning the bottle upside down about five or six times she could still see a little of the sediment settling at the bottom. Jane frowned and bit her lower lip. What should she do? Maybe it would dissolve in time? She’d give it ten minutes then see…..
The empty blisters she replaced in their box which she placed in her rucksack. She would need all these things for later that evening…… The pestle and mortar though, she put into a plastic bag inside the rucksack, peeled off her gloves and put them inside too.
Had she been watching too many crime movies, she wondered? Maybe it had been a little ridiculous to have given her mobile to Bob at lunchtime so it could strengthen her alibi when she said she had been shopping all day in Chichester. In the thriller she had watched last week, she had learned that the police could trace where a suspect had been from their mobile phone and had made a mental note of that for today.
Bob had come up with a great idea to make her alibi stronger too. She would leave Mike with his apero while she went for a takeaway, slipping out of the side door to avoid being spotted by the curtain-twitchers and take her car which was parked round the corner. They would grab a leisurely hour together at his place, she’d get her phone back, then she would pass by the Indian to pick up a take-away meal for two on her “way home from her day’s shopping” and have a good old chat with Pete there. She had to make sure he was the one to serve her though, as he was Mike’s mate, as well as being the one that fancied her on the sly. She would make sure he knew it was for Mike, and would flutter her eyelashes at him and ask him to put in a few extra poppadums for her darling hubby. When she got home, she would park in the front driveway.
Her alarm suddenly warned her she had only got two minutes left. Phew, the whisky looked fine now. She glanced around and smiled at the scene before touching up her lip gloss in the mirror and running a comb through her hair.
Mike’s glass and whisky sat waiting invitingly, along with a bowl of salty peanuts. She placed her wine glass next to his and draped herself sexily on the sofa in anticipation….
Author Notes: I would really appreciate any thoughts please.......
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France • 61 years old