Runner-up

Ernesto didn’t take orders from women. Never had and never would. But he listened good to the barrel of a gun when it was pointed at his head. He listened real good.

The Beretta rested dead still in Genie’s slender hand. The big man could see her bright pink acrylic nails resting comfortably on the black weapon. He wanted to glimpse a little shaking or maybe a little sweat on her face. She was calm. She stared him straight in the eye. He had faced killers before, and when he glanced over and faced her, he was scared to death.

She hadn’t been paying attention to the road as the Crown Vic rolled north on the 101, approached the interchange and slipped over at the last moment onto the curving onramp to the 405. She had told him not to use the 405 and now they were trapped.

“I told you to take Laurel Canyon,” she said. She punctuated her comment with a little forward movement of the gun.

“Could you put that thing down?” he asked. There was no fear in his voice. “We’ll get off up here at Getty Center and go down Sepulveda.” He tried to sound relaxed.

“You’re like me, Ernie,” she cooed after a few minutes of bumper-to-bumper traffic.

“How’s that?” He pictured his run-down little bungalow in San Pedro. He compared it to the massive glass house in Malibu overlooking the Pacific. He glanced over at her again. What he saw was makeup and jewels and expensive clothes worn by a skinny little tramp who’d use bedroom eyes like the military used land mines. He had seen it a thousand times, and she wasn’t anything like him.

“We both grew up on the wrong side of town,” she continued. She used a soft tone of voice. “We both used people to get what we wanted. To get out. To get somewhere.”

“Yeah?” he said flatly. He wasn’t interested.

“Charlie says you never killed anybody.”

He was quiet. He concentrated on the road. He wished she would shut up. He would have told her that, but she held that pistol like she knew what to do with it. This wasn’t the time to make her mad.

“My dear husband says you just beat and maim people but you never have ever killed a soul.”

“That’s what he says.”

“So, you see, you’re like me, Ernesto,” she continued. Her soft slow voice became shrill, as the angry words slipped from her Modigliani throat through her perfect teeth. Her pastel eyes narrowed and her two hands tightened around the Beretta. “Neither of us have killed anybody.”

“Do me a big favor and shut your trap,” he said. He had had enough. He didn’t like talkative women. They were almost to Falco’s estate. He could make a move then, depending on how things went down. He smiled. Soon he’d escape her annoying chatter.

The gate was open. Genie told him to drive slowly and stop at the security booth. She tucked the weapon into her purse and spoke to the uniformed man who stepped out to greet them. The man recognized her and waved the big car along toward the house.

She hadn’t spoken for 10 minutes. But now she started again. Ernesto was ready to get out of the car, gun or no gun. She took one hand off the weapon and used it to hit the power locks so Ernesto was momentarily trapped in his seat.

“But I don’t want to be like you,” Genie said. “We’re both headed for hell, of course. But maybe I’ll be in a different part if I’m not like you.”

Ernesto scowled. “Don’t have a clue what you’re saying. Don’t care.”

“We’re both scum,” she hissed. “And we’re both pretty much alike. Only you never killed anyone.”

“Not that again.”

“You’re not listening,” she said. “Neither of us killed nobody. Not until now.”

A loud blast punctuated her sentence.

Dan Hennessy is a middle-school history teacher.