His Beast
Four policemen burst through Chuck and Mary’s front door, guns drawn.
“Let her go! Unhand her!” They yelled.
“No, please,” Chuck shouted, “you don’t understand. It’s not what it looks like!”
“Oh, yes it is!” Nosy Noreen stuck her fat head through the doorway. “Your wife-beating ass is going down!”
Two of the cops restrained Chuck. The other two ran over to Mary. “Ma’am, are you okay? We’ll call the paramedics for you now.”
Mary, mouth bloodied and swollen, trembled. “Please don’t hurt him,” she stretched a bruised arm toward Chuck. “Don’t hurt my husband.”
“Don’t protect that piece of shit Mary,” Noreen screamed through the doorway, “maybe the coppers could beat on him for once.”
The lady cop wiped Mary’s sweaty brow with a handkerchief. “We caught him red-handed, ma’am. He’s going down. You don’t have to be afraid of him anymore.”
Chuck, in handcuffs, struggled against the officers’ grasp as they led him to the front door. “You don’t understand. It’s not me you need to be afraid of. It never was.”
A deep, guttural growl shook the living room. All eyes locked onto Mary. She rocked back, forth, and convulsed. The two cops at her side tried to step away. Mary flung them across the room like they were rag dolls. Her bones cracked and her eyes blanched. The other two cops unhanded Chuck and turned their guns on Mary. She mouthed the words, I’m sorry, as coarse fur sprouted across her face and her height doubled in an explosion of energy. Noreen froze in the doorway. Chuck dropped to his knees.
“It’s too late. I couldn’t beat the monster inside. Christ save us all.”
Mary, now a ten foot beast, advanced upon the officers. Their bullets, useless. She tore both arms off of one of the cops and clawed the heart out of the other one.
Noreen made it to the walkway. Mary grabbed her at the back of her neck and squeezed. The contents of Nosy Noreen’s head splattered across the porch.
“Mary, honey?” The monster whipped around to Chuck’s upturned face. “You’ve given me the best 30 years of marriage. I love you. You’ll always be my girl.”
The Mary-beast bent down and stared at the sobbing man. She cocked her head as if straining to recognize something in his face. In one swift, brutal motion, she ripped Chuck in two. Blood from his upper half pooled around the monster’s hairy hooves.
The Mary-beast sniffed the air and let out a howl that drove the sleeping birds from the trees and the rats back into their nests then barreled down the moonlit street.