MicroHorror

Let me make something clear–what’s your name, officer? Perez? Alright–Officer Perez, let me make something clear before I say anything else: I ain’t crazy.

I know that’s the first thing everybody tells you: that they ain’t crazy. But I ain’t lying. I ain’t crazy, Officer Perez. And that’s the irrefutable truth.

See? I’m even using big words to tell you I ain’t crazy. What crazy person says something like “irrefutable?” None. Crazy people don’t say “irrefutable.” So again–and you’ve got to believe me because if you don’t you’ll think I’m crazy–I ain’t crazy.

My wife… she’s the crazy one. She’s the one who sees ghosts and talks to the dead. Heck, if I were her I’d be crazy too. I wouldn’t want none of them ghosts whispering in my ear to kill my husband.

No. I ain’t know what they told her; I’m just guessing. See, a week ago I woke up in the middle of the night with a big back pain–you know how those get with age–and found her standing next to the night table, staring at me. “What you doing standing there for, woman?” I told her. And she just looked at me. And then she left the room.

But I saw. Before she left.

I saw the knife she was holding in her hand.

She’d been standing there, holding that knife, and thinking about killing me, Officer Perez. I asked her about it in the morning, but she didn’t know what I was talking about. But she knew, alright. I know she knew. And I know she’d been wanting to kill me that night.

Why do I think that? Well, what she do that for, then? Standing there next to me with a knife in her hand. I don’t know ’bout you, but I ain’t thinking nothing pretty.

Now, I ain’t know how she spoke to them ghosts, but sometimes I could hear her talking in the kitchen, saying stuff I didn’t understand, and I’d go and look and there be nobody there. And then she’d see me and get mad at me and send me away.

Them ghosts killed my wife, Officer Perez. Drove her crazy. They told her the Lord was waiting for her in Heaven, and the only way to get there was burning herself alive. And she believed them, because them ghosts are already dead, and they said they knew how to really get to the other side.

I came home tonight from a poker game in a friend’s house–his name? Wilson–and found her in the kitchen, pouring oil over her head. She saw me, said she was gonna meet the Lord, and she was laughing crazily when she lit that match.

I watched her burn, Officer Perez. Watched her laugh and scream at the same time while she burned. I thought she chanted something–like a prayer–while she screamed. Then more screaming. And then nothing more came out her mouth and she just burned.

I screamed then, but them ghosts came and quieted me down. They told me I’d done nothing wrong, that my wife was where she was supposed to be, that I’d helped deliver her into the Lord’s embrace. It made no damn sense, but they kept talking. Talking and talking all at the same time till I couldn’t understand a thing.

And then they left me alone.

I ain’t know what happened after, Officer Perez. Only thing I remember is the police coming into the house, putting handcuffs on me, and bringing me here. They didn’t tell me nothing. The person who came before you told me I was being charged with homicide. I ain’t know what he was talking about. I still ain’t know what he was talking about. I didn’t do nothing.

I done told you, Officer Perez, them ghosts–them goddamn ghosts–did it. They killed my wife.

And you know I’m telling the irrefutable truth, Officer Perez. Because I ain’t crazy.