The Cold Heart

He stared at her purple colored feet which had frost on the tips of the blackening toes. He smiled and said,"Darling...that expensive ebony nail polish finally matches your tootsies." His walked the fingers of his right hand up her shin, over her knee and then danced them up her naked body to her right breast.

He flicked her nipple with his index finger and moved his warm finger slowly to the tip on her nose. The look of fear in her clouded eyes was begging him to kill her. He reached and pulled the headphones apart to hear,"Memories, like the colors of my mind....misty water color memories....of the way we were."

He let the headphones snap back on her ears as he grinned...singing,"Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind....smiles we gave to one another...but...then you became a slutty, cheating whore!"

Melissa could only moan in pain...being strapped to the back roof of their ranch house. John had knocked her out and strapped her down on the tin roof. It was mid January in northern Ohio. The pitch of the roof was about twenty degrees...the temperature was even less.

He had strapped her hands and legs apart with leather belts...secured by barn spikes. He'd placed a heating pad beneath her torso and all of her sexy undergarments became her pillow. He cut off her beautiful long red hair and tied it together with a silk stocking. He hung it on the TV antennae so that she could see it.

It took Mellisa four days and three nights to die. It was a freezing Tuesday morning when John shoved her mostly frozen body off of the roof. It was like cracking limbs of a tree when she hit the hard frosted ground. John looked over the edge of the roof and said,"Wow sweetie...I can still crack you up after all these years."

Her left arm and left thigh had broken in two. John got down from the roof while pulling the extension cord and headphone chords with him. He tossed them on the back porch as the music of Barbra Streisand played. Melissa hated that music...really hated that music!

John loaded her body and parts on the back of his lawnmower wagon and drove his Cub Cadet back in the woods to a prepared burial location. John buried her by pushing the frozen dirt with his handy Cub Cadet bulldozer blade attachment into the deep hole.

He went back to the ranch house and finished burning the last of her clothing, a purse and pair of green high heels in the pot belly stove. John had gotten away with murder. He already had a story for the police....she ran off with a musician she met at a Truck Stop.

Melissa had no family and very few distant friends. She had been married to John for twenty six years. His extreme jealousy prevented her from having any kind of social life.

John went in the house...cooked himself a hamburger and sat down to eat while watching the five o:clock news. He was listening to the weather man when suddenly....multiple thumps!

John looked up as the grease from his first big bite ran down the corner of his mouth. He spat the food from his mouth and rushed out the door to look on the roof! He picked up the ladder, slammed it on the house and scurried up!

The first thing he saw was Melissa's red hair hanging from the antenna. He shouted,"Fuck..I forgot that!" He immediately looked around the roof to see that nothing was there. Music came blasting from his stereo,"Memories...like the colors of my mind!"

John took three steps down and jumped from the ladder! He ran back in the house and slammed his fist on the off button! He screamed,"Who the fuck is here...I'll fucking kill you!"

The thumping across the roof came again...back and forth...human steps...running...stomping! John then heard the TV come on in the bedroom. He was terrified but eased towards the bedroom doorway. As he crept by the open door...he could see the TV screen was nothing but white, black and blue static.

John was frozen in fear as the television turned on the dresser to face him. The thumping on the roof became as loud as thunder...then silence. A face began to form on the TV screen and a voice came over the speaker...saying,"John....John....memories like the colors of my mind John...like the colors of my mind John." John could see that the shape of the face was Melissa's. He screamed,"This isn't real...this isn't fucking real!"

He fell back on the bed and began trembling. He was groaning and spitting vulgarities at the face on television while his hands began removing his clothing. His vulgar attacks soon turned into begging for mercy when a sharp cold began to enter his chest. He lay naked and helpless as the TV sang that song with a chilling, terrifying voice.

John arched up and screamed as his chest heaved with each slowing pump of his heart! His arms and legs were hot but he could feel his torso freezing. He started digging at his chest with his fingernails. He madly pulled the flesh open and the cold blood soaked his hands.

He dug his fingers in...gripped and pulled his rib cage apart! He lightly touched his freezing heart...he could feel the rough frost and could hear the crackling beat of splitting ice.

He looked at the face on TV and cried,"Melissa!"
The face seemed to smile as it said,"You're going to need a new heart my love....you can have mine... it is still alive...in the grave."