Not So Model Home - By David James Page 0,61
for my last drink, and walked to my car alone.
I drove home in silence, turning off the radio when Patsy Cline’s “Your Cheatin’ Heart” started playing. I don’t think I could have felt any lower than I did right then. I turned down my street, swung my car into my driveway and up into my mid-century carport, and turned off the ignition. It was late. I looked at my watch: 12:05 A.M. God, I couldn’t take these long days anymore. I needed to get some rest and just wanted to undress, burn my clothes, scrub my soul, and go to bed, but I remembered that there were some house brochures in the trunk that I needed to take inside. I went and unlocked the kitchen door so I could carry the heavy box. Knucklehead was usually at the door, but he was probably sulking in my TV room, a result of my long days away from him. He had his doggie door in case he needed to go out and do his business, but when he was disappointed in me, he took his good ol’ time coming to greet me, sniffing me casually, then looking at me as if I had hit him with a rolled-up newspaper. I waited a second. No Knucklehead.
I went back to the car. God, the brochures weighed a ton. I teetered back and forth with the heavy box on my towering heels. I know I should’ve taken them off when I unlocked the house, but I was so tired I only wanted to make one trip. As I neared the house, I could hear the tape on the bottom of the box ripping, sending 500 brochures cascading onto the dirty pavement. Great.
As I was about to let out a great sigh, I saw someone race up behind me, and the next thing I knew, that someone had something around my neck. I was being strangled. It happened so quickly I could hardly believe it was happening.
Next, I did what any red-blooded American female trained in karate would do: I forgot everything I ever learned. Almost. Instead of wasting time trying to get the rope off my neck (which is never any use since your attacker always has the element of surprise and the advantage of being behind you), I went right for his eyes. My assailant was wearing a ski mask or some sort of head covering, but I took my best guess and hit with my thumbs and index fingers, trying to gouge the eyes. I knew I only had ten to twenty seconds before I passed out, so I had to work fast and make my strikes count while I stabbed at my assailant’s instep with my shoe’s heels. We struggled back and forth, knocking over garbage cans, yard rakes, and pool floats as we smashed into just about everything in my carport. A second later, there was the sound of furious barking, growling, something ripping, and the rope around my neck fell away as I was shoved forward violently, falling over a garbage can and coming to rest lying on my back, staring at the ceiling of my carport while Knucklehead licked my face. A second later, I heard what sounded like gunshots going off, followed by silence. I checked myself for bullet holes but found nothing. I wasn’t shot. My assailant was gone into the night. No sense chasing him now. Plus, I didn’t want to mess up my Guccis any more than they were already.
A second later, Regina appeared standing over me, a gun in her hand.
“Amanda, I swear you have the lousiest dates of anyone I know.”
It took me a few minutes to regain my composure. As I sat up amongst my smelly garbage, trash cans, garden tools, and gardening pots, I tried to piece together what just happened.
“You okay, honey?” Regina said, squatting down to talk to me at my level. “You had a close call.”
“All those years of training in karate, and I couldn’t think of a thing. I didn’t even throw him over my shoulder, which I could’ve easily done. Damnit!”
“There’s a big difference between a karate tournament and real life, sweetie. I remember when I was working on a picture with Richard Burton. He was so hammered, all those years of training and perfecting his craft didn’t do him a lick of good in remembering his lines. They just wouldn’t come to him.”
“Regina, you do realize that you shoehorned that story into my comment about