The Green Fairy

“Two stiff drinkers fertilize the olive grove,” Sallow says, dropping his guard after a night-long bender. Sallow knew it was foolish to imbibe in his own product.

“What?” Cash exclaims. “We don’t need dead bodies. Could be risky.”

“Easy pal,” Sallow chides. “The first threatened to put us in for bootlegging five years back. Sniffing for the free product. The second tried it on for a share in the business. Both got a taste of the “The Xtra Green Fairy." I boiled and dried their body parts, put them in a bone crusher, and dried the mixture into calcium-rich fertilizer.”

Cash’s face loses color.

Absinthe is a potent mix of wormwood, hyssop, lemon balm, and aniseed, macerated in alcohol. Bohemians and creatives named it, The Green Fairy. When Sallow sensed a threat he added a hint of arsenic.

Sallow pours Cash another.

In the early twentieth century, absinthe was banned in America after reports found wormwood had psychedelic properties that led to violence.

Cash’s tongue flops out of the side of his mouth like a tired puppy. His eyes bulge, and an explosion of excrement soils his pants. He collapses.

Sallow stuffs him in a barrel. The bone crusher broke down after he minced the blackmailers, so he rolls his buddy a stone’s throw to the edge of Dark Lake. He pulls his buddy’s body out. It seems lifeless, and it’s covered in poop and puke. He drags him into the lake then pushes the floater into deeper water with a stick. He figures the crawdads will eat him soon enough.

After rolling the barrel back to the distillery to clean out the excreta, he switches the radio on. A preacher reads a bible verse: “…a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water – the name of the star is Wormwood.”

Sallow vows never to drink again, then falls asleep. He bolts upright with a revelation. He plans to turn the distillery into a factory for jarring olives. He considers going legit until the thought of a couple of snorts enters like a serpent’s whisper. There are several raps on his door. He peeks through the peephole. It’s her, Cash’s wife, Eva. She’d invited him to a service a few months back. Her cheesy smile and a low tolerance for religious fanatics forced him to decline.

He considers ignoring her until his hand reaches for the doorknob. He pauses, then turns it slowly before swinging the door ajar. By some power of trickery, he welcomes her inside. She looks younger, and he wonders why he dismissed those heaving breasts and attractive green eyes when they first met.

“Hey there, sorry to intrude. Is my husband around?”

“No.” Sallow stares through gunmetal eyes surrounded by skeletal eye sockets. Eva lowers her voice. “Oh, I see, Well, the corner store is closed. May I borrow some milk.”

Sallow’s posture remains gun-barrel straight. Borrow, huh.

He ushers her inside, offers her a drink. Before she can say “no” he fetches a green bottle from the oven. The oven didn’t work proving a great place to store his personal stash.

“Say, that’s a strange place to keep…”

“La Fe`e Verte… The Green Fairy. I was keeping it out of sight for a special occasion.”

“How sweet.” Eva follows him to the adjoining kitchen. His hands shake as he measures shots into two Tarragona glasses. He tops each glass pouring water over a sugar cube resting on a flat slotted spoon. The contents turn from natural green to an opalescent white.

Sallow gestures towards a cream chaise lounge. He hands her a glass. Dusty paintings hang crooked between dirt-stained windows. She sips tentatively. “Mmm… licoricey liquor warms my throat.” She giggles like a child. “Oh, and an afterglow of herbal aroma.”

“It’s known to have extra side-effects,” Sallow adds, with a rictus grin.

“Sounds wild,” Eva teases. “I quit the church you know. Envious congregants slandered me for promiscuity.” Sallow smiles inward. So that’s why you’re begging for milk instead of going to the corner store.

“Do you often have friends over?” she inquires.

 “Rarely. Some like to appear, for various reasons, and… some remain underground.”

“Ahh… absinthe makes the heart grow fonder,” she quips. “Some just don’t like to party.”

She twirls her hair like a schoolgirl.

Idiot. If she keeps wringing her hair, I’ll hang her from the chandeliers.

"Ever been married?” Her long dark eyelashes flutter like butterfly wings.

“My ex-wife tried to poison me.”

She jiggles her empty glass, signals for another. He obliges, this time pouring doubles.

“Thank you, you are so kind.” Her voice scales the walls. His jaundiced face shrivels.

She slips off her shoes. Cold tiles chill her feet through fishnet stockings. She shivers. He pours two doubles hoping to maintain mild conversation inherently knowing it will shift to an argument, and murder. First, it starts in the imagination, then it becomes reality.

“And yourself, Eva. Ever been married?” Sallow sneers.

“Oh, my shex-husbands were both alcoholics. The current one is, too. At least the firsh was dirty rish.” Eva slurs.

Sallow recalls a saying from Alcoholics Anonymous: “First you take a drink; then the drink takes a drink; then the drink takes you.”

“My, aren’t you clever?” Eva returns, with a hint of sarcasm.

Sallow envisages a coat hanger tight around her neck. “Another?” he inquires.

“Why, yesh. That’s so kind. By the way, I mush confesh...”

Sallow shuffles to the kitchen. He returns with a double shot of the Xtra Green Fairy in one hand, The Green Fairy in the other.

“There you go.” He hands her the glass. “You were saying something?”

Eva nearly spills her glass. She excuses herself, and places it back on the stand, untouched. She produces papers from her handbag.

“Well, you shee. I have shertain information from a very reliable shauce that shed you have two dead bodies fertilishering your olive treesh. Here’s the shing. All I arshk is sign thish paperwork leaving me as shole beneficiary of your home.”

He scans the documents. His face reddens. “Did Cash put you up to this?”

Eva miraculously sobers. “You know as well as I, so sign the dotted line by nine. If you don’t, he’ll call the police.” She had hoped to gain an advantage by drinking with Sallow. “Oh, and he’s waiting nearby in case anything happens. Let’s cut to the chase. You don’t have any dependents and you told me yourself you don’t have a wife. It’s not like I want it now. It takes effect if you pass away, only. That’s all. Besides, if you did pass away, your estate would go to the government. So, what’s the point? There’s also the matter of the bootlegging distillery. You can continue as normal. All I ask is you sign… just here.” She produces a pen with a flourish.

Sallow ignores the gesture. He ponders her words. He suspects she’s bluffing about Cash just as she’d bluffed with the slurred speech. He wonders if Cash survived being ditched in Dark Lake. He concludes he wouldn’t give himself up by calling the cops.

He inquires. “What were the names of your ex-husbands?”

Eva knew her game was up, but she had the upper hand. Both of her ex-husbands were indeed friends of Sallow. Friends until he turned them into fertilizer.

“Has Cash put you up to this, or is it your idea?” Sallow demands.

Eva counters, “You’ll know if you don’t sign.”

Sallow considers. It’s nearly nine o’clock. He’ll kill this she-devil by strangulation if she doesn’t drink her comeuppance. “Why, it’s only eight o’clock. You haven’t finished your glass.”

“What if it’s a touch strong?”

Sallow grins. “Here, pass me your glass.”

Eva passes the glass. He takes a mouthful without swallowing and returns it with the hint of a smile.

She takes a sip. “Well, why not sign now.”

Sallow gestures with his finger to wait a moment. He heads to the bathroom, takes a pee then flushes to mask the sound of spitting the Xtra Green Fairy into the toilet. He returns to the lounge room.

“We’re having so much fun with these surprises. Why sign now?”

Eva takes a deeper mouthful. “I guess we can wait.”

An idea springs. Cash won’t risk calling the cops. If, in fact, he is alive, he would call on Eva first. He’d let him arrive then do them ‘both’ in.

Sallow pours a triple from the same bottle by mistake. He sculls it down before signing the papers knowing it won’t do them any good when they’re dead. The Xtra Green Fairy kicks. His jaw clenches, his eyes roll, and his face creases. His teeth gnash and blood issues from his mouth then, he falls on the tiles headfirst crushing his skull.

Cash raps at the door with the butt of his gun. Eva opens the door. Her face grows red, then purple. Frothy saliva covers her lips, and her eyes open wide. Her body goes limp and she slumps into Cash’s chest. Cash carries her inside and lies her body next to Sallow’s.

Cash stuffs the Deeds in his back pocket. He shoves Eva in the barrel and rolls her down to the lake. He watches her body float away.

After reporting Eva as a missing person, detectives question Cash.

“Your wife’s ex-husbands both died under strange circumstances. Any idea where she might be?”

“No.”