When you decide to kill someone, the first thing you want to do is research.  Not just on the method.  Anyone can find a method to kill in a way they can get away with if they’re smart and watch their detective dramas.
 

            I wanted to know all about her.  I wanted to know how they met.  I wanted to know if he’d been seeing her while we were together.  I wanted to know what she did for fun.  I wanted to know her favorite songs and what perfume she wore.  I wanted to know what had made Dom choose her over me.

          Something inside me had snapped.  I looked in the mirror and wasn’t quite sure who I was anymore.  The lines of my face seemed more jagged and my eyes blazed forth in a mixture of madness and fury.  Yet, I felt very calm.  I felt peaceful, even.  Peaceful because I was going to have my revenge.  She was not going to take my world away from me.

            On Friday night, I picked myself up off the floor and I showered.  I got out of my filthy sweats and put on jeans and a shirt that playfully showed off every one of those hard-earned curves that I’d kept in top shape to show off.  I did my makeup and my hair.  I made sure I looked the part of the femme fatale I had decided to play.

            I knew exactly where I was going.  I got in the car and drove till I reached the little hotspot I knew Dom always frequented.  Dom had been one of those struggling, woe-is-me type writers.  He wanted to write fiction, novels, poetry and be famous for it…but in truth, his writing was horrible.  He wrote science fiction…and not very good science fiction.  One of the things I’d always loved about Dom was that he was a bit nerdy in a sexy way.  He was Clark Kent in the daytime, Superman in the bedroom, but his fiction writing was dry and boring.  To support us, he did graphic design work on the side.

            His hangout was this trendy little coffeeshop/bar on the East side.  Sunday through Thursday, it was a place that had open mic every night and you would find guys with thick eyeliner whining into the mic about how they were going to kill themselves or reading excerpts from their awful novellas.  Girls who looked like they were being strangled by their thick, woolen scarves would get up and talk in monotones about the oppression of women.  On Friday and Saturday nights, the place would transform to a different crowd.  College boys and girls would come assault the place demanding beer and a breeding ground.  The music was loud, pulsating stuff that none of the weekday regulars would be caught dead listening to…yet, somehow they showed up anyway.

            I just knew he’d be there…and there he was, chatting animatedly with a few of his coffeehouse pals with her in tow.  He didn’t see me slip in.  The place was much too packed for that.  I quietly ordered a drink at the bar and found a quiet spot in the back of the bar at a table near the restrooms.  A couple sitting in front of me were making out so intensely that nobody would dare look this way.
 

            She was laughing at every word he said.  Tonight, she had the top part of her hair pulled back and was wearing shimmery green eyeshadow and had glossy peach lips.  Her shirt was the color of a freshly-mown yard.  Given the Hello Kitty bag I’d seen her with, I had hardly judged her as old enough to even be in a place like this.  I watched her every move.  She had a habit of stirring her fruity drink with her straw a little too much…almost to the point of annoyance.  She looked down while Dom was loudly talking to his friends in a demure way.  Dom looked like an idiot with her.  Like Tom Cruise with Katie Holmes.  She looked more like his befuddled niece.

          She took a sip of her silly, brightly-colored drink.

            “That’s it, sweetheart,” I mumbled, “Just drink a little faster…You’ll have to come my way soon…”

            Almost as if on cue, she nudged Dom almost apologetically and asked him if he could hold her drink.  Dom took it from her and I watched him appraising her as she walked away.  Quickly, I got up and slipped into the restroom and into a stall.  The thumping music was muffled in the restroom but quickly became louder as she came through the door.  I knew it was her…I saw her green heels go into the stall next to mine.  They matched her pretty green top.
 

            I waited a second and then I flushed the toilet and went to the sink, washing my hands.  She came out and I got a good look at her.  She was pretty, but not as pretty as I’d thought from far away.  She wore a lot of makeup.

            Why Dom?  Why her?  She’s not any better than me…I could have dyed my hair blonde if that was what you wanted…What did you want anyway?

            I pretended to check out my mascara as she washed her hands, but then I looked at her out of the corner of my eye.

            “Excuse me…do I know you?” I said, “You just look so familiar…”
            “No…I uhhh, I don’t think so…” she didn’t recognize me.  I was hoping for that.
            “I swear I know you, I just don’t know where I know you from…What’s your name?”
            “Kirsten,” she said as she dried her hands slowly, “Kirsten McCafferty?”
            She said it in a questioning way, as if she didn’t even know her own name.
            “Are you from Warington?”
            “No, I’m from Kellersburg?”

            “Perfect,” I smiled at her, “No, I guess I don’t know you.  I’m sorry…”
            “Oh…” her blue eyes were wide, “Okay then.”
 

            She walked out the door and I watched her feeling rejected again.  She was the girl my Dom was with.  I wanted to scream at her, to tell her he was mine.  I wanted to ask her what she was doing with the man I spent so many years with.  Instead, I let the door slam behind her and then opened it again and followed her out.  There was no reason to stay any longer.  I already had all the information about her I needed to start making my plans.