Classifieds

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Sunday

Victor Guardado crimped the blinds with his fingers that Sunday morning and peered at the world from his living room window. Aside from a few Mexicans painting the front of the apartment complex across the street, there weren’t many people ambling about.

He knew the men across the street were Mexican because of the regional Norteña music thumping from the cheap speakers they’d been lugging around; the heavy bass and accordion-laden tunes wreaking havoc on his ears.

Before he made for the door, a pair of Jehovah’s Witnesses in white shirts and finely pressed slacks sauntered up the street, stopping at the end of the driveway of his bungalow. He gasped and pulled away from the window, leaning his spine flat against the wall. Had they seen him? He clutched his chest as his heart jackhammered against his sternum. 

Please go away, please go away, please go away.

Victor shut his eyes and waited a couple of minutes for his palpitations to settle before he ventured a peek outside. They were gone. He stepped out onto the stoop, snatched the morning’s paper, and darted back inside, fastening the bolts on the door as fast as his hands would let him.

Breathless, he padded into the kitchen, opened the cupboard, and shook a bottle of Xanax. A lone tablet rattled inside. He’d gotten bad about refilling his prescriptions. It was just as well. All the drugs in the world couldn’t help him. If anything, they’d made him numb, dampened his senses. He tossed the bottle in the waste basket.

Victor beelined to the bathroom. He liked to start the week by shaving. As he stood in front of the mirror, he realized he’d neglected his grooming routine. A full two weeks’ growth. He lathered up, plucked the straight razor from the sink, and carefully guided the blade along the contours of his face, shaving against the grain. When he was done, he patted the towel over his face and watched the man in the mirror, his brown eyes scrutinizing Victor’s dark skin with contempt.

“Fuck off,” Victor said. 

Nestling into the sofa, he moved a stack of old wordsearch and sudoku books aside and perused the Sunday paper, skimming through the news and clipping the week’s online coupons before settling on the day’s crossword puzzle. The puzzles had kept him busy while sharpening his mind and halting the onset of cognitive decay. They had become something of an obsession the last few years; akin to taking daily vitamins. Victor hadn’t missed one yet and had accumulated quite a collection of cheap dime store puzzle, trivia, and riddle books. 

Today was an easy one; the Times had recycled some words from a few months back. They couldn’t slip something like that past him. No sir. Not him. 

When he was done with his puzzles, he flipped past the comic strips and went straight to the romantic classifieds toward the back of the paper. Maybe today he’d get lucky. He scoured the listings, going over every single box for anything that might catch his fancy. 

Outgoing W looking for like-minded W. 

W seeks adventurous M. Loves hiking, snorkeling… 

Victor shook his head. No one liked to stay in anymore. Do a nice puzzle over a cup of coffee. 

He had just about given up on having a love life. Not too many women getting hot and bothered over an agoraphobic bachelor in his mid-50s. Love was the one puzzle he’d yet to solve. Before he folded up the paper and tossed it atop of the towering heap in the hallway, something caught his eye. A listing tucked all the way at the bottom of the page. 

Naughty W seeking naughty M. If this is you, please know I’m in danger. Help Me. 

Victor arched an eyebrow. There was no number listed. No email. No nothing. 

He ran a hand through his oily, gray hair. What the fuck was he supposed to do? After some thought, he flipped through the phone book, located the number for the L.A. Times, and picked up the receiver. Just before he dialed, he hung up. No. Must be some idiot playing a prank. Hardee-har-har.

Grunting, he stood and set to making breakfast before browsing the TV for a game show to watch.

Monday 

From behind the blinds, he watched as neighbors loaded up their sniveling kids into the car and got ready for work. As pedestrians crossed the street like insects and the far-off clamor of construction work inundated the world.

He waited until things died down. Until the streets cleared out. It always upset him, the way people watched him, judged him. 

The Mexican painters across the street had moved past the courtyard and made their way deeper into the apartment complex. Their horrendous music was muffled now but still audible enough to creep into his house. He threw on his robe, scooped up the paper, and slammed the door behind him.

After his daily crossword puzzle, he solved a riddle: What can be driven but has no wheels, can be sliced but stays whole? A fucking golf ball. Too easy.

Afterward, he turned to the romantic classifieds again. He didn’t know why he routinely subjected himself to these tortures. There was that saying: The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Maybe he was insane. A glutton for disappointment. Romance was an enigma to be solved, after all. He took his index finger and ran it down the paper as he went over every single advert. 

W looking for M. I am career oriented, two kids…

W seeks M for platonic connection…

Scouring the rest of the ads, he shook his head and sighed. Same shit, different day. 

His finger glided all the way down and he saw the posting again tucked in a little square near the corner of the page.

Naughty W seeking naughty M. They are coming for me. Can’t leave the house. They are always watching. 

Victor scratched his cheek with grimy fingernails. What the hell was going on? Again, this woman had left no means of contacting her. No clue as to her plight. This was turning out to be some elaborate prank. Though, he wasn’t sure what the punchline was.

But, if she was to be believed, he could relate. Not being able to leave the house. Being watched. He almost felt pity for her. He wanted to help, but there was nothing he could do without some address or number to contact her through. Besides, he wouldn’t leave the house for anything. Not even for this mystery woman.

Before he fired up his computer and logged in to work, he peered out the office window. A few Hispanic kids on their way to school giggled as they gazed at his house. Little Fuckers. 

It was awful feeling like a prisoner in your own home. The crippling fear. The anxiety. The world was a monster ready to swallow you whole.

Tuesday

He did the unthinkable and skipped the daily puzzles. His finger trembled as it skimmed down the paper and settled on the classified listing. It waited for him in a tiny box as it had before. A private message just for him. 

Naughty W seeking naughty M. Subhuman monsters have infiltrated society. It may be too late. 

Subhuman monsters? Now he was almost certain it was all a prank. Something some conspiracy nut would drone on about. Or a cultist. 

Still. These classifieds cost money. Why would someone go through all that trouble? And what was the point? She did say she couldn’t leave the house, though. That she was being watched. What if this was the only way she could reach out? Communicate to the outside world? Perhaps she was being cryptic on purpose. Some kind of hidden meaning. A puzzle to be solved. But why couldn’t she leave an address? A number? 

“Bah!” Victor said, rubbing the new stubble on his chin. He wasn’t about to let himself fall for this. No way. 

He clocked in to work from his desktop and carried on with his remote job. As the day progressed, he couldn’t help but shake the thought of the woman in the classifieds. Who was she? What had gotten her so upset? The questions gnawed at his brain like a parasite. That night, he couldn’t sleep. 

Wednesday

Naughty W seeking naughty M. This is what they don’t want you to know: They hide in plain sight. Look out the window. How many coloreds, how many Mexicans are new to your street? Was it like this twenty, thirty years ago? 

Victor opened the blinds. A couple of Black children moseyed on to school. A few Southeast Asians and Mexicans, too. No. It was never like this. Where had they come from? The influx of foreigners was startling, but having seldom gone outside, he had grown oblivious to it. The world had been changing and he’d been none the wiser. A fool of a hermit. Because of his malady. They were indeed hiding in plain sight. Encroaching. So many of them, he knew, were undocumented. Vermin. They hadn’t come here legally like his parents had. Hadn’t been screened. Infiltrators. 

Subhuman monsters.

Victor yawned and rubbed his eyes, watching the Mexican painters in their white overalls as they toiled in the sun, their music crackling from those busted speakers. He almost hadn’t noticed he’d been grinding his teeth.

Thursday

Victor bit his lip until a thin trickle of blood seeped down his chin. The listing hit him like a punch in the gut.

Naughty W seeking naughty M. Coloreds are perfect hosts for subterranean race of parasitic creatures as they are prone to violence and sexual deviancy. Will take over country soon. Must act. 

Certainly, there was a seed of truth in that statement. His fingers balled into fists. He didn’t know about any secret subterranean race of parasitic creatures but he vividly recalled the mugging that night all those years ago. The occulted face in the shadows of the parking lot. The blow to the back of his head. The squeal of tires. Surely, it had been a colored man.

Prone to violence.

The veins in Victor’s neck began to throb, pulsing to the rhythm of his hastening heartbeat. He felt the back of his head grow hot where he’d been struck. A small spot just below the occipital bone.

After he’d been discharged from the hospital, he couldn’t bring himself to leave the house. He couldn’t face the world, its monsters. The attack had left him crippled with fear. Jumpy at the sound of shouting, the shuffle of shoes on asphalt, the screech of tires on pavement.

The thought of it all made him queasy, lightheaded. He needed to take a breather. He sat on the couch and looked around for his bottle of Xanax. 

That’s right. It was gone.

Friday

Pacing back and forth across the living room, Victor pulled his hair until his scalp burned. He picked up the paper and read it again. Just to make sure there weren’t any hidden clues.

Naughty W seeking naughty M. Can’t say much. Don’t have much time. There is a way to uncover the monsters.

“Fuck!” That couldn’t be it. He needed to know. Why wouldn’t she just tell him? Why did she have to string him along like this?

He flipped the coffee table over and a pile of faded crossword puzzle books flapped lethargically like dying birds. In the hallway, he kicked the stack of old newspapers, causing them to topple.

That night as Victor prepped dinner, the questions became intrusive little vermin, swarming his conscious, taking little bites of his sanity. There at the counter, he’d felt like a mindless ghoul as he chopped onions. Then, there came a sting, a shooting pain emanating from his hand. He glanced down. He had nearly severed his left index finger.

Wanting to avoid the hospital, he stuck his hand in a bowl of ice until the throbbing ceased. He watched almost absentmindedly as the blood swirled into the melting ice like a spiraling galaxy. Next, he wound bandaging around his finger until it grew numb. 

In bed, he tossed and shivered. Every now and again, he’d peer outside his bedroom window. To see if he could spot the coloreds skulking in the dark. Coming for him now that he knew what he knew. He was a marked man. Privy to some dangerous secrets.

Again, sleep eluded him that night. 

Saturday

Victor stepped outside wearing nothing but his briefs, the chill morning air nipping at his face and limbs like fine needles. He snatched the newspaper and read it there on the stoop.

Naughty W seeking naughty M. Their true monstrous forms lie underneath the skin of their faces. Look for yourself. 

He crushed the paper and dropped it at his feet. The Mexican painters had just parked their van across the street. Five men stepped outside, all wearing white overalls and white caps, the music from their speakers hammering his eardrums. A few colored kids rode their scooters up and down the block. An Asian couple was walking their dog.

Subhuman Monsters.

Parasitic creatures.

Will take over country soon.

Look for yourself.

He walked back inside, plucked the bloodied knife from the sink, threw on his robe, and stepped back onto the stoop. He inhaled a breath of fresh air and let it settle deep in his lungs. It had been ages. It felt…good.

Victor’s legs trembled as they brought him down a small flight of steps. His heart raced as beads of sweat started to dot his forehead. There came a tightness in his throat. A tingle of anticipation. He swallowed. It was dry and scratchy. 

He shambled down his driveway, past his dusty car, and stopped at the curb. His fingers laced tightly around the handle of the knife before he padded across the street. He plunged the knife into the chest of the first painter he saw. The others screamed and fled. As did the children.

The painter fell and spasmed, a big red blotch spreading across his white overalls. He lay there, gasping like a guppy dying on the planks of a pier. Victor knelt beside him and made an incision on his jawline, swatting away the man’s feeble defensive swipes. He slid the knife carefully around the contours of his face. After a moment, the man ceased his twitching and his arms slowly uncurled at his sides. When the knife circled back to the initial incision point, Victor peeled the man’s face off like a latex mask. 

Nothing. Just tissue and clots and fat and muscle. No monster. No parasitic creature writhing within. 

One of the painters was on his phone, pleading with emergency services in Spanish. Victor made a dash for him and killed him much the same way as his friend. He inserted the knife just below the ear and slid the blade along the man’s face. He lifted the man’s skin. 

Nothing. No monster there, either.

An Asian woman screamed from her window in the apartment complex above. She receded inside and drew the curtains shut. 

Victor wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. He scanned the street. Down the block, a pair of old men garbed in robes lurched behind some women crawling over blood-drenched lawns. They must’ve gotten the message too. Good. There were too many coloreds for him to handle. He took comfort knowing there were crusaders like him, willing to uncover the truth, to help that poor woman in the classifieds. 

A Hispanic mother down the street was pushing a stroller, her mouth agape as the carnage unfolded. Victor wondered what lurked inside the stroller’s shadowed recesses and ambled over to say hello.

Before Victor could reach them, the wail of sirens filled the neighborhood. He dropped the knife and shuffled across the street, ambling up the steps and into his house. He fastened the bolts and collapsed on his bed.

Sunday

Victor opened his eyes and winced as spears of sunlight pierced the blinds and fell on his face. He’d had the worst dream. Visions of scarlet-faced humanoids shrieking, bowled over, spasming in agony in their death throes. Like some horrid expressionist painting made real.  

He swung his legs over the bed and stood. Legs wobbling and vision blurring, he steadied himself against the armoire. It took a few moments for him to recompose himself. Slowly, the memories began to trickle in. The newspaper. That’s right. The occulted monsters. Yes. 

Victor rubbed his temples as the onset of a vicious headache crept in. What time was it, anyway? As he shambled toward the living room, he heard the buzz of chatter in the street.

He opened the door and picked up the Sunday paper on the stoop. His hands, he’d noticed had been stained red. The headline on the front page read: Racially Motivated Murders Befall Los Angeles.

Before turning inside, he witnessed the bedlam before him. A portion of the street had been cordoned off as police officers scrambled about. Some wore jackets that read Coroner’s Office on their backs. A half dozen news vans idled down the block.

A familiar-looking Asian woman across the street had been giving an officer a statement when she locked eyes with Victor. She pointed at him and screamed. Victor retreated inside and locked the door.

Had the dreams been real? He fumbled the newspaper, flipping toward the back until he came upon the classifieds. His finger ran down the page until he found it.

 Naughty W seeking naughty M. The invasion’s roots run deep. Have you been infiltrated?

Victor let the paper fall to the floor. He turned his hands over. They were brown. Colored. The possibility had never occurred to him. That he’d been a perfect host for the parasites.

There came a knock at the door.

“Police,” a voice yelled. “Open the door.” 

As he stumbled into the bathroom, Victor looked himself over in the mirror. He hated everything he saw. A cantankerous colored man prone to violence. No. Good God, no.

The knocks came again.

“Open the door!”

He jabbed a palm into the mirror, causing it to shatter in a web of cracks. A dozen brown eyes stared back at the subhuman monster standing before them. It couldn’t be. Not him. 

But he had to be sure. One last puzzle to solve.

The knocks turned into pounding.

Victor snatched the straight razor from the sink. With a trembling hand, he brought it to his jaw and made the incision. He hissed and gritted his teeth and tried his best to ignore the flaring pain until he saw the task through. The deed done, he gently placed the flap of skin inside the bowl of the sink. 

The front door shattered.

He gazed into the mirror, at the fragmented scarlet reflection. Behind the façade of his mask, Victor finally learned what he truly was.