A/N: I just saw No Country For Old Men and wasn't entirely thrilled with the ending, although I think it was quite well done. This is just a oneshot, something that might have tied up a few more of those loose ends they left hanging. This takes place at the end, right after Carla Jean's mother's funeral. I don't claim ownership for the characters or background, I've just twisted the plot a bit. This is a departure for me from anything I usually read and I've definitely never written anything like this before, so please let me know what you think!
"I need to sit down."
Carla Jean Moss thought a million things as she gingerly lowered herself into the only other chair in the room. She didn't have time to call for help. One hint of a scream from her and she'd be finished. The man sitting in the corner was calm and collected, and had all the time in the world. She had whatever she could buy herself by talking.
"I knew this wasn' over."
She half-listened to the man answer her, wondering how she'd reach the loaded pistol behind the picture frame on her vanity table in time. Catch him off guard. Make him look out the window. Make him look at his hands. Make him look anywhere but at her, for just one or two seconds.
"I buried my mother today."
Catch a man like that off guard? A man who tracked her down purposefully, walked into her house, sat in her mama's chair and waited, just waited for her to come home? She'd as like bring Llwelyn back from the dead.
This was going to be the end.
"I knowed what was in store for me soon as I saw you sittin' in that chair." Unsteady. Carla Jean rubbed her hands, slippery with sweat, on her skirt. She felt him watching her, like she'd never been watched by any man before. No feeling. No thought in his gaze. He didn't lust like some men might have done, didn't notice her black mourning dress, he sure as hell didn't pity her, like any sane man would, knowing what was planned.
But she'd always known this man wasn't sane.
"You don't have to do this you know."
The man looked at her blankly for a second, and then laughed. Closed his eyes for a second, lowered his head for another second, and laughed "Everyone says that!"
When his eyes found their mark again, he was looking down the barrel of a pistol held steady in both her hands. Carla Jean levelled her arms and shot into the man sitting in her chair. Everything felt slower, sharper. She set about ruining his despicable face, half surprised, still etched with mirthless laughter. Each bullet hit home with a different thought.
Maybe it's a good thing mama's in the ground. She'd throw a fit at havin' guns in the house.
The man jerked as the first bullet caught him in the neck, his arm moving wildly to find the gun that was lying on the ground behind the chair. Carla Jean let her pistol drift, burying the second bullet in his forehead.
I wonder if he paid the barber that done gave him that haircut?
Between his eyes.
Damned if them ain't his brains all over my wallpaper now.
His stomach.
Lord, I never knew a man had that much blood in him.
She steadied her hands, staring at the ruined body, aiming where his heart should've been.
And this one's for you, Llewelyn.
Carla Jean watched the bullet leave her gun, watched it move through the air, the sun making it shine, making the cold contours almost beautiful. Her expression didn't change, though someone watching might have noticed something strange about her eyes. Nothing there. For just having killed a man, Carla Jean didn't seem at all altered, but for the emptiness that settled in her gaze as the last bullet found its mark. She felt her arms drop, the pistol dangling in her hand as she heard a muted squelch. Huh, she thought indifferently, it sounds just like I thought it would. A squelch. Almost funny. She stood there watching dust particles fall back into place, erasing the path of the bullet. Apathetic. Heard a fly settle on the man's arm, still twisted behind the chair, still reaching for his gun.
Must have been an hour Carla Jean stood there, facing her mama's old armchair and the empty shell of a man that was using it. The late afternoon sun continued its path, unconcerned with the scene in the little house, unaware of how its setting rays threw the mess of blood and brains into a muted golden haze. An ironic still life of a madman and a small-town southern girl. Sunshine rays on death...almost beautiful.
None of this occurred to Carla Jean. To her, the changing light in the room only revealed a damned mess. Her shoulders sagged when she realized she was the only one around to clean it up. A mess like that...it made her tired looking at it. Her eyes wandered, searching for something else to fix on, finding her feet. Just in time to make her step back from the sluggish pool of blood that had found its way to her Sunday shoes. She stepped delicately to the left and found, standing in a new spot, a wave of questions hit her. She shook her head and stepped again, tried to get away from the questions, the problems. What had she just done? What was she going to do? What would Llewlyn have done? Who could she go to? Who'd believe her story?
What now?
One more step over, and Carla Jean had the answer. She gave a last indifferent look to the dead man in the chair and laid herself down on the bed, farthest away from the bloody corner, her hand on her chest, the pistol's barrel under her chin.
And shot.
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