The Plan
By Sigrid Nunez, first published in LitMag
A man plots to murder his wife, but news of her pregnancy throws off his plan.
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Plot Summary
Roden decides he wants to be more cultured, so he begins to go into the city to observe those around him more closely. On his way home, he stares at a woman who is wearing a mini skirt. When she moves away in disgust, he labels her as a good candidate for murder. Ever since he was a teenager, Roden has always wanted to murder someone. Most recently, Roden has decided to murder his wife Harley. After their hotel room in Aruba was robbed, Roden devised the perfect murder. He plays his plan out constantly in his head: he would strangle Harley in the hotel room, but make it look like a robbery. On his way home from the city, Roden stops at a sex worker's house. Roden books the flights to Aruba and sets his plan into motion, except that Harley begins to act strange. Roden soon finds out that she's pregnant. She doesn't want children, but is distraught at the thought of an abortion. Roden sees this as a good opportunity to make her murder look like suicide. But Roden doesn't want to ruin his original plan, so he decides to wait a week before he kills her. Abruptly, Roden drives to the same sex worker's house. When he gets there, he strangles the sex worker, Marilyn, and then uses her bra to strangle the man in the front of the house.