"Gray. Everything is just gray. The walls. The couch. The counters, the sinks, the floor, the ceilings. Just everything! How could anyone imagine living here?" Mrs. Lynwood inquired, as they rummaged through their the belongings left in an old apartment.
"I don’t think anyone ever really did," Mr. Lynwood replied.



*

*

*

The relationship between and the Worthington’s and Dale had been rocky since the young couple moved into the duplex three years prior to the incident. Gloria and Richard were used to getting anything and everything they wanted. And Dale had something that they both wanted and for some reason no matter what bargain and no matter how much money was thrown at him, he was unwilling to give it up.
"That apartment, Richard. Get me that apartment! The view! The kitchen! Everything is just simply immaculate. What does the man need with all that? He’s the only one there," Gloria said in a frustrated manner after having a few drinks to ease into the evening.
"He won’t budge. Beside the apartment isn’t..."Richard was suddenly interrupted by his drunk wife.
"YES IT IS. It is that great!" Gloria shouted making her practically loose her balance.
"Well, what do you want me to do? He won’t give it to us, he has some sort of attachment to that place," Richard said as he picked his wife up off the floor, "Why don’t you just go to bed, and I’ll see what I can do, alright?”
"Whatever," she mumbled, then stammered off to bed.
The next morning, Richard is woken by the sound of loud music playing in the apartment. He looks over to his side but does not see his wife. She was sitting in the kitchen smoking a cigarette and already on her third glass of wine.
"Gloria, what are doing it’s six in the morning and you’re already drinking!?" Richard exclaimed.
"We can move in next week," she said solemnly.
"Move where? What are you talking about?" Richard asks.
"Into our apartment, I got Dale to......to....budge," she said with slight giggle.
"What do you mean?" Richard was now very puzzled by his wife’s statements.
"Go see for yourself," she seemed very pleased.
He walked upstairs while Gloria sauntered behind him. He opened the door already cracked door, and walked slowly into the apartment.
The color gray was everywhere. Splattered and smudged, it did not seem as if anyone had painted it, just kind of threw it all around. The once beautiful, black marble counter tops no longer shined. The heavenly view out of the windows was now deterred as eyes would have to get their the thick gray stain in order to seen any of it. The leather furniture that was once soft, felt crusty as gray paint dried on the exterior. The white, pearly floors now looked more like cement. Pictures of family and friends were now ruined, as the people in them had their arms around blobs of gray, instead of their families.
Richard, continues to walk around the apartment, Gloria stands in the doorway.
"What happened here?" Richard asked still wandering around. He seemed to be looking for something, but not even he knew what.
Richard walked into the bedroom of their neighbor, and found him lying on the bed.
"OH MY GOD! HE’S DEAD!" Richard yelled at the top his lungs, "Gloria, you killed him. I thought you said that you weren’t going to do that anymore. I thought it was over," Richard said in a panic.
Still calm, Gloria walks into the bedroom behind Richard, "Well, it’s not liked planned it. He got an attitude."
"What did you do?" Richard asked.
"Well, I figured that you weren’t going to get him out of here, so I took care of it. No one wants to live in a gray-scaled apartment its just ugly. So, I did a little...redecorating. And then...well...he got in my way. So, I shot him. Simple as that," she said as if nothing was wrong.
Richard stomps out of the bedroom, picks up a small table sitting next to the gray accentuated couches. He takes the table back into the bedroom where Gloria is standing, and he throws it at her. She was knocked straight to the ground. He knew she was unconscious.
Richard took a deep breath and scooped up Gloria. Holding her in his arms he looked around for a place to stash her for a moment while he cleaned up the mess that she had created. He decided to place her back on the floor and then tended to his now dead neighbor.
Picking up Dale, he looked around for a wound or anything that would show how she killed him. There was nothing. No bullet wound, no piercing, not even a bruise. His cause of death was a mystery and Richard planned on keeping it that way.
Richard picked up the phone to call the cops, praying that Gloria stayed unconscious, he planned to turn her in.
He started talking out loud, “ I told her that, that was the last time. I told her I was gonna do this. This is her fault. I can’t cover for her. That b***h.”
He slammed the phone down the phone, and started rubbing his temples as if he had a striking headache. Running back into the room to look at his wife and the dead neighbor, he picked up the table he had used to strike Gloria and threw it against the wall. He sat down on the floor with his head down. Soon, he was in the missionary position with tears rolling down his eyes.
“Richard…Richard…what’s going on? Where are we Richard?” Gloria had no memory of what had just happened. Richard turned around.
“Don’t worry about it,” Richard said giving up on all hate toward his wife. Richard slowly got up and went back into the kitchen and picked up the phone. He reported that he and Gloria had found their neighbor dead in his apartment, with the walls smudged gray. He told him that he thought it was suicide.
Richard did not wait in the apartment for the police to arrive as he had promised them. He instead took Gloria back down their apartment. He sat on the couch while she still was slightly unconscious.
“Richard..Richard,” she mumbled.
Richard did not respond to cry of Gloria and proceeded on his way. He walked into the kitchen and unlocked the cabinet where they stashed their valuables. He left everything in it, except for the gun.



*


*


*

“Whatever did happen to the people who lived in this apartment building,” Mrs. Lynwood asked her husband.
“Well, the man that lived here, Dale I think it was, killed himself,” he replied.
“And the couple that lived downstairs...?” Mrs. Lynwood inquired.
“They died too. They said they found both of them dead in the living room. There was blood everywhere. The walls, the floor, the ceilings, and furniture were all painted gray.”