Clarence Benkowski was overweight and overbearing. All his life he’d been number one in that miserable household. And even now, after retiring from his job as a welder, he expected to be waited on hand and foot. When his sick and aged mother decided to move in it got worse for Judy, because it meant there were two of them bullying and cursing her. They made her serve them as if she was a slave. They treated her like dirt. There had to be a better way to spend your life, surely?Often these two obese specimens would sit in their cosy armchairs in the sitting room of the Benkowski’s neat, detached suburban home at number 508, South Yale Avenue, Addison, near Chicago, for hours on end without lifting a finger. That was when the wretched little bell rang the most. An endless stream of demands followed. Ring. ‘Get me a coffee,’ said one. Ring. ‘Get me a beer,’ said the other. Ring. ‘This coffee’s cold, get me another.’ Ring.
