It was 1966. The year everything changed.
My parents and I were living in a sleepy little seaside town in northern Massachusetts. My mother had dropped out of college when she got pregnant which would have been around 1960.
As I entered first grade she had gone back to community college. My father was working as a bartender and dealing a little pot on the side.
From what I remember I was a very happy child. I would wake up with the sun and make myself the same breakfast every morning. Melted American singles on Wonder bread and a big glass of Ovaltine. Then I would fill one of my many plastic water guns under the tap. Then I would hunt my tabbies, Marco and Polo to the ends of our rented house. I found nothing more satisfying then catching them napping in some out of the way alcove, only to be rudely awakened by the big stream of water.
After I had emptied the chamber it was time for Captain Kangaroo and Gigantor.
I would play with my father when he came home every night. My favorite game was Superman. He would lift me with his feet and hands as he lay on his back and I would scream, "Superman!"
There was joy in the simple things.
Then, like I said, everything changed.
One day my Dad called me into the living room.
"Mark. I'm going to be going away. You're going to be the man of the house now."
"What? Why?"
"Mommy and Daddy aren't going to be together anymore."
"But-but..."
It was no use. I could see it in his eyes. He was about to breeze out of my life forever.
I did the only thing six year old me could think of. I resorted to force.
I wrapped myself around his ankle and began to cry hysterically.
He stood there looking down at me as tears streamed down my face. He lit a cigarette. He smoked it. Then he said, "Aren't you out of tears yet?"
I cried harder.
"You'll run out of tears soon."
He was right. The well went dry and I learned force was not always effective.
My Dad left and I never saw nor heard from him again.
Things went from terrible to unimaginable in record time. My mother who I barely remembered before that seemed to have a nervous breakdown. She began to call me by my father's name. I hadn't ever really remembered much interaction with her before my Dad left. But after he was gone it was impossible not to have the indelible print of the back of her hand forever etched in my memory, let alone my face.
We moved from our rented house to a run down one bedroom apartment with cockroaches. We went on the welfare and the food stamps. A full day included no breakfast and a smorgasbord of hair pulling, face smacking, and the occasional objet d'art thrown in my general direction.
Not only did I lose my Dad, within one short month I lost my cats, my name and my peace of mind.
"Welcome to the real world, brat."
Those pearls of wisdom were the extent of my inheritance.
Things were not so bad at school. It turned out I had an extremely high IQ and an aptitude for drawing and painting. As part of the President's, "Great Society" programs I somehow ended up in an alternative school for gifted children. There were only nine of us in the class plus our teacher Mrs. Clausewitz.
"Ve vill haff discipline, children. You vill not be permitted to squander your gifts. You vill serve a higher purpose."
Mrs. Clausewitz was very strict but if we obeyed her she made us feel as if we were special.
"You vill be leaders vun day. You must take your rightful place in history," she would tell us before our morning calisthenics.
Oddly enough we never had to say the Pledge like at my old school.
But at night it was always the same. Pure torture.
If I recall it was just a week or so before Christmas and we had already been buried in snow.
"What's for dinner, Mom?"
"DINNER!?!?!?!?!? DINNER!?!?!? YOU WANT DINNER?!?!?!!? WELL EAT THIS!!!!"
SMACK!!
Then she would address me by my long gone father's name and beat me till she was too tired to lift her arms.
That night was particularly brutal because I made the mistake of trying to fight back.
I punched her in the face as hard as I could and that was it.
After pulling my hair and throwing me into the wall she stripped me to my underwear and threw me out in the hallway and locked the apartment door.
I rang the bell over and over but she ignored me. I sat down on the cold floor in front of my door and sobbed quietly.
A door at the end of the hallway slowly opened and an old man with hair white as snow poked his head out. His head ducked back in, then out again, only this time a pair of bifocals sat perched at the end of his nose.
He came out in his red ratty bathrobe with matching slippers and shuffled down the hall towards me.
When he reached me he only said, "Hello. My name is Mark."
"That's my name, too," I snuffed.
He reached into the pocket of his robe and pulled out an unopened package of Kleenex. He popped it open with a too long fingernail and handed it to me.
"You have snot on your lip, son."
I took out some tissues and blew my nose and wiped my mouth.
He looked down at me and adjusted his glasses.
"That's a lot better."
I handed him the pack of tissues but he said, "Keep them."
I was embarrassed. I wished he'd go back in his apartment.
"I realize this must be embarrassing for you, young man. My mother was very strict when I was your age too. Very strict . So, please, do not be embarrassed. Perhaps I should have a word with your parents?"
"No. Please."
"I'm afraid I cannot leave you here on the cold floor, young man. No. That will never do."
He rang my bell. Then after a while he rang some more. Time passed and the old man seemed to be growing impatient.
"Okay. Enough of this horseshit," he muttered under his breath and then began to pound on the door.
"Yeah. Yeah. Hold on."
The door flung open and my mother stared at the old man wide eyed.
"What do you want?"
"I want to know why your son is sitting on the cold floor in his underwear, Mrs...?"
"Because Jackson has been very very bad!"
The old man looked at me and said, "I thought your name was Mark?"
"Jackson is my Dad's name. He's gone."
The old man thought for a second and then nodded.
"I'm sorry but your son does not look well. What exactly is going on?"
"None of your beeswax is what's going on Mister. So why don't you butt out?"
The old man reached in to the same pocket the Kleenex had come from. This time he pulled out a thin leather wallet and flipped it open.
It was a badge.
"My name is Mark Hittel. I'm an FBI agent and your neighbor at the end of the hall."
"How nice for you. Now why don't you get lost?"
My mother began to push the door closed but the old man grabbed the handle and flung it open hard. My mother lost her balance and the old man grabbed her by her hair.
"Wh-what-"
"Listen lady," the old man hissed. "I could have you brought up on a list of charges long as my arm. As a matter of fact I can make sure that you never see the light of day again. Maybe I take you to a special place we have for dirty birdies like you. A special place where there's no lawyers and no phone calls. But there's plenty of rats. Hungry ones at that. You should fit right in, huh?"
"I-I-I never hurt Jackson. He's always telling lies."
SMACK
My jaw dropped. He had grabbed my mother by the sweater and hit her across the face with the back of his hand. Her eyes had gone all koogly for a second.
"Lady. I can end you. And I'll do it and never lose a minute of sleep. I will bury you alive. Do you understand?"
My mother said nothing.
"I need to hear it. Tell me you understand."
"I-I-I understand."
"Louder."
"I UNDERSTAND!"
"That's better. Now you're being reasonable. That's good. Now I'm going to be taking a very special interest in you and Mark, from now on."
My mother said nothing. She rubbed her face where the back of the old man's hand had struck her.
"What's the kid's name?"
"Jack-"
SMACK
"Try again."
"Mark. It's Mark."
"There. That's not so hard, is it? To remember your own son's name. Maybe not beat him up? You don't like being roughed up much either, do ya lady?"
My mother looked down and whispered, "No."
"Wonderful! Now close the door lady. Mark and I have some things to discuss."
My mother thought for a second. The old man looked at her cross. The door closed.
The old man squatted down and said, "Some of my Grandson's clothes are in my apartment. They should fit you. And I've got pizza and color television. You like television and pizza, Mark?"
I felt embarrassed. It felt like welfare and food stamps.
"Listen kid," he said and opened his robe and pulled up his shirt a bit.
A long thick ugly scar snaked from his belly button to the gray hairs of his chest.
"When I was a little older than you my mother did this. With a hot knife. So don't feel funny about nothing. My wife died last year and my family lives on the other side of the country. You'd be doing me a favor. I could use some company."
I didn't say anything.
"So. Mark. Can you do a fellow Mark a little favor and share some pizza and Gunsmoke with me?"
I nodded slightly.
The old man's face brightened. "That's the stuff, kid!"
...
That night was the last time my mother ever laid hands upon me. She wasn't particularly nice but she knew the FBI were watching her. I didn't feel much sympathy for her.
Mostly after school I would knock on Mark's door and he would feed me and ask me how my day at school was and then we would watch his big color TV. Our favorite show was Star Trek.
A few days later Mark said, "Mark. I need a favor."
"What?"
"I want to get a Christmas tree. Will you help me pick one out?"
"Sure! Sure I will! You bet."
We got a real big sweet smelling Christmas tree and we decorated it together until late in the night. We drank hot cocoa with little marshmallows and Mark played me his old Glenn Miller records.
Mark stooped over to plug in the lights and the whole tree lit up in its multi-color glory.
"Wow. Cool!"
"It is. Isn't it."
...
"Where you going?" my mother sneered.
"To Mark's."
"What does that old man want with you anyway? Does he touch you?"
I just shook my head and slid down the hallway in my tube socks till I got to Mark's door.
I did the special FBI secret knock that sounded like, "Shave and a haircut."
Mark knocked back, "Two bits."
Then the door opened and Mark was dressed in a sweater and tie and had shaved.
"Merry Christmas, Mark."
"Merry Christmas to you too."
That night we watched Christmas specials on the television and ate turkey with all the trimmings.
"Well, son. I got you a little something for Christmas."
I frowned.
"What's wrong?"
"I don't have anything for you."
"Tut tut, little man. Your friendship is the greatest gift of all. And Christmas is for children. So..., do you want your gift or not?"
"Yeah I want it? You crazy?"
"Let's not change the subject," he chuckled. He made a fuss under the Christmas tree and gave me a big box wrapped in festive red paper with a big silver bow.
"Wow! What is it?"
"Really? You want me to tell you or you want to rip it open live a savage and find out for yourself?"
"Rip it open like a savage?"
"Damn straight, kid!"
Mark lit a filterless Lucky Strike and drank some of his whiskey.
I ripped it open and it was a, See 'n Say, The Farmer Says.... Just like I had been seeing on television all week.
"Oh wow! This is so cool!!!!!"
"You like it, kid?"
"Wow. This is the best gift anybody ever gave me!"
Mark blew a smoke ring and gave a knowing nod.
That night he drank whiskey and I drank eggnog and we watched TV till late in the night. I fell asleep on the couch and he covered me up with a quilt.
I heard him whisper, "Goodnight, mini-moi..." as I drifted off to sleep, snug as a bug in a rug.
...
It was a great Christmas vacation but as 1966 became 1967 strange days had found me.
School was getting stranger all the time. Mrs. Clausewitz had begun the new year teaching us about both World Wars and how after World War I all of Europe and the United States had punished Germany pushing them into a depression so bad that people were burning cash to stay warm during winter.
"But the folk had vun thing that this nation lacks; discipline. And that vill be zis year's theme. Ve must haff discipline. And all will be revealed."
I was fairly obedient and I think Mrs. Clausewitz secretly liked me.
"I see great zings in your future, Mark. Ve must be patient for all vill be revealed in due time."
But some of the other kids who talked during class or passed notes, well, things did not go so well for them.
There was ear pulling. And the stick.
Mrs. Clausewitz would stroll the aisles with her long wooden dowel stick, wrapping the knuckles of the other eight boys whenever they would lapse into even the slightest of infractions.
"No talking, please." WHACK
"No chewing gum, please." WHACK
Well, you get the picture.
And over the coming months it got worse. We would stand at attention for an hour a day. We would march in line kicking our legs high. But it was never high enough.
"Higher! Higher!"
We would learn of the magnificent history of the German peoples and how destiny was not through with them.
We learned about the corrupt Jewish bankers and the lazy black underclasses.
"Be proud of your race, boys. For you are the chosen ones."
...
That night over pizza Mark and I were watching the television.
Some policemen down in Mississippi were beating black people in the streets and shooting them with fire hoses.
The policemen held big German shepherds on short leashes as they lunged at the black people baring their fangs.
"Why are they hitting them, Mark?" I asked.
"That's not a question with a simple answer, Mark."
"Mrs. Clausewitz says black people are lazy."
Mark nodded knowingly.
Then he suddenly brightened.
"Hey! Star Trek should be starting in a few minutes. Why don't we bookmark that question and boldly go where no man has gone before?"
"Okay!"
...
About a week later at school Rudolph Hessman and Albert Lancemeyer were having a fist fight over a game of colors.
"I won. You owe me that Sandy Koufax!"
"Did not!"
"Did too!"
Mrs. Clausewitz came into the room to see Rudolph straddling Albert's chest and punching his face.
"Boys!"
They both looked up.
"Albert! Fight back like a man!" Mrs. Clausewitz ordered.
"What?" Rudolph said, stunned.
THWACK
She hit Rudolph across his head with the dowel stick.
"Did I say to stop fighting? Are you a coward?"
Rudolph hesitated.
"Hit him Rudolph! Ze weak must suffer!"
He hit Albert.
"Fight back, Albert. You fat little lump!"
The rest of the class sat quietly while Rudolph and Albert fought until Albert's face was a bloody mess.
"Enough! Albert! Go to the nurse. Rudolph, go vash your face then take your seat."
...
For the first time when I came home from school Mark was not home. There was a note on his door that read, "Back tomorrow. -Mark".
That night my Mom's new boyfriend Steve was over. They sat at the kitchen table holding a spoon over a candle. I went to my room and shut the door.
I had read all my comic books and was bored. I picked up my See 'n Say.
I pointed at the cow and pulled the string.
"The cow says, 'You must push Rudolph down the well, Mark."
I shook my head in disbelief.
I pulled the string again.
"The cow says, 'Rudolph is evil. He will lure you to the well. You must push him in."
I looked around the small room with the peeling paint.
I felt a chill.
I pulled the string.
It slid steadily back inside the toy as the farmer said, "Kill Rudolph Hessman tomorrow. Or else. Tell nobody."
I pulled it again.
"The cow says, 'Moooooooooooooo................'."
...
When I awoke the next morning it was a beautiful day. I didn't feel beautiful inside. I felt gray.
There was nothing to eat in the refrigerator. I went to the bathroom to pee and found my mother sitting naked on the toilet with a needle sticking out of her arm. She was snoring.
From inside the bathtub, her boyfriend snored.
I went to the kitchen and peed in an empty jelly jar and then poured it down the sink.
I left for school.
That afternoon at recess Rudolph said to me, "Mark. I know where there's buried treasure."
"Where?"
"It's a secret. You have to come with me but you can't tell anyone or I'll have to kill you."
"Okay," I heard myself say even though I had meant to say, "No.".
We went through the woods behind the school traveling down a long ravine. We found a path and followed it until we got to a manhole.
"It's buried down here," Rudolph said. "Help me get the lid off."
"Okay."
We had gotten the lid off. It was a deep well that had metal rungs that descended into the blackness.
"You sure it's down there?"
"Sure, I'm sure," Rudolph said.
"Lead the way. I'll follow." I said.
"Don't chicken out."
"You're the leader. I will follow the leader. No chickens involved."
Rudolph looked at me.
"Yeah. I am the leader," he said, his thumb tapping his chest.
He began to climb down the ladder into the void. When all I could see were the tops of his fingers I scooted to the edge and kicked him hard in the face.
"What?!?!?"
I stomped on his fingers.
"Stop! Mark! Stop!"
"I'm sorry, Rudolph. The farmer says I should kill you."
"Please. Stop. I'm losing my grip."
I pushed the big manhole cover back in place as he continued to beg me to stop.
Then I went back to class where we learned about the evils of communism and loose morals.
...
That night over pizza Mark told me, "Mark. I have to go away for a few days. They're going to fumigate my apartment. It seems I have critters in the walls."
I frowned.
"You'll be all right. I already spoke to your mother, and, ahem, reminded her to behave."
"Can I go with you?"
"I'm afraid not. I have to visit my family. You can't come."
I nodded.
That night in my room I took out my See 'n Say.
I pointed the farmer at the sheep.
"The sheep says, 'Albert's next. Down the well with him, Mark."
I pulled the string again.
"Albert is evil, Mark. It's you or him. Down the well he goes."
I pulled it again.
"The sheep says, 'Bahhhhhhhhhhhhh....'"
...
"No! Mark! Please! Let me up!"
"Sorry Albert. The farmer says you must die."
"Please!"
I stomped on his head and he disappeared down the hole. Forever.
3rd week of April, 1967
Monday
"The pig says, 'Julius is next. Down the well with him, Mark.'"
Tuesday
"The dog says, 'Walhter is next. Down the well with him, Mark.'"
Wednesday
"The turkey says, 'Dolf is next. Down the well with him, Mark.'"
Thursday
"The pig says, 'Martin is next. Down the well with him, Mark.'"
Friday
"The coyote says, 'Hermann and Gustav go together. Down the well with them both, Mark.'"
By Friday afternoon the sheriff and the FBI were all over the school. I was the only one left in class.
It was just me and Mrs. Clausewitz.
That night in the parking lot a bullet found its way into her left eye.
They closed the school and I was sent back to my old one.
...
That night the police broke down my door to come and arrest Steve and my mother. But it was too late. They were laying dead in the bathtub. Needles dangling from the tracked up flesh of their arms.
There was a note. It read:
You'll find them all in the well. Mrs. Clausewitz was too fat to fit so I shot her. I hope they all rot in hell.
- Steve
PS- The kid was next.
...
Children's Services came to get me that afternoon.
"I want to stay with Mark!" I screamed.
"Who's Mark?" one lady said to another.
"He's Mark."
"No! Another Mark! He's my friend at the end of the hall. He works for the FBI. Please. Just knock on his door. He'll tell you!"
They disappeared for a few minutes and left me with a police lady in my living room.
The two ladies from Children's Services returned and one of them said, "Bring the boy."
They walked me down the hall. My landlord Mr. Whipple stood in front of Mark's door.
He put his key in the latch and turned it. Then he opened the door.
They walked me inside.
The apartment was empty.
"I tole you. Apartment's been empty since 1963."
"You'll have to come with us, Mark."
...
That first night I stayed at the house of one of the ladies from Children's Services.
"You've had a hard day, dear. Please try and get some sleep."
Then she turned out the light.
I was alone. In the dark.
I reached under the bed and grabbed my See 'n Say.
I pulled the string.
"The farmer says, 'Hi Mark. It's Mark. I want to thank you. You not only saved my life but the lives of three billion people.
I was not a good man. I grew up angry. I came to power. I sought vengeance against the living.
There were camps. They were not pretty. They died by the millions. Every day like clockwork.
But my inner circle grew too ambitious.
It was a bloodless coup. They had me put under house arrest. But how could I have predicted it? That Rudolph and Albert would use the doomsday device! The fools! I tried to stop them but it was too late.
Billions dead. Civilization reduced to rubble. The air too contaminated to breathe. Humanity on its last seconds of borrowed time.
That's when I knew I had to go back.
The only way to stop it was before it could begin.
And it all began with you, Mark. You and Mrs. Clausewitz and the school for the gifted.
Trust me son, the future was nothing like Star Trek. The few lived parasitical existences on the backs of the many. But thanks to you that has all changed. With your help we've pushed the genie back into the bottle and erased this horrific timeline.
You see, Mark. We shared more than a name.
We shared a soul.'"
Then silence.
I pulled the string.
"The farmer says, 'Have a nice life, Mark. And remember, hatred is the first and only refuge for those too weak to think for themselves.'"
I pulled the string again.
"The farmer says, 'That's the cow. The cow says, 'Moooooo............'".
Later that year I was adopted by a nice family from New Hampshire. They showered me with love and the farmer never asked me to beat ploughshares into swords again.
Submitted April 20, 2015 at 10:36AM by mypumassmellfunky http://ift.tt/1O6Q0jY WTFiction
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