God will have his revenge. That’s what I’ve always heard. It’s what my mother would tell me after a fight in school while she knelt in front of me, twisting a tissue between her fingers and dabbing it on my busted lip. She was the only good in my world growing up. Always kind, never angry. Never angry when I would cuss out another eighth grader for spitting some sort of poorly planned vitriol at me in the school hallway. Never angry when I would get caught shoplifting at a local convenience store. Not even angry when I put Jimmy Nelson in the hospital with a broken nose. Always kind. I think about her sometimes, on the better days. I used to let that phrase roll around in my head, like a bad pop song that just won’t stop playing in your mind. God will have his revenge. For a time, I even believed it. I hear it even now as I look at the photograph. The one that reminds me of what they looked like. Stacy and Eddie. My wife and son. I’m there too, cracking a genuine smile at the camera. A reflection of the happiest time of my life, all because of them. All because of her. She pulled me from the depths of being a troubled and hateful kid. She was tough; knocked some sense into me on more than one occasion. And I was better for it. I can count the people who meant the most to me on one hand. I feel the lump in my throat. I shouldn’t reflect on these things. Not when there’s work to do. I glance out the window. The sun is setting and I can see him sitting in my car. He’s waiting. He’s been waiting a long time. So have I. I go into the bedroom and open the closet. The black duffel bag is poorly hidden under some empty luggage and shoeboxes. Inside of it are my tools. Some are traditional tools. I’ve got zip ties, a length of rope, duct tape, needle nose pliers, a box cutter, a small hand saw, and a drill. Some are a little less traditional. Several scalpels, a melon baller, a barbed fishing hook, and a handful of syringes full of tetradotoxin, a powerful paralytic. I stuff a handgun into the back of my jeans and pull my jacket over it before stepping out of my suburban home. The streets are quiet as I throw my bag into the trunk and get in the car. He doesn’t speak until I turn the ignition. “Is man not the tool with which He executes His revenge?” He says to me, although I’m not listening. This is the thirty-fourth time I have gotten behind the wheel of this car with my current agenda. Thirty-three times of failing to muster the courage required to pull it off. I used to pray. I used to pray for the ability to forgive. And then I settled for the ability to forget, to have refuge from the things that I have seen. The things that I should not have survived through. But God didn’t answer. I am in his home. I have been here before, I have planned this for many years. We are in his basement and he is bound before me; a pig ready for slaughter. His eyes dart up at me and his wheezing, throaty yells are muffled by his gag. I close my eyes and reach my hand in the bag and select a tool at random. The handsaw. Excellent choice. He tries to roll from me but there is nowhere to go. I take my time, listening to my boots scrape against the gritty concrete floor of his basement before kneeling by his side. I think that he’s telling me he’s sorry and yes, of course he would. I let the teeth of the saw dig into the flesh of his leg just a little bit. A tease before I begin my work. “You’re doing the world a service,” my passenger says to me, awakening me from my fantasy and returning me to our drive. “Some men just don’t belong.” I don’t answer. I rarely do. I’m not doing this for him and I couldn’t give two fucks about the world. The world’s never done me any good. All it’s done is show me what life could be. It let me have a taste of happiness only to rip it from my hands and desecrate it while I watched. I told them it was okay, that everything would be fine. It was my responsibility to keep them from harm, to protect them. And I watched them realize I was lying when he began to torment them. I thought that I knew cruelty. I thought I knew the worst of the world. He showed me that I was wrong. He showed me the darkness that cowers in the hearts of men you trust. The same darkness and fear that granted his plea bargain and prevented his justice from reaching full term; releasing him back into the world, a free man. I turn the steering wheel and merge onto the highway. It takes me 15 minutes, depending on traffic, to travel from my home to his home. That’s how close the monsters are. They’re right outside of your door. The sun has set below the horizon and the sky has gone from its palette of warm orange to a darkened blue. Every night that I’ve taken this trip, I have timed it perfectly so that I get there at nightfall. I am in his home and he does not know it. I can hear Sinatra playing in the kitchen, the smell of the hot oven permeating throughout each room. He is singing along. “That’s life. That’s what people say. You’re riding high in April – Shot down in May.” The music is loud enough to conceal my footsteps along his polished hardwood floors. I have a syringe in my hand, my thumb against the plunger. I’ve squeezed a good squirt of liquid out of the needle and flicked the tip, just like in the TV shows. I am enjoying this. I quietly approach the kitchen and can see him through the open doorway. He is slicing something on a cutting board and I am acutely aware of the blade. I stand by and wait for him to leave it, which he does when he crosses to the refrigerator. Now is my chance. He opens the refrigerator door and I quietly step forward, breaching the light of the kitchen. I put my hand over his mouth and pull him into my chest. He doesn’t have time to struggle before I push my syringe into his throat and release the toxin. I make sure he has time to see my face as I lay him to the floor. His eyes show many things. Shock, desperation, anger. I revel in all of them. It is not the same degree of anguish that I had felt. But I have come to terms with the fact that it never will be. This will have to do. I go to get my tools. A car merges in front of me and my trance is broken. They are becoming more and more frequent. Each daydream makes my heart race and I lose myself to them everywhere. A friendly conversation at work will end when my eyes lock into the hidden foray of my own mind. I can see the pity in their eyes when I return. They can’t see the murder in mine. His home is ahead and my palms are sweaty. The old steering wheel is beginning to crumble in my hands from wear. The bits stick to my hand and I wipe them on my pants. I sneak a glance at my passenger and he is smiling. His eyes are yearning and lustful. He stares forward, keeping his eyes on the approaching home, and speaks. “For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer.” I stop the car in front of his home. I approach his door and put my shoulder through it, feeling the lock give under my weight. He is in the sitting room, reclined back and watching a television show. He stands to run or defend himself, and I fire two shots from my handgun into his left leg. One lands in his thigh, the other his knee cap. He crumbles to the floor and I beat his face with the cold steel of my gun. He will know justice. I stop when I see that he has quit resisting and I turn the gun on myself. I cannot live in a world without them. I open the door to my car and retch onto the pavement outside. My fear is too strong and I have failed again. My passenger is silent but I can sense his dissatisfaction. I sit up in my seat and he has already gone. I pay no mind to him. He may think this task is his but he is just along for the ride. I can feel myself grow stronger every day. I will be back tomorrow. Tomorrow is the day.
Submitted June 23, 2017 at 06:34AM by PM_me_something_real http://ift.tt/2t0oXT4 shortstories
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