A Time For Monsters

by Gareth Worthington

  “Yeah, I guess.” Rey sauntered after Jiji, silently judging the backless top and absence of a bra on a girl whose massive chest clearly required support.

  Rey rubbed at her wrist which throbbed a little. “Why does my bloody wrist hurt?”

  “Don’t ’cha remember?” Jiji asked, her head cocked, an annoying crooked smirk on her face.

  “If I remembered, I wouldn’t ask, would I?”

  “You proper bottl’d that prick. Right in tha ’ed. Bouncers threw you out!”

  Rey furrowed her brow and attempted to squeeze the memory from her still-pickled brain. There had been a guy. With his friends. Rey hadn’t recognized them, so they weren’t locals. Probably navy boys. They’d bought her and Jiji more drinks. Rey had been getting off with one of them in the corner of the club, “Pony” by Ginuwine playing loudly as everyone bumped and grinded.

  “Jesters?” Rey asked.

  Jiji nodded.

  It had been dark and full of cigarette smoke, but Rey had been too drunk to care. The name of the guy with his tongue down her throat remained elusive, but she did recall he’d had a small dick. It had fit snugly in the palm of her hand as she jerked him off at the back of the room. But something had caught her eye. A scuffle. A struggle.

  Jiji.

  Two friends of Little Dick had surrounded her, concealed in the crowd of drunken revelers. One of the guys had her held from behind, his hands up her dress. The other guy facing her had grabbed her by the throat with one hand and shoved the other down the front of her panties. They had been trying to finger her at the same time as if it was a sport. Jiji hadn’t said anything but squirmed and fidgeted, her pained eyes brimming with tears.

  Why the fuck had she let them do this?

  Rey’s memory crystalized now, the images coming thick and fast. She’d shoved off Little Dick and stormed over. A sharp shove and the rear guy had fallen on his ass. Throat Grabber had turned on Rey. She’d snatched a bottle of Grolsch from a nearby girl and smashed the beer over the pervert’s head, which had sent him sprawling. Rage had consumed every cell in her body. Rey’d leaped on Throat Grabber and hammer fisted his face over and over. She’d screamed long and loud, emptying her fury into a now silent dancehall, the punters staring in disbelief. The next thing Rey remembered was having her arm twisted by a bouncer three times her size and then being thrown into the street, Jiji hot on her heels.

  “I got thrown out because a couple of idiots tried to finger fuck you.”

  Jiji nodded again. “But then you fucked ’em up good!” She reenacted the swing of the beer bottle.

  “For fuck sake, Jiji. You gotta be careful. I’m not gonna be around to save your ass all the time. Just learn to say no.”

  “Yeah, I know.” Jiji shrugged. The whole ordeal seemed to roll off her back as if it never happened. “Anyway, what’s on the cards today, me old maid?” Jiji fumbled with a loaf of bread and the toaster as if slotting those slices into the perfectly shaped holes was a task beyond her faculties.

  Rey huffed out her irritation and concentrated on something better: her new spending power. “Funny you should mention cards.” She pulled a credit card from her purse.

  “Anovver new one?”

  Rey shrugged, trying not to concentrate on Jiji’s irritating Janner diction. How was it that Rey could enunciate correctly and this posh tart sounded like she’d been dragged from the nearest farm?

  “Kinda,” Rey said finally. “I transferred the balance from the last one to this one. Better interest and I get more credit.”

  “Those fings are helluva expensive, and you’ll never pay it ov. You’ll just be payin’ the stupid interest foreva. I can buy those boots y—”

  “No,” Rey barked. “I’m fine. I have a job in Dingles, remember?”

  Rey smiled to herself. She’d gotten the part-time job in the upscale department store just walking through there one day. Never able to afford anything in that store, she liked to window shop and could put on the best, “I can afford it” act thanks to her mom’s tuition. The store assistant running the Tommy Hilfiger stand, touting some new perfume, had stopped her and asked if she’d be willing to do some promo work on the launch. The actual job had quickly followed. So, every Sunday, she was paid time and a half to convince Janners to part with their dole money for eau de toilettes they didn’t need. The wages covered her ever-increasing credit card bill.

  “I have my eye on those Moschino shoes. I think I’ll get them on the way home.”

  “Oh, yeah, I liked ’em, too,” Jiji said, a big smile plastered all over her makeup-smeared face.

  Without replying, Rey ate her toast and sipped her tea in relative silence, each swallow of food pushing down a swelling annoyance with the girl. Jiji had taken to Rey in a big way, even choosing to dress the same and buy the same clothes—clothes that for Rey came with 22.5% interest. Wasn’t it supposed to be the other way around? Jiji had the good parents, the money. Even a car—a Ford Fiesta—that she bombed around town in. Shouldn’t Rey be in awe of this girl? Emulating her? Perhaps Rey’s credit card bill spoke to her need to live in an upper echelon, but in no way did Rey admire Jiji. She was stupid. And if there was one thing Rey could not stand it was stupid people. Morons, unable to see the forest for the trees. Jiji would likely get knocked up fifteen times by ten different men before dying in an alcohol-riddled shithole. Why? Because she didn’t appreciate what she had.

  “I have to go home and change,” Rey said, slurping down the last mouthful of tea.

  “Oiright, me lover,” Jiji said. “Gimme me a hug. Back on for tonight though, right? Pound a pint night at Revolution.”

  “Yeah, I’ll be there,” Rey said, and then left to walk the hour-long trip home.

  Rey pushed the door open and slid her key from the lock. The air inside the house was thick, difficult for her lungs to process. Not because of a fire, or steam from a shower left running too long, but thick with emotion—anticipation, and fear. Rey’s gut knotted.

  What now?

  While Rey had great sympathy for her mom, the last few years—and the growth of the children into adults—had had an unexpected and somewhat unwelcome side effect. Their mom had rebelled. Not in a massively meaningful way. She hadn’t left. She hadn’t found a secret affair or even asked the police to intervene. Instead, she had taken to goading Joe. Poking the bear with things she knew would irritate him. Wearing something a little too revealing, flirting with the men in their new friend group—couples from Joe’s new job, the acquisition of which was a miracle in itself.

  Rey, better than Damien or even Riley, remembered her mom as a loving, soft woman who never considered cursing and to whom violence was abhorrent. Nearly two decades of living with Joe in a hellhole had changed her. Broken her. Now she drank and flirted and swore, and it riled Joe no end.

  This is what Rey couldn’t understand. Why didn’t her mother just leave already? There was no forgiving what Joe did, but do you blame the bull for gouging the matador when a red flag is waved?

  “Grimmy died,” Damien said.

  Rey snapped back to the moment, now aware she was just hovering in the hallway with the front door wide open. She closed it and then turned to her brother. “What?”

  “Grimmy,” he repeated. “Uncle Steve’s best mate. Speedball—coke and heroin—on his birthday. Steve came ‘round for a bit.”

  “Shit,” Rey huffed out, closing her eyes in both reverence of Grimmy and pained understanding of what was to follow.

  Steve and Kevin were mom’s half-brothers. Rey’s mom didn’t know who her dad was, and thus Rey’s lineage stopped with her absent maternal grandmother. A fact Rey would often use, telling people she was a quarter foreign. Sometimes Italian. Sometimes Spanish. As long as it sounded exotic. The problem with Steve and Kevin was they were gang members. Slightly younger than her mom, the boys were notorious in Plymouth and had been on the inside a couple of times. Steve, in particular, was not right in the head and had done time for grievo
us bodily harm after a guy wouldn’t hand over his kebab. Joe was scared of them and didn’t like Rey’s mom having too much to do with her younger half-siblings—lest they decide to turn their aggressive nature on him.

  Grimmy’s death meant Steve was here, which meant Joe was now in a foul mood. He’d be spouting that Rey’s uncles were a bad influence and they should not be allowed within ten feet of the children. This was of course bullshit. Joe didn’t care about Rey, Damien, or Riley. And if he’d ever bothered to speak with Steve or Kevin, he’d know the brothers were vehement about Rey and her siblings never becoming involved in their business. Kevin would give long speeches about how Rey needed to keep going and to finish university.

  A crash came from the bedroom.

  Rey dashed to the stairs and leaped two at a time up to the landing. Her mom had slammed the bedroom door and stormed to the bathroom. A long moment of silence passed before the bedroom door splintered as Joe came through it. He didn’t open it, he came through it. The wood ripped off its hinges and the paneling split open. He crashed through and powered toward the bathroom, then grabbed Rey’s mom by the hair and bent her head into the sink, screaming something unintelligible.

  Rey pushed past Damien who was now halfway up the staircase. She raced into the kitchen and into the walk-in area by the back door that stored all manner of crap from a lawnmower to a blow-up paddling pool. She immediately found what she wanted: a solid maple baseball bat. She clenched it tightly, imagining Joe’s skull caving in as she pummeled him.

  Through the kitchen again, and up the stairs, Rey reached the landing.

  Joe had backed off and slunk to the bedroom—the door still hanging awkwardly off its hinges. Her mom was curled up in a ball on the bathroom floor, any bravado she might have had stripped away. Damien stood at the top of the stairs, blocking Rey’s path to both the bedroom and the bathroom.

  “Get out of my way,” Rey said, lips peeled back in a snarl.

  “No,” Damien replied.

  “I’m gonna fucking kill him.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  It seemed today her brother’s allegiance was with Joe.

  “Don’t make me batter you, too, Damien. Fucking move!” She pointed the bat at her brother.

  “Put it down, Rey,” he said. “Just back the fuck off.”

  Rey’s resolve faded. What was she going to do? Smack her brother with a bat to get to Joe? That didn’t make sense. She stared into her brother’s deep blue eyes, heavy eyebrows—just like Joe’s—slung over them. He didn’t look angry, or sad, or upset. In fact, he didn’t seem to register any emotion at all.

  Rey screamed as she turned around and stomped down the stairs into the living room. The bat thumped against the couch over and over, her rage flowing outward onto the flower-covered fabric that couldn’t fight back. There were no tears, only pure and unadulterated hatred.

  After ten minutes of beating the sofa, Rey’s arms grew tired and the rage was spent, leaving only a hole in her chest. She flung the bat onto the opposite armchair and folded in a heap by the stereo.

  The equalizer lights blurred behind a film in her eyes, the digital display of the CD player unreadable. Rey’s fingers worked instinctively, popping open a CD case, slipping the silver disc into the tray, and skipping all the way to track number nine—“Two Beds and a Coffee Machine” by Savage Garden. The opening piano notes made her skin prickle, and the tears that had evaded her until now swelled. This song was a departure for Darren Hayes and Daniel Jones. A devastatingly accurate song, telling of domestic violence as seen from the point of view of a child—him actually. Only having lived it could he possibly string the images and feelings and actions so eloquently. How his mother had tried to run but had to go home to buy groceries. How the mind of a child is an amazing thing, able to rationalize almost every horror. And how, in the end, you build a fortress to keep out the world. Today, another slab of concrete had been cemented into Rey’s battlement. Laid against the stereo, something inside crumbled, and Rey simply cried and cried and cried.

  Oslo, Norway, 2016

  “Two Beds and a Coffee Machine” was another song Rey refused to play but would never delete from her library. Hearing it dropped a leaden weight into her heart like no other, and could reduce her to a sobbing mess after only two bars. The shrill piano notes filled her empty vessel with anguish, confusion, and hurt—the kind only experienced by children oblivious as to the reasons, if any, they are being abused by those supposed to love them the most.

  Today, the thought of this song elicited rage.

  This was new.

  Never had Darren’s soft voice caused a violent reaction in her before. The idea of Huakaas’s wife having to create alibis for the latest bruise, his daughter hiding in a corner to avoid watching her mother cower in fear, flooded Rey’s mind with imagery of bashing in the detective’s skull. This rage kept her feet marching on, one after the other, robotically down the dark street.

  The cheap jacket she’d bought had the advantage of having a hood and being waterproof, protecting her from the shroud of constant sleet-cum-rain, but was thin as hell and so the cold of the early evening, usually bearable, seemed emboldened. Still, Rey’s concern was not for her health but for the task at hand. This kill would be tricky. Normally, Rey had time to scope out a location. Take the time and proper precautions. Today, she was under time pressure. Leif’s murder had to occur when planned because he was her exit strategy—he was necessary. The absolute final piece. Huakaas was a bonus. Deep inside, Rey hoped the detective’s punishment would help pull satisfaction from within her—since Henrik’s demise had not elicited the emotions for which she’d hoped. This detective’s insult was fresh and raw and had buried into Rey’s mind like a tick, infecting her thoughts.

  You dealt with ticks by burning them out, then ripping the little fucker’s heads off. It was his fault she’d been hospitalized, his fault she was now sleeping on the street, and his fault she’d been attacked and had to kill two teens.

  Once at Huakaas’s house, she had two options: find him alone and take the opportunity to kill him immediately, or survey the place for a little while and come back later in the evening and then kill him. The latter would mean she could set it up to look like the blood bath of victims she’d already left behind, to look like the King Kubb Killer. She’d need time to acquire protective gear, and a bottle of akevitt and to sterilize it. On the other hand, killing him in an opportune moment might just be easier. Maybe she could make it look like the other two teens, like a copycat killer of some kind or just a random act.

  Rey clenched her jaw and muttered to herself, “Or you can fucking leave it, Rey. You’re so damn close.”

  Someone bumped into Rey’s shoulder as they stormed by, head down, knocking her out of her trance. She looked up and found that she’d actually reached her destination and was now just hovering openly on the street.

  “Shit.” Rey sidled up to the wall next to the stairs that led to the first floor of the apartment block. “Get your head together, Rey. Are you doing this or not?” she said under her breath.

  With her jaw and resolve set, Rey stuffed earbuds into her ears, then pulled out her phone to scroll the playlist. Need something, she thought. Using shuffle play, Rey skipped nearly twenty tracks, before she stopped on track twenty-one. More piano notes. Once again, a somber key. Perhaps it was because she’d just been thinking of Savage Garden’s song and their own effective use of piano, or it could have been due to the cold dark sky and bitter falling rain—either way, the song fit. “Hello” by Evanescence.

  Amy Lee’s voice had always held a certain sway with Rey. Unique, light, and operatic set against heavy metal guitars. There were only a few bands who had come close. Within Temptation, a Dutch group had a similar setup—but Amy was still the queen. In a literal sense, “Hello” had been written by Amy to describe her point of view as a six-year old being told about her three-year-old sister’s death. For Rey, the song spoke to the deat
h of her own inner child—the formation of a mask, an alter ego that allowed her to survive the cruelty of the world. In fact, the song seemed to Rey to be told from the point of view of that very alter ego: the lie living for her so her true self could hide. This was a mask Huakaas’s daughter, no doubt, had to create to survive watching her mother being beaten and hospitalized.

  Rey adjusted the hood of her jacket, pushed off the wall, rounded the railing, and took two stairs at a time to reach the top. He could be on any floor, so she’d have to check each one—starting right there. She checked the street, which seemed devoid of people, then edged up to the first window to peer in.

  Inside it was dark, save for some dim lighting from under the cupboard that hung over the kitchen sink, and a small area for food preparation. Whoever lived there didn’t cook much. There were no pots or pans to be seen, no utensils readily available to cut or ladle. Instead, where culinary materials might be, stood a lonely picture frame—though in the poor light Rey couldn’t make out who was in the picture.

  At the window was a desk covered in paper—messy and disorganized—and a laptop facing inward. Brown card folders, pens, scribblings. Nothing legible in this light.

  So dark, maybe they’re not home?

  She edged a little farther around the frame. Rain streaked down the window, obscuring her view, but between the tiny rivers on the glass, she could make out newspapers covering the floor. They did not look fresh. Dirty boot prints and small black pebbles littered the crumpled sheets of inked paper. No, not pebbles—shit. The owner of the dried-out fecal bullets hopped from a gloomy corner. Almost as large as a small dog, the floppy-eared rabbit snuffled around its own crap.

  “That rabbit looks familiar,” Rey whispered. “Huakaas.”

  Rey stepped back to search for a way in when movement inside made her freeze. From a darkened doorway concealed at the back of the room, Arne Huakaas stumbled out. In his home, he appeared weaker than in the hospital. A little frame, slight hunch, ashen beard, and craggy face.