by Ike Hamill
When the second scream echoed through the house, it set off a fresh wave of barking from the dog next door. James suddenly remembered what had woken him up.
He moved to the doorway.
He’d spent enough time at the Millers’ to navigate their second floor in the dark, but still, he banged into the wall before he found the stairs. He flipped the light switch. Nothing happened. James felt his way down the stairs, relying on the banister to keep his balance.
At the bottom of the stairs, the doorway at the end of the hall flickered with blue light. James turned towards it. The shape of Mrs. Miller, Greta, filled the doorway. She had her arms out to her sides, gripping the doorway to hold herself up.
James opened his mouth to call to her. He closed it again without speaking.
She took an uncertain step forward. James held his ground.
With her next step, her leg didn’t support her. She spun and began to fall. James rushed forward, but didn’t make it in time to catch her. She crashed to the floor of the hall. The light wasn’t very bright. The blue light gave James just enough detail to pick out the horror of Mrs. Miller’s face. Deep gouges ran down her cheeks. The blood looked like ink in the blue light. Jutting from her eye sockets were the metal ends of two pieces of silverware. One was sunk so deep that James couldn’t identify the utensil. On the other, he could see the beginning of the fork’s tines before they disappeared into her flesh.
He rose carefully, trying to keep perfectly silent. He could hear giggling from the kitchen.
When he tilted his head through the doorway, James saw the back of a figure at the stove. The young man was naked. It took him a second to recognize him as his friend, Bobby.
Bobby giggled again. The voice clearly originated from the naked young man at the stove, but it didn’t sound like him. Bobby turned away from the stove’s blue flame and held up the thing that tickled his funny bone. It was the glowing red end of a spoon that he had heated up over the flame. James could smell his friend’s flesh searing as he gripped the hot metal.
Bobby didn’t seem to care. He transferred the glowing spoon to his other hand and reached for another from the open silverware drawer.
Despite his fear, James was about to call to Bobby. This had to be a mistake of some sort. His friend wasn’t capable of hurting his own mother. Again, James stopped himself from forming the words. Something caught his eye and then captured his attention.
It was Mike Miller, over by the back door. Between the door and the window, there was a patch of wall with a bulletin board. The Miller family used this board to display photos, pictures Bobby had drawn when he was little, and the weekly grocery list. This night, the board bore a much greater weight. Mr. Miller was pinned to the board by forks jammed through his bathrobe. His head was tilted towards the floor. James hoped to get his attention until he saw the dark stains on Mr. Miller’s t-shirt.
James shot his eyes back to Bobby, when he sucked in a hissing breath. James saw that his friend had pressed one of the hot spoons to his own chest. The skin crackled with the heat. When Bobby let go, the spoon stuck there for a second before it fell to the floor. Bobby giggled again.
It was time to run. There was no hope for Mrs. Miller, but Bobby’s dad might still be alive.
James couldn’t seem to make himself move. If he could simply back away, the front door was right at the end of the hall. He could be out into the night while Bobby seared another spoon to his chest.
As soon as James had the thought, Bobby noticed him. His eyes looked up while his head was still tilted down. His hands were still playing their game of heating and searing, but Bobby’s eyes were locked onto James.
James started to slide his foot backwards. He began to shift his weight away from the kitchen.
He stopped when Bobby began to whisper. His friend sounded hopeless, and sad. “I didn’t want to do it,” he whispered. “I can’t stop myself.”
Bobby’s eyes looked down again.
# # # # #
James ran. He leaped over Mrs. Miller’s body and reached for the front door. Behind him, Bobby began to giggle again.
The sidewalk pulled at his socks. James leaped again—this time over the spot where his mother’s body had been found. He slowed as he approached his own house and nearly kept running. He could see the tire tracks from where the ambulance had pulled up on the grass next to the garage. Death was here, too. He stopped on the sidewalk. He remembered Bobby and Mr. Miller. He needed a phone.
The lawn was crunchy and cold under his socks. The front door was locked. James patted his pockets and realized that his keys must be back at Bobby’s house.
He went to the kitchen door. With a rock, he busted out a pane of glass and let himself in. He stepped carefully over the entrance, and still managed to step on a shard. He hopped on one foot to the phone and called in the emergency.
They told him to stay put, but James didn’t want to stay in the dark house. He kept looking out the back window towards the picnic table, where he’d found his father. Each time he looked, he expected to see his father’s limp shape, resting with his forehead down on the wood. He kept his eyes moving as he leaned back against the table and raised his foot. He plucked the glass from his foot—it wasn’t deep—and tossed it towards the door. He removed his wet socks.
James forced himself to go down the hall to his room.
The door to his father’s office was still open.
In his room, James pulled on a sweater, a fresh pair of socks, and old shoes. He grabbed what little money he had stashed in his desk and found a second set of car keys. He imagined making his escape. He wanted to leave all the chaos behind. The world had become too unstable recently. He needed to find someplace more dependable.
Back in the hallway, his eyes were drawn to the office.
He took a careful step over the threshold and absorbed the unnatural sight of his father’s empty office. The walls seemed to be waiting for the typewriter’s clack.
James moved forward until he could see out the window to the back yard. The picnic table was just out of view. The typewriter was a tangle of keys and levers. The machine sang under his father’s fingers. James had never been able to coax one consistently-struck, error-free word from the device. His thoughts returned to his friend, Bobby. He could be anywhere by now. He could be creeping through the back yard, coming for James with a glowing fork. What a strange choice of weapon.
“…kills his whole family with silverware…”
James spun even though he knew the voice was only a memory. He found himself facing the stack of boxes that Bobby had violated. James couldn’t help himself. He had to understand the coincidence.
He opened the box.
The story was right there on top. James lifted it out, but it was too dark to read. He sat at his father’s desk and turned the chair so he could keep his eye on the doorway. James turned on the lamp and began to read.
# # # # #
The car screeched to a halt out front.
James tore his eyes from the story and rushed to the front door. The police car was next to the curb. Its lights were off. Not even the interior lights came on when the officer slid from the passenger’s door and came towards James’s house.
James turned on the front porch light.
He opened the door and greeted the officer.
“Who else is home?” the officer asked.
“Nobody,” James said. “I’m here alone.”
“Come with me.”
# # # # #
As he sat at the station, James had a lot of time to think.
Information came slowly from the police. Eventually, he learned the fate of his friends. They were like his second family. He’d spent so many nights with the Millers, and yet he felt himself disconnecting from them automatically, like it was nothing. His grief had cauterized him to further trauma.
One by one, he found out about their deaths.
An older officer that he recognized from the previo
us day informed him that Mrs. Miller had passed. James misunderstood. He thought the man was telling him that she had just passed. That meant that she was still alive when he had leaped over her still form. That meant that he should have tried to save her. After a flurry of questions, James got the correct version. She had been dead when the police arrived at the house.
An hour later, a different officer sat with James and explained that Mr. Miller hadn’t survived. Minutes after that James found out about the death of his friend, Bobby.
All he could think about was the story.
Bobby had read the story, and then somehow committed the same acts only hours later. Was it possible that Bobby had been mentally unstable, and reading that story had somehow pushed him over the edge and given him the modus for his operandi? Was Bobby a ticking time-bomb, ready to blow at the slightest provocation?
Had James ever sensed that his friend was unhappy at home? Did he seem disturbed or upset in any way?
“James?”
“Pardon?” James asked, snapped back from his thoughts.
“I asked if your friend was unhappy at home. Did he seem disturbed or upset?”
“Oh,” James said. “No. I mean, he was upset for me because of my dad, I guess. But not like…”
“Okay,” the officer said. “I’m going to ask Daniels to give you a ride. Do you have family you can stay with?”
James shook his head. “The Millers… They were the closest…” James couldn’t finish the sentence. The officer seemed to understand. Besides his dad and the Millers, James didn’t have anyone he would call family. All his grandparents had been dead since before he was born. He didn’t even have the full names or addresses of any cousins. His parents had been an island, and now James was out to sea.
Officer Daniels talked the whole way back to James’s house.
James didn’t hear a word of it. He was concentrating completely on two things—trying to remember the month and year that Ron had died, and thinking about the box of letters in his father’s room. When the unmarked car stopped at the curb, James jumped out and thanked Officer Daniels with a nod. He practically sprinted for the house. At his back, the sun was coming up.
James examined the sides of boxes, until he found one that Ron had opened. The dates were written on the side of each box, but he didn’t have to rely on that alone. His father had actually annotated one box with “RG.” Inside, one of the stories was marked “RG” as well. He lowered himself to the floor and read the document. He scrubbed the tears away as he read the story of how Ron had killed and died. The story didn’t mention the man’s name, but it didn’t need to. James had heard whispers of the story over the years. The gory details came out in the newspaper. Kids talked in little clusters around their lockers. Eventually, James had heard the story of the terrible acts his father’s friend had committed. Now, he was reading an account more detailed than even the police had reconstructed.
James’s next stop was the box of letters in his father’s room.
He opened the lid, but his hand froze when he pulled out the first envelope.
The boxes in the office had been marked with general warnings, that nobody should read the contents. These letters had specific instructions, written directly to James. He found it difficult to disobey his father’s explicit command, but he tore open the first letter. He wasn’t supposed to open it for another month.
His eyes scanned the content quickly. He shook his head, refusing to believe. He forced himself to start at the top and read it more carefully. The details fit what James had experienced, but it was impossible.
He carried the letter back to his father’s office. He saw the boxes again with new understanding, and new terror.
If it were true, they contained an unimaginable quantity of suffering.
If it were true, then his father’s life had been complete torture.
Those boxes of stories had claimed the lives of Ron, Mr. and Mrs. Miller, and Bobby. They had claimed the sanity, and therefore the life, of his father.
The box marked with “RG” was still open. James put Ron’s story back in the box, and pulled the next stapled story from the pile. He had to know—were they all as terrible as the two he’d already read? He had to understand the depth of his father’s madness.
The chair creaked as he leaned back. The story was in his lap.
James flipped the cover page.
CHAPTER 15: BALCONY
HIS BODY BENT IN two as his stomach clenched around the ball of pills. A convulsion tore through his muscles, making him flop on the threshold of the sliding door. James wasn’t aware of the shadow that fell over him as he thrashed and vomited. He wasn’t aware of the person until strong hands lifted him and rolled him over so his head faced the deck.
The slimy pills exploded from his mouth and through his nose. They were coated in thick foam and stomach acid.
The arms jerked him backwards as the hands jabbed into his abdomen.
James suffered a fresh wave of vomit. The contents of his stomach seemed to explode from every hole in his head. He couldn’t hold himself up.
“Call nine-one-one,” he heard a familiar voice say.
“No!” he groaned.
“Don’t worry,” the voice said. James identified the voice—it was Bo. “We’ll get you help, buddy.”
“No,” James said. “No ambulance. No police.” More vomit cut him off.
He heard a woman’s voice. “Should I call?”
“Yeah,” Bo said.
“NO!” James said. He shook himself free from Bo’s grip and pushed up to his knees.
Danielle’s finger hovered over the button on her phone.
“Don’t call the police,” James said. “People will die.”
She lowered the phone.
# # # # #
James tried to object as Bo went in the house. He was too weak to do much more than blink and shake his head.
Bo came back out shortly with a glass of water. He handed it to James. He crouched next to James’s chair and helped the man lift it to his mouth.
“You should really get to the hospital,” Danielle said. “I don’t know what you took, but you seem to have taken an awful lot of them.”
“That many pills is not a mistake, man,” Bo said.
“Listen,” James said. He dragged in a breath. “I screwed up, okay? I’m going to be okay. I puked them up.”
“But why?” Danielle asked. She put her hand on his.
James looked down. Drool leaked from his mouth and he wiped it away with his free hand.
“I got some really bad news. I found out that my father was the one who murdered my mother.”
“What happened?” Danielle asked.
James slumped back in his chair. Bo helped him take another drink of water. It cooled his burning throat, but made his stomach rumble as it hit.
“It’s a long, awful story. I can’t talk about it.”
“You might not want to talk about it,” Bo said. “But we deserve to hear it.”
“Give him a break, Bo,” Danielle said.
“No,” Bo said. “He’s our responsibility now. We saved his life, so now it’s our responsibility.”
“My gag reflex saved my life,” James said. He tilted his head back and closed his eyes. “Get over yourself.”
“Stay awake,” Bo said. “Don’t go to sleep.”
“I’m tired,” James said. “Sue me.” He kept his eyes closed.
“He’s right,” Danielle said. She removed her hand from his and he heard her voice moving as she talked. “You should at least stay awake.”
Bo’s voice moved directly in front of him. “I knew this kid in high school who overdosed,” Bo said. “He begged his friends to not call the police because he didn’t want to get in trouble. They figured since he could still talk, he was fine. He went to sleep and got brain damage because of it.”
“I don’t believe that,” James said. He kept his eyes shut.
“Well, h
ow about this—if you fall asleep, we’re going to call nine-one-one. So, you either keep talking and open your eyes, or you can explain it to the triage nurse at the hospital.”
“Fine,” James said. He opened his eyes.
Bo was leaning against the railing and holding an empty glass in both hands. He took a fresh glass from Danielle and held it out towards James.
“Drink this. Do you think you’re going to throw up again?”
“No. All the pills are up,” James said. “I’d be dead already if they weren’t.”
“Don’t say shit like that,” Bo said.
James dragged his eyes to his right. Danielle was kneeling and picking up the mess of vomit with a plastic bag. He felt his stomach roll and threaten to give back the water. He closed his eyes, hoping to quell the new wave of nausea.
“Hey, man,” Bo said.
“Okay. Okay,” James said. He opened his eyes. Danielle was gone.
“How did you find out your father killed your mom?” Bo asked.
“He wrote a confession in a letter,” James said with a vague wave towards the house.
“Oh,” Bo said. “So he might have meant it metaphorically or something, right? Maybe he didn’t do it directly.”
“He stabbed her,” James said.
“Oh,” Bo said. “That’s pretty bad.”
“Yeah,” James said. “The worst part was, he used me as bait.”
“What?” Bo asked.
“Yeah. I was sleeping over at my friend’s house and he came and scared me through the window. I cried and wet the bed. My friend’s mom called my mom and she came over to take me home. That’s when my dad killed her.”
“Holy shit, that’s terrible,” Bo said. “I’m so sorry.”
