The Monster Within

by Jeremy Laszlo

  “Detective King?” she asks me, but she knows exactly who I am, long before she ever asks me. All I do is nod at her, not willing to play this game. “I’m supposed to escort you to Chief Mendez’s office. He has some questions for you.”

  “What a surprise,” I sigh. I stick out my hand for her. “What’s your name, officer?”

  “Cindy Turner,” she answers, shaking my hand with a strong grip.

  “You don’t get points for kissing ass here,” I tell her.

  She takes me all the way up to the bull pen and as I enter, I can feel dozens of eyes watching me silently as I pass my desk where there’s a detective sitting on the opposite side of it reading the newspaper. He looks up at me and I can see that he’s waiting for me, but he wasn’t expecting me to be escorted to the Chief’s office. He stops from rising up and catching me and just looks back at his newspaper as Officer Turner leads me straight to Mendez’s office and lets me enter.

  Mendez is sitting behind his desk like the emperor of some evil dark dominion that I’ve trespassed into. As I sit down, Officer Turner closes the door and I sit there in silence for a moment. I’m not scared, I just don’t want to do this. I don’t have the patience. Whoever is sitting at my desk right now might have a clue as to what I’m dealing with here. Instead, I’m stuck with Mendez, dealing with his bullshit.

  “Care to explain to me what you’re doing?” Mendez asks me after signing a piece of paper and putting it onto a tray that I’m guessing his assistant will be taking care of later. He folds his hands and looks at me, waiting for a response. I look at him with a maelstrom of answers whirling around inside my head like a game show wheel, waiting for my mind to land on one.

  “Filling the time,” I say elusively.

  “By taking cases from some of my best detectives?” Mendez says with the full amount of piss and venom that he can muster. “By taking the coroner’s office’s best doctor and distracting him with a suicide case that you’ve labeled as a homicide? What the hell are you doing, King? You’re wasting man hours and resources on suicides.”

  “I don’t think they’re suicides.” I shake my head.

  “So a couple of assholes get fed up with life and decide to take themselves out in a dramatic way.” Mendez tosses up his hands showing that he doesn’t give a damn about any of it. “So what? People kill themselves all the time and they try to make the people they leave behind feel bad or guilty about what they did or didn’t do for them. You’ve seen it a million times.”

  “Sure, once or twice,” I say, but honestly I can’t recall a time where someone stabbed over thirty pens into his body to kill himself. “But that’s over the course of a career, Mendez. Why have three people in the past week killed themselves in bizarre, unnatural ways and decide to leave vague, cryptic messages for the living? What’s that all about? Huh? That shit doesn’t just happen, Mendez. And now two of them are connected. I caught one this morning that was with my previous victim the night before she killed herself.”

  “This is circumstantial bullshit, King,” Mendez shouts. “Your Martinez girl was so high and drunk when she went home that Martin practically raped her. He goes home, feels terrible about hearing that she’s killed herself, he decides that he’s a piece of shit and takes himself out. Simple as that, why are you making it more than that?”

  “Why are you simplifying it?” I shake my head. “Nothing’s that cut and dry.”

  “Suicides tend to be,” Mendez shouts.

  “These aren’t suicides,” I snarl at him. “Not until I sign off on Jenny Martinez and Ted Martin.”

  “You’re off those cases, Steven,” Mendez shouts at me. “I assigned Redman to them and he’s already signing off on them as suicides—as we speak. There’s no evidence here to point to homicide.”

  “It’s not about the evidence,” I shout back at him. “It’s the logic of it all.”

  “Get the fuck out of here with that bullshit.” Mendez waves me out. “You sniff around another suicide and try to make it a homicide, I’ll have your ass on suspension before you can blink. I mean it, King. I’ll have your ass out of this building for the next three weeks just to make sure you’re not fucking around any more of my crime scenes.”

  “Go ahead, you incessant puke.” I stand up from his chair. “Before your suspension even gets typed up, I’ll already be retired.”

  I slam the door to his office and feel the magnitude of every eye on this floor staring at me as I storm back to my desk. I walk past the black guy in his tan suit and drop down at my desk, not saying a word to him as I look at the black, blank computer screen, deciding if it would be worth it to put my fist through it. I hear the man across from me clear his throat as I’m picturing everything I want to do to Mendez right now and I look over at him as he folds up his paper.

  “I was contacted by an Officer Owens,” the man says after clearing his throat. It’s like he has a magical power, because while he starts to talk, everyone in the bull pen goes back to work, ignoring me and the little tirade that they got to listen to, no doubt. He hands me a file. “I’m working the case at the Stinker Station across from Whispering Hills,” the man says to me. “Detective Peter Carson, Robbery.”

  I look at him, silently glaring at him. Owens is really starting to be a pain in my ass.

  “This is everything I have,” he taps the file he put on my desk. “The guy we’re looking for is a real amateur, but I was told that you might want a crack at him. He’s driving a stolen car, but we got a good look at him once we started tracing his steps. He looks straight into an ATM camera. We contacted his wife, apparently he told her that he was away on business. We’re not sure where he’s at, but we have an APB out on him. We think he’s going on a robbery spree.”

  “Or a killing spree,” I sigh. Do I really want to do this right now? After Mendez?

  “That’s what Owens implied,” Detective Carson answers.

  12

  I dump the car in a Walmart parking lot. Pulling my hood up, I step out of the car and stretch. I’ve been driving for four days and I can’t say that it’s been worth it. Everything feels strange. Since I pulled that gun out and ran into that first gas station, I’ve felt like a different man. That was a road that I’d gone down that I don’t think I should have. They say that we are our decisions, but somewhere I don’t think that’s necessarily true. I mean, I’m not a bad man. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Everything will work out fine. I’m not a bad man. I just have to do what I have to do. I shouldn’t feel ashamed for that. I do what I must so my family can survive.

  Pulling the duffel bag out of the back seat, I’ve got enough money to pay the mortgage for two years and enough to pay all the other bills for the next three months. We won’t be able to live like we used to, but there’s enough here to survive. I’ve brought home the bacon. Becca will never have to know. She’ll never have to know all that I’ve been through. I look at the duffel and I know that I’m going to be fine. This is going to be enough for us to endure. I’ll find another job and we’ll be fine. I keep telling myself this as I sling it over my back and toss the keys into the back seat. Locking the door, I leave it for the police to find. I filled it up for them. I hope they won’t be too angry. All I did was put some miles on it.

  I feel like a hunter, like a killer. I feel like an assassin walking in the shadows as I make my way across the parking lot, heading in the direction of home. I have quite a bit of distance, two, maybe three, hours of driving. If I’m lucky, I’ll be home right when I told her the flight would be getting back. I’ll be able to kiss her on the cheek and go check on Will and Jaime. I’ll be able to sleep in my own bed, instead of the back of some car I stole. I’ll be able to wake up and make pancakes and bacon and hash browns with the love of my life, instead of eating protein bars for the past four days. If I look at another energy bar I feel like I’m going to throw up.

  Fishing my keys out of my pocket, I approach Becca’s Subaru and unlock it, opening
the door and dropping down behind the wheel. I smile and lean back in the seat and take in the familiar smell of Becca. God, I’ve missed her. I’ve missed waking up to her. I’ve missed being next to her at night, reaching over and feeling that she’s there next to me. For over two months I’ve been lying to her, sneaking off to interviews and trying to find another job, but nothing has been working out for me this year. Things just keep getting worse and worse. But this is the end. Things are going to start getting better. I put the keys in the ignition and turn the key, listening to the Subaru start up without a moment’s hesitation. It’s time to go home. It’s time to see my family again.

  It had been Stephen’s fault. Everything that had happened to me this year had been that jackass’s fault. He was the one that Walter listened to when we were all telling him that the investments were bad. Like usual, they had tried to keep us all on for as long as possible when the signs first started showing, but that wasn’t going to happen. There was no way that it was going to happen, according to Walter and his bromance with Stephen. But lo and behold, the investment fell through like a skyscraper crashing through a glass pyramid and so too did the company fall into the crater. Everything around us was gone and I was left holding my balls, crying on my shower floor, praying that God would give me something to save my family. But God never answered. God never answers.

  So I had to take matters into my own hands. I took my father’s revolver out of his case and told Becca that I was going to take a business trip that would take four days. I drove the Subaru to this parking lot, dumped it and walked four miles to the next grocery store. I waited for someone to start their car and leave it to return their shopping cart. That’s when I stole it and started a four day robbery spree that was sporadic and strange enough that I don’t think the cops picked up on it. I peel off my fake mustache and throw it out the window as I head for home. I still need a job, but at least I can tell Becca that we’ll be okay. I’ll tell her that all this money is savings that I’ve stored up. I’ll hide it in the garage with my dad’s old carpenter tools. She never goes through that stuff. I’ll put in four hundred a week until we have enough to get by.

  Driving into the night, I wonder what Becca and our boys have been up to while I was gone. I hope they had fun. I hope she didn’t worry about me or nothing happened to blow my ruse. I look into my back seat and see the suitcase I’d packed. I made sure to wad up all the shirts and make it look like I’d been wearing them. I even threw my old gym clothes in there to make them stink. I’ve planned this through. I’ve made all of it legitimate.

  I’m not paying attention. I blink and look at the road as I’m driving, noting the odd halo of the headlights. I wonder what it’s going to be like with Becca. This past year has been really hard for the two of us. She hasn’t been happy with me since she suspected that I was having an affair. Thankfully Nora had been one of the first to be laid off when the business started to head south. She went back to Colorado and left me in the clear. Sure, I got texts from her every now and again, but I deleted them. From everything I can suspect, Becca has given up and has no clue. But that doesn’t mean she’s happy with me. I love her. I truly do. I had just been looking for more.

  It isn’t Becca’s fault. Since Jaime was born, she hasn’t been in the mood and when we do have sex, it’s short and barely enjoyable. It’s over in five minutes and that’s it. Nora had been hesitant at first, but once I convinced her that no one would ever know, she’d been totally willing. But that had quickly backfired. The more time I spent with Nora, the more I wanted Becca. I missed her and to be honest, since cleaning up my act, I’ve never felt more in love with her. I’m just afraid to tell her that the company sank. I’m afraid that this will bring up all the distrust and anger that she has toward me. I don’t want my marriage to crumble in my hands. God, I’ve screwed up. I realize I’m still not paying attention. I look up at the road again.

  Slamming on the breaks as quickly as I can, my heart is racing, pounding against my chest like a rabbit bouncing as hard as it can to get out. I feel my stomach churn and my eyes widen as I let out a scream, rubber ripping against the road and the whole car lurching, trying to stop in time. I skid to a stop, staring in horror at the sight in front of me, or what might have happened in front of me. The car slides to a stop and I’m staring, maybe a few inches, from a little boy that’s standing in the middle of the black, nocturnal road in nothing more than his footy pajamas covered in teddy bears. Breathing heavily, I look at the boy and realize that his eyes aren’t open. He’s just standing there, swaying, holding his little stuffed turtle in the middle of the road.

  Opening the door, I step out cautiously, wondering if the boy is even aware of what just almost happened. I reach into the car and flip on the caution lights. The boy is covered in ochre light as I walk out into the road. There’s nothing on the left side of the road, but on the right is a house behind a long lawn with a door wide open. I’m guessing that’s where he came from. There’s a light on upstairs in one of the windows and I know that whoever this boy’s parents are must have heard me almost kill their child. Nervously, I stand there, afraid to leave him here in the middle of the road. I’m afraid someone else will come around the bend and hit him.

  “Caleb?” a woman shrieks, running out of the door. She’s barefoot, in her night clothes, rushing to come and check on her boy. I hold up my hands as she starts shouting his name. “Caleb, honey, are you alright?”

  “He’s fine,” I assure her. “He’s fine. He’s just sleepwalking.” I try to lie so that I don’t sound like a complete asshole zoning out as I’m driving down the road in the middle of the night. “I looked down to change the radio and looked up and almost ran right into him.”

  “Oh my God.” The woman’s eyes widen. Her hair is a mess. It looks like she’s been sleeping for a while now and she’s wearing a tank top and sleeping shorts. She’s in pretty good shape for a mother. The boy, Caleb, is just around Will’s age. Granted, Becca had Jaime two years ago, but she is still struggling to get the baby weight off. After Jaime, she sort of lost her motivation. She hadn’t looked amazing when I got her pregnant for a second time, but Caleb’s mom is definitely looking good. She’s been working hard to keep the weight off. “Oh my God,” she repeats again, hugging her boy. I’m pretty sure that this is the exact opposite of what she’s supposed to be doing, but I don’t say a word. I’m in no place to tell a mother how to react when I almost killed her boy. “Oh my God, thank you,” she looks up at me. “Thank you so much. Oh God, thank you!”

  She stands up and hugs me. I can feel her warmth as her body presses against me and I feel ashamed for being so greasy and disgusting from not showering for three days. I miss having someone touch me. Becca hasn’t hugged me like this in a very long time. That’s because she probably can’t stand the sight of me most of the time, but it still feels wonderful to have someone actually touch you like you’re a human being. I hug the woman back and I look down to little Caleb, who is finally starting to come around.

  “Oh my God,” the woman says again into my ear as she starts to laugh. “Who are you? What’s your name? I have to send you something—a card, a gift basket, something to thank you! Oh my God, you saved my little boy.”

  “No, really,” I shake my head. “I’m sorry I almost hit him.”

  “Mommy?” Caleb mutters, rubbing his eyes and looking around. I can feel for him. He must feel like he fell asleep in the middle of a war zone with everything that’s happening and the way his mother is reacting. The woman steps back from me and immediately reaches down and scoops up her boy. She’s laughing and covering his face in kisses. For the first time in a very long time, I feel like I’ve done something right. I feel like I’ve actually done a good deed, especially after the past four days. I forgot what it was like to feel like a good guy, to not feel like the guy who keeps screwing everything up.

  “It’s okay, sweetie.” Caleb’s mom kisses his face again. “Mommy’s here, Caleb. Don�
��t worry.”

  The boy isn’t crying. He looks confused and scared, but he’s not crying. He looks at me with a disturbed, haunted look on his face, as if he can see the things I’ve done. Maybe he can. Maybe he knows that I’m a piece of shit and doesn’t want his mother anywhere near me. Maybe he’s smarter than most people that way. Maybe he knows exactly what I am and doesn’t want a thing to do with me. Maybe this was God’s punishment for me robbing all of those stores. What if I was supposed to kill the boy and go to jail because I’m a terrible father, a horrible husband, and an all-around worthless human being? I look at the boy who stares at me, pale faced, wide eyed, and haunted. I know that he knows what I am. He sees something that he doesn’t like.

  “Please, sir,” his mom looks at me with teary eyes. “Let me get your name and address. Let me do something to thank you.”

  I shake my head. “No,” I say calmly, “don’t worry about it. Maybe take him to a sleep specialist or something.”

  “Definitely,” she says with a breathless tone. “My God, thank you so much.”

  “You’re welcome.” I reach up and pat the boy on the shoulder. He flinches and draws away from me, not trusting me and instinctually afraid of me. I’m not sure why, but he doesn’t like me touching him. I almost feel ashamed for having reached out to touch him, but as my hand touches him, I realize the ordeal is over and I’m exhausted. I feel tired and worn. I feel useless and worthless. I didn’t save this boy’s life. I just stalled the inevitable. What if he wanders out tomorrow and gets hit by a drunk driver or a mom of five on her way home? Who is to say that I’ve done something good here? Fate is fate.