Beneath the Mask of Sanity

by Mark Phillips

  So, Bentley turned and walked out of the store. He didn’t stop to look at the people, he didn’t even stop when he recognized the other two cunts eating their ice cream and talking about playhouses. He walked out of the door and into the fresh air, determined not to stop until he reached his place. Where he could be alone.

  35.

  “Finally,” Karen said when Katie and Brenda came into view. “We’ve been waiting forever for you.”

  “Did you get something nice?” Sheila asked.

  “I think so,” Katie said.

  “Oh I want to see it when we get home.”

  Katie heard the glee in her mother’s voice and her soul sank down a little. “Well if there’s time. I’m really tired.”

  “Hey,” Brenda said. “Why don’t you sleep at my house tonight?” That way, we can get ready together before we go to the party.”

  Katie’s face lit. “Oh, can I Mom? That would be perfect.”

  Sheila looked from her daughter to Brenda and then back again. There were matching looks of expectancy on their faces. She cursed a little in her head for Katie putting her on the spot like this, in front of Brenda. No one wanted to come off as the bitchy mom.

  “Well I guess that’s okay.”

  ”Cool, Mom, we just need to stop by the house so I can pick up a few things and then you

  can drop us off at Brenda’s.”

  The two girls ran ahead, giggling and clutching each other as they went.

  “Goodie,” Sheila muttered

  36.

  Bentley was back again. The sky was overcast over the home. Rain had been threatening

  all day, but had yet to show up. All the kids stood outside, near the fence in a single file line.

  Mr. Coxburn stood in front of them. Wilford Coxburn, was the administrator of the home, but he was rarely seen. The entire staff was there, all the people that cared for them because no one else would. The children looked confused; the grown-ups were somber. There was also a new addition, a policeman. He stood next to Coxburn, a fat man with a pasty white face and brown eyes.

  Mr. Coxburn cleared his throat and then addressed the orphans. “I have some terrible news, children.”

  “They’re closing down,” a kid next to Bentley whispered. “This happened to me a year ago, the place I was at closed and we were all split up. Some kids went here, some went to other places. God, to start all over again would…”

  “Shut up,” Bentley said.

  The kid looked at him with hate in his eyes. Bentley turned his head to look the kid in the eyes and there it was, the fear. Bentley had become something else, no longer was he going to let others tell him what to do, and this kid was the first to see the new look. He didn’t say another word.

  “One of your fellow students, Chester Allen, was found in the bathroom. He’s not going to be around anymore. He’s gone to Heaven.”

  “The fuck,” another boy close by whispered. “Ogre’s dead.”

  “What happened?” A boy in the crowd spoke up.

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss that right now,” Mr. Coxburn said. “However, this gentleman standing next to me is going to have to ask you all a few questions.”

  The uniform stepped forward. He smiled, but Bentley saw through it. His eyes were cautious and watchful, but there didn’t seem to be any fear in them.

  “My name is Mr. Leheigh,” the cop said. “I know that none of you know me, but I want you to try to think of me as your friend. I’m going to be asking all of you some questions, one on one. You see, we want to see if we can find out what happened to our friend Chester.”

  A murmur began to spread in the crowd of children. Mr. Coxburn raised his hand and the sound died down.

  “I’m going to be calling your names one by one to have your conversation with Mr. Leheigh. Until it’s your turn, you can have an extended recess.”

  “Nice day for it,” Bentley said. None of the kids around him picked up on the sarcasm. In fact, none of them said anything.

  Coxburn walked over to Mrs. Tanney and she handed him a large clipboard with papers on it.

  “Victor Rogers,” Mr. Coxburn read.

  Victor stepped forward, not looking at all happy to be the first victim. Leheigh greeted him with a smile and a handshake and then they walked off together.

  The kids dispersed. There were none of the games and fun that normally marked outdoor time. Instead, most of the children had opted to sit somewhere and socialize while they waited their turn to talk to the officer.

  Eighteen names had been read before Bentley had his turn.

  “Bentley Grimes,” Coxburn said.

  Bentley had been sitting by himself, pulling out swatches of grass and spreading it on his arm. When he heard his name, he stood up and walked towards the building. Leheigh was at the door, waiting for him.

  “Bentley,” he said. His voice was hearty and full of cheer, but those eyes never changed, they watched, they marked, they took everything in.

  “Hello,” Bentley said.

  “Come with me.”

  Bentley followed behind the policeman. They walked down the main hall and stopped at the first door, Mr. Coxburn’s office.

  The door was opened and Bentley followed the cop in. The desk had been cleared and sat bare. There were two chairs, both in front of the desk, Leheigh sat down in one and he patted the seat of the other, an invitation for Bentley to sit.

  For a second after Bentley sat down they just stared at each other. Leheigh seemed to be unsure how to begin, even if it was the nineteenth time he’d done it today.

  “Are you nervous Bentley?” Leheigh asked.

  “No,” Bentley said. “Policemen are friends. They’re the only strangers that we’re supposed to talk to.”

  “That’s right,” Leheigh said. “And I’d like you to think of me as more of a friend than a stranger. I mean I want to find out what happened to your friend Chester, don’t you?”

  “He wasn’t my friend,” Bentley said.

  Leheigh raised his eyebrows. “Oh really? Did you two not like each other?”

  “He was mean to me sometimes,” Bentley said. “He beat me up one day when we were on outdoor time.”

  “Really? Did he hurt you?”

  “It was more embarrassing than anything really. I didn’t get too hurt.”

  “Why do you think that he beat you up?”

  “I don’t know. I think he thought I was looking at him funny. He beat up a lot of kids.”

  “So Chester was a bully?”

  Bentley shrugged. “Yeah I guess, a lot of the older boys are.”

  “Can you think of anyone that would want to hurt Chester?”

  “Sure, lots of people. His only friends were the older boys.”

  “You’re not exactly a little one, though.”

  “I’m in the middle. The older boys don’t like me because I don’t like to play their stupid games. And I’m too old to go around playing pretend with the young ones.”

  “Do you feel like an outsider, Bentley?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean do you ever feel like you don’t belong?”

  “None of us belong, we’re orphans. Our parents didn’t want us and so we have to live here.”

  “When you lived with your parents did they ever hit you?”

  “I never knew my parents,” Bentley said. “As far back as I can remember I’ve been here.”

  Leheigh looked surprised. “According to what I’ve read, you’ve only been here three years.”

  “You try living here for three years and tell me that’s not a long time.”

  “Oh, I’m not saying that this is a good place to live. It must be very hard to not have a family to come home to.”

  “Yeah, well you’ll never know will you?”

  Leheigh paused and gazed at Bentley. Bentley stared back not dropping his eyes.

  “So you have no memories of your family at all.”

  “No.”
<
br />   “Did your father drink a lot?”

  “Wouldn’t I have to remember my father to know that?”

  “Did he ever hit you?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Did he ever touch you in a way that you didn’t like?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “What about your mother, did she…”

  “I said I don’t fucking remember!”

  Leheigh leaned back and looked at Bentley. The smile was still plastered on his face, but Bentley could tell that his mind was working behind those eyes, trying to figure things out.

  “Okay, enough with the parents,” Leheigh said. “Have you ever heard any of your friends talking about owning a knife?”

  “What kind of knife?”

  “Oh, any kind. Did you hear someone bragging about having a knife?”

  “No.”

  “Did any of your friends ever…”

  “They are not my friends!”

  “Okay. You don’t have any friends at all?”

  Bentley crossed his arms over his chest. “How long do I have to be here for?”

  “Not much longer. What did you eat for lunch today?”

  Bentley didn’t answer right away. “What?”

  “For lunch, what did you eat?”

  “I…well…I don’t remember.”

  Leheigh’s eyes sharpened. “You don’t remember what you ate for lunch? It was only a few hours ago.”

  “I don’t really like to eat the food here. I skip meals when I can get away with it.”

  ”So you weren’t in the lunch room today?”

  “No.”

  “Where were you?”

  “I was in the REC room watching television.”

  ”What did you watch?”

  “I like cartoons. I watched mostly that until towards the end of lunch. Then, I walked

  back over by the lunch room and joined the other kids so no one would know that I’d skipped.”

  “When did you change your clothes?”

  “What?”

  “Your clothes. Mrs. Tanney seems to think that you were wearing something else when you were in her class today.”

  “I changed my shirt after her class.”

  ”Why is that?”

  “It felt dirty to me.”

  “Bentley do you own a knife?”

  “No.”

  ”Could we go back to your room and maybe have a look?”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Okay,” Leheigh said, standing up. “Then why don’t we do…”

  The rest of what he was about to say was cut off as Bentley lunged forward and jabbed

  the knife into Leheigh’s stomach. It was in his pocket and he’d been holding onto it for the duration of the conversation.

  Leheigh lurched forward and made a gurgling sound deep in his throat. Bentley wanted to stay. He wanted to grab the knife and pull it out, slowly. He wanted to hear Leheigh scream, wanted to listen to how that gurgling would change if he cut his throat and stood over him.

  Bentley wanted to do all these things but he knew there was no time. So instead he ran. He ran out of Coxburn’s office and down the hall towards the front door, away from the gaggle of kids in the back.

  He expected to see a group of policemen standing at the door, barring his path, but there were none. He burst through the doors and he ran out of the home and down the drive. There was a grove of trees to the left of the building and he ran there. He didn’t stop until he was at a highway, where a passing semi-truck picked him up.

  After that, the road was his home.

  Bentley woke up from his dream as he usually did, with a start and a puddle of urine under him.

  “Motherfuck,” he spat. The dreams served their purpose, but he hated this side-effect. He stood up and walked to the other side of the shack, closer to the dead dog and the dead hobo and lay down again. Sleep came hard. Visions swirled in his mind.

  “Those little cunts have to die,” he said.

  He thought about the older little cunt, his Prize, in that pink dress and his mind eased a little. In a few minutes sleep dragged him down in its cold embrace, he didn’t dream any more that night.

  37.

  Katie sat on Brenda’s bed. The dress was laid out in front of her. Brenda stood by her dresser fooling with the radio until she found a song she liked.

  “This party is gonna be like the best.”

  “I know,” Katie said. “Can you imagine how many seniors are gonna be there.”

  “Oh, totally. Jimmy has, like, a million friends.”

  “Do you really think he likes me though?”

  “In that dress he’d have to be blind not to like you.” Brenda sat down on the bed across from Katie.

  “Really though, Brenda. I mean why would he like me?”

  “Cause you’re hot, plus he probably like likes your personality and all that crap.”

  Katie rolled her eyes. “You know, Brenda, boys aren’t the most important thing in the world.”

  “I know that,” Brenda said. “Hot boys are.”

  The two of them began to laugh and it swept them away. They giggled together for several minutes with little stops for breaths and then it would start all over again, until they both finally died down.

  “So you know Jimmy pretty well,” Katie finally said.

  “Well, I, like, wouldn’t say that. I mean I, like, talked to him a few times, but it’s not like we hang out or anything.”

  “I’m just curious, why didn’t you try to get him for yourself?”

  Brenda smiled. “Cause I see the way he looks at you. I know that he likes you and you’re my friend.”

  “I know, you’re my best friend too.”

  Brenda raised her hand to her forehead and threw her body back in a dramatic fashion. “Oh, I can feel the love in the air.”

  Katie snickered. “No really, you are.”

  “I feel the same way,” Brenda said. “Besides, don’t worry about me, there will be plenty of boys at the party.”

  “Brenda, can I talk to you about something?”

  There was an air of seriousness in Katie’s face and Brenda matched it. “Sure. You can tell me anything.”

  “It’s just…I haven’t really talked a lot about my Dad since he…well, you know.”

  “No one wanted to believe it when it happened. My Mom even cried. Everyone around here liked your Dad a lot.”

  “I know,” Katie said. Her head was cast down and her voice barely rose above a whisper. “I miss him a lot, and I don’t like to talk to my Mom about it.”

  “How come?”

  “Her and my Dad were going through a lot when he died. I…I don’t really like to talk about it.”

  Brenda reached a hand forward. “You know, sometimes it’s easier if you talk about things.”

  “I know. It’s just…she was cheating on him.”

  “Your Mom?”

  “Yeah, she had this thing with some guy from her book club. I guess it’d been going on for a long time. I don’t know how long though. Well, eventually she told my Dad and he flipped out.”

  “Why would she cheat on him?”

  Katie raised her face, tears stood in her eyes. “I don’t know. He was the best Dad, and he treated my Mom so good. You should have seen his face when he told me about it, he was crying.”

  “He told you?”

  “Yeah, we talked about a lot of things and when he told me that he was going to be going away for awhile, I asked him why. He tried some lame excuse, but I knew it was a lie. He never could lie to me.”

  “That’s terrible.”

  Katie nodded. The tears were running faster. She sniffed some of them back, but others just forced their way out and landed on Brenda’s comforter.

  “He was coming back from a business trip when that asshole killed him. My Mom said that they had worked things out and everything was going to be all right.”

  “Then he got killed?”

/>   Katie nodded. “Yeah, and it’s all because of her. If she hadn’t cheated on him, he never would have left. He never went on business trips that he could avoid; he liked being at home with us.”

  Brenda reached a hand out and rubbed Katie’s back. Katie flung herself towards Brenda and the two girls hugged. “I fuckin’ hate her. It should have been her that died!”

  “It’s okay,” Brenda said, stroking Katie’s back. “It’s okay.”

  38.

  Frank sat in the park. Lunch consisted of a ham sandwich that he’d bought at the deli around the corner from the station. There was a paper cup of soda sitting between his legs. The trees swayed in the breeze; the grass, cut short, sat below the area where the wind affected things.

  There was a man with a black and white dog. Frank didn’t know the breed; he wasn’t really an animal person. The man threw a ball high into the air and the dog tore off after it, its fur blowing back as it went.

  A child played on the large plastic structure behind him. A woman, presumably the mother, sat on another bench with a paperback in her hand. Every so often she would glance up to make sure that she still had a son.

  These things happened around Frank and his subconscious took them in, but his conscious mind was preoccupied. It was the Braddock case. Since he’d arrived at the scene to examine the body; it had only been the Braddock case.

  He had stopped by Rick’s desk on the way to lunch to make small talk. There had been no new developments in the case and Rick already had another homicide that he was working. According to him, this one was much more open and shut than Braddock’s case.

  Frank had closed two investigations since he’d given the Braddock case over, but he felt no joy in it.