by Richard Long
“No,” Martin said.
“Other men don’t have the power you have. The fierce clarity. The absolute commitment. The unshakable will. Do they, boy?”
“No,” Martin said.
“Other men get all bogged down with feelings…love and fear and pain clouding their proper judgment, sapping away their strength. You don’t have feelings like they do. You don’t whine and cry every time a little pain gets in the way. Do you, boy?”
“No,” Martin said.
“Why, I could nail your hand to this table and you wouldn’t budge an inch, would you, my brave, strong lad?”
“No,” Martin gulped.
And so he did.
There wasn’t much blood on the table, just enough to create soft little red pools in the cracks and gouges. Martin breathed deeply and tasted copper in the air. He breathed again and caught a whiff of ozone mingling with the smell of his own sweet life.
Time was moving slow. Tick-tock. The pain was phenomenal, even for Martin. He breathed slower and less deeply, taking shallow gulps as he struggled to lower his heart rate and move to the place where Paul had brought him so many times, a place where everything was equal and pain was just another word, another sound in his head fighting for attention.
They sat across from each other for what seemed like an eternity, neither one making a sound. Martin battled within himself, fighting to stop fighting, to sink like a stone to the bottom of the sea. Bit by bit, he drifted down, losing form and substance until the voice of pain began to whisper instead of scream. The pain was still there but it wasn’t “pain” anymore. It was just another nameless feeling he didn’t understand or have to obey. Down, down, down, he floated, further into himself where all the pulses and demands of skin and flesh and bone became a single chorus, until at last he settled on the ocean floor.
He rested there, breathing slowly, deeply. He was safe now, if only for a moment. Then he began to remember.
Rats. Martin shivered in bed all night thinking about them. As soon as the sun came up, he would be going hunting for the first time in his young life. He was seven years old. The big man living with him and Momma for the past few months had been talking about it all week, telling Martin how much fun they were going to have.
They weren’t going to the cool green forest across the wheat field behind the house. They were going to the town dump. To shoot rats. Martin was terrified.
The man was tall and thickly built with deep blue eyes. Momma made Martin call him Daddy as soon as he moved in. It bothered him at first, but after a while he began to like it. The man was nice and would smile at Martin and give him hugs and tell him what a big strong boy he was. Martin didn’t know where Momma met him or what his real name was because she always called him Daddy too.
They lived on a farm somewhere, but Martin wasn’t sure where. They didn’t do any farming at the farm and there were big rusty machines sitting behind the house and in the broken-down barn. They never had company, except for the other men that came before, none of them staying as long as this one. He could see other houses that were far, far away, but he wasn’t allowed to go near them or talk to any people who came to the door, though no one ever did except salesmen. “Don’t talk to strangers,” Momma said. Everyone was a stranger.
Martin had never played with another child. He knew he was missing something, but he wasn’t sure what it was. He only knew there was a big hole inside and he felt sad almost all the time. But Martin wasn’t allowed to cry. Every time he cried, even a little, Momma always said the same thing: “I’ll give you something to cry about!”
Then she did. Each time the “something” got worse. He hardly ever cried anymore.
Momma didn’t have any women friends he knew about except for Norine, who was really Momma’s sister. Norine wasn’t allowed to come to the house because, Momma said, “She’s a nosy bitch and I don’t want her snoopin’ around!”
Martin went to stay with her once in a while when Momma had to “take a rest” from him. She lived on the same big farm in another house down the dirt road and it only took a few minutes to rumble over there in Momma’s old truck and drop him off. Every time Momma came back to get him he wanted to cry, but he knew things would be even worse if he did.
Most of the times Momma went out, he didn’t get to go to Norine’s. When he was smaller, Momma just put him in his crib. The crib was a five-foot-tall box of raw plywood with splinters everywhere. Martin would just sit there in the lump of his worn-out blankee and stare at the knots in the wood till Momma came home again. Sometimes she didn’t come home for a long, long time. If Martin went to the bathroom, Momma would be extra mad so he tried as hard as he could not to do a number two. But sometimes she would leave for two days or more, and he would have all that time to think about what was going to happen when she came home and saw the mess he made.
When he was old enough to climb out of the crib, Momma locked him in the cellar until she came back, leaving a jug of water and some cold cuts and bread. There was a bucket in the corner for him to “empty himself,” but he tried not to because the smell got so bad. He hated the cellar more than anything. It was where she took him when she said he’d been really bad, even though he wasn’t sure what he did to make her mad. He tried so hard to be good all the time, but no matter how good he was, he wasn’t good enough for Momma. He needed to be punished. He needed it all the time.
“If you ever tell Norine, I’ll find out and lock you down here for the rest of your life. You’ll never, ever see her again.”
He never, ever thought about telling Norine. Or any of the men that came to visit.
When the big, blue-eyed man came to stay, Momma didn’t hit Martin or say the bad things for a little while. But soon she started up again, bit by bit, like she was slowly sticking her toes into a steamy bathtub to make sure the water wasn’t too hot. One day while he was roughhousing with Daddy, Momma started laughing really loud. “He’s such a little shrimp!” Momma yelled. “You could throw him across the room like a bundle of dirty laundry!”
Martin got really scared when she said that. But the man didn’t seem scared at all. Instead, he looked at Momma like he’d never seen any other Daddy look at her. He looked at her like he was mad.
The old pickup truck bumped and rattled down the dirt road like a circus ride. They turned onto a smooth black highway that seemed to stretch out forever in a straight line. After a while they turned onto another dirt road.
The smell hit them about a minute before the mountains of stinking oil cans, rotten food and battered refrigerators came into view. The truck screeched to a halt and it only took a few seconds before signs of life started to appear. The rats were bold and big as possums. Fat, greasy rats, shiny with the stink of old meat. One even stopped and stared right at him. Martin would have jumped back into the truck if hadn’t been for the voice calling out to him, “Hey, little man, gimme a hand with this gear!”
He was in the back of the pickup making lots of clunking noises. Martin darted over in a flash, eager for his noisy bulk and fearlessness. Daddy put his arm around Martin in a hug that was the nicest thing Martin had ever felt from anyone besides Norine.
“Don’t you worry about dem filthy, stinkin’ rats, m’boy. You’ll be seeing in just a teeny weeny bit that they’re no match for a big strong lad like yerself.” He squatted down until his big blond head was only inches away from Martin’s tiny face. Martin smelled something sour on his breath, but compared to the dump it smelled like sweet perfume. “After today, you’re not gonna be afraid of anything, anymore, ever. Doesn’t that sound good?”
Martin smiled a great big smile that was as honest as it was happy. “Yes!” he cried.
Daddy smiled back and began his lesson:
“The thing…blam!…about rats…blam!…you see…blam!…is that rats…blam!…are a whole lot better at runnin’…blam!…than they are at fightin’.”
Blam-blam-blam-blam-blam! Each blam! punctuated the explosion of
a cat-sized rat. They were frantically scurrying everywhere, torn between the fear of the cannon-loud shots and the hunger for all the newly fresh meat of their fallen brethren. The blam! generators were a pair of brushed silver, .48 magnum revolvers that were actually shooting out two-foot long flames from their barrels with each blast. The kick was so great that the pistols practically hit the man in the forehead each time he fired. It was incredible to Martin that he could control each one with a single hand.
“The other thing about rats…blam!…is that they’re such hateful…blam!…dirty…blam!…filthy…blam!…creatures…blam!…that killin’ the little bastards…blam!…feels good right down to the marrow of your bones!” Blam-blam-blam-blam-blam! Rat guts, bones and clumps of fur painted the side of an old washing machine like a vintage Pollock. “So what do you think, buddy boy? Ready to give it a try?”
Martin shook his head and turned his face to the ground, expecting the sharp blow that always came when he said no to Momma. He didn’t want to see it coming from a hand this big. To his complete amazement, the hand came down and gently lifted his chin so he could see the big man leaning over to kiss his forehead.
“Don’t you worry, now. You don’t have to do anything ’til you’re good and ready.”
Martin stood up straight and beamed at the man with such a smile that he couldn’t resist picking up the tiny weight of the boy and giving him a growling bear hug. “You’re a very special boy, Martin,” said the man softly. “A very special boy, indeed.”
Martin was bursting with joy. He wished and wished with all his might that this one would never ever leave. “Will you be my for real daddy?” he asked shyly, turning his head away again, bracing himself for an even bigger blow. But the big man didn’t say the words he expected…the push-away words that hurt even worse than the slaps and shoves and names Momma called him. What he said was this:
“Yes, I’ll be your daddy. I’ll be your daddy for ever and ever and ever.”
Daddy pointed at the cargo in the truck bed and Martin shouted, “Wow!”
“You bet your ass ‘Wow!’ little buddy!”
Martin stared at the green metal footlocker. There was a rifle with a really long barrel that had holes drilled in the side and made a loud ca-chunk sound when Daddy showed him how it worked. “Special forces riot shotgun,” he said dryly. “Semi-automatic with a twenty-four-round chamber of armor-piercing titanium slugs.”
“Uh-huh,” Martin nodded, pretending he understood. And there were more: a dozen pistols in all shapes and sizes, resting snugly inside gray plastic cases with foam rubber cut to the exact shape of each shiny weapon. More rifles and shotguns too. They were the most beautiful things he’d ever seen. There was one that made him gasp out loud. It had a black matte finish and looked like a cross between the pistols and the rifles.
“Excellent taste,” Daddy said approvingly. “Sawed-off, pistol grip, twenty gauge, side-by-side shotgun. Easily concealed for close-quarter fighting and convenience store stickups.”
“I want that one!” Martin shouted with a grin too wide for his face.
“Welllll…I don’t want to discourage such noble instincts, but I’m afraid it would rip your little chicken wing right out of its socket.”
Martin pouted and scuffed his sneakers on the dusty ground.
“Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Daddy smiled. “Let’s do it together. Put your hand under the barrels like this,” he said, curling Martin’s fingers beneath the twin pipes. It was a stretch, but the span of his palm finally managed to contain them.
“Good,” said the big man eagerly. “Now put your other hand here,” he instructed, wrapping Martin’s small fingers around the pistol grip.
“Now listen carefully,” Daddy said slowly, his head resting on his shoulder. Martin could feel his blond mustache grazing his cheek. “A shotgun isn’t a rifle. It’s a clumsy, brutal weapon. All you have to do is point it in the general vicinity and ahead, always ahead of the way the dirty beast is runnin’.”
“But how do I point if I don’t look down the barrel?” Martin asked, more uncertain than ever. It was probably the most words he’d said to anyone but Norine.
“You move your arms…” Daddy answered, steering their joined hands on the shotgun toward a particularly plump specimen waddling between a box of laundry detergent and a Big Wheel tricycle, “…and you point with your eyes…(Martin followed the slinking rat with more intensity than he thought he was capable of)…and when it feels just right…(just a little more to the right)…and you get a tingle in your stomach…(almost there, just a little more)…and a little voice whispers in your ear…(yes, that’s it!)…then slowly squeeze the trigger…(now! now! now!)…and…BLAM!
“Wow!” Martin yelled, watching the rat explode with so much force that its guts made a hula-hoop around the Big Wheel’s handlebars. “Wow! Wow! Wow! Wow!”
Martin jumped up and down like he might have done on Christmas morning if he ever had the chance. It didn’t matter that Daddy had helped him point it or even that he squeezed Martin’s finger on top of the trigger. It didn’t matter! He had done it too! He had killed the rat. Killed it! Wow! It felt strange and confusing and powerful and exciting and…yes…there was no doubt about it…it felt good.
It felt really, really good.
Martin opened his eyes and stared at the nail in his hand. Then his gaze drifted upward to Paul’s unblinking eyes. He was still wearing the dead mask, showing him nothing—a shark with his eyes rolled backwards. But as Martin surfaced, Paul came back to life and put on his warm friendly mask, congratulating him on his victory.
“Ahhhh…good boy,” he said, with genuine admiration. He started to get up, but then sat back down and placed his hand on top of Martin’s crucified one. Paul had no fingernails. He closed his eyes and breathed in slowly through his nose, savoring the moment, feeling the trembling wreckage inside Martin’s hand. He had evaded all the bones, tendons and major blood vessels with a surgeon’s skill, knowing that Martin would need full use of his hand very soon, but not quite yet. Paul breathed in deeply again, looking into Martin’s tortured eyes, smiling sweeter than Martin had ever seen. Then he grabbed Martin’s hand and gave it a quick sharp tug toward him.
Nothing in the world could have stopped the scream that bellowed from Martin’s throat. Paul threw back his head and screamed along with him, two mad dogs baying to a stone-deaf savior that would never, ever come. Suddenly, Paul stopped, cooing to Martin like he was just a baby, “Shhh…shhhh. Yes, that’s a good, brave lad.” He said the soothing words over and over until Martin’s breathing returned to short, sharp gasps.
Paul rose again from his chair and Martin couldn’t stop himself from groaning in relief. At the sound, Paul froze in place, hovering over him.
“Be a man,” he sneered, then corrected himself: “Be like Christ.”
They started with pins. Tiny needles that looked like the ones in Norine’s sewing kit. It scared Martin just to look at them. Daddy used the needles slowly. Push. Stop. Push. Stop. Then a little bit more, right to the point where Martin could barely stand it. Daddy talked all the time in a voice so calm it felt like a warm, soft towel: “Pain is nothing. One day you’ll grow so big and strong that no one will ever be able to hurt you again. You want to be a big strong man like daddy, don’t you?”
Martin would nod and fight back the tears and Daddy would push in the needle again. Push. Stop. Push. Stop. “Feel the needle, Martin. Feel it…don’t fight it. Feel the core of the pain. It’s sharp, but it’s soft inside. Feel the soft part in the middle and go in there, dive into it like a cool summer pond. It’s not so bad now, is it?”
It was. But the more they did it, all day long sometimes, the more he could feel the soft part…the cool pond…and the deeper he would sink. Down. Down. Down. No words. No voice. No “Ouch!” Just the switch. There it is, right over there. Push. Stop. Push. Stop. Click. Now the pain was something else. It wasn’t good, but it wasn’t bad either. It just was. The
re was nothing you could say about it, and no more reason to cry.
The first time Martin didn’t want to pull his hand away was the proudest moment of his short young life, even better than his first kill. There was no hurt. No pain. No tears. No fear. Well, some fear, but even that must have its own cool pond. Its own switch. Martin looked up at the man with the sharp needle and asked, “Daddy…what’s your real name?”
Daddy looked at him with an expression he couldn’t understand, then answered in a whisper so faint he had to lean in to hear it.
“Son, my name is Paul.”
“Tell me a story,” Martin said with a smile half as big as his face. They were in the wheat field again, sitting in the worn wooden flatbed of a broken-down pickup truck.
“What kind of story?” Daddy asked, already knowing the answer.
“Tell me about the angel!” Martin cried in a high-pitched voice.
“Again?” he asked, feigning astonishment. “I have many stories to tell.”
“No, tell me about the angel!” Martin yelled gleefully.
The stories had become a ritual for them, every day after his lessons. Now that Martin was controlling the needle, he pushed it in even harder and deeper than Daddy, wanting him to be proud, yes, but also wanting to finish quicker so they could get to the stories. Daddy (he still couldn’t call him Paul, no matter how hard he tried) would sigh as Martin drove the needles in farther and farther, sometimes in one side and out again. When he finally said, “Aye, that’s a good lad,” it was time for the stories. Or story. All his tales seemed connected, like they were part of one big story that didn’t have a beginning or an end. Martin liked the story about the angel most of all. It seemed like Daddy did too.
“Please, please, please!” Martin begged, knowing he didn’t need to.
“Okay, you little rascal,” Daddy smirked, giving him a scorching noogie.
