Beautiful Victim

by Claire C. Riley

  The funny thing is, I like my days now, but I would still go back to the past if I could.

  Because she was always there, right where I least expected her.

  I’d eat my dinner and head upstairs to my room, and she’d be sitting on the middle of my bed reading one of my comics like it was normal for a girl to sneak into a boy’s bedroom.

  “Don’t you ever use a door?” I would ask, and she’d laugh at me. But she never replied.

  I learned a lot about Carrie very quickly. I watched her when she wasn’t aware I was there. I was behind every corner, and every door, waiting for her. Learning her ways, her nuances.

  She hated boiled potatoes, but she loved them mashed. She loved Marvel, but not DC. She liked watching me play computer games, but she never wanted to play them herself. She liked to play in the mud, and she was always catching head lice. My mom said that her mom never cleared them away properly, and that was why.

  But the biggest thing I knew about her was that she was beautiful.

  Not pretty.

  But beautiful.

  Her hair was a golden yellow, and when the sun shone on it it looked like hair spun from pure gold. It was long, but it was always tied back. She never let me touch it, and that was okay because it always had bugs in it, but I knew that if I would have touched it, it would have been soft.

  I didn’t mind it when she turned up without me knowing.

  I liked her unpredictability.

  And that wasn’t something I normally liked.

  I couldn’t tell you why I fell in love with Carrie Brown. It could have been because she was beautiful and broken. Or it could have been that she knew I was weird but told me it was okay to be so. Carrie made me feel accepted and understood. She made me feel both normal and weird. And she made me feel that either was okay.

  Love is a strange thing. You don’t even know that it’s happening until it’s happened, and you’re ten feet deep in a puddle of love that makes you smile for the first time in a long time.

  I think it was the only reason my mom let us be friends: Carrie broke me out of my shell. She made me leave the carefully guarded world I had built for myself. She made me leave my sanctuary.

  She was fascinating and beguiling and she was all mine.

  Only mine.

  We shared our first kiss on her eighth birthday.

  I had bought her a sparkly headband. I’d worked all month doing jobs for my mom and dad so I could get it for her. She looked confused when I gave it to her. And then she cried when she opened it.

  I told her not to cry and that I was sorry. My present was supposed to make her happy, not even sadder, and I wouldn’t have bought it if I had known what her mom had planned to do.

  And then she said sorry to me. She put the headband on and then she leaned over and kissed me on the mouth. Her lips were warm, but not as warm as her tears on my cheek. And then she turned and left because her dad was calling her from the front step.

  I felt bad because her mom had finally gotten sick of the head lice and had shaved Carrie’s head completely bald.

  Every inch of gold was gone.

  But I still thought she was beautiful.

  With or without her hair.

  I didn’t see Carrie for a month after that.

  Chapter six:

  I lock the door behind me after switching off the lights inside the slaughterhouse.

  I refuse to call this place by the company name because it’s lame and no one calls it that. Charlie said his kids named it, in a roundabout way. They were playing with their toys one day, when he heard them talking. Seemed like a good idea at the time, he laughed. But it wasn’t a good idea. It’s a truly awful name.

  Charlie didn’t come back into work today, and I feel bad about that because I know it was my fault he stormed off. I pissed him off by bringing up things that needed fixing, with money he doesn’t have.

  Sorry, Charlie, my bad.’

  I think about getting him a croissant on my way in to work tomorrow—a nice hot one, freshly baked like I had today. But then I think of the rude woman behind the counter who didn’t smile and who looked at me like I was shit and I decide against it.

  Maybe I’ll buy him a pack of smokes instead.

  I sit at my bus stop, two blocks from work, with my hood up tonight, thankfully. And though my jeans and sneakers are getting soaked through, my head isn’t.

  So that’s a good thing.

  I wish they’d fix the bus shelter. But Charlie said it’s been broken for years. Just a metal frame where a structure used to be, and he’s surprised a bus even stops there at all. I say it’s just my luck that it does and I smile.

  I try to always look at the good things in life. And not to dwell on the bad.

  ‘Life’s too short,’ my mom used to say. And though I think that’s bullshit because life is actually fucking long and arduous, still, I get the sentiment she was going for.

  You have to respect life and everything it stands for, because you never know when it’s going to be taken away from you. When the carpet, so to speak, will be ripped out from under you.

  ‘We’re all going to die. You could get hit by a bus tomorrow,’ my counselor used to say. ‘You have to be positive, Ethan.’

  ‘But it’s like I can see the bus already coming toward me,’ I would reply in my blind panic. ‘I want to step out of the way of it, if I can.’

  And then he would laugh. Because he said there was no avoiding death. Hadn’t I ever seen the movie Final Destination? It always caught up to you in the end, he said, so the best thing was to just enjoy life while you had it.

  I hadn’t seen the movie. Nor any of the ones that came after it. So I rented it out from the video store near work, and I was horrified when I watched it. More so because my counselor, the ever-loving prick that he was, was right. There was no avoiding death. It caught up to you no matter what.

  And so it got me thinking about all the other things in life that perhaps couldn’t be avoided.

  Like Carrie.

  Perhaps if I hadn’t seen her that day, it would have easily been another.

  Perhaps if I had stayed inside that day, instead of listening to my mom’s nagging about going out and getting some fresh air, perhaps none of this would ever have happened.

  Perhaps if I hadn’t fallen in love with the beautiful Carrie, perhaps everything would be okay.

  Perhaps my mom would still love me.

  Perhaps Dad would still take my calls.

  Perhaps I’d have a wife and 2.5 fucking kids. Kids who would no doubt hate me because I’d make them do their homework and I wouldn’t let them stay out late at night. I’d make sure we had family night once a week, no matter how tired I was from work. Or how much I just wanted to take my wife to bed and fuck her until she quivered in pleasure underneath me.

  I’d always make time for my kids.

  Just like my parents did for me.

  Because I’d seen what happened when parents didn’t care. I’d seen the sting of pain and bite of horror, and the desperate things that people would do to make the pain stop. But that would never be me or my life.

  Perhaps things would be different, if things had worked out differently.

  Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps…

  And so all I got out of the stupid movie in the end was “what’s the fucking point?” Just get on with it and make the best of what you have while you have it.

  Turns out my counselor was right about a lot of things.

  I sigh and lean forward, resting my forearms on my knees and tapping the fingernails of my right hand against the fingernails of my left hand. I like the tap, tap, tap sound it makes.

  When I get stressed, I need my hands to do something. I think it would be easier if I smoked, because they’d have something to do. Plus they remind me of her.

  Of her breath hot on my cheek after we’d made out, and the way the scent of cigarettes would cling to her lips. It made me feel dirty and gross, but she was wo
rth that feeling. Even if I had to brush my teeth ten times to get rid of the taste.

  I swallow down the lump in my throat and I wonder where the bus is. It’s late and I hate being late. Not that I’m going anywhere other than home, or meeting anyone other than the cry of empty walls, but that’s not the point at all.

  I look down the road, eager to see the bright lights of the bus, but there are none. It’s still dark where I need the spotlights of hope to be.

  I think about walking. I like walking; I walked here this morning. But I don’t like walking in the rain, even if I’m wearing a coat. So I stay where I am and I wait for the stupid bus to come, and twenty minutes late, it finally arrives.

  *

  Back at home I climb the stairs of my apartment building. I pretend I’m climbing the stairs to heaven, only I know that when my time comes I’ll probably be going down rather than up. You don’t have the thoughts that I do—the memories of blood and pain singing in your ears like an old friend—and get to go to heaven.

  I don’t sigh or complain. I never do; instead I stare longingly at the broken elevator as I pass it. It’s been broken ever since I moved in, and by the looks of the dust inside it, it had been like that long before I arrived. I guess it’s not a priority in a place like this, for people like us. But it would be nice.

  I pass number twelve and hear the husband yelling at the wife, as usual. She’s foreign, and I think she married him just for a visa. I know that’s a bad thing to do, but then I don’t judge because I don’t know what her life was like back in her home country. And my mom always said that you shouldn’t judge people unless you knew their real circumstances because you never really knew what was going on in someone’s lives, behind closed doors and twitching curtains. A whole world simmered just below the surface. And she was right.

  Of course my mom turned out to be the biggest fucking hypocrite of them all. But I don’t hold that against her. Not at all. I love my mom, and I know that deep down she still loves me.

  She’ll come around, one day.

  She’ll see me for the good boy I really am.

  I know she will.

  She just needs more time, and time is something I have in abundance.

  I pause before I climb the next set of stairs, and look back toward the door of the husband and wife. He’s really letting rip on her now. I mean, I know he likes his dinner on the table when he gets home from work (because he’s always screaming that at her), and I also know that he’s a meat-and-two-veg kind of guy (he yells that too). He doesn’t like to wait for any length of time when he gets in, and in some ways I can understand that. He has a tough job, and she’s a stay-at-home mom so it’s her job to make sure the food is cooked and the clothes are cleaned and the house is tidy. That’s what my mom always did anyway.

  She ran the house (that was her job) and my dad went out to work (that was his job). It all worked perfectly because they both knew their places in the marriage. And she had me, and she baked and she weeded the garden and she volunteered at the animal shelter several times a month. My mom did it all, so I don’t understand why this man’s wife can’t be like that. Just because you’re poverty-stricken and English isn’t your first language doesn’t mean you’re an imbecile.

  So maybe he’s not so bad and not so wrong after all.

  Maybe this woman came over here thinking she had an easy way in. Thinking that she wouldn’t need to do jack shit for her husband. And that’s not good. Not good at all.

  I know that if I had married Carrie, she would have cooked and cleaned and popped out my babies like a fucking trooper.

  She would have been a perfect fucking wife.

  I scrunch up my forehead in sadness and frustration at the things I want but can’t ever have.

  Not now.

  Not ever.

  I hear a loud sound that sounds like a slap and then she starts to cry, and I’m back to thinking he’s an asshole again, because there’s never an excuse to hit a woman. Even if your dinner is always late.

  I go on up the stairs, pushing the couple far from my mind, my thoughts instead on Carrie and not on the blood I see in my memories.

  Back at home I take a long shower because the smell of disinfectant seems to be embedded in my skin. I spilled a little earlier today before I mouthed off to Charlie over the roof, and he threw a fit because apparently ‘that shit is expensive and is coming out of your wages now.’

  Wait, let me back up a minute there.

  One of the other guys knocked over my bucket that I had just freshly filled. But I didn’t get angry, even though I wanted to. Even though I wanted to grab a knife and ram it in his throat. I didn’t—I didn’t. Because you just can’t go around doing that sort of stuff.

  I’m learning to control my temper, and my urges. See? I’m not dangerous, despite what people think.

  I knew it had to have been an accident because he’s mostly a good guy. Sure, he calls me names sometimes, but it’s all in good fun. It’s all in jest.

  But man, that stuff got onto my clothes and went all over my hands when I tried to clean it up, and it’s all I’ve been able to smell all day.

  Normally I enjoy it because it helps to makes the smell of blood and memories go away, but not today. Not when it’s this strong. When the smell is this strong it washes everything else away: the fabric softener I use on my clothes, the smell of rain-soaked streets, even the smell of car engines. And after so many years trapped inside, smelling the same crappy doctor’s office and the same medicinal scent that clung to the walls of the wards, I like to smell everything. I like each of my senses to be caressed by the world every day. And I never take it for granted.

  It’s funny how that works—how some things you miss right away, and others you don’t even know you miss until they come back to you—isn’t it?

  I like to clean out my tub after my shower, so still naked, I run some cleaner around the white porcelain sides and I make it shiny again. When I’m done, my body is almost dry and I pull on my sweatpants, forgoing underwear, and then pull on my hoodie and head to my kitchen.

  I make minestrone soup again, and I jack off in my hand thinking of her, and then I sit in my comfy secondhand chair that I found by the dumpster downstairs and I watch the news while the whore upstairs fucks another john.

  He goes on for a long time, and I think he’s never going to finish, and honestly I really wish he would. Not only because it’s every man’s God-given right to be able to come, and he seems to be struggling, but because my light fixture is swaying something fierce and I worry it may fall out of my ceiling giving me a full-on peep show into her apartment if he keeps on like he is.

  Of course he eventually does finish, and I put my bowl down and I head to the peephole in my door as they both leave. He’s a fat old guy, with a little tuft of hair on top of his big round head—not that I’m judging, but I really don’t like the way he’s looking around at the graffiti-riddled walls like he’s somehow better than this place.

  Because he’s not.

  He’s a lowlife just like the rest of us.

  You don’t come into a place like this pure and innocent, man. None of us do.

  In fact, no one is innocent in this place. Especially not me.

  Chapter seven:

  “Need you to lock up tonight,” Charlie says.

  “Sure thing,” I reply as I look up from my mopping with a smile.

  And I don’t mind. I honestly don’t.

  I know I should be paid extra for it, but I find it comforting, the fact that he trusts me enough to lock up for him. I mean this is his business, his livelihood. In many ways, this is more important than his kids and wife, because they don’t provide him with the things he needs more than anything else—money. And I know he needs money by the way he’s been swearing at his computer screen all day.

  Online gambling. It’s the fucking future.

  He smiles and pats my hand. “You’re a good boy,” he says, and then he goes back into his
office and shuts the door. Charlie has his bad habits, but he’s good at heart, and I honestly think that’s all we can ever hope for in this life.

  Work is busy today, with a big shipment of meat going out for the first time in a long time. And I’m a little surprised that Charlie isn’t more hands-on with it because I know he’s broke right now. He knows that his guys fuck things up if they’re left to their own devices. He’s seen it himself. But still he stays in his office, the orange glow of his screen reflecting off of his sweaty face.

  But I don’t say anything to him, or them.

  It’s not my place to lecture anyone.

  I know when to keep my mouth shut. I’ve learned that over the years. Besides, after mouthing off yesterday it’s probably best to keep my head in the sand for a while because I really need this job. My parole officer would be pissed if I lost my job.

  So I go back to mopping and disinfecting and I help out when they need me to carry some of the heavy boxes, because I’m a pretty strong man, not a weedy little boy like I used to be. There’s some good men working here, but I don’t mix too much with them. Or maybe they don’t mix too much with me. Either way, it works, and I’m good with it.

  I don’t need to make any friends.

  I like my solitude.

  I like my space.

  I like my routine.

  I’m a little pissed off, though, when it comes to quitting time and I realize that I’m actually the only one still here. Charlie left several hours ago, and the other guys, I have no idea when they went.

  I’m normally very observant too, so it’s strange that I didn’t notice.

  I clean down everyone’s workstations and I finish up my job, and then I finish up theirs because although they don’t care, I do. And then I go around and I do the usual routine of turning off lights and locking doors and making sure everything is where it should be and safe and secure.

  I need to know that things will be exactly where I left them when I come back in tomorrow.