Slip

Slip1

I'm kneeling over the husk of what used to be a living, breathing boy and inside, the monster wears a ghoul's grin. And I must admit, I'm not completely without a little nugget of joy myself. This one was a fighter, after all, and it's always so much more fun when the hurly-burly happens. Looking at the blood and viscera on my hands, I feel more like I've just gutted a pumpkin than an actual person.2

Without warning, there are red and blue eyes blinking rapidly out in the darkness of night and the damning thing that wants to put me away is drawing near. The previously dwindling adrenaline in my veins starts to flow again, so fast that I feel like I'm burning from some coal-gobbling furnace core. It's always better when this turns into a chase-and-run. Just like Cops and Robbers, only instead of money or jewels, I've stolen something far more precious.3

The red-blue eyes give way to the screaming of the damning thing, the high-pitched howl of Justice or whatever they like to call it, and many men appear with guns ready to turn me into Swiss cheese.4

I run. Run into the dark, into the Shadow. As I flee, there are voices. They yell, telling me to stop, but there's no way I'm gonna be that stupid. Stopping, slowing down, means the box. It means cold, stone walls and bars and grim-faced men waiting for their chance to kill this thing that I am. Stopping means this is the end.5

So. Is this the last one? Is this the end of my tyranny, my search for what I've lost? I can't believe this is it, game over. And after all the time I've put into this. I've been to every nowhere place there is, hiding, looking, losing my name just to satisfy what I need. And here I am, barely having gotten a taste, barely having fed this craving. There are still worlds of that black something beneath me waiting to be discovered. I haven't even found the answer to all of this.6

What's a boy to do when they find out what he's done and go to put him in the corner?7

Someone fires. I throw myself against the ground, the grassy green field, just in time to miss the bullet that was nowhere close to hitting me. Fucking rookies and their toys.8

As some gruff voice from far behind condemns my not-quite-shooter, I hear the hurried Clydesdale clomp-clomp-clomping of the rest of them. I push myself back up and start to dash off again, but that fuck-up of a cop who tried to clip me but only got air, his little stunt was enough to slow me down and allow his buddies in blue to catch up to me.9

"Don't move!" the damning thing says through their mouths. It tells me to drop my weapon, to stay right where I am, and brings its puppets close to bind my hands behind me. I feel the rough, unforgiving touch of angry near-neanderthals with badges. They pick me up off my knees and start to take me away. I drag my feet just to be an ass and that wins me a meaty elbow to the gut.10

I just don't get this. All I've done is play my part. Who can blame me for that? Even boogeymen have jobs to do. This is what they made me. Just another sick and dark-souled fuck that the world can point its finger at and spit on. In a way, this is a very real sort of martyrdom. I've given my life to the world so that it can have a villain. I am the opposite of a Christ. A deviant savior. A pervert messiah.11

Oh, those irksome delusions of grandeur. I'm not crazy. In the end, I know I'm just a bad guy. There's no great purpose behind my destruction, just anger and loss. It doesn't matter what I've done, this is all just something else to talk about on the news.12

They take me back all the yards I've run and towards the shining, red-blue blinkers. I pass a circle of men staring down at the scene of the crime, admiring my work. Although, the looks on their faces could hardly be described as awe. The knuckledraggers open up the back seat of the cop car and push me inside, no regards for my head or nothin'. I just smile and stare out the window, watching them clean up the mess I've made.13

So. I'm finally caught in the claws of the world. What's next?14

~ ~ ~15

Hot water sprays onto my naked flesh and I revel in the pain when it grazes my old and new wounds. All around me there's nothing but other nude men, all of them bearing some brand, some logo, something that screams 'felon'. I turn to face one of them, a stocky Latino with a tattoo of a little sombrero-wearing imp holding a bottle of tequila and the words "El Diablo Español" written in cursive on his bicep. When he catches me staring at him from his peripheral vision, he looks at me and sneers.16

"You like whatchoo see, you sick pendejo?"17

I grin and turn away. There's so many colorful characters in prison.18

"Yeah, I bet you don't. Too ripe for your taste, huh? Fuck off."19

This is where I make myself the target. Oh, I love these little games.20

"Maybe if you shaved your pubes and that hairy ass of yours, we could work somethin' out, papi."21

El Diablo Español grunts and glares at me and the universe starts to move in slow motion. Like in a movie, the water from the showerhead jets out lethargically and I can make out the nuances of every drop exploding against skin. Low in tone and distorted, the Spanish Devil's voice booms out, indiscernible, just something loud and angry. Whatever he's saying, it doesn't really matter, so long as the black beast is there in his words. And it is.22

I see the Devil's fist coming long before it hits me, but I don't flinch or duck out of its path. Instead I wait there, eyes closed with content, for it to embrace and ruin me.23

The moment the two of our selves meet makes a beautiful shattering sound inside my head. My jaw jostles, briefly free from its confines, before returning to its proper place and I fall to floor, my mouth a fountain of blood. The Devil stands over me, towering like a hairy, naked giant, and I start to cackle like this whole thing is some terrific prank I'm playing. And it is.24

The other prisoners stop with their soaping and lathering and form a circle around us, a new bloodsport born into existence just for their entertainment, better than Pay-Per-View.25

"Little maricón came on to me!" The Devil explains, earning support with the others' unanimous displays of disgust. Funny thing is, any of these bad boys would shiv every other one for a chance to get at me. But right now, they don't care. They just want to see more of my blood. They urge him on--beat the shit, stomp his balls, bash in his skull!26

Oh, all this attention. I'm so flattered. Eight months here and I'm still everyone's favorite pariah.27

I spit crimson onto the floor and it thins and spreads as the water washes it away. Mouth open wide, I get onto my knees and reach for the Devil's cock. I latch onto his waist and try to swallow him up but, of course, he pushes me away. There's a storm of noise in the shower room now and what seems like a million furious forms staring down at me ready to kill, to devour, and their fists come down like lead rain. I'll burst under their punches and the room will flood with me and turn into a tiny little Red Sea.28

To some people, this would be a nightmare come true. But I've lost that part of my brain that feels fear. For me, this is nothing even close to scary. This is shallow chaos, just a warm-up, just a hobby. Just another day in the box.29

~ ~ ~30

The doctor, I don't know his name, he asks me, "How are you feeling?"31

I sit on my little metal bed, broken and bleeding under the gauze, making faces.32

"Just fine," I say. "Never better. I'm swell. Or, swelling."33

Dr. Whoever stares at me blankly. There's no inkling of fake concern here, no façade of compassion or interest. I know he doesn't care a lick about how I feel and he knows I know. He's just doing this to get paid the lousy scraps of money they toss at him. I like it this way, though. It's a real honest sort of indifference. In my experience, upfront apathy is always favorable next to the lies people try to shove into your brain.34

"You like it when this happens, don't you?"35

"It's my favoritest game in the whole wide world."36

"They'll kill you one of these days, you know."37

"Can't wait, boy howdy."38

The doc rolls his eyes and doesn't say anything for a while. He takes a look at some little file about me and all the naughty things I've done.39

"It's your turn soon, isn't it?" he asks.40

"Could be. Can't say, really. Never can be too sure about anything these days."41

Tired Dr. Zilch gets up and walks over to the other side of the room, then pours himself some coffee. Probably, it's something like his dozenth cup. The dark bags under his dull cow eyes scream of sleep deprivation.42

"You know I've got a report to write. So stop busting my balls and just give me something new I can work with, would ya?"43

"Absolutely, doc. How 'bout this? I've recently come to the realization that everything around me is a complex delusion that represents my inner guilt and sense of emptiness. You, the others, this whole place, it's all just a way for me to tell myself how very, very lonely and trapped I feel." I pout for a moment, sad as a stray pup, then bat my eyelashes and grin. Playing The Victim is so much fun. "And this," I point to my mess of a me, "is just how I've chosen to exorcise my sins."44

Dr. Whatshisface sighs and takes a sip of his coffee. He makes a face; I guess it must taste bad. He turns and dumps the shit into the sink of his little sanitation nook.45

"At least I can say that about this job," he says and chuckles wryly. "You sickos are always good for a laugh or two."46

"Nice to be appreciated, doc," I say and giggle like a schoolgirl.47

There's a dirty look on his old, sagging, forgettable face. It makes him look like some kind of absurd monster mask come to life. That's the thing about so many grown-up people; how ravaged they are, it can really scare you. Every day becomes Halloween in a place like this.48

The doc turns nasty. "What's wrong with all of you?" he growls. "Were you all dropped on your heads as babies?!" This happens every time I come here. I've just learned to enjoy it, same with so many other things.49

"That's one hypothesis, doc--"50

"It's because of all of you twisted bastards that the world's gone to shit!"51

I burst into laughter. People with a sense of morality are just so damn funny.52

"Now, doc, please try to uphold your professional veneer..." I say through my hysterics.53

Dr. Blip leans into me, his eyes just slits that stare at me darkly. "They should kill every last one of you..."54

I nod. "You're right, doc. You're so right." I pat his head to try and get him out of his mood, but he just grabs my fractured wrist and jerks my hand away.55

"Piece of pervert trash..." he mutters to himself. He moves away from me and plops down behind his desk.56

"They're not, though," I continue. "So I guess you'll just hafta deal with me a little more 'til they make me disappear same as all the others." I slump off the edge of my bed and reach over to kick at the doc's feet playfully. He doesn't react, though, which kind of bums me out. I love getting a rise out of people, getting them to yell or scream or cry. I guess you could argue that's kind of how I got myself stuck here.57

"...'Course, we don't really know if there ever were any others..." I add off-handedly. "Sorta makes you question this whole shindig, huh, doc? I mean, it's gotta be a pain in the ass not knowin' if all this hard work of yours is even payin' off. I mean, just a real bitch tryin' to figure out if all the fuck-ups you hypothetically sent back even exist. Right? I mean, how do you keep track of somethin' like that? How do you keep track of folks who aren't supposed to have ever ended up here? It's like playin' hide-and-seek with the Invisible Man. And in the end, if all this pans out, it'll never have fuckin' happened. That's like...that's like, a paradox or somethin', isn't it?"58

The doc just grumbles and opens up a notebook. He glances at me for a moment before taking a pen out of his coat pocket. He starts to write.59

"'Patient suffers from being a depraved asshole. I.e., same old, same old'."60

"Oh, it's not that I question if it's working," I go on. "It's just I don't think it matters all that much. Whether we're here or not is irrelevant, doc. We're not made, we're born. A sick fuck is a sick fuck is a sick fuck. Always and forever. 'Til death do us part.61

"And besides, I mean, my god. Time travel?" I scoff. "What kind of shit is that to think up? You are scientists, right? Or are you just a buncha Trekkies with Ph.D.s?"62

There's a knock from outside the doc's office. I look through the glass of the door and there's a guard glaring in at me, my own personal escort in this piece-of-shit place. The doc waves him in eagerly.63

"We're through for today," Dr. Nobody says. "Hopefully the next time I have to see you, you won't exist."64

"I'll miss you too, doc. Tell those cute little kiddies of yours hello for me," I say and blow him a kiss while I'm cuffed. The doc jumps up from his chair and gives me a look like he wants to rip me apart. He can't do a thing, though, 'cause of the guard. Before I'm taken back to my cell, I hear him hiss something awfully mean about me under his breath. What a grouch.65

~ ~ ~66

Metal grinds againt metal. I wake up out of another bad dream and watch one of the lab assistants slide open my cell door. He looks down at me like I'm some kind of rodent from behind glasses thick as telescopes and he tells me it's time. When I get up, I start shaking so badly I have to grab ahold of the bars to keep from falling down. It's been days since I've had anything toxic in my system and being this sober is starting to take its toll on me.67

"Take these," the assistant says and offers me a pair of beautiful baby-blue pills. Slippers, they call 'em. How clever.68

"What is this? X?" I joke.69

His thin, pale lip curls up and he says, "No." Not too surprising to see he doesn't have any sense of humor. I shrug and pop the things in my mouth. They go down easy enough, but nothing happens. I figure I just have to give it a little time before they can work their magic. 70

The assistant tells me to follow him and as we make our way down the cell block, the rest of the inmates yell and cuss me out. I guess they're just pissed 'cause it's not their time yet. That, or maybe they think I don't deserve this kind of thing. Redemption or whatever. No one really does. Not me, not with all the evil I've done. Better that I rot in a cage. And the thing is, I'd have to agree.71

~ ~ ~72

It's dark out tonight, and hot to boot. Alan left to go somewhere, so I figured it'd be a good time to try and get away. It's really only ever worth trying when Alan's gone, since Stanley's so high all the time that he doesn't notice if I disappear. I haven't been outside in probably weeks, a month even maybe, and breathing normal air feels strange. I have to stop running every once and a while just so I don't pass out. 73

There's lights on in the distance. It's a town, I think. I hope. I don't know what town it is, but at least there's gotta be people in it. People who can help me. Sometimes I have dreams that I get away and find someone to save me, but then it turns out everyone I see is just another Alan or Stanley.74

Please God, I'm praying, don't let it be like that this time. Just let me get the fuck out of this.75

~ ~ ~76

By the time we get to where we're going, after they clean me up and I get a change of clothes, I'm tripping balls. Weird things are happening, but they're just tiny moments, barely anything. What was maybe a two-minute walk from the prison block to the laboratory building felt more like half an hour. Things keep sliding out of place and repeating themselves. Or cutting themselves off.77

The dweeby little lab assitant, he's told me about this little science project they're conducting about thirteen times now, or so it seems. The DuMacher experiment. Or as some of the inmates call it, "The Doom Maker", 'cause once they make you go back, you're gone for good. No more you. At least, not a you that's done whatever wicked crimes the you that's here has. When I try to remember any of what he's said to me about it, though, I come up with nothing.78

We step into a room and I let my mind wander as I take in the bare, open space. It looks like it might've been used for storage once, but now it's the center of this fucked-up little universe I'm in. This is where it happens. Where the drugs those doctors give us make us leave, make us Slip. Here and only here can we go back. Even though they don't say anything about it, it's obvious none of 'em knows why. They're just as lost and clueless as the rest of us. Who are they to call us monsters and perverts? Maybe we're the righteous ones.79

Yeah, right.80

"...Do you understand me?" the little assistant asks me, frowning. I guess he must've been talking. Not that I'd understand any of the babel that came out his mouth.81

"Ease up, poindexter. I'm totally on top of this."82

"Well, then do the meditative exercises like you've been taught."83

"You got it, lab rat."84

He sighs. I guess he's not too fond of all the cute little nicknames I've got for him.85

"Remember," he says, moving on, "the chrono-psychotics only work as long as--"86

"Hey, Beakman, I told you already, I know the drill. Christ. Get outta here."87

He leaves, happy to be rid of me, no doubt, and I get down on the floor to adjust my body into the padmasanam, the lotus position. Authentic Hindu-Buddha shit. The kind of stuff Zen followers do. Zazen, it's called. It's supposed to open up the "hand of thought", to shut down all those pesky layers of consciousness that hold people down so much. You calm the body, calm the mind, and when you look inside you find satori, enlightenment. It's all really strange and sounds so childish to me, which is why I love it. The imagination makes anything possible. There's nothing you can't justify if you just make-believe some excuse. It is all a little tough to chew, though. I mean, you can't expect to ease yourself into a state of nirvana when you're on death row.88

But that's why I'm here, doing all this complicated nonsense that these scientists decided was the best way in which to focus the mind to Slip. Because if this works, I just might be able to salvage this worthless thing I call my life. Maybe I can have something like a normal one. Maybe I can fix all these awful, evil things they say I've done.89

I start taking long, deep breaths. My eyes closed, I do what they've trained me to do and concentrate on my hara, my stomach. As I inhale, exhale, and feel the air sink down and in, rise up and out of me, I begin to lose awareness of my surroundings. My body forgets the feeling of the cold stone floor beneath me. My mind detaches from my body until it's just a working machine I barely even notice. All the tiny noises around me are sucked into some vacuum as I continue to close myself off from the world.90

I burrow further inside myself. Deeper and deeper. Slowly melting away like candle wax and absorbed into a womb of light. Time becomes nothing. Reality is an illusion. Even the concept of self is now an absurd flight of fancy. I don't matter. I am not I. I am Not.91

At last, the Eye opens and I reach Samadhi.92

I ask myself the koan I have been taught. 'When is the beginning also the end?' The unanswerable question. Logic dies in the face of it and so I am flung into the world again. But I am still, unmovable. Outside and inside of everything. Though drowning in my senses now, there is only one thought in my mind. And that is the Memory. From a long time ago...93

...And I disappear.94

~ ~ ~95

And I'm here. There. Then. In some alleyway, right behind a large green Dumpster, staring out at a small-town street. To my left there's a stack of empty food packaging boxes, waiting for re-use or refuge, and behind me is another street, just as plain and unextraordinary as the one in front. Standing up and glancing feverishly around, I'm settled that no random passerby has witnessed me materialize out of thin air. I walk out of the alley and onto the street. On the far right end, I see it, the old school.96

I check the watch they've given me. 2:26. In a few minutes, the school bell will ring and all the costumed kiddies are gonna pile out like a herd of candy-mad cattle. It's a crisp, bright Halloween afternoon and the town looks like it's been wound back to some imaginary Colonial wonderland. Cool wind makes all the dying leaves dance and fall to the ground. Shivering, I zip up my obligatory coat to stay warm. People walk past me on the street--old couples, young collegians, Mr. and Mrs. Joe Average--on their way to work, to home, to get treats for tonight. I didn't remember it all being like this when I was little. It all feels more like a dream than anything real.97

I walk down the street and into the corner store across from the elementary school and idly gaze at magazines that I vaguely remember seeing before, every now and then casting my eyes to the school's double doors to see if any of the little tykes have come scampering out yet. The guy at the counter, some obese bald man who probably dies a couple years from now, gawks at my cuts and bruises and hesitantly asks if he can do anything for me. I tell him he can leave me the hell alone. After all, I don't need some guy who's little more than an extra in this precious re-run of mine ruining the Kodak moment I'm trying to have. I buy a Coke with the meager money I've been allowed and go back out onto the street.98

I hear the all too familiar blare of the bell and, even from outside and across the street, the sound of the school halls suddenly becoming alive with the noise of high-pitched voices and slamming lockers and quick little feet is audible. Somewhere in there, he's getting ready to go home, to go trick-or-treating. Little Johnny Pureheart, so innocent and oblivious to what he's in for. His night of candy and costuming is going to end up being the last time he'll ever consider himself a part of the world around him.99

It's so strange being here, watching this. Like a horror movie you've seen too many times, one can't help but become desensitized after a while. Your life turns into this kind of schlocky slasher flick and you get to know the ending all too well, then it's just like anything else. Nothing stays scary once you see what goes on behind the scenes.100

The colorful parade of children, some done up in the outfits the teachers let them wear to school, comes pouring out into the chilly afternoon air. They break off and scatter away in little clumps, some off to the buses, others to the parking lot, and then there's those lucky few who live close by and can just walk home. Even though he's usually bus-bound, today he dashes off with the parking lot crowd, looking so tiny under the too-big Superman hoodie he's wearing, and as he runs with his toothy child's grin, I'm blown away by his cherubic beauty.101

Johnny stops short of running into an older girl leaning against the trunk of her car. His sister, Karen. A strawberry blonde prom queen-in-the-making who's usual moodiness is overlooked on occasions like this when she actually goes out of her way to pick him up. Maybe she's just being nice to him because it's Halloween, he's not really sure. She knows how much he loves it and, underneath all that make-up and cheerleader mentality, maybe she shares that same passion. That, or maybe their mother told her to go get him unless she liked the idea of staying in tonight.102

The little fourth-grade Boy of Steel gets into the car with his sister and I watch them drive off towards the other end of town. I know where they live, so there's no need to stalk after them. I've got time. And right now, I've got the urge to go and eat some actual food after spending months digesting prison gruel. Fast food sounds like a Thanksgiving feast to me compared to that.103

~ ~ ~104

The policeman stares ahead and drives me back towards Alan and Stanley's place. He looks a little bored, tired too, but he seems like a nice guy, overall. Too bad he doesn't know what he's doing to me. Too bad he's only making sure I stay a slave.105

I don't tell him anything. There's no point. I've tried before with other people, but no one ever believes me. They take one look at me and they think I'm a bad seed. Just an angry little kid who keeps running away and wants to get his "uncles" in trouble. It's crazy how they always buy into that bullshit without a word. But I guess it's easier that way. Easier than hearing the truth.106

The police car pulls into the driveway of Alan and Stanley's trailer. I can see Alan's car in front of us, so I know there's no chance in Hell I'm going to get out of this. Alan's smart. He always knows just what to say to get them to leave me behind.107

"Poor little bastard," he'll say. "Kid's been a wreck ever since his mom passed. She was my li'l sister and all, so we took him in, me and Stanley."108

He'll have every detail of my fake little life prepared for the cop or the child services lady or the concerned teacher who raises any questions. And he'll pull the fake little rabbit of a gay man out of his hat, too. Act all swishy and maternal to convince people he's just a poor, harmless faggot worried about his dead sister's son. As much as I hate him, hate them both, they've taught me a lot about people and what you can make 'em swallow. You can convince anyone of anything with a friendly smile. Or a limp wrist and a slight lisp.109

The policeman turns the car off and gets out. He walks around to the other side and opens my door. I don't move, just dig my nails into the seat, shaking my head and begging him to take me back to the station. He kneels down so his face is level with mine and nods.110

"It's okay, little man. You're home now."111

"You don't understand..." I tell him. My eyes are blurry and I try hard not to cry.112

"Aww, don't worry. I'm sure you're not in nearly as much trouble as you think."113

He has no idea what they'll do to me for this. No fucking clue. He reaches out his arms to lift me up out of the car and even though I hold on as tight as I can to the upholstery, he manages to pull me out. I start to kick and scream, but it's too late now. He's passed the point of changing his mind. Alan and Stanley could tell me how they plan to punish me right in front of this guy and he probably wouldn't give this mistake of his a second thought.114

He walks up to the porch door and knocks. I stop trying to get out of his grip and just start bawling into his shoulder. I turn away and stare out into the dark street. I can't bare to look at Alan when he comes out. He'll make me look at him later for sure, so for now I'll enjoy the few moments I have wrapped up in the arms of someone who doesn't want to get my pants off me.115

After this, Alan and Stanley and I, we'll pack up and slink away, disappear back into the Shadow. Same as wandering exiles or hated gypsies, the Shadow will follow us. It's the only thing that stays, the only constant, our quiet home. And as with everything else, the living darkness wears two faces, both a savior's and a sadist's, and no matter where we go it will always be right behind us, protecting us, but binding us to its will. Because once you're a part of the Shadow, you can never get free.116

~ ~ ~117

Downtown, I spot them. Them. Alan and Stanley. Driving in their shitty, beat-up van, they pull into the local McDonald's and it almost makes me throw up right there on the sidewalk. That chariot of terrors, that dungeon-on-wheels of theirs, it's right out in broad daylight for everyone to see, but not one goddamn person is suspicious. Maybe it's just because I know what's gone on inside, what's going to, but I can't understand why no one else feels the filth of it.118

I think about doing what they sent me here for right now, think about how I could just barge in there and kill them, but I decide against it. It has to be later. It has to be right at that moment when they try and snatch up little Johnny Angel and drag him into the Shadows with them forever. I don't just want them dead. I want retribution, I want divine justice. I want to intrude upon reality and edit over this one little thing that fucked up everything that came later. I want to be the Superman that kid used to love to pretend he was.119

I walk into the restaurant. The place is done up for the season, with little orange, black, and white paper cut-outs of pumpkins and cats and witches and ghosts all over the place. On the counter, there's a UNICEF box asking for donations and on the far wall I can see a billboard covered with Halloween-y drawings done by kids. If I remember correctly, one of them belongs to little Johnny Sprite.120

From the corner of my eye, I catch the two of them going into the kid's playroom with their trays of food. It's odd how normal and unthreatening they look, how human, considering the plans they have for tonight. One would just think of them as two average people, maybe at most a couple of queers, but nothing more. And here I am, probably sticking out like a dark blot on some otherwise immaculately clean floor. I guess some pieces of shit just blend in better than others.121

The greasy teenager in front of me asks me for my order.122

"Happy Meal," I say. "And a vanilla shake."123

"Is that for here or to go?" he asks dispassionately.124

"Here."125

He nods and then places the order. After a moment, he looks at me, then beside me and around the rest of the place.126

"Uh..."127

"Somethin' wrong?"128

"No, I just...I don't see a kid."129

"What kid?"130

"Aren't you getting the Happy Meal for, like, your son or something?"131

"Nooo."132

Teeny McZitface stares at me bewilderedly, but doesn't says a thing. He just shakes his head and goes to get my food. When he comes back with it, I pay him and go sit down in a booth facing the door to the kid's playroom.133

As I chow down on my squashed cheeseburger and pathetic-looking fries, I watch them in there, eyeing the kiddies running around inside the enormous jungle gym like they're checking out savory pieces of meat on display. A little blond boy in the ball pen seems to especially entice Alan and it's all I can do to not heave up all the stuff I've just been eating.134

This is the hypocrisy of me. Were things different, that might very well be me doing exactly the same demented sort of window-shopping. But when it's them, the burning, fiery anger that rises up in most people right now bubbles inside of me, too. But I guess even if we love the very same sin, we'll always hate the ones who opened up those doors for us in the first place. It's a kind of warped parent-child rivalry. Or maybe we just hate it when we see ourselves in the people we don't want to become.135

Sucking down my milkshake, I'm so lost within my own daydreams of vengeance that I don't notice when a little boy walks over and pulls on my coat sleeve.136

"Hey, mister."137

"Huh?" I turn my eyes away from the playroom and glance down to see a boy with silky dark hair and a camouflage t-shirt on shyly smiling up at me. I grin back, falling into my old charming ways and, instinctively, my pants start to grow a little tight. "Oh, heyyy there, buddy. What can I do for you?"138

"You want that?" he asks and points to the toy car I got with my Happy Meal still inside its plastic wrapping.139

I chuckle. "Well, I dunno. You wanna trade me for it?"140

"Trade what?"141

"What kind did you get?"142

The kid reaches into his pocket and pulls out a little blue car that looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. He hands it to me.143

"Ooh, that's pretty cool," I tell him and look it over. I've got no interest in the toy whatsoever, but it's been so long since I've been able to talk to a kid. Among other things.144

"Yeah. And I only need one more to have 'em all."145

"Lemme guess, I have the last one?"146

The kid nods enthusiastically. It's good to see some life in somebody after all this time.147

"Well, I wouldn't wanna ruin your collection by taking this one off you," I say and hand him his car back. "So how 'bout you tell me your name and that'll be our trade?"148

"Tell you my name? Really? That's all?"149

"Yep. Here, I'll even open it for you first to prove I mean it." I tear my own little car, an orange one, out of its plastic bag and hand it to him. "There, now you tell me your name and the deal's done."150

"Okay. My name's--"151

"What are you doing with my son?" I hear a woman's voice ask accusingly. I look up to see a middle-aged mother moving towards us, glaring with fierce hawk-eyes.152

"Nothin' at all, ma'am," I say and smile warmly at her. "Just havin' a little chat."153

The woman scoffs at me, all distrust, and grabs her son's arm protectively. She tears my toy car out of his hand and slams it back on the table.154

"Come on, Shawn."155

"Mom, we were just talkin'--"156

"That's enough!" she barks at him. They walk away from me and under her breath, I hear her whisper, "Damnit, you know better than to talk to strangers..." And, of course, she's right to be so concerned. I am the eternal Stranger.157

Little Shawn and his snoopy bitch of a mother head out to their car and take off and I sigh, disappointed. When I turn back to look into the playroom, my prey is no longer sitting and drooling over their giggling aphrodisiacs, but are instead standing before me.158

Alan smirks down at me, stealing a solitary fry from my tray and nibbling it away. He reaches back down and picks up the little orange car, examining it like a mechanic as if it were the real thing.159

"Cute kid, huh?" he says and chuckles. "It's little fellas like him that make it worth it. I mean, when they're just beggin' you for it, it's rude not to give 'em what they want, don'tcha think?"160

I swallow hard to keep the bile in my throat down. Red worms squirm inside of me, fueling a razor-sharp wrath that's waiting to cut them open, but my face remains a passive mask. I don't know why, but somehow they know I'm like them. Maybe it's some extrasensory sort of thing, maybe they can smell it on me. Or maybe they can tell because of what I am to them. What I was. Will be. Whatever.161

"Excuse me?" I manage to say.162

Stanley pats me on the arm and I try not to burst into a howling, murderous animal.163

"It's cool, buddy," he says. "We gotcha. Like recognizes like, man. People like us gotta stick together."164

"Shut up, you moron," Alan orders him, cool as a cucumber. This is the normal run of things. Alan, the alpha male and Stanley, the bitch. Alan looks back to me. "Don't mind him, he's just an imbecile."165

"I really don't know what you're talkin' about," I tell him, anxious guts clenching.166

Alan nods. "Sure you don't."167

There's a lapse while the three of us are silent and it's all I can do not to scream or cry or stab my fingers into their eyes. To anybody else this must look like nothing, but we all know that right now we've just formed some sick little club.168

Alan sets the toy car back down and taps his knuckles on the table in finality.169

"Well... see you later," he says. He stares back at Stanley and motions his head towards the door.170

"Yeah, see ya around, man. Have fun 'trick-or-treating'," Stanley adds, laughing, his fingers makeshift quotation marks.171

Alan smacks the back of his sidekick's head. "Come on, you idiot. We got shit to do."172

They walk away from me and I sit still as a stone until I hear the restaurant's door open and close again. When I glance over my shoulder, I watch them get into their van and vanish. The red worms stop their squirming, but they still burn hot inside of me.173

~ ~ ~174

Alan's slapping me in the face, telling me what a nasty little shit I am, and Stanley's standing over his shoulder with a camcorder, taping the whole thing. I'm naked and bruised and everything hurts from the waist down, but I can't do anything, there's nowhere to go. We're down in the basement, their arena, their land of cum and honey, and outside, all the world is just as strange and terrible. Home is somewhere far back in my mind, just a memory drowning under all these awful things they've made me do and any hope of getting away is only through the off-chance that one of them kills me. But they won't, they'll make sure they hold back just enough to keep their fun little toy alive and kicking and screaming and sucking and bending and crying and moaning and stroking and gasping and bleeding and--175

~ ~ ~176

Full now, but anything other than Happy after my Meal, I head back downtown. Slowly but surely, the sights somehow manage to reinvigorate me, sending me into a nostalgic high as something close to that fuzzy, familiar feeling of all-is-well-and-good expands in the bottom of my being and rises up, up, up to gently tickle my brain and pulls a shroud over my darker memories.177

The entire town is right here for me to touch, but somehow it still feels like some hallucination. I keep expecting the acid dream to fade, to find myself in prison clothes, not walking the streets, but locked in my cell.178

I pass a small store with large orange and black painted letters on the window and before I take another step, I turn back and see HALL-O'-WEEN COSTUMES 4 SALE! written in bold and realize that this is The Attic, the store little Johnny Play-Pretend loves to go in every fall to look at all the spooky masks and Halloween paraphernalia, cobwebs, bloody limbs, Styrofoam tombstones and all. My own Child Within is compelled to go inside and I enter, bells jingling as I open the door.179

The girl at the cash register is something like in her early twenties, probably a student from the university. She's done up in pale make-up and has a black wig on and wears some kind of occultish attire, although I doubt the Wicked Witch of the West ever wore anything so tight and revealing. She looks at me, her attention suddenly piqued, and she gives me a seductive wink with her long eyelashes. I nod courteously, but try my best to come off as uninteresting.180

I put the girl out of my mind and walk over to the far right wall and gaze at all the various monster masks. Some are good, very real-looking and most likely would scare the shit out of a kid. Others are poorly made, badly painted or just look plain ridiculous. Down on the other end of the store, I see little kids and some teens checking out costumes. Since it is Halloween today, the store is mostly bare, but people like to come in anyway, for last minute stuff and just for the novelty of it all. I make my way to some racks and glance at the fake blood and plastic vampire teeth and putty moles and noses. Memories bubble up to the surface of my mind, and though a part of me hates remembering them, I let myself do it anyway.181

"Looking for something?" someone asks and I look over, startled, to see the cashier girl standing beside me with a big salesperson smile.182

"I'm... just browsin'," I mutter.183

"Already got a costume then?"184

"Uh, no. Not really."185

"What?" she asks, her mouth forming a shocked 'O'. "You can't be serious."186

"Nope. No duds."187

"Well, that won't do. People are big on Halloween in this town. If you're caught walking the streets just as yourself, you're liable to get egged or something."188

I chuckle, reluctantly. For some reason, this girl seems interested in me. Too interested. This has happened to me before, more than a couple of times. As bizarre as I always seem to find it, it seems that a large number of women find me attractive. I really don't understand why. Not that I doubt my own sex appeal, I've just never been one to think about the other side's point of view.189

"That's okay," I tell her. "I'm monster enough without all the, uh, you know. Bells and whistles."190

But my 'leave-me-be' brand of charm doesn't work and the girl grabs my hand and starts dragging me towards the counter.191

"Don't be silly," she says, "you have to dress up on Halloween!"192

She goes behind the counter and pulls out a little make-up kit.193

"Here, I know. I can make you a ghost."194

"With that?" I say and point to the make-up.195

"Sure, why not?" She says as she pulls out a little brush and starts wiping white powder on my face. At first, I try and talk her out of it, but that goes nowhere, and when she says she's almost done and I might as well let her finish, I relent. She switches from white to black make-up and moves the brush in little circular motions around my eyes and then touches up my cheeks so they look hollowed in. When she's done, the girl puts her kit away, tousles my hair a little, takes her work in, then grins.196

"Perfect."197

"Thanks," I say, more of a question than an actual statement. "What do I owe you?"198

"What? Nothing, of course!" She laughs. "Silly."199

"Not really. Anyway, um, I gotta go now."200

"Wait a minute," she says and taps my shoulder as I turn to leave.201

"Yeah?"202

"What're you doin' tonight? I get off at nine and I'm gonna head over to this party later on. Maybe you wanna go...?"203

She bats her eyelashes and holds a pointer finger against her pursed mouth. One of those obnoxious-but-sexy looks, I guess. I know I've used them plenty of times, anyway. But it's usually just to fuck with people.204

"I don't know if that's such a hot idea, um..." I look down at her nametag and right next to her cleavage I read the name. "...Liz."205

She pouts. "Why's that?"206

"I..." I search for something to say.207

Alan and Stanley, when they'd finally decided to make me the trio member of their depraved duo, showed the world of girls off to me. We went to plenty of bars and clubs and brothels. Hell, a few times I even tried honest-to-goodness dating. But all I could ever feel was a hollow pang, a type of empty agony where I knew that something like love or, at the very least, lust was supposed to be. But there was nothing. I was an alien in the world of women. The girls couldn't soothe the angry, pathetic thing inside of me. I had to take care of that myself.208

"Sorry, but I think you're probably carrying more STDs than they have documented, toots," is all I can think of to say. The cashier girl's face becomes an 'O' again, but her eyebrows have turned into a sharp "V". I quickly run out of the store, dodging something large that she throws my way while she swears loudly.209

~ ~ ~210

It's a quarter to six and inside the house, little Johnny Goody Two-Shoes' mom and sister are fawning over him as they put on his costume. He's going as a mummy this year after becoming obsessed with the Karloff flick. His dad let him stay up late to watch Midnight Monster Movies and now he's wrapped up in gauze to his knees. His face and hands are already painted an asparagus green thanks to his sister's earlier work and there's a smile he's wearing the likes of which only comes out on Halloween. A golden, slender thing wrapped up like a morbid present, it's almost easy to see what there is to find so appetizing about him. He's a choice specimen, a perfect catch, to be sure. Real grade-A stock, a prime rib of a kid.211

I watch for another ten minutes as his mother finishes up the job while the sister goes upstairs to change. The kid's mom is babying him, telling him to stay in sight of his sister, to only go up to houses of people he knows, to--most importantly--stay away from anyone he doesn't know, and finally, to have fun. She gives him a kiss on his little green nose and the little guy fidgets, giving her an embarrassed 'Mawwwm!' sort of look and then giggling. Neither of them know this will be the last time they see each other. That is, depending on how things go for me.212

Another fifteen minutes and the sister comes downstairs in some Vampirella get-up that nearly knocks Mom off her feet but, nevertheless, she doesn't try to get her daughter to change. Instead, she kisses her little boy again, hands him a jack-o'-lantern bucket for his candy and, after a few words with her eldest child, waves the two of them goodbye as they get into the girl's car and drive off. If memory serves, Sis' plan was to go meet up with Boyfriend and then take Little Brother trick-or-treating for an hour or so before ditching him back home and leaving for a party. That was the plan. Was.213

When the kid's sister's car turns the corner and is nowhere to be seen, I don't know what to do. They won't start going door-to-door for another half hour, so there's little sense in me following after and risking my place in the Shadow. Gazing back into the house, I see the mother making dinner in the kitchen and there's an itch to go up to the house that I just can't get rid of. I spend a few moments pacing back and forth with indecision before I finally tell myself it really doesn't matter what I do at this point. After all, if everything goes right, I won't be around much longer. I cave in and walk across the street.214

Before I have any time to pause and reconsider, I knock on the door with its little dangling skeleton staring back at me from a pair of empty sockets. Everything's quiet and then I hear footsteps coming towards the door. It opens and then she's in front of me, staring at me like I'm nobody to her at all. Just a beaten-up weirdo powdered up to look like the Ghost of Halloween Past. Future. Whatever.215

"Um, hello," she says, perplexed but polite.216

"I, uh..."217

A long, awkward pause settles, but she keeps up her forced, rictal grin. Then, she seems to realize something and the smile becomes a smirk. “A bit old to be out trick-or-treating, aren’t you?”218

Looking at her, there is a familiar feeling that comes and goes like a tap on the shoulder and something deep and ancient in me starts to fall apart.219

"...Just wanted... see you..." I tell her. A tear falls down my cheek and I quickly wipe it away, smearing the make-up, I'm sure.220

Propriety and good humor melt away and I see a glimmer of fear in her eyes. "I don't understand. Do I know you?"221

"...Can't be real..." I say and take a step closer to her. She recoils.222

"Please, I don't know who you are or who you think I am, but I’d like you to leave."223

I don't know why, but inside I break open and a sobbing fit hits me hard. I start to shake bad, like I'm withdrawing all over again, and I have to get down on my knees. I can't get anything else out for a while but mumblings and wet gasps. I put my face to the brick walkway and pound my fist against it in desperation. Somewhere in the pit of me a baby is crying.224

I don't know why I did this, why I'm reaching out to her. Maybe I want something from her that she gives her son; a warm, bright something that's absent in me. But I can't ask for it, because no matter how deep down into me someone might go, there's only a monster waiting at the bottom. A monster who loves what he is, and he and I are bound to the unspeakable things we've been brought up to crave. We are vampires and we will always feed.225

"Your son... he's... he's a... a good boy, isn't he? Isn't he?" I ask, getting ahold of myself.226

"How... how do you know my son?" She asks. I look up at her, broken, ruined, and her eyes bore into me like I've just admitted what I really am.227

"Get out of here. Now. Get out of here or I'll call the police," she threatens. Just looking at her, I can tell she's scared of me. For me. I mean, him.228

Whatever it is that's supposed to be here, it's not. Some kind of emotional umbilical cord that's severed. I'm not a part of this place. Like the Mickey D's mother said, I'm a Stranger and everything's so fluid to me that I keep wondering when I'm going to wake up. This woman was never meant to see this thing that's crying like a little girl in front of her right now. I get onto my feet with difficulty and without looking at her again, I turn, ashamed, incomplete, and I run away.229

~ ~ ~230

I was thirteen the first time they made me do it. Do to someone else what had been done to me. I guess it was the voyeurism of it that got them off. When they tossed the kid in front of me he was rigid with fear, sniffling and weeping as he stood naked and surrounded by us. 231

I was torn. At first, of course, I pitied him. After all, I'd been in the same mess he was in countless times before. But there was another part of me, something that had recently started to poke its vile, dark little head out, that was ecstatic. There was someone else. Someone who could share my pain and humiliation. Even better, someone who could go through it in my place. Someone I could give it to. For a long time there had been something growing, a piece of me that wanted to see what it felt like to be on the other end of all of this.232

"Go on, Johnny boy," Stanley had said, egging me on. He was already exposed, holding himself and ready for some live-action sadism to help him go to town with. Alan just watched from the corner, a small smile on his face. In his mind, I imagine it must have been like watching your son go up to bat.233

They were letting me loose.234

I went up to him slowly, whispering and circling him. I didn't know what I was going to do, or if I was going to do anything, I just wanted to experiment, to see what would make him crack. There wasn't much that didn't. Alan and Stanley had already done most of the work just by bringing him down into our world. I looked at it all as objectively as I could, considered it a type of trial, a way of building character, both his and mine.235

What didn't kill us would make us stronger.236

I touched him slowly, hesitantly, tried to excite him. It was the only thing I could think of doing that might give him any kind of good feelings about what was happening. He didn't seem very welcoming upstairs, but the little man below seemed to be more accepting. He was a pretty young thing, with only the faintest inklings of emerging manliness. I talked with ease, brought him towards me, playing The Friend. I told him that I wouldn't hurt him, that if he just didn't make a fuss, he'd get out of it alright. He gave in to my gentle lulling, behaving with me like most boys did with girls. Every now and then, I could hear the slapping sound that Stanley's flesh made against itself, but I ignored it and stayed with the other boy in our own little bubble. He grew more agreeable with me, going so far as to kiss me, and behind us, Stanley said, "Faster, do it faster."237

It's when the boy was close to being warm, white goo in my hand, that I kicked his feet out from under him. He grabbed onto me, tried to keep his balance, but I shook him loose and he slipped. There was the dense cracking sound of his head against the stony floor and he laid still as the wind came back to him. He looked up at me, crying, betrayed, and I knew how it felt to deceive someone.238

And it felt good. Good to have that kind of control. Good to stab someone in the back. I smiled down at him. For a moment, I thought he looked just like me. Then I brought my foot down on his still erect member.239

I heard a loud snapping noise and my foot was suddenly covered in something squishy and hot and the other boy yelled out and Stanley laughed behind me and I became a blur, a monster for the first time in my life. I went far away from where I was, from who I was, and made up memories of blood and power and flesh and fucking and never going home ever, ever again because there never really had been one and when I resurfaced from the violent, animal world of my brain, the boy lied next to me, dead and broken. His face was a mess of bone and bruises and all along his body, there were jagged tears where his flesh had been torn away from the rest of him. Blood pooled out of his ass like some viscous waterfall and as for his little man below... well, he had taken up new residence within the basement's garbage bin. I still had bits of him all over me, and that got me hard as a rock.240

When I looked over to Alan and Stanley, there was something like actual fear on their faces. They'd thought this would be a good laugh, that I would be just as timid and blubbery as the brand new corpse beside me. But the hunger that had been growing in me was free now. My Pandora's box of hate was open and I had adopted their grotesque urges and sinful desires, had even acquired some new ones all on my own. Now I was lost and tainted forever, and they had their very own Frankenstein.241

~ ~ ~242

Johnny Clean and Sis leave one of her friends' houses and someone new is with them. He's an All-American type, letterman jacket, blond hair, blue eyes, and he has his arm around the girl's waist just like any normal, red-blooded golden boy would. The little guy's looking up at them, a small frown on his made-up mummy face. He doesn't like his sister's choice in boyfriends much. After all, he isn't even wearing a costume, and there's no greater sin on a night like tonight.243

It's dark now and trick-or-treating has come full swing. Kids are everywhere, shepherded by a few adults and teens, and there's laughter in the October air, but it doesn't mean much to me. All of them dressed up as cowboys and creatures, athletes and killers, pretty princesses and comic book superheroes, pretending they're something to respect or fear. Wearing masks so they can be something other than themselves. Tonight you can lie and you can laugh and you can lose yourself for a while and then go back to being happy and stupid and normal tomorrow morning. But tonight is all that's left of my world. There is no tomorrow.244

I watch on as the little guy stops at his first house, where his teacher from last year lives, and she opens her door and smiles down at him, greets him with soft, warm words. He holds up his pumpkin bucket and she drops in a little candy bar and waves a goodbye-but-not-really-goodbye, goodbye-just-for-tonight wave. He goes back to his sister, excitedly points to the house and says something, and Sis pats him on his bandaged head, unhearing, chatting it up with Boyfriend. The three of them move on to the next house and I walk a little further up the sidewalk on the other side of the street. Some people passing by give me curious looks, but it doesn't matter now if I seem out of place. I'm going to be little more than a phantom soon enough.245

Johnny Saint runs into a few friends of his coming back from the same way he's headed. Two girls, a witch and a rabbit, and a ninja boy whose having fun showing off his fake kung fu moves. The little guy knows them from school, has a crush on the rabbit girl, but doesn't really like the witch all that much 'cause she's really bossy. They stand there, huddled, and the three of them show off their horde of goodies, while he lets them know he's still got booty of his own to win. 246

Trailing behind them, the kid's sister takes the time to flirt with her All-American. How much of what's going to happen is her fault has never been a question. Karen can't be blamed. If she knew about the tragedy that was fast approaching, she'd do something. But all she can do is play her part while I play mine.247

The little guy hits up another row of houses, so I scope out the scene around me. Nice suburban homes on a nice suburban street. This is practically the definition of Any-fuckin'-town, U.S.A. So why'd it have to happen here? Why'd it have to happen to m... to him?248

Oblivious to where I'm walking, I bump into a little kid. I turn around and crouch down, helping him pick up a few pieces of fallen candy. When I look up to put the stuff in his bag, it's little Mickey D's Shawn staring at me. He's dressed up as an army soldier, I guess, in the little camo tee I saw him wearing earlier, but now he's got a toy gun and camo face paint as well.249

"Heya, buddy," I say. "'Member me?"250

Shawn nods with a little bit of hesitance. I pour the candy into his bag and ruffle his hair.251

"Don't worry, pal. I ain't a goblin or a ghostie or a four-legged beastie."252

"I know," little Shawn says. "'S just... my mom told me not to talk to strangers."253

I nod, agreeing. "Your mom's right. But hey, we met earlier today, didn't we? So we're not strangers, then. Not really."254

Shawn scrunches up his green-black-brown face. "I... guess so... yeah, you're right."255

I stand up and flash a smile. "So, Shawn, where's your mom at, anyway?"256

"She's with Mrs. Miller down the street. They're talkin' about their jobs or somethin', so she said I could go on ahead, but that I had to come right back as soon as I was done with this side of the street."257

"How many houses you got left?"258

"Three," Shawn says and points up ahead.259

"Want me to go with you, make sure you get by okay?"260

Shawn looks up at me and there's a sort of uncertainty in his eyes, but it disappears almost as soon as it comes and he says, "Yeah, okay."261

He takes my hand and we walk up to the next two houses where he gets his candy. The people at the houses must not know him 'cause they don't seem to question why little Shawn is with the powder-smeared Stranger. At the last house, I see a forgotten or maybe festive knife lodged into the 'head' of a jack-o'-lantern which little Shawn has judged as harshly as some professional critic on it's poor quality, and when the guy giving out candy isn't looking, I yank it out of the pumpkin and stick it in my coat pocket. Just in case.262

When we get to the end of the block, I look down the road running through the one we're on and see that it leads to a kiddie park. It would be so easy to take little Shawn down there, finally feed the hungry monster inside, so long deprived of a meal of young flesh. I glance back at Shawn and he's as clueless as can be, absolutely convinced I'll take him right around and back to his harpy-whore mother. It would be so easy...263

But no. I just can't get into the mood. As pleasing as he is, little Shawn fails to whet my appetite. Here he is, a fucking fish in a barrel, so to speak, and all I can think about is precious Johnny Ambrosia.264

And then it hits me; I have to have him. In the most surreal, unexplainable way, it's a perfect fit. This boy that so desperately needs me, well I need him to. I've had so many in the past and it's all come to nothing, just more empty searching. But Johnny, sweet little Johnny, maybe he has what I've been looking for all this time.265

"Alright, Shawn-boy. Better get back to your mom, huh?"266

Shawn stands still for a moment and, though I can't be sure, he seems to be let down.267

"...Okay. Bye, mister."268

"Bye-bye, soldier," I say and salute playfully.269

I watch little Shawn run back down the street, towards his mother on the other side, and I turn my attention across the street and, up ahead, I glimpse the van hiding in its darkened alley. The driver's door opens and I watch Alan get out and walk over to the end of the alleyway. Stanley comes out to stand beside him from the other side. They stay there, just barely hidden in the Shadow, waiting for the right moment.270

It's long since been my opinion that the real horror about all of this is that they're not out for anyone in particular. Anyone will do. Just a kid, any kid. It could've been any one of them. I know that, right now, they're just narrowing down their selection. Picking away the rejects to settle on a lanky little guy wrapped up in gauze. There's just two houses between him and the rest of his awful little life.271

I spot Johnny Kismet as he reaches the last house, rewarded with candy by its occupant. He looks back at Sis in her bloodsucker babe costume and impatiently tries to get her attention. She waves him away with her manicured hand, racoon-mask eyes never looking away from Boyfriend. They're lost in the mating ritual of normal people. She's giggling, even, so it's hopeless. The little guy might as well not be there at all.272

"Go on, Johnny," she's saying, "we'll catch up." I can still remember.273

This is it. It's about to happen.274

He brightens up, the imaginary leash of protocol and Halloween safety unfastened, and he turns and starts to cross the alleyway...275

...And runs right into the hands of a man wearing some cheap clown mask. Johnny Lamb doesn't have time to react before his new pal "Funny Bones" picks him up and starts to take him into the darkness. The poor little guy, thrashing in the clown's mad grip, drops his pumpkin bucket and all his precious candy spills out onto the ground. It's not long before another man appears, "Mr. Smiley", his yellow Happy Face mask huge and grinning with the lie that says 'Everything is fine'. They walk like giddy boogeymen further into the alley towards their van, and I know exactly what goes down from here. They'll take him to the woods outside of town... and then he'll be theirs forever...276

But not this time. They can't have him. He's mine.277

I don't hesitate, just sprint across the street like a bullet shot out of a gun. I pass Sis and Boyfriend, neither of which knows what's happening yet, and into the alley after my prey. The monster is staring out of my eyes and, after waiting all these years, he's ready for this perfect fantasy to come true.278

Funny Bones the Child-Fucking Clown and Sadistic Mr. Smiley don't see me coming. They're high on victory as they shut the van doors on little Johnny Prize and when I come down on them, it's like I'm some kind of apparition.279

"Hey!" I hear Alan's muffled shout from beneath the clown mask. I don't bother to slow down or say hello, I just punch him in the face. He stumbles backward and falls and when Stanley realizes what's going on, he charges at me.280

I hit the ground hard, but manage to knee Stanley in the balls and push his bulky form off me. When I get up and turn to start kicking him in the ribs, a hand grabs me and spins me around and Alan's there, mask gone, his face contorted in anger and lust and when he sees it's me, he laughs caustically and tosses a punch.281

"This one's ours!" is all the need will let him say and he goes to hit me again. I throw myself into him and when we fall, I jump on his stomach and start bashing my fists into his thin face. I stop after a few blows and, making out his features under the blood, I see he's passed out. I slap him till he wakes up and, dazed, he starts to plead for me to stop.282

Inside me, the monster is cackling. My red worms, it devours them whole and its gut starts to burn with a cruel fire. I don't resist now, I let it out to play.283

"Fuck you, Alan," I say.284

"What? How'd you--?"285

With my voice, the monster lets out a primal roar and screams, "This is for every... fucking... time!"286

I fumble for the knife in my coat and when I grab ahold of it, I jerk my hand out and bring the blade down, stabbing Alan in the chest. I do it over and over and over, poking enough holes into him that you could hide away an animal in his guts and it'd have enough air to breathe. While he's screaming in loud, beautiful agony, I start slashing the knife across his face, hacking away ribbons of skin. Then, without an ounce of hesitation, I bring the shining sharpness down into his eyes. He screams even louder when I do that and when I take the knife out after piercing each of them, they make a wonderful deflating sound.287

I hear Stanley cry out in anger behind me, and turn to see him watching me as I blind his friend. He comes at me like some big, dumb bull again and when he's close enough to me, the monster makes a fist with my knife hand and aims for his throat. It slices through his Adam's apple and he starts to make watery sort of choking noises.288

Even though I know I can't, I wish I could come back and do this all over again. There's eons of white-hot pain I want to fill them up with. New ways of torture I want to invent just to be able to give them all the hurt they truly deserve. I want to find a way to make them immortal just so I can keep this up forever.289

I'm a blur, a monster. Far away from where I am, from who I am, and making up memories of blood and power and flesh and fucking and never going home ever, ever again because there never really was one and when I resurface from the violent, animal world of my brain... I plunge right back down into it again and don't stop until they're nothing but tossed around pieces of what used to be people and puddles of gore in the alleyway.290

Across the street, I can hear people starting to figure out something very bad is going on. When I look over, there are a few of them looking back at me and shouting in horror at what I've done, but I just ignore their frightened cries. Composed and passably civilized again, I search for Alan's pants, nowhere near the rest of him, and find his keys. I hop into the van. Sticking the keys in the ignition, I turn to look at Johnny Paleface.291

"I'll get you outta here, don't worry," I tell him. I'm covered in human being and panting like a dog. The kid says nothing, just sobs, tears dribbling down his face and he's so fucking scared. I'm wet with warm blood and don't know what I can do for him now but die. It's when he reaches out to me from the back of the van, teary-eyed but something inside of him turning brave, that I realize this isn't over yet. There's still something left to do.292

After all... he's mine.293

I start up the van and tear out of the alley, completely indifferent to anyone nearby. In the distance I hear sirens, the howls of the infamous Justice, of the damning thing. It's following behind. I don't know where to go. It probably doesn't matter. They'll find me. Him. Us. No matter how many times I've tried to run away, someone's always caught me.294

We cannonball through the town circle and, like the needle on an Ouija board, something pulls me towards the forest outside of town. Alan and Stanley are corpses behind me and the world around us feels strangely empty now. No one's around. But I know better than to assume anybody ever was. It's only me here.295

~ ~ ~296

In prison, I kept having strange dreams. They said it was a symptom of the Slip conditioning, that all the inmates went through it. Whether that was the case or not, I didn't care, it was fucking with my head so bad that I'd make myself go for days without sleeping.297

In the dreams, it'd be autumn and I'd be in a forest--the forest--watching the sun sink into the horizon like a fat, burning pumpkin through the trees. It'd be a while before I noticed that I was holding someone's hand. When I'd look over to see whose it was, I found myself standing beside... myself. That poor, young me, all dressed up for trick-or-treating like he'd been years before, he would be gazing up at me with a bizarre mixture of fear and tranquility on his face. And I'd tell him that we were going to go someplace no one else could hurt us. We'd hide in that forest that glowed with a golden-orange splendor and we'd disappear forever. And there was a swell of anticipation in both of us to do that, to go away, to not exist. The reason the dreams haunted me so much wasn't because they disturbed me. It was because no matter how hard I tried not to, I always woke up.298

~ ~ ~299

It's quiet in the forest. 300

Even though I've saved him from the thing I had to become, I understand what's missing now, I know that this is more than meant to be. Who else has had the opportunity that I've been given? No matter what I do, I'll always be this monster. Even If I don't exist. That's why I have to do this terrible, beautiful thing. I've gotten myself so lost, and this is the only way that makes sense to me if I want to bridge whatever gap that was made that cut me out of humanity. This is how I preserve a piece of what we'll always be. I can't let the darkness die with me. It's too much a part of me. Him. Us. So I unwrap the bandages in a kind of taboo act of foreplay and for some reason, he doesn't fight it. Maybe he knows. Maybe he's always known. What he would be. What would happen. And if my innocence was meant to be stolen, then at least it should be me who takes it this time.301

But there's no more time for philosophy.302

He slips his skinny body onto the old, ratty mattress in the back of the van. I look at him and, with the moonlight shining down through the front windshield and onto his nudeness, he looks as pale and pure as I could have ever hoped to be. I give him one last chance to back down, to run away from the monster of himself, but Johnny Godsend just stares at me with luminous eyes that tell me this is what we owe ourself. Ours eyes closed, we do what we've been made to do. I enter into him. Into me.303

As I inhale, exhale, and feel the air sink down and in, rise up and out of me, I begin to lose awareness of my surroundings. My body forgets the feeling of itself and becomes just another part of his. All the tiny noises around us are sucked in to some vacuum as we continue to close ourself off from the world.304

I burrow further inside myself. Deeper and deeper. Slowly melting away like candle wax and absorbed into a womb of light. Time becomes nothing. Reality is an illusion. Even the concept of self is now an absurd flight of fancy. I don't matter. I am not I. I am Not.305

And the universe becomes complete somehow. Like a tear has been seamed. Like a broken chain has been restored. Like the ouroboros has finally caught the tail in its maw and can happily eat itself into oblivion. This is the last and first time. This is poetry.306

I remember the koan they taught me. Or the one that they'll never teach me, maybe.307

When is the beginning also the end?308

The unanswerable question. Logic dies in the face of it. But I know the answer, now that we're outside and inside of everything. Though drowning in our senses now, there is only one thought in our mind. And that is the Memory. The one that doesn't exist.309

~ ~ ~310

When is the beginning also the end? 311

When the Snake consumes its tail.312

When is the beginning also the end? When the Snake consumes its tail. When is the beginning also the end? When the Snake consumes its tail. When is the beginning also the end. When the Snake consumes its tail? When is the beginning also the end. When the Snake consumes its tail. When is the beginning also the end when the Snake consumes its tail when is the beginning also the end when the Snake consumes its--313

~ ~ ~314

The doors are opened and outside are many strange men. Harsh metal stares me in the face as they hold their guns up and tell me to stay where I am.315

So. This is the last one. This the end of my tyranny, my search for what I've lost. I can't believe this is it, game over. After all the time I've put into this. I've been to every nowhere place there is, hiding, looking, losing my name just to satisfy what I need. And here I am, and the monster is finally full. I've been to all those black worlds beneath me. I've found my answer.316

I look over and try to feel for the boy, but they grab at him before I can do anything and there's nothing beside me, only a space where I should be. One of the men, all of them in blue with stone faces, comes in and pins me belly-down against the mattress. My hands are cuffed and I'm pulled up and shoved out of the van that, for a brief time, was the center of this fucked-up little universe I'm in. I keep my eyes on the mattress until we're out in the forest night and then I look away and close my eyes as they take me and put me in the back of one of their cars.317

This time, when I stare out the window, I see the little guy staring back at me, a blanket draped over him. His eyes are empty now because he understands what it's like in my world. I don't smile.318

~ ~ ~319

The cop is scowling at me, eyes beady underneath salt-and-pepper brows thick as woolly bears. Meanwhile, his head is so hairless that the flourescent lights above us make it gleam like a crystal ball. He clears his throat and coughs like a man who's smoked most of his life might, then says, "Tell me everything."320

I hold back a chuckle. "I'll try... but it's all so hard... it's all so hard to remember," I say. And I'm not lying. Everything's jumping around. I can't make any of it stick. But the smirk that's sneaking its way onto my face is making it hard for me to convince anyone of that.321

The cop, his face is tense, like he's holding back a hurricane of rage and repulsion. I can tell that he wants to say and do all kinds of really bad things to me. But he doesn't, he keeps calm, he maintains control. I wonder what that's like.322

"Well, for your sake," he says, voice stern, "you'd better."323

This time I do laugh. He just doesn't understand. While we sit here in this little room, my whole world depends on me keeping my eyes from closing. Everything that I've gone through, and I'm finally descending into oblivion. Maybe going to the Hell they've all told me I was destined for. It seems so long overdue.324

I don't know what to tell this guy. I mean, how do you remember something when you're not even really fucking real anymore? How can you trust memories of a past that's no longer happened?325

I'm starting to feel so woozy. The cop with a head as bare as a baby's ass asks me if I'm okay. He doesn't seem to really care, though. No one ever really cares.326

All I want to do is go to sleep, but then that's the end of me, the end of all of this. There's only one more sleep that's left for me to take and that's the Big One. And for some reason, I suddenly understand what that really means and I'm so scared. The kind of scared only a kid can be. I try to get up, try to plead with the cop to help me, with what I don't know, but when I rise up out of the chair, I crumple to the floor and can't for the life of me get back up.327

"Get someone in here," the cop calls out the door. "Get a doctor in here now."328

"Won't... do shit..." I wheeze out and start to laugh and cry all at once. "No one does... anything..."329

I think my brain is disappearing.330

The cop sets me up, tells me someone's gonna come help me, and I tell him that it's already too late. I'm just make-believe now, just some kind of psychotic imaginary friend, and all that's left to do is fade away.331

"I fucked so many... killed 'em... I slaughtered and choked and tore open more than I can even remember..." I laugh. And laugh and laugh and laugh. "Only I can't remember... 'cause it doesn't happen anymore..." I start hacking violently and when I open my mouth up wide, dark, black blood spews onto the floor.332

"It's over... it's... finally... fuckin'... over..."333

I'm crying so hard that I can barely breathe. I don't think I've ever been this goddamn happy.334

More of these powerful, expressionless men come and carry me away. Officer Bald Eagle tells me again that someone's going to help me. I don't bother to try and explain anything to him.335

~ ~ ~336

Alone now in a cell, I can finally close my eyes. It's done. Undone. Whatever. I've destroyed the world that made me and I've passed on a part of me that I can still cherish forever in some unwritten future. I may be gone, but I'll be alright without me. 337

...I wonder who we'll be when Johnny Me wakes up...338

...And I disappear.339