Earthenwing
They�d gotten the gun to protect him.
It had taken applications and permits and lying and, when those had failed, an illegal purchase from a Russian immigrant, paying three times the gun�s value for it and three boxes of bullets. It had gone in the closet, on a high shelf, in a locked box. The key stayed in the dresser drawer, taped to the side. Where it sat, only Bernd could reach it, shoved into the back corner, too high for his wife without pulling aside the vanity chair, too high for their son, who would not go into closets. Kurt feared the dark in closed places.
Bernd supposed his fear of the dark would leave him one day. And that was why the box was locked.
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�No!�
It was his first word, and for a month, his only word. He would shout it back at them like a parrot, hanging from the rings of the window curtains, squirming and kicking and sometimes biting as his mother tried to pull him back down. When she finally caught him by the hips and pulled he�d scream it, too strong for his age and too fast, slow to talk and quick to climb, dangerous to get ahold of with his teeth out.
He�d say it, stubbornly, when he fell asleep in Ingred�s arms at night, still damp and fluffed and smelling of soap, curled like an overgrown kitten. �No.� he�d say around the thumb in his mouth, eyes already half shut, dozing against her chest. �No.�
It would take another three months to finally call her �mama.�
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Kurt would go to the roof at night, laying on his back on the sun-hot shingles, the last strip of red gone from the horizon and the porch light glowing beneath him. Distantly, he could see the lights of town on the hill, hidden behind night trees, stretched over the earth like a spiders web glistening with dew. And above it all would be stars. Bright stars. Blue stars. Country stars. He would pick out the constellations he knew, and wonder if there were cities up there, too.
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Company.
It was his mother�s aunt, the aunt who Didn�t Know, the aunt who Couldn�t Keep Her Mouth Shut. It was the aunt who wore long pearls in her photographs, who had hats that matched all of her outfits. She came in a blue car, with her husband, who could never remember his father�s name, and she came without invitation. She�d simply called them an hour before, saying she was on her way and she�d been to visit her sister and they needed to talk about her mother�s care, and maybe they could all go out to lunch because she was starving. And his mother had tried to put her off, saying they were busy and her husband had work to do, but the aunt had said Nonsense, she only came once a month and they could very well make time for her.
So she�d come. And Kurt and his parents had scrambled around the main rooms, gathering everything that was his, loading it in his arms and sending him up to the attic with a match under his heel, locking the door behind him. He�d bolted it, and he�d put it all down on his desk, and he�d sat down on the chair by the window to watch the dirt road that wound through the trees to their home.
He was still there when the blue car pulled up, when his Great Aunt came stepping out in long pearls, his blue face up against the circular window that looked out from the one place that was his. He saw her and her husband who�s name Kurt couldn�t remember because it didn�t matter, because he�d never met him and never would meet him, come up to the front porch and his parents go out to meet them, talking for a long moment on the front lawn of the house. Kurt couldn�t read their lips. Kurt couldn�t hear them.
Kurt was in the attic.
His mother disappeared back inside the house for a moment and reappeared with her purse, all four of them going to his aunt�s blue car, all four of them loading inside. And neither of his parents looked back at the attic window, because if they looked maybe the aunt would look, and if she looked she�d see his face behind the glass. And she didn�t know. No one could ever know, that the Wagner�s had a son.
He watched them drive off down the dirt road, turn the bend, and disappear. Kurt dropped his forehead against the glass, and was silent.
Kurt was in the attic.
Kurt would always be in the attic.
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-Stop me.-
-Somebody get up here and stop me.-
He�d been sitting on his bed for nearly an hour now, the door locked, the radio off, the rain falling gently on the roof of the house, making soft, feline footsteps. He�d planned the best way to do this. On the bed, with his back to the wall, so when all was said and done they�d only need throw away the mattress and sponge the wallpaper. No carpet to tear up. No window to replace. He�d briefly considered laying down a tarp, but the only one was over the wood pile, and his father would notice it gone. No tarp, then. The blankets would do.
It would be messy. He knew that.
Kurt had watched those real life crime dramas on television, the ones with photos of little girls with their stomachs ripped open, wives with their skull�s blown apart, and he knew there would be blood. But his options were limited. He couldn�t do it in the downstairs bathroom, with the razor. They�d find him to fast.
-Somebody get up here and find me. Now.-
They couldn�t find him until it was done.
Besides, it had been sitting in his dresser drawer for three months now, hiding under his winter clothes that it was too warm to wear, places his mother wouldn�t look. For three months he wondered if they�d notice, if they�d go in the closet and find the lock box forced, the gun missing, and then they�d know. But there�d been dust on the box, so much dust, and he knew they hadn�t touched it in all the fourteen years of his life.
Kurt, running his thumb over the serial number on the cold black barrel, took a shaky breath and raised the gun up, holding it at the ceiling. His finger barely fit beneath the trigger guard, he�d have to use his fingertip to press it. It was awkward. He could do it. He could do it.
A rabbit ran in his chest. Beating, beating, beating.
Only for a little while.
�Shit.� Kurt said, or squeaked, scrunching his eyes shut and mouth pulling open in a grimace, neat, straight, perfect white fangs bared. His shoulders rose up around his ears.
-Somebody fucking find me.-
-Somebody find me right now.-
The muzzle touched the side of his head and Kurt jerked away, startled by its coldness. The gun was heavier than he thought it would be. More solemn, more impersonal. He�d held it often, these past three months. Cradled it. Looked at it. Pulled the safety on and off, cocked it and uncocked it. Put it in his mouth once. Hadn�t pulled the trigger.
Kurt�s breath shook and he was making little noises, little animal noises, on the exhale. He felt his heart beat. Beat. Beat. And beat.
Kurt gave an open throated bleat, flinched, and pulled the trigger.
The noise was massive.
Kurt felt white hot pain at the side of his head, blood pouring into his ear, his ear ringing and throbbing and deafened, and his eyes snapped open. Hyperventilating. Bleating. Animal noises.
He�d missed.
Kurt dropped the gun and wilted forward over his legs, lungs heaving, blood running from the scalp wound into his face, into his eyes. Throbbing and red. He couldn�t breathe. There were footsteps pounding on the staircase, two sets of them, alerted by the shot, alerted by the noise, the slam of his father�s body against the door and his fist pounding.
�KURT!� he bellowed, trying to force the Krieger lock. �KURT!�
Kurt opened his throat and the noise broke out like a water balloon, wailing, high, horrible and infantile. Kurt pulled his legs to his chest and collapsed sideways on the bed, wrapping his arms around his knees and his tail around his feet, bawling and bleeding onto the bedsheets.
His father, cursing, screaming, shouldering the door down.
Pound.
Pound.
Pound.
The hinges gave way first. The door split into the room from the wrong side, sending screws and bits of metal flying into the carpet. Two bodies tripping in, scrambling for the bed, hands grabbing at him, uncurling him, voices shouting and shrieking and pressing blood stained bedclothes to his head.
Kurt�s heart beating.
It beat. And beat. And beat.
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The ring wouldn�t come off.
Amy was thirty pounds too heavy, and eight months too pregnant, for the ring to come loose, but she�d pulled at it until her knuckle bled, fingers slick with soap. What a cheapskate. What a con man. Probably wasn�t even a real diamond. Belly swollen and back hurting, Amy bent over her bleeding hand and cried, chair creaking beneath her at the cheap kitchen table, bills piled in one corner, empty take out boxes in the other. Soap slicking the middle.
She was alone in the ugly apartment. Alone and alone and alone. He�d taken her mother�s earrings, and all of her credit cards.
He�d left the bills and the television and the baby with her.
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�EWW! God. No! No Todd!� She winced, picking the baby up off the ground and sticking her fingers in his mouth. Todd twisted, and squirmed, and tried to swallow, but she caught it between two fingers, pulling the cockroach out by its head, its hard body squirming in the dark confines. Amy made a face, looking around quickly for a place to put the cockroach, but that ugly green strip of a tongue lashed out and around her fingers, sliding down her knuckles towards the squirming insect. Amy froze, mouth open, sickened, as the baby�s tongue slid down and around, tugging weakly at the insect�s abdomen.
Amy shrieked and threw the cockroach, putting the baby down QUICKLY on the dirty couch and running to the bathroom to gag. Todd, old enough to crawl and old enough to babble, began to cry.
The cockroach righted itself, and scattered beneath the refrigerator.
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This made twelve men. Twelve that Todd knew of. Four she�d admit to.
They came at night, on her days off, when she�d sent Todd to bed; they came reeking of cigarettes and beer and hard labor. They�d talk for a while, they�d laugh and they�d drink, and then there would be noises, and Todd would pull the pillow over his head and press down over his ears and try to block it out. Sometimes it would work.
Sometimes, when Todd got up for school the next morning, they�d still be there, eating breakfast or watching television in their underwear, spending a night away from their wives or girlfriends, grunting at him as he got ready for school.
Usually, they were gone by the time he came home.
Sometimes they weren�t.
Sometimes they were still there when his mother left for work at night, weekend leftovers that hadn�t moved from the couch, sending Todd to fetch beer, to fetch food from the fridge, to microwave some waffles and bring them in. And some of them were there when bedtime came, still parked, still present, still drinking. These men became �uncle�. Uncle Carl. Uncle Steve. Uncle Rich. And they�d sit, unemployed and immobile, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes on the filthy couch, dominating the television.
And then one day, a month later, Todd would come home and they�d be gone.
The process repeated.
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�Come on, frog boy, show us!�
�No!�
Todd twisted, writhed, tried to get out from Ryan Berghoff�s grip behind him, the boy�s arms twisting up beneath his armpits, holding him. Danny Hopewell leaned into his face, Tom, Adam, and Nick behind him, grinning.
�Come on. I saw you catching flies out at the bus stop, stick it out for us, freako.� His hand, his hand which had broken Todd�s nose last February, grabbed Todd by the jaw and tried to force his mouth open.
Todd lunged, and bit him.
Danny howled. �Fucking�! Little cocksucker bit me!� he cradled his hand to his chest, shocked as much as hurt. His eyes flashed up, furious.
The punch caught him in the diaphragm, forcing Todd�s breath out with a wuff, doubling him over in Ryan�s arms. Ryan jerked back and forced his straight, giving Danny a clean shot at Todd�s face. Todd wheezed, pulled a leg up, and kicked Danny Hopewell in the stomach.
Danny stumbled back, eyes bulging, face falling towards his knees with a ragged sound of air escaping. The rest of the posse started shouting, Kill him, Danny! Kick his ass!
Danny, still doubled, gave a short, wet gasp. He started coughing.
The asphalt spattered with spots of red, red blood.
A sudden silence as Danny fell backwards onto his ass, trying to cough, arms wrapping around his middle as blood splattered around his mouth, onto the legs of his jeans.
�Oh fuck�.Danny?� Ryan said, loosening his grip on Todd in shock. Todd twisted away, grabbing his backpack from where they�d knocked it to the ground, and bolted. No one chased after him.
Danny slumped over onto his side, wheezing, hacking.
Blood.
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She�d looked so old today.
So many nights drinking, so many nights with cigarettes stuck between her fingers, staring out at the television screen, exhausted. So many nights with strange men, they paraded through like an assembly line, all identical, all interchangeable.
She looked so old.
Todd could see it in the lines of her face, deep, lonely crevasses made of too many nights alone, too many nights working at the diner, too many years spent watching him, feeding him, protecting him, caring for him while all the good men left her, chased off by her mutant son. Chased off by webbed, needy fingers, grasping hands, a mouth that needed fed, yellow eyes that watched them when they wanted to be alone.
She was too old to be so alone.
He knew she needed things, things Todd couldn�t give her. The hundredth man, or maybe the thousandth, Todd had lost count ages ago. He was the only one to ever own a suit. The only one to come with no attachments, the only one to leave each morning and come back each night, the only one she went with in return.
They were on the sofa together, him in his nice polo shirt and pressed trousers, her sprawled half in his lap, her head on his knees, his hand combing gently through her mouse colored hair.
She�d said this one was different, Todd. This man was real, this man was for keeps.
�Uncle Steve� wanted to have children with her. New children. Fresh, bright, unruined children, children without the webs between their toes, children who called him Daddy.
He was in the way again.
He was keeping her alone, again.
�Todd?� his mother asked sleepily, glancing up from the television. �Where are you going? It�s late.�
�I�m going out, ma.� Todd said quietly, shifting his backpack on his shoulders. He had three changes of clothes, his personals, and fifty dollars. Fourteen years in one bag.
�Well don�t be gone too long.� He mumbled. �You�ve got school tomorrow.�
�I know, ma.� He said, looking at her, the only mouth that had ever kissed him, the only arms that had ever held him. �I won�t.�
She settled back against Steve, watching the television, letting him pet her hair.
Todd left. And he didn�t cry.