Having your first real drink is one of those firsts you remember. Like your first non-solo orgasm, it’s a milestone on life’s road. My first drink was on an early spring day in 1966, when I was in seventh grade. My buddy Terry approached me before school began.

“Hey, you’ll never guess what I got: booze!”

Of course, I was intrigued. 

“No shit?”

“Yup. It’s sloe gin.”

“How’d you get that?”

“Found it. Next to the railroad tracks. Almost half a bottle left. I stashed it in a safe place. We can drink it after school.”

“Cool. I stole a couple of my old man’s cigarettes.” Cigarettes, when we could scrounge them, were already part of our routine.

I’d never heard of sloe gin, which to the ear seemed like gin that is in no particular hurry. I’d heard of gin, of course, but not its lackadaisical variant. But that didn’t matter. Here was an opportunity to drink like a man—the dribble of wine my parents permitted on very special occasions didn’t count—to pass a bottle and swig from it.

Neither of us knew that sloe gin isn’t meant to be drunk straight up, that it’s a cheap, cloying liqueur intended for mixing into the sort of froo-froo cocktails one of our aunts might have ordered. Or, as with this particular bottle, to be tossed aside unfinished by a discerning bum, to be finished by undiscerning thirteen year old boys. And for all we knew the guy who threw the bottle away may have pissed in it before he did so, but who thinks of that, right?

After school we headed toward the C&EI spur that ran a few blocks from school. Terry led the way to a gully parallel to the right of way. There, among the weeds, brush,  junk and debris accumulated over decades, hidden behind a chunk of broken concrete, lay the precious bottle. He held it up to me, smiling proudly. We sat on a nearby stack of old railroad ties, and Terry opened the bottle and passed it to me.

“Have a taste.”

I raised the bottle to my lips and took a long pull of the sticky, sweet liquid. I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but it wasn’t this. It was like drinking candy, except for the warmth I felt growing in my core as the syrupy liquid passed down my gullet.

“Ah… Good!”

I passed the bottle to Terry and from my breast pocket produced the protective tube of notebook paper that held the cigarettes. We lit our cigarettes, and smoked and drank contentedly.

I was basking in self satisfaction and pride; I wasn’t a kid anymore. I had convinced myself that I now stood in the ranks of the sixteen and seventeen-year-old local hooligans who were so sophisticated in my mind, who dismissed me as a snotty nosed kid. Snotty nosed, yeah, but not a kid anymore, dammit. Here’s the bottle of booze to prove it.

We finished the bottle and tossed it into the weeds. Time to go home. I was slightly woozy as we made our way up the muddy embankment to the roadbed, and I slipped and fell and slid down to the bottom of the gully, grinding mud deep into the weave of one side of my pants, from the waist to the ankle. This wasn’t any kind of mud, mind you, but a particular mud. Where I lived at the time, just ten inches below the topsoil, was yellow ochre-colored clay: the residue of limestone dissolved eons ago, before any human beings ever lived anywhere, let alone in America. In my neighborhood, this clay laid on the surface wherever humans scraped through the topsoil to construct such things as railroad lines.

Terry laughed, of course, as friends are permitted to laugh at other friends' minor misfortunes. I laughed too, as required, but thought to myself, oh, shit, this is trouble.

When I arrived at home, my mother stared at me wide-eyed.

“What happened?”

“Uh...I slipped and fell.”

“What? Where?”

“Just, you know, on the way home.”

Mom was enraged—not unusual for my mom—but in retrospect understandable in this case: These were dress pants, mind you, which, with a dress shirt and necktie, was part of the uniform required of Catholic school boys at the time. Not easy to clean.

“What do you mean ‘on the way home’? Where were you?”

“You know. Nowhere. Just on the way home.”

“You were hanging out with Terry. That kid is nothing but trouble, I’ve told you a million times. I want you to come straight home after school. No detours.”

True enough that Terry was trouble to some degree, but he never pressured me to do anything I didn’t really want to do. But Mom didn’t see it that way: Any divergence of mine from the straight and narrow path could, of course, have only been caused by a bad influence she couldn’t control.

“Take off your pants. This is going to take me hours to clean, if I can clean them at all. There’s going to be hell to pay when your father gets home.”

I felt like a kid again.

“Hello?” Maggie said aloud as dropped her steel garden claw and stared at the creature perched within a hydrangea bush. It was large and unlike any insect she was familiar with.

Is it a praying mantis? I’ve never seen a mantis this big, she thought. Jesus, this thing’s huge! 

Then it occurred to her it didn’t look like a mantis, or an insect of any kind. It had six legs, but they weren’t thin and twig-like. They were thick and muscled, with feet that grasped the branches, long jointed digits and opposable thumbs. And the body wasn’t right for an insect. Not composed of three distinct segments—a tiny head, a slightly larger a thorax, and an enormous rear abdomen—the body looked like that of a smooth-skinned, iridescent grayish-green vertebrate, broader in the chest and narrower towards the rear, with a large round head and no visible antennae. Two circular vibrant blue eyes with tiny black pupils were set closely spaced at the front of the head, and seemed to be staring back at her.

A miniature lizard, or a salamander? No, they don’t have six legs, and this critter doesn’t have a tail. What the hell?

When she gently parted the leaves and leaned closer to get a better look, it darted away. 

She shrugged and continued working. It must be an insect of some kind. What else could it be? Bigger than any one I’ve ever seen, that’s for sure. Maybe some invasive species that hitched a ride from the tropics in a crate of bananas.

An hour later she had finished tending her garden, stood and smiled as she surveyed her work. She was proud of her garden, and rightly so. Now that she was old, retired, and widowed, gardening had become her passion. She’d spent long hours in the local library learning horticulture and the latest organic methods, and the result was magnificent. She focused on flowers and grasses native to her region, the Midwestern prairie, planning it so that something would always be in bloom throughout the growing season, providing a smorgasbord for bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. Maggie’s garden was a legend in the neighborhood.

——

Maggie had just brewed a cup of tea and was seated at her kitchen table. She was on the phone with her daughter.

  “Sorry I’ve been out of touch, Ma,” her daughter said, “you know we’ve been busy helping Emma get ready for college this September—we drove up to Madison with her for orientation, spent the weekend there. Lovely town. So, what’s new with you? How’s the garden going?”

  “The garden’s great. Going to be better than ever this year. By the way, I saw the weirdest bug there today. Huge, like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I’m going to have to find the camera—it’s packed away in the basement, probably still has film in it—I want to take a picture of it if I see it again.”

   “Ma, nobody messes around with those old film cameras anymore. Use your phone. Even that crappy little flip phone of yours takes pictures. And if you had a smart phone, I’m sure you could download an app that would identify the bug for you.”

  “The phone I have is just fine. I can call people and they can call me—I don’t need anything more complicated than that.”

  “Don’t be silly, smart phones are easy to use, I know a lot of people your age who have them.”

“I  just don’t want to learn how to use another new gadget. Life was so much easier without all of this electronic stuff.”

“Ma, it’s not rocket science,” Maggie visualized her daughter rolling her eyes, “Everybody uses them. Look, Mark and I are planning to visit next Saturday, so I’ll pick up a new phone for you and bring it when we visit, then I’ll activate it and show you how simple it is to use. We’ll even download a few apps I know you’ll like, including something to help you identify your new bug.”

”Oh Sharon …”

“No arguments Ma. We’re doing this. You’re getting a smart phone—welcome to the twenty-first century. See you next Saturday.”

——

Saturday. Maggie and her daughter and son-in-law were in the backyard, seated at the wooden picnic table with cups of tea and a plate of cookies. Sharon was showing Maggie how to use the features of the new smart phone.

“Here’s the camera app,” Sharon said, pointing to the icon on the screen of the new phone, “Hard to miss, right? Looks like a little camera. Just tap this icon and a screen pops up. This button is obviously the shutter,”

“Obviously,” Maggie said.

“Now, watch this.” Sharon snapped a photo of the flowers growing nearby, and opened the photo. “These icons down below are pretty self-explanatory: This one is for sharing the photo either in an email, or a text, or posting it online. This one, like a little heart shape, is if you want to indicate that it’s a favorite in your photo library. This one is for adjusting the exposure, or cropping, or applying special effects filters. And this one, the letter ‘i’, is for information.”

Sharon tapped the “i” and a window appeared beneath the photo containing the date and time, the file number and camera settings. Above all of that pedestrian data, was the word “Butterweed”, the name of the flower, and a small arrow. She clicked the arrow and a new window popped up with more information about the species and links to the Internet, where one could learn all of the specifics of butterweed.

“Pretty amazing, right? And easy.”

“Yeah,” Maggie said, “I have to admit it is.”

“Now you’re all set. I’ll recycle this antique.” Sharon dropped the old flip phone into her purse. “And I want you to keep the new one with you at all times, so we can stay in contact. I want you to call or text me anytime you feel like it, and I want to be able to contact you, without delay.”

“Sharon, please don’t treat me like I’m helpless. I’m not that decrepit.”

“Promise me, Ma.”

“Okay, I promise.”

——

Maggie sipped her tea as she strolled through her backyard the next morning. She paused and frowned as she looked down at the patch of ground cover in her garden. A five-inch square swath of the creeping thyme had been reduced to stubble. She frowned. Something eating it? But what? I can’t imagine. No, wait … that precise, neat area, taken down to a quarter inch of the ground, no animal did that. It’s not some-thing, it’s some-body.

  She glanced around, her brow furrowed, wondering which of her neighbors had harvested her thyme for their kitchen. She knew them all, and they were good friends, none of them would be so petty.

  After she finished her morning ritual, she went indoors, changed her slippers for shoes, gathered her purse, hat, and car keys, and left the house to run some errands, then meet her friends for their weekly game of hearts and a late lunch at a local diner.

Returning home at 4:00 PM, she parked her car in the garage. Walking from the garage through her yard, she noticed another square of her thyme had been mown. Oh, for heaven’s sake! Who’s doing this? Maybe it is some garden pest after all. Some animals do things with that sort of precise geometry—like the hexagonal chambers in a bee hive, for example.

She turned toward a rustle in the bushes nearby and saw the creature staring at her. You! she thought.

She pulled out her phone and snapped a picture. When she tapped the information icon, it identified the plant—Purple Coneflower—but not the animal. She opened the app “BugIQ”, imported the photo, and frowned as she read, “Unknown”. 

“Who the hell are you?” Maggie said aloud.

She thrust her phone into her pocket. I have to identify this damned thing, but how? Maybe show the photo to some local university biology department. Better yet, capture it, and bring it in alive. 

She stomped into the house, went to her bedroom closet and grabbed a wire coat hanger, then selected a needle and thread and a pair of scissors from her sewing kit. Next, to the basement, where she rummaged through a cardboard box full of discarded clothes she kept for cleaning rags till she found an old lace curtain. She marched upstairs, sat at the kitchen table, spread her materials before her, and set to work. An hour later she smiled and admired her handiwork—a butterfly net. Once again, my Girl Scout training serves me well.

——

Maggie woke before dawn the next morning. She sat in her kitchen, drinking tea and thumbing through a magazine she was too distracted to read. When the sun was up, she picked up her butterfly net and an empty mayonnaise jar, its lid punched with several holes, and went out to her garden.

  Another neat square of creeping thyme had been shorn, and the three swaths formed the beginning of a checkerboard pattern. 

Dammit! Where are you? She walked slowly along the garden, scanning the foliage, pausing to part branches and peer deeper. After she walked the entire length of the garden, she began the search again, and again, and again. I’ll find you if it takes all day. 

As the sun rose higher, the air grew hot. Sweat trickled down her forehead and stung her eyes, her back was aching from bending over to scrutinize the greenery, but she continued to search. After repeatedly scanning the garden for over an hour, it was evident that the search was a waste of time, and she felt a bit foolish. She sighed, wiped her brow, and was ready to give up when she caught it in the corner of her eye. Perched among the milkweed, the creature stared at her. There you are. She paused, peering at it. My God, it’s gotten bigger!

She scooped the creature into the net, and transferred it quickly into the mayonnaise jar. She held up her prize, admiring it, and smiled. “Gotcha!” she said. The creature didn’t struggle, but continued staring at her.

In the cool of her kitchen she placed the mayonnaise jar on the table, poured herself a glass of lemonade from the fridge, and plopped into a chair to regard the creature. It stared back at her.

So, now what? Who do I contact about this thing? Some local government department? The nearest university is Northwestern—call their biology department? I’ll get some robo-answering system—most likely never get through to a live person, and if I do it’ll be to some clerk who’ll probably dismiss me as a doddering old crank.

She pulled out her phone and dialed her daughter.

“Hi Sharon, it’s me.”

“Hi, Ma.”

“Sorry to bother you at work. Listen, I captured this … um, I don’t know what it is—it’s not an insect—the strange animal that I told you about in my garden—looks like the damn thing’s been feasting on my thyme—now I’m not sure what to do with it. Any thoughts?”

“Jeez, Ma, if it were me I’d just squish the thing.”

“Sharon, you know we’re not supposed to ‘just squish’ things. If there is one of them, there are probably others, and if it’s an invasive species, I want to know. Everybody should know—maybe it’s one that hasn’t been identified yet, or maybe it is known, and the authorities would want to track it. But who would I contact?”

“You’re the gardening expert, Ma, I thought you would know. Is there a county bug department?”

“You’re a big help.”

“Didn’t the app on your phone identify it?”

“No.”

“Well, go online and do some research. I’ve told you a million times, the laptop we bought you is for more than just watching YouTube videos and emailing.” Again, Maggie imagined her daughter’s eyes rolling. “Google ‘invasive species in Illinois’ or ‘garden pests’. Also try ‘where to report invasive species’.”

She picked up the jar with her quarry and went to the spare bedroom that was her office and library. After a few minutes of online searching she learned that the University of Illinois had a department called The Illinois Cooperative Agricultural Pest Survey Program. Of course, I should have guessed, U of I. They recommended that captured specimens be killed to assure they can’t escape, in a leak proof jar with alcohol or white vinegar. “Do not squish it,” they emphasized. Returning to the kitchen, she found an empty pickle jar and poured a few inches of vinegar into it.

“This is the end for you my friend,” she said as she entered her office. She stopped in her tracks, staring at the jar on her desk that had held the creature. It was open and empty, the lid lying next to it.

How is this possible? Maybe I didn’t tighten the lid enough, she thought, though she distinctly remembered doing so.

She searched the room, under the desk, behind the bookshelves, between the potted plants, in the closet, between the clothes and shoes, on the shelves. The creature wasn’t there. It must’ve slipped out of the room. Crap! It could be anywhere in the house.

She moved through each room of the house, searching under furniture and lampshades, between the cushions of the sofa and chairs, under the piano and in the piano. She searched her bedroom, then moved to the kitchen, checking all of the cabinets and drawers, and looking under the sink, under the stove and fridge. She checked every inch of the bathrooms. Nothing.

Returning to the kitchen, she put a kettle on to boil for tea, and slumped into a chair and sighed. Now what? The basement, the attic crawlspace—oh God, they’re so crammed with junk I’ll never find it. 

It was late afternoon, and she was tired and hungry since she had skipped lunch. She brewed a cup of tea and made a tuna salad sandwich, then retired to the living room to eat and watch television. She was too preoccupied with her uninvited houseguest to focus on the TV news, so she switched it off. She picked up her phone and called her daughter.

“Sharon, I’m afraid I’ve done something dumb. I captured that thing in the garden, put it in a jar and brought it into the house, now it has escaped and I don’t know where it is.”

“It’s no big deal, Ma, it’s just a bug.”

“It’s not just a bug, it’s something else, and it’s creepy, it scares me.  And it’s gotten even bigger—it’s growing fast. It’s smart, too. It was able to unscrew the lid of the jar and escape.”

“Calm down. I’ll stop by your place tomorrow after work, then we’ll deal with it. We can call an exterminator.”

“Oh God, I don’t want to have the house fogged with poison! And I don’t even know what to tell them to exterminate.”

“We’ll deal with it tomorrow. Goodbye.”

——

It was 3:00 AM, and Maggie had spent a restless night in bed, sleep eluding her. The nocturnal sounds—every creak and groan and knock that an old house makes at night—startled her and she’d sit up, straining her ears and wondering if the sound she’d heard was made by the creature. She threw off her covers, got out of bed, and slid her feet into slippers. It’s hopeless, I’ll never sleep tonight.

She shuffled to the living room and turned on the television. Sitting with her arm extended, pointing the remote at the TV, she surfed through the channels, not staying on any one of them for more than a few minutes. Infomercials peddling overpriced kitchen gadgets, or herbal supplements, or zirconia jewelry. Reruns of TV series dating from her childhood. A low-budget 1950s sci fi movie with people screaming and running from gigantic atomic mutant insects—Oh God, not this! Mexican soap operas. Oily televangelists. Jesus, more channels than I can count, and they’re all crap. She turned the television off, leaned back on the sofa, closed her eyes, and sighed.

Her eyes snapped open at the sound of her tea mug shattering on the tile floor in the kitchen. She ran to the kitchen and switched on the light. The creature stood on the counter, staring at her. It had grown to the size of a squirrel.

Maggie stood frozen for a moment, then slowly advanced and took hold of a nearby frying pan. She inched forward until she was an arms length from the creature, then swung the pan. It clanged like a bell against the countertop. The creature stood on the window sill, several feet away. Oh my God … I didn’t even see it move. It stared at her for a moment, then turned and darted through the open window, tearing through the screen as if it were a cobweb. She ran to the window and saw it shoot into the garden.

“God damn you!” she shouted.

 Flinging the frying pan to the floor, she ran out her kitchen door, through her yard to the garage. She had lost her left slipper so she kicked the right one off, and was now barefoot and clad only in a flimsy cotton nightgown.

In the garage, she picked up a five gallon gasoline can that she kept for fueling the lawnmower. She shook it, listening to the liquid slosh inside and thought, this won’t be enough. She took the lighter fluid and matches used for the barbecue, and before she walked out the door, she grabbed a gallon of paint thinner and a bottle of fuel used for the tiki lamps.

She splashed all of the liquids on the garden, covering every inch of it, then struck a match and tossed it into the middle. The entire garden instantly ignited in a blast. A ball of boiling flame and black smoke rose, enveloping the overhead power lines, and the wires’ insulation caught fire and fell in burning sheds.

The explosion had knocked her off her feet, and singed her eyebrows and hair. When she came to her senses, she saw the hem of her nightgown was burning. She swatted the burning nightgown and finally extinguished it, but half of it was gone. Crawling away to a safer distance from the garden, she stood and watched the fire, smiling.

——

When Sharron and Mark arrived, they had to park half a block away. Maggie’s home was unapproachable by car because of the crowd of neighbors and the cluster of emergency vehicles surrounding it. They approached the policeman who appeared to be in charge.

  “I’m Mrs. Franklin’s daughter. How’s my mother?”

  “She’s in the ambulance now and will be sent to Saint Bernard Hospital emergency room. Physically, it’s not serious—first-degree burns on her face, arms, and legs—not much worse than a sunburn. But mentally…”

  “Mentally, what?”

  “This wasn’t an accident, it was arson. She told us she started the fire.”

  “Oh my God!”

  “She says there was some kind of monster living in her garden.”

  Sharon leaned against her husband and buried her face in his chest, sobbing.

  “When they’re done treating her, she’ll be held until she’s transferred to a mental health facility,” the officer said. “A court order is on the way. I wouldn’t worry too much, your mom committed a felony but she’s not going to prison. Not at her age and with her mental state—it’s obvious that she’s not responsible for her actions. Most likely the state will commit her to a mental institution.”

  “Can I speak to her?” asked Sharon.

  “Sure.”

  In the ambulance, Maggie was lying covered in a blanket and strapped to a gurney. Sharon crouched next to her and took her hand, squeezing it lightly.

  “How are you, Ma?”

  “Good. That thing wasn’t from this world, but there’s nothing to worry about now. There’s no way it could’ve survived. But we have to get the word out to the appropriate authorities, they have to know about this thing. The cops here don’t seem to get it.”

  Tears trickled down her daughter’s cheeks as she nodded. “Sure Ma. I’ll take care of it and warn them. You don’t have to worry about it.”

  The ambulance left, escorted by a police squad car. Sharon and Mark drove to the hospital to be with Maggie. The firefighters were rolling up their hoses and preparing to leave. Neighbors stood in clusters, chatting and shaking their heads.

The garden had been reduced to a few inches of black, steaming ashes. The redwood fence next to it was a collapsed blackened ruin. In a neighboring sycamore tree, in a branch overhanging Maggie‘s yard, a pair of circular vibrant blue eyes with tiny black pupils stared between the leaves, watching the scene.

It’s 3:00 am and I’m lying in bed, not asleep. Just now I recall being maybe four, at most five years old, and my dad coming home from work in a winter’s early evening—at around 5:00. It was dark, nearing dinner time, and my brothers, sisters and I were in the living room, crowded around the television, watching cartoons. As he entered through the rear door that opened to the kitchen (he routinely entered through the rear door) my mom called out from the kitchen, “Dad’s home!” and all of us kids ran, squealing, to greet him. I recall clutching and hugging his leg and that the cloth was cold and smelled of night air.

He dutifully hugged and kissed us all, and then he walked over to my mom  who was standing at the stove stirring something, and he kissed her and patted her ass.

That memory has remained with me ever since. One of the few that I don’t wish I could forget. I revisit it often.

When I was very young—I can’t say how young, maybe three-ish—I severely injured the thumb on my right hand. My dominant hand. 

Apparently a tendon had been severed, and ever since the thumb has functioned like a panda’s thumb. I wasn’t even aware that it didn’t work correctly until I was well into my 20s, but that’s another story.

Flashes from that episode—too brief to be called moments—have remained with me ever since. I think they are my earliest memories. I remember seeing broken ruby-red glass on the street and being fascinated by the curvy sharp forms flashing in dappled sunlight. I remember reaching for them. I remember sitting terrified in our neighbor Mr. McNear’s car, in my mother’s lap, with her hand gripping mine with a towel that I thought had been used to clean up spilled ketchup. I remember not cooperating with the hospital X-ray tech. The flashes have remained among my memories.

But it has just occurred to me that maybe the pretty ruby-red glass I remember wasn’t red glass at all, but had been stained with my blood. Not that it matters.

1

Brian Flaherty sauntered into my office, looking smug and self assured as usual. “Shut the door and have a seat, Mr. Flaherty,” I said. 

He dropped into the chair across from my desk and slouched, smirking at me. Flaherty was a football star that every teacher granted an undeserved passing grade because St. Brendan was a football powerhouse favored to win another state championship, and of course, football rules.

A muscle bound, dimwitted brute who made the lives of kids who were smaller and smarter than him a living hell, he was the kind of thug who was the bane of my existence all through my own high school days—privileged, with an overweening sense of entitlement, and a bully—and now that I was a high school principal, was the bane of my existence again.

“Do you know what this is about,” I asked.

He shrugged. “Like I care?”

“You should care,” I said, “this is serious.”

“So the president of the chess club is whining because I gave him another swirly. Gimme a detention if you want.” He smiled. “I’ll be excused from it so I don’t miss football practice.”

“Oh, you’ve got more than that coming to you, sir,” I said. “You’re going to a criminal juvenile detention center, and you’ll stay there until you’re twenty-one years old.”

I opened a drawer of my desk, pulled out a dozen small, sealed plastic bags of shiny crystals and dropped them in front of him. “I found these in your locker—I’m guessing they’re not sugar packets. I assume the police lab will determine this is crystal meth. You’re dealing drugs.”

He pulled himself out of the slouch and stared at me wide eyed, his mouth hanging open, his lips quivering. In an instant, the self assured thug had morphed into a scared little boy.

“Of course, a few years in ‘juvie’ is the best case scenario,” I said, “For something as serious as selling meth in a high school—and since you’re nearly eighteen years old—the state could try you as an adult and send you to prison.”

He tried to regain his composure. “My locker’s private,” he said, “You can’t search it without a warrant or something.”

“I certainly can, my friend,” I said, “Your locker is the property of St. Brendan High School, and I have the authority to open it at my discretion. That’s why I have a master key for all the lockers. And that’s spelled out in the waiver that you and your parents signed when you enrolled. You’d know that if you’d bothered to read it.”

Of course, If I’d actually wanted Flaherty arrested I would have voiced suspicion to the dean of discipline about him dealing drugs, had the dean present as a witness when I searched the locker—as per St. Brendan’s disciplinary guidelines—then called the police. I knew that having no corroboration and removing the evidence would taint it in a criminal case, but he didn’t know that.

I had searched his locker the previous night, when the faculty and extracurricular students had long gone home. It was an exploratory mission—you could say it was along the lines of a sociological study—to learn what makes an incorrigible miscreant tick.

Sure, I thought, even hoped, I might find some sort of contraband that would warrant some kind of disciplinary action, but that was secondary.

When I found the packets of crystals tucked between some books, I knew I’d struck gold. This was worth more than hours of detention, more than suspension, this was expulsion and criminal charges material.

I placed the packets back where I’d found them, making sure all the items in his locker were exactly as he’d left them, and closed the locker. In the morning I’d meet with the dean of discipline and call the police.

Then it dawned on me: Flaherty was exactly the tool I needed to solve a larger problem. I needed somebody to do some dirty work, and he was the perfect candidate. I could confiscate the drugs—not telling anybody else about them—and use them as leverage.

In the morning, when Flaherty was in his first period class, I waited till the corridor was empty, quickly opened his locker and retrieved the drugs, and returned to my office and called him in to meet me.

He leaned forward in his chair, blinking back tears. “Please, Mr. Bergman, don’t call the cops. This will ruin my life, it’ll ruin my parents.”

“Yes,” I said “It will. You can say goodbye to the scholarship offers from Ohio and Penn State, but you should’ve thought of that before you decided to pedal narcotics. Oh well, you’re young, after you’re released you should be able to get back on your feet. Even though you’ll have a criminal record, you’ll probably be able to land some kind of a job to support yourself—for instance, sorting in a recycling plant.”

“Please, sir,” he whimpered. “Can’t you give me another chance? Everybody deserves a second chance, don’t they?”

I leaned back in my chair, sighed, and looked at him as though I were considering his plea. “A second chance? You’re asking me to just make this go away. Why would I do that?”

He started to blubber. “Sir … Please …,” his voice halting, “Gimme a break …. I’ll do anything you ask. … Anything. Just gimme a break.”

“You’ll do anything? Really?”

“Yes, sir. Anything you say. Anything to make this right.”

I swept the drugs into the open drawer, then closed and locked it. “All right. Meet me after school in Madison Park, 3:45 sharp, at the benches next to the tennis courts. Don’t be late. We’ll talk about it then.”

“But I have football practice after school.”

“You’ll miss practice today. Be there.”

——

I was sitting in my car parked across the street from the tennis courts when Flaherty arrived at 3:35. I watched him pace as he checked his phone every few minutes, until 3:55—I figured I’d let him stew a bit, a little anxiety would serve him right—then I left my car and walked across the street.

  “I was starting to think you weren’t coming,” he said.

  I pointed to one of the benches, and sat. He took a seat to my right. We were both quiet for a moment. He slipped his phone out of his pocket, and held it next to his right thigh, trying to glance down at it without moving his head, poking at the screen as if he were texting in class.

  “Put that damn thing away,” I said.

  He squirmed, cleared his throat, and pocketed the phone. “So now what?”

  “So now,” I said, “I’m the only one who can save your life, and you’ll do anything I ask of you, right?”

  “Right.”

“No arguments. No negotiating.”

“Yes, yes! God, stop playing around—what do you want from me?”

“I need you to do something for me. A service that requires the only talent you have.”

“Football?”

“Not football, you blockhead. Violence.”

”What do you mean by ‘violence’?”

I handed him a printout of a photo with an address written on it. “You’re to take a sick day from school tomorrow—do not have your parents call in, that’s important—I’ll cover for you. This is the address of a high-rise. Be there at 8:30 and watch for this man. I want you to work him over, hard, break a few bones. And take his wallet, so it looks like a robbery.”

“Holy shit!” He said.

“You may keep his cash, but wipe the wallet clean of fingerprints, and dump it immediately. Do not take his credit cards. If you’re caught with them, you’re going to jail.”

“Burn the printout immediately,” I said, “That’s very important. It’s also evidence that would convict you.” And me, too after he’d tell the police who gave him the printout.

“What? You can’t be serious, man. I’m not gonna do that.”

“Yes, you will. I don’t know why you’re being so squeamish—violence is your stock in trade.”

“Jesus! What’s this guy done to you?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“I think it should be, if I’m the one taking the risk.” He smirked, “This guy’s been fucking your old lady, is that it?”

“Shut up!”

He grinned, “Ha! That’s what this is. Can’t keep her satisfied, can ya. Probably can’t even get it up. I’m not surprised.”

He’d struck a nerve and he knew it, he could read it on my face. I was losing my composure—big mistake.

“Just keep your filthy mouth shut,” I said, “and follow your instructions.” I tossed him a black ski mask. “Make sure you’re wearing this. There’ll be security cameras, so put it on before you arrive at his place. And burn it immediately afterwards.”

“What if I say no?”

“No? You can’t say no, you moron, remember? I’ve got you by the short hairs, Flaherty.”

“So, the stash of crystal meth that you showed me in your office this morning, you’re still holding it?”

“Of course I still have it,” I said, “I wouldn’t be able to use it against you if I got rid of it, could I? And if you don’t do what I want, I’m telling the police that I found it in your locker.”

“And after I beat this guy up for you?”

“Then you’ll have nothing to worry about.”

“Understood.”

He stood, smiling. “I’m going home now, enjoy the rest of your day Mr. Bergman.”

I knew I was taking a major risk by trusting a stupid lump of meat like Flaherty to do the job and not screw it up, but he was my only option—I couldn’t very well do a Google search for “thugs for hire”.

——

The following day I fixed it so that Flaherty wouldn’t be accused of an unexcused absence. That evening at home, I turned on the television news. There was nothing about a violent assault downtown.

That’s odd, I thought. This is the sort of stuff they love—when it bleeds, it leads, as the saying goes in journalism. 

My wife Carol was behaving as if nothing were amiss. Something's wrong here, I thought. If her boyfriend had been beaten to a pulp and robbed, certainly she’d know about it, and she’d be upset and show it. She’s not that cold-hearted. Quite the opposite—considering the near daily tearful harangues about how unsatisfying her life had been married to me—I’d say she’s overly emotional.

Carol and I both know we should never have married. We never satisfied each other emotionally or physically, and stayed together because it would’ve been inconvenient not to. By the time I was being considered for a position as principal in a conservative Catholic high school, divorce would have been problematic. She couldn’t afford divorce financially, regardless of the alimony, with her bachelor’s degree in Theatre Arts and no meaningful job experience for the previous twenty years.

A resentment grew between us that turned to anger, and exchanging volleys of insults.

I’d belittle her efforts at poetry and photography, calling them pathetic attempts to play ‘sophisticate’. Not fooling anyone, I’d say, you’re a dilettante and everybody’s laughing at you.

She’d ridicule my career goals and achievements. You’re a high school principal in a private school system, she’d say, a mid-sized fish in a tiny pond—and that makes you feel powerful and important. How sad.

I’d mock her appearance: Don’t tell me you can’t lose weight, you won’t lose weight—trying saying ‘no’ to a slice of pizza now and then.

She’d repeat to me and anybody who’d listen that all of her friends told her she could have done better than marrying a bore me. Everybody we know thinks you’re a tedious bore, she’d say, even your own family.

When she started spending long evenings away from home several times a week, often returning well after 1:00 AM—supposedly going to her book club at first, now her pottery class—that’s when I started to follow her and discovered that she’d hooked up with our financial advisor.

That was the ultimate humiliation, and damnit, I was determined to hit back harder. I wanted to hurt them both, and I figured hurting him badly would hurt her as well.

  At around five o’clock, Carol came into the living room where I was watching TV, saying, “Your dinner’s on the table. I’m going to my pottery class, as usual, then out for drinks with the girls. Don’t wait up.”

  So, I thought, Flaherty lost his nerve.

——

At 8 AM the next morning, I switched on the intercom. “Brian Flaherty, report to the principal’s office immediately.”

  He walked into my office, smiling. “Good morning, Mr. Bergman,” he chirped.

“Don’t ‘good morning’ me,” I said, “You didn’t do what you were told, did you?”

“No, sir, I didn’t.”

“And why not?”

Still smiling, he pulled out his phone. “Let’s see,” he said as he tapped at the screen, “I believe it’s at the three minute mark where it gets really good.” 

He held up his phone as the recording played:

“… I’ve got you by the short hairs, Flaherty.”

“So, the stash of crystal meth that you showed me in your office this morning, you’re still holding it?”

“Of course I still have it, I wouldn’t be able to use it if I got rid of it. And if you don’t do what I want, I’m telling the police that I found it in your locker.”

“And after I beat this guy up for you?”

“Then you’ll have nothing to worry about.”

“This sounds to me like the meth belongs to you,” he said, “and you’re threatening to frame an innocent student, trying to blackmail him into committing a crime. I think the cops will hear it that way too.”

He put the phone in his pocket. “I think this is what the chess club geeks would call, ‘checkmate’, isn’t it,” he said, “I’m not sure, I don’t know anything about chess.”

“You bastard!”

“I own you now, bitch, now you’re the one who has to do what I say.” He held out his hand. “For starters, you can give me back my meth.” 

——

I didn’t sleep that night, staring at the ceiling, feeling stupid being outwitted by that ape. Something as simple and commonplace as recording with a phone—even he could figure that out, but it didn’t occur to me.

Now what? He’d be an even worse disciplinary problem at school, that was a given, but what else? Probably demand money. Or more. Worse. I opened that door, extorting him to commit criminal battery and robbery.

He’d always have that recording, I thought, probably downloaded it to a hard drive as soon as he got home.

And there are security cameras in the school running 24/7/365, and they recorded me rummaginging through Flaherty’s locker—twice—the day before I tried to blackmail him, and the next morning. That footage, together with the phone recording, would destroy me.

For a week I waited for the other shoe to drop. Nothing. Flaherty would occasionally pass me in the corridor, and he’d show no flicker of recognition, as if I weren’t even there, while I’d expected a knowing, sly, ‘I’ve got you now motherfucker’ grin.

But I knew he wasn’t going to be content that I returned his meth, and let bygones be bygones. He was biding his time.

I had dismissed Flaherty as a blockhead, but I hadn’t considered that a blockhead could be cunning.

 2

My desk phone rang. It was my secretary. “There’s a student who wants to talk to you. He doesn’t have an appointment, and I told him you’re busy, but he insists you’ll want to see him.”

“Who is he?”

“Brian Flaherty.”

“Send him in.”

So it begins, I thought.

Closing the door behind him, Flaherty strolled in—grinning, his hands in his pockets—and sat on the credenza next to my desk. 

“How are you this fine day, Mr. Bergman?"

“What do you want?”

“Kinda grumpy today, aren’t we. The principal’s supposed to be our pal.”

He was taunting me. Toying with me like a cat with a mouse. It took all the strength I had to maintain my composure.

“State your business and get out of here Flaherty. I’m busy, and you should be in class.” 

“Business. Yeah, exactly why I’m here. Meet me at Madison Park, same spot, tonight—5:30 this time, I don’t wanna miss football practice. We’ll talk about it then.”

——

I arrived at the park at 5:35–I knew he wouldn’t be there at 5:30–and sat on the same bench. At 5:48 I saw him strolling between the swings and monkeybars in the children’s play area, holding a styrofoam cup, the straw stuck in his mouth. As he approached, I could hear the loud gurgling of his spent beverage echoing in the cup with each pull on the straw, the ice cubes rattling as he shook the cup, and gurgling as he sucked again. It seemed he enjoyed making the sound, like a small child would.

“Hey, Mr. Bergman,” he said, “I keep you waiting long? Sorry, I needed a cheeseburger after practice.”

He took a final, long, pull on the straw, turned and threw the cup. It sailed in a rainbow arc into the center of a trashcan thirty feet away.

He pumped his fist. “Three points!”

“Let’s not waste any time, Flaherty,” I said, “What do you want?”

“That’s what I like about you, Mr. Bergman: No beating around the bush. Okay, I'll get right to it. I’m holding that audio file of our conversation, and I figure you should be paying me a storage fee. I Googled it, and your salary is around a hundred-sixty-K a year—that’s good money for doing nothing—so I figure a thousand a week would be fair.”

“That’s a third of my salary. I can’t pay that!”

“Hm. Well I’m a reasonable guy, so I tell ya what—instead of paying me, you can do me a service.”

”What kind of ‘service’?”

Handing me a slip of paper, he said, “Thursday night, you’re gonna drive me to this address, I’m going to be there ten minutes or so, and then you’re gonna drive me back. Meet me in Fido’s parking lot, 7:00 PM.”

“Fido? Who’s Fido?” 

“Jesus, Fido’s. The hotdog place on Harrison and 14th.”

I could only assume he was planning a drug deal, or something else criminal, and I’d be directly involved. I checked the slip of paper. The address was a decaying neighborhood of the inner city, with mostly abandoned buildings—light industrial, warehouses, plus some residential—puncuated with empty lots strewn with rubble and weeds. Not the sort of place a paunchy, middle-aged, suburban, high school principal driving a Lexus wants to be.

“Why don’t you drive yourself?”

“Because my old man has been a real asshole lately about borrowing his car, and yours is available.”

“What do I get in return for the chauffeur service?”

“In return, I won’t charge you for storing the audio.”

For now, I thought. Later, when you want some easy cash? And of course, you’ll always want another ‘service’. This would never end. I was under his thumb, and there was no escape.

“Alright, I’ll see you Monday at seven.”

——

I couldn’t sleep that night, and sat in my study, thinking. I’m no longer in control of my life. Flaherty’s eighteen, I’m forty-seven, for as long as I live I’ll be subject to his every whim.

  There was no conceivable way to undo this. It would go on until one of us died, and now that I was permanently attached to Flaherty in drug trafficking—and God knows who else by extension—that could be me at any moment. He had to die first.

Deciding to murder Flaherty wasn’t easy. The idea of taking another human life would have seemed outrageous ten days earlier, but now I saw it had become a practical necessity.

Morally? Flaherty's existence is a detriment to humanity, I thought, he’s a thug peddling lethal narcotics in a school. And now the thug is a threat to an educator, a respected, productive citizen dedicated to the common good. 

I resolved the moral question: killing can be justified—the good war, the individual justifiable homicide—and this was such a case. Flaherty’s death would not only be no loss for humanity, it would be a net gain. Killing him was the right thing to do.

Easy to say, I thought, but how? I can’t do it face-to-face, shooting or stabbing him. Then how?

I had to find a way to kill him and get away with it, and do it as soon as possible. My life had gone off the rails, and my future would be dangerous, unpredictable, and short unless I somehow got it back on the rails.

Figuring out how to do that would have to wait. Thursday night was the matter at hand, and I could be killed then.

I can’t go there defenseless, I thought. Buying a gun would be impossible on this short notice, plus even if I could there’d be a legal record of the sale that could come back to haunt me. I have Grandpa’s little ‘stinger’. It’s small, only holds two shots, but it’s a gun, and it’s unregistered.

It took me a few minutes to rummage through a file cabinet and find the cigar box with the gun. A nickel-plated, double-barrel derringer with mother of pearl grips, the frame engraved with a swirling floral design, it was the personal protection favored by dandified card sharps and dancehall girls in Hollywood Westerns. 

The bullets laying loose were short and squat, and looked like Lego accessories.

My grandfather bought the gun when he ran a hardware store in a rough neighborhood in the 1940s. It was only effective in close quarters, but that suited him. When I was a boy, he’d allowed me to fire a few rounds at tin cans. Now it seemed smaller than I’d remembered.

Not much of a match for machine pistols, but it was something anyway, and its toy-like size made it easy to conceal in any pocket.

 I closed the box and put it in a desk drawer, beneath some papers. There was nothing else I could do but wait for Thursday.

 3

Thursday evening, and I was driving with Flaherty, the radio blasting as he continuously switched mid-song to different stations.

Jesus, he has the attention span of a gnat, I thought. “Dammit Flaherty, just pick a station. It all sounds the same anyway.” 

He switched the radio off. “So this place we’re going is a junkyard,” he said, “They’re closed at night. You’re gonna blink the lights once as we approach and park near the fence. Don’t block the entrance driveway, that pisses them off.” 

I rested my hand on my left jacket pocket and felt the derringer. It wasn’t much comfort.

“Then what?” I asked.

“Then, like I said, you wait in the car while I do some business, and we go home. And we can stop for some tacos on the way.”

——

Arriving at the junkyard, I cruised to the side of the street, blinking the lights, and rolled to a stop. A pair of pitbulls in the yard flung themselves against the chain link fence, barking and snarling frantically. A young man approached us, looking suspiciously at me, his hands in the pockets of his hoodie.

Flaherty lowered his window, and said, “Yo, It’s me. Don’t worry about him, he’s my ride tonight.”

He grabbed a gym bag he’d brought, got out of the car, and walked to the darkened office shack. The man in the hoodie remained outside, not taking his eyes off of me.

My heart was pounding like it wanted to burst out of my chest. I began to feel nauseous.

I can’t do this again, I thought, ever. I have to kill him tonight, if I don’t, I’ll die. But can I find the nerve to shoot and kill a human being? It’s not the same as shooting tin cans as a kid. 

This would be the neighborhood to do it in. The streets are dark for a major city—only streetlights and almost no lit windows. Little traffic. No security cameras in an abandoned, ruined area like this.

How? I’d have to play it by ear—something I hate doing.

Flaherty returned ten minutes later, plopped into the seat next to me, dropping the gym bag on the floor between his feet.

“We’re done here,” he said, “let’s go, I’m hungry.”

I began to drive, and he turned on the radio, again surfing from station to station. Just as well, I thought, I don’t want a conversation. Now is the time to think.

If Flaherty’s found shot dead in this neighborhood, the police will see another upper middle class, suburban, white kid gone bad. He fell in with nasty people and paid for it—a familiar story. They’d have no reason to think anybody other than gangbangers killed him. That gives me some security.

But shooting him, I thought, with the toy I have I’ll have to be close, just a few feet away, and he’s eighteen years old and built like a bull, and I’m not. If I can find a way to divert his attention, even if for a couple of seconds—and in one quick motion, pull out the gun, cock it, pull the trigger. If I hesitate, I’m dead.

Flaherty nudged my elbow. “Pull over,” he said, “I have to piss.”

This is my chance, I thought. I might not get another one.

I scanned the area, looking for an alley. I saw a dark, narrow service alley between two gutted buildings, and headed for it.

“C’mon, pull over,” he said, “I've been holding it for half an hour.” 

“I’m looking for a place with a little privacy.”

“Privacy? You joking? You think there’s anybody around here who gives a shit about pissing on the street?”

“I have to go too, and I like my privacy, so you can keep holding it for an extra few seconds, it won’t kill you.”

“Jeez, you're a delicate daisy, Mr. Bergman.”

I turned into the service alley and continued deeper between the buildings.

“Stop the car,” he snapped, “my bladder’s gonna burst.” 

I hit the brakes and stopped. He hopped out of the car, unzipped, and released a stream against a brick wall. I got out of the car and walked toward him, pulling the derringer out of my pocket and aiming as I approached, my mouth dry, my heart pounding, my hand holding the gun shaking.

I stood behind him as he was finishing, the gun inches from his head. He was zipping up.

Now. I have to do it now. In another second it will be too late.

He turned and saw the gun, quivering in front of his face, and stared at it, befuddled. I squeezed the trigger, and there was a loud, sharp, ‘pop’. He fell back against the wall, and slid to the pavement, blood gushing from the hole in his head.

I was shaking, nauseous, dizzy, my heart pounding—I knew I was having either a heart attack or a panic attack. I have to get out of here as fast as possible, I thought. 

His phone. The police will search his phone and the recording may still be on it. The gun and the phone—I have to get rid of them, but not in this neighborhood, where the police might find them.

I searched his pockets, grabbed the phone, and ran to my car.

Backing out of the alley—the tires screeching, almost sideswiping a wall—I sped away. Ten minutes drive through this Hellscape to the freeway, I thought, then I can breathe easier.

Flaherty’s gym bag caught my eye.

Dammit! That’s his inventory. I’ve got to get rid of that. The gun. The Phone. The drugs. Where to dump them?

I’ll drop them in a sewer, I thought, in a hoity-toity, low crime neighborhood, miles from here.

No, to fit the gym bag I’d have to lift an iron manhole cover and put it back in place.

A dumpster, that’s it. One behind a restaurant or grocery market would  have garbage picked up every morning. Once it’s in a garbage truck, no one will find it. A few days later it's in a landfill and gone forever.

I drove to a big-box warehouse store and bought some heavy-duty plastic trash bags. Sitting in my parked car, I unzipped the gym bag and dropped the phone and gun inside where they nestled into dozens of packets of meth.

A few of these planted in Flaherty’s locker would support the suspicion that he was killed during a drug deal, I thought. Should I? It’s risky. It would be the third time school security cameras have recorded me rummaging in his locker.

I’m banking on the police not combing through the security archive, especially video recorded in off hours when students wouldn’t be there. If Flaherty’s murder twelve miles away seems cut and dried, why would they?

I don’t know, but there’s always the possibility they will. Well, I’m already recorded twice, so a third time won’t make a difference.

I grabbed a handful of the packets and stuffed them into a jacket pocket, zipped the gym bag closed, and sealed it in a plastic trash bag.

——

The next forty-five minutes were spent looking for a suitable dumpster. The alleys behind every restaurant, produce market, and grocery store, were washed with bright, cold light. Of course, security cameras were everywhere. Now what?

Now, I thought, miles from the crime scene a camera will have recorded another person dumping their garbage in a commercial dumpster at night, that’s what. Shouldn’t be a problem. One of a hundred cameras recording dumpers that night, and nobody cares.

I parked around the corner from a small restaurant, put on a baseball cap, and dropped the garbage bag in a dumpster, rearranging the other bags to cover mine.

I found myself miles from home, an hour's drive or more. It didn’t matter. I couldn’t sleep that night anyway.

 4

5:50 AM, an hour before faculty would start arriving, and there were only a few maintenance and cafeteria staff in the school.

I stopped in my office, grabbed the lockers master key, and headed to Flaherty's locker.

The corridors were empty, and dimly lit as the lighting was still on overnight energy saving mode. My footsteps echoed and seemed surprisingly loud in the emptiness. Damn these leather heels and soles!

I arrived at his locker, and paused to look around and ensure I was alone. As quickly as possible, I opened the locker, stuffed the drugs between two books, closed it, and walked away.

Back in my office, I sat at my desk with a file folder open in front of me, so I’d appear to be working.

Now to wait.

——

My desk phone rang, startling me out of a daze. I checked the clock: 7:01.

I answered, “Bergman.”

“Mr. Bergman, Detective Lieutenant Brownlow, CPD here. Please meet me at the front entrance, there’s a police matter involving one of your students.”

“Police? What’s this about,” I said.

“I prefer to give you the details in person, sir.”

“Of course. I’ll be there shortly.”

I rushed out of my office, striding down the corridor. Whoa, slow down, I thought, don’t be breathing hard when you meet him. You’re the principal, you’re always calm and in control. Steady. Dignified.

A man in a dark gray suit showed me his badge as I opened the door and stepped outside. “Detective Lieutenant Brownlow,“ he said.

“Miles Bergman. So, what’s this about, Lieutenant?”

“One of your senior students, Brian Flaherty, was shot and killed last night. His body was found at about 1:00 AM.”

“Oh, my God.”

“He was found in a rough neighborhood, where there’s alot of gang activity and drug dealing. No signs of a struggle and we’ve determined the body wasn’t dumped there. So it seems he went there of his own volition. That’s a long way from home for a privileged, middle class, white kid. I’m afraid the only plausible reason he’d willingly be in that neighborhood would be buying drugs.”

“What a tragedy,” I said, “we all thought Brian had a bright future ahead of him.” 

“Yes,” Brownlow said, “it is. I’ve seen it happen too often.” He pulled a piece of paper from his breast pocket. “So, I have a warrant to search Brian’s locker.”

“Of course, I’ll direct you there.”

“Thanks. Also, what is your availability this afternoon? I need to interview you in detail about Brian.”

“I’ll check my planner.”

I pulled the notebook from my jacket pocket and flipped it open. As often happens, a few items—notes, business cards and such—spilled out to the ground.

Brownlow bent to pick them up, saying, “Allow me.”

“Thank you,” I said. 

I looked down and saw—between the business card for my auto mechanic, and the schedule for the Spring Educational Administrators Conference—one of the packets of meth, a straggler left behind when I rushed to plant its companions in Flaherty’s locker.

That was the moment I knew that I would never get my life back on the rails.

Chicago, 1919

Branko was wearing his finest suit. This was an important meeting and, God knows, he was an important man.

“Your Mari won’t find a better match than my Jan, you know that. She’s not the prettiest girl in the world, and you all don’t have a pot to piss in, so what would she bring to the match? Just a cunt. Those are easy to find.”

Mari’s mother Anna flinched at the crude characterization of her daughter, then scowled. She had always had a low opinion of Branko, a rude, ignorant oaf who invariably behaved as if he were proud to be that. This sort of remark was typical of him.

Mari’s father Agoston knew Branko was right nevertheless, but of course wasn’t about to give any indication of it.  A low ”Hmmm” rattled from behind his scowl, implying the point was noted, not conceded.

“Mari can’t do better than my boy. You know, of course, we just got this farm in Wisconsin. Rich land, not like up north in Michigan where there are only rocks, pine trees and bears. And a bigger piece of land than you've ever seen. Yes, my boy is a good catch for you. We could have our pick of wives, but my boy loves Mari.” Although his son hardly knew her.

Mari’s mother, Anna, looked at Jan as he sat glassy-eyed and smiling next to his father. “Your ‘boy’ is thirty-five years old, but he’s still a boy. Do you think we can’t see that?”

His father turned to Jan and surreptitiously kicked Jan’s ankle. “I love Mari, and I want to make her my wife. I will be a good husband”, Jan intoned.

“He has everything a woman needs in a husband,” Branko said, “A strong back, and a good piece of land.” He cast a quick glance at Agoston, seeking some indication of affirmation and ah-ha! Caught it: an almost imperceptible arch of Agoston’s eyebrow, a subtle dip of his head that unconsciously betrayed a nod. Branko winked and continued, “A man doesn’t need fancy words or books to earn his bread. Not an honest man, anyway. Not a real man. And stop thinking some banker or moviestar with soft hands and a skull stuffed with shit is going to carry your daughter off to live in his palace, and then toss money to you like it’s chicken feed.” he said pointing at Anna, although she’d never said, much less considered, any such thing. “That’s not going to happen. We’re working people and always will be. And you know—everybody knows—you folks haven’t done well since coming to America,” then suddenly bolting up straight in his chair and jabbing a thumb at his puffed-out chest, “but we have. This is an opportunity. Don’t be stupid.”

Branko was right, Agoston was never very prosperous. He was a blacksmith in the old country—a corner of what was once and again called Slovakia, at that time called Upper Hungary—but he found little demand for his skill when they immigrated to America and settled in the northern upper peninsula of Michigan. There the few small farmers who needed a blacksmith were all either old and dying or going bankrupt, and blacksmithing was following them into extinction. But working a smithy was all he knew. Sporadic work as an unskilled industrial laborer barely made ends meet. People said a head injury suffered while working a lime kiln in Michigan had addled him such that he couldn’t hold a job for any length of time. They also said it was the reason for his more or less permanent state of surliness punctuated by episodes of cruel violence. In any case life in northern Michigan, where there were few opportunities in the best of circumstances, had become untenable, so the family moved to Chicago and settled in the Slovak enclave in the far south side neighborhood called Roseland. It had once been a semi-rural village until it was incorporated into the city as Chicago grew in the decades after the Fire of 1871. Although a neighborhood of a major metropolis, Roseland was still semi-rural at that time, a village within the city, with small truck farms scattered between the homes and businesses. 

Agoston and Anna sat quietly for a moment, then looked at each other and nodded. They had no choice but to agree: it was a good match. That is to say, a prudent match. Marrying a child into wealth meant the chance of getting some share of that wealth, even if just an occasional sliver. The decision was not made from greed, but rather the need of the family to survive.

Mari was informed of the decision and that she should be happy about it. Just seventeen years old, marriage was something she had only thought about in the abstract till then. As a looming actuality, it was daunting. Why do I have to get married? Why now? Why him? Him? This man who is almost as old as my father. This strange simpleton who doesn’t seem like a man at all. She was told to stop being childish, that this was an opportunity that few girls get and that it will never come again for her, and she should be grateful.

The courtship was brief, and as formal as an Easter morning missa solemnis. The day after the wedding, Mari, her newly minted husband and her father in law set out for Wisconsin—a prosperous farm could not be left unattended.

 A few weeks later Mari’s letters arrived in Chicago. Then followed the urgent hushed conversations, Agoston and Anna hunched over the kitchen table; he agitated as usual, she measured and sober. And their consultations with neighbors. Heads shaking, ‘no’ or nodding, ‘yes’. Fingers wagging. All furtive, conspiratorial. They were careful not to let the kids hear but Gus Jr, who always seemed to be in the background when the adults were together, managed to pick up this much: Mari was in some trouble and needed help.

—

A crooked figure with a syncopated gait scampered toward him.

“Joshko!”

Joshko looked up from the drawing he had been scrawling with a stick as he squatted in the dirt. “Yeah, Gus.” 

Gus lowered his voice as he approached. “You’re going to Wisconsin. You’re gonna live with Mari.”

“We’re gonna live with Mari?” Good news, he thought, Mari—I love her, he thought, More than Ma. Not supposed to be that way but I do—Mari loves me more than Ma does. She always took care of me, not Ma. And now she’s gone, moved away with that stupid man. God, I miss her! “When we leave?” he asked excitedly.

“No, not all of us, only you. I just heard Ma and Pa talking, and Mari,” his voice halted slightly, his head lowered, “Mari’s not happy up there. She doesn’t know anybody, and she wants someone from home with her, to help out and kind of keep her safe. Bela can’t go. He’s working at the Pullman factory and can’t leave that. Ma and Pa said they’re gonna send you.”

He was confused. Keep her Safe from what? What could be dangerous in Wisconsin?

“And they said you’re good for farm work and they need help on the farm, so…”

True. For the past two years he had spent more time picking cucumbers, green beans and onions than learning to read, write and calculate. All while the family lived in Michigan then uprooted and moved to Chicago, he worked truck farms, handing all the coins earned to his parents. Joshko’s life as an agricultural laborer was not interrupted when they moved to Chicago.

He knit his brows and stared at the drawing in the dirt as he pondered the news. Then he looked up with a slightly panicked expression. “But you. You going too, Gussie?”

They both knew it was a ridiculous question. “You know I can’t.”

Gus, eleven years old, the second of the five sons that survived infancy, was Joshko’s older brother. Afflicted with spinal tuberculosis shortly after birth, his spine was curved like a question mark, his pelvis skewed, his step hobbled. Gus was named after his father and that was one of the world’s great ironies. While his namesake was kind and loving, smart and curious, the father was vicious. Three years older than Joshko, he stood an inch shorter.

Gus didn’t let his own sadness and worry show, and did his best to comfort and encourage his young brother: “This is good. You’ll be happy with Mari, you know that. And you like living in the country, right? And you’ll be getting away from Pa.”

Pa. Yeah, Pa. Joshko’s face brightened again for a moment at the thought of escaping, but then darkened: Why doesn‘t Pa love me? Why only me?

Alone among Agoston’s children, Joshko was unwanted. It was the familiar pattern: The first born boy—girls have a separate hierarchy—was the crown of creation, and as more boys followed and the younger ones were pampered, the one in the middle was lost in the shuffle when parental love was dealt out. And the unstable father’s indifference to the middle son readily shifted to annoyance and even contempt. The boy was a convenient focus of the anger and bitterness that seemed to suffuse his father’s every waking moment. Agoston had a unique penal code for Joshko. He never got as angry with the other kids as he did Joshko, and his unloved son’s offenses were somehow always greater, the punishments swifter and harsher. When he would explode, Pa would slam his fist on a table, or kick a piece of furniture, or whack his unwanted kid—it was all the same to him.

He was now old enough and smart enough to hate his father, and so he did. Pa was selfish, unjust, and cruel; there was nothing in his being for Joshko to love or respect. And yet he never shook the feeling of guilt, the misunderstanding that was imprinted on him before he pulled on his first long pants, that he was somehow to blame for being shunned by his cruel father and preoccupied mother.

When Joshko was informed by his parents that he was moving away to live with his sister, he was told nothing more than it was because a large farm needed hands—especially unpaid ones—and Mari needed somebody from home who knew her and understood her to help her out. This was not a choice he was permitted to make, it was an obligation. But he knew it wasn’t that simple: There was trouble. Gussie had told him as much. Keep her safe, Gussie had said.

“Now you stay close to your sister and do what she says”, Anna said as she buttoned his jacket. “And remember, she’s in charge. Mari is your mamma when I’m not there.” He always knew that.

“And don’t go up there thinking you’re something special because the woman of the house is your sister”, his father snorted. “You have to pull your own weight. You’re going there to work.”

—

Two days riding two trains deep into the center of Wisconsin, then a final two-hour jolting wagon ride on a rutted dirt road, his childlike brother in law Jan at the reins. Jan didn’t have much to say at all, and what he did say was, well, hlupy, Joshko thought, just silly. Like little brother snotty-nose, shit-pants Marty who’s only five years old. He laughs at things that aren’t funny. And he smiles too much. And he doesn’t know anything, like a kid, but he’s a man, like Pa.

The mule ambled casually and as the farmhouse came into sight, the last one hundred feet were excruciatingly slow. As the wagon pulled through the front gate, Mari burst from the house and raced toward it. He leapt from the moving wagon and ran to his sister with his arms stretched wide.

“Marika!”

“Joshinko!”

They gripped each other in a desperate hug and held it tightly for a long moment, saying nothing. Then she pulled his face from her bosom and held it in her two hands, tenderly kissing his cheeks and forehead, running her fingers through his dense curly hair, pulling it off his forehead and out of his eyes. Her tears gushed, and for a brief instant her trembling face contorted into the same pained grimace a weeping infant wears, an unselfconscious display of anguish. Joshko wasn’t crying. He hadn't cried openly—audibly, with actual tears and sobs—for the past four years, fully half his life. He looked up at her, quietly smiling. The smile evaporated when he saw that the corner of her mouth was swollen and split. His face darkened and he pointed to the wound.

“What's that?”

She smiled and wiped her eyes with her bare forearms. “Pfft! Nothing. I’m so clumsy, I let the kitchen door hit me in the face! Come,” she put her arm around his shoulders and walked him toward the house, “I have to feed you. We still have cabbage pies from lunch—still warm. You can eat those now, and I’m making a special supper, stuffed cabbage and potato pancakes and…"

An older man, older than his father, had been walking from the tool shed and workshop that was between the back of the house and the barn and now approached them. It was Branko. He was futilely wiping his blackened greasy hands with a blackened greasy scrap of grain-sack burlap; he’d been working all day repairing the potato harvester. He paused, looked poker-faced at Joshko and said in Slovak, “Eat your fill, boy, and get a good night’s sleep. You’ll need it.” then continued to walk past them, He hadn’t looked at Mari at all, as if she didn’t exist. 

Joshko and Mari said nothing and continued to the house. Jan passed briskly past them on the path to the house as he carried the load of provisions he’d picked up in town before meeting Joshko at the railroad station, as well as the boy’s potato sack of earthly possessions. Without pausing, he turned his head and looked at them both, his face the same vacant, smiling mask that a contented infant wears, and he continued into the house ahead of them.

Brother and sister turned and looked at each other. Joshko gave her a quizzical look that asked silently, ‘Why?’ Mari responded with a barely perceptible tilt of her head and shrug that answered silently, “It wasn't my choice.”

—

When Joshko arrived, he was given a small unfinished room just off the kitchen. The walls were thin and perforated with gaps between the clapboards, but that wouldn’t matter in the summer. When the weather turned cold he would sleep wrapped in a blanket in front of the kitchen stove.

The work was hard, the hours long. In late summer the sun scorched him mercilessly as he worked in the field. But this was all familiar: His muscles had already known the motions when he’d arrived, his hands were already leathery, his hide already seared and toughened by the sun.

But this place, these people, they were unfamiliar: This ugly old man who insulted his sister and Joshko whenever he spoke, who would give him only gristle and scraps to eat at the table while Mari sneaked him bits of food when she could throughout the day. And Jan, the hlupak, who would just laugh as the old man pawed Mari’s breasts whenever he passed her, or forced a rough slobbering kiss on her mouth, or pulled her into his lap when he was roaring drunk after supper—not letting her go, slapping her if she talked back. Why would Jan, her husband, let the old man do that? Why would he laugh about it?

—

Jan whistled happily as he finished harnessing the mule. He was in a good mood. The weather was pleasant and he was on his way to town to have some saws reset and sharpened, and pick up flour and sugar and a new fuel pump for the tractor. He loved going to town so he typically made more than a full day of errands, returning after sunset when he could have easily been home in the afternoon. It was the one regular task he performed dependably, and that was because he loved doing it. Of course because the trip always included a visit to the bakery for some sweets, and a stop at the tavern for lunch and a glass of beer, but mostly because it made him feel important. He was in command and control of the mule and wagon, and being in command and control of anything at all was a rarity for him. He relished it. And he also felt important saying ‘my farm’—referring to the place for which his father was mortgaged to the gills—to whomever in town would listen. I’m buying this or that for my farm, he would say to storekeepers. Give me a beer before I go home to my farm, to the barkeeper. He tried to work the phrase into every conversation while he was in town. How could Jan not be especially happy this morning?

It was midmorning in early September, and both the sun and Joshko had been up for four hours. Joshko was walking in from the field for a drink of fresh water and hopefully a couple of boiled potatoes or a chunk of fresh bread from Mari. Jan smiled and waved as he mounted the wagon and flicked the reins against the mule’s rump, “Beautiful day, eh, Joshko?”

Joshko nodded, smiling slightly. Good for nothing hlupak! He’s going to waste the whole day in town while I do his work and my own.

As he continued to the house his step quickened, his mood brightened at the prospect of both food and a kind word from his sister. The sustenance for both his body and soul was in the kitchen, in the person of Mari. Her smiles and hugs and kisses alone were enough to give him strength, more so than the food.

He burst through the kitchen door shouting, “Marika! I’m hungry!”

She pulled her hands out of the bread dough she was kneading and wiped them on her apron. I have something special for you today,” she said as she handed him a meaty beef soup bone recently pulled from the pot and still warm. He instantly began to gnaw it ravenously, where he stood. “Tsk, tsk. Sit down and eat slowly, or you’ll get a bellyache,” she said as she placed his mug of fresh new milk with a splash of strong coffee on the kitchen table. As he always did when she said this, he obeyed in his way: He took a seat at the table, without pausing his attack on the bone, and continued to wolf down his food.

As he finished stripping the bone of meat and sucking out the marrow, she began to wrap a thick chunk of bread and two apples into a napkin . “I’m giving you something to take with you. I know you’ll be hungry when you go back to work.”

She handed him the bundle in exchange for the bone—as clean as if it had been polished—to be passed to the dog. Then she held him by the shoulders, kissed his forehead, swivelled him around, gave him a playful swat on his butt and said with mock sternness, “Now go. I’m very busy!”

“I love you, Mari”, he said, as he always did, as he walked out.

Walking toward the fields, he smiled contentedly. Hlupak Jan was right: It’s a beautiful day! The air is warm and dry, the wind is soft, the birds are singing, and I have Marika to take care of me. And I ate meat! He took one of the apples from his bundle and took a huge bite, fully one third of the apple. As he finished the apple and tossed the core aside, he approached the field he’d been working and saw the dark figure of Branko, weight on one leg, arms akimbo, glowering at him. When Joshko came closer, Branko snarled, “What are you smiling about, you lazy little pussy?”

Joshko's smile dropped like a curtain.

“These cucumbers have to go to market tomorrow morning. You’re staying out here as long as it takes to pick them. I don’t care if you don’t eat or sleep until then.”

Joshko found a shady spot to set his bundle of food and went to work. He worked continuously, not even the act of wiping sweat from his face interrupting the flow: It was just one of the set of rhythmic machine-like motions he repeated. The work paused when Mari brought them sandwiches and fresh water at noon, then continued without a break until late in the afternoon.

Branko stood and stretched. “I’m going in for dinner. You stay and finish picking. I don’t want to see your ugly face before every cucumber is picked.”

Joshko nodded silently. He frowned as he watched Branko walk toward the house, then turned to the remaining harvest and shrugged: He didn't mind so much not resting and eating even though he was tired and hungry. It was a relief to have Branko gone. He retrieved his bundle of food from the morning, devoured the remains, then went back to work.

The sun was sinking and beginning to bathe the landscape with warm color when he loaded the final basket of cucumbers into the bin and began to shuffle toward the house, tired and aching, his shoulders stooped and his arms hanging limp. Although he desperately wanted to return to the comfort of the house, he moved slowly, his strength sapped.

As he entered the yard, he heard the sounds of dishes shattering, furniture being upended, the crack of a backhanded slap and then Mari’s scream. He suddenly stood straight, his eyes wide, and bolted to the house. When he burst through the kitchen door he saw Branko wrestling his sister onto the kitchen table, her blouse torn to shreds and her breasts exposed, her skirt raised above her waist. The old man was holding her down with one hand clamped on her throat as he was unbuckling his belt with the other.

Joshko stood frozen, unable to move or speak. Branko turned to him and barked, “Get out of here, you little bastard!”

Branko’s grip had loosened at the interruption, and Mari squirmed, her feet reaching desperately for the floor. He tightened his grip and slammed her down on the table again. “I said get out, bastard!”

Joshko stood staring and quivering. He was powerless, and he knew it. He had been told to keep his sister safe, and he couldn’t. He couldn’t stop this large, strong man whose every whim or impulse was law in this home. He couldn’t protect the one person he loved above all others. The only person who loved and protected him now needed his protection, and he could do nothing for her.

Branko threw Mari to the floor. She laid in a heap of torn and dishevelled clothing, gasping, her face swollen and bruised, blood trickling from her nostrils. He turned to Joshko and hissed, ”Your mother fucked a rat” then grabbed him by the collar and flung him like a rag doll against the wall.

Joshko was desperate. He didn’t know what to do, and he looked around frantically, as if somewhere in some corner of the kitchen he might find the answer. The old man was losing his patience. He knit his brows and sneered as he took a step toward the boy. Mari shrieked, “Jozef! Get out of here!” But he remained, staring, with his mouth hanging open.

Then, summoning the fullness of her surrogate maternal authority, she looked her stupefied little brother in the eyes and said, in a stern, calm and measured voice that could not be disobeyed, “Leave. Right now!”

He scrambled to his feet, stumbled out of the door and started to run. The sounds of violence again rang from the house, and he broke into a sprint. He raced into the middle of the cornfield and collapsed. He laid there, his face sunk in the dirt as he salted the earth with his tears.

Eighth grade, the last step before high school. Nobody wondered more than I did how I got to this point. As a dyslexic kid with attention deficit disorder, my teachers dismissed me as stupid and incorrigible. I slid through all of grade school with a consistent C-minus grade-point average, but I assume now that my GPA may have been lower if St. Nicholas’s faculty hadn’t pushed me from one grade to the next just to get rid of me. I believe my C-minus wasn’t a D-minus or an F because faced with the prospect of holding me back to repeat a grade, and spend another year coping with me, each teacher decided to kick the nuisance down the road.

All of the adults around me had assumed that I was impervious to learning, like a duck’s plumage is to water, but that’s not how I saw it. My problem was that the proscribed fill-in-the-blank and multiple-choice exams mostly asked me what I didn’t know rather than what I did know. An educational system operating like a factory assembly line succeeds in its simplistic, efficient way for most students, churning out uniformly compliant and uninspired workers who can read instruction manuals and fill out forms, but it doesn’t work for the likes of me. I’m one of the factory rejects.

Besides struggling academically, I was a behavioral problem, I can’t deny it. I was bored. I was disengaged. I couldn’t keep up with what was going on, so I stopped trying. What to do in those circumstances? May as well have fun, I figured, and goof off. And sure teachers, like everybody else, talk shop when they socialize, they compare notes on the students—the kindergarten teacher telling the first grade teacher who are the smart kids, who are dumb, who are troublemakers, who are angels, and so on up through all eight grades—so at the beginning of each academic year before I even set foot in the classroom I was already tagged as a bad apple in the barrel. After kindergarten, each subsequent teacher approached me armed with the strategies and tactics to counter whatever “bad apple” happened to mean to each of them respectively.

It was clear to me from the beginning that the die was cast. They’d determined I was a misfit and anethema and could never be anything else. I couldn’t fight that, so I embraced it and made the best of it. I became what they said I was because they—both teachers and students—gave me no other option: A goof. The class clown. A slacker. Good for making a joke now and then, and I took being the butt of jokes like a good sport. A comic foil. For students I provided a welcome diversion, but I was also an oddball, the slightly weird kid. Social skills were a mystery to me, so I wasn’t someone the other kids would love to hang out with, but not someone they’d chase away either. I stayed on the periphery, and that was OK for me. For everybody.

So naturally, when it came to matters of the heart and the hormones, I again found myself on the periphery. Girls tended not to notice me in that way. I was too immature, both physically and emotionally. Too clumsy in every way. Too weird for most of them for any interaction deeper than that required for the classroom practical joke du jour.

Except for Michelle Nowicki. She noticed me. I noticed her noticing me.

Michelle and I became friendly in fifth grade. Through sixth grade, we grew from being occasional, casual and chatty acquaintances, to actively seeking each other’s company to share classroom rumors and gossip, or talk about popular culture—then after a time, to sharing a few private thoughts now and then. Arching over all this was a slowly growing flirtation begun by Michelle—because girls grow up faster than boys—but that I always noticed. Looking at me that way, straight into my eyes, briefly, locking them in her stare before turning quickly away and smiling. Making physical contact with me; touching my hand when taking a borrowed pen, brushing against me when we passed in the aisle between desks when there was  enough room for us to not touch; not shrinking away when—after I figured out that these repeated contacts weren’t accidental—I began to do the same. But, I thought, I must be reading it wrong. Girls aren’t into me that way. I didn’t want to form the thought: She could do better. Nor the thought: I don’t want to be embarrassed and humiliated so I’d best back off. Thing was, this was hard for me to grasp. Unlike me, Michelle was normal in every way. She got decent grades—not great but good enough—teachers didn’t hate her or love her. She was friendly with everybody and everybody was friendly with her. She fit in.

And she was pretty. It seemed to me that she got prettier by the day. Not Barbie doll, plastic, cutesy pretty, but pretty in a natural way. She looked good without makeup, with her hair cut simply and tied back in a ponytail, wearing a simple school uniform—not that makeup would have been permitted by either the school or Michelle’s parents—and I speculated how she’d look powdered and painted like a grown up lady, like my mom or one of my aunts going to church on a Sunday morning, and I thought, no, that would ruin it all.

She had a warm and honest smile. She smelled good. And she was nice to know—kind and generous and fun and funny. All of which raised a conundrum: Michelle’s everything I’m not, so I’m not her type. 

After some weeks of the “looks,” the flirting, the smiles whenever we saw each other, the fact that we were hanging together each day and she hadn’t told me to get out of her face!—I finally bypassed the conundrum and accepted the improbable: She really likes me, and I really like her and this feels so good. And by the time seventh grade ended and eighth grade began, the other kids knew we were totally more than just friends. It was common knowledge. However, Michelle and I had never actually talked about it.

One afternoon toward the end of the school year I had decided to steel myself and go to the after-school mixer, where eighth grade teacher Mr. McNally served as DJ, spinning screened and approved records, and the students from St. Nicholas School and nearby Samuel Gompers Public School danced, while Sister Corda and Miss Riordan chaperoned, assuring the kids’ outward behavior was appropriately chaste.

Because Michelle would be there, I knew I had to attend and, God help me, dance. That was worrisome. I didn’t mind playing the fool in class, but any sort of formal social event was always distressing for me, and I was worried I’d look unintentionally comical dancing with her. I had to look cool. Sophisticated. Confident. Thing is, I was socially awkward, more so than most socially awkward kids, and I accepted that, but I was physically awkward as well. A classic klutz, I could trip over a grain of sand, as my old man liked to say. And dancing? Rhythm was something my body refused to acknowledge. My attempts at dancing—practiced at home in advance of the mixer, with a tinny-sounding radio playing—looked like I was having a seizure. My sisters laughed so hard they cried watching me. I asked my mom for advice, maybe a lesson, but between her daytime mothering and her night job as an office cleaner, she had no time for something so trivial, for something that should come naturally, for Chrissake.

“Stevie, don’t think about it, just do it,” she said absently while she was chopping vegetables for stew. “Feel the music and move. It’s as easy as walking.” She saw the pained desperation in my eyes and paused, gave me a hug and a kiss on my forehead and said, “There’s nothing to worry about. Believe me, the other kids won’t be watching you, they’ll be all wrapped up in their own fun. Relax, and have a good time.”

Now the fateful time had come. That afternoon walking to the gym I felt queasy. For me, emotional distress is manifested in my guts, and they were now in the throes of spasm. My legs trembled as they buckled like my knees were made of rubber. There was a pain growing in my belly as my clenched large intestine audibly howled. Oh, God, I’m gonna crap my pants if I don’t hit the john! So I took a sharp turn into the boys room, hurried into a stall and explosively released the load the instant I sat on the toilet. I remained sitting for a few minutes in a cold sweat, limp, leaning against the wall with my eyes closed. Jesus, I thought, this must be how the holy martyrs felt before they walked into the Roman arenas. Save me from this pain, O Lord!

The outer door swung open and through the slit in the stall door I saw Larry Murphy, the class thug, stride in. I waited quietly while Larry relieved himself at the urinal. I preferred to wait till the washroom was empty before emerging from the stall to gather my strength and either forge ahead to the dance, or bolt for the exit and run home—I was still considering the options. Larry had finished and began to wash his hands. Then a wad of wet paper towels sailed over the top of the stall and plopped on my forehead.

“Hey”, Larry barked, “You saving that for somebody?”

“What?”

He recognized my voice. “Wallace, you stupid doofus. Flush! It stinks in here!”

I flushed and finished up, but not too quickly, waiting for Larry to leave before exiting the stall. I shuffled to the basins to wash my hands, my knees still rubbery.

After splashing my face with cold water I felt some physical relief. I leaned on the basin and looked in the mirror for a moment. A scared, ashen face looked back at me. I was alarmed at how pitiful it looked. I asked myself, go into the gym, or leave? It would be such a relief to go home right now. But no. I have to do this. I’ll look like a silly little kid if I don’t—especially now that Murphy knows I’m here and probably is already telling everybody ‘Hey, dumbass Wallace showed up!’ I took a deep breath and walked out to the gym. Clinging to the small hope my mom had given me, I told myself that the other kids would be busy focusing on themselves and not watching me. Of course. Why would they?

But what if they are watching? Waiting for goofy Steve to appear for an easy, instant laugh?

After eight years of being goofy, dumb, weird Steve, of not defying everybody’s expectations of me, I now needed to be taken seriously because this afternoon was different. Dancing with a girl wasn’t like some childish activity, it was an adult thing. This afternoon, I didn’t want to be a walking joke, nor the weird kid on the periphery. I needed to be acknowledged as no less mature than anybody else in the room. To fit in and be no different than the rest of them. Or even, I dared to hope, be cool.

What is it about Murphy anyway, I thought. Everybody just accepts it: he’s one of the cool kids. But why? What’s so cool about him? He’s fat, he’s pretty dumb, he lisps, he only beats on kids who are smaller than him. Nothing special about him at all except that he’s a huge jerk. But he’s cool and I’m not. It’s crazy: He just acts like, ‘Of course I’m cool’, and everybody buys it. Just acting, that’s all. 

 Then it dawned on me, so that’s what matters—acting. Not actually being something, but acting like you’re something. So why don’t I act? Maybe that’s it. Maybe it’s just that easy. Maybe if I don’t let them see I’m panicking inside, if I act mature and confident, they’ll take me seriously—they won’t all be like, ‘oh, great, the clown showed up!’

I paused at the door, threw back my shoulders and entered the gym trying my best to affect confident nonchalance, almost swaggering, with one hand in a pocket, one eyebrow arched a bit, and wearing an ever-so-slight, knowing smirk. Suave. Like James Bond sauntering into a casino. All I lacked was a tuxedo and a cigarette. As I strolled in, surveying the room, the other kids wore wide smiles—grinning even—when they made eye contact with me, and a sense of relief washed over me. I’m not the dork. The goof. They accept me! I could hear giggles around me, but I gave them no thought. The isolated giggles grew into laughs and merged into a chorus of laughs. Even Sister Corda and Miss Riordan were laughing. Too bad I missed the joke, I thought.

Michelle was standing with a few of her girlfriends and I walked toward her. As the girls watched me approach they were resting hands on each others’ shoulders as if they were laughing so hard they’d fall down without mutual support.

“Oh Steve, you’re something else!” Michelle chortled.

“I don’t get it. What’s so funny?”

She pointed at my feet. “Look!”

I looked at my feet, then looked up at her and shrugged. “What?” 

“Behind you!”

I turned and saw an eight-foot long white serpentine tail trailing behind me; a strand of toilet paper had stuck to the bottom of my left shoe. Although the music played on, the dancing had stopped and everybody was circled around me, laughing. I stepped on the tail with my right foot and pulled my left foot free, then turned and rushed out of the gym as the crowd applauded.

I walked briskly down the corridor and stopped at my locker, my head bent, my eyes closed and leaned against the locker door. I remained that way for several minutes until I heard Michelle’s voice behind me.

“Hey. Aren’t you going to dance with me?”

I ignored the question and looked at her, my eyes watering. “I know they’re always gonna laugh at me, and I can take it. But you?”

“Oh c’mon. It was funny! Why are you being, like, so sensitive all of a sudden?”

“I’m tired of not being part of the crowd. I just want to fit in. Be like everybody else.”

“But you’re not like them, and I like that.”

“You just don’t get it. Maybe you never will.”

I opened my locker and gathered my books. “I’m going home.”

The radio playing cool jazz

on a gray, rainy day,

the rhythm of the rain

playing under

a slow, ambling piano riff,

takes my mind off

of a world gone mad.

It’s a small comfort.

Joseph and Mary 

on the road to Nazareth.

Mary’s so ripe 

she’s ready to pop.

Chased from a gas station convenience store

outside of Bethlehem.

Hey, 

can’t you read 

the sign?

No.

Loitering!

As they left,

Joseph fished some of yesterday‘s donuts 

out of the dumpster.

They look clean, he thought.

He looked at the sun 

in the Western sky.

Night will be coming soon, 

he thought.

Goddamnit, 

I can’t take another 

night in a stable.

Ah-ha, she looks good, he thought. I can see it in her face.

Her avatar photo showed a pale, mousy face with a long thin nose, weak chin and enormous thick round glasses that made her eyes appear unnaturally small. He clicked the photo and arrived at her page, scanning her profile: “Poet, art lover and old soul. … an introvert with a penchant for finding the beauty in quiet moments … looking for a kindred spirit who appreciates the power of language and the profundity of silence …  Ideal first date: A quiet afternoon in a bookstore cafe where we can share our favorite passages, followed by a walk in a park.”

“Oh Emily,” he said aloud to no-one, “you are too perfect!” 

He was perusing HeartSync.com where he was Roger, “high school Social Studies teacher and amateur nature photographer. Ideal first date: Let’s take a walk through a botanical garden followed by coffee or tea at a cozy cafe where we can share our thoughts on life, classic films and favorite books.” Emily had ‘liked’ his profile. He smiled and clicked the ‘like’ icon on her profile in return.

Yes, he thought, I think she’ll do very nicely.

He hunted on four different dating websites using four separate, markedly different profiles, each wearing a different disguise and using a different pseudonym. He would kill his prey on the first or second date, before she could share too many details about him with friends or family. After dispatching one victim, he’d use the second website, then the third, the fourth, then start again with the first. He made sure none of his victims lived in Chicago, where he lived, but in far-flung suburbs or towns—including areas of southeast Wisconsin and northwest Indiana—and each lived at least twenty or thirty miles or more distant from the previous one. Nobody would ever discern a pattern.

It had been three months since he’d murdered the last one. That was his rule, to wait at least three months before hunting again, and then to be careful about it. Meticulous. Find the perfect prey, selecting the loneliest, neediest, most vulnerable soul, gain her total trust, and kill her at the right moment of vulnerability. Afterwards he’d hang the corpse by the feet from a hook he’d installed in the ceiling over his bathtub, slice the neck from ear to ear to drain the blood, then cut it into manageable chunks—limbs, head, torso—wrapping each in plastic and storing them in his garage refrigerator. Over the course of three days he got rid of the pieces, burning them in pits he dug in remote wooded areas—each disposal separated by miles from the others—dissolving the ashes with hydrochloric acid, filling the pits with dirt and covering them carefully with plant debris so the ground appeared undisturbed. Each one gone, as if she’d never existed. Not so much as a molecule of DNA could be retrieved. It was perfect.

Damn, I came up with such a fine plan, I’m proud of myself. It’s a shame I can’t share it with anybody.

But it didn’t start that way. His first murder was on an impulse. He picked her up in a bar near his home and killed her the same night. He strangled her in his car, with her own scarf, then dumped her body in a rural drainage ditch miles outside of the city. That was sloppy, and out of character for him. He was nothing if not fastidious in everything he did.

He’d hardly slept for months afterward, waiting for the cops to come and ask him about the missing woman last seen with him in a bar, but that never happened. A year later, just as he began to to feel safe, the TV news and the papers reported her skeleton was found, and the sleepless nights started again. But the cops never identified the remains, and the case became just one more added to their countless cold files. After a few months he felt safe again, and he slept like a baby. But he knew it was dumb luck he wasn’t caught, so he swore he’d never do it again, that he’d never gamble with his own life and liberty for that momentary thrill.

But he never stopped savoring the thrill, the power he felt as he looked into her desperate pleading eyes, how the power surged as, at his whim, the light in her eyes dimmed and flickered out. He re-lived the moment again and again in his daydreams and his nighttime masturbatory reveries. But over time the memory became less thrilling, and after a year it seemed nearly unreal, almost as if it were a fantasy rather than something that had actually happened. He yearned to experience the thrill again, not only dream about it. He decided he had to do it again. Surely there would be no shortage of suitable prey, women who would disrespect him, who would think he’s a creep and tell him so. They all did. Since he was a kid, the female of the species treated him like a pariah. Nobody ever liked him, ever wanted to keep his company, but girls were especially adamant, even cruel, in their rejection.

Of course, I can do it without the risk—it’s just a matter of planning. Yes, I can do this, safely, and on a regular basis if I’m careful, if I’m smart about it.

And he knew he was smart, but nobody ever gave him credit for it. No, they hated him for it, of course, because they were jealous. That’s why they bullied him through his entire childhood. They dismissed him as a weird geek, but he knew he was better than all of them, smarter than all of them, and that that was his strength—the fact that as a rule, people underestimated him. They couldn’t see his superiority. Of course not, how could they, they’re inferior, they’re bugs.

He had murdered twelve women to date. It occurred to him that Emily would be number thirteen. Thirteen, the unlucky number. Stupid superstition. Who decided thirteen is unlucky? He shook his head and laughed. What if whoever started this got it wrong, and thirteen is actually lucky? God, people are so stupid.

He contacted Emily and after a few online exchanges arranged a date for 2:00 pm on a Saturday. They were to meet at Steep & Read, a far north suburban teahouse and free used book exchange. It was her suggestion, but it suited him as well. He’d reconnoitered it for a few days. It was a tiny place, off any beaten path, with so few patrons he figured it operated more as some well-heeled bookworm’s hobby than a viable business. On the appointed day he donned his Roger disguise: Black horn-rimmed glasses, fake moustache, and a red wig. He arrived at 1:30 and parked down the street, watching the place. She entered at 1:45. He waited until 2:05 before he walked in. The place was empty, save for he and Emily and the person behind the counter. Emily sat at a table in a corner. Small, and skinny, she had sloping shoulders, a hunched posture and an ashen complexion. Her eyes were riveted to a book and she didn’t seem to notice him entering. He smiled and approached her table.

“Emily?”

She jerked her head up and stared at him wide-eyed, as if she wasn’t expecting to be disturbed.

She's a strange one. “I’m Roger.”

She extended a bony, limp hand, “Oh. Roger. Pleased to meet you,” she said blandly.

“And you.”

He pulled out a chair and sat opposite her. He looked at her and smiled, hoping she would begin a conversation. He sucked at small talk and depended on others to begin a conversation and keep it going. Unfortunately, she was likewise socially crippled and she continued to stare at him. He began to squirm. An awkward pause followed—it seemed unbearably long to him—as she continued to stare.

“So, you come here often?” He understood the onus had fallen on him to start, and that was the best he could come up with.

“Yes.”

Again, an awkward pause.

“Um… so, what are you reading there?”

She held up a dog-eared paperback, The Portable Emily Dickenson.

“Ah. Emily. What a coincidence.”

“What coincidence?”

“Well, your name is Emily.”

“I guess you could call it a coincidence. She’s my favorite poet.”

“Hm. Yes, she’s great.” Shit, ever since being forced to read poetry in high school, I thought it was a waste of time, and that opinion hasn’t changed. “I understand you’re a poet yourself. Is she, like, your inspiration?”

“Yes, I suppose so. We have a lot in common. I often prefer to keep my own company, being alone, like she did. And I explore the same themes she did—like nature, faith and death and immortality.”

“Death?”

“Sure. You’re a teacher, you're well educated, you must know. For instance, probably her most famous poem on the subject, the one everyone knows, it goes,

Because I could not stop for Death—

He kindly stopped for me— 

The Carriage held but just Ourselves—

And Immortality.

And so on.”

“Oh sure, we all know that one.” Yes, Emily, I’m death and I kindly stopped for you.

“So what do you like to read?”

“I like poetry too. I mean it’s not my primary interest, like it is for you, but I like it.”

“Who’s your favorite poet?”

“Robert Frost.” That being the only name that came to him at the moment.

“Frost. The two of them seem to go together—Dickenson and Frost. Both New Englanders. Both often wrote about nature while delving into deeper philosophical questions and exploring the nature of the human soul. They’re kind of like bookends, don’t you think?”

“Sure.” Dammit, I shouldn’t have said I like poetry when I don’t know anything about it. “But, like I said, it’s not my primary interest. I read a lot of non-fiction—politics and history. That’s related to my job, a social studies teacher, but it’s entertaining in its way. I think the real human drama can be as compelling as any fiction.”

“I suppose. I prefer poetry, though.”

A pair of customers entered. One of them smiled and nodded and waved at Emily. Oh no, they’re regulars and at least one of them knows her. If they start socializing with us, that changes things—I’ll have to abandon her and find a new one.

“It occurs to me,” he said, “It’s such a nice afternoon, how about we get out of this stuffy place and go for a walk? Some fresh air and sunshine is good for the soul, I always say.”

She tucked her book into her purse and smiled. “It’s like you’ve read my mind, Roger. Yes, let’s take a walk.”

They left the cafe and walked down the street. She moved briskly, he followed.

“What do you do for a living, Emily? I assume poetry doesn’t pay the bills.”

“I’m a hospice nurse.”

“You help people die.”

“That’s a blunt way of putting it, but yes.”

“How would you put it?”

“I help them accept and welcome death. Death isn’t something to be feared, it’s a natural part of life, the final step of our trip to the next world, the end of sadness and pain. It's the great equalizer. It comes for us all. It makes every human being equal, no matter who they are in life. Death is kind and just.”

“Hm. I guess you’re right.”

She walked as if purposefully—as though, he thought, she had a destination in mind—turning at the first corner, then again at the next, as he followed. 

“So are we just out for a stroll, or are you taking me somewhere?”

“There’s a lovely park a few blocks from here,” she said. “In the center is a wooded area. They keep it as untouched and natural as possible, with dirt paths and narrow trails. Like a piece of real wilderness in suburbia. In there it’s as if you're hundreds of miles away. It’s my favorite place. I spend a lot of time there.”

“Sounds beautiful.”

Does she truly believe all of that bullshit she was spouting about welcoming death? That would defeat the purpose of killing her. No, she can’t possibly believe that. Nobody would. When the moment comes, she’ll be like all of the others—panicking, kicking and clawing and struggling to stay alive—I know it. The sooner that happens the better. Seems to be going well enough today, I should be able to get a follow up date, arrange to pick her up and when I get her into the car—goodbye, Emily.

They turned a corner and a massive expanse of green emerged into view. Gently curving asphalt paths snaked through prairie grasses, flowers and brush surrounding a dense grove of oaks, maples, cottonwoods and hickory. The Cook County Resource Management Department had created an idyllic model of Midwestern nature on reclaimed farmland, an ideal worthy of a Romantic landscape painting.

“There it is,” she said, “my refuge.”

“Wow. I can see why. I’d spend every free moment here if I lived nearby.”

“Yes, I thought you’d love it, with your interest in nature photography.”

 “What a shame I didn’t bring my camera.”

Strolling through the park, flies, beetles, grasshoppers and crickets buzzed around them. Dragonflies hovered, darting suddenly forward and backward and zig zagging like tiny helicopters as they hunted gnats and mosquitoes.

“Look,” she said, pointing, “There’s a swallowtail butterfly. When’s the last time you saw a butterfly in the city?”

“Couldn’t say. Seems like the only insects we have are house flies and cockroaches.”

“All of these grasses and shrubs and flowers, they look like they occurred naturally, but this all has been thoughtfully planned and planted. They’ve selected native Illinois Prairie plants plus a few non-native species adapted to this ecosystem. The flowering plants were selected so some bloom in Spring and early Summer, when they finish the mid Summer flowers bloom, and after them the late Summer bloom happens. It’s a perfect haven for bees, butterflies and hummingbirds.”

“Geez, this is impressive.”

“Yes, who would have thought a department of the Cook County government would actually do something right?”

“Right.”

Hm. She doesn't seem so bad, really. Not like the others—selfish, vacuous airheads—it’s almost a shame to kill her.

Oh c’mon, man, don’t be naive. You know they’re all the same. She’d turn out to be like all the others over time.

Of course, what was I thinking? How could she be any different than the others? Yes, they’re all the same. I have to kill her.

“But it’s sad, isn’it,” she said, “that this little bit of reconstructed nature is something to celebrate. This small patch of green is just a bandaid on a cancer.”

“I never thought about it before, but yes, it is kind of sad.”

“Humanity never fails to disappoint me,” she said, “collectively, as a species, but as individuals as well. People don’t think about things that matter, about the consequences of their actions, about the lives going on around them. The individual attention span doesn’t range beyond that of the brief social media post, beyond gratifying the momentary impulse, or shopping for the latest trending plastic junk product they don’t really need.”

“Yes, yes. You’re right. That’s exactly how I feel!”

“That’s why I don’t fit in and never have,” she said. “I don’t think the way other people think, and that threatens them somehow. I’m shunned because of that. I’ve spent my life as a misfit.”

Maybe I was wrong, and she really isn’t like the others. She seems like …like me in a way. It’s like it would seem kind of wrong to kill her. Or not right somehow. Should I let her live? I don’t know. Maybe?

“So, I take refuge in my books, in my poetry” she said, “They are my fortress. They keep me safe.”

“I know what you mean. I feel as if there’s nobody in the world that I can trust, nobody who I can talk to, who understands me and accepts me for what I am. So I shut people out, they don’t need me and I don’t need them. But I feel differently about you, Emily. I don’t want to shut you out. Quite the opposite, I think we’re kindred spirits, I want to let you into my life.” Oh geez, laying it on a little thick there. Ease up! “Uh, I hope that doesn’t sound ridiculous—like I’m just saying something you want to hear—I mean, we just met and we don’t even know each other.”

She smiled slightly. “No, Roger, it doesn’t sound ridiculous at all. And I feel as though we actually do know each other in some way. We’re both old souls, we’ve both gone through many lives, we’ve seen it all, and now we are quiet spirits who’d rather not be caught up in society's turbulence. We understand each other.”

She stopped and pointed at one of the unpaved trails that branched off of the asphalt path and through the bramble into the woods. “Let’s do like Robert Frost and take one of the roads less travelled,” she said.

“Yes, let’s do that. I’m up for a woodland adventure.”

She stood aside and gestured for him to proceed. He forged ahead through the brush. A narrow slice through the folliage, the trail had seen scarcely enough human foot traffic to be worn to a path. Burs and sticker seeds clung to his clothes. He pulled them off as best he could, but the effort seemed futile. His ankles itched as they were ravaged by tics. As they approached the scrub growth that fronted the woods, he pushed branches away and felt sharp stings on his forearms and cheeks. Round droplets of blood formed along thin red stripes, like rosary beads on strings. He stopped and wiped them, the smeared blood staining his skin pink.

“Jesus!”

“Careful,” she said, “some of these bushes have thorns.”

“So I noticed.”

“Once we’re into the woods it won’t be this rough. These bushes and shrubs don’t live in the shade of the tree canopy.”

“Yeah. This place is a little more natural than I expected a suburban park to be.”

They breached the wall of scrub growth and entered the woods. Laced with exposed tree roots and interrupted by fallen deadwood, the trail was no less challenging. He paused, brushing burrs and stickers from his clothes as he surveyed the scene. Looking deep into the forest, where direct sunlight never fell, everything was in dark shades of brown and gray with splashes of vibrant green where moss clung to rotting fallen timber.

“This is like something from another world,” he said, “like out of some old German folk tale.”

“Yes,” she said, “that’s why I love coming here. I can escape to another world within walking distance of my home. I come here to practice shinrin-yoku—it means forest bathing in Japanese—mindful breathing and immersing myself in the sights, sounds and smells of the forest. It reduces stress and depression, and improves concentration.”

“I can see how it would be effective.”

They continued their trek, deeper into the forest. The air was cool and suffused with the musky fragrance of the forest floor, the sounds of twittering birds and rustling. He felt serene, and walked carelessly, casually, tilting his head back and staring up at the canopy.

There was a sudden sharp sting on his neck, and a rush of warmth. The trees began to whirl around him in a blur. He no longer sensed his legs. It was as if he were floating now. His world went black—he couldn’t tell for how long—then the blackness faded to green, then the mottled green formed trees as his vision focused somewhat, but not completely. It was as though he were looking through frosted glass. He heard a sound repeating. It was a voice. Emily. She was calling him.

“Roger? Roger? Can you hear me?”

Her face came into view, then out, then in again as his swaying head searched for the source of the voice.

“Em-il-y?”

“Yes, Roger. I’m here. I’m surprised you’re still conscious.”

“Wha’ hap-pen’d?” The words oozed out of his mouth like porridge dribbled by an infant.

“Morphine. I shot it into your carotid artery and it rushed immediately to your brain.”

She was wearing vinyl gloves and held a hypodermic syringe inches from his face.

“Unh. Morph-ine?”

“Yes, Roger, morphine.”

She placed the empty syringe in her purse and pulled out another one and uncapped it.

“Wha’? I don’ unnerstand. Morph-ine?” He shook his head. “N-no …no.”

He was sitting with his back against a tree. He tried to pull himself to his feet, but slid down again with a thump. He moved again, but she placed a hand against his chest and he stopped.

“Let me help you. Don’t worry, I’m a nurse, remember? I can take care of you.”

“Uh-right.”

She wiped the syringe with a tissue, picked up his limp right hand, placed the syringe in it, then closed his hand around it. She released his right hand and took the left, turning the palm upward. He looked at his left arm as if it didn’t belong to him. He saw his belt wrapped around it and cinched tightly above the elbow.

“Make a fist.”

His fingers curled loosely. She held his hand closed and said, “Squeeze. Tighter.” Tapping the crook of his elbow, she said, “Good, there’s a nice fat vein,” and inserted the needle. “This will take care of you,” she said as she pulled the plunger back, drawing some of his blood into the syringe.

“Unh. …Thanks-s-s.”

“You’re not meant for this world, Roger. I can see it. You’re a soul out of place, so I’m helping you leave. When they find your body, the police will assume you died from an accidental overdose, or possibly suicide. If they bother to check the syringe in your arm for fingerprints, they’ll only find yours. They won’t notice the injection wound on your neck with all of the scratches and insect bites.”

“Wh-at? I don’ unnerstan’.”

“I’m helping you die, Roger, it’s what I do.” She pushed the plunger.

“Huh? No, no!”

She loosened the tourniquet. “Goodbye Roger. Perhaps we’ll meet in another world.”