Lust Demented

{XXXVII}

“YOUR LIES ARE SO NATURAL they’re dangerous.” I guess the details were easy to obsess over. Kiko and I were standing in the same spot I found Percy’s body. Bookshelves from the floor to the ceilings, filled with classics, closed in on us by design.

“As fucked up as it sounds… the deal I had with Percy was one of the greatest successes of my writing career… the career, but not the writing… when it was happening… it was just happening… you know what I’m talking about?”

“No. I don’t know. Monika’s dead. Percy’s dead. Lars’s dead. Books are ruined. Lives are ruined. You don’t even care about your daughter. I understand how Missy felt. She must have found out. Everyone is just a pawn in your grand strategy to make writing worth something in a time when it’s worthless. In a time when everyone can write their own stories. We don’t need writers anymore. We don’t need you.”

“I made you need me.”

“You did you bastard you did.” Kiko stretched both her arms out in a martyr’s stance grabbing an encyclopedic hardcover from each wall. Howling with anguish, she clapped both books together on my head. It was all adrenaline. My brain rattled as I dropped to kiss a familiar floor.

I couldn’t believe how angry the truth made her. Kiko went ballistic. Books rained down on me as she emptied the bookshelves. I got flashes of Percy’s corpse. He was long removed, but I was his chalk outline. Gritting her teeth, Kiko jabbed her bony knee, pinning me where my repugnant idol finally made sense of it all. I didn’t take it serious enough while I still had a chance. The beating didn’t stop. Her anger turned the lights out.

“Da-da. Da-da.” It was a voice I’ve never heard before. Just hanging in the air. The words lifted me up. I looked down at her. My daughter. Could she look like that? Was she even that old already?