Say Goodbye

THIRTY-FOUR

THE WOMAN WHO USED TO BE MY MOTHER WAS WAITING where she said she’d be. She sat at a little wrought-iron table, outside a busy coffee shop. She had one leg crossed over the other, her hands clasped nervously on her knee.

I watched her from across the street, hidden in the shadows of a doorway. I kept telling myself to step forward. But my legs didn’t want to move yet. I stood, I watched, I felt something heavy and hard grow in my chest.

First time I called, she hung up on me. Second time, she accused me of playing a cruel prank. Then she’d started to cry and that upset me so much I hung up on her.

Third time, I composed myself better. I kept it simple. I had information on her missing son. I wanted to meet with her. I thought I could be of help.

I don’t know why I put it like that. Why I didn’t just say I was her little boy. I’d been snatched out of my own bed when I’d been too young to save myself. I’d spent the past ten years surviving unspeakable horrors. But I was old now. The Burgerman didn’t want me anymore. Maybe I could return home. Maybe I could go back to being her little boy.

I wanted to tell her these things. I wanted to see the smile I remembered from my sixth-birthday party, when she led me to the garage where there was a brand-new Huffy bike topped by a big red bow. I wanted to watch her flip back her long dark hair the way she did when she leaned down to help me with my homework. I wanted to snuggle up with her on the sofa, my head against her shoulder as we watched Knight Rider on TV.

I wanted to be nine years old again. But I wasn’t.

I caught my reflection in the glass of the store window. My sunken eyes, hollowed-out cheekbones, overgrown shaggy hair. I looked like a hoodlum, the kind of kid shadowed by security officers at the mall, the kind of kid other parents didn’t trust hanging out with their son. I didn’t see my mother’s features imprinted onto my own; I saw the Burgerman.

Across the street, my mom was fidgeting restlessly, twisting a ring on her right hand over and over again. She kept glancing over her left shoulder as if waiting for me to appear.

All at once I got it. She wasn’t looking for me. She was checking in with someone else.

I followed her line of sight, and finally made out the uniformed officer, standing just around the corner from the coffee shop. He turned to frown at my mom, as if to warn her to settle down, and I saw his face.

I sucked in my breath.

These are the things that no one tells you, that you must experience in order to learn:

You never can go home again. A boy raised by wolves will someday only have wolf left inside him.

And a mother’s love can burn.

I arrived back at the apartment at 3:05 p.m. I remember because when I walked through the door, the first thing that I noticed was the clock hanging on the far wall. It read 3:05 and that struck me as funny. Such a normal time. Such a normal day. Such a normal afternoon.

For such an abnormality.

I didn’t take off my coat. I didn’t kick off my shoes. I had never crossed the street to my mother. Instead, I had headed to a pet store five blocks away. Now, I had a brown paper bag in one hand, a brand-new Louisville Slugger in the other. I left the apartment door wide open and strode straight into the Burgerman’s bedroom.

He slept on his back, one hand on his doughy stomach, the other hand flung above his head. He was naked, the sheet tangled low around his waist. At the far edge of the bed, the boy was curled up, also naked, no covers, shivering in his sleep.

I slapped his shoulder hard. His eyes popped open.

“Get out,” I ordered harshly.

The boy eyed me blankly. I leaned down until we were nearly nose-to-nose. “Get your scrawny ass out of this fuckin’ bed,” I told him, “or I will cave in your fuckin’ skull.”

The boy scrambled out of bed and hightailed it out of the room. Did he leave the apartment? Run for the neighbors? Yell for the police?

I didn’t care. Not about him, the police, the neighbors. I came here with one thing to do, and by God, I was getting it done.

I opened the brown paper bag, took out the box. I’d wanted a pit bull or maybe a python. With thirty bucks, however, this was the best I could do. I remembered what the kid at the pet store had told me-spiders made great pets, actually hated to bite. In fact, they only attacked if you really pissed ’em off.

So I opened the box and tossed the huge black spider smack-dab in the middle of Burgerman’s chest. Then I reached down and pinched one of the spider’s legs-hard-to make sure the female was good and pissed off.

The tarantula promptly sank her fangs into Burgerman’s hairy chest. And he bolted awake with a roar.

The next few moments happened in a blur: Burgerman, looking down, seeing the huge black tarantula dangling from his chest. Screaming harder, plucking at its bristled body, then shrieking louder when the tiny barbs covering its legs needled his fingertips.

Me, hefting back the baseball bat.

Burgerman, looking up, yelling, “Get it off, boy! Holy mother of God, get it off get it off get it OFF!”

Me, swinging the Louisville Slugger, connecting nice and solid with Burgerman’s nose.

There was a cracking sound. The spray of blood. A deep oomph as Burgerman whomped backward onto the mattress, one hand now clutching his shattered nose, the other hand still groping blindly at the spider.

“Aaargh!” Burgerman yelled, something wet and slurpy gargling in the back of his throat.

The Burgerman ripped the tarantula out of his chest. I had an image of a hairy black spider, suspended midair, giant flap of skin still dangling from its fangs, blood pooling in the hole left behind. Burgerman dropped the spider, started to rise up with another enraged roar.

So I hit him. Right kneecap. A crack. A scream. Left kneecap. A fresh crack. A fresh scream.

“Boy, boy, boy, what’re the fuck’re you doin’, boy? Don’t cha know I’m gonna kill you, boy? Boy, boy, boy…”

I thought, coolly, with composure I never knew I had, that the Burgerman was a first-class whiner.

He was on his side. Fingers clawing at the stained sheet, trying to find traction. If he could just pull himself up, he’d come after me. I could see it in his eyes. Even now, about to meet his Maker, the Burgerman was not thinking about repenting. He just wanted to kill somebody.

I wondered if that’s what I looked like. And instead of feeling ashamed, for the first time in my life, I felt strong. Powerful. In control.

I wound up the bat and hit him. Again. In the face this time. Connecting with his jaw, hearing his teeth shatter, then aiming for his cheekbone. I stood over that mattress, and I swung my bat until my arms ached and I gradually became aware that Burgerman didn’t make any sound anymore and the only noise I heard was the wet smack, smack of my baseball bat connecting with his caved-in skull and the moisture running down my cheeks wasn’t tears at all, but Burgerman’s blood and brains, dripping off the bat, into my hair, down onto my clothes.

I think I started laughing then. It was hard to be sure. I just knew I couldn’t stop swinging that bat because at any time, the Burgerman’s eyes would pop back open and he’d rise out of the bed and get me again. That’s the way it worked in the movies. No matter what you did, the monster always rose from the dead.

Eventually, however, my shoulders gave out. The bat came down and no matter how much I wanted, I couldn’t raise it again. I sank down on the carpet, panting hard, sweat-soaked, gore-spattered, my bloody hands cradling my bloody head.

I waited for a while, I don’t know why. For the neighbors to knock on the door. For the cops to come pounding up the steps. For the new boy to return and see that I’d finally done it: The Burgerman was dead.

After a time, when nothing happened, I walked to the bathroom, trailing the bat behind me. I noticed idly that the boy had closed the front door behind him; maybe that’s why the neighbors never came, or maybe it was because the Burgerman had a knack for choosing apartments where the neighbors didn’t care.

Once in the bathroom, I turned on the water, climbing in fully clothed, trying to rinse off the worst of the gore. But not letting go of the bat. Just in case, you know. Just in case.

In my bedroom now, shedding my wet clothes into one bloody pile. Pulling out my second pair of jeans, an old T-shirt, sweatshirt, the few articles of clothing I had left.

At the last minute, I got smart. Found a duffel bag in Burgerman’s closet, went to the front hallway, and loaded up on cash and porno tapes. Given that I starred in most of the home movies, I figured they were the least I deserved.

I tried to think of what else to take with me; there was so little of value in this place. Burgerman spent money on booze, drugs, and whores. He’d never even bought me a goddamn video game.

The rage hit me all over again, and for an insane moment I wanted to go back into the bedroom and resume whacking him with the baseball bat. I had to catch myself, focus. The other boy was long gone. No doubt already spilling his guts to the police.

I had to get out of here.

At the last second, as I headed for the door, I caught a faint blur of movement out of the corner of my eye. I stumbled over my feet, groping blindly for the baseball bat, pivoting toward Burgerman’s bedroom.

I’d just raised the bat over my head, when I realized that wasn’t Burgerman’s foot moving under the sheet. Instead, the white folds parted and a hairy black spider emerged.

The tarantula lived, working her way carefully around the bloody sheets.

After another brief hesitation, I found the pet store box, scooped her inside, and slid her into my duffel bag.

I’d never had a pet before.

I thought I’d name her Henrietta.