“I’m just delivering a message from god,” I say, and pop my hat back onto my head. I’m acting again, keeping my true feelings repressed—I’m aware of that, but I can’t help it.
Lauren looks at me like maybe I’m a demon from hell or the Antichrist, and says, “Why did you do that?”
“What did you do to her?” the rent-a-cop asks, trying to look official and tough.
“I gave her a cross on a silver chain and tried to tell her I love her—I do love you, Lauren; I really do—then I kissed her passionately.”
She looks at me with her head all cockeyed and her wet lips parted.
She’s so confused.
I’m kind of confused too, because I’m not attracted to Lauren at all anymore and the kiss was a spectacular failure.
I can tell that some part of her deep inside liked the kissing, because it’s natural for teenage girls to like kissing, but she feels conflicted, like she’s not supposed to like it, that she’s supposed to deny her instincts here, like her religious training bids her, and that’s what’s really eating her up inside.
Maybe that’s how rapists justify their actions.
Maybe I’m a monster now.
Because I can see the thought process happening—it’s written all over her face.
Yes.
No.
Yes.
No.
Yes.
No.
No.
No.
No.
I can’t.
I really can’t.
I really truly absolutely can’t.
Why did you do this to me?
Why did you make me feel this way?
Why?!?
Lauren says, “I have to go,” just before she drops her stack of religious pamphlets and runs away.
I hate myself.
She literally runs.
I really fucking hate myself.
And I don’t have the heart to chase, mostly because I used up whatever courage and strength I had just to kiss her.
There’s a part of me that still wants to believe the kissing was wonderful.
Black-and-white Bogie-Bacall perfect.
Even though it wasn’t.
My dad used to say that the last drink of the day, when the work and thinking are over and you’re just about to surrender to unconsciousness, that’s always the best drink regardless of how it tastes.
Maybe Lauren was my last drink of the day.
The tracts blow all over the concrete sidewalk like dead leaves in the breeze.
“You better work on your delivery, Romeo,” the rent-a-cop says. “Now keep moving.”
“Aye, aye,” I say, and give the kid a military salute, making my body rigid and stiff, karate-chopping my eyebrows. “Good job keeping people with guns away from the subway. You really are a fantastic rent-a-cop.”
He looks at me and puts a hand on this two-foot club strapped to his belt, probably because they won’t let the kid carry a gun. He makes this evil twisted face, like beating me to death would really make his day. The rent-a-cop actually intimidates me a little, which is ironic, since I’m going to kill myself. But I haven’t shot Asher Beal yet, and death by rent-a-cop is probably even worse than death by übermorons.
“Here’s me moving on,” I say, and he lets me, because it’s the easiest thing for him to do.
He probably makes what—eleven-fifty an hour?
A rent-a-cop’s not exactly going to take a bullet in the line of duty for that type of wage, and who would?
As I walk away, my backpack feels lighter.
I’ve delivered all of my presents, so now it’s finally time to kill Asher Beal.
Let’s get this birthday party started!
I’m so ready to be done with this life.
It will be so so beautiful to finally be end-of-the-road done.
This will be the best birthday present ever; I’m pretty sure of that.
TWENTY-FOUR
I open my birthday present in the woods behind Asher Beal’s house—feel the familiar cold heaviness of the P-38 in my hand—and then wait for my target53 to come home.
I’ve been doing reconnaissance for a few weeks now, so I know that on Thursdays my target arrives home around 5:43 from wrestling practice, and then usually goes into his first-floor bedroom for an hour before dinner.
The target usually surfs the Internet while waiting for feeding time, at which point the target will relocate to the kitchen.
The glow of the laptop screen lights up the target’s face and makes him look like an alien or a demon or a fish in a lit tank, and watching the target’s dead expression illuminated by the screen has also made it easier to visualize killing him—the weird lighting really dehumanizes the target.
I’ve practiced shooting my target from the tree line, using my hand as a gun.
But today I’m going to creep up to the window, shoot the target through the pane at point-blank range, stick my arm through the jagged glass teeth and pop the target six more times—mixing head shots with chest shots—to ensure the target has been eliminated, and then I’ll escape into the woods, where I will off my second target with the last bullet in the magazine before the local cops and maybe even the FBI arrive.
That’s my plan.
All I have to do is wait for my target to flick on his bedroom light, which will be the first falling domino to set the chain of events in motion.