It was a Friday night--a night for fun and first dates, a night for violence and death--and they rode in that night. They were both young, in their twenties, and they wore the navy blue uniforms of the Fire and Rescue Department.
"Hey, Tom, turn up the stereo. I love that song." It was the driver who spoke. His name was Earl, but he hated it, so he called himself Bone. Not Bones, plural, but Bone, singular. It was his nickname because of his size, six foot four and only weighing 150 pounds. People that didn't know Bone well thought he called himself that because of his job, and he didn't discourage that.
Tom reached over to the radio dial and turned up the volume so that they would have to yell at each other to be heard. The song was "God Is a Bullet" by Concrete Blonde. Tom didn't have a nickname. He was an unassuming man, much shorter than Bone, five foot ten, with light brown hair and a beard tinted with a reddish brown.
It was their job as emergency medical technicians to guide their ambulance through the streets of the city prepared for the inevitable call to pick up the victims of the darkness. Hopefully most would be living and would make it once they were delivered to the emergency room, but sometimes the bodies would already be lifeless. Then their job was merely to taxi the corpse to the morgue without the haste, without the attempts to administer aid.
Their companions along the dirty streets were other denizens of the darkness, working the night shift for legal or illegal gain, walking or driving in sleepless insomnia, or merely relishing in the otherworldly quality of the night. For the night is a world apart from the day. A world in which sound takes on a different quality, with deeper and more ominous tones. A world in which touch and taste and smell take on more importance than sight, for it is a world in which perspective flattens and colors dim showing only the contrast of black and white.
"Quiet night so far," Tom said, making himself heard over the loud rock.
They heard the other radio then, barely, and it called their number.
Tom turned down the music and picked up the microphone for the radio. "Go ahead."
"Man down at 50th and Jefferson. Man down. Police units are already on the scene."
"Ten-four."
Tom replaced the microphone and switched on the emergency lights and siren.
"You shouldn't of said anything," Bone said making a U turn. "You jinxed us."
Tom didn't say anything, though he was not superstitious. He thought it was amusing to listen to the ridiculous beliefs of the others in his profession. He sat in his seat quietly, listening to the radio, mentally blocking out the siren of their vehicle as Bone dodged and weaved in the weekend traffic.
They pulled up to the scene accompanied by the squeal of their tires. They were both out of the vehicle quickly, but the cops waved them to slow down. "Uh oh, looks like we're too late," Bone said.
They walked up to where a group of uniformed cops was standing looking down to the pavement. One cop, looking very young, was away from the scene, bending over the fender of one of the police cars. The emergency lights highlighted the scene as he retched.
Tom could see the body first, the group of cops blocked Bone's view. "Holy shit," Tom said. "Look at that!"
He could see the body of a white male, its limbs twisted as it lay on the pavement. The body had no head. Blood was puddled underneath it.
"Jesus," Bone said as he gained a view of the scene. "I haven't seen anything like this since that wreck out on the interstate. Where's the head?"
One of the cops, with sergeant stripes on his sleeve turned to them and pointed toward a dumpster. One cop was already there taking pictures with a camera. "Sick mother fuckers," the sergeant said, referring to Bone and Tom.
They walked casually over to the dumpster and peered in at the target of the photographer. The head of a man peered back at them with unblinking eyes, his mouth open in a silent scream.
"Man," Bone said to Tom. "The head must have been sheared off."
"Yeah, you're right. Look at the cut. It was done neatly, with just one slice. Any idea what happened?" Tom asked the cop with the camera.
"No. I'm just taking the pictures. Ask Sergeant James." The cop paused, "Doesn't anything bother you guys anymore?"
"Naw," Tom said. "We've seen too much. We've seen it all. It just looks like spaghetti sauce and meat balls now."
"And throw in some Italian sausages with that," Bone said, giving a wink to the head and turning to the cop.
The head shifted its gaze at Tom then and gave him a wink and a smile. "Shit!" Tom said.
"What's the matter?" Bone asked.
"Nothing, nothing. The head twitched is all." Tom looked at it, not believing what he saw. It was back in its original position, mouth agape and eyes staring.
"It twitched?" the cop asked.
"Sure. Happens all the time," Bone replied. "It's just an involuntary muscle contraction. Nothing to worry about, right Tom?"
"Right."
"So, what's everybody waiting for?" Bone asked the cop with the camera.
"The medical examiner isn't here yet. We can't move anything until he gets here."
"I think that the man's dead," Bone said. "It doesn't take any special degree to figure that out."
"Yeah, well we still have to wait."
Just then a car pulled up, and a man in civies got out. "Here he is," said the cop. He turned and took another picture of the dumpster that held the head.
The two EMT's hung around, Bone joked with the cops and Tom stood quietly by as the examiner checked out the body and then the head. He took a quick look around the scene and motioned for Bone and Tom to get to work when he was done.
Hands clad in surgical gloves, Tom and Bone put the body on a gurney that they had waiting and put it into the back of the emergency vehicle. Then Tom got a plastic bag, went to the dumpster and picked up the head by the hair placing it in the bag. When they had finished they tugged at the gloves pulling them off, distorting their elastic shapes and dropped them in a bag in the vehicle. No one was willing to take chances with a bloody scene these days.
"See you guys later," Bone called out as they were pulling away. The sergeant shook his head as he watched them go.
"So what do you think happened?" Tom asked as they were on their way to the morgue.
"I'd say that someone was really pissed off at the dude."
"Pissed off nothing. Someone would have to be more than pissed of to do that. I wonder what the motive was."
"Don't you know?" came a voice from behind them. "Look inside of yourself, you'll find the answer."
"Did you say something?" Tom asked Bone.
"Not me," Bone said with a smile. "Maybe it was him." And he jerked his thumb back indicating the back of the truck.
They were silent for the rest of the ride, the stereo provided the only sound. Look inside of myself, Tom thought. Where did that come from? He was afraid to guess. By the time they pulled up to the back door to the morgue he doubted that he had even heard it.
* * *
It was the next night and another shift patrolling the dark streets. They felt comfortable in their unit with the stereo blasting out music that was meant to be played loud. They felt at home in the night.
Bone had been talking, which was normal. He was outgoing and talkative, flirting with the women and joking with the men.
"So there we were, my cousin and I, with no clothes on, each pointing to the other trying to lay the blame. We had no idea how ridiculous we looked and how obvious it all was. I mean, after all, we were just little kids. What did little kids know about that kind of stuff?" He shook his head and laughed. Looking over at Tom he said, "I wonder what she's doing now? I bet you she's prettier than hell. I always thought she was pretty when I was a kid."
Tom had been listening without saying much. He had long ago perfected the art of responding appropriately to conversation without actually entering into it. He nodded his head and chuckled when it was called for. This worked very well with someone like Bone--it kept him talking which helped kill the time while they were on shift.
"So Tom, did you ever do anything like that when you were a kid?"
Tom didn't respond at first, he just nodded his head in time to the rock beat coming out of the speakers. At last he said, "No. No, I don't think so."
"You don't think so? That's the kind of thing I could never forget. What do you mean 'I don't think so'?"
"I don't know. It's just that I don't remember much about my childhood. I mean that not much memorable happened I guess." He turned and looked at Bone then and gave him a grin. "I don't think that much happened until I graduated from high school and joined the service, you know, and ended up in that little fight down in Panama as a corpsman. Shit, that was when I saw my first blood and guts. That was when I first got laid." Tom looked back out the windshield, still keeping time to the music with his head.
But what Tom didn't say was that he had been searching inside of himself, looking desperately for something that he felt he had lost, for remembrances that would not be released, for reasons and antecedents, for the causes of who he was. But there always seemed to be a gaping emptiness where something should be. Tom wondered why Bone could recollect so much from his childhood while Tom could remember so little. It seemed that there was so little--too little--to remember from his youth, as if it had never occurred. To Tom it seemed that he had always been an adult without the innocence and naivete of a child.
What was missing? What had he missed or forgotten or repressed? He thought then about that voice he had heard the night before--"Look inside of yourself." He looked, but he found little.
Then they got another call. Again they raced to the scene. As they got out of the vehicle they could see that this time the victim was a black woman, a prostitute. She had been wearing a red miniskirt and black fishnet hose held up by a garter belt. Her skirt had been cut off, no jagged cuts, but a nice neat slit. Her panties had been ripped off and were in shreds next to her body. She wore a black, silky tank top, but the way her torso was twisted on her left side, her right breast, pale in death, had fallen exposed. The nipple had been bitten off, and blood had streamed from the bite, caking her breast now that it had dried. Like the previous night, the body had no head, and again it had been cut cleanly, as cleanly as her skirt had been slit.
As Bone and Tom walked up, Bone asked, "Is the head in a dumpster again?"
"Over there," the sergeant pointed out. When the pair moved in that direction he said "Sick mother fuckers," again. It was the same sergeant as the previous night.
They peered into the dumpster to see her face staring out, blood coming out of the side of her mouth in a nice neat line, rust red against her dark cheek. The skin around where her neck had been cut was puckered, as if trying belatedly to close the wound. She had been in her thirties and not very attractive, having made the rounds by this stage in her life and career.
"There's a real sicko out there," Tom said looking away, toward the street. "Real sick."
"Yeah, well, there's all kinds that make up this world. Some of them we would be better off without," Bone replied.
Tom looked at Bone who had turned to the street also, he then looked back at the head. She was smiling at him. She licked her lips and asked, "Want a little head? Twenty bucks," and she laughed and formed her mouth into an O. The dried line of blood cracked, flaking off.
"Shit," he said turning away, "I've been at this job too long." He started walking back to the vehicle. His heart raced as he worked at keeping his pace calm and measured.
As he walked he looked at the crowd of bystanders. He couldn't understand it. After all, he had to look at the scenes of violence over and over again. It was just a part of his job. And he had even become immune to most of it, hardened, desensitized. But these people, these onlookers, were here for the show, here for the excitement. The flashing lights must quicken their normally slow pulses, the sight of gore and blood must lighten up their normally dim lives.
There was a woman in her fifties who had a small white poodle on a leash watching all of the hustle, bustle and commotion with a keen intensity. Next to her was a man in his sixties. His hand came up to his mouth to cover a yawn. Was he sleepy or just bored? And next to him was a young man in his twenties. He actually had a grin on his thin face as he ogled the scene with his fierce blue eyes. And the sergeant thought Tom and Bone were sick.
"Hey, you're not turning wimp on me are you?" Bone yelled to his back, but Tom didn't reply. Bone turned to the head and winked. "What do you know," he told her. Something about her head looked different. Wasn't there some blood that had run out of her mouth? It wasn't there now. "What do you know," he said again turning to follow Tom.
When he got to where Tom stood next to the vehicle the medical examiner was just saying, "It's okay to clean it up now."
With gloved hands they lifted up the body and plopped it unceremoniously onto the gurney, and her legs parted showing off her merchandize. They put a sheet over her with a false modesty. Tom grabbed another plastic bag from the back and went to the dumpster. She said nothing to him as he picked up her head by the hair and put it in the bag. But she spoke as he carried it back. "Know what it's all about? It's all about sex, that's what it is. It's all about sick sex. He wants to cut off his own dick, but he doesn't have the balls!" and she cackled. Tom didn't let on that he heard, and he thought that he was losing it, going crazy. No one else seemed to notice. Sweat beaded up on his forehead, and again his heart pounded.
He put the bag with its contents on the gurney with its body and slammed the doors shut behind him. He got into the cab of the vehicle where Bone waited behind the wheel. "Okay, let's get going," he said.
Before he took off Bone took a close look at him. "Hey, are you okay, man? Something's wrong. What is it?"
"Oh, I don't know. I'm just not feeling well--tired you know. Just tired."
"Hey, maybe you should take some time off. You deserve it. You've been working your ass off lately. When was the last time you took a night off?"
"You should talk," Tom said looking toward his partner.
"Yeah, you're right," Bone said as he put it into drive and took off to the morgue. He didn't hurry because what was the use, the whore was dead anyway.
They rode silently listening to the roar of guitars on the radio, then pulled into the driveway of the morgue. Silently they opened the doors to the back of the unit and pulled out the gurney, letting the legs come down to support it. An attendant opened the door and held it open for them so that they could wheel in the body. They pushed it down a long corridor, antiseptic clean and smelling that way. They finally pushed their way through double swinging doors into the morgue itself. The medical examiner was already there waiting for them.
"Bring her over here boys," the examiner instructed them. Tom felt a twinge of resentment at the use of the word boys, but they wheeled the gurney over and lifted the body over to the examining table. Tom reached back and grabbed the bag with its grizzly contents and placed it next to the body.
"Thanks for the ride...boys," came the voice from inside the bag. Tom ignored the sarcasm and looked at the faces of Bone and the examiner. Neither one gave any hint at hearing the voice. I know I'm going crazy, he thought, this is just too much.
Bone was beginning to wheel the gurney back the way they came hoping to find a particular nurse that he liked to flirt with and Tom turned to follow him when the examiner said, "Say would one of you boys do me a favor and get my bag? It's back there in cold storage."
Bone gave an imploring look to Tom, so Tom said "Yeah, I'll get it," and he moved toward the door in the back of the examining room.
"I'll meet you up at Receiving," Bone yelled behind him. Tom waved his hand without looking back. He could hear the squeak of the wheels as the gurney moved and then the sound of the swinging doors as they came rushing back after being opened.
Tom went through the door to see rows and tiers of small doors in the far wall. The doors had latches like those on the old fashion freezer doors of the good humor truck. He spotted the bag on a table on the other side of the room. It looked like the old stereotypical doctors bag, of black leather, wide at the bottom tapering up to the top with its two handles. The leather looked worn and was wrinkled.
As he walked up to the table he heard a voice. "I'm a victim too," it said. "Though he didn't take my head, he cut off my nipples with a small knife." The voice was male. Tom's pulse quickened involuntarily. "And me," came a woman's voice, "he disemboweled me, trying to get to my ovaries. He gutted me."
Tom had stopped dead in his tracks. Another woman's voice, deeper than the first, spoke up, "He tortured me, before the rape, and tortured me after. I screamed for mercy, begged to be killed, but it only excited him. He raped me a second time, pulling out before coming, spreading his sperm on my wounds. It stung like salt water, and he laughed at me. Why? How could anyone be that cruel, to take pleasure in the agonizing pain and misery of someone else?"
Why was he hearing these voices? He had heard of burn out in this job, but he hadn't heard of anyone hallucinating. Was he having a psychotic episode? Was he suddenly now a schizophrenic?
The next voice ripped at Tom's heart. It was the voice of a child, a young boy he thought, but he wasn't sure. "He was a kid once too, I could tell. He was a kid like me. When he made me kiss him, when he made me do that awful thing I could feel what was inside him. I could tell that someone had done it to him too. I think it was his daddy. When he turned me around and put his thing up my butt, he talked to me about hate and his daddy, about his mommy who watched it all and kissed the hurt to make it better and held him till he went to sleep crying."
Tom was turning his head searching and hoping to see someone. He saw no one. "Who was it?" he asked quietly. His breath was labored causing his chest to expand and contract noticeably with each inhale and exhale.
The voices became a babble then, a roar. He could almost make out a name, but not quite.
"Hey, what's taking so long," came the voice of the examiner over the din of dead voices.
"Coming," Tom said. It took an incredible effort to wade through the voices that seemed to tug at his body like an undertow at the beach. He made it to the table and picked up the bag. He pushed his way back to the door and into the other room and gave the bag to the examiner who said "Thanks. Hey, you know, you don't look so good. Got the flu?"
"No, I'm okay," he said. "Gotta go now. See you later."
"See you," the examiner said without looking back up.
Tom rushed out the door and found his way out of the building. The atmosphere inside was too stifling. He stood by the vehicle for a while in the night air, but it was warm and muggy, and he did not feel refreshed as he had hoped. There was a feeling of panic in his head and pain in his heart. The voices from the morgue had brought back memories that he did know were his, memories held in some dark recess of his mind hidden from his consciousness, hidden since childhood. He saw his Uncle Chuck's face, with fat red cheeks and black horn rim glasses. He was breathing hard and sweat was on his forehead. "That's it," he said. "Yes, put it in your mouth and suck on it. That's a good boy. Doesn't that feel good. It feels good to me. Oh, that's it. That's it!"
And Tom remembered vomiting. His Uncle Chuck was holding him as he heaved. "Come on now. It wasn't that bad, was it? Didn't it taste good. It tastes good to me."
And then Tom remembered running and running and running until he forgot.
After that time he wondered why the other kids in the family didn't like Uncle Chuck, and he wondered why he didn't like the way his uncle hugged him when he came over to visit, and he wondered why he never would go back to Uncle Chuck's house ever again, why he would get sick and not be able to go, or why there would always be something else more important to do. After all, Uncle Chuck was family and he was supposed to love family, wasn't he?
"Here you are," came a voice behind him, it was Bone's voice. "I've been looking all over for you. What's the matter? Are you sick? You're white as a ghost."
Tom looked at him and wiped the sweat from his forehead. "I don't know. Maybe I'm coming down with something."
"There's a flu going around. Hope you're not getting it. Come on, help me with the gurney," Bone said opening the back doors of the vehicle. Tom helped him to load it, swinging the legs up and back as it went in. Bone moved to the drivers side and got in. Tom got in and sat quietly as Bone pulled out into the quiet side street. "
"Man, have you met that new nurse, Marcia, what's her name? Marcia...Marcia, oh, I forget, but what a knock out. With tits out to here. Man, I wish she would go out with me, but all she does is flirt."
They had gotten to the main street and Bone was waiting for a break in traffic so he could go on, but Tom wasn't paying any attention to Bone or the traffic. All Tom could think about was his new found memories and horror. Did this really happen to him or was this part of his apparent psychosis? He wasn't sure of anything anymore. "Isn't it close to the end of the shift?" Tom asked.
"Yeah," Bone said in reply. "Let's head on back to the station. Looks like you could use some sleep. You look like shit."
* * *
The next night, Sunday night, before they left the station, Bone and Tom were having a cup of coffee, getting ready for their shift. They heard the call over the radio--the call announcing another mutilation murder, another prostitute.
Tom spilt his coffee, knocking over the cup, and grabbed Bone by the sleeve of his shirt. "Come on! We've got to get there!"
"Hey, what's the hurry? Just another corpse. No one is going anywhere. The body will keep."
But Tom pulled him along anyway, until they got to the unit. Tom usually let Bone drive, preferring to sit back and passively watch the streets go by in an endless panorama, but now Tom jumped into the driver's seat and started up the engine. Bone had to jump in the passenger's side just as Tom was beginning to pull away. "Jesus, Tom! What's the matter?" was all that Bone was able to say.
But Tom was silent, driving to the scene with emergency lights and siren on. He whipped around corners and ran red lights without consideration of their safety, almost colliding with a car in mid intersection three blocks before reaching the destination. They made it to the scene squealing to a stop behind a police cruiser with its lights flashing, casting a red glare strobe-like across the scene. Tom jumped out of the vehicle just as it stopped leaving the door open and rushed to where the body lay, the cops moving out of his way with puzzled looks on their faces. "What's with him?" the sergeant asked Bone as he got down from the vehicle.
"I don't know. I've never seen him like this before. I think he's beginning to lose it." The sergeant shook his head. He thought that they had both lost it long ago.
Tom knelt at the body, looking it over. She was on her back, her arms and legs spread out as if surprised at the absence of her head. Her miniskirt was pulled up around her waist showing a garter belt and hose with runs up and down the legs. She wore no panties, and her pubic hair was red. Her blouse was ripped down the front and her large breasts flopped to each side, the paleness of the skin contrasting with the brown aureoles surrounding the nipples. On the ground, underneath the neck where her head should have been, was a puddle of blood.
"Where's the head?" Tom asked the nearest cop.
"Back there," the cop motioned to a mound of boxes behind a building.
He stood up and quickly walked to where the cop pointed. Two cops stood by guarding the bodiless head which lay on the ground behind the boxes. He knelt down and looked into the face. Her mouth was open in a voiceless scream, her eyes were shut tight with lines radiating out from the corners from the effort. Blood puddled around the clean cut along the neck. Her red hair lay matted in the blood.
Tom looked up at the two cops who weren't paying much attention to him. They were looking back to where the crowd was being held back. They didn't like being picked to guard the head, it made them nervous.
Tom looked back down to the prostitute's painted face. Her eyes looked up at him now and she was smiling. "You've come to visit us again, Tom? What do you want? Somehow I don't think you want a fuck."
Tom looked back up at the cops who didn't seem to hear, then looked back down again. Who did it, he thought, who did this to you and the others?
"He's out there," she said, the smile leaving her painted lips, the red contrasting against her deathly palor. "He's in the crowd right now, watching and laughing. You know it's not just the killing that he gets off on. He likes to hang around and watch afterward. It's like he's taunting the cops, making fun of them. Or maybe he wants to get caught. Think that's it?" she asked.
Who is he, Tom thought. How do I recognize him?
"He's white, tall and skinny. With light hair, combed back with kind of a widow's peak up front. But it's his eyes. Look at the eyes. There's a crazy blue intensity to them. Look at the eyes."
Again Tom looked up at the cops who were looking down at him now. He couldn't believe that they couldn't hear, that he alone could hear the dead speak. He looked back down at the prostitute's head. Again her mouth was open and her eyes shut. Tom stood up and turned slowly without saying a word to the two cops. He walked back to where the crowd watched. The cops watched him walk away and looked at each other shaking their heads. They didn't like Tom, he was too different, too quiet and brooding. They didn't understand him, and what they didn't understand they didn't like. They were almost afraid of him.
Tom got back to where Bone and the sergeant stood, and he said, "He's here somewhere."
"What?" the sergeant asked. "How do you know?"
But Tom ignored the question, he was busy looking at the faces. There were all types of people that watched the scene--street people, whores and pimps, passersby, men and women. A cross section of America? He wondered as he searched the faces, looking at their eyes as the prostitute had instructed him. Then he saw him, pale skinned with sandy hair. He was wearing dark slacks and a blue shirt with a button down collar. He fidgeted, standing behind the yellow tape acting as a barricade. He looked around him taking in the scene as if he relished the activity and energy coming from the people, then he looked right into Tom's eyes, his gaze not straying. Tom began to panic. He felt drawn, sucked into the blue of his eyes, spiraling in tormented eddies, struggling to regain the surface, holding his breath in the fear of drowning. Then he felt as if he reached air. He breathed deep and looked into those eyes. They burned with an intensity Tom had never seen in a person before. Here was an intent and purpose like no one else possessed. Here was the gaze of madness.
Tom elbowed the sergeant and said, "Hey, wasn't that guy at the scene last night? That was a different part of town, what's he doing here now?"
When the sergeant looked in the man's direction, the man broke off his stare at Tom. He fidgeted more and looked around him. He turned and began to push his way back through the crowd. The sergeant yelled out to a cop standing at the barrier "Hey, stop that man. Yeah, him."
The man began to push his way through the people more doggedly when he heard the order. He looked behind him and saw the approaching cop and panicked. He tried to run but the crush of bodies slowed him down. He finally got away from the crowd and began to run, but the cop was close behind him now his pistol drawn. "Halt," he ordered, but the man cut to his right and into the path of an approaching patrol car lights flashing. The car barely stopped, blocking off the man's retreat. He cut to the left then, back into the crowd of onlookers. The bodies buffeted him, pushing him back and forth. He ran into a large black man who pushed him back forcing him hard up against the ass of a fat woman. She wheeled around and shoved at his face, scratching, drawing three parallel lines of blood under his left eye. He turned to continue his flight but another woman tripped him up with her foot, and he fell. The cops were on him then. He had a tight smile on his thin lips, and a slow light rain began to fall onto his face.
* * *
"How did you know?" Bone asked. They were back on patrol with Bone driving.
"Like I told the cops, I saw him at the scene the night before."
"But no one else noticed. There were so many people there. The faces just turn into blurs after awhile, no body ever notices. How come you noticed?"
"I don't know. His face just stood out. I remembered it." Tom was afraid to tell Bone the truth. How could he tell anyone that the bodiless heads had spoken to him, that the dead whore identified the perp to him? Who would ever believe?
"I heard the cops say that they found a machete on him," Bone said, "Inside his pants, of all places. And an Xacto knife in his pocket. Both had blood on them." Bone visibly shivered. Tom had never seen him react to any situation with revulsion. They had both picked up bodies, mangled and battered, with faces an unrecognizable pulp, and innards falling out, and neither was sickened. They had both become desensitized and numb. But now Bone was affected, and Tom had remembered a long repressed experience. Both had been profoundly touched by the incidents.
"What makes a person do that?" Tom asked. "What turns someone into such an animal. No...wait...not an animal. Animals don't do that. What turns someone into such a fiend, such a demon?" He thought about his Uncle Chuck and his rape of such a young and innocent child. What made Uncle Chuck do it?
Bone didn't answer, right away, he just drove watching the traffic. The windshield wipers squeaked across the glass in a slow rhythm. Finally Bone said, "The cops said that he admitted committing the murders. He also told them that he had been raped by his father as a child, and that his mother watched." He paused as he turned a corner in the wet street. "I've read that victims often turn into perpetrators, into victimizers. I guess that they learn that that is how they are supposed to act."
Tom looked at his partner then. "But not all do. Not every victim turns around and commits the same atrocity," he said defensively. "Not every one." At least that was the hope planted deep in his heart. He repeated, "Not every one." Please, let me break the cycle here. Oh, please.
Karl has had work published in Thresholds Quarterly, Left Curve, Happy, The Storyteller, Free Focus, Asking the Question, Creatio Ex Nihilo, and Earth Tones: Creative Perspectives on Ecological Issues. He also had work accepted for publication by The Fifth Di..., My Legacy, Writers Corner, Alpha Beat Press, Raven's Tale and an anthology.
E-mail: karl_eschenbach@hotmail.com
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