If I had a sword, I might slide it into my belly and pull upward until I fell dead, but I have no weapon. And what satisfaction is there in killing a man who wants to die?
All my life, I’ve been wanting to see my father, to meet him for the first time. I’ve wanted to ask him questions. To interrogate him.
I stare at his face in the mirror.
“Why did you leave me?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer.
“Why do you have a photograph of me when I was five? Did my mother send it to you? Why did you want to carry a photograph of me but not me?”
I can feel him fighting me. He doesn’t want to remember the day he left me.
But I am younger and stronger. I am better. I will make him remember. I will force him to remember. I will kill him if I have to.
And so I push against my father’s mind and soul. I crash through his fortifications and rampage into his memory and tear through his homes, wells, and streets, until I see it: the hospital where I was born. Or, rather, the memory of that hospital. And I burst inside and race up the stairs, and back through the years, and rush through a door into the maternity ward hallway where my father paces.
Somewhere on this floor, my mother is giving birth to me. But my father is not in that room. No, he’s outside, removed, remote.
“Sir?” a nurse asks him. “Can I help you?”
“My wife is giving birth,” he says.
“Do you know where?”
“Yes, room eight-twelve.”
The nurse is confused. Why is he standing here while his wife is giving birth? Men don’t wait outside anymore. Men aren’t allowed to wait outside anymore. Or maybe there are problems. Maybe it’s a difficult birth. Maybe this poor man needs compassion.
“Sir,” the nurse says, “your wife and child are going to be okay. We have the finest—”
He puts his hand over her mouth. She doesn’t stop him. She’s too surprised. Confused. No father has ever touched her face like that. Has violated her boundaries like that. Expectant and fearful fathers have grabbed her. Even pushed or pulled her. But nobody has ever tried to silence her. He realizes his error. He pulls his hand away.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he says. “It’s just—I can’t stand words right now. I can’t stand to hear anybody say anything. Please, just go. Just go and leave me alone.”
She quickly walks away, wonders briefly if she should call security, but then realizes that the man has enough problems. She knows he’s just a weak man ashamed of his weakness.
She prays for him. Dear God, she thinks, help this man become a better man than he is now.
My father doesn’t feel her prayers.
He only feels a sharp pain in his chest. Something has broken. He knows he is sick and damaged. But what has made him sick? And what has damaged him?
My father remembers being eight years old, lying in bed while a man stands in the dark doorway. Who is that man?
It is my father’s father.
“I know you’re awake,” my grandfather says. He is drunk, slurs his words, and wavers in the doorway.
My father doesn’t move. He believes that his father will go away if he doesn’t move. It’s a magic spell that gets repeated every Friday and Saturday night.
“Your momma said you went out shooting today,” Grandfather says.
When my father hunts, he imagines the animals, the targets, are his father.
“Did you bring down anything?” Grandfather asks.
My father imagines pressing the rifle barrel against my grandfather’s temple. Imagines pulling the trigger.
“Did you kill anything? Any meat?” Grandfather asks.
That day, my father shot at and missed three quail and one deer.
“I asked you if you got any meat,” Grandfather says.
My father doesn’t want to tell the truth. The truth will get him hurt. A lie will also get him hurt. He’s going to get hurt no matter what he does.
“If you don’t answer my question, boy, I’m gonna get mad.”
Silence.
“I’m gonna ask you one more time,” Grandfather says. “Did you shoot anything today?”
“No,” my father says.
“Jesus,” Grandfather says. “What good are you? What kind of man are you? Ain’t I taught you how to shoot? And you waste my time and my bullets and my energy. You’re just a pussy boy. I can’t believe you are part of me. I wish you’d just go away.”
And then my grandfather leaves my father alone in the dark.
My father wants to weep. He wants to cry out for his father. He wants to be forgiven, to be loved. But if he speaks he will only be ridiculed again. He will only be diminished.
And then my grandfather walks back into the room. He stands over my father.
“I want you to know what I know,” my grandfather says. “You ain’t worth shit now. And you ain’t ever gonna be worth shit.”
My father stares at a stain on the ceiling. He has memorized the shape of that stain.
“Say it,” my grandfather says.
“Say what?” my father asks.
“Say you ain’t worth shit.”
My father wants to resist, to rebel, but he knows the punishment will end only if he submits.
“I ain’t worth shit,” my father says.
“Say it again.”
“I ain’t worth shit.”
“Louder.”
“I ain’t worth shit!” my father screams.
“Louder.”
“I ain’t worth shit!” my father screams. “I ain’t worth shit! I ain’t worth shit! I ain’t worth shit! I ain’t worth shit!”
My father screams long after my grandfather has left the room.
And now my father, whipped and bloodied by his memory, stops pacing in the hospital hallway. Somewhere on this floor, my mother is giving birth to me. But my father cannot be a participant. He cannot be a witness. He cannot be a father.
And so he runs. And as he runs, he closes his eyes. And as he closes his eyes, I close my eyes.
Nineteen
WHEN I OPEN MY eyes, I’m standing in a bank in downtown Seattle.
Yes, that bank.
I have two pistols in my coat, a paint gun and a .38 special.
Yes, those guns.
I’m supposed to pull them out and shoot everybody I see.
Yes, I’m supposed to kill for Justice.
I did it before: a long time ago, a little while ago, a second ago. I don’t understand how time works anymore.
There’s that man again, the one who told me I wasn’t real.
I think he’s wrong; I think I am real.
I have returned to my body. And my ugly face. And my anger. And my loneliness.
And then I think, Maybe I never left my body at all. Maybe I never left this bank. Maybe I’ve been standing here for hours, minutes, seconds, trying to decide what I should do.
Do I pull out my guns and shoot all these people?
Do I shoot that little boy over there with his mother? He is maybe five years old. He has blue eyes and blond hair. He’s wearing good shoes. A jean jacket. Khaki pants. Blue shirt. He’s beautiful. A beautiful little man. His mother, also blond and blue-eyed, smiles down at him. She loves him. She sees me watching them and she smiles at me. For me. She wants me to know how much she loves her son. She’s proud of the little guy.
Did my mother love me like that? I hope so.
I wave at the little boy. He waves back.
I hate him for being loved so well.
I want to be him.
I close my eyes and try to step inside his body. But it doesn’t work. I cannot be him.
I open my eyes. I think all the people in this bank are better than I am. They have better lives than I do. Or maybe they don’t. Maybe we’re all lonely. Maybe some of them also hurtle through time and see war, war, war. Maybe we’re all in this together.
I turn around and walk out of the bank. I step out onto First Avenu
e.
It’s not really raining, but this is Seattle. There are only fifty-eight sunny days a year in our city. So it always feels like it’s just about to rain, even when the sun is out.
I used to hate the rain. But now I want it to pour. I want it to storm. I want to be clean.
I am surrounded by people who trust me to be a respectful stranger. Am I trustworthy? Are any of us trustworthy? I hope so.
I remember my first day of school. Kindergarten. My mother walked me there. It was only six blocks away from our apartment, but six blocks is forever to a child.
As we walked, my mother talked to me.
“It’s going to be okay,” she said. “School is a good thing. You’re going to have lots of friends. And you’ll learn so much. And the teachers will take care of you, okay? I love you, okay? You’ll be okay. I’m going to wait right here for you. All day, I’ll wait right here.”
She was wrong, of course. School was not good for me.
I never made friends.
I didn’t learn much.
I was not okay.
And my mother didn’t wait for me. She died.
After she died, I went to live with her sister, my aunt.
Yes, that’s the dirtiest secret I own.
This is what I don’t tell anybody. I don’t talk about it. I don’t dream about it. I don’t want anybody to know.
My aunt was supposed to take care of me. She had promised her sister she would take care of me. She was the only family I had.
My father was gone. My mother was gone. My grandparents were gone. Everybody was gone.
My aunt was all I had.
Aunt Zooey. Auntie Z.
She lived in an apartment with her boyfriend. A man who smelled of onions and beer. A man who leaned over my bed in the middle of the night. A man who hurt me.
I told Auntie Z.
She slapped me.
I told Auntie Z again.
She slapped me again.
I was six years old. I cried for my mother. Like a lost dog, I howled all night. I could not stop crying. I missed my mother.
My mommy. My mommy. My mommy.
I cried for one week. Then two weeks. Then three weeks.
Every night, Auntie Z rushed into my room, shook me, slapped me, and screamed at me.
Stop crying, stop crying, stop crying.
I miss her, too. I miss her, too. I miss her, too.
She’s not coming back. She’s not coming back. She’s not coming back.
Some nights, her boyfriend came to see me. He hurt me and whispered to me in the dark.
Don’t tell anybody, don’t tell anybody, don’t tell anybody.
Everybody knows you’re a liar. Everybody knows you’re a liar. Everybody knows you’re a liar.
Nobody loves you anymore. Nobody loves you anymore. Nobody loves you anymore.
I learned how to stop crying.
I learned how to hide inside of myself.
I learned how to be somebody else.
I learned how to be cold and numb.
When I was eight years old, I ran away for the first time.
When I was nine, I poured lighter fluid on my aunt’s boyfriend and tried to set him on fire. He woke up and punched me into the hospital. They sent him to jail.
After he got out of jail, he left my aunt. She blamed me.
When I was ten, Auntie Z gave me twenty dollars and sent me to buy some hamburgers and fries. When I got back to the apartment, she was gone. She never came back.
When I was eleven, I ran away from my first foster home and got drunk in the street with three homeless Indians from Alaska.
When I was twelve, I ran away from my seventh foster home.
When I was thirteen, I smoked crack for the first time.
When I was fourteen, I stole a car and wrecked it into a building beneath the Alaska Way Viaduct.
When I was fifteen, I met a kid named Justice who taught me how to shoot guns.
But I am tired of hurting people. I am tired of being hurt.
I need help.
I walk from street to street, looking for help. I walk past Pike Place Market and Nordstrom’s. I walk past Gameworks and the Space Needle. I walk past Lake Washington and Lake Union. I walk for miles. I walk for days. I walk for years.
I don’t understand how time works anymore.
I walk until I see a police car parked in front of a restaurant.
I walk inside.
It’s a cheap diner. Eight tables. Two waitresses. A cook in the back.
At one of the tables sit two cops, Officer Dave and his partner. They’ve arrested me more often than any other duo.
I walk up to them.
“Officer Dave,” I say.
“Hey, Zits,” he says. “What’s going on?”
I want to tell him the entire story. I want to tell him that I fell through time and have only now returned. I want to tell him I learned a valuable lesson. But I don’t know what that lesson is. It’s too complicated, too strange. Or maybe it really is simple. Maybe it’s so simple it makes me feel stupid to say it.
Maybe you’re not supposed to kill. No matter who tells you to do it. No matter how good or bad the reason. Maybe you’re supposed to believe that all life is sacred.
“Officer Dave,” I say, and raise my hands high in the air, “I want you to know that I respect you. And I’m here for a good reason. I’m raising my hands up because I have two guns inside my coat. One of them is just a paint gun, but the other one is real.”
Officer Dave and his partner quickly get to their feet. Their hands touch their guns, ready to pull them out of their holsters.
“This isn’t funny, Zits,” Officer Dave says. “You say stuff like that, you’re going to get shot.”
I start laughing.
“What’s so funny?” Officer Dave asks.
“I’m not trying to be funny,” I say. “And I don’t want to get shot. I really do have two guns. I want you to take them from me. Please, take them away.”
Twenty
OFFICER DAVE TAKES MY guns.
And then he takes me to the police station. He stands nearby as a detective interviews me. He’s a big black man with big eyeglasses. He calls it an interview. It’s really an interrogation. I don’t mind. I guess I deserve to be interrogated.
“Where did you get the guns?” Detective Eyeglasses asks.
“I got them from a kid named Justice,” I say.
“Was Justice his first or last name?”
“He just called himself Justice. That’s all. He said he gave himself the name.”
“You don’t know his real name?”
“No.”
“Where did you meet him?”
“In jail.”
“When was this?”
“A few months ago, I guess. Don’t really remember. I’ve been in jail a lot.”
“Okay, so you met him in jail. But you don’t remember exactly when. And you say his name is Justice. But that’s not his real name.”
“Yeah.”
“None of that information helps us much, does it? It’s not very specific, is it?”
“No, I guess not.”
I can tell that Detective Eyeglasses doesn’t believe me. He thinks I invented Justice.
“You say this guy named Justice is the one who told you to go to the bank and kill people?” Eyeglasses asks me.
“Yeah,” I say.
The detective stares at me hard, like his eyes were twin suns. I feel burned.
He pulls a TV cart into the room and plays a video for me. It’s a copy of the bank security tape.
Eyeglasses, Officer Dave, and I watch a kid named Zits walk into the bank and stand near a huge potted plant.
I laugh.
“What’s so funny?” Eyeglasses asks.
“I just look stupid next to that big plant. Look at me, I’m trying to hide behind it.”
It’s true. I’m using it for cover. Eyeglasses and Officer Dave have to laugh, t
oo. It is funny. But it’s only funny because I didn’t do what I was supposed to do. It’s only funny because I’m alive to watch it. It’s only funny because everybody in that bank is still alive.
So maybe it’s not really funny at all.
Maybe we’re all laughing because it’s so fucking unfunny.
In the video, I pat my coat once, twice, three times.
“What are you doing?” Eyeglasses asks.
“I’m checking to see if my guns are still there,” I say.
“Are you thinking about using them?”
“Yeah.”
“But you didn’t. Why not?”
On the video, my image disappears for a second. I’m gone. And then I reappear.
“Whoa,” Officer Dave says. “Did you see that?”
The detective rewinds the tape. Presses PLAY. I’m there in the bank. Then I’m gone—poof. And then I reappear.
“That’s weird,” Officer Dave says.
“Aw, it’s just a flaw in the tape,” Eyeglasses says. “They reuse these tapes over and over. The quality goes down. They got weird bumps and cuts in them.”
Eyeglasses is probably right.
On the video, I am staring at the little blond boy and his mother. I smile and wave.
“Who is that?” Eyeglasses asks me.
“It’s just a boy and his mother,” I say.
“Do you know them?”
“No.”
“Then why are you being so friendly to them?”
“They were beautiful,” I say.
Detective Eyeglasses snorts at me. He thinks I’m goofy. But Officer Dave smiles. He must be a father.
“Do you know where we might find this Justice?” Eyeglasses asks me.
“Maybe,” I say. “We lived together in this warehouse down in SoDo.”
“Jesus,” he says. “Why didn’t you tell us this before?”
“You didn’t ask.”
I lead them to the warehouse. I wait outside with two rookie cops while Dave and Eyeglasses and a SWAT team check out the whole building.
Nobody is there.
Pretty soon, Eyeglasses comes out and takes me upstairs to the room where Justice and I lived for a few weeks.
There are empty cans, bottles, and plastic containers. There are two beds made out of newspaper and cardboard. There are newspaper photos and magazine articles taped on the walls. All the people in those photos and articles have crosshairs painted over their faces. They were all targets.
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