My Pet Serial Killer

by Michael J Seidlinger

7.

  In dreams that I’ll never need to have, I am with him riding the same interstate, dead end of night, but the situation’s reversed. I’ve been hunted. He’s been hurt. He bleeds more blood than I’d ever think a person could have; I drive the entire way. The headlights are relentlessly there, blinding me whenever I try to look into my rearview mirror.

  Their sirens are loud enough to ruin any show.

  I’m not quite sure how long we drive, but we are chased.

  We take part in a chase that’s scripted to end with our incarceration.

  But in dreams we can hide from anything. I’m able to keep the convertible running long after the tank runs dry. I’m able to keep him awake until they shoot out our tires and the sun blinds me and it’s clear that this is the part where we’re written out of the script.

  It’s our turn to die.

  He leaves me before I design the way it passes.

  Spin out the car, hitting others, flipping twice, my body launches into the air, his is crushed under the weight of a nearby semi.

  Airborne, I witness the entirety of what it feels like to have been found.

  I’ll die with their cameras on me. They’ll be filming my fall.

  Right before I can hit the ground, I wake up.

  If traveling south of any border, make sure to be well manicured.

  1.

  I had data. More data than originally expected.

  I had enough data to finish a study and corroborate three more.

  I had him at my side, the two of us posing as people without purpose, loitering and wandering around a nearby lake.

  No one was here.

  We were alone.

  I wasn’t master. He wasn’t pet.

  We were simple people.

  We had gifts for each other.

  He had every single tape I had missed, and in turn I had an equal share.

  And so we traded.

  After that we walked. We talked. We were just some couple.

  We felt no urge to assail, no urge to assign extraneous meaning.

  I heard sirens in the distance. They got close, but quickly faded.

  We were alone here. We were simple people.

  They wouldn’t see who we really are.

  It was a lake in the early afternoon.

  And he was mine.

  No camera would exaggerate the scene.

  The scene was as simple as stock footage.

  2.

  This part isn’t captured on film.

  But it’s worth mentioning that something happened here.

  Time elapsed, and if we are both still alive, know that we’re both still trying. A lot happened here, a lot that is shaved off clean, well-manicured, wondrously smooth.

  And explored. Explore the final stretch of the mystery.

  The best part. The best part you’ll never see.

  It’s left for us, master and pet.

  3.

  I asked him to tell me a little bit about his part of the fantasy. He laughed it off, “Nothing in particular. Shitty roadside attractions, a lonely clerk or two, a lot of road. A lot of driving.”

  He asked about mine. I told him, “It’s all on the tapes.”

  He nodded, “Mine too.”

  Then he said, “It’s never the same as how we remember it.”

  I replied, “Nope.”

  And then added, “But that’s why we have the data. No one’s going to see those tapes.”

  He agreed.

  Data recorded.

  4.

  I had something else for him.

  My pet deserved a gimmick.

  My pet deserved a name.

  I handed him another tape wrapped in one of my panties.

  Told him that it was his, the label read, “For Stephen.”

  He took the tape. I told him not to watch it until it was safe.

  Save it for the bedroom, I whispered.

  Until we were there, our one and only destination.

  And then he put my panties back on.

  He drove while I slept in the backseat.

  Time would pick back up.

  Time would erase all potential suspects.

  Time would erase all probable leads.

  Time would bring us home.

  Home sweet home.

  5.

  The mystery is that we get along at all.

  Home is where my heart is hidden.

  1.

  Close up shot of asphalt, moving at high speed, camera aimed low enough to see the blemishes, the stains, the cracks, faded blotches of asphalt.

  The shot holds, resembling the passing of time as we hear the following voiceover inserted—lines from the prequel, the film before the show, the scene before there could have been any clear sense of a person’s wanting.

  She wanted so very much to find and be found. But now we’re moving, quickly moving to the conclusion. It’s enough to let the lines ring out.

  “But you see, I was different. I knew what he had planned. What I offered him no one else has ever offered. I offered him more than my body. More than my love. I offered him my home. My kindness, my secret, my safety. He would be mine and I would keep him to his craft.”

  Get the sense that we’re going somewhere.

  “I support you financially. I give you a place to hide. I make sure you are never under suspicion of being what you really are, a cold-blooded psychotic killer (so hot), and, in return, you clue me into your process. You become mine.

  “You do what I say.

  “When I say it.

  “Master and pet. This isn’t unreasonable.”

  Getting closer.

  “I need someone that’ll need me, want me, covet me, consume me, captivate me, just as much as I do all those things and more to them.

  “I’m selective in that way.

  “But really, how can you not be?

  “That girl, that guy, doesn’t need you.

  “They’ll get what they want. If they are being picked up, it’s because they’re not the aggressors, the players; they aren’t capable of putting up a fight. They know they don’t have any fight in them so they wait it out, hoping to be found by the other fighters, the ones capable of getting anything they want, be it one hour or the rest of your life.

  Closer. Any minute now.

  We will arrive.

  “He didn’t know what he was getting into when he first agreed.

  “Have any of your exes?

  “I’d like to think my breakups are always mutual.”

  Though the road never seems to end, it will, and soon. Much sooner than you think.

  “You might as well begin and end all comparisons on the violence of our everyday actions and reactions because that’s where the victim’s chance to break free ends. And when that weapon is made murder weapon, and the location is made crime-scene, the last thing that’s important is whether or not the victim was a good human being or not.

  “So no matter what, the media’s going to make the victim as innocent as can be. No matter what the victim might have done, there’ll be this disconnection from reality and fiction when it comes to serial murder, so it doesn’t really mean that much to answer why, and I’m really trying not to answer the question why because no matter how hard I try, I’m not going to be saying what you want because I don’t really know what you want and I don’t know the answer.”

  A jump cut to final scene.

  The scene where mystery becomes more method for every kill that’ll ever occur.

  “The mystery will consume everyone, and I’m the only one that’ll have known every inch. I’ll have seen everything before it turned into common knowledge. I’ll have been there, telling him what to erase and what to keep. And I’ll be saying to him every line that no one else will hear.

  “Every line of that mystery.

  “Every line of you and me.”

  Now let this fade. Let go.

  And watch the final episode.

  The lines, they ri
ng true.

  “A pickup isn’t over until they ask you where you want to go.”

  Where do you want to go?

  2.

  It’s only him and I, master and pet. It’s only him that can do it, but I’ll teach him. I’ll tell him every step of the way what needs to happen. What he’ll do, no matter how heinous, this is the last scene, you see. This is the last scene of the mystery.

  “You need to make them happy,” I’m saying.

  There needs to be interest.

  “You need to keep me interested.”

  My pet and I sit in his coupe, the cool night air seeping in through the vents.

  I look around, the neighborhood hushed, snuffed until dawn. Houses of little to no variation line the street. Cars parked on driveways, garbage cans on the curb waiting to be collected. I’m reminded of where I used to live, and where I’d like to live again, someday. The serenity of a neighborhood like this affords a lot of privacy. Seems like Florida is packed in with tons of these neighborhoods. Makes sense—there’s little to be done that can’t be done indoors. So go away. It’s like an owner’s saying, we’re consenting adults; we’ll do whatever it takes to please us. You can’t watch with the curtains down.

  My parents before me had a home that might as well have been in the middle of nowhere. As long as we abided by the homeowner’s association code, we could host any number of spectacles indoors. I’m looking at the clock. 4:35AM.

  Yawning, I recline back in the seat.

  All we can do now is wait. You can’t rush this.

  With my eyes closed, I coach him on what’s going to happen next.

  He’s silent, though, which concerns me.

  I’m forced to ask, “You understand, right?”

  He should have said yes. With no hesitation, yes.

  I recline the seat back up. Turn to him and look deep into his eyes, “Say it.”

  He doesn’t say it.

  “Look at me and say it.”

  He looks at me but doesn’t say it.

  “This is how you’ll prove to me that you’re mine.”

  He sighs. And it’s a sigh that answers more than anything he could have said.

  I take his face into my hands and, an inch from his lips, I whisper the command. I tell him that it’s necessary. The tapes recorded as cover, part of his fantasy, will inevitably be found by his father, or his mother, or worse. Much worse.

  He has to do this if he wants to ensure his legacy. Our legacy.

  “It’s them or me.” I’m saying a little louder now, “You have to choose. What’s it going to be?” And then you have to understand what it means to set fire to a home. You have to understand what he’s going through. But then, with his reply, I’m quickly regretting why I ever doubted him.

  He massages his forehead, “No contest—I’m just a little exhausted. Wondering if I’ll have time to nap for a half-hour.”

  This is the first time I kiss him.

  I bite his lower lip, just enough for him to wince, and he bites back.

  We share this moment and it’s secure. All we do now is wait.

  I decide to rest in the backseat, that way his father won’t see me. He nods off with his arms wrapped around the steering wheel.

  It is 4:49AM. His father doesn’t knock on the car window until around 6:30AM. approximately. His father doesn’t see me, and I don’t see him. But I hear everything.

  Father says, “Finally made it back.”

  My pet nods, providing an appropriate excuse, “I didn’t want to wake anybody up.”

  Next words being his, “What time is it?”

  I glance through the rear windshield as my pet and his father walk into the house.

  I look at the time. 6:45AM.

  I’m not going around back, slipping into the house via the basement door, until around 7:30AM. By then, his mother is collecting dishes, cleaning up after breakfast. My pet’s in his room, waiting. His father’s reading the newspaper at the kitchen table.

  There’s no convertible. There’s no conceit. It’s just me. Him and I, we no longer need any fantasy. I’m tiptoeing up to the second floor. Inside his room, he sees me and stands up from his bed. I look at the TV. He watched the tape. We share another kiss. We know that it’s time.

  For the first but not the last, I address him in name, “Stephen, only you can do this.”

  He nods. But that’s not enough. I want to hear it.

  “You understand why. If you’re going to own up to that name, the gimmick I’ve designed for you, there can be no leads, no links. It has to be like you never were. Nothing but an apparition, a ghost. A killer of killers: and in that way a media saint.”

  I hand him gloves and a knife, “Now I’ll hold them down, but you have to cut.”

  We put on gloves. Hear footsteps at his door.

  Lindsey walks in, says something like, “Who’s this?”

  He tells her to walk over and shake my hand.

  “Why are you wearing gloves?”

  I’m saying, “It’s cold in here.”

  I give my pet one last moment to say goodbye.

  She asks me, “Are you my brother’s girlfriend?”

  I hug her, saying, “Thank you for saying that.”

  With my arms wrapped around hers, he cuts her from the back of her neck, and stabs her a few times in crucial points on her back.

  Good—I command him to make sure by cutting the stomach too.

  No matter the smell. We’ll get used to it.

  No matter the blood; it’s just another bodily fluid.

  I grip on tightly making it hard for her to breathe.

  I’m saying, “This is yours to design, do whatever you like as long as you do it.”

  Do it with confidence. There shall be no killing with kindness.

  Some of those closest to us only end up holding us back. My pet and I will never be happy, never be impossible to track, if there are people that expected him home, knew of his cover story, knew of something suspicious. His father could sense that something was wrong. His son had changed, grown into his potential.

  Lindsey’s a bleeder. I get it all over my shirt, so I take it off.

  He gives me one look. I pose for him, back arched, shoulders back, letting it show.

  Lindsey tries to scream. “Hush now,” I’m telling her, “can’t do that if I won’t let you breathe.” She quickly bleeds out, four-foot frame rendered slack in my arms.

  I lift her up and wrap her in his bedsheets.

  He’s got a choice but he can’t have that gun. I’m shaking my head. Snap of my fingers, he hands me the gun. I offer him the wire or the chemical.

  He takes both.

  “Good pet,” I say.

  He descends the stairs on the balls of his feet.

  I wait until I hear a mother’s screams. That’s my cue to supervise.

  Downstairs, he has his father hog-tied and stripped down to only his shirt.

  His mother’s screaming, face red, eyes shut and swollen.

  How creative, he used the chemical on her, not him. I stand back, arms crossed and watching. You watching this? How’s it faring, so far?

  The father tries to move, wiggling towards the front door, but falls over in a way that makes it impossible to move at all. My pet tends to his mother, whose screams quickly become irritating.

  If you don’t shut her up anytime soon, few will be able to stand it.

  We’ll have to hit mute.

  I command him to get her to eat the chemical. It’s not possible until we make it possible. It’s a powder that burns and ruptures skin with little effort. Ingesting it would quickly cause hemorrhaging. Of course, I base this on nothing. I’ve never tried it before.

  But I want him to try it.

  He can’t hold onto the powder chemical for long. Even with the gloves, it burns.

  I hand him a scooper found in the cupboard. It was used to scoop out flour for baking.

  Bake this—my pet pries his mother’s
mouth open.

  I’m shoving a funnel into her mouth.

  He’s pouring the chemical in.

  I’ve got the duct tape.

  He tapes her mouth shut.

  We stand back for a moment, watching.

  I command him to tend to his father while I watch and wait for the big payoff. Mother’s going to have a reaction, but what will it be?

  My pet’s dragging his father in a way that shows that neither cared for each other very much. The one that may have hurt the most is already over. Lindsey didn’t feel much. Well, actually she did. But it’s over now. My pet will be able to move on. He’s got me.

  I command him to hang him by some hook, but while I’m finding a hook that can hold the weight of an adult male he proves, yet again, why I can’t resist. Why he’s my perfect pet.

  Why he’s everything—he hangs his father by the tallest banister in a way that uses the entire structure to hold up the hog-tied man.

  I tell him, “Go for it.”

  So he does.

  The wire is sharp enough to cut anything.

  I look down at the mother, no noticeable change, “She’s seizing a little.”

  He cuts the father’s left ear off and shows it to him.

  Father’s crying. Keep with it. Cut the left ear.

  This time he tosses it aside, no bother.

  My pet takes a step back, observing his creation.

  He’s taking suggestions. What would you like to see?

  The wire could cut his genitals off, but that’s to be expected and not very entertaining.

  The wire could cut a few fingers off. That’s more like it.

  The wire could shave skin like a knife cutting butter. Pleasant image?

  The wire could cut straight through his father’s neck, but that’s the kill. That’s the final act. Shouldn’t there be something else here? Something to enjoy?

  He removes the father’s ball gag.

  Father spouts pained gibberish, more a sobbing with poorly enunciated speech.

  Cut the lips. Oh, never seen that before.

  I command him to play dentist. People like to cringe. They like to see teeth removed even though it causes them to look away in horror.