by Kirk Alex
“This be the part that don’t be fun. Be like work.”
Remains filled up the depression rapidly, and now the stuff had piled up and it appeared to be higher than the surface.
“Have to make the pit deeper and larger. Thought you knew your shit by now.”
“I knows my shit.”
“Get that shovel.”
Marvin reached for the shovel, and went about enlarging the hole.
“Thought I had it figured right. One thing be for sure: ground gonna soak all that blood right up; and what the ground don’t get and what don’t rot, you know them coyote’ gonna dig up and feed on.”
“Depredation is exactly what you don’t want to happen. You don’t want animals dragging body parts all over the canyon and maybe dropping limbs on the road or maybe right in front of that retirement home back there.”
“Guess you right, Cecil.”
“It’s too good a place for dumping all this shit to let somebody start snooping around and maybe cause the rollers to get suspicious. One of my favorite burial sites, you could say. Like to keep it that way.”
CHAPTER 90
The depression was large enough now and the pile seemed to recede down into it. Marvin had the shovel on top of the heap and pressed down on it. Couple of the bigger bones were still sticking out more than they should have been and he gave them a good whack and some of the blood spattered him across the face. Muck wiped at the blood with the back of his hand and then licked that right off.
“Hate the smell. Be likin’ the taste.”
Except Biggs knew he was faking.
“Don’t be stupid. You’re eating dirt.”
Bishop watched him cough, spit it out, and cough some more. Cecil waited. Deacon ran his sleeve across his mouth and face. Cursed.
“You done?”
Marvin nodded.
“Get the shopping bag.”
Marvin walked to the Caddy trunk, reached inside with both hands to grab what he presumed was a package of soup bones, instead what he came up with was a large and bloody boar’s head with major fangs. And there were two others under it. He froze that instant, cursing up a storm. Dropped the head back in. “Goddamn, Trusty.”
He was leaning over, away from the Caddy trunk, about to vomit. “Mothafuck.”
“What’s your problem?”
“How many of these fuckin’ things we need, Cecil?”
“Not your concern.”
“An’ what about the coin them fuckin’ Parfrey head’ be costin’? You got three of ’em in there, man. Three fuckin’ Porky Pig head’. Waste of bank. What chu gonna do wiff ’em? Ain’t we got enough of them mask’ back at the crib?”
“Bring the bones over. We need to get going.”
Muck wiped vomit from his chin. Carried the shopping bag over.
“Take the bones out.”
Marvin stood there, looking at him.
“You hard of hearing? My back’s acting up.”
Muck shook his head. Turned his head away, then reached down. Came up with one of the bloody and vicious heads. It was immensely gross. He couldn’t stand to look at it.
“Don’t lay it in the dirt. And I can’t have it touching the ground—at all.”
“What chu want me to do, man?”
“How about if you shove it up your crybaby ass, punk?”
“Fuck you, clown.”
Biggs drew his Mag. Held it in Muck’s face, and waited. Marvin’s eyes shifted nervously from side to side, while a series of farts escaped his rectum. Biggs released the hammer, re-holstered the weapon and walked to the Caddy. Was back with that blue plastic tarp. There was a patch of weeds and grass near there and he spread the tarp over it.
“Lower the heads on the tarp. Don’t drop them. Lower them. Gently. I don’t want them damaged.”
Marvin carried the head over, his face turned away, grimacing. Leaned over carefully, cautiously, and lowered the head to just about on the tarp, then, misjudging, dropped it when he had it inches above it. He cursed to himself.
Biggs let it go.
“Now, get the other two. Don’t drop them. I don’t want the Parfrey heads soiled and/or damaged. We don’t disrespect the Parfrey heads. Ever.”
“Fuckin’ one pig head be like any other. All of them be the same to me. But you keep callin’ all of them Parfrey.” Marvin proceeded, until he had completed the task. Was relieved. Quite. Wiped his forehead.
“Get the bones.”
Marvin reached down for the bones wrapped in wax paper. Handed the package to Biggs. Bishop tore it open. Dumped the soup bones on top of the human remains in the hole. Grabbed a shovel and stirred things up a bit, mixed things up. This way you hoped no one would be the wiser. He knew there were no guarantees, but at least he made the effort. It was worth that.
“Cover it up.”
Both men shoveled dirt and sand on top. Cecil’s pain remained, although not as intense presently. He would tolerate it. What choice did he have? The hole got covered up, and Biggs had the deacon place some large rocks on top of the dirt for good measure.
“Make sure you got all that blood off the shovel.”
Muck ran it through grass and dry leaves along the bank of the wash and then began slamming the shovel indiscriminately. Biggs had been “slicing sand” with his.
“What’s the point? You won’t accomplish anything that way. Run it through sand like I’m doing with mine. Pay attention. You might learn something.”
“Yo. I like learnin’.”
Did as told. Dug the shovel into the sand a few times. Turned it over, and did it again, giving both sides equal time. Biggs examined the shovels for traces of blood, hair, and other bits of DNA. Enough blood was visible to make him go for the water jug in the trunk. He had Marvin hold his shovel out while he poured tap water over it. Had him turn it over and did it again. The same procedure was followed with the other shovel.
“Look’ like you got it all off.”
“DNA is not as easy to get rid of as you think. Can’t always be spotted with the naked eye. Should pour ammonia on them both to make sure—only it always fouls up the trunk.”
“You sho don’t be wantin’ that.”
Hearing Marvin say it was enough to convince Biggs to change his mind. Better to be safe than sorry.
He had Muck get the jug. Ammonia was poured liberally over one shovel, and then the other. They were both shoved between thick layers of old newspapers in the trunk. He had Marvin tilt the chest while he rinsed the inside of it with water. Poured ammonia over it as well. Inside and out. Handles, too. Wiped it clean with a towel. The tarp was folded over the “Parfrey heads” and placed inside the chest, and the chest was returned to the trunk.
It was then that Biggs hesitated, not able to turn away from the plastic jug that had blood in it sitting snuggly inside a corner on his right.
He cursed under his breath. Reached for it. Grabbed the battered case that contained the makeup kit, grabbed the entrenching tool.
“What I said? Man got wood.”
“Shut up, and pay attention to the police scanner. Hear anything. Let me know right away.”
“You the boss, Hoss.”
Biggs was no more partial to being called “Hoss” than he was to being called Omar, but he was anxious to get going. Hurried back across the sand and climbed the ridge, losing his footing intermittently in the loose dirt and small rocks in his desperation to get to level ground up there.
A lizard, five inches in length, appeared out of nowhere. Froze up among the poison ivy and weeds, wild flowers, to give him the quick once-over, and just as suddenly fled out of sight.
He pushed on. Reached the top. Noticed an area that may have been used (post dumping of this Jolly Dolly) as a ritual site by quasi Satan-worshipping types, in that pentagrams, inverted crosses, double-bladed inverted axes, black mass indicators and other symbols of this nature were in evidence, carved into barks of trees, as well as painted on various rocks on the ground that
had been formed into a circle approximately nine feet in diameter. What it actually meant he didn’t know, nor did he care. The only reason it perturbed him at all is that this particular spot used to be his for dumping, exclusively.
He looked about, searching out with his eyes for the grave he had buried the body in almost four weeks ago, and while doing so could easily feel the sensation in his loins. There was no use trying to prevent the arousal phase. It was happening. Fine, so long as it didn’t happen too rapidly and resulted in premature ejaculation.
“Pearly Girlie, Jolly Dolly . . . where art thou?” Where the hell was she? “Where did I plant your ass?”
Punk was right. No denying it. The need was there. The need. Goddamn Muck, and all the rest of them. Didn’t get it. They never would.
CHAPTER 91
He paused. Had to. Things did not look right. It had been too long. Lowered the jug and makeup case. He reached in his pocket. Withdrew a stack of Polaroid shots wrapped in clear plastic. Some were of the McVictim he was desperate to see again, the others were of the gravesite—in an attempt to gain perspective that would make sense and yield the answer. It didn’t work. There was but one thing to do: select a sturdy enough stick or rod and start probing the earth with it. He went about it with bated breath, literally, hoping that premature spooge would not occur to taint and lessen the thrill.
Alas, the excitement increased so rapidly that he wondered if he would be able to have control over any of it.
I can’t shoot my wad now, without seeing the body first and making it look right. Her makeup needed to be done. Appearance meant a lot. Can’t let it happen. Don’t allow it. Stay focused. Concentration is everything.
He poked at the earth, driving the stick in every conceivable patch of ground that he could think of, before his loins erupted and the spooge was for naught.
He stopped. Looked around. Where hadn’t he driven the damned stick into the ground? Where was left? Couldn’t tell. Went over the stack of Polaroids again. Ones on top were of the area, the rest were of the body, the whore: Before and After shots. He didn’t dare gaze too long at the post kill images from fear that he would climax right where he stood.
It was back to the Polaroids of the area itself. He recalled having left markers, three stones: one about the size of a Crenshaw melon, the others no larger than your average grapefruit—only they were not in sight, to be seen anywhere. Covered in leaves? Removed by someone? Human or animal? Couldn’t tell. Maybe those Devil worshipping assholes had been here tampering, doing their ritual and needed stones for it? Couldn’t be certain.
There was nothing to do but probe with the stick some more and hope to get lucky. Once, twice, three times . . . with zero results.
It wasn’t until about another two dozen times of driving the stick down into the soil did he feel it bump against something solid. Missy? About time. It was. He tossed the stick aside, grabbed the entrenching tool and fervently scraped leaves, twigs, and dead weeds aside, rocks.
Scooped the top layer away. Did the same with moist soil underneath. And there it was: the corpse. Waiting to be unearthed. And unearth it he would. Careful now, though. Don’t disrupt to any great length, don’t disturb.
The storm that had pummeled the Valley a few days back had brought the vermin out en masse: fibrillating night crawlers (anywhere from a couple of inches to a foot long), dozens of them, inch-long grub worms (and other invertebrates) feasted on his Jolly Dolly: slugs, slow worms (that were not worms at all, but legless lizards), beetles (full grown, and the other, in their infancy stage as grubs) centipedes, pocket gopher or two, what he perceived were pill bugs and sow bugs, voles, and a nine-inch mole with a mouthful of night-crawlers, while flesh-eating birds circled overhead, after a piece of his Pearly Girlie, without ever requesting or having been granted consent by him.
The flying scavengers were far easier to deal with than the underground type, who were everywhere: either burrowing into the soil and/or digging deep inside the corpse through various and varied body cavities: sockets (and what was left of the eyes; his own fault there, should have harvested them when he had the chance), nose, mouth, vagina, and rectum, desperate to escape the ultra violet rays of the sun. All of them, just about all of them, did what they could to avoid the harsh sunlight that these below ground, nocturnal creatures (with the exception of the fully matured beetles) had a justified fear of.
The stunned mole did an about-face, attempting to flee daylight and the dangers it surely foreshadowed and seek out the protective safety of the tunnel it had emerged from. Only Biggs was quicker. Whacked at it once with the entrenching tool, severing the creature in half. Flecks of blood sprayed his jacket front and upper brow.
Other rodents wasted no time scampering for cover, either below ground or off under leaves and weeds and brush.
Biggs had his gloves on and did what he could to scrape off the rest. If not all, quite a few grub worms and others of their ilk who crawled, or slithered away, inside the dead woman.
Some had been in and around her mouth. Not very many, since her throat had been stuffed with her very own underpants. There were things crawling in and around various dagger wounds, vagina, and rectum.
The parasites may have repulsed a loser like Marvin, and others like him, instead the sight had the opposite effect on the bishop: enhanced his arousal by increasing the intensity. Never failed. Mainstream squares were repulsed because they didn’t get it, couldn’t grasp it, never would. Then, too, you had the unmistakable odor of death, decay. Nothing opened up his sense of smell and invigorated him sexually like the miasma caused by decomposition.
Explain it to Joe Lunchbucket out there? Vinnie Bagadonuts? Never. Beyond their ability to comprehend. Not in a million years.
Drones worked shit jobs for slave wages because drones served that particular purpose and function and were never meant to rise above it, therefore could never fathom anything like the thrilling sight before him. McCunt. McBush. “Mo betta than a Happy Meal at Mickey D” as dufus Muck might utter—while ogling a live one.
The white vinyl gloves he had on were torn in places and needed to be replaced. He stashed them away inside the makeup case. Unlocked the cuffs on her wrists, and tossed them in the case as well. Got into a pair of fresh vinyl gloves before doing some more brushing away of dirt and assortment of worms. Well, the ones who had squirmed their way inside her rectum he wouldn’t bother with, couldn’t get to. Let them eat shit, what the hell. Nor could he do anything about the others, countless of them, slithering inside the dead whore’s mouth, who had managed to get past her balled-up panties in there, as well as the vagina. In too deep.
And there were the flies, thousands of them, beetles flying about, wasps, mosquitoes—and other insects who felt a need to encroach on his Pearly Girlie.
Should run back to the Caddy and get the can of Black Flag for the flying bloodsuckers. No time. Bloodsuckers were annoying, more than anything. Didn’t mind them gorging on the corpse, only their assault didn’t stop there; they were taking bites out of his neck and face. Goddamn them. He swiped at the determined, impossible-to-reason-with sons of bitches. What else?
Forget them. Try to. His groin rigid. Near eruption. No, thought Biggs. Not yet. Can’t shoot your load just yet. Put it off, keep putting it off, until after you’ve combed her hair, applied the lipstick and blush-on. He scrutinized the fingernail polish on her nails. Chipped. Far from clean. Parts of her nails were chipped as well. This wouldn’t do. His mother, Charlotte Yvonne, may not have been the neatest whore who ever existed, but her makeup she never failed to keep up, nor were her fingernails ever-less-than attractive and impeccable. Cherry red was her favorite. Cherry red. Lips and fingernails. Toenails, too.
He reopened the makeup case. Did what he could with the nails. Brushed them with a manicurist’s brush. Applied blood-red nail polish. Went to work on the hair next, at least attempted to, except the scalp slid off when he tried to adjust the head, position it straight while p
lacing a rock under it for a pillow. The hair needed combing out; there was a certain way he needed it to be. Curling the hair would have made it perfect, the way he liked it, but there was no time and no place to plug in the curling iron out here, either. There was no use. The goddamned scalp shouldn’t be sliding off. Water logged. That it? “Skin slippage.” Could be, or else he was to blame for having made an incision all around at the time (had considered taking it with him to give to Sassounian to wear, but decided against it, out of respect for the victim).
There was no real reason to be one hundred percent without conscience, without a degree of some feeling and respect for the victims he slaughtered.
“Just say no. Say no no no. . . .” He recalled her pleading in this gentle manner during the assault. Well, he reasoned, if on the other hand, she had cried: Do it. Please do it. Kill me—he may have stopped himself. Sure. It was possible. Show fear and weakness and it fueled his rage. On the other hand, show that you feared nothing, that his menacing and deadly ways of committing homicide and various sundry atrocities were without impact, were not fear-inducing . . . and it defeated the intent and took the wind out of his sails. Something like it.
Biggs went about applying white powder to the face, blush-on to the cheeks. Had the stick of cherry-red lipstick in his hand needing to do her lips, only not easy to accomplish when the corpse had a pair of her panties jammed in her mouth.
He pushed down on the panties, shoving them out of the way and making it possible to apply the lipstick. Biggs was generous with it, seeing to it that the cherry-red overlapped plenty. He applied black eyeliner, penciled in exaggerated brows.