by mike Evans
“So now you don’t want to share and you want me to take a nap? What are you, my dad?”
“Do you want me to be your daddy?” he joked.
“Oh, aren’t you cute. Give me my sandwich, ass. You owe me big time if I get in trouble at work over this.”
“We are not that important dear, don’t worry about it. I gotta take a piss though. You guys go ahead and eat, I’ll slam my sandwich on the way.”
“Are you shy?” Shelli asked.
“I like my privacy. Deal with it, all right?”
The three sat down, peeling open the baggies, and Tim held up three joints to brag before. “We have a very strong chance of being unable to move for the next few hours. It is going to be awesome.”
Tim then walked down the back of the hill out of sight. He pulled down his pants and began letting it drain. He’d been holding it for a mile and moaned happily as it came out. Suddenly, The Stranger came from around the tree, scaring the shit out of him. He had the hood of his rain slicker up, and whilst it was not nearly as scary as the now infamous Stranger mask, he was still very much an intimidating man to lay eyes upon.
Tim took two steps back, pinching it off and tucking, when he hit the ground, embarrassed and scared. “What the fuck are you doing, trying to give me a heart attack?”
Matt smiled, tilting his head a little. The look in his eye was not one that made Tim feel any more at home.
Tim said, “What are you stupid or something? I said what the fuck do you want?”
Hardin pulled the knife from its sheath. It looked almost puny in his hand; the six-inch blade would have looked like a bowie knife in any normal-sized person’s hand, but not in his. Hardin pointed it at him, “You can’t talk?” Tim asked.
“I don’t like to talk. I prefer screams,” Hardin said.
“You like to scream? Okay psycho, why don’t you put the knife away and let me be on my way? I’ll have friends looking for me soon, and I don’t think you want them coming to look for me.”
“No.”
“No, what?” Tim asked.
“I don’t like to scream. I like it when they scream.”
Tim tried getting up from the ground but Matt wasn’t going to rush this. He wanted it to last as long as he could. He wanted each of them to go the long haul, if he could. He was going to cure an itch in a very bad way.
Matt picked up a foot, kicking him in the chest, knocking Tim to the ground and watching him fall on his side.
“Look asshat, you do that again and I don’t care how big you are, I'm going to whoop up on your ass.”
Matt smiled and said, “I said that I like it when they scream.”
Tim tried getting up again, but this time, Matt gripped him by the back of the neck, raising him up off of his feet. “Who are they?”
Matt let go of his neck and he almost lost his balance when he hit the ground, but was just barely able to stay on his feet.
“My victims.”
“What do you mean your victims, do you got issues or something?”
“It depends who you ask, but I’d say most people would probably tend to be on the side of yes.”
Tim tried backing away, but Matt brought up his free hand quicker than he could believe. He took Tim’s wrist in his hand swinging him around and Matt whispered in his ear, “Scream.”
When there was no sound, he slammed his hand to the tree. He then made a fist with his one free hand and started punching Matt in the face, splitting his lip. Matt brought his own head back once and smashed it with all the force he had into his face. Tim’s nose shattered underneath the brutal hit and blood poured over his lips. Tim spit bubbles of blood as he tried to scream, but Matt let go of his wrist, instead holding his mouth shut. He was too close for comfort and he couldn’t help but feel the tingles. “I'm sorry, but you can’t scream yet.” He held his mouth a second longer before letting up.
“Why? What do you want? What do you want?” Tim asked.
Matt licked his lips, tasting his own blood. “I want you to feel pain, like you’ve never felt before.”
“I don’t understand.”
Matt smiled devilishly, gripping the man by the neck. “You will.”
Tim tried punching him again, but Matt screamed, this time with more of a primal growl. He lunged in with his mouth wide open, gripping onto the cartilage of Tim’s ear, and clenched down onto it until his teeth met. He bit until Tim’s warm tears found their way to Matt’s hand. Matt whispered, “Does it hurt? Do you like it?”
He let go of his face the slightest bit. “No, I don’t fucking like it! Let me go! Just let me go, please, there’s people coming for me soon.”
“If they don’t, then I'm going to have to go find them. Don’t worry. I will remember this day for a very long time to come. I fear it will help me last through the long years alone.”
He covered Tim’s face again, taking another bite of his ear and not quitting in his pull until the ear came off completely in his mouth. The blood flowed freely from the side of his now missing ear.
Tim fought with all he could at this point, but Matt’s hand stretched across almost his entire face. He pulled him away from the great cedar before slamming him back into it. Stars rushed into his vision as his head went into a wobbling motion. Tim tried to shake it, but couldn’t.
Matt let go for only a second, taking him by the wrist. “Are you okay?”
“No, I need a fucking doctor, cocksucker.”
“Now, that isn’t very nice. You can scream now, I think I'm ready to meet your friends.”
“Go fuck yourself, I'm not bringing them over here so you can do God knows what!”
“Oh, I think that you will. I’ve never had issues with getting people to beg and scream,” Matt threatened.
Tim took a deep breath, trying to pull his hand free. Matt held him there for just one more minute, toying with him. “You don’t want to play my games? It's going to hurt if you make me mad. You sure you don’t want to stay and play?”
“Let go of me, you fucking freak. I'm going to have every cop in six counties out here looking for you. There’s something fucked about you.”
“I was trying to be good. It isn’t my fault that you are out here.”
Matt pushed Tim’s hand up against the tree, taking his knife and pushing it slowly through his open, outstretched palm. Then he leaned in close. “So, does that hurt? Aren’t you going to scream?”
Tim put his free hand in his mouth to keep from screaming. “You must have great will power. I can admire that, but it probably just means that I need to cut something off. Is there anything that you’d like to keep?”
“Go to hell,” Tim blurted.
“I will,” Matt pulled the knife from Tim’s hand and placed it an inch inside of his stomach, slowly starting to cut the blade across his abdomen. Tim could hold it in no longer and screamed help at the top of his lungs. “Thank you.”
Matt looked at him. His head was shaking from the trauma. He took the knife, bringing it quickly across Tim’s front, leaving no time to take in what was happening. His blade dug into Tim’s neckline. The blood covered what wasn’t already caked in dirt and blood on his hiking shirt.
Tim tried to speak, but only a wheezing sound came out of his mouth. Matt placed a finger to his lips and started brushing Tim’s hair. He hushed him, patting his cheek and continuing his stroking. “I need you to be quiet again. I want to listen to the blood coming from your neck. Do you hear that? Do you know how special that is? I could drink it if there was time. Do you get chills from this? I'm beyond in love with it.”
Tim’s eyes began to roll into the back of his head, but Matt covered his mouth, taking the knife and putting it through his hand, pinning him to the tree. “Do you feel that? That is only going to happen once in your life. You’ll never be so alive like you will be just before you die. I only hope that your friends heard you. I’ve never seen someone walk so far just to relieve themselves. Is it little? Is that what you are
worried about? Or were you going to try to smoke one of those yourself?”
Tim tried to claw at Matt but he stopped his hand. Tim had nothing left to give. Matt dipped a finger in his torn ear, sending one last shot of pain through Tim’s body. He moved it to his cheek, drawing a smiley face on the only clean part of his face left. “I need to go play with your friends. I have a feeling that little blonde is going to scream until I can’t take it any longer. Which one of them is yours? There’s no way that you brought them all the way out here and you aren’t with one of them.”
Tim’s eyes were rolling into the back of his head and his eyes kept trying to shut. Matt pulled the knife from his hand letting him slide to the ground. He pinched his eyelid in between his fingers and used the knife to slice it off, then repeated the action with his other eyelid. Matt was the last thing that Tim would ever see.
Matt said, “You might want to look away, I wouldn’t want God to judge you for seeing me last. You probably get a free pass for dying like this. I won’t lie, I wish I could've spent more time with you. I think that we could have had a lot of fun. You seem like you had a lot of spirit in you. There aren’t many people who didn’t scream when I asked them to. Most people couldn't help but scream. I hope if they bring you back through reincarnation that I get the chance to see you again.”
Tim looked at the knife that was being waved in front of his eyes before Matt turned it so that the knife blade was pointing up. Matt brought it out of his eyesight, then up with so much force that it ripped through the cartilage and bone in one lunge, leaving the tip of the blade sticking out of the top of Tim’s skull.
Tim’s eyes lost their light, and Matt kept a hand on his chest until he felt the very last heartbeat pump. Matt shook his head. “I don’t know why I ever left the city. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to do what dad did—stopping. I think I’d rather be dead. But if I was dead, then I couldn’t ever be bad again.”
***
Shelli looked at Jason, unsure what was taking Tim so long. “Aren’t you like, going to go check on him?”
“He’s like, twenty-eight. I don’t go check on him. If he’s pooping, I don’t want to know and if he is still peeing, then I secretly think he’s jerking the chicken,” Jason replied.
“How old are you?”
“I think a wise man said to never grow up.”
“That’s Peter Pan you moron. And you need to grow up; anything would be amazing.”
“Well, if you want to go check on your boy toy, then be my guest. Maybe he’s waiting for you down at the bottom of the hill and wants to give you a quickie. You are on vacation. I’ve heard something so bold as you are supposed to have sex while you are off work. Can you believe that? I mean, I can’t personally say anything about it, but I know someone who knows a guy, who said that couples actually still have sex. Especially women waiting for an engagement ring.”
Joyce slapped him and said, “You keep talking like that and we aren’t going to have to worry about doing any of that this weekend either. And my legs being open should have nothing to do with getting an engagement ring. If you wanted to have sex for a ring, then I suggest you look into a mail-order bride.”
“Well, I’ll go check on the son of a bitch myself. Thanks so much for making me feel better about—never mind. You suck, Jason. I hope that it falls off.”
Jason scratched it, and said, “Well, I don’t think that is going to happen. Trust me, I pull on it like all the time and it just keeps working great. Doesn’t matter how much tugging it gets, it just keeps working. I could-”
Shelli got up, throwing her sandwich at Jason, who dodged it. “I don’t think I could eat another bite; all I can see is Jason being creepy in a corner and rubbing himself off. I think I might be temporarily blind as well. Why in the fuck does Tim work with you for?”
“Because he loves me, I’m like his brother, and I make sure that he doesn’t get too stressed out at work.”
“He pities you, that has to be it. I’ll be back, Joyce. Please try to do something to make Jason stop talking. I don’t want to hear his voice for a while.”
Jason laughed, “Well, if you get Tim to come back up here and spark up one of those joints, I’ll happily put that in my mouth. You won’t hear from me for hours.”
“I don’t like you sometimes, Jason. I think you have some issues,” Shelli said.
“Oh, you hurry on up and get back here, Shelli! I’m going to miss you something fierce.” He shook his head to Joyce, who was trying to keep a straight face while mouthing, I’m not going to miss her at all.
Joyce snorted on a laugh trying to hold it in. Shelli sighed, walking past shaking her head.
“You two might have been meant for each other, Joyce.”
“I don’t know if I appreciate that, Shelli,” Joyce said back.
“Uh, well, I don’t think I appreciate that you don’t appreciate what she just said,” Jason said.
“Honey, try not to think too hard about that, or you might hurt yourself,” Joyce said.
Shelli started walking down the hill, doing her best not to lose her footing. She screamed over her shoulder. “If I break my fucking neck, you are both going to feel horrible! Absolutely horrible!”
“I’ll miss you the most, Shelli!” Jason yelled.
Shelli cursed the entire way down the hill until she tripped three quarters of the way down and rolled the rest of the way, screaming and cursing. When she came to a stop, her world was spinning. She could feel pain erupting in the back of her head and felt like she had a million little cuts and wounds across her legs and back. She was less happy now about the idea that she had worn shorts and a cute top for Tim today. She rolled to her side slowly, and she was damn sure her city-manicured ass was going to be feeling this fall for a few days.
Shelli rubbed her hand across her stomach, pulling them back and seeing blood on her fingertips. She looked up at a pair of legs, but a pair she was sure did not belong to her boyfriend. She squinted up. The sun was pouring in through the holes in the trees which seemed to stretch into the heavens. “Tim? Where’d you get those pants? Why’d you change?”
Something came down towards her, but she wasn’t sure what it was. She rolled back to the other side to get out of its way. It hit just an inch from her face, and something wet splattered on her cheek. She rubbed at her face, looking down at her hand when she felt something wet on the back of it. She got up, crab-walking, unable to focus on everything going on at once. When Shelli looked back to where she’d been lying she saw Tim—or at least Tim’s head—staring back at her.
She screamed at the top of her lungs, but only heckling came back from the top of the hill. “It isn’t that big! I’ve seen him getting dressed before,” Jason screamed down, laughing hysterically.
She could not take her eyes off of Tim. That is, until the legs that had been standing in front of her began swaying side to side. Matt was in a near euphoric state at the moment. She walked her eyes up his never-ending body, but stopped when she saw his smile, covered in blood with bits of gore in it. Tears were pouring from her face. A heartbreak she didn’t know she was capable of was violently ripping her heart out of her chest. She reached out a hand towards his head and pulled it back in, almost as if it hurt. “Why?”
Matt shrugged, holding the bow out in front of him. She looked around the forest floor, trying to see if she could find something to protect herself with, realizing that anything shy of a gun would probably be useless. She turned to sprint away, but Matt moved much quicker than she thought he would or could.
He took her by the back of the neck, holding tight to it and slammed her face into the tree, breaking the second nose of the day. He enjoyed how much blood could come from something so small. He let go and she fell to the ground. He knelt next to her, whispering, “Do you think if I peeled your skin back, we would be able to see your soul? Do you think if you scream enough that your friends will come down here?”
“You broke my fucking
nose, asshole!” she screamed at him.
“Oh, I’m going to do a lot more than that. You can die knowing that you saved a lot of innocent people by keeping me in the woods with a little to tide me over for a while. Maybe I should keep you for a while. You could be my toy. Do you like toys? Do you want to live, or do you want to die?”
“I want to live, but I want to leave,” Shelli cried, trying to get up off of the ground.
Matt looked at her, tilting his head side to side, and sighed. “I don’t think dad would let me have a toy. We could have had so much fun though. I’m not going to lie, torturing you and your friends out in the woods definitely feels a bit like déjà vu. If only I’d have been more careful in Missouri, I could probably still be there today. That day was what started it all, you know. It was the most people I’d ever killed in one day—well, at that time, anyways. And then the next day, I got to kill my entire police force—or the majority. God, I enjoyed that! My hands had never been so wet with blood. Do you have any idea how many people I wanted to murder there? You couldn’t possibly imagine.”