Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso

by Jeff Vrolyks

  * * *

  Howard returned from the restroom and said, “Okay, let’s get it over with.”

  “If you insist. You’ve gone too far to turn back now.”

  “That’s a fact.”

  “You were unconscious on the kitchen floor in a puddle of yourself. Obviously I didn’t see any of this, I’m just telling you what I found out after the fact.” She regained her somber tone. “They were kicking you as you lay on the floor.” She gingerly added, “Including your face. A broken nose. Couple teeth kicked in—ever notice some of your teeth are fake?” She tapped her left front tooth, bottom left tooth. Howard shook his head and touched his brand new (to him) fake teeth. “Open gash on your head. The worst of it was probably your ribs. They kicked your chest and back, broke several ribs.”

  “Broke several ribs?” Howard mused.

  “Then they left you. Maybe they thought you were dead or on your way there. But to Lester and Damien, it was my turn.

  “When Lester opened the closet door, I had a little something lined up for him. A wire coat hanger straightened out, nice and pointy. It was behind my back in my right hand. Lester reached in and grabbed me by the left wrist, I jabbed with all my might the hanger into his eye. It was a lucky shot: it impaled his lower lid and wedged between his eye and socket.”

  “Good! Thank you!” Howard cheered, but didn’t let himself get too excited—the story wasn’t over.

  “He let go of me and shouted words I never heard before. I ran like a kid with a plan. I would have escaped if it was only Lester. I made it to the front door, the double-locked front door, which we never locked the top lock, tried opening it and that’s when a realization came to me: their intentions weren’t to rob us or to… to just be mean to me, rough me up a little. Nope, they planned on killing us. The realization came like a whispered voice in my ear.

  “I had no idea where you were. I tried screaming for you again as I worked the top lock on the door, but my vocal chords were damaged. Damien called me from behind, only I don’t think he knew my name was Melinda. He called me Millie. Millie. I turned around and there he was: the younger but equally disgusting Cobb brother.

  “I tried, Howard, I tried my damnedest. I faked a run around him, stopped short as he reached for me and I kicked him as hard as I could in the balls. He grunted and doubled over, lunged at me anyway.

  “Lester was now right behind him, and I was done pretending that I might get away. They took away my will to resist instantly, with sheer force. They didn’t hit me, they didn’t need to. Lester had an iron grip, he throttled me into submission. Staring eye to bleeding-eye with Less, I dropped to my knees. I couldn’t breathe.”

  “I can’t listen to this,” Howard muttered. “Could you please just tell me how it ended? Hearing this is traumatizing, and it’s conjuring up thoughts I shouldn’t be thinking. Unhealthy, bad thoughts.”

  “You wanted to know. I warned you.” She swapped out paper-towels.

  “But I didn’t want to know this. I just wanted to know the gist of what happened. You telling me in graphic detail is breaking my heart.”

  “I had to suffer through this, Howard.” She was offended. “And suffer I did. And you’re wanting me to tell you the Disney version? So then maybe it won’t be as big a deal to you? Are you fucking kidding me?”

  “No, no. I’m sorry. I misspoke. I understand that it was really, really bad. I just don’t think it’s going to help my sanity hearing this. I’m sorry it came out sounding like it did.”

  “Believe me when I say I’m not telling you every detail. I’m aware more than you know of how this affects you. But Howard, brother, there is a reason I’m telling you the explicit details. If I don’t, you’re going to hate yourself when I’m through.”

  “How so?”

  “You’ll see. Just let me finish.”

  Her nose was red and raw. Howard went into the other room to get a box of Kleenex while Melinda went to her bedroom to get a blanket.

  Now she sat with her legs folded under herself at the very end of the couch, blanket-wrapped into a white Hershey’s Kiss with a ribbon of sad girl poking out the top. Howard offered to turn the heat on: she said no.

  “From the entryway,” she continued, “Lester led me by the wrist; Damien followed. I don’t know why I did it—I guess I didn’t know any better—but I tried to wriggle free, as if freeing myself would be my ticket out. He yanked my left arm, a nasty little sound came from my shoulder: I wasn’t going to try that again. Up until then I hadn’t yet cried, chalk it up to shock, but that first arm yank brought tears to my eyes. Before we made it to the bedroom, I asked them where you were. Lester stopped and looked curiously at me, asked me to repeat myself. I said nothing. With him glaring at me, I was afraid, too afraid of his reaction to say anything. I didn’t know that his curiosity was in my voice, or lack thereof. He wasn’t aware that he’d hurt the insides of my throat until I opened my stupid mouth.

  “When I didn’t respond to him, he did it again, yanked my arm excruciatingly hard.” She mimicked it. The gesture reminded Howard of the old ‘pull the tablecloth out from under the dishes’ trick. “But this time it was too hard. Dizzying pain stabbed at my shoulder, now out of socket. My legs gave out and down I went, with my wrist still in his hand. He threatened to pull it again if I didn’t speak. So I asked where you were and it was exactly what he wanted to hear. If I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t scream. He pulled me up to my feet, but at least had the decency to lift me by my other arm.” She scoffed, “Decency. Poor choice of words.”

  Melinda, who had been avoiding Howard’s eyes, checked how he was doing. He refused to look at her. She was grateful to see tears, but she needed more than just agony out of him, she needed him to be livid. A broken heart and a vengeful heart, both in their most extreme state. Then and only then would she divulge the details of what he did; when nothing short of Lester and Damien’s deaths would pacify him.

  “They led me to the kitchen to show me what they’d done to you. The pain, the tears, they shut off like a faucet when I saw you. It was numbing to see you like that. It was hard to tell it was you. Your face looked like you were in a cherry pie eating contest. I thought you were dead. I asked if you were dead.

  “Damien said, ‘Looks like he’s still breathing. Hey, I got an idea, Less: let’s have Millie kill him.’ Lester laughed and said it was an awesome idea. I said no way. ‘Then we’re going to kill you,’ Damien said. ‘It’s your choice. And if I were you, I’d do it because the dude’s on his way out anyways. It would be mercy. You’d be doing him a favor.’ I asked if they were going to kill me anyway. Damien grinned this malicious grin. Lester said no but his face said yes. They did intend to kill us both, Howard. They did.

  “I didn’t think Lester and Damien Cobb were human beings anymore. Really. I didn’t know what they were, but humans don’t laugh at the idea of a little girl murdering her brother under the threat of execution. Monsters, aliens, I don’t know, but I was confident that they weren’t like us, and we were going to die regardless of what I did. So I refused. Lester smiled and gave me a wink. Then touched my shoulder, circled behind me and rubbed my neck and shoulders. One thing you will never see is me getting a massage. That was my first and last.

  “As he worked his thumbs deep in my lower neck, he whispered in my ear, ‘How’s your left arm, sweetie?’”

  “‘Hurts. Broke inside.’ ‘You know what else hurts, Millie?’ I nodded yes. ‘You do?’ He said it like the proud father of a kid who knew the answer to a tough question. ‘What else hurts, Millie?’ I didn’t say anything. ‘Not doing what I fucking say.’ He pushed me. I tripped over you and braced my fall with both arms. My left shoulder, already dislocated, made a horrible sound, like severing a taut rope. The pain blinded me, seized my breath. I heard laughter, the sound of drawers opening and closing, then I passed out.

  “I awoke to nauseating pain and the sound of tearing. I thought the tearing was my arm because it felt like i
t was being torn off. The sound was a strip of duct tape being torn by Damien and the pain was my arm being raised above my head so Lester could pull my tee-shirt off.

  “I screamed. The sound that came out of me… it wasn’t like anything I’ve ever heard. They didn’t care much for it, either. Damien tore a smaller strip of duct tape and stuck it over my mouth so they wouldn’t have to hear it again.

  “Of all the things they could’ve done to me, taping my mouth shut was the worst. You know why, Howard?”

  He thought about it, then nodded. “Chronic sinus-something.”

  “Chronic Sinusitis. Childhood nasal congestion. You use to tease me because of it. I couldn’t pronounce my H’es.”

  “‘Ouwie,” he muttered gravely.

  “It was bad enough when I wasn’t crying. My sinuses were clogged shut. It was a death sentence. Lester paid no attention to me freaking out. I suppose he figured it was normal. He tried to unhitch the shirt caught at my neck and arms. I was in full panic mode.

  “It was either adrenaline or a survival mechanism, but the pain in my left shoulder blinked away and the only thing on my mind was air. It didn’t help that I was panicking, draining my oxygen. While Lester was going up with the shirt, I was going down with my right arm, to reach my hand on the tape. My elbow caught inside the shirt and wedged, folded over like a fucking chicken wing. I didn’t have a chance in hell of freeing myself. My other arm was ruined and Lester was running out of patience with me. I was thrashing, using-up what little oxygen remained. People say that when you suffocate your vision fades to black, but it doesn’t. It’s like watching TV with an antennae; the clear picture starts getting fuzzy, reception gets progressively worse until it’s just snow.

  “Lester didn’t mean to, but he did me a favor. I heard more ripping. It sounded a mile away. Vaguely I felt my arm being cut. It didn’t hurt in the slightest.” Melinda pulled the blanket away from her left arm and slid her shirt-sleeve up, revealed the pale underside. A thick white scar spanned from armpit to elbow.

  “You got that from that night?” Howard said incredulously. “I’ve asked you about that scar before and you said it was from crashing your bike. You lied to me.”

  “Yeah, well, the lies are over. Lester had taken a knife from the kitchen drawer. Why exactly he took it, I don’t know. Well, I can guess. But I doubt he had the insight to know he’d need it to cut my shirt off. But thank God he did, because I was out of air. He cut through the folds of shirt, not careful enough to avoid the skin beneath it, but hey, I’m not complaining.

  “The millisecond after he cut through the last of it, my right hand was peeling off the tape. When the air streamed in my lungs, it was the best feeling on earth. The loud gasp for air got the boys’ attention. I begged them not to do that again, that I can’t breathe through my nose. Before they could respond I promised I’d be quiet if they left the tape off. And they did.

  “It didn’t take long for the euphoria of having air in my lungs to go away. The pain in my now-bleeding left arm, still above my head, came back with a fury. Damien had removed my shoes and socks so the duct tape around my ankles would better adhere. He wrapped them together. I don’t think Damien had a clue what he was doing.

  “Lester, sitting beside me on the bed, saw that Damien had taped my ankles and called him an idiot. ‘How are we going to take her pants off with her ankles taped together?’ Damien snickered and began taking it off, then noticed what Lester had been up to: my arm. ‘Damn, man, breaking it wasn’t enough, you had to cut it?’ He wasn’t as concerned as he was humored. Lester said he didn’t think he broke it, just