by Jason Starr
They crossed Park Avenue and turned north onto Madison and then Peter saw Mount Sinai Hospital, the large buildings occupying several blocks, and realized that was where Scrub Boy was headed. He also knew that he probably wouldn’t have a chance to get rid of the skinny-necked fucker today. He couldn’t help feeling a letdown, the way you might psych yourself up about going out to some great party, only to find out that the party’s been canceled.
Scrub Boy crossed to the west side of Madison and continued uptown, alongside the hospital. Peter followed on the east side of the street. Near one of the entrances, the asshole spotted someone he knew, another guy his age in scrubs, and they shook hands and stopped to talk. Peter stopped as well.
Scrub Boy and the other doctor had a short conversation, smiling, then they parted and Scrub Boy continued uptown. At around One Hundredth Street, he entered the building through a large revolving door. Peter watched from across the street, trying to decide what to do next.
He knew that following Scrub Boy into the hospital was out. Too many security cameras, too many people around. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t stick around, to see if an opportunity came up to do it somewhere else. It seemed unlikely, but he had nothing to lose.
Peter knew that people were creatures of habit; they stuck to routines. Maybe the predictability gave them comfort or something. Katie, for example, always took the same route to work every day. On their date in the park, she’d even told Peter that sometimes she felt like “such a rat.” Peter had seen the same ratlike qualities in other people. Stuff like that had always fascinated him. If he’d gone to college he probably would’ve majored in psychology, studied human behavior. Not to become a psychologist—he had no interest in helping people—but to learn as much as he could about other people’s habits. While the hospital probably had many exits and Scrub Boy could take any one of them, Peter hoped that he was a rat and would exit the building the way he’d gone in. If he did, he’d probably retrace his steps home. Peter would have to be careful on the major streets, but he was confident that on Ninety-seventh Street, between Park and Madison, there were no security cameras and he could strangle Scrub Boy without being seen.
Peter knew he was taking a big risk. Doctors sometimes worked twenty-four-hour shifts, or longer, so, for all he knew, he would have to wait until tomorrow night to have a chance to kill the bastard. And if the guy didn’t stick to a routine, exited the hospital some other way, all the waiting could be pointless.
It didn’t help that Peter already had to take a leak. The street was too busy to go between parked cars, and the last thing he needed was a cop noticing, or someone seeing him peeing and reporting it to a cop. But there was no way he was going to leave the area now. He didn’t care if he had to hold it in all night and all of tomorrow; hell, even getting a bladder infection or some minor kidney damage would be better than missing this chance.
Peter stood near a bus stop, holding the open Post, pretending to read it, but he was really watching the revolving doors. Casually, he inspected the area and was confident that there were no security cameras in the vicinity. He didn’t want anyone to notice him loitering in one spot, so he alternated—strolling half a block in one direction, then back in the other—while continually, casually, looking out for Scrub Boy.
As it got dark, pedestrian traffic lessened. This was great because there was much less chance of being noticed and he was able to spend most of his time directly opposite the hospital entrance. He was thinking, Scrub Boy appear, Scrub Boy appear, Scrub Boy appear, but it didn’t work this time.
The hours went by. Peter’s feet ached, he was starving, and he had to piss like hell, but the idea of giving up didn’t even occur to him. Then, at around ten o’clock, it started getting windy and Peter remembered that the weather forecast had been for rain, heavy at times, tonight into tomorrow morning. At around eleven, the storm arrived. It was raw, nasty, windswept rain, and Peter quickly became soaked. The rain had a couple of major upsides, though. Figuring he was wet anyway, so what difference did it make, he peed his pants. It was a huge relief. Also, by tilting his head back and sticking out his tongue, he was able to drink enough water to quench his thirst. Now he was confident he could easily last another twenty-four hours or longer if he had to.
He didn’t have to.
At about eleven thirty, Scrub Boy left the building. He headed downtown along the west side of Madison Avenue, holding an umbrella against the wind and rain. Peter followed along the other side of the street. As they approached the corner of East Ninety-eighth Street, Peter slowed, expecting Scrub Boy to cross at the same corner he’d crossed at earlier. He did, just like a rat in a maze going after a piece of cheese. As Scrub Boy crossed to his side of the street, Peter crossed to the other side to avoid any stores with security cameras. At the next corner, Ninety-seventh Street, Peter expected the asshole to turn left, and turn left he did. Peter crossed the street and followed him, again sticking to the opposite side of the street.
Between Madison and Park, the street was empty—probably even emptier than usual, thanks to the rain—but there were many tenements and Peter felt it would be best not to strike until Scrub Boy reached the other side of Park Avenue, a darker block where there were fewer residences.
But when they reached Park, Peter thought he might’ve blown his best opportunity. The pedestrian-crossing light on Park was red. Rather than waiting, Scrub Boy started to turn right and Peter feared he would go to the much busier Ninety-sixth Street, and the chance to kill him would be gone. But before he took two steps, Peter thought, Rat, turn back, Rat, turn back—in his desperation, he almost said it out loud—and, like magic, Scrub Boy decided not to head to Ninety-sixth, and instead turned back and jaywalked across the avenue. Remaining on the other side of the street, Peter followed.
As Scrub Boy headed toward Lex, Peter knew it was nearing time to strike. Confident from his earlier observation that there were no security cameras in this area, Peter crossed to the south side of Ninety-seventh Street and followed about twenty yards directly behind him. The spattering of rain against the pavement was loud enough so that he didn’t notice Peter. And if he did happen to turn around, what would he see? A very normal, nonthreatening guy, walking home in the rain. He would have no reason at all to be alarmed.
Midway along the block, Peter increased his pace, while staying light on his feet, making as little noise as possible. He was gaining ground fast now, the distance between his hands and Scrub Boy’s neck decreasing with his every stride. As Peter put on the latex gloves, he imagined that Scrub Boy was thinking about Katie, about how he couldn’t wait to see her again. He was probably planning to call her when he got home, see if he could arrange a late-night booty call. Maybe he was hoping she was lonely, vulnerable because of what had happened to Frat Boy, and that he could use that to his advantage. Not because he liked her or wanted to get to know her better or even because he thought she was particularly pretty. No, the last thing he cared about was her, or about her feelings. He wasn’t even thinking about making love to her. No, love had no meaning at all to that prick. He didn’t want to love her, he wanted to fuck her, jam his dick into her as far as he could, pound against her body so hard that it would make her wail in pain. All guys like him were the same; they didn’t know the first thing about love. It was all about hate, about pain. Guys like him didn’t deserve to live. What was one less dick bag in the world anyway?
Peter was several feet away from Scrub Boy when he noticed the group of kids up ahead near Lexington. There seemed to be about five or six of them, but they were far away and seemed distracted, talking amongst themselves. If Peter had time to process the threat of the kids on the corner, he probably would have decided against attacking Scrub Boy right then. He would’ve waited for another chance, even for another day. But it was too late to reconsider. He was beyond the point of no return, lunging forward, grabbing the skinny fuck’s neck.
He was glad that it was a thin neck, thinner tha
n Frat Boy’s, and easier to get his hands around. Still, the wetness from the rain made it difficult to get a firm grip, and as the rat reacted instinctively, dropping the umbrella, trying to pry his attacker’s hands away, Peter was afraid he would scream and that the kids on the corner or maybe someone else, in one of the nearby apartment buildings or tenements, would hear something and call the cops. To prevent this, Peter let go of Scrub Boy’s neck altogether and then, moving quickly, wrapped his arms around his midsection, tackled him to the ground like a linebacker taking down a running back, and rolled together with him off the curb into a space between two parked cars. Scrub Boy managed to scream a couple of times, but even if someone heard, it wouldn’t matter. They were out of view now, between the cars, and, besides, what was a little screaming in New York City? In New York, screaming was normal background noise, as normal as honking horns and car alarms.
But Peter knew he had to move ultra-fast now. Maybe a couple of screams would go unnoticed, but if the screaming was loud and persistent enough, someone could become alarmed. Peter managed to get his hands around Scrub Boy’s neck, but the son of a bitch was a fighter. He kept wriggling and twisting and fighting and managed to break away from Peter’s grip long enough to scream, “Help me! Help!”
Peter couldn’t risk any more of this. The screaming was hoarse and probably wasn’t carrying very far, but if Scrub Boy was able to belt out a few more “helps” the kids at the corner or someone else might hear. There was no way in hell Peter was going to let that happen. The big thing Peter had in his favor was that he was much stronger than Scrub Boy. They were probably a similar size and weight, but in muscle mass there was no comparison. The fucker was grabbing Peter’s forearms, trying to free himself, but Peter was able to overpower him. But then, instead of trying to strangle him, Peter grabbed his head and started banging it against the gutter again and again. It made a surprisingly hollow sound, reminding Peter of the time in Mexico that he tried to open a coconut by cracking it against a rock. It shut the rat up, though; that was the important thing. It was also a much easier way to kill someone this way than strangulation. Within thirty seconds Scrub Boy’s eyes closed as he lost consciousness, and after another thirty seconds, he seemed to be dead. Just to make sure, Peter banged the head for another minute or so.
It was an efficient way to kill somebody, all right, but it had a couple of minuses. The first was, it was exhausting. Peter considered himself to be in excellent shape and it had still taken a lot out of him. Kneeling over the body like in the woman-on-top sex position, Peter’s heart was going the way it did when he used level 20 on the Life Fitness machine at the gym. The other minus was the blood. There was a lot of it—well, enough to create a nuisance. Peter had been aware of it while he was banging Scrub Boy’s head and knew some of it might wind up on his clothes. He’d have to be careful about getting rid of any evidence, and make sure not to leave any of it in his apartment. Still, none of the negatives came close to overwhelming the positives—Scrub Boy was dead, the path to Katie’s heart was clear once again.
Peter got up slowly, peeked over the car. The kids were gone; no one else was around. As carefully as he could, he took off the gloves and put them in his jeans pocket. He’d have to get rid of all his clothes as a precaution, but there wasn’t as much blood on the gloves as he’d feared. In case the kids were around the corner on Lex, Peter walked to Park Avenue at a normal pace, and then headed downtown. He planned to avoid eye contact with anyone he passed in the vicinity, but the sidewalks were empty. Everything was going his way and it felt so good.
TWENTY-NINE
Katie’s roommate, Susan, was spending the night at her boyfriend Tom’s, and Katie, alone in the apartment, was terrified. She had to check several times to make sure the locks were bolted and that the chain was on. But every noise she heard outside, in the hallway or on the stairs, scared the shit out of her.
Earlier, before she went to work, the two detectives had finally gotten in touch, and she went into work later so she could talk to them at her apartment. She’d told them all she knew about Peter and about the woman who’d been outside her office and at the bar, but this didn’t calm her down; actually it had made things worse. She felt like they hadn’t taken her seriously, like they thought she was just some ditzy, paranoid country girl in the city, and wasn’t it cute that she thought some guy was out to get her? She feared that the detectives would go talk to Peter and then Peter would get so angry at her that he would come over to her place and try to kill her. She was also afraid of that woman from the bar. Maybe she knew Peter, was a crazy friend of his or something. Maybe he’d even killed Andy and was planning to come after Katie next.
Katie tried to distract herself by reading and going on eBay, but she couldn’t stop obsessing. She turned on the TV, figuring a movie would help her relax. One of the first movies she flipped to was Scream 2, during one of the gruesome murder scenes. She turned quickly to something else, not only because of the mood she was in, but because she just couldn’t deal with horror movies. When she was growing up, it was different. She and Heather were horror fanatics. Whenever their parents went out at night, they would turn out all the lights and watch horror movies, scaring the crap out of themselves. Back then, it was fun to get scared; it was exciting. But since Heather died, Katie hadn’t been able to watch movies with excessive violence. Life was disturbing enough.
She watched the Food Network for a while, then House Hunters on HGTV—that was more like it. During a commercial, she surfed the movie channels, stopping on Sense and Sensibility. She started watching it, then remembered how, that night at the French restaurant, Peter had mentioned that he loved all of the Jane Austen movies, especially some British TV version of Pride & Prejudice. She’d told him she’d only seen the one with Keira Knightley, and he went on about how much better the other one was and how they’d have to watch it together sometime.
Suddenly feeling nauseous, Katie turned the channel. Thanks to Peter Wells, she’d never be able to enjoy a fucking Jane Austen movie ever again.
She started watching some of Wedding Crashers, figuring laughing would be a good thing for her, when she heard creaking footsteps outside in the hallway. She was convinced it was Peter coming to kill her. He’d somehow managed to get into the building and now was going to break down the door or chop through it with an axe like Jack Nicholson in The Shining.
She went to the phone and dialed 911. The operator picked up and Katie screamed, “There’s someone breaking into my apartment!”
“Is the person in your apartment right now?” the operator asked.
“No. He’s—” Then Katie heard the laughter in the hallway—female laughter. It was her neighbor, what’s-her-face with the red hair, talking to a friend. Feeling like a total idiot, Katie said to the operator, “Sorry, I…I made a mistake.”
“Is there someone in your apartment or not, ma’am?”
“No, there isn’t. Sorry.”
She hung up quickly.
This was crazy—she had to get a grip. After checking the locks, she returned to the couch. TV wasn’t helping. She didn’t know how the hell she was going to fall asleep tonight. Though she didn’t smoke, she craved a cigarette. She needed to fucking relax somehow. She opened the fridge, found an old bottle of wine in the back. No glasses were clean, so she poured some into a mug. It tasted more like vinegar than merlot, but it calmed her a little bit.
It was starting to rain, the drops splattering hard against the window. Rainy nights were very horror movie-like. The farmhouse in the middle of nowhere, the power cut off, the killer outside…
“Stop it!” Katie screamed. “Just fucking stop it!”
She gulped more merlot and reminded herself that she’d done everything she could and that the police would protect her. Besides, this wasn’t a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere—this was an apartment building in the middle of Manhattan. She had neighbors a few feet away, right behind the thin walls. Nobody was going to hurt
her here.
But she wasn’t buying any of this crap. She felt completely alone in the world, more alone than she’d ever felt in her entire life. How had this happened? A couple of weeks ago everything had seemed so great—she was going out with Andy, adjusting to life in the city, and now everything was shit. She had no boyfriend, no close friends. She knew her relationship with Amanda would be ruined forever. How could she ever face her after making out with Will, a guy Amanda was so into? Katie couldn’t believe she’d done that. What the hell was wrong with her?
She wanted to be home, in Lenox, in her old bedroom. In her closet there, she still had her old stuffed animals, and she wanted to take out Snoopy and Clifford and curl up with them, the way she did when she was a kid whenever she was sad. She knew if she called her parents and told them what was going on, they’d freak and come to New York immediately to get her.
But Katie didn’t want to call home. Her mother would just get on her case, blaming her for getting involved with Peter Wells, and her father would be his usual distant, unsupportive self. Besides, calling her mommy and daddy would just make her feel like a big fat baby.
It was past midnight. Katie knew she had to try to get some sleep or she would be a wreck tomorrow at work. The rain was still coming down hard and there were occasional rumblings of thunder. She dimmed the light, but didn’t turn it down completely. She was so anxious, she didn’t know how she’d ever fall asleep. She kept thinking about Peter, replaying just about every conversation she’d ever had with him, as if the repetition would reveal some hidden truth. But it didn’t do anything except increase her anxiety. One thing that was really stressing her out was what her mother had told her, about how Peter had stalked Heather in high school. Katie was still amazed by how little she remembered from that period of her life, how it all seemed to have taken place in a fog. Maybe she’d blocked it out because the memories of Heather were too painful, the same way she rarely thought about her sister’s suicide and the weeks afterward. That had been the darkest period of Katie’s life by far. It had been terrifying to see her parents lose control that way, wailing uncontrollably. The whole family met with a grief counselor, but it didn’t seem to help. They were beyond grief, unreachable.