Battered Dreams

by Hadena James

  “How many people work with hematite and gold?” Skartal asked.

  “Hundreds, maybe thousands of small artisanal jewelers,” Lucas answered for me. “It’s big business to have one of a kind pieces of jewelry these days.”

  “Even my sixteen year old niece is working with the stuff. She has an Etsy store and makes several thousand a year off it, all on jewelry,” I said, ignoring that stupid voice again.

  Nineteen

  My phone had vibrated itself off the table several minutes earlier. The bright screen flashed to life once again as the contraption danced across the carpet. My phone case was black, but even with only a single light out, the shadow could be made out.

  At the moment, I was trying to figure out a way to explain why I thought our serial killer was small in stature. Even Lucas had seemed unsure about it. Malachi’s werewolf would have to wait. I didn’t have time to discuss the philosophical aspects of a person who believed they could shapeshift.

  To me, the theory made sense. Smaller people were just less intimidating, unless I knew the person was suffering from either ASPD or borderline personality disorder. Furthermore, if I knew it to be borderline, I was still less intimidated by a smaller person.

  I was a good example. I was a few inches shorter than the national average of five feet, five inches tall and I weighed about one hundred and thirty pounds. I was evenly proportioned, legs to torso and all of that made me unimpressive to look at. When I could manage a real smile, I was capable of disarming most people. That was my flaw though, not the flaw of a pure psychopath, who could be charming when it served their purpose, even achieving real smiles with the flip of a switch.

  Should a psychopath be a few inches shorter than I was and a dozen or so pounds lighter, they would be well camouflaged. She would appear to be too small to be dangerous and too friendly to be anything but sincere.

  That did of course depend on the type of psychopath. Studies on female psychopaths were still rare, because female psychopaths were still rare. To make it worse, the majority of female psychopaths had Borderline Personality Disorder, not Anti-Social Personality Disorder. Borderlines didn’t have the genetic mutations that went with ASPD. They also tended to be more violent for longer periods of time.

  With that in mind, our killer was exhibiting the traits associated with ASPD psychopathy and not Borderline. That meant she was a whole lot closer to having my mentality than the females that had been studied. The thought was cringe-worthy.

  The distinction between nature and nurture was becoming more and more evident with the rise of the abnormal personality. I was sure Lucas occasionally scribbled notes about me before he went to bed. I was his own personal case study. I wasn’t just a female psychopath with ASPD, but I had somehow managed to exchange some of the psychopathic personality traits with sociopathic personality traits. The jury was still out about whether this was a help or a hindrance. Until recently, I had always considered it a good thing, but recent events were making me rethink that.

  Using myself as the model for our serial killer, two things became crystal clear. She was very smart and she was much better with the camouflage. Proving this to my team members was difficult. Proving it to people who didn’t know me was damn near impossible.

  My phone began vibrating again. I picked it up. Malachi’s number flashed across the screen for the hundredth time.

  “I’m thinking,” I snarled into the receiver.

  “I’ve been reading up on people who suffer from lycanthropy, the mental disorder, not the actual werewolf thing.”

  “So?”

  “So, they may be out of my league.”

  “I’m on a case.”

  “I know. I’m not asking you to drop everything and come here. I need some more advice.”

  “Lycanthropy as a mental illness is pretty straight forward. For whatever reason, the person thinks they are a werewolf.”

  “Yes, I read all that. What I am trying to figure out is how to identify someone who thinks they are a werewolf.”

  “Look for the normal signs; baying at the moon, running around naked, hunting for rabbits on all fours.”

  “As far as I can tell, they don’t do that.”

  “I have no idea. I’ve never actually encountered a werewolf or someone who thinks they are one. Lycanthropy is a fairly rare mental illness. Have you checked hospital records?”

  “Yes, and I didn’t find one.”

  “I can’t believe I’m about to say this; the illness seems to be more common in populations of heavily superstitious people. Look for ethnic groups in the area that have a strong belief in werewolves.”

  “You want me to use ethnic profiling?”

  “Sort of. Look, the Irish and the Scottish don’t have many werewolf legends. So, lycanthropy is rare in large groups of Scots or Irish. Werewolves are more a Germanic thing, particularly Polish and Czech.” I tried not to sigh. “It’s also a more common superstition in Native American beliefs. Since you are in Ohio and Indiana, start by asking if anyone has seen Dogmen lately. There are a dozen or so sightings every year. If someone with lycanthropy is running around, the sightings will increase. It’s unlikely they will refer to them as a werewolf based on the geographical location. They will call them Dogmen, which is only sort of the same thing, but few people remember the Dogmen myths, just the name.”

  “I’ll start with reports to the police.”

  “Hey, since you are on here and I’m helping you, you have to help me. Explain why a short serial killer isn’t intimidating.”

  “Like a midget?”

  “I don’t think that is the politically correct term and no, I don’t mean that short. I just mean someone who is petite and below the national average for height.”

  “Despite being a psychopath, short people are just not intimidating. Fear is a strange thing and we do not usually fear things that are smaller than us.”

  “What about spiders and snakes?”

  “Those are phobias, which as I understand it, is different.” Malachi lit a cigarette. The noise of his lighter closing on the other end of the line was loud. “For example, you are intimidating because you rarely hide behind the mask of normality anymore. However, if I was short, because I do appear normal, no one would find me scary. I’m intimidating first because of my physique and second because of my mental condition. You are scary solely for your mental state, and since your surgery, you seem unwilling to put on your mask again, so you are almost always scary.”

  “How do I explain that to a normal person?”

  “You can’t. Your mental identification with psychopaths is what keeps you alive. Most people do not have that ability. They consider all people to be relatively the same.”

  “That is unhelpful.”

  “Is it a short man or a short woman?”

  “Female.”

  “Then you can’t even talk about a Napoleon complex.”

  “Napoleon was of average height for a man in the 1700’s. He did not have a height complex.”

  “But everyone thinks he did.”

  “That is actually helpful.” I hung up.

  The impression of Napoleon is that he was a madman determined to rule the world to make up for being short. However, other world leaders at the time didn’t take him seriously, because he was so small. This was not the case. He probably wasn’t a madman, just a power obsessed, land-hungry leader, like other leaders at the time. He wasn’t short. He wasn’t taken as a serious threat because France was pretty bad off after the French Revolution and no one thought he had the money to finance wars. They were wrong.

  In my head, a tiny Napoleon was stomping his feet and having a temper tantrum as a much taller James Monroe stared at him. While the image was comical, it cleared my head a little. Short people, even when they were angry, didn’t elicit fear from those around them. I drew a stick figure cartoon of the image in my head, clearly labelled the participants, took a picture of it, and sent it to Lucas.

  Afte
r a few seconds, Lucas responded by telling me to go to bed. A few seconds after that, Xavier texted to see if I was all right. A few more seconds went by before Gabriel sent me a text that said he was laughing out loud. I didn’t believe he was. My next text was from Fiona. She had gotten it. It required a woman to understand a woman, even one as dysfunctional as me. She sent a group text explaining the picture. I considered beating my head against the wall.

  I was about to put my phone away when it went off again. It was from Nyleena asking me why I was drawing terrible stick figures of Napoleon. I ignored her; it was a conflict of interest.

  With Malachi hunting down Dogmen and my phone blissfully not vibrating itself to pieces, I got into bed and turned off the lamp. In the hushed darkness, that stupid voice could talk loud and clear. The one that was convinced our serial killer wasn’t just a petite female, but a teenager.

  It wasn’t the Jiminy Cricket voice that guided my moral decisions. It was my own voice, echoing from the deepest interior of my brain. The voice that had kept me alive over the years. A girl in her late teens would definitely wear that necklace. A girl in high school would love the novelty of it, and since she was smart, she would probably have an idea that the magnetic hematite was considered a healing stone.

  I picked up my phone and texted my niece. The text was my email address and a simple sentence: Need pics of all gold/hematite necklaces you’ve made. The necklace wouldn’t be one of Cassie’s creations, but the pictures would prove exactly how popular the stone was. I hoped her phone was turned off since it was the middle of the night. I didn’t need her waking up and flunking a final exam.

  At that, my mind did a mental head slap. High stress times were sporadic for teens. For a smart teen looking to get into a good college, exams were definitely high stress times. As were papers, if they still required high school students to write them.

  All the pieces fit nicely. A young girl would go with a teen girl, only a few years older than her. A boy would definitely go, and an older teen or twenty-something would not have any concerns about a high school girl giving her a lift. I picked up my phone again, texting Cassie one more time: What’s a booty call?

  Volleyball

  The last game of the season was underway. San Marcos was one point away from winning the match. The girls moved as a coordinated effort to keep from losing. If they could win this game, they would go to the state championship this summer. Jess really wanted to go to state. It was an honor to be a captain as a junior. If she could lead her team to victory here, it would prove that she had not only deserved it, but had earned it.

  Jess backpedaled, reaching for the ball that had just been served. As it struck her forearms, she lost her balance. The ball sailed into the air. She braced for impact with the ground. One of her teammates jumped, her palm slamming against the ball, spiking it over the net. Jess slammed into the floor, arms behind her to catch her.

  The ball hit the floor. Game point. The team erupted into celebration. Jess attempted to get up. One arm refused to hold her weight. She fell sideways, impacting with the floor again. Her chin split open. Blood gushed from the wound, falling onto the floor, creating a puddle. The excited shouts died down, replaced by gasps and shrieks.

  Jess’s forearm was bent at a strange angle. Her hand flopped uselessly. It hurt, but the pain seemed distant and unreal. She stared at it. The gash on her chin completely forgotten.

  Her coach ran onto the floor. She was barking instructions, but Jess wasn’t sure who they were aimed at. She had never broken a bone before. She’d never even needed stitches. Injuries had always been limited to minor bumps and bruises.

  Her mom was suddenly on the floor, next to her. She was talking. The words made no sense. Jess wondered if yellowish marrow was leaking into her body. She wondered if it was mixing with red blood cells to create a thick fluid that would fill her arm. Part of her wanted to see it. The urge to do exactly that was strong. She could push on the broken bone, push it through her skin and watch the marrow leak from it. The thought made her dizzy, not with fear or horror, but excitement and euphoria.

  However, no one would understand her desire to see the damage. Gossip would already be spreading about her breaking her arm. Tongues would wag much faster if she were to expose the bone.

  A paramedic arrived. Jess stared into her grey eyes. There was no need for a paramedic. Once she was off the floor, she’d be able to walk to the car and go to the hospital. Both her parents were here, one of them could drive her.

  The paramedic tilted Jess’s head back and began to apply gauze to the chin wound. The paramedic wore purple gloves. Her face was slim, too slim to look healthy. Her eyes had a yellow tinge to them. Jess didn’t know what was wrong with the paramedic, but something was. She just didn’t look healthy.

  Jess debated letting the paramedic touch her. If she was sick, it wasn’t unreasonable to think she was contagious. Would that disease infect Jess through the bleeding wound in her chin?

  Deciding not to panic her mother any more than necessary, Jess sat still. Her mother was fretting over her arm. Jess realized they had won the game, so they would be going to the state championship. Only, Jess wouldn’t be able to play. Her arm would probably be stuck in a cast. She couldn’t play volleyball like that.

  The tears that began to flow down Jess’s face were not from the pain. She could handle that. It was disappointment, disapproval, and frustration. She’d worked really hard to make the team. She’d worked even harder to make sure they won. Now, everyone else would get the credit for her victory.

  Some of her teammates could barely tie their shoelaces, let alone organize a winning offense and coordinating an impenetrable defense. Becky probably could, but she was the exception, not the rule. Sure, if they won, Jess’s name would be on the winner’s plaque. She’d get her picture taken with the trophy, but it wouldn’t be the same because she wasn’t the winner. That was if they won. Without her, it was very likely her team would lose.

  She was loaded into the ambulance and taken to the hospital. The break wasn’t as bad as it looked. She’d only have to wear the cast for six weeks. Six weeks was just long enough for her to miss State. Six weeks would be well into summer. Six weeks would mean writing with her non-dominant hand on her finals. She’d never practiced writing right handed. It would be difficult.

  The drive home was filled with sulking and her mother attempting to soothe her hurt feelings. Her mother rehashed all the thoughts Jess had experienced earlier. However, to Jess they were negatives. Her mother seemed to think they were positives.

  Jess could see it. The girls on the volleyball court, attempting to man their positions. Her back-up player serving the ball into the net. It would be a disaster. They would leave the state championships with their heads hung low.

  There would be no trophy to hoist. No celebrations to partake in. Just a year of hard work and planning to take second place.

  Worse, they might not make it out of the preliminary rounds. Second was bad. Anything lower was completely unacceptable. She had not worked this hard to go out in the early rounds. If she could just find a way to delay state championships, life would be better. However, not even death would delay the games. She’d just have to hurry up and heal. There were three weeks until they started. She could be healed in three weeks if she put her mind to it.

  Arriving home, Jess went to her room. A plastic bag went around the cast and she got into the bathtub. This was ridiculously difficult. Washing her hair with one hand took an extra-long time. The shampoo had to be squirted directly on her head. Globs of the rosemary and lavender scented soap slipped down her hair and ran down her face before splashing into the water.

  She scrubbed as vigorously as possible. Her nails scraped along her scalp, attempting to exfoliate any dead skin in an attempt to keep her dandruff under control. No one knew she had dandruff and that wasn’t going to change just because she had broken her stupid arm.

  What was wrong with her arm anyway? T
he fall hadn’t been awkward. Her body didn’t weigh that much. There was no reason for her arm not to have supported her as she fell.

  Her gaze wandered to her cast without her realizing it. They had used hot pink to wrap it. It wasn’t her first choice of colors, but they had drugged her for the pain. She hadn’t resisted because it would have looked strange if she had. It had been her mother who had suggested the hot pink. She had agreed because of the drugs. Now that they were wearing off, she wasn’t entirely happy with the choice.

  “Honey, are you okay in there?” Her mother asked, knocking on the door. Her hand stopped scrubbing her head. Her fingers were covered in a pink liquid that ran down her arm. The shampoo was stinging her scalp.

  “Fine,” she shouted to the closed door.

  “Do you need help with your hair or anything?”

  “No, I’m good,” she submerged her head. The water made her scalp burn even more. It was not entirely unpleasant. She kept her arm above the water as she swished her head back and forth under it. Her head stayed under until she could no longer hold her breath.

  The water had a film of strange looking grime on the top of it, the results of using an all-natural shampoo. Artificial lather was omitted from the ingredients, so there weren’t any soap bubbles on the surface. The grime was whitish and more distinctive because the water was slightly pink. She’d really have to scrub her fingernails to get all her scalp out from under them.

  Standing was tricky. All her weight went on her wet hand and arm. For a moment, she imagined it breaking as well, as if she were suffering from brittle bones or something.

  The broken arm kept attempting to help as she dried herself with a towel. It could bend and twist at the elbow, but the wrist and fingers were useless. The cast covered from just below her elbow to just over her first set of knuckles.