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by Edward Lee

  Gruesomely, Brice noticed tendrils of mushroom-colored tissue ooze through one of Clark’s nostrils, like mush cranked through a Play-Doh factory. Clear fluid dribbled from the other nostril.

  “You get it, Loger!” Sarah May cheered. “Drop yer fuck in that bastard’s brain!”

  “Just you hump that city boy’s head!” Gut cried. “You hump it fierce!”

  “Fill that city boy’s head up with your ball sauce, Loger!” Tucker commanded.

  Brice glanced at Augie, who continued to gape at this horror. His face was the color of mashed potatoes. He could only seem to remember to breathe through his mouth.

  “I’se gonna have me my nut here, boys,” Loger reported, rattling Clark’s head in his hands like he was shaking a paint can. He flinched and stalled his thrusts. “Ah! There she goes! Eeeeee-YUH!”

  Sarah May squealed and clapped her hands, finishing with a little cheerleader jump. “You did it, Loger! You filled that rape-o piece o’ shit’s melon to the brim, real good and proper! Our Babba’d be proud!”

  “Get’cha a good nut right up in ‘nare, son. That’s the way,” Eamon said, still the only solemn one of the lot despite everyone else heaping praise on Loger like a toddler who blew out all his birthday candles.

  Clark’s head thumped on the wood. Loger whistled as he stepped back from the table, his penis coated with blood and chunks of gray matter. He gasped, clearly winded from his brain-copulating exertions. He braced himself against the wall and gradually managed to hoist up his jeans and button them again.

  He’s not even going to clean that off? Brice thought inanely.

  Under the table on the far side, little spatters began to drip on the floor like a melting icicle. Runoff from Clark, whose head now rested against the table top like a fallen jug with no cap.

  “I can’t believe it,” Augie said, with barely any inflection. He looked like he’d slink to the ground and curl up in shock if Horace wasn’t locking his arms. “Clark was always threatening to shave it all down there. I never thought he’d go through with it.”

  Brice hadn’t noticed until he said that, but sure enough, there was no hair to be seen on Clark’s crotch.

  “He thought it would make him look bigger, like those porno guys.” Augie shook his head. “It doesn’t look bigger at all…just weird.”

  Brice was inclined to agree, though perhaps a partially dissected scrotum and boiled dick didn’t offer the fairest specimen for evaluation.

  “Now, where is our manners? Yawl haven’t been properly introduced, have ya?” Eamon indicated the colorful cast of characters in the room. “This tall son of a gun is Loger, my son, and these other fellas who all look alike, why, they’se—”

  “The Larkins Brothers,” Brice finished for him.

  “Boy, why you’se are just a blammed fountain of knowledge, ain’t ya?”

  “I heard all about the Larkins Brothers tonight, and I saw some of their handiwork. The dead blonde with the hole in her head? And the boyfriend without any skin? I saw their bodies in the woods. We dug up the grave.”

  “You did what?” Augie asked. A little life had returned to him.

  “Well, that’s pretty low down if’n ya ask me,” Clyde said from behind Brice, “disturbin’ someone’s grave like that.”

  “You mean the grave of someone whose head you put your dick in when they were probably already dead?” Brice asked. He cried out as Clyde tweaked his arms up behind his back.

  “Yeah, that’s what I done told you, city boy! You retarded in the head or somethin’?”

  “Brice, why the hell didn’t you say something to us?” Augie wasn’t about to drop his line of inquiry.

  He didn’t answer. Because we got tied up with that whole incident where you sexually assaulted a family member of half the people in this room didn’t seem like such a good thing to reveal. Clark’s fate all but assured they were terminally screwed (in the figurative sense, with reservations for the literal as well), but if they had a glimmer of hope, a confession would bury it.

  Eamon smirked at Gut and Horace. “Now you boys are gonna have ta be more careful when you’re a-buryin’ these folks, ya hear?”

  “Sorry, Mayor,” Gut mumbled. “Shee-it.”

  Eamon returned his attention to Brice and Augie. “But back ta what I was sayin’, see, there’s one more person here too, who you’ve already met.” He nodded to Tucker and Gut, who walked past them to the door.

  Shellshocked or not, soon as they opened the door, Augie hollered, “Help! Please help us!”

  The Larkins snickered, and Brice’s stomach sank to his shoes when he realized there was chuckling outside the room too, from back in the bar. A few people yelled Help! in falsetto, mocking Augie.

  Everyone is in on this. It’s like “The Lottery,” but they’re fucking brains instead of throwing rocks.

  Augie struggled to rabbit for the doorway, but Horace held him with such a lack of effort, he may as well have been a child. Brice didn’t bother. There were three times as many people outside who’d be willing to stop them. They wouldn’t be able to run from this. Their only shot was to swear Clark did it himself. If he had any misgivings about the ethics of that, he only had to look over at Clark dripping jizz from a skull-hole to convince himself that friendship wasn’t everything.

  Tucker and Gut emerged from the unmarked door beside the kitchen, apparently a maintenance closet. They pushed a rolling chair into the room, in which sat a body wrapped with a bloodied sheet. Brice recognized Babba immediately. Her head lolled, tongue dangling as they spun her around for her intended audience.

  “This here’s Babba. My daughter.” Eamon was silent for a moment, stricken by the sight of her. He cleared his throat, perhaps remembering she was in a better place now. “Babba were as innocent as innocent could be. Come out all wrong, the poor thing. Brain all mussed up.” He glared at Augie and Brice with eyes of cold steel. “How could you rape and murder someone like that?”

  “We didn’t rape or murder anyone!” Augie shouted. “You know we came here for Sallee’s. The ugliest girl in there didn’t look like a distant relative of the fucking Elephant Man, so why the hell would we choose that instead?”

  But no offense, Brice thought.

  “No? Well, we shore heard ya did. ’Twas Babba herself who told us.”

  “Bullshit! She couldn’t have told you anything ’cos she couldn’t talk!”

  Brice would have face-palmed if his hands were free. Augie seemed to know an awful lot about her for someone who allegedly didn’t hurt her. He felt compelled to interject, “We did see her in Backtown, and she didn’t talk.”

  “Couldn’t talk with her mouth, no,” Eamon agreed, “but she could talk just fine with her hands.”

  Loger wore a death’s head grin. “Ain’t ya never heard’a sign language? I learnt by takin’ county classes so’s ta help Babba grow up easier. ’Twas free, too!”

  He pointed with his index and middle fingers at eye level and dropped them until they were at the middle of his chest, then made a motion from right to left in front of his face, as if finishing a cross in the air.

  “That’s how ya say ‘yer dead meat’ signin’,” Loger informed them. He laughed, with Sarah May and the Larkins soon joining in.

  “Shore as shit, son,” Eamon said. “Poor Babba was bleedin’ like a blammed spigot when Loger got her home, but ‘fore she died she told us it was two city fellas who up’n raped her. Said one of ’em had a fancy gold chain ‘round his neck.”

  He fingered the chain around Clark’s neck.

  Two city fellas. Brice hung onto those words. They couldn’t pawn it all off on Clark. She’d implicated two of them.

  Sweat gathered at his brow. He would swear the walls had moved in, that he should be able to touch both sides if he held his arms out.

  Two city fellas. Double header.

  Oh, Christ.

  “But what we’se faced with now I think is what they call a quandary,” Eamon continue
d. His gaze shifted from Brice to Augie. “’Cos Babba told us that two fellas raped her. So…which one’a you was it?”

  “This is bullshit!” Augie had begun to sweat, too, Brice noticed. “You guys are psychopaths!”

  “I thought you’d say as much. Sarah May?”

  Sarah May finally showed a hint of her seductive smile as she sauntered over, a mean sway to her hips. She’d teased her nipples to erect points watching Loger. The soft mounds nudged against Brice as she came up to him and began running her hands up and down his chest.

  “What in God’s name…?”

  “God’s name?” Eamon echoed. “It weren’t in God’s name that Babba was fucked ta death by one’a you.”

  “Brice, what the fuck is this?” Augie shouted.

  “I think I can guess,” he replied. His voice cracked as if he’d regressed to puberty.

  Sarah May turned away from him. She bent over and ground her ass against Brice’s crotch. The sway she’d demonstrated a moment ago returned, rubbing side to side. She faced him again, level with his crotch. She met his stare and slowly ran her tongue across her lips. She seized a handful of his shirt and near the beltline and slipped it out. It stretched as she stood. Once upright, she continued to tug Brice’s shirt up in a single fluid motion. Clyde relinquished his grip so Brice could raise his arms and allow her to pull it all the way off. She twirled it in a helicopter fashion and released it. Its momentum sent it sailing into the corner.

  “Well, ain’t that somethin’?” Eamon said as he inspected Brice’s chest. He turned to Augie. “I was hopin’ it was you.”

  “I didn’t do anything! Brice, tell him I didn’t do shit!”

  Sarah May danced her way to Augie. He suddenly wasn’t the least bit excited to have such a commanding view of her ass. She winked at Brice again as she worked her backside into Augie’s groin. Horace kept Augie’s arms locked since he still seemed intent on trying to dash out the door.

  “See, what Babba signed ta Loger was the second fella had a big ole shark tattooed on his chest,” Eamon revealed.

  “Yeah,” Loger said. “See, she knowed what a shark is on account’a this pitcher book.” He picked up a tattered booklet from a table in the corner, displaying an illustration with the words S IS FOR SHARK.

  Sarah May squealed with delight. Rather than a teasing effort to pull off Augie’s shirt, she whipped it up from his waist and pulled it over his head like a bed sheet. Augie’s head twisted side to side like he could see anything but the fabric which had made a shroud of his face.

  “Now would you look at that!” she said, poking the shark on his chest. Augie flinched.

  “Shore is the damn silliest lookin’ tattoo I ever seed,” Tucker opined.

  “A hell of a job on her part makin’ the connection ‘tween the pitcher in this here book and that shitty lookin’ drawin’ ya got there, boss. “ Loger said.

  Augie slumped in defeat, as if wounded by these dispersions. Sarah May obliged him by pulling the shirt back from his face.

  Eamon had backed up to the far end of the long table. He patted Clark’s head. “I’m afraid this head’s wore out. See, me, Gut, Tucker’n Loger done had our go…but Clyde and Horace ain’t gone yet.”

  “That’s right,” Clyde affirmed behind Brice. “We’se been waitin’ all patient like to put us some peckersnot in a tight coconut.”

  Eamon managed a rueful smile at Augie. “Congratulations, son. You’re gonna be the fresh head.”

  Behind him, Horace grinned ear to ear. “Boy? We’se gonna fuck your head like it’s a two-dollar whore!”

  “We shore are, Horace! We shore are!” Clyde concurred. “Ain’t had me a city boy brain nut in a coon’s age.”

  Horace slapped the back of Augie’s head. “You got you some prime rib settin’ on that neck. Yes sir, I’se got a big ole load waitin’ to pump inta yer brain.”

  Eamon clapped his hands once, gunshot loud. He had reverted to his deadpan expression. “Time for the next round. Boys?”

  Loger grabbed a handful of Clark’s shirt and slid him across the table until he flopped off the edge and hit the floor in a tangle of limbs. Loger’s contribution (and evidently Eamon, Gut, and Tucker’s as well) continued to ooze from the crevice in his head like Elmer’s glue.

  Horace manipulated Augie into a full-nelson and muscled him over to the table. He slammed him on the table top until Loger, Gut, and Tucker joined the effort. They spun him around and hauled him up. The angle of the table went crooked as Augie fought to free himself.

  “Brice! Help me! They’re going to run a train on my fucking head!”

  Clyde took hold of Brice’s arms again as a warning, although Brice had no intention of coming to Augie’s aid. What could he do? They were outnumbered in this room and outside in the bar.

  Over on the table, Loger fastened rope from one corner around Augie’s right hand. They had it looped around the chair leg. The brothers held onto Augie’s kicking legs and left arm until Loger completed firm enough knots to keep the right hand secured.

  “I never touched her!” Augie screamed. “She lied, you stupid fucking bumpkins! SHE LIED!”

  “Shore she did,” Eamon said. “She just got lucky that you had a retarded lookin’ shark on ya, is that it?”

  “I didn’t touch her! Brice, tell them I didn’t touch her!”

  Brice opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

  It’s my brother, I’ve got to try something! he thought, but when he tried to speak again, the words weren’t there. He knew the words wouldn’t change anything, except maybe make it worse for himself for trying to cover for Augie.

  Tucker worked the rope around the left hand while Loger and Horace saw to Augie’s feet. With all of his limbs effectively restrained, he whipped his head from side to side as one of the few body parts he could freely move.

  His tongue was another.

  “Brice! Holy shit! Help me! Goddamn it, Brice! These animals are going to fuck my head! Do something!”

  Brice found something to say after all. “What do you want me to do, damn it? This whole thing is your fault!”

  Augie continued to struggle against Loger and the brothers, but he’d ceased to thrash his head, fixing his eyes on Brice. They bulged in wounded disbelief. “I’m your brother, for shit’s sake! Help me!”

  For better or worse (right now, definitely the fucking worst ever), Augie was his brother, and his contemptible actions did not change that fact. Nor did all the asshole rhetoric he spouted given half a chance. Nobody was any one thing, although Brice would have a hard time seeing the guys in this room as anything more than drooling, degenerate sickos even if he saw them handing out presents to little boys and girls at an orphanage. As much as Brice abhorred what his brother and Clark had done tonight, he found he couldn’t sit by passively. “Come on, Mayor! You can’t do this!”

  “Oh, but we can and we will. We already done it, case you forgot.” Eamon nodded in the direction of Clark’s crumpled form. “City fellas gotta learn. When you fuck with folks like us? You git fucked back a hundred times harder.”

  “You tell him, Uncle Eamon,” Sarah May said. She rubbed her hands together in anticipation of the coming festivities.

  Brice bit his lip. They couldn’t change what had happened tonight and they sure as hell weren’t going to change the minds of the Larkins and Baba’s family. The only minds subject to change tonight were his and Augie’s, after they were drilled and fornicated. If they had any shot here, it seemed to be in the things their captors couldn’t possess without their help.

  “I’ve got an eighty thousand dollar BWM outside, Mayor,” Brice said. “I’ll sign the title over to you right now. “

  Eamon winced. “You oughtta be ashamed of yerself, son! Be American, buy American.”

  Augie was now efficiently cinched and immobile. His hands shook as he strained against the bonds, but he wasn’t going anywhere. Rope burns peeked out, an angry red on his wrists. Tucker turned from the
table, a demented smile on his face. He held up a hole-saw. The jagged teeth of the cylinder rather ironically reminded Brice of a shark. Tucker revved the saw. The teeth became a blur as it whirred.

  “This is what we use ta open up their noggins,” Tucker explained.

  The revving of the drill seemed to boost Brice’s pulse to a frantic new level. He stammered as he rummaged through his mind, searching for a bargain that would save both their lives. “Look, look, let us go and…and…I’ll give you a check for three hundred grand! It won’t bounce! And Augie can give you even more than that! I’m serious! Just let us go!”

  “Yeah, man, sure!” Augie echoed from the table. “Four hundred K, no bullshit! We won’t say a fucking word to anyone, we swear to Christ!”

  Eamon sighed, tsking as he shook his head. “Why is it city folks put more value on money than anythin’ else? We don’t want yer money, son. We just want our proper revenge, in the name’a my innocent daughter. You just don’t get that, do ya?”

  He pointed at Tucker. This time the teeth of the hole-saw did not slow as Tucker guided it toward Augie’s head. “Hold him steady, boys! Clyde and Horace need a good straight hole to pound this fella’s skull meat.”

  “I bet they’se could do it even with a hole ’bout yay big!” Gut said, holding his thumb and forefinger so close together that a gnat couldn’t squeeze through.

  They all roared laughter, except Eamon and of course Clyde and Horace.

  Loger and Horace both clamped their hands to either side of Augie’s head to hold him still. He made a high-pitched whining sound in his terror that was almost indivisible from the drill. It harmonized with the grating racket of the hole-saw until Augie screamed, “Briiiiiiiiiiiiice!”

  The free spinning of the cylinder stalled as it connected with the top of Augie’s head, and then it found its groove and began cleaving into the cranial bone.

  Brice screamed to be heard over Augie and the drill. “Don’t! Please, I’m begging you! I’ll give you my Upper West Side condo, man! It’s worth a million bucks! And we’ll throw in all that money!”

  Eamon snorted. “Here’s what we think’a yer blammed condo, son.”