Page 96 of You Can Make Me
“As soon as she realized she was pregnant, she became desperate. She returned to her husband and tried to pass you off as his. But he knew you were illegitimate. He made you pay for it your entire childhood.”
The pieces of his life he hated the most were coming to me rapid-fire, though from where, I had no clue.
“How…? Big deal, News Boy! I was an abused kid. Wah-wah. Don’t you think I know the psychology of why I am the way I am? I take pride in it! I became a brutal killer, and I’ve loved every minute, so dear old Dad did me afavor. So if you’ll excuse me.”
He tried to push me aside—and his hand disintegrated.
We both looked down at the stub, and Evans screamed.
“What did you do?!”
I opened my mouth to reply that I didn’t know, but instead, the truths kept coming.
“When you were twelve, your mother admitted you were the biggest mistake of her life. Your siblings turned their backs on you, began to ignore you. They refused to speak to you, pretended you were invisible, that awful game kids play…but they excelled at it. You often went days without a single member of your family saying a word to you.”
His mouth opened and he tried to respond, but his jaw disappeared.
“Oh my God, Cooper,” Dane gasped. “Keep going!”
Evans’ eyes shook in their sockets with terror, and I saw movement to my right.
“Walter, no!” Dane called out to him as he approached from the house. Walter had his weapon trained on Evans, but I held up a hand.
“At school, your siblings let the other kids in on the game, and they ignored you, too. You tried to make a name for yourself with your teachers, tried to impress them with your above-average intelligence, but they didn’t pay attention. And you couldn’t impress your parents because neither of them wanted anything to do with you, either.”
His ears vanished, and he shook his head, bringing his lone hand up to what was left of his mouth. His skin began to crack like ash before our eyes.
The truths continued to pour out of my mouth in a matter-of-fact tone devoid of empathy or warmth. I didn’t sound like myself, but then, this person hadn’t earned compassion or sympathy from me.
“You made it through graduation with mediocre grades, probably because you spent all of your time torturing small animals and dreaming about blood. You were obsessed with it, and pictures and movies weren’t enough. You’d gained no knowledge of any trades, you didn’t earn any scholarships, so college was out of the question, leaving manual labor as your only option. But in the mid-sixties in California, that didn’t pay enough for you to live on, and your parents kicked you out with nothing but your clothes and twenty bucks.”
The lower half of his legs disappeared and he thumped to his knees, shaking his head and pleading wordlessly with his arms and one hand.
I couldn’t have stopped if I’d chosen. A force within urged me on.
Witness it all. Tell the truth.
“The last straw for you was when you showed up for your military draft appointment and, after the exam, they wouldn’t take you. You’d been so eager to join because you knew you’d have the freedom to kill. You’d seen all the news clips about Vietnam. But they said no.”
The skeleton fell forward onto his hand as the thigh bones disintegrated, a fine dust blowing in the breeze.
“You found Caltrans, and started to make enough money to live on, made some friends—or so you thought. But they only tolerated you because you paid for the drugs and booze.
“And then you met Tess Miller.”
The skeleton shook its head again and crawled forward. I stepped back to avoid it touching me…and the final blow fell from my lips.
“But she wanted nothing to do with you, either. She sensed the evil in you, and she was terrified when you came around. Try as you might, you couldn’t get close to her…until you attempted to murder Dane. You were stopped, thwarted by the carnival that had always rejected you all. You assumed with Dane out of the way, you could finally get Tess to agree to see you. She still refused. So you ended her life. But it was bittersweet, wasn’t it, Virgil? Because your feelings for her were your last remnants of humanity.
“You may have thought you’d become powerful when you learned to control minds, but you couldnevermake the people you loved most in your life love you back. Your existence was empty from then on, and despite all the slaughter, despite your manipulation, you made it to the carnival…only to be stopped. Permanently.”
The torso was all that was left. A strangled cry erupted from the maw where its mouth once was, before the ribs collapsed into a pile with the broken skull on top.
“And now it’s time for you to pay the enormous debt you owe. With your death, all of those you’ve controlled will be released to make amends—but you will be given no quarter. You are doomed to an eternity of nothingness. No power, no love, only an awareness that you…are…nothing.”
A strong breeze blew through the yard, and the remaining bones crumbled to dust.
I exhaled and stepped back, holding on to my chest to calm my racing heart.
