Blue Stew (Second Edition) (29 page)

Walter staggered away from the table, leaving more, smaller blood prints with each step.

His head felt incredibly light now.

But, of
course
it did—what a strange, startling thing this was. How had he not felt his skin split? And . . . it wasn’t just split, he now looked closer: it was
gouged
.

Stepping on the heel of his bloody foot even though it still did not hurt, Walter started for the bathroom. A roll of toilet paper was the best he could think of to slow the bleeding.

He only made three full strides across the room, however, before he slowed to a queer stop. Comprehension had caught up with him.

No,
that
wasn’t why his head felt light. It wasn’t fear or shock or anything like that. It was
more
than that.
All
of him was starting to feel light—intensely light. He was starting to feel entirely weightless . . .
empty
, that’s how he felt.

Empty.

Walter’s eyes began to dart around the ugly motel room. What was he looking for? Sharp corners, more nails? He envisioned a whole wall covered in nails . . . he could drag his entire body along it . . . One big mosquito bite yearning to be scratched, that’s all Walter Boyd was fast becoming . . .

Walter’s phone, resting on the bedside table, began to ring. A few weeks ago he had thought it would be funny to set Maddie’s personal ringtone to the theme from
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
. A man’s voice wailed shrilly, someone whistled a three note progression, and on these sounds looped. Walter listened, detached from everything but the sound. When the sound stopped, it came together, and suddenly Madeline Wendell’s beautiful face flashed before Walter’s glossed-over eyes.

At the same time, for only a short second, Walter was reminded of something distant, and he understood. He had left the door unlocked last night (he had never locked a front door in his life, living in the country). He had left the TV on, too, so there’s little chance he would’ve heard someone creeping thought the motel as he slept. Then there was his grape juice, which he’d left open in his fridge . . . certainly a dark and flavorful enough drink that any mixture of a light, baby-blue substance would go undetected as he drank it . . . Two
full
cups of it.

Walter knew he had thought this scenario through before, in a world wholly separate from the one he was fast entering. He couldn’t fully understand
why
anymore even as he started for it, but he knew that it was
vitally
important, somehow . . .

He fell hard to his knees in front of his fridge, and the rough jolt that the fall sent through his bones made him spontaneously think of his body as a glass statue, shattering into dust and floating off into the air . . . He considered getting up and throwing himself on the floor again . . . but
no
. He knew what was happening . . .
didn’t
he?

Either way, what he apparently needed to do didn’t sound
so
bad . . . Walter pulled open the small freezer at the base of the fridge and lowered his head into it.

The cold tightened around his skull beautifully, and the pleasure spread into his lungs as he inhaled. He closed his eyes and smiled dully. Yes, he could do this, as he had promised himself he would . . . it wouldn’t take long for his brain to become an ice cube, and from there he could move on to . . . better things . . .

Time passed in the most insignificant of ways.

When the question of how long he’d been in there idly surfaced in his chilled mind, Walter realized that time had become hard for him to conceptualize. One minute could well have been thirty as he knelt down, one foot bleeding profusely, his head jammed into a freezer.

In a handful of instances in this vague span of time, impulses compelled Walter to pull his head out and find a more immediate,
satisfactory
means to the end he lusted for—but something inside of him calmly reminded him that it
had
to be like this. His understanding of why
phased in and out (more often
out
than
in
), but it was what it was at that point, so, complacently, he went along with it.

Walter faintly recalled how he had always been the type to scarf through a good meal . . . his Mom used to chastise him for never savoring things like a good meal, hadn’t she? So, this was one of those good things, wasn’t it? And it’s not like he
wasn’t
enjoying himself . . . everything felt good, everything felt right . . . he was squandering meaningless time, waiting to leave for a place of true meaning.

The feeling came on gradually, and it was diluted with directly contrasting sensations, so Walter didn’t notice when his head began to hurt, just a little.

More time passed.

There came a sound, somewhere outside of the freezer. Walter had more-or-less convinced himself that there
wasn’t
a world outside of the freezer, so he didn’t react.

That familiar hallow voice, however, was undeniable.

“Walter Boyd, my friend, are you still with us?”

Ever so slowly, Walter pulled his head out of the freezer. His frosted eyelashes stuck for an instant before they snapped apart.

Timothy Glass, pulling a hood off of his mangy, scarred head, stood in the doorway.

“Ah. I’m sorry you’re still with us . . . but part of me is
not
,” Timothy pulled the door shut behind him. He looked more shriveled and weak that he had when he’d last been seen, and his long hair was even wilder now. “I’m so happy you came, Walter. I honestly wasn’t sure you would . . . though I
knew
we’d made a
connection
.”

Walter stared at him blankly.

Timothy smiled, and even then Walter shuddered slightly.

“I apologize for being rude, what with all the sneaking about . . . but I didn’t want to allow your chemical imbalance to overpower the
true
you this time.” Timothy took a few steps into the room. “I watched you drink two cups, through the rear window. How does it feel, to think with an unimpaired mind?”

Walter, after a second, shrugged.

“It’s hard to put to words, such eloquent beauty. Everything I said makes perfect sense, now, doesn’t it?”

Slowly, Walter began to nod.

Crazed satisfaction flashed over Timothy’s pale, cut-up face, “Good. I
am
happy you’re still here, because I wanted to give you a gift. Something to make your departure far more
satisfying
.”

He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a small red Swiss Army knife. Using a grungy fingernail to flip out the main blade, Timothy explained, “One of the Boy Scout boys dropped it.”

He held it out for Walter, handle forwards.

Walter rose to his feet, one of which was caked in dried blood. His eyes were moving around quickly, but Timothy never noticed this small sign of anxiety. He only saw what he wanted to see.

“Thank you,” Walter spoke. His voice was subdued. He gimped towards Timothy, wincing mutedly every other step, and accepted the knife.

Walter stepped back and looked at the blade.

“It would be an honor to watch as you set yourself free. I saw so much of
me
in you that night, Walter.”

Walter swallowed, still eyeing the blade. Then he turned around and said as he moved towards his bed, “Actually . . . I think I have something better in my backpack . . .”

As Walter reached for his backpack’s front zipper, Timothy replied from behind him, “
Oh
. Okay, good. You know, it was an interesting choice, sticking your head into the freezer. No one else has done anything so . . .
tame
.”

Walter turned around, clutching the knife in one hand and a plastic Ziploc bag in the other.

“It worked for Victim Number Two,” Walter replied simply. His voice was much less subdued, all of a sudden.

“What?” Timothy asked, one eyebrow raised. He hadn’t yet noticed what the Ziploc bag contained.

“That’s how Victim Number Two survived the Blue Stew, accidentally: he threw himself into ice water. I didn’t have that, but I had a freezer.”

All expression left Timothy’s face. He didn’t look much different than usual.

“Once again,” Timothy’s voice was barely a whisper, “I have
grossly
overestimated you, Walter Boyd.”

Walter stared into Timothy’s eyes, and Timothy stared back. There was betrayal somewhere far off in those dark, receded eyes.

“Depends on how you look at it,” replied Walter.

Timothy shook his head, on the brink of hysterical exasperation, “How can you
still
not see? I told you, and now I
showed
you, but you still do not
see
: Life is cold, random pain and suffering.”

“Sure, it can be all of that,” conceded Walter freely.

“
Yes
. . . think about all the wars . . . think about our long histories of rape, of torture, of genocide. Something so cold and random inherently
can’t
have a purpose.  Life has no
point
, Walter.”

Walter sighed, “You’re right. But maybe
that’s
the point, Timothy. It’s up to
us
to create our own points—to create purposes for our lives.”

Walter’s words crashed against a brick wall, “Did you get that from a motivational poster? Was it the caption under a picture of a loving mother hugging her child? You are
hopeless
, Walter.”

“So are you,” replied Walter.

Utter silence.

“What now? I am unarmed.”

Walter held up the Ziploc bag. There was a small light-blue capsule in it. “I saved this for you.”

“Is that my . . . Blue Stew?”

“Yes, it is yours.” Walter took a step towards Timothy; Timothy flinched. “It should have only ever been
yours
, Timothy. You created your life’s purpose: a medicine to treat your own mental illness. But you were deluded and arrogant and you forced something that is
yours
onto those five men and those six boys, and that is sickening.”

Walter saw Timothy’s eyes dart to his side, towards the door.

That was when Walter acted as he had since decided he should’ve on that defining night, late last fall.

He lunged towards Timothy. Timothy let out a screech and jumped for the door, but Walter was too fast. He barreled into Timothy with all his weight, and Timothy’s body went sprawling before him with startlingly little resistance. It felt as though he had just tackled a scarecrow.

Walter easily overpowered Timothy’s bony, flailing limbs, straddled his chest, and put the Swiss Army knife up to his neck.

“Now I’m giving you a choice,” Walter spoke fast. “Either I turn you in, and you suffer for the rest of your life in
two
kinds of prisons . . . or you take your own medicine and end this yourself, right now, the way it should’ve ended before any of . . .
this
.” With his free hand, Walter retrieved the nearby Ziploc bag that’d been dropped in the abbreviated scuffle.

Timothy looked up at Walter, blinking frantically, panting. Walter felt as though he was staring down a scared, cornered rodent.

“So,” Timothy swallowed, and his convulsing Adam’s Apple touched Walter’s blade, “this is how it ends for me?”

“This is how it ends for you,” asserted Walter.

Timothy closed his eyes and forced a slow, shuddering breath out of his lunges.