Shut The Fuck Up And Die! (18 page)

“
You hear me? Come out now and I’ll
make sure my brother doesn’t make that whore of yours suffer to
much. Daryl likes those dark haired ladies. He could have himself a
real good time with the likes of her. Unless, that is, I stop
him.”

Earl knew he would never catch up with the
man if Matt kept running. The act of walking and yelling at the
same time was already making him winded and, after all the activity
of the previous night, his muscles were as sore as if he’d been
cutting grass for three days straight. In the same light, however,
his quarry couldn’t keep up forever either. Sooner or later, a
stitch would develop in the man’s side. His lungs would feel like
they were on fire with every breath, just as Earl’s did now, and
he’d be forced to slow his pace. The secret was to keep after him
just quickly enough that once Matt’s initial burst of adrenaline
started to fade Earl would begin closing the gap. Besides that, the
heavyset man knew this forest. He’d spent countless hours
scampering through them as a child, had poached game in them ever
since he was big enough not to be knocked on his ass by the kick of
a rifle; they were just as much his home as the old farmhouse with
its peeling paint and rusty gutters.

So he’d save his breath and stop hurling
threats to the uncaring pines. He’d follow the footprints in the
snow with strides so long that he probably looked like a Sasquatch
from a distance. And, when he finally closed in on the tired and
hopelessly lost outsider . . . well, then the fun would really
begin.

“
This is for you, Mama.” He whispered.
“This is for you.”

Matt skipped through the forest as if he were
playing a game instead of being stalked by a cold-blooded killer.
Every so often, he’d leap into the air and twirl around, kicking
little puffs of snow out from under his heels. Even the cold didn’t
bother him that much. His jacket kept the worst of it at bay; and
any chill that managed to make it through the quilted lining was
quickly defeated by the excitement that warmed his veins.

It was much quieter now that Earl had stopped
trying to sound like a bad ass from some cheesy action film. Every
so often, he’d hear some unseen animal crash through the underbrush
and, once or twice, he’d even though he’d heard the distant
chuffing of a deer.

The trees overhead were clustered so thickly
together that the woods were almost in a perpetual state of
twilight. He could see well enough for fifty yards ahead or so, but
after that it grew progressively darker. However, that darkness
seemed to be perpetually just out of reach . . . as if it were
matching his pace and racing away from him as quickly as he could
approach it. Which was fine by him. Chasing the darkness was
something of a hobby . . . and one which he’d been doing his entire
life.

The smell pine scent, the evergreens with
their tall, straight trunks, and the crunch and swish of his feet
passing through snow: it all made him feel as if he were nearly a
decade younger. It was like he were that pimply faced fourteen year
old boy again being taken to his father’s cabin for his first
hunting trip.

He’d prepared for that expedition all summer
long, shooting the thirty-ought-six so often that his right
shoulder was perpetually bruised from the recoil and gunpowder
clung to his hair and clothes like cologne. Their backyard had
sparkled with shattered beer bottles and tin cans with star-shaped
holes blasted into their sides. And he’d become quite the marksman.
At first it had only been because he liked the way his father would
rustle his hair and beam down at him every time his bullet found
its mark. He’d liked the praise heaped upon him from this normally
cold and distant man, had sought it as eagerly as a puppy will seek
a scratch on the belly. But, over time, he’d come to take a certain
pride in his skill that had nothing to do with his old man.

The secret was in pretending that the
bottles were the heads of all the kids who’d ever pushed him in the
playground. The bullies who’d flicked his ass with wet towels in
the locker room. That garlic-smelling, fat ass bastard, Mr. French,
who’d kept him after class in second grade to play the petting
game. All the cute girls who’d laughed at him and made him feel
like he was no better than the gum they chewed up and spit into the
dirt. Even his own father for that one time Matt had came home
early until to find the old man thrusting into some woman half his
age who was bound and gagged just like in the magazines he’d found
stashed under his old man’s bed. Matt had been beaten so badly that
he could barely move for a week after and, even then, he could
still hear his father’s seething voice whispering in the darkness
of memory:
you tell anyone about this and
I swear to God no one will ever find your body. I’ll tell them you
ran away, that you’d been threatening to for weeks. Not that anyone
would miss you anyway . . . .

Matt’s father had been almost like a cruel
god. On one level, he hated the old man so badly that it sometimes
felt as if his guts had twisted themselves into knots. He
fantasized about beating the man down with his Louisville slugger,
of seeing him cry and beg for mercy. But, on the other hand, he
yearned for those rare moments when he’d see pride glimmer in his
dad’s eyes or when his large hand would clap Matt on the back as if
to say “that’s my boy”. They were fleeting, but there were a
handful of times when Matt had honestly felt like he had a real
father.

And that initial hunting trip had been one of
them. He could still remember watching the redhead zig-zag through
the snow through the scope on his rifle. The dimpled skin on her
bare chest, the way she’d stumble and fall, and how her bush would
be clumped with tiny snowballs when she’d scramble back to her
feet. His father’s voice whispering in his ear . . . .

“
It’s time to become a man now,
Matt.”

With his dad, it had always been redheads
and, though it could have just been a trick of memory, it seemed to
Matt now as if they had all bore a striking resemblance to the
pretty young woman smiling from the pictures on the mantle. The
mother he’d never known. But none of them had been quite as
exhilarating as the first.

He remembered standing over her and watching
as steam curled from the crimson stained snow. How motionless and
perfect she was in death . . . . Her blue eyes had stared up at a
sky that matched their color exactly, unblinking and free from all
the worries and pain and heartaches that accompanied breathing.
Almost as if she were watching her soul float into the sky like a
balloon that had slipped from her grasp.

His father had whooped and cackled, had
scooped the frail boy into his arms, and kissed him on the forehead
so wetly that it later formed a thin layer of ice. But, at that
precise moment, Matt knew what it meant to bask in the approval he
had so desperately chased after all his life. With his father’s arm
draped over his shoulder and a dead woman at his feet, it almost
seemed as if the kidnapped hooker’s soul had been consumed by his
own as thoroughly as scavengers would later devour the carcass. He
felt stronger and more in control than he ever had. No more was he
a confused and frightened child bobbing on the waves of doubt and
uncertainty; no longer would he look at other people and struggle
to figure out what made them so much better than him, what magic
piece they possessed in jigsaw puzzle of existence that he lacked.
For he then knew the truth: all of those people with their upturned
noses and downcast eyes . . . they were nothing more than cattle
awaiting slaughter. Nothing more than sustenance for a predator
that loomed over them from the next link in the foodchain. And each
and every one of them was his for the taking.

With his mind firmly back in the present,
Matt glanced over his shoulder to see is he could spot the plodding
Neanderthal through the thick cover of trees. His gaze was met with
nothing more than a pair of birds hopping from branch to branch and
his own footsteps trailing back into the depths of the forest.
Frowning, he scratched his chin for a moment as he thought.

Maybe this oaf was smarter than Matt had
given him credit for. As he’d thought about his father, he’d
purposefully slowed his pace to the point that ice could have
almost melted more quickly. Driven on by anger and adrenaline, the
overweight beast should have at least been close enough by now to
be glimpsed as a silhouette moving through the bushes and trunks .
But there was nothing.

Had his pursuer changed tactics then?
Perhaps instead of blindly following wherever the tracks led him,
he was circling around and planning to cut Matt off at some point
further into the woods. He hadn’t seemed too much brighter than the
skinny one, but there
was
the
chance that he was operating off pure instinct now and allowing his
actions to be controlled by a much more primal portion of the
brain.

It would be better to be safe than sorry, as
Mona always said; he’d adapt his own tactics, as well. Change his
initial plan into something that would work no matter what
situation presented itself. On the off chance that fat behemoth was
more cagey than at first he’d seemed, Matt would have to improvise,
adapt, and overcome . . . .

That thought brought a smile to his
face as he removed the object that was slung over his shoulder and
scouted his surroundings with eyes that noted every detail with
microscopic clarity. He could feel the excitement tingle his arms
and legs, could smell every scent on the crisp air as clearly as if
he’d been born a wolf, and hear the slightest rustle in the
snow.
He
was the primary
predator in these woods and everything else simply existed to serve
his needs.

From somewhere close by, an unseen deer
crashed through the undergrowth as if it had suddenly sensed danger
on this otherwise peaceful, winter morning. As if it somehow knew
that blood would soon darken the forest floor and evil would roll
across the landscape like a roiling fog.

“
Let’s do this, Fat Man . . . . It’s
time to play.”

Earl couldn’t help it. He’d had to stop and
catch his breath for a moment, to give his lungs time to gulp down
the cold air and refuel his body. If he hadn’t have been up all
damn night running errands for Mama, then it may have been
different; but, as it was, his back pressed against the rough bark
of a tree while he leaned forward. With his hands resting on
slightly bent knees, he tried to listen past the sound of his own
gasps for the tell-tale sounds that would gave away his prey’s
location. But with his throat rattling with every gulp of air and
his heart beating so hard that it almost sounded like the thumping
of a low-flying helicopter, he was lucky that he could even hear
his own thoughts.

“
Son of a bitch . . . shit . . .
.”

The frigid bite of the air had spread into
the metal of the gun and it now felt as if he carried a block of
ice solidly in his hand. From his back pocket, the fingers from a
pair of green work gloves waved at his ass and he was tempted to
slip them on, even if it were only for a little bit. The numbing
cold made his knuckles and joints feel as stiff and unresponsive as
an engine that had been running without oil. Even just five minutes
would be enough to chase away the needles of pain that nicked his
exposed flesh.

“
Gotta be ready.” He reminded himself.
“Gotta be prepared.”

It was, after all, hard enough for him to
force his rounded index finger through the trigger guard as it was.
He had just enough room to feel the frosty curve of metal against
the crook of that finger. Just enough space that he would be able
to squeeze off a shot at a moment’s notice. With the thick, cotton
gloves on, he’d be lucky to get even his fingernail into position:
it would be like trying to shove a pig into a bucket.

Besides, what was a little discomfort
compared to what those bastards must have put Mama through? If he
couldn’t even put up with some discomfort in order to have his
revenge, then he was never really deserving of her love to begin
with and no better than that good for nothing brother of his.

“
Don’t know for certain that she’s
dead.” Part of his mind insisted. “What did ya really see? Nothin’
more than a pair of glasses and a bit of blood. Blood coulda been
from that blond bitch. And the glasses coulda broke when they fell
off.”

Earl would have liked to believe this quiet
voice in the back of his mind. He would have loved to think that
Mama was back at the house, hiding somewhere while she listened for
the familiar sound of her sons’ footsteps. Perhaps under the sink
like a frightened little mouse. Or wedged into the closet-sized
space behind the false paneling where they stashed the jewelry,
clothing, and other personal effects of those who were unfortunate
enough to be brought into their home. There were a thousand places
in the farmhouse that a nimble old woman could lay low.

But, deep down inside, Earl knew this wasn’t
the case. It was a certainty that felt like a hollow pit somewhere
between his gut and chest and he wondered, for a moment, if this
was how a mother felt after carrying a child in her womb for the
better part of a year. To have this life suddenly gone after being
accustomed to its weight for so long. This pit that was now as
empty as a shallow grave waiting to be filled.

Earl’s eye stung and he tried to tell himself
that it was only because they were dry and tired. Real men didn’t
cry. Real men pushed it all back inside and fed off its bitter
aftertaste like a baby bird being force fed worms and insects. It
made them stronger, made them able to get up and do what needed to
be done. Crying was for sissy boys like Daryl; tears were why that
little pansy was cut up and whimpering in the dark while Earl was
rewarded with Mama’s special treats. As long as he remained a man,
Earl was able to enjoy the pleasures that accompanied it: the soft
squish of a boob squeezed in his hand; the musty scent of a woman’s
most secret place . . . and Mama’s voice, whispering in his ear
that it was okay, that this was what men did to women, that it was
natural that it felt good.