THUGLIT Issue Twelve (16 page)

He screams. Like a bitch. Finally those contorted sounds turn into a word.

"Why?"

I
'm dressed all in black, from my boots to the balaclava covering my face. Don't want him to recognize me. I do my best Batman voice.

"
Because."

He
'll walk eventually. With a limp. Maybe a cane.

Reggie is the last of the six. The other five, like him, are in various states of disrepair, all with permanent reminders of how breakable they are. Reggie probably had it easiest, because he didn
't do very much. Didn't do anything to stop it either.

My brother is in what they call a persistent vegetative state. Everything works except his brain. There's all kinds of articles about it. I've read most of them. Some claim he can hear it when you talk to him. Some say he can't. He has this thing, muscle memory. Put a deck of cards in his hands and he'll shuffle them. Spooky. I remember teaching him how to do it. Give him a fork or spoon and he'll feed himself, keep going even after the food's gone. Does he want more? Can he taste it?

A little while ago, I brought him a bat. I was curious. Sneaked it in under my coat. Placed it in his eager hands. He adjusted his grip, choked up a bit, then almost took my head off with a mighty swing, almost swung himself out of the bed. I had to pry it out of his hands, hands that kept reaching for it after I took it away.

I gave him a deck of cards. It seemed to occupy him.

I stop by Johnny Del Negro's pub. Tell him how things went down with the BC kid and with Saul.

"
You better pray that insurance money comes in."

I already have.
"It will."

"
In the future take it easy on the co-eds, tough guy. I don't need to draw any more heat on my operation than I already got." He says it because he has to, but he doesn't mind a reputation for being heartless. Word will spread, he will benefit.

"
Okay."

"
Nice work, Legs. Get out of here."

He knows where I
'm going. The one thing he doesn't crack wise about. Smart of him.

I can smell the sterile hospital scent even before I step inside. The people at the desk, the orderlies all know me, we nod at each other.

Today, I look closer at them. My brother's been here for years, just like they have. They've changed too, heavier, grayer hair, eyes a little sadder every time I come. I'm no different.

There are not a lot of happy stories inside the rooms in this facility, not a lot of smiles, or relief. Like a church, this place is full of quiet, desperate, unanswered prayers. But we keep hoping. Hoping someone will hear, someone will answer one.

I slide a chair over next to my brother's bed, sit. I take his hand, squeeze, he squeezes back just as hard. Harder maybe. I think about what I did to Reggie Hanson. My last errand for my brother. I wonder again, like always, Did I do what he wanted me to? My brother's breathing seems to get deeper, his eyes open wide, like always. I have no idea what he sees. No idea if he knows what I did, what I've done, for him.

Just faith. Maybe that
's all we ever have.

I think back on that day, when we were kids. I was warming up before a game, in my team uniform. I tossed a ball in the air, took huge, Dwight Evans cuts at the ball, swinging for the fences, for an imaginary Green Monster. I had hit my first home run the week before. I can still remember the feeling. That perfect moment: the ball, the bat, the swing, everything aligned just right, the ball going and going. Nothing quite like it.

But I wasn't connecting with the ball, kept missing or hitting it into the ground. Too eager. The more I missed, the harder I swung.

Nick made some comment, maybe grinned when he shouldn
't have. Then the smack of the bat hitting him. The blood. The expression on my father's face. The truest, purest hurt I've ever seen.

After a bit, Nick lets go of my hand.

I lift the bat I brought in under my coat. My funeral coat. My skin tingles, my heart beats loud and strong, echoes in my head.

We
've been practicing. I usually hold up a pillow after I hand him the bat. His swing has gotten better, a home run swing.

No pillow this time.

He adjusts his grip until his knuckles turn white. His jaw clenches. Any second now.

I lower my head. To the cent
er of an imaginary strike zone.

Exhale.

Pray for the scent of Saul's bread when I wake.

Swing for the fences, brother.

KEVIN GARVE
Y
aka TheGARV, is a MMA ring announcer, commentator and blogger. His short fiction can be found on
infectiveink.com
and his own website,
thegarv.com
.

EDWARD HAGELSTEI
N
continues to spew out ugly, immoral fiction from a damp abandoned fallout shelter in Florida, where he lives an otherwise average life.

ROB HART
is the class director at
LitReactor
and the associate publisher at MysteriousPress.com. He's the author of
The Last Safe Place: A Zombie Novella
, and his short stories have appeared in
Shotgun Honey, Crime Factory, Thuglit, Needle, Kwik Krimes
, and
Helix Literary Magazine
. He lives in New York City.

LEON MARKS
writes fiction that explores darkness, crime and identity.  He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Fairfield University and teaches writing and communications at the City University of New York.  More at
www.leonmarks.com
.
 

MIKE MINER
lives and writes in Connecticut.  His stories can be found in the anthologies,
Lost Children: Protectors, Pulp Ink 2
and the
Plan B Anthology
as well as journals such as
Narrative
,
PANK
,
Beat to a Pulp
,
All Due Respect
,
The Flash Fiction Offensive
,
Shotgun Honey
and others.  He is the author of three books:
Everything She Knows
(Solstice e-books),
Prodigal Sons
(Full Dark City Press), and
The Immortal Game
(Gutter Books).

JUSTIN PORTER
was born and raised in New York City. His fiction has appeared in
Thuglit
,
Demolition Mag
,
Plots With Guns
,
Pulp Pusher
,
Steampunk Tales
and the anthologies
Sex, Thugs and Rock & Roll
, and
Blood, Guts and Whiskey
. His articles have appeared in The New York Times and can be found at
portersnotebook.tumblr.com
, where he posts new fiction regularly.

T. MAXIM SIMMLER
writes crime, horror and assorted weird stuff, mostly while working the night desk at a riverside hotel.

J. J. SINISI
is a professional out of New York but spends what little free time he has strolling dark alleyways creating crime fiction. After receiving an honorable mention in
Glimmer Train's
annual Family Matters contest, he launched the noir webcomic
This Desperate City
. His work has appeared at
Heater,
multiple times on
Shotgun Honey
and will be featured later this year on
The Flash Fiction Offensive.
He plans to increase his fiction output just as soon as the little girls in his house start falling asleep earlier. To see more of his crime stories and to get hooked on his webcomic, drop by
www.thisdesperatecity.com
.

TODD ROBINSON
(Editor) is the creator and Chief Editor of Thuglit. His writing has appeared in
Blood & Tacos
,
Plots With Guns
,
Needle Magazine
,
Shotgun Honey
,
Strange, Weird, and Wonderful
,
Out of the Gutter
,
Pulp Pusher
,
Grift,
Demolition Magazine
,
CrimeFactory
,
All Due Respect
, and several anthologies. He has been nominated three times for the Derringer Award, short-listed for Best American Mystery Stories, selected for Writers Digest's Year's Best Writing 2003, lost the Anthony Award in 2013, and won the inaugural Bullet Award in June 2011. The first collection of his short stories,
Dirty Word
s
is now available and his debut novel
The Hard Bounce
is available from Tyrus Books.

ALLISON GLASGOW
(Editor) Edits.

JULIE MCCARRON
(Editor) is a celebrity ghostwriter with three New York Times bestsellers to her credit. Her books have appeared on every major entertainment and television talk show; they have been featured in
Publishers Weekly
and excerpted in numerous magazines including
People
. Prior to collaborating on celebrity bios, Julie was a book editor for many years. Julie started her career writing press releases and worked in the motion picture publicity department of Paramount Pictures and for Chasen & Company in Los Angeles. She also worked at General Publishing Group in Santa Monica and for the Dijkstra Literary Agency in Del Mar before turning to editing/writing full-time. She lives in Southern California.

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