Read We Need to Talk About Kevin Online
Authors: Lionel Shriver
Tags: #Fiction, #Psychological, #Teenage Boys, #Epistolary Fiction, #General, #Literary, #Massacres, #School Shootings, #High Schools, #New York (State)
We Need to Talk About Kevin (40 page)
Eva
FEBRUARY 24, 2001
Dear Franklin,
When I saw Kevin today his left cheek was bruised, his lower lip swollen; his knuckles were scabbed. I asked if he was all right and he said he cut himself shaving. Maybe the lamest remarks pass for drollery when you’re locked up. It gave him palpable pleasure to deny me access to his travails inside, and who am I to interfere with his few enjoyments; I didn’t press the matter. Afterward, I might have complained to the prison authorities about their failure to protect our son, but considering what Kevin has himself inflicted on his peers, objection to a few scrapes in return seemed worse than petulant.
I dropped any further preliminaries. I’m increasingly indifferent to setting him at ease on my visits when his own efforts are aimed solely at my discomfiture.
“It’s been preying on me,” I said right off. “I can almost understand going on some indiscriminate frenzy, venting your frustrations on whomever happens to be in the way. Like that quiet, unassuming Hawaiian a year or two ago, who just flipped—”
“Bryan Uyesugi,” Kevin provided. “He kept fish.”
“Seven coworkers?”
Kevin patted his hands in mock applause. “Two thousand fish. And it was Xerox. He was a copy-machine repairman. Nine-millimeter Glock.”
“I’m so pleased,” I said, “that this experience has afforded you an expertise.”
“He lived on ‘Easy Street,’” Kevin noted. “It was a dead-end.”
“My point is, Uyooghi—”
“Yoo-SOO-ghee,” Kevin corrected.
“It clearly didn’t matter who those employees were—”
“Guy was a member of the Hawaiian Carp Association. Maybe he thought that meant he was supposed to complain.”
Kevin was showing off; I waited to make sure the little recital was over.
“But your get-together in the gym,” I resumed, “was By Invitation Only.”
“All my
colleagues
aren’t indiscriminate. Take Michael McDermott, last December. Wakefield, Mass., Edgewater Tech—AK, .12-gauge shotgun. Specific targets. Accountants. Anybody had to do with docking his paycheck 2,000 bucks—”
colleagues
aren’t indiscriminate. Take Michael McDermott, last December. Wakefield, Mass., Edgewater Tech—AK, .12-gauge shotgun. Specific targets. Accountants. Anybody had to do with docking his paycheck 2,000 bucks—”
“I don’t want to talk about Michael McDermott, Kevin—”
“He was fat.”
“—
Or
about Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold—”
Or
about Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold—”
“Morons. Give mass murderers a bad name.”
I told you, Franklin, he’s obsessed with those Columbine kids, who upstaged him only twelve days later with six more fatalities; I’m sure I brought them up just to rile him.
“At least Harris and Klebold had the courtesy to save the taxpayer a bundle and make a quick exit,” I observed coolly.
“Weenies just trying to inflate their casualty figures.”
“Why didn’t you?”
He didn’t seem to take offense. “Why make it easy for everybody.”
“Everybody like me.”
“You included,” he said smoothly. “Sure.”
“But why Dana Rocco and not another teacher, why those particular kids? What made them so special?”
“Uh
, duh
,” said Kevin. “I didn’t like them.”
, duh
,” said Kevin. “I didn’t like them.”
“You don’t like anybody,” I pointed out. “What, did they beat you at kickball? Or do you just not like Thursdays?”
In the context of Kevin’s new specialty, my oblique reference to Brenda Spencer qualified as a classical allusion. Brenda killed two adults and wounded nine students in her San Carlos, California, high school only because, as the Boomtown Rats’ hit single subsequently attested, “I Don’t Like Mondays.” The fact that this seminal atrocity dates back to 1979 distinguishes the sixteen-year-old as ahead of her time. My nod to his puerile pantheon earned me what in other children would have been a smile.
“It must have been quite a project,” I said, “trimming the list.”
“Massive,” he agreed affably. “Started out like, fifty, sixty serious contenders. Ambitious,” he said, then shook his head. “But impractical.”
“All right, we have forty-five more minutes,” I said. “Why Denny Corbitt?”
“—The ham!” he said, as if checking his grocery list before checkout.
“You remember the name of a copy-machine repairman in Hawaii, but you’re not too sure about the names of the people you murdered.”
“Uyesugi actually did something. Corbitt, if I remember right, just sat all google-eyed against the wall as if waiting for his director to block the scene.”
“My point is, so Denny was a ham. So what?”
“See that dork do Stanley in
Streetcar
? I could do a better Southern accent
underwater
.”
Streetcar
? I could do a better Southern accent
underwater
.”
“What part are you playing? The surliness, the swagger. Where’d it come from? Brad Pitt? You know, you’ve picked up a bit of a Southern accent yourself. It isn’t very good, either.”
His fellow inmates are abundantly black, and his locution has begun to warp accordingly. He’s always spoken with a peculiar slowness, that effortfulness, as if he had to hoist the words from his mouth with a shovel, so the slack-jawed urban-ghetto economy of dropped consonants and verbs is naturally infectious. Still, I was pleased with myself; I seemed to have annoyed him.
“I’m not playing a part. I am the part,” he said hotly. “Brad Pitt should play
me
.”
me
.”
(So he’d heard; a movie was already in development at Miramax.)
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “Brad Pitt’s way too old to play some pipsqueak high school sophomore. Even if he were the right age, no audience would buy that a guy who looks that street-smart would do anything so moronic. I’ve read they’re having trouble casting, you know. Nobody in Hollywood will touch your filthy little part with a barge pole.”
“Just as long as it isn’t DiCaprio,” Kevin grumbled. “He’s a twit.”
“Back to business.” I sat back. “What was your problem with Ziggy Randolph? You could hardly accuse him of failing your exalted artistic standards, like Denny. Word was that he had a professional future in ballet.”
“What had a
professional future
,” said Kevin, “was his butthole.”
professional future
,” said Kevin, “was his butthole.”
“He got an overwhelming reception when he gave that speech, explaining he was gay and proud of it at assembly. You couldn’t bear that, could you? The whole student body cooing how
courageous
he was.”
courageous
he was.”
“And how do you like that,” Kevin marveled. “Standing ovation for taking it up the ass.”
“But I really haven’t been able to figure why Greer Ulanov,” I said. “The fuzzy-headed girl, short, with prominent teeth.”
“Buck teeth,” he corrected. “Like a horse.”
“You generally had it in for the lookers.”
“Anything to get her to shut up about her ‘vast right-wing conspiracy.’”
“Ah, she was the one,” I clued. “The petition.” (I don’t know if you remember, but an indignant petition to New York congressmen circulated Gladstone High School when Clinton was impeached.)
“Admit it,
Mumsey
, having a crush on the president is totally low-rent.”
Mumsey
, having a crush on the president is totally low-rent.”
“
I
think,” I hazarded, “you don’t like people who have crushes of any sort.”
I
think,” I hazarded, “you don’t like people who have crushes of any sort.”
“More theories? ’Cause
I
think,” he returned, “you need to get a life.”
I
think,” he returned, “you need to get a life.”
“I had one. You took it.”
We faced off. “Now you’re my life,” I added. “All that’s left.”
“That,” he said, “is pathetic.”
“But wasn’t that the plan? Just you and me, getting to know one another at last.”
“More
theories
! Aren’t I fascinating.”
theories
! Aren’t I fascinating.”
“Soweto Washington.” I had a long list to get through, and I had to keep the program moving. “He’s going to walk again, I’ve read. Are you disappointed?”
“Why should I care?”
“Why did you ever care? Enough to try to kill him?”
“Didn’t try to kill him,” Kevin maintained staunchly.
“Oh, I see. You left him with holes in both thighs and that’s all on purpose. Heaven forbid that Mr. Perfect Psychopath should miss.”
Kevin raised his hands. “Hey, hey! I made mistakes! Letting that little movie nerd off scot-free was the last thing I had in mind.”
“Joshua Lukronsky,” I remembered, though we were getting ahead of ourselves. “Did you hear that your friend Joshua’s been brought on board the Miramax film, as a script consultant? They want to be historically accurate. For a “movie nerd,” it’s a dream come true.”
Kevin’s eyes screwed up. He doesn’t like it when tangential characters collect on his cachet. He was equally resentful when Leonard Pugh posted his web page, KK’s_best_friend.com, which has garnered thousands of hits and purports to expose our son’s darkest secrets for the price of a double-click.
Best friend my ass!
Kevin snarled when the site went up.
Lenny was closer to a pet hamster.
Best friend my ass!
Kevin snarled when the site went up.
Lenny was closer to a pet hamster.
“If it makes you feel better,” I added sourly, “Soweto’s basketball career is no longer a
slam-dunk
.”
slam-dunk
.”
“Yeah, well as a matter of fact that does make me feel better. Last thing the world needs is one more darkie who wants to play hoops in the NBA. Talk about stale.”
“Talk about stale! Another high school rampage?”
Kevin cleaned his nails. “I prefer to think of it as
tradition
.”
tradition
.”
“The media assumed you picked on Soweto because he was black.”
“That makes sense,” Kevin snorted. “Nine kids locked in that gym. Only one of them’s of the
Negro
persuasion, and bingo, it’s a ‘hate crime.’”
Negro
persuasion, and bingo, it’s a ‘hate crime.’”
“Oh, it was a hate crime, all right,” I said quietly.
Kevin half smiled. “Totally.”
“They said the same thing about Miguel Espinoza. That you went for him because he was Latino.”
“Superspic? I leave out
communities of color
, they’d say I discriminated.”
communities of color
, they’d say I discriminated.”
“But the real reason was he was such an academic bright spark, isn’t it? Skipped a grade. All those dizzyingly high scores on state achievement tests and the PSAT.”
“Whenever he talk to you, turn out he just trying to use ‘echelon’ in a sentence.”
“But you know what ‘echelon’ means. You know all kinds of big words. That’s why you thought it was such a hoot to write whole essays with words three letters long.”
“Fine. So it’s not like I was
jealous
. Which, if I’m getting the drift of this
bor-ing
third degree, is what you’re getting at.”
jealous
. Which, if I’m getting the drift of this
bor-ing
third degree, is what you’re getting at.”
I took a moment; you know, Kevin
did
look bored. Documentary makers like Jack Marlin, criminologists dashing off best-sellers, the principals and teachers and reverends interviewed on the news; your parents, Thelma Corbitt, Loretta Greenleaf—all these people obsessing over
why KK did it
, with the notable exception of our son. It was one more subject in which Kevin was simply not interested: himself.
did
look bored. Documentary makers like Jack Marlin, criminologists dashing off best-sellers, the principals and teachers and reverends interviewed on the news; your parents, Thelma Corbitt, Loretta Greenleaf—all these people obsessing over
why KK did it
, with the notable exception of our son. It was one more subject in which Kevin was simply not interested: himself.
“The cafeteria worker,” I raised. “He doesn’t fit the pattern.” (I always feel sheepish that I can’t remember his name.) “He wasn’t on the list, was he?”
“Collateral damage,” said Kevin sleepily.
“
And
,” I said, determined to say something to get him to look alive, “I know your secret about Laura Woolford. She was pretty, wasn’t she?”
And
,” I said, determined to say something to get him to look alive, “I know your secret about Laura Woolford. She was pretty, wasn’t she?”
“Saved her trouble,” Kevin slurred. “First sign of a wrinkle and she’d a killed herself anyway.”
“Very, very pretty.”
“Yep. Bet that girl’s mirror was all wore out.”
“
And you were sweet on her
.”
And you were sweet on her
.”
If I’d any remaining doubt, Kevin’s theatrical guffaw cleared it right up. He doesn’t often, but he rent me then, just a little. Adolescents are so obvious. “Give me credit,” he sneered, “for better taste. That Barbie doll was all accessories.”
“It embarrassed you, didn’t it?” I prodded. “The eyeliner, the Calvin Klein, the designer haircuts. The nylons and opalescent pumps. Not icy, misanthropic
KK’s
style.”
KK’s
style.”
“She wasn’t all that hot-looking when I was finished.”
“It’s the oldest story in the book,” I goaded. “
After confiding darkly to friends that, ‘If I can’t have her, then no one else is going to . . . ,’ Charlie Schmoe opened fire . . . .’
Is that what this whole sorry mess was meant to cover? Another pimply teen smitten with the unattainable prom queen goes berserk?”
After confiding darkly to friends that, ‘If I can’t have her, then no one else is going to . . . ,’ Charlie Schmoe opened fire . . . .’
Is that what this whole sorry mess was meant to cover? Another pimply teen smitten with the unattainable prom queen goes berserk?”
“In your dreams,” said Kevin. “You wanna turn this into a Harlequin romance, that’s your midget imagination, not mine.”
“Luke Woodham was lovesick, wasn’t he? In Pearl? You know, ‘The Whiner.’”
“He only went out with Christy Menefee
three times
, and they’d been busted up for a year!”
three times
, and they’d been busted up for a year!”
“Laura rebuffed you, didn’t she?”
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