Erik Handy (14 page)

She pulled away.

***

Buckles drove around looking for another baseball field. There was no way he would go back to his old haunt. Someone might get suspicious and ask him why he would watch a Little League game and not have a child playing. That would devastate his Saturdays.

He eventually found a field fifteen minutes from his house. It was a double field -- two games were being played at once.

He quickly parked and snatched up his baseball cap.

***

Off reported to Buckles again. Eddie just was not conforming to the library's regime.

***

Meat and potatoes for dinner.

***

Buckles called in from work one day and followed a school bus on its morning and afternoon routes.

He brought along a spare pair of pants.

***

"What do you want to watch tonight?" Buckles asked his wife.

No answer.

"Honey?"

"I don't know. Nothing."

"Okay."

It was cold in the living room where they sat.

Buckles got up. "I think I'm going to walk the dog."

***

And so it went.

Routine.

And Buckles was fine with that.

***

"He's writing story about us," Off told Buckles. "I saw him."

"You saw him writing?"

Off nodded. "I saw what he writing, too. Bad, bad word."

"Well, there's really nothing we can do about that. If he changes the names and doesn't defame us . . . . " He realized he was talking too fast for Off so he quit trying. "Thank you, Off. Keep me posted."

***

Buckles couldn't sleep that night. Did that damn Eddie know his secrets? There was no way he could. Absolutely no way.

"Damn you," he whispered.

Eddie was a threat to his routine life, to his little slice of the world, and this frightened Buckles. This was all he had and he would do whatever it took to preserve it. Whatever it took to not fear it slipping from his hands.

***

Buckles was parked in his favorite spot near the elementary school when the cop tapped on his window. Buckles lost a breath. He rolled down the window.

"Morning, sir."

Buckles tried to say "Hello."

"Can I ask you what you're doing here?"

 Buckles caught his breath. An answer came with it. "I was driving by yesterday and one of these kids threw a stick at my van. I wanted to see if he went to this school before calling you guys."

It was a flimsy excuse, but it was the most logical one he could come up with.

"I see. Well, some parents have noticed you've been parking here for the last couple of days. When did the kids throw the stick?"

A corner of Buckles' little world fully left his hand. There wasn't much left to hold on to, but he tried anyway.

"Tuesday. Tuesday morning."

"Today's Thursday, sir."

Buckles looked at his watch, feigning ignorance. "Oh." He shook his head.

"I'm going to have to ask you to move on here. Next time a kid throws stuff at your vehicle, call us right away, okay?"

"Yes, sir."

***

That evening after work, Buckles traded in his blue van for a pick-up truck. It put a kink in a plan he had been mulling over recently, but the van was now known. He would also need to find another elementary school, preferably one further away from the previous one. That meant he would need to change his work schedule to 9:00 to 5:00.

No one at work would mind. His wife wouldn't either.

This could really be something special.

***

Buckles bought a baseball uniform in a child's size and hid it in his shed. He also bought a roll of duct tape and a hunting knife.

When he got home after his shopping trip, he immediately went into the bathroom, past his wife who was reading on the couch, and masturbated.

He had a plan. A plan so bold he couldn't even think straight.

The first step was getting his wife out of the house.

***

The next day at work, Eddie walked up to an unsuspecting Buckles and said, "I know what you're planning."

"Huh? What? What am I planning?"

Eddie walked away without another word.

Buckles suddenly felt sick to his stomach. He left work early, speeding to his new school. If he made it in time, he could catch a straggler.

He made it in time.

"Eddie doesn't know," he told the boy in the seat beside him as he headed home. "He can't know."

"Oh he knows," the boy said.

Buckles looked over and for a moment saw Darrell instead of his captive.

"What?"

"Let me go."

Buckles didn't.

***

"I pooped my pants."

Six years old.

"Go sit back down, Buckles. I mean, Bucky."

"But I have to go to the bathroom."

"Hey, guys!" shouted one of the other kids in the classroom. "Buckles pooped his pants again!"

All the other kids started to laugh.

Buckles started to cry.

***

Now.

Buckles sat in his truck by the empty ball park. Blood was drying on his hands, but his mind was far from physical matters. He wanted to cry over what he did. He knew it was wrong. He may have been a lot of things, a loser, a failure. He might have been oblivious to practically everything that people didn't like about him, but he knew he was completely in the wrong now.

He wasn't a religious person, but he knew he would go straight to Hell after he died.

He didn't care.

Buckles felt remorse, but the remorse was overpowered by the urge to do it again. He didn't care who he hurt or how terrible he felt afterward or how evil he was. Nothing mattered but what he wanted. Wasn't he owed a little pleasure in his miserable life?

He was in charge. He could keep his hunger under control. He could finally live fully.

Buckles was a dead man.

***

Buckles kept checking the local news to see if anyone found the body. It wasn't long before the police did.

Buckles couldn't bear to watch the teary reaction of the boy's parents. It was too real and took the pleasure out of what he did, ruining those precious moments he shared with the child. The only thing that could undo the spoiling was to create more such moments.

And Buckles did.

***

"I wish I could go back in time and change my life," Buckles told the dead Boy Scout. "I would have fought those punks who made fun of my name. I probably would've gotten beaten up, but at least I would've stood up for myself more than I actually did."

The boy didn't reply.

"I'd also do something about my sisters. I miss them. But I'd still do something about them. Something horrible. My mother, the same."

Buckles stopped talking then. There were too many "what ifs" and "what could have beens." And they were all moot points. Buckles was as Buckles was. There was no changing him. Not now. It was too late for him.

***

Off was reporting to Buckles again, Buckles' ears were numb to what was said. His thoughts were in a far different place. That damn Eddie didn't matter anymore. Meat and potatoes tonight didn't matter. Hell, his wishing for a different life didn't matter. One thought, one want consumed him.

"Off," Buckles said, "what do you think about baseball?"

"I like it, boss. I like it a lot."

"Me, too." Buckles tried to come up with something else to say, but he couldn't. He never had anything worthwhile to say. No one listened anyway.

***

After stopping off for more duct tape, Buckles went home.

"Honey?" he called out. "Where are you?" He walked down the hallway to the bedroom. He couldn't wait to walk the dog this evening. He really needed it. "Honey?"

He didn't know why he bothered. His wife didn't bother anymore. Why keep up the facade of a normal couple?

Buckles opened the bedroom door. "Honey? You napping?"

His wife wasn't napping.

She was sitting on the edge of the bed. She was holding a bloodied baseball uniform, child's size. Her eyes were puffy and red. She had been crying, but her shock gave way to her fearing for her life. That gave way to anger, absolute in its resolve.

"What the fuck is this?" She held out the bundle to Buckles.

That did it. The little world he created slipped out of his grasp, out of orbit, spiraling far, far, away. He couldn't remember that happy place anymore.

"I pooped my pants," Buckles said. "I don't want to play with them."

"What the fuck?"

"I'm sorry." Buckles began to cry, not because he was suddenly wracked with guilt, but because he got caught and his world was gone.

"Sorry?" His wife stood. "You sick fuck."

Buckles wanted to turn and run. However, a stronger urge developed in him. He wanted to strangle his wife. He could get rid of her -- even better than he could his kids. Chop chop. Dig dig. Then he could withdraw money from his bank account and disappear. A new town. A new field. As usual, he soon found himself thinking about Little League.

"I --" His wife couldn't form any other words so she repeated herself. "You sick fuck."

Buckles never saw his hunting knife in his wife's hand, but he felt it go cleanly into the soft meat of his stomach. The pain was the worst sensation he ever felt. Losing his world paled to this. Anything his mother of sisters did to him paled. That was all history and history hurt, but history wasn't real anymore. The present was real and it hurt and it would be all he remembered.

"I was never a horrible person," he said as he fell to his knees.

"No. You were."

COMING SOON
from Erik Handy

Sabrina, the troublemaker.

Jillian, the loud one.

Desiree, the pretty one.

Megan, the quiet one.

All are on the verge of womanhood.

All are about to die!

CHEERLEADER MASSACRE
!

A juvenile prank gone horribly wrong leads each of these young women down a path of supernatural terror . . . and pity those who weren't even involved as the terror envelops ALL!

CHEERLEADER MASSACRE
!

Here's an excerpt:

"So, Desiree," Sabrina said. "What's up with you and Jeremy?"

Desiree blushed. "Nothing. Yet."

This brought some "ooh's" from the girls.

Sabrina was a tall, skinny, lithe brunette. She was not quite the girl-next-door -- she was too plain looking to be something special. Desiree, however, was prettier, more inviting to the eyes.

"He's definitely cute," Desiree continued. "But that country music is such a turn-off."

Jillian raised her beer. "I'll drink to that."

Sabrina snorted. "You'll drink to anything."

Jillian looked hurt at that. She was short and treaded between the treacherous waters of average size and chunkiness. Besides that, she always laughed too loud for anyone to truly enjoy her company. Why she was invited was anyone's guess. She was a cheerleader like the rest of the group, but that link was tenuous at best. Maybe the rest of the group liked her more early in their cheering days and now they didn't have the heart to eject her from their circle.

Megan watched the girls, calm, smiling and interjecting when she saw fit. The others didn't have this filter, this trait of restraint.

Sabrina lowered her voice as she got serious for a second. "Let's see who can tell the scariest story!"

Jillian and Megan both exclaimed, "No!"

Sabrina started to pout. "Aw, come on. What else are we going to do tonight? We've talked about boys. People we hate. We've painted our toenails and ate way too much pizza."

Desiree raised a half-empty bottle. "Let's drink some more!"

"I'll drink to that!" Jillian blared.

Desiree got up to get some more beer, but Sabrina stopped her.

"I'll get them," Sabrina said."I gotta go pee."

Sabrina got up and left.

"Make sure you wipe this time!" Jillian shouted at her.

The other two girls shook their heads in comic disgust.

"Classy," Megan said.

"So Jillian," Desiree said despite her better judgement. "Anything new with you and Mark? Any juicy details would be nice."