---

 

This writing was accepted for publication in the 108 page perfect-bound ISSN# / ISBN# issue/book “Skeletons” Down in the Dirt, v188 (the October 2021 Issue) Order the paperback book:

Order this writing that appears in the one-of-a-kind anthology Stardust in Hand the Down in the Dirt Sept.-Dec. 2021 issues collection book		get the 422 page Sept.-Dec. 2021 Down in the Dirt 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

Forging A Monster

Edward N. McConnell

    Forging a child into a monster is not that difficult. Knowledge of the workings of that process should be rare, better yet; unknown. Unfortunately, the formula isn’t so secret. Bill Reicks, unsophisticated and unkempt, cracked that code long ago. A powerfully built, diminutive man with dark, beady eyes, excelled at dishing out abuse. Unaccomplished and uneducated, he was combative. He had trouble keeping jobs. Topping off those fine qualities, he was a petty thief, liar and worse, humorless.
    The main object of his mistreatment was his son, Sammy. It always started the same way, Bill was in a mood.
    “Bend over you little bastard. I need to teach you some manners.” Bill would say. The irony, not lost on Sammy, was that his father knew very little about manners.
    Always careful not to leave marks that showed, Bill often used his paddle to punish his son. He always swung hard, cracking with full force into the butt cheeks of his defiant son. The blows produced a searing, burning sensation which the boy had felt many times. Sammy would not give his father the satisfaction of letting out a painful yelp. Determined to deny his father satisfaction, Sammy waited and cried later, alone. To do otherwise, would lead to more beatings.
    Sammy sole offense was being born. Sammy lived, his mother didn’t. Her picture, the only one displayed in the apartment, sat atop his father’s dresser. Bill blamed the boy for his miserable, empty existence. Sammy thought he killed his mother. How could he not, his father reminded him of his crime every day. The beatings, administered in front of his mother’s photo were to reinforce the point.
    Sammy was a bright child, a trait he never lost and, as he grew, his intellect and cunning sharpened. His anger swelled also. While directed at his Dad, as he matured, it spilled over to the world in general. Everyone was suspect; a possible abuser. The trouble with creating a monster is controlling it. With each passing year, Bill was losing control.
    This fact was not lost on him. Sammy was growing stronger and soon would be able to overpower his abuser. As Bill grew more ill at ease by Sammy’s presence, during one of their frequent quarrels, he said, “I can’t wait for you to be gone.” Sammy glared back, saying nothing but harbored the same thought. Sammy was hatching his own scheme to be rid of his tormentor but he had to bide his time. Everything had to fall into place to pull it off. He needed a couple of dupes to pull it off.
    Jimmy and Theresa Snyder, who lived next door to Bill and Sammy, were the perfect marks. A quarrelsome pair, Jimmy drank too much. Theresa was a flirt and teased Bill. Jimmy sensed this. The result, the two men did not like one another. Jimmy accused Bill of peeping on his wife through a backyard window. Bill denied it but he had been doing it for a long time. For her part, Theresa kept the shades up a bit to allow Bill a glimpse of her shapely figure. Bill wanted Theresa. Jimmy had to go. One night Jimmy opened the door to his own end with an ill-placed threat.
    Over the backyard fence, Jimmy said to Bill. “If you make one more move on my wife, I’ll kill ya.” Bill laughed it off. He was good with a knife and figured “Jimmy’s all talk.” Watching this, Sammy noted the bad blood between his father and Jimmy, tucking it away for future use.
    “I hate that Jimmy Snyder.” Bill said to Sammy. “Stay away from him. If I catch you with him, I’ll kill him and kick your ass.” Sammy said nothing. Now approaching eighteen, he had reached the end of tolerating his father’s abuse. Without knowing it, Bill had shown Sammy a way to escape.
    Jimmy and Teresa usually ate dinner at the Willow Inn on Fridays. Theresa liked to hang out there and dance to the juke box. Jimmy tagged along to eat and get drunk as usual. Sammy was outside in the yard when the Snyders, on their way to dinner, invited him to come along. Sammy saw his chance to trigger his father by putting him together with Jimmy.
    “Let me grab my coat.” Sammy said. While in the apartment, he left a note on the kitchen table.
    Once outside, Sammy said to Jimmy and Theresa, “Thanks for inviting me. I’m hungry.”
    “No problem, Sammy.” Theresa said. “We love having you along.” Sammy now put three people in harm’s way in service of his escape. He didn’t care, to him, they were only pawns.
    When Bill came home and read the note he exploded. “I told him to stay away from them.” He grabbed his knife and went to find Sammy. Navigating the three blocks to the Willow Inn, he burst in the door and spied his son. He went to the table where the three were sitting. He grabbed Sammy’s arm to pull him away from the table towards the door. “I told you to stay away from these two. Get home.”
    Jimmy jumped up and said, “Bill let him sit here he’s not bothering nobody.”
    Bill, without speaking, pulled his knife and stabbed Jimmy. Theresa screamed. Sammy jumped back watching his father cut deep into his neighbor. Theresa carried a .32 in her purse. Jimmy was a crap husband but he was her husband. She grabbed her purse, pulled out the pistol and shot Bill two times in the chest. He fell where he stood. The bartender called 9-1-1 as screaming patrons scrambled for the exits. Soon the Willow Inn was swarming with cops and paramedics.
    Jimmy later died at the hospital. Bill was dead before he hit the floor. Theresa was in police custody and not talking. Sammy, between fits of phony tears, gave a statement to the police. To the cop, Sammy seemed rattled, which is what Sammy wanted him to think. When asked why he was there, he said, “I hadn’t had dinner, I saw Jimmy and Theresa in the yard. They invited me along to get something to eat.” He never mentioned the note left for his father or Bill and Jimmy’s relationship. To complete the charade, Sammy said to the cop, “Why did Theresa have to shoot my Dad?”
    An officer offered Sammy a ride home. He didn’t want the police to search his apartment and find the note. He said, “I live three blocks away. I’ll walk. It will help clear my head. What happens next?”
    “You’ll get a call and be told how to make arrangements for your father. Do you have any family that could come over? Also, you’ll probably be visited by some detectives. They will want to go over these events again. Sorry, but it’s routine.”
     “I’d better call my aunt. She’ll come and help,” Sammy said, but there was no aunt to call.
    “That should get him off my ass for a while,” Sammy thought.
    With detectives coming there would be more questions, it was time to leave. He packed his bags, including his mother’s picture from the dresser. Locating his father’s stash of cash, he stuffed it in his bag. Then he looked at the note, ‘I’m at the Willow Inn with the Snyders.’ It had served its purpose. Smiling, he removed the note still lying on the table; put it in his pocket to be disposed of later. He had accomplished his plan.
    He knew he needed to stay ahead of the cops. As he left the apartment, a free man; he closed the door on this world. A whole new one was now open to him. Sammy headed for the bus station, destination, New York City; a place to get lost in the crowd. Sammy had engineered the deaths of two people and the ruin of another to escape. Bill Reicks’ fully forged monster was now loose on an unsuspecting world. He was just getting started.

Copyright of written pieces remain with the author, who has allowed it to be shown through Scars Publications and Design.Web site © Scars Publications and Design. All rights reserved. No material may be reprinted without express permission from the author.

Problems with this page? Then deal with it...