Prodigal Blues

"…but some of them ca

"…because the soul of a monster is a tricky thing…"

"…a mischievous thing…"

"…and Grendel would quote something whenever we did not understand what he meant…"

"…over and over and over…"

"…about what monsters would walk the streets…"

"…and over and…"

"…if our faces were as deformed as our souls…"

"…and Grendel would punish those whose speech fell offensive on his ear…"

"…offensive speech deforms not only the soul of the speaker…"

"…but of the listener, as well…"

"…and with each transgression, you would lose a part of your soul…"

"…the part that was hidden in your face…"

"…what monstrosities would walk the streets…"

"…if we lost enough of our souls, then we would understand…"

"…and if we lost enough of our souls…"

"…the part hidden in our faces…"

"…then he would turn to our bodies…"

"…because the monstrosity spreads, you see…"

"…it spreads so fast…"

"…and our souls continued being punished…"

"…terrible punishment…"

"…awful, painful…"

"…lonely…"

"…and if you dared to scream or call out…"

"…so lonely…"

"…if you cried…"

"…if you so much as whimpered…"

"…or even wept…"

"…so lonely…"

"…Grendel's outrage was openly to be seen…"

"Slow down," I said.

"…you did not want Grendel to be angry…"

"…oh, no…"

"…so lonely…"

"…because his anger would not be just yours to suffer…"

"…oh, no, never…"

"…always never…"

"…not ever…"

"…a family suffers together…"

"…if one hurts, you all hurt…"

"…he told us it was only fair…"

"…only just…"

"…only moral…"

"…only honorable…"

I lifted my hands.  "Stop it, please."

"…if one of us made a mistake in speech…"

"…or in actions…"

"…then it was all our faults…"

"…our mistake…"

"…and mistakes must be chastised…"

"…only fair, that is what Grendel said…"

"…and so he hurt us…"

"…he hurt us so much…"

"…I still bleed down there…"

"…I still leak…"

"…still feel the burning…"

"…the pieces of skin that are missing…"

"…the taste…"

"…his taste…"

"…all over…"

"…inside…"

"…sometimes his taste was all the food we were allowed…"

"…for days and days…"

"Jesus Christ!" I shouted.  "Stop it, please.  I can't—"

"…sometimes he would lock us away…"

"…one by one…"

"…lonely…"

"…and leave us in the dark to think about what we had done…"

"…and wonder what he was going to do to us when he brought us back out into the light…"

"…so bright and scary…"

"…I miss my mommy…"

"…I wonder if Dad will remember me…"

"…if they are even still there…"

"…do not want them to have forgotten me…"

"…hurts so much sometimes I just want to die…"

"…scared, I am so scared of the light all the time…"

"…please do not be afraid of us…"

"…do not scream or call out…"

"…it is important…"

"…you have to understand…"

"…we do not want to hurt you…"

"…honest, Mark, we do not…"

"…oh, no…"

"…but this is something we ca

"…not like this…"

"…not the way we are now…"

"…so safe in the dark because Grendel was not there…"

"…because we were discourteous…"

"…we were lazy in speech and ma

"…and did not know any better…"

"…until Grendel…"

"…our Eternal Lord Grendel…"

"…taught us what we needed to know…"

"'…Grendel, they called this cruel spirit…'"

"…I hate him…"

"…he came with the coming of night…"

"…oh, God, how I hate him, too…"

"…cut them off…"

"…and I know it is wrong to hate someone like this…"

"…but I do not think he was human…"

"…always lonely…"

"…he just wore a really good mask that made him look that way…"

"…I thought he had a nice face when I met him…"

"…cut them off…"

"…he smiled and told me not to worry…"

"…do not cry…"

"…I will help you find your mommy…"

"…that is what he told me, too…"

"…you do not have to be scared…"

"…he cut them off!  HE CUT OFF MY LEGS!" screamed Thomas from his wheelchair, wrenching forward with such anguished force he almost fell face-first onto the floor, but Arnold was there in an instant, grabbing him underneath his arms, steadying Thomas as his body shook, wracked by sobs as he reached up and tore away the mask—

—and revealed his burned, terrible, ruined face.

I did not blink at the sight of him.

I did not look away.

I did not gasp, cry out, groan, or whimper; to have done any of those things would lessen me in his eyes—his eye, his one, perfect, azure-blue eye—and I did not want him to think ill of me; I wanted his understanding, his strength, his respect and blessing:  I was looking at a face that had known more pain, horror, and suffering in its few brief years on this earth than any ten people who lived to the age of ninety would ever know or imagine or turn away from when confronted by.

So I did not make a sound; that act, and that act alone, may be the only moment of genuine grace I offered the world in my entire life.

But I did weep; the tears formed instantaneously in my eyes and just as quickly streamed down my face and I did nothing to stop them.

I wouldn't allow myself to.

Because even though all their confusing words were still swimming around in my drug-addled brain, even though I still didn't know for certain what was happening because no one had yet said it outright, even though I was still scared shitless and wishing now I'd never agreed to make the drive down to Kansas, some dimly-lighted corner of my mind was whispering the truth of what I was witnessing but did not want to accept.

"Can we please take it off now?" asked Rebecca.

False-Face looked at me, picked up his gun, then nodded his head.  "I do not know how you are going to take this"—he rose to his feet and stepped to the bed, pressing the business-end of the silencer against my jaw—"but if you try anything, I will harm you."

I was still looking at Thomas as he wept into Arnold's chest; Arnold stroked the back of the boy's scar-clumped head, whispering, "It is all right, Thomas, it is, I promise, there, there, it will be all right, you will see…."

Rebecca exhaled with relief as she pulled off her wig to expose a moist, jagged, discolored scalp, speckled with a few tufts of stringy hair, that covered only two-thirds of her head; the rest was a slightly dented metal plate.  She looked at me and shrugged her shoulders in a girlish, oh-well way, then reached up and slowly, carefully, with precise and clearly practiced movements, began removing the sculpted prosthesis that was her nose; underneath was a set of exposed sinus slits that bubbled with thick, colorless mucus every time she breathed.  Setting the nose into a clean handkerchief beside her, she reached into her mouth and took out the partial plate; almost every one of her upper teeth had been removed—and none too gently, judging from the blackened appearance of her mangled, deeply-rutted gums.  She then peeled away her left cheek from earlobe to jawline and, after that, the layer of latex that had been underneath the false cheek; there was nothing below that but gleaming bone.  She sighed, a three-year-old (Are we done yet?), looked at me, popped out her left, glass eye, then put the partial plate back into her mouth.