Grace. Rebecca. Hannah. Michael.

A short story of man and his family.

            I am a normal man in a normal world. I have a job, a wife, a little boy, and two older girls. My wife, Grace, named our first girl Rebecca. I hated the name, but she did all the work so I let it pass. I named the next girl, Hannah. I did not like the name, but I had to call her something. We both agreed on our youngest, Michael, well, she suggested and I told her I loved it. I hated it, but it is not my place to say otherwise. I didn’t hate my children, they were great, I just didn’t like what they were, same with my wife, and me. If you see me on the street, please, turn around and do not bother me. If you talk to me, you will think that I am the nicest human on the earth, they all do. Just know you make me sick. A small clump of your hair is waving in the air, your teeth are not cleaned properly, your right shoe is tied tighter than your left, you are not wearing a watch but you have a tan line where a watch should be, you have a speck of dust on your left shoulder, I could go on, but you would get bored and think that I am crazy. You are right about one thing though, you will get bored, but I am by no means crazy. However, you are mentally insane.

            Michael is now fifteen, Hannah is eighteen, and Rebecca is, well I forgot, no one cares anyway. She died when she was fifteen. She had a rare heart disease and died slowly and painfully, but that was a while ago. All I know is they said was than small holes were opening up in her heart and that there was nothing they could do. At least I didn’t have to plan for her sweet sixteen, she wanted to go on vacation, so glad that will never happen.

            Michael is now twenty-three and Hannah is twenty-six. I am a single father who is pushing out his two homesick children. My wife died last year. She wasn’t sick or anything, her body was just never found. My wife and I were both on a road trip, but we got in a wreck. It was my fault; I should have listened to my car when it popped up saying one of my tires was flat. We ran right into a post. She was knocked out cold, I luckily was not. I pulled her out. We happened to crash next to an old abandoned warehouse. I took her there and laid her on a table. I ran outside to call 9-1-1, and no, I could not have called 9-1-1 inside because the walls were blocking my signal. After I called them, I ran inside, and she was gone. After hours of explaining what happened to the judge, I was able to return to my kids who were still living at my house at the time.

            Michael is now thirty-four, and Hannah is dead. Hannah’s lungs collapsed when she was scuba diving. She had an undetectable disease that, as she got older, deteriorated her lounges. When she dove to a certain level in the ocean, she suffocated. There was nothing anyone could do. Hannah hated water, the only reason she went diving was because of the accident. About a week early a maniac killed hundreds of people by a poisonous toxin. The body count was in the hundreds; it was a sight to see.

            Michael is now dead. He would have been fifty-seven. Michael was my favorite. I know as a parent I shouldn’t have favorites, but I was never a good parent. He died from multiple stab wounds. Luckily they got the finger prints from the knife used to kill him, as I knew they would.

            Want to know how I did it? A very small needle. When Rebecca would fall asleep I would heat the needle over the fireplace. I would then poke a single deep hole in her chest piercing her heart. I did this for three weeks until one day, she collapsed. I understand why she didn’t die sooner. The holes were so small, so it took a decent amount of puncher wounds to do the job, but it worked. I made sure to do this when we went to visit my hometown on vacation. Our hospital has a short staff and not so good doctor. So I took advantage of that, they would never find the microscopic holes in her chest where her heart was.

            My wife was easy. I drained the driver’s side wheel, then when we were close to the warehouse, where I put my special machine, I ran straight into a tree. I didn’t mean to knock her out from the impact, but that’s okay. I wanted her to suffer and understand that I was the one killing her, but life isn’t perfect. When I dragged her body in the warehouse, and laid it on the table. I wanted a few moments so the medical team could see that her body, at one time, was on the table. After a minute or so, I dragged her to the furnace that I put in this specific warehouse. I burned her alive until only ash remained. After that, I disposed of the ashes, poured water all over the furnace, and called the police. Again, this road trip happened to pass a really poor small town, so one medic and a county sheriff showed up. Wasn’t hard to fake my tears.

            Hannah was a little difficult. I put tiny doses of Nexium in her food and drinks, over time Nexium can harm your lungs. Bingo! All I had to do was get her to go swimming with her damaged lungs. Luckily, I know a boy that Hannah liked, so I asked this young man to take Hannah scuba diving so she could get her mind off the people who died to the toxin that I developed to kill hundreds of people. Yes, that I was me.

            Michael, I am sorry. Michael is a short story, he invited me over for dinner, I stabbed in multiple times then called the police. They are probably on their way to arrest me right now, I don’t care. I rigged some explosives. Once they open the front door, they die, and I die. Why did I do this? Well, I thought I made it clear in the beginning? I hate people, I hate everything to do with them. And them being me as well, I have to hate myself. So I killed my family, killed hundreds of other families, and now going to kill a couple husbands, fathers, sons, grandsons, nephews, and well, anything that comes after that. Goodbye…