Chapter Six

Chapter Six

Love comes in many different forms, but perhaps none is more dangerous than the obsessive kind. It was that kind of love that took hold of Paul Marks, and sadly it was more obsessive than loving. Like those old cartoons, he was the character with the anvil dropped on his head, the unfortunate coyote left seeing stars. This love, so completely, innocently out of the blue, for a woman so dear and pure and good, had devastating consequences. From it, Paul learned a hard lesson: love was not a fluffy bunny of chocolates and Valentine's Day cards, but a vicious beast just waiting to be unleashed. 

That December was the coldest it had been in years and the streets of Catalina were slowly icing over. In the parking lot of Adele's Grocery, Paul Marks sat in his car, his radio turned on to some annoyingly cheerful Christmas song. He was struggling to start his car, whose engine was almost hormonally uncooperative. Every two or three weeks or so, the old Ford would act up in some way -- she'd need an oil change, or a new battery, or her tires pumped -- all the repairs costing Paul an extra $200 to $300 he didn't have and couldn't spare. He knew it was time to retire the old girl, but walking to Catalina Middle for work just like Christina did for school -- well, that just seemed awfully humiliating for a grown man. He knew it'd take him months to save up money for a whole new car, which really wouldn't even be new because he'd have to buy used anyway. 

So instead, he turned the key in the ignition again and prayed. Work baby, come on, start for Daddy… But the car just let out an enormous rattle and coughed some smoke out her backside, which he saw dissipate into the air in his rearview mirror. Angrily, Paul slammed his hand against the dashboard, causing the radio to skip through a lyric in "Frosty the Snowman." 

Beside him there was a rap on the window. Startled, Paul turned and saw Mary Hendrick's red-nosed face peering in at him, looking concerned. 

"Paul," she said through the glass, "do you need help?"

Paul sighed and motioned that he was going to get out of the car. Storing the key in his pocket, he climbed out, Mary backing away a few feet to make way for the open door. She was wrapped in a pink parka and carrying a grocery bag in each hand.

"Hi Mary," said Paul tiredly, leaning back against the old hunk of metal. "Yeah, the car's acting up again and won't start. I've been here almost 30 minutes now, hoping I'll get to her."

Mary glanced at the Ford worriedly. He saw she was shivering slightly in the cold and Paul's heart went out to her for caring enough to stop and ask about him. "Oh dear," she said with a reluctant smile, "I'm afraid I don't know a thing about cars, but how about I give you a ride home. I can send Jack over to your place first thing tomorrow and you two can come back here and fix her up. It's getting dark out here now, and the temperature sure is dropping fast."

She was right. Though it was only half past six, the day was almost dark and the streets of Catalina were emptying fast as everybody was hurrying home for dinner. 

"I'll take you up on you offer, Mary, with much thanks." Though he'd been neighbors with Mary Hendrick and worked with her at Catalina Middle for years, Paul had never really had the opportunity of studying her up close. She could've been Abby's sister with those emerald eyes and that dark hair… she was a classic beauty, the kind he liked best… 

Together they walked over to Mary's old Volvo, which had once been white but had turned grey from the continuous coat of grime over the years. After helping Mary store the groceries in the trunk, Paul climbed in beside her. When she turned on the ignition, the heater immediately let out a lukewarm jet of air and the radio clicked back on to the end of "Frosty." They pulled out of the parking lot and onto Main, hitting the red stoplight in front of Collins Diner (Today's Special: Hot Vegetable Soup and Garlic Bread!). 

"How's Christina?" asked Mary over the advertisements now playing on the radio. He could tell she was eager to fill in their silence with conversation so he tried to humor her, though naturally he was a man of few words. 

"Oh, fine, fine," he said with a rather awkward breeziness. 

"She looking forward to the holidays?" asked Mary. "I know my boys are ready -- Jamie's already talking about going ice-skating on Parson's Lake, though it hasn't frozen over in years."

The light turned green and they were off, passing the many empty store windows, which looked even more desolate in the winter evening.

"Well, who knows, he could get his wish. It might freeze over this year, what with these temperatures," said Paul, sending her a smile but feeling stupid. They were talking about the weather.

"Remember when we were kids we used to go out there? That one winter it was ten below…" She shook her head at the memory. "Goodness, we were what? -- 15? 16?"

Paul remembered that winter, and it had indeed been blistering. He had stepped outside in what felt like every sweater and jacket he owned, and still it felt like he was going to lose every limb from frostbite. But he remembered skating around on Parson's Lake, its surface like white glass, the empty black branches of the trees around him jutting out against the pale sky. 

"I took Abby to Parson's Lake that winter," he told Mary quietly. "Of course, we weren't dating then -- " He smiled at her ruefully. "She was the one girl who wouldn't date me in high school -- but we went there as friends -- spent the whole day skating across that lake, freezing our asses off. My toes were covered in blisters by the end of it…"

Maybe it was because the car was finally warming up, or because of the meditative passing of the trees and the low rumble of the engine, but Paul found himself talking, talking more than he had in the last few years.

"I don't think I could go out to Parson's Lake now. It probably wouldn't be the same without her… and I couldn't take Christina. I know it would break her heart." My heart, he thought to himself. "And I can't afford to buy her a new pair of skates anyways." He tried to laugh it off. "We bought her last pair when she was six."

Mary did not laugh. On the radio an instrumental version of "Silent Night" had started playing, its simple melody seemingly underlying the sadness of his words. In the darkness of the oncoming night, Mary turned on her headlights to see the country road she had turned onto.

"How's Christina been since Abby's death?" she asked him somberly. Had it been any other person asking this, Paul would've told 'em to mind their own goddamn business, but instead he sighed and said, "She's doing the best she can. I think she's lonely more than anything. Abby was almost more of a friend than a mom to her."

He looked over to Mary, studying her profile. "Jamie's a big help. It's nice to know she has someone to talk to -- confide in." He looked down. "I just -- " he stopped, unsure sure how to phrase such amorphous thoughts. "I love her -- more than anything in the entire world, but it's like we've lost each other -- or I've lost her somehow." He let out a humorless little laugh. "And it doesn't make any sense because I see her everyday and her room's just down the hall…" 

Paul knew that his daughter, his beautiful, intelligent, resilient daughter had transformed into someone beyond him, someone he could only admire and love from a distance, but could no longer reach. And though he was proud of her for outgrowing the simple confines of this hick town, for blossoming still after the death of her mother, for trying to become someone more than her blue-collar dad with a high school education, he was sad, and a bit heartbroken.

Mary pulled up to his driveway, grey gravel crunching underneath her tires. His house, a crumbling split-level, stood silent and dark. They hadn't put up a tree that year. Paul was hesitant to step out of the warm car and into the cold night air. His insides felt like they had been reduced to jelly, as if given the proper cue, he would dramatically burst out into tears. Something within him felt dislodged.

Perhaps seeing this predicament, Mary turned off the engine, abruptly sending them into darkness and silence, making her next words all the more intimate. 

"Oh, Paul…" she said softly.

She reached over and hugged him, encompassing him in her pink parka and the smell of talcum powder and lavender perfume. For how long she held him, he did not know; at her touch, his mind had gone blank. He simply was.

But she pulled back when they both realized -- at the exact same moment -- that he was crying. It was so strange to feel tears on his face, the little drops of wetness hot against his skin. Paul had been raised by the unflinching maxim of "Boys don't cry," with two older brothers and a father dedicated to the discipline of the military. Even during his harrowing time in the Gulf, Paul had not cried, always suppressing, repressing, oppressing such girly emotions.

But there he was in Mary Hendrick's Volvo, two weeks til Christmas, feeling foolish but pouring his heart out nonetheless. Gently, Mary pulled off one of her matching pink gloves and sat it in her lap without saying a word. Looking back, Paul couldn't understand the gesture for the life of him, why she did it and why at the time it had meant so much to him.

She reached out and tenderly wiped the tears from his cheeks with her bare hand. The touch of her fingers was warm, strangely motherly, and he quieted under her sweet gaze, his catharsis shushed. 

"I'm so sorry," she said, her voice oddly disembodied in the darkness of the car.

He kissed her then. 

Perhaps he did it because she reminded him so much of Abby, or because he wanted to respond to her kindness with more than a "Thank You." All Paul Marks knew was that at that moment he loved Mary Hendrick with all his heart. 

His lips pressed against hers and he drew a hand up to caress the side of her face. Everything was hazy, only the need within him sharp and demanding, the long self-enforced celibacy now ready to be broken. He bent down hard upon her, his tongue trying to open her lips to meet hers. He briefly tasted the cheap peppermint toothpaste she used, before being suddenly pushed back against his seat.

It was broken, all of it. The spell of their mutual understanding had been demolished by his boorish action. He looked at Mary, but she could no longer look at him, her delicate sense of propriety -- no, her unwavering morality -- refusing to be compromised. 

"No," she said. "Jack." 

And those two words were really all she needed. 

He sighed. So unfair. 

"Please Paul," she said, "get out of the car."

Like a schoolboy being sent to his room, Paul was banished. The rosy flush of humiliation started to stain his cheeks as he awkwardly climbed out of the car, not saying goodbye, not sure if he would ever speak again. He slammed the car door harder than he meant to, but Mary started the ignition gamely and continued resolutely down the road.

He stood there in front of his house, bereft of his dignity. An ugly resentment, a red-eyed monster, had sprung up within him. He had opened up to Mary and she had given him nothing.

Unfair.

He had fought for his country and in return received only trauma. He was estranged from his daughter and he had lost his wife. He was stuck with a nowhere job in a nowhere town. He was beaten, he was downtrodden, he was the sucker everybody was laughing at.

Unfair.

Even Mary Hendrick was probably thinking, That poor pathetic schmuck…

And then, just like that, he hated her. Her life seemed so much fuller than his with her loving husband and two rowdy boys. She seemed unshakeable, her persistent kindness grating. It wasn't human, such goodness. 

In the freezing night air, with the knife wind slicing his face, Paul wanted to hurt Mary, mar her and her perfect little world. It would be like a science experiment, observing and collecting data -- Mary Hendrick: A Woman Unseated. Depression, denial, rage, grief, and helplessness, he wanted to see her don these emotions one by one. And over the loneliness of the holiday season, the resentment only grew, parasitically feeding off of all the wrongs ever done to him. 

On the night of the Catalina Christmas Pageant, Paul had already had five beers. The drive to Catalina Middle was unsteady and he could feel Christina's anxiousness in the seat next to him. Before she left him to meet the rest of her class in the green room, she told him she would get a ride home from Jamie, not willing to risk a return trip with him. 

He drifted in and out of sleep throughout the show, missing most of it. The children's squeaky voices barely made it to the back of the auditorium and by the final bows the audience's loud applause had given him a headache. He followed the trickle of the crowd back into the hallway where he saw Mary holding Jack's hand and smiling at her chattering, excited youngest son, Luke. He had changed out of his costume, the only remnant of it left the bright orange baseball cap still on his head. He was bouncing on the heels of his feet, caught in the post-performance high. Jamie was nowhere to be seen.

Eventually, Mary was called away, another mother lassoing her in to help set up refreshments in the cafeteria. Looking a little lost, Jack trailed after his wife, leaving Luke to attend to his own plans. Paul watched the young boy dive headlong into the crowd -- searching for his friends? His teacher? His big brother? Not knowing why, Paul followed him, pushing his way past the mingling people. His eyes never left the orange baseball cap.

It dawned on Paul where Luke was leading him… through the hallways, each one emptier than the last, until they reached the backstage door. Luke, still unaware that he was being followed, opened the door and went through, Paul hesitantly entering after him 30 seconds later. 

The backstage area was dark and sinisterly silent. Miscellaneous props -- a cane, a fake Christmas tree, some old pieces of furniture -- leered out at him through the darkness, and between the gaps of the great dusty red side curtains, Paul could see the empty stage whose expansive length stretched out before him impressively. On the wall beside him was the electrical box for the house lights and the rack of pulleys to open and close the stage curtains. The area he was standing in was small and confined; he felt as if he were trapped inside a matchbox.

"Mr. Marks, is that you?" said a high voice behind him. 

Taken by surprise, Paul swiveled around. 

"Uh -- hello, Luke," he said, not sure how to explain himself. 

Up close, the boy seemed ridiculously small, his blue eyes peering up at him innocently. He was carrying his Spider-Man backpack in his hand -- it must have been what he had come back for. He seemed happily unfazed by the strange fact that Paul was the only other person backstage, as if it were only something to be expected during the course of the Catalina Christmas Pageant. 

"Did you like the show, Mr. Marks?" asked Lucas. The boy's voice contained a hint of pride, but it was overwhelmingly countered by the sweet tilt of his face. The way he benignly gazed up at the disheveled man before him made it seem like he truly wanted to know Paul's opinion. 

"Uh," stuttered Paul again. "Yes, yes I did." 

The boy smiled at him, at once pleased and reaffirmed. The way his smile broke across his face, the slow stretching and partial opening of the pretty pink lips, reminded him inexorably of Mary. The comparison made him hate the expression. A surge of dislike filled him. He suddenly hated the boy, not for anything he did, but for simply what he was: Mary Hendrick's son. 

Mary -- how did she make such a fool out of him? And didn't she deserve to be punished for it? Lucas looked up at him, good-naturedly waiting to accompany him back to the cafeteria. Paul saw so much of Mary Hendrick in Lucas. He saw everything he had grown to loathe: her kindness, her good humor, her patience, her angelic spirit. How he wanted to crush it.

His inhibitions freed by the alcohol, Paul turned upon the boy. Separated from the crowd, where no watching eyes could see, he unleashed his savagery. Lucas' cry of pain was mixed with shock and disbelief -- he had spent his whole life being cuddled and spoiled by adults -- Paul's rage was partially incomprehensible. How could this be happening to him?

He crumbled to the floor as weak as a doll, his half-screams and whimpers not enough to draw help. Paul beat down upon him, turning the boy's face into a bloody pulp and bruising his delicate little body. The man had foregone himself completely, so consumed by his feelings he had lost track of his actions. He couldn't hear the boy's sad pleas to stop, and at long last, after Lucas had fallen unconscious, did he come to and realize what he had done.

He gazed down at the curled body below him. 

It was still. 

He blinked. 

It was unnaturally still.

The eyes did not flutter. The chest did not rise. When Paul bent down to touch him experimentally, the boy did not flinch. Lucas was not unconscious -- he was dead. Underestimating his own strength, Paul had killed him. The fact dawned on him in earth-shattering horror. He looked down at his bloodstained hands and saw the scarlet drops of blood splattered across his shirt -- all irrefutable evidence proving his guilt.

Thinking fast, he quickly stepped into the janitor's closet next door, changing into one of his janitorial jumpsuits and hiding the bloody clothes underneath the large custodial sink, vowing to burn them later. 

He went back for Lucas' body, which was still thankfully undiscovered. Carefully, he picked it up -- it weighed no more than 40 pounds -- and navigated the back passageways of the school to get to the faculty parking lot. He took Lucas out to his car, the icy air whipping Paul's face. Into the trunk the boy went like a bad movie parody. Too intent on fleeing the scene of the crime, Paul left Christina; he knew she would think her drunken father had simply ditched the after-party early.

The answer of what to do with the boy came to him in the car. It was fully-formed and made perfect sense: bury the boy in the woods, in Isaiah Grimm's woods. Nobody trusted the crack -- if the police ever found the body, he could take the blame.

Paul drove out to the Hendrick land, slavishly driving under the speed limit to remain inconspicuous. He trekked through the trees, the undergrowth causing him to stumble a few times, his low curses carried away by the howling wind. He hacked away at the frozen earth with a tire iron, thinking. The trees all around him rattled like skeleton bones, berating him. The snow both zapped him of his energy and caused him to feel painfully awake, washing away his previous drunken stupor and leaving him with the terrible monstrosity he had just committed. 

What had he done? Dear God, what had he done?

It came back to him in fluorescent flashes -- he had been mad, attacking the boy like a rabid dog. Temporary insanity, he had heard it called. If only he could take it back somehow, stop himself. How could he live with himself after this? Lucas' body lay in the snow and would be in the ground soon, eaten by maggots and covered in dirt, when only less than an hour ago it'd been happily dancing across a school stage in front of all the parents in Catalina. How could he have let this happen? He had never lost control so quickly or so violently before. Lucas Hendrick had made such easy prey, and Paul knew he was too much of a coward to step up and declare himself the unjust predator.

From above, the grief-stricken moon shined down upon him, her white light making the snow sparkle in the night.