Episodes of Violence Read online

  “Fuck that guy,” Daemon said and upended his beer can. His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed. Finished, he crushed the can in his hand and tossed it out the window. “I hope that asshole’s SUV is totaled. Fuck it, I hope he’s dead.”

  “You think the driver’s dead?” Sage asked, mouth hanging open.

  Bobby swallowed, feeling a small lump in his throat. Dead? He didn’t think that was the case. It wasn’t that he cared about the driver. He didn’t. But a death would mean a more serious police presence. The scene combed over.

  It was odd not caring if the person was dead or alive. If they went back and the driver was dying, he would have the power to possibly save him—or let him die. That much power over another person was intense, the feeling new and worth exploring. It was getting caught and going to prison that frightened him. He wasn’t cut out for that life. Daemon and Sage were loose cannons and crazy. They would survive incarceration. That was the problem with smarter people. They thought about the future. People like Daemon and Sage lived in the present. He envied them for that.

  It was freeing not to give a shit if the person lived or died. It meant he had no guilt. In fact, he never had guilt about much. No one cared about him, so why should he care about some stranger. A faceless asshole who thought he was some kind of vigilante.

  His parents cared, or at least pretended to. Like when they watched the news and saw a report about some fuckhead mother who’d left her kids in a car on a ninety-degree day with the windows open an inch, as if that would make a difference, and the kids died. Or when those commercials came on about starving kids in other countries, their skeletal-like frames and grotesque pot bellies. His parents would say how bad they felt and how they wished the world was a better place for everyone. The unnerving thing was, when they spoke about such things, Bobby saw nothing in their eyes. No compassion or yearning. They never donated to any causes, despite their wealth. It was like they were putting on an act when they were in front of him, hoping their words would come across the right way and teach him how people were supposed to feel.

  They were fucking liars.

  Cold, like him.

  The truth was they didn’t care about him anymore than they cared about each other. So how were strangers supposed to care about him? Had anyone given a shit when he was getting beat up in the Shop Rite parking lot? People recorded it on their phones and others called 911, but no one intervened. Or when he fell on his skateboard and was bloodied up. No one wanted to come too close. People only said things like, “Are you okay” and “you should be more careful” and “you need to wear a helmet and knee and elbow pads.”

  For the first time in his life, he wasn’t mad at those people. Those uncaring assholes, because he was one too.

  “Can’t we go back, please?” Sage asked.

  “It isn’t a good idea,” Bobby said. “The cops might be on their way. Another motorist might have stopped. People might have heard the crash and are coming out of their houses, despite woodland acres between houses.”

  “You heard the man,” Daemon said. “No way we take a chance.”

  Sage threw her arms up. “Oh well, I tried. Maybe next time.”

  “Guess this neighborhood is off limits for quite a while now,” Daemon said, lighting a cigarette.

  “Yeah,” Bobby said. “For at least six months.”

  “So where to now?” Sage asked. “I’m still up.”

  “No you’re not,” Bobby said, “That last one counted. You got zero points.”

  “Fuck off,” Sage said, giving him the finger.

  “Sorry, babe,” Daemon said, exhaling a lungful of smoke. “He’s right.”

  Sage shoved him. “Maybe he can suck your dick tonight then.”

  “We’ll head over to the other side of town,” Daemon said. “Hit Maple Street. It's been a while I think.”

  “Yeah,” Sage said, jumping in her seat with excitement. “About time we hit Brewmeyer again, that prick fuck.”

  Daemon flung his cigarette butt out the window and as he exhaled said, “Worst teacher in history. Man's got it coming and more.”

  “And I get to do it this time,” Bobby said, rubbing his hands together like some evil cartoon villain.

  “Lucky bastard,” Sage said.

  Daemon stayed on the backroads and made it to Maple Street in fifteen minutes, driving the speed limit. Since they had begun their mailbox baseball routine a year ago, the cops had supposedly amped up their investigation into the property damaging bandits, but in a small town with a five-person police force there wasn't much to be done without catching them in the act or hearing something via word-of-mouth. The crime wasn’t worth calling in the State Troopers. This was a good thing, but it also pissed off Daemon.

  Mailbox baseball was kid’s stuff, an activity high school teens took part in. Sure, it had been fun for a while, but now it was growing old. He wanted something else, something that would give him more of a rush and cause more chaos. Sage still seemed to get off on it, but the girl was nuts and got off on almost anything destructive.

  Getting pursued by Waiters was something he enjoyed. The thrill of the chase, as the saying went. It was true. If only he had a better, faster car. The latest chase had been phenomenal. He wished he could’ve relived it. They might have to add a video camera to their mailbox baseball supplies, despite Bobby saying such things were bad for business and always got people in trouble. But what he really wanted was to do something that wouldn’t be forgotten. Something that would horrify the town and baffle the law.

  However, this last encounter with a Waiter would most likely prove serious enough to push the mailbox baseballers up on the cops’ most wanted list. They had used firearms before, but now that they added vehicular damage, serious injuries, and possibly death…

  The more he thought about it, the more he wished he’d gone back and seen the wreckage. He’d love to whip out his penis and piss all over the driver. Then he’d take the bat, break the guy’s legs and skull. Thinking about the violence got him semi-hard.

  Looking at Sage, he wanted her right then and there. Tell Bobby to wait outside while he banged the shit out of her. But even more than that, he wanted to hurt someone. Use his hands up close. Cause real harm. Change a person’s life because they fucked with him or were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just walk up to a person, male or female, and clock them cold. Make someone fear the unknown and be afraid to walk down the street.

  “What’s wrong, babe?” Sage asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Bullshit,” Sage said, then tickled him under his chin. “Coochie, coochie—”

  Daemon swatted her hand away.

  Sage giggled. “Poor baby. What’s wrong?”

  He hated coochie, coochie coo, and Sage knew it. She could be such a bitch at times. He’d told her how his low-life mother used to do it when he was younger, before Eugene entered their lives and turned his mother into a junkie.

  Chapter Two

  Shortly after Daemon’s twelfth birthday, his father ran out on him and his mother, causing her to spiral in and out of depression. Her sister came and helped out around the house while his mother received help from a psychologist. With medication, his mother improved a little and got a new job, one that would allow her to keep the house. Before then, it had been Daemon’s father who made a good portion of the household's money. Daemon’s mother had been doing what she loved, painting and selling her art over the internet and at local arts and crafts fairs.

  Daemon had always imagined he’d see the man again, that his father would one day walk through the front door and beg his mother for forgiveness. He tried looking for the man, but to no avail. His mother wanted nothing to do with the son-of-a-bitch, and if he returned, she'd kick his ass right back out. She would make it on her own.

  As weeks turned into months, and there was no sign from his father, Daemon gave up hope that he’d ever see him again. Then two years later, they were informed t
hat the man had died in a car accident. Death benefits were going to his new family. Daemon's father had changed his name within weeks of leaving him and his mom, which was the reason Daemon hadn’t been able to locate him. The man had given his wife instructions that in the event of his death, she was to inform his ex-family. She certainly didn't have to after the fact, but did as he had wanted out of her love for him. It didn't make sense that the asshole wanted nothing to do with Daemon and his mom but made sure they knew when he died.

  The news sent his mother into a tailspin, the past roaring up in force. Daemon had been shaken too. There was no explanation as to why his father left. Had it been something he’d done? Something his mother had done? Was his father just a bastard? Had his father just fallen in love with another woman? Did his father love him? Hate him? In the end, Daemon figured it was simply another way to hurt them.

  He wrote to his father’s second wife and asked all the questions that ran through his mind, but never received a reply. He felt somewhat hollow inside, as if a piece of his soul had been taken or killed. So he turned to his mother for guidance and everything else a mother was supposed to be. She was a wreck, but she was all he had.

  Eventually, his mother wound up losing her job, her boss stating she'd taken too many days off and wasn't reliable. She doubled up on her assortment of mood stabilizers and depression medication, and when her insurance lapsed, she turned to booze. Frequenting the dive known as the Purple Pony, she met Eugene, the scumbag who’d introduced her to a plethora of narcotics, including heroin and cocaine.

  Unable to make mortgage payments, Daemon's mother was in jeopardy of losing the house, and that’s when Eugene moved in. He was a total loser; ten years older than his mom, ugly with a crooked nose, balding head, a face deeply scarred with pock marks and most of all a complete jerk. He oozed vileness, like some slimy creature with beady eyes and fangs that crawled out of the gutter and sought ways to steal people's souls.

  Daemon came home from school numerous times to find his mom and Eugene screwing in the living room, kitchen or their bedroom with the door wide open—even twice in his room. After catching them the second time, he stole a lock from the local hardware store and secured his room. There were other times he’d find them passed out somewhere in the house, clothed or naked, with used needles and other paraphernalia lying around them. And then there were the times when his mother and Eugene wouldn’t come home for days, leaving him with little to no cash for food.

  Eugene hardly touched Daemon. This was mostly due to Daemon staying out of the man’s way, locked up in his room. But when Eugene did manage to lay a hand on Daemon, it was bad. The scumbag would almost never use his fists. Instead he'd kick Daemon, use a belt or whatever was around, even clobbering him over the head with a potted house plant.

  One night the dirtbag had come home in a real sour mood. Daemon was upstairs and heard the man swearing and breaking things downstairs. A few minutes later, his door was kicked open, splinters of wood from the door frame flying like plastic from the bumper of a wrecked car. Eugene stomped into the room, eyes red, and demanded to know where Daemon had hidden his stash of drugs. Daemon had only fucked with the man’s dope once, switching out the weed with oregano so he could sell the stuff to some kids at school—and because it would be funny when the asshole went to smoke it. He figured the man was always so fucked up he wouldn’t know the difference. But Eugene had known, his customers too. He beat the shit out of Daemon and threatened that if he ever touched his shit again he’d kill him.

  “I warned you, kid, about fucking with my stash,” Eugene said, chest heaving.

  Daemon’s heart was in his throat, his mouth dry. “I… I didn’t—”

  “You’re going to get a beating, but it’s up to you how bad it’s going to be.”

  Daemon had been watching porn on his laptop, ready to jerk off, and now he could hardly breathe. Eugene had never kicked his way into his room. The funny thing was that he hadn't touched his drugs.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Daemon said, wanting to sound tough, but his voice cracked, giving away how unnerved he was.

  Eugene walked up to his bed, Daemon holding his ground and swallowing hard. “Last chance to make this easier on yourself.”

  “I swear I didn’t take your shit.”

  Eugene smiled, but his bloodshot eyes remained ice-cold. Daemon saw his life flash before his eyes. He knew something really awful was going to happen and braced for impact. Eugene’s arm shot forward. The man’s fingers clutched a fistful of hair and then Daemon was yanked off his bed. He cried out, his scalp on fire as he was dragged across his room, then out the door and down the hallway to the edge of the stairs. Eugene pulled him to his feet and got in his face.

  “I was going to give you another chance back in your room,” the man said, his breath a mixture of feces and alcohol that made Daemon’s eyes tear, “but you blew it.” Daemon was then shoved backward and went sailing down the stairs. His right shoulder hit first, biting agony enveloping it immediately. Then his back came into contact with a stair and he tumbled ass over head the rest of the way down.

  He came to on a stretcher as he was carried to an ambulance that was waiting in his driveway. Apparently, Eugene had come to some sense of mind and called 911, not wanting to go to jail for murder. Daemon's mother had been passed out at the time and only discovered what had happened the following morning when the police paid her a visit and arrested Eugene.

  She blamed Daemon for everything and demanded that he tell the police he had tripped on his own and fell down the stairs and that he lied about Eugene having pushed him.

  “I know what really happened, Daemon,” she said as he lay bruised with a concussion in his hospital bed. “Eugene told me you threw yourself down the stairs to get back at him. I know you don't like him, but he's good to me and wouldn't lie about something like this.”

  Daemon couldn't believe what his mother was saying, and when he refused to change his story, she flipped out. She screamed at him and knocked over his food tray and IV stand, ripping the needle out of his arm. Security was called and she was escorted out of the building. Eugene remained in prison awaiting trial for child endangerment, battery and attempted murder.

  Desperate for drugs and money, Daemon's mother moved to prostituting herself, sometimes even bringing the johns home. One night, two days after his sixteenth birthday, one of the johns started beating his mother.

  Daemon had been in his room when he heard his mother come home. He knew by her laugh that she was working, and hearing the man's voice only confirmed it. Normally, he'd go outside and hang out on the front steps smoking cigarette after cigarette, talking on the phone or listening to music, or if it wasn't too late he'd head over to Bobby's house. But it was late and he was tired, so he stayed in his room, not only wanting to hear his mother's romp, but needing to, thinking maybe it would do something to him. Make him finally give up on her and leave her to the wolves while he worked on moving away. He'd steal whatever cash he could get his hands on and scram.

  After hearing her bedroom door close, the man started yelling, saying how he was going to beat her bloody, while he throat fucked her to unconsciousness. The first smack sounded and his mother screamed. The floor shook. The sex noises Daemon could deal with, but violence against his mom was another story.

  He grabbed his baseball bat—the item stolen from a kid's backyard one night as he made his way home drunk from a keg party—and headed to his mom's room down the hall. He checked the door, found it unlocked and slowly opened it. Instead of charging in like an angry bull, he wanted to surprise the guy, and snuck up behind him. His mother was on the floor in her bra and panties, crying. Her right eye was already swelling and her lip was bloody.

  Daemon raised the bat to smash the guy in the side of his big head when the floor creaked beneath him. The man spun around and their eyes met, Daemon having to look up at the behemoth. He swung the bat, but the guy stepped in and took t
he blow on the upper part of his meaty arm, laughed, and then backhanded him across the room. Daemon slammed into a dresser, knocking a few items off it and losing the bat.

  The next thing he knew, the guy was standing over him, a wicked grin on his face and the bat in his hands. “Should've stayed in your room, boy. Do you know what I'm going to do to you in front of your ma? Gonna break your jaw and let it hang. Then your legs so you can't run while you watch me do things to your mom that'll fuck you up for good. Just what my pa did to me. Teach whores a lesson.” The man raised the bat, his eyes full of malice. Daemon was about to be introduced to a whole new level of agony when gunfire filled the air.

  The man grunted and straightened, his eyebrows coming together in confusion. He coughed and turned around, his footfalls heavy as if his shoes were made of cement. Another gunshot sounded and the man's body stiffened. He fell to his knees, and then face-planted to the floor. The bat tumbled away.

  When Daemon looked up, he saw his mother holding a revolver, a wisp of gray smoke rising out of the barrel. The gun was Eugene’s.

  It took some going over, but when all was said and done—Daemon backing up his mom's story of self-defense—she wasn't charged with a crime. He was sent to his uncle’s house in Ohio while his mother got the help she needed. His uncle was an alcoholic who slapped his kids and wife around, but never laid a hand on Daemon, even saying how he wished his kids would be more like him. He wound up staying there for a year, moving back home shortly after his seventeenth birthday. His stay in Ohio had done little for his outlook on society. His cousins had learned to hate him, thanks to their father always comparing him to them. He'd been a loud-mouthed, weed-smoking, truck-driver mouthed asshole—the same person he'd become while living with Eugene—but for some reason his drunk for an uncle practically looked up to him. Maybe it was because he felt bad for him, that his father, his uncle’s brother, had left him and then died.