Death is Not the End, Daddy

and then told me about the pit in her stomach. She said it’s been there since seeing Marcy’s body last night and that she’s afraid it will be there for a long time.

  I can’t stop looking down at the food she won’t eat. It’s a constant reminder of how little I can do. I can’t even take care of my wife. I can’t even make her smile anymore.

  The silence is a divider between us. And the only thing I feel is the anger flooding back into me. This is the very reason why Marcy became all consuming in my life. She always needed me. She always lit up when she saw my face. I never wondered if she loved me…

  I can’t say the same for Janet—

  My marriage isn’t going to last. The thought is like a ghost walking past me. Nothing has changed. The two miscarriages nearly killed Janet. What is Marcy’s death going to do to her? The wife you saw yesterday was a glimpse of who you’ll never have again—

  “Matty?” Janet’s voice slightly cracks as she speaks.

  “Yeah?” my reply is quiet.

  “Can you hold me?”

  I nod without speaking and wrap my arms around her. She starts to cry immediately.

  “I miss her, Ma-Matty.” she’s struggling to speak. “And I’m trying to hold onto what Jesus told me. But, it hurts—so much. Whenever I think about our little M, I think about what we won’t get to experience. The school plays we won’t g-get to see. The report cards we won’t get to read. The holidays we won’t have t-together.” she pauses. “We won’t see her get married. Or have children. Or-or—

  “I know.” I can only whisper. “But we have to keep going, sweetie.” I pause. “Do you know why I made you breakfast this morning?”

  She shakes her head.

  “The day after Marcy was born I made you breakfast in bed, because I was so proud of you, so in love with you. I made you breakfast today to tell you the same thing: even though our little girl is gone, I am still so in love with you.”

  There’s that smile, showing amidst her tears. I’ve wanted to see it for so long. It is the smile I saw when I fell in love with her, the smile I saw when I pulled back her veil at our wedding, the smile that she carried with our little girl, the smile she met me with every morning, and the smile she ended everyday with. It was the smile that always told me she was okay. And it tells me the same thing now.

  John Doe

  It’ll be any moment now. The endless ticking of the clock above the door is a constant reminder. Things are about to change. And even though I had to face Matthew while holding his daughter dead in my arms, I haven’t truly felt the pain of my consequences.

  But, that’s coming. Any moment now, the officer in charge of M’s case is going to come through that door. He’ll bring me into a separate room and learn everything I’ve done. He’ll see what I no longer am. And then everyone else will see it. And that is where my consequences will truly begin.

  When I close my eyes, I can see it: waves of people holding signs to express their disgust, the deafening chant of their inexpressible hatred toward me, toward the monster I will always be to them. Some will hurl questions at me that I can’t answer. Nobody will understand. They won’t care how it started, about the day in the shed, and everything that came from it. They’ll only care about what I became. And what I’ve done—

  I think the door is opening. A quiet click has brought a much louder set of sounds: someone laughing, someone else coughing, and phones ringing from more places than one—officers settling into their morning shifts. I haven’t opened my eyes yet.

  “I’m in charge of Marcy Mill’s case.” his voice is steady; but, my heart rate isn’t. And I’m starting to shake. “Stand up and walk towards me.”

  I open my eyes. The man standing outside of the cell is twice my size. His eyes are flat and empty, like blots of dried ink on dirty paper. He’s a living man who looks like he’s already dead. How familiar…

  My shaking has stopped. The fear has settled. I stand up and step toward him. He reaches his hands into the cell and cuffs mine tight. He doesn’t say anything. He just unlocks the cell door and lets it swing open.

  I step out of the cell, immediately lost in his long shadow. The dim light in this room is only hitting him. Through the door ahead, I hear the sounds of the day continuing. Behind me, I hear only his breathing. It’s deep and controlled—which means he wants to lose control. It means he doesn’t know how to react to me.

  I step forward, staring down at my feet. I have no shadow; his covers me even when he doesn’t follow. But, I’ve come to realize that there is no me anymore. My identity is my crime. Right now it’s M’s kidnapping and death. But, soon it will be so much more. I’m not even a person. I’m just part of this process: a criminal caught and waiting. I’m at the mercy of everyone else. And it starts with this man…

  But, this man will understand. a quiet whisper from within. Just like you, John, he knows what it means to have his life taken from him.

  What should he understand, Jesus? The death of those children? I don’t even understand why I killed them. I know what I’ve told myself. But, I should have died instead of killing Thomas. I didn’t have to do it. I made a choice. I was so hurt, and angry, and alone. Teddy made me feel wanted. I was willing to do anything to have someone in my life…

  Is that what it really all comes down to? I killed Thomas Aerie to have a friend?

  You were lied to from the beginning, John. The thing you call Teddy earned your trust through lies. Your father wasn’t a tyrant; he killed himself the night of your mother’s funeral. When this was hidden from you, all truth was hidden from you.

  Does that make it o—

  The officer grabs my right arm from the side, forcing me forward quickly. He’s leading me out of this room and into the next. And now he stops me in the doorway of the main room.

  “Take a good look, ladies and gentleman!” he’s showcasing me. “This is why a child is dead.”

  I have to keep looking down at my feet. I don’t want to see their eyes. I don’t want to see their hate. But, I can feel it regardless. Everyone is looking at me. And the silence in this room is louder than screams. The atmosphere is filled with their disdain. I am on display as a child killer. If they could, they would kill me right now.

  I am at the mercy of this man, whose hate towards me is only now fully showing. He needs to show me to others, to share in his hate, because his isn’t enough. It’s like a fire that can only be put out with an explosion.

  Except, it’s not being put out. It’s burning hotter. He squeezes my arm as he forces me left of the doorway. His breaths are losing any sense of control. They are shallow and faltering, unable to hide his rage any longer. He’s rushing me to the room, no longer wanting to share in his hate, but to keep it to himself.

  What will he understand, Jesus?

  The bondage, John.

  I’m nearing a door with a faded gold number 1 on it. His grip on my arm continues to tighten. He’s not under control. He’s about to snap.

  “You’re broken.” I didn’t mean to speak. The words just came out.

  His grip loosens slightly as he continues to lead me toward the door. Those two words didn’t slow him down. But, somehow they calmed the storm…

  He opens the door, leading me in.

  “Sit down.” he says as he closes the door behind him.

  I do what he says.

  “I don’t understand a man who takes a little girl from her school, and in less than a day’s time, returns her dead body.” he pauses as he sits down. “I don’t care what your name is; I’m supposed to care. I’m an officer of the law. I’m supposed to follow a specific protocol. A code of conduct. But, I don’t apply it to filth.”

  I’m looking down at my feet again. I don’t know what to say.

  “When you turned yourself in, you made it clear that Marcy Mills wasn’t your first. You told the officer that you had kidnapped fourteen other children in the last twenty six years. What happened to them?”

 
I’m shaking my head slowly.

  “I was afraid of that.” he sighs. “Fifteen children dead, because of you. You can sit there and play remorseful. You can avoid all questions with that pathetic silence. But the fact remains that you are worthless. A man who kills children is not a man. He’s an animal, who needs to be put down.”

  “I know.” I whisper as I look up at him.

  “What do you know?!” it slithers from his lips. “You know how to listen and react! You know how to manipulate a situation just the way you want it. You know how to act remorseful. But, you don’t really know what you’ve done. You don’t really know the pain you’ve caused or the lives you’ve destroyed. You are nothing more than a dog who has mauled a child. Your eyes are apologetic, but you don’t really understand the ramifications. Just like an animal, you can’t comprehend the emotion. Or the permanency of the loss.” He makes me feel so small. “The dog kills the child but then looks for the child to play a day later. It doesn’t understand what it’s done. Even when you are about to put it down, it doesn’t understand why.”

  “I know what I’ve done.” I whisper. “I turned myself in because I finally can. I’m finally free from it.”

  “Free from what?” he asks very slowly.

  “Prison.”

  He smiles slightly, “where do you think you’re going?”

  “It’s different. And I know you understand that, officer. I see your eyes. They are empty like mine used to be. You understand