Happy Father’s Day!
Thought I’d be a bit devilish and post my dark sci-fi/horror short story ‘Vanilla_Bean’ for your reading pleasure. The theme of fatherhood is at its core.
Fair warning, this is a dark and devastating piece.
I hope you enjoy it.
@writingiswar
Vanilla_Bean
I.
“Spread your legs, Jer! Shoulder’s width! Bend your knees a little!”
The spindly seven-year-old settled into a more appropriate stance for an outfielder. An eager fist hammered into the mitt.
“Like this?”
Dwight nodded, winding up. “Here comes a fly!”
The baseball soared into the red horizon. Jeremy tracked it, squinting to deter the light of the setting sun.
3 – 2 – 1
THWOCK!
The boy sprinted to his father, showing off the catch with a proud grin. Dwight lifted Jeremy’s cap and tousled his sandy brown hair.
This will all be perfect soon.
#
Robot. Synthetic. A.I.
When he saw it – breathing, blinking, looking as he remembered her during the good and healthy times – it was Laura.
Sweet. Beautiful. Laura Krasner.
Her medical gown landed in a blue puddle around her ankles. She blushed a little when he inspected her naked body from tip to toe. All there. Every mole, freckle, stretch mark, scar, and beautiful wrinkle.
Laura.
Dwight reached out, fingers shaking. He stroked the tender spot behind her earlobe. The synthetic giggled. An unerring response.
Later that day, Jeremy reunited with his resurrected mother. Dwight watched them from the observation chamber.
At first, the boy cried. Then, looked aghast. He placed an asterisk on new Laura, deciding she would never be real to him. Meeting her, however, razed his intentions. Within the hour, Jeremy was curled up in her arms, stroking her wrist. They talked about baseball. Told jokes. All doubts vanished into the chasm of his smile.
The reintroduction technician clapped Dwight on the back.
“Did you get what you paid for, Mr. Krasner?”
“It’s perfect,” he said, palm to glass.
#
She bulleted from the Student Union, designer bookbag slung over her shoulder.
Dwight’s practiced smile formed when she approached. Be cool, not creepy.
He tipped his baseball cap.
“Hey ther—"
She breezed past, latte to lips, her slap-dash ponytail bouncing in the wind. If she wasn’t the only thing on his mind, like ever, he’d drop the whole crazy notion of asking her out. Just like his roommate suggested.
“She’s a smart girl. What the hell would you talk about anyway? Batting averages? Keg stands? She’s too bookish for you, Krasner. Leave it alone and get yourself a hot, dumb cheerleader instead.”
But Dwight couldn’t leave it alone. There was something about this girl he couldn’t shake out of his brain. Maybe it was her general disinterest. Maybe it was her amazing legs. Maybe it was her unreachable smile.
“Hey! Wait up!”
The girl paused, turned, and arched an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”
“Sorry, I—"
“You a stalker?” She crossed her arms. The bridge of her glasses slipped down her button nose when she leaned in. “Well? Are you?”
“No! No, I’m—"
“Don’t think I haven’t noticed you watching me.” She patted the bottle of pepper spray dangling from her bag. “We both have.”
“Not a stalker! Swear!” He extended a sweaty hand. “Dwight Krasner.”
She studied his glistening palm. After a hellishly long pause, she wrapped her fingers around it and squeezed.
Did she just roll her eyes?
“Laura,” she said and started to walk away again. “I’m late for study group! See you around, Derek. Maybe.”
“It’s Dwight, by the way, and um…yeah…nice to meet you, too!” He waved like a dope, watching her cross the grassy quadrangle alone.
It’s over. I blew it.
Then, she slowed down.
What the hell is she doing?
When Laura finally stopped, she cast an austere look over her shoulder. The iciness in her expression thawed a little.
“Nothing changes in life until you make a decision to do something unexpected!” She waved him hither. “This is so crazy!”
“Oh yeah?” Dwight jogged over, confused, but happy she waited. “What’d you do that’s so unexpected and life-changing, huh?”
“Didn’t you see?” Laura smiled. “I stopped walking away.”
#
Laura 2.0 picked out her favorite clothes with 97% accuracy.
She watered her plants and recalled 88% of their names.
She went grocery shopping and selected 92% of her favorite brands.
Whenever she defied expectations, Dwight flagged the activity in the Bionica Life application and requested a behavioral patch.
5% more frustration when unable to open the pickle jar.
7% reduction in enthusiasm for vacuuming.
15% increase in sexual open-mindedness (because, why the hell not?).
#
“Astronaut,” Laura said, brushing her fingertips down the newborn’s rosy cheek. Dwight snorted from his place on the lumpy hospital couch.
“Not if he’s got your math skills.”
“You’re lucky I’m too baby-tired to smack you!” She cuddled the infant against her breast. “You’re going to do whatever it is that makes you most happy in life, Jeremy. Mommy will make sure of it.”
Dwight groaned, sitting up. “We better keep him away from law school then. I recall a certain somebody flaming out like a comet.”
“Don’t you dare!” Laura’s laser eyes blasted him. “Wasn’t my fault I met a stalker who turned out to be a major, major distraction.”
Dwight offered a guilty-as-charged smile, toasting her with his cold cup of coffee.
“Would you hold him for a bit?” Laura shifted in the hospital bed. “I need to rest a little.”
Dwight stood up, then slid his palms underneath his son’s delicate frame. He cradled Jeremy Allen Krasner, careful not to wake him. Laura settled in, smiling at his new-daddy awkwardness.
“Jeremy and I are lucky to have you, sweetheart,” she said. “You always make sure things are absolutely perfect.”
Dwight returned to the couch, proud to have passed the first (and most important) test of fatherhood: don’t drop the baby.
The newborn’s porcelain hand played with the tip of his pointer finger.
He’s real, isn’t he?
Dwight kissed the fuzzy crown of Jeremy’s head.
“Fine. Astronaut it is.”
#
The news chyron read:
MASSIVE SECURITY BREACH AT BIONICA LIFE CORP: CHIEF TECH OFFICER RESIGNS AMID CRISIS.
“…on the phone, Madeline Hughes, a representative from Bionica Life Corporation. Ms. Hughes, thank you for calling in. Please tell us what happened this morning.”
“Robert, thank you for having me. I’ll share what we know so far. Please understand, our investigation is ongoing. At 3:30 AM, we detected suspicious activity in our distribution network servers. We have since determined our security was breached for an indeterminable amount of time…
“Do you know who or what breached it, Ms. Hughes?”
“Not at present. We’ve deployed assets to help us determine that information. We will keep everybody apprised of our findings.”
“And the distribution network is responsible for deploying software to Bionica Life products worldwide?”
“Firmware and security upgrades and behavioral patching, yes.”
“Ms. Hughes, there are millions of Bionica Life products in operation globally. What does this mean for consumers?”
“Great question, Robert. While the investigation is ongoing, we recommend placing all nonessential products in sleep mode until our threat assessment is complete and security patching deployed. We are in the process of—"
“Brave new world, eh?” the hotel bartender said with a whistle. He scooped up a glass of melting ice. “Another seltzer, bub?”
Dwight waved him off.
Fucking tech.
The Bionica Life application hadn’t connected all morning.
GPS: down.
Remote access control: offline.
And the activity log over the last 24 hours?
Blank. Smoke. Digital dust.
Laura Krasner was off the grid.
He called home. Nobody answered.
II.
Dwight gripped the steering wheel, knuckles flushed.
“We need a second opinion.”
Laura placed her hand on his thigh. “Look, I know you’re freaking out about this, but I really need you to be two things right now: brave and realistic. Can you do that? For me?”
“I’m trying.” Dwight ground his teeth. “I just want to make sure we know what we’re dealing with. Get verification. Is that so unreasonable?”
His wife sighed. “No, it’s reasonable, but it won’t change anything. We know all that we need to know.” Laura took a deep breath. “The MRI clearly showed a spot…on my brain. That’s fact, Jack.”
“Could be lots of things. An error. A technical glitch, maybe?”
“Dwight…”
“Did you see the technician? She looked high to me.”
“Dwight.”
“People are misdiagnosed all the time, Laura. We’ll make another appointment. Maybe shop around for a different neurologist—"
“Jesus Christ, quit it!” Her fingernails bit into his quadriceps.
“Ouch! What the fuck, babe?”
“Don’t do this right now.”
“Do what?”
“What you always do when you get bad news: try to will it away. Let’s deal with this like grownups for once, okay?”
“Um…I am.”
“No, you’re not. You can’t redo reality just because you don’t like the present outcome. That’s not how it works, Dwight.”
He looked at her for the first time since leaving the appointment. His eyes were as irritated as freshly popped blisters and pooled with tears.
“Laura?”
“What?”
“Aren’t you…scared?”
“I am scared, yes.” She gazed out of the passenger window. “Scared that we’re going to be late picking up Jeremy. Terrified we don’t have a thing to eat for dinner…”
#
Thanks for flying Delcon Airlines, Dwight Krasner! For your enjoyment during the flight, here are today’s Top Headlines:
● MACHINES OF MAYHEM: 2 DEAD IN COLORADO FOLLOWING SYNTHETIC RAMPAGE.
● A.I. ARSON – 10-STORY APARTMENT BUILDING BURNS IN PHOENIX.
● SYNTHETIC HOSTAGE SITUATION SHUTS DOWN MOVIE THEATER IN ROANOKE.
● U.K. – GUNMAN STORMS PARLIAMENT, SCOTLAND YARD BELIEVES SYNTHETIC.
● I LOVED HIM – WOMAN SAYS AFTER ROBOTIC HUSBAND DROWNS NEWBORN IN POOL.
● TECH MOGUL RECALLS 2032 DIRE PROPHECY OP. ED. – IF THEY CAN THINK, THEY CAN DESTROY US.
● INTELLIGENCE NIGHTMARE: MILITARY GRADE SYNTHETICS DEACTIVATED – BUT TOO LATE?
● TRACKING THE CYBER TERRORISTS – FAMILIAR FOES AND FINGERPRINTS?
● BREAKING NOW: PRESIDENT DECLARES STATE OF EMERGENCY – ONGOING A.I. CRISIS DEEPENS.
● BIONICA CORP. IN PR CRISIS. TOP EXEC ADMITS TO AI VULNERABILITIES: WE WEREN’T READY.
#
Jeremy packed his bowl with rocky road, crushed candy bits, and graham cracker dust. With the electric eyes of a mad scientist, he tarred his masterpiece in a sticky web of hot fudge.
Then, there was Laura, who watched her son with a tender, tranquil smile. She held the smallest of cups in her thin fingers. In it, a half scoop of vanilla bean.
“Mommy, don’t you want chocolate chips?” Jeremy hoisted his soupy creation up to her chin. “Don’t you want some enn and enms?”
“No, baby, I’m fine. Mommy’s not hungry today.”
Jeremy shrugged and bopped over to the cashier station.
“Put it on the scale, bud,” his father said.
The four-year-old obliged, reticent to let go of the gooey treat – even for a nanosecond.
“Bet it weighs five hundred and a thousand pounds, Da-dah!”
“Wait,” Laura said. “You forgot to add mine.”
The cashier glanced at her paisley headscarf and med-dead eyes.
“No worries, ma’am. Your scoop is on the house today.”
#
“Rate your experience with WeDrive,” the digital concierge in the autonomous vehicle said. “Use our mobile app to reserve your next ride and don’t forget to refer friends and fam–“
Dwight yanked his luggage halfway up the driveway before letting it go.
Please be okay. Everything needs to be okay.
He punched in the code. The front door opened. Darkness inside.
“Laura! Jeremy!”
He ran upstairs to the master bedroom. A sizable lump lay beneath the comforter. “Laura?” He yanked it off, revealing only a fluffy body pillow and ice-cold sheets.
She’s not here. Maybe sleeping with Jeremy?
Dwight charged across the loft to his son’s room. A small projector cast spectral spaceships on the walls and ceiling. A pile of plush animals covered the boy’s otherwise unoccupied bed.
Where the hell are they?
Back on the landing, Dwight curled his fingers around the banister. His heart thumped inside his temples like a Timpani drum.
*the distant trickling of water*
Dwight stumbled downstairs, rounded the corner into the pitch-black kitchen. The heel of his shoe skidded across the floor. He caught himself against the counter.
Click! Lights.
Laura Krasner hunched over the running faucet. Dishwater lapped over the basin. Clumps of suds drifted on the wet floor like fluffy, wayward glaciers.
“Laura?” Dwight reached out, taking a shaky step across flooded tile toward her slack figure. “Are you okay? I’ve been calling—"
“Raaaak!” She spun to face him, her busted eye-coloration system cycling through a maddening rainbow of mismatching hues.
It’s bottomless, isn’t it?
The slate muzzle of the handgun she aimed at his head swallowed him.
#
The nurses had their orders: make Mrs. Krasner comfortable, adjust the morphine drip, and ready for a code blue.
Laura weighed 84 pounds. Purple bruises spotted her yellowing skin. Her taut skull only held a few disparate strands of chestnut hair.
She fought so damned hard. She deserves to rest now.
Why, if Dwight believed those words, could he not stop resting his cheek against hers? Why did the thought of a Laura-less world make him want to follow her into the infinite dark forever? Why did he keep asking her to fight on – please don’t go, we need you, baby – when the requests only made her weep tears of hopelessness?
“Momma?” Jeremy stroked her brittle wrist, held her bony hand. “Do you need more medicine, Momma? Are you okay?”
“Yes, baby, I’m okay. Everything’s okay. I love you so much.”
Entwined, the Krasner family laid in the hospital bed until morning.
Two left behind, sobbing. One silent, but everywhere.
#
Laura simpered behind damp tangles of greasy hair. A battalion of malfunctioning expressions warred across her face.
“Haz-buh-hend,” she croaked, voice off-pitch and marinated in static.
Dwight backed into the counter, hands up.
“Put down the gun, Laura. Please.”
She stomped a foot and rattled her head no.
“Bah-hhad hazz-buh-uh-eend.B-B-broh-kh-khen f-f-fah-fah-ma-lee.”
…we recommend placing all non-essential products in sleep-mode until our threat assessment is complete and security patching deployed…
Worth a shot.
“Laura, go to sleep.”
She gnashed her teeth. “No ssss-leee-phfff.Mom-ee!”
“Laura, go to sleep. Control command, go to sleep.”
“No! Mom-ee! No! Cry! Cry!” Her finger twitched on the trigger.
Sweet Jesus! Fuck! She’s going to shoot you! Find a weapon! A knife. A rolling pin. Frying pan. A goddamn spork! Anything!
A junior baseball glove sat on the kitchen counter near the fridge.
Dwight’s heart tumbled from its ribcage, down a bone stairwell, and splattered on the basement floor of his belly.
Jeremy.
“Where is our son?” he asked. “Did you hurt him?”
Laura’s jaw flapped open. A tendril of synthetic drool hung from her chin.
“Bah-had hazz-buh-end. B-b-bro-khen ch-ch-eye-llld. Mom-ee.Cry! Cry! Cry!”
Now! While she’s agitated!
Dwight reached for the gun.
Crack!
Metal against skull.
Wet floor.
Her ankles…
Darkness.
#
Dirty laundry spilled from overstuffed hampers.
Stacks of food-spackled dishes lined the kitchen sink.
Wayward toys trespassed into forbidden living spaces.
Laura’s plants decomposed in their pots.
Mounds of unopened mail jutted from drawers.
Red rings (of God knows what) calcified in their toilet bowls.
And while it all eroded around him, Dwight Krasner stayed in bed.
So much easier to sleep the days away in the dark.
And the demons?
They whispered about death.
What good is a boy without his mother?
Dwight pulled the whiskey bottle from his lips.
“No good at all.”
#
BOOM!
Shards of pixelated skull soared across the smoking battlefield. A blond soldier stomped over the bleeding carcass of another dead werewolf. He pumped his shotgun.
Dwight groaned, sitting near the giant, flickering television. Volume low. Lights too bright for his burgeoning headache to absorb.
Try as he might, he couldn’t escape the wraps of cord and cable spun around his body like a spider’s web.
Jesus Christ, Laura. What have you done?
On the carpet, smashed household gadgetry drifted on a seabed of tangled wire. From the looks of it, she spared no charge stand, smart plug, kitchen appliance, or console in the house. Demolished. Pieces everywhere.
Whiizzzraaahhhh!
The chainsaw bayonet at the end of the soldier’s space rifle pushed through the sternum of another howling heathen. Bloody jelly splashed across the screen by the bucketful. The beefy soldier smiled.
Who is playing the goddamn game–?
The grim answer sat next to him. It slumped in the adjacent rocker, wearing a heavy virtual reality headset and crooked baseball cap. His little thumbs flicked joysticks and tapped buttons at a breakneck pace.
“Jeremy!”
“Pah-err-fff-ekt fff-ah-muh-lee,” a shattered voice said from the doorway.
#
“One, then two,” Dwight said for the thousandth time, breath rank from a day-long bender that melted into the night.
Jeremy didn’t hear him, of course. He’d been asleep for hours, curled up under his Super Mario duvet.
One, then two. That’s all. This, then that.
The Smith & Wesson felt like a rock in his hand, two rounds in the chamber.
One, then two.
“I knew you’d be an amazing father,” Laura’s ghost said, wrapping her smoky arms around his waist from behind.
“Don’t watch me,” Dwight said, shaking. “You shouldn’t watch me.”
The barrel scraped against Jeremy’s skull.
“Do it, sweetheart.” Her icy fingertips trailed down Dwight’s arm. “Do it for me. Send him to space where astronauts belong…”
He closed his eyes, felt the tension of the trigger.
I’m so sorry, bud.
“Da-dah?”
The gun tumbled from Dwight’s hand, the weight of it (and Laura) gone.
Jeremy yawned, rubbed his eyes, and sat up with a grunt. “Have you come to sleep with me, Da-dah?”
Dwight crash-landed on his knees, the room askew and torrid as a desert. Why is it so fucking hot in here?
Jeremy wrapped his skinny arms around his father’s sweaty neck and pulled him in for a hug. Dwight collapsed onto the mattress.
“Nothing is right,” he said, tears muffled by a Bowser pillow.
Jeremy rolled his dad’s head onto his lap, then petted his stubbly cheek.
“Why did the cookie go-tah the doctor?” he asked, grinning.
“…why, Jer?”
“Cuz, he felt crummy. Get it? CRUMMY!”
The boy laughed. Dwight did, too.
#
The synthetic heaped more smashed electronica onto her trash pile. A kitsune tail of plugs and wires was dragged into the den behind her.
“Sweetheart, untie me,” Dwight said, voice measured but firm. “You’re sick. I can help you feel better. I can fix you, if you let me.”
Laura’s head cocked at the sound of his voice, her glitch-bot eyes afire. A grin, like a wound, opened above her chin.
“F-f-fix you?” She pointed at Jeremy, who continued to massacre werewolves with grenade and gun. “F-f-fix you broh-ken ch-ch-eye-lllld.”
“Laura, I don’t know what you’re saying–”
“Cry! Cry! Cry!” Her snarling face suddenly close enough to kiss. “Ba-had hazz-buh-end,” she growled. “So broh-ken, hazz-buh-end!” Laura’s finger stroked his cheek, her expression both disgusted and fascinated.
A dark notion formed in the maelstrom of her eyes. Dwight imagined something wicked born – a vile centipede of an idea hatched from a small, black egg – in the motherboard of her brain. Then, Laura pushed away from him, skittered to the part of the den he could not see.
Do something! Hurry!
“Jer?” he said, eyes aside. “Can you hear me?”
The boy jiggled the joystick. A snot bubble burst from his nose.
“Jeremy, I need you to run and get help, okay? This isn’t a game. Your mom is dangerous, and we need to get help for her. Jer? Can you do that–”
Wham!
Laura leaped from the darkness and clambered onto her husband’s lap. She admired a small, green circuit board in her hand, squared, with gold connectors. “Ssss-oh p-p-preh-tee.”
Dwight tried to shake her off, but she pressed it against his face. The sharp prongs on the board’s underbelly pierced his skin.
“What are you doi–”
An ominous red firefly ascended the reflection on the television screen. A crisp hiss!proceeded a searing pain in Dwight’s left cheek.
“Jesus! Fuck!”
“S-s-so broh-khen…” The soldering iron illuminated her grin like the ember tip of a lit cigarette. “S-s-so preh-tee….”
“No! I’m not broken. I’m not fucking broken!”
“Ba-had hazz-buh-end.Cry! Cry! ”
“No, no, no! Jeremy, run! Go get help! Jer–”
Hiss!
“Arrrghhhh!”
Dwight’s fingers curled into fists. He rocked with pain-fueled fury. “Get the hell off of me!”
The synthetic spilled onto the floor, tangling herself in wire. She clawed back to her feet just in time to watch the circuit board slide down her burnt husband’s tear-slicked face. Her expression darkened.
“Ba-had! Ba-had!”
“Laura, you need to stop this shit!”
She scampered around the rocker.
“F-f-fix you hazz-bend! F-f-ix yoooouuuu!”
“Nuuugghhh…” Dwight thrashed, arching his back the best he could, trying to keep his windpipe from collapsing. Laura cinched the extension cord around his throat tighter, tighter, tighter…
#
“Where does it go, Da-dah?” the boy asked, fascinated by the amber liquid swirling around the drain. “To the sewers? With the alligatohs?”
Dwight nodded, turning over the next bottle of bourbon.
“Where demons go to drown, Jer. Way down in the dark.”
The boy appeared pensive, pulled his elbows off the counter, and sat down on the footstool. “So, you’re not sad anymoh?” he asked.
“A little.” Dwight tossed another dead soldier into the bin, glass clinked against glass. “But not like I was. Not like that.”
“What made you so sad?”
“Mom. Saying goodbye.”
Jeremy nodded. “I get sad, too.”
Dwight knelt down to face his son, then placed a hand on his thin shoulder. “I’m sorry to hear that, Jer,” he said. “I guess, I never saw it in you.”
The boy looked at the ground. “It’s okay, Da-dah. I’m strong like this!” Jeremy flexed his skinny arms and growled like the Incredible Hulk.
“You sure are!” Dwight said, laughing. “Tougher than me by a mile.” The afternoon sun peeked through the kitchen window. “Hey, you want to go throw the ball? We both could use some fresh air.”
“Yesssssss! Yes! Yes!” Jeremy clapped.
“Go get your glove then. I’ll meet you in the backyard.”
The boy dashed off. Dwight poured the last bottle of alcohol into the drain and ran the garbage disposal for good riddance.
Chirp! His smartphone rattled on the counter. Dwight hadn’t checked his messages since the funeral. He recalled what his dream girl once told him on the grassy quadrangle at university: “Nothing changes in life until you make a decision to do something unexpected!”
“Okay, Laura,” he said, smiling. “Let’s see if you’re right.”
Dwight checked his notifications. Nothing critical, mostly spam, some work junk. Then, a curious subject line caught his eye:
Bionica Life – Never let go of a second chance. Start yours today.
#
Blood vessels exploded in his eyeballs like baby stars in a new universe. Everything sparkled. Everything glorious.
“Ba-had! Ba-had hazz-buh-end!” Laura screamed, putting all of her weight into her murdercraft.
Dwight looked at Jeremy, the boy who sometimes felt sad. The boy who liked to tell jokes just after midnight. The boy who lost a mother, and soon, a father, too. Dwight imagined him in the World Series, catching the game-winning out. It was a joyous meditation as muscle and organs asphyxiated, ready to release from spirit. Don’t watch me. You shouldn’t watch me.
Jeremy didn’t. Never looked over. Never pulled off the VR mask to cry for help or tell his mommy to stop. In fact, he never moved at all.
Not even when the gamepad fell from his stiff, little fingers.
“Raaakkk!” Laura let go of the extension cord.
A glorious gulp of air washed down Dwight’s throat. He gasped for another, and another, and another…
What the hell just happened?
The synthetic scuttled around the rocker, loomed over Jeremy with a darkening scowl. Something is wrong.
“Bro-khen ch-ch-eye-llld,” she said, scooping up the abandoned controller from the carpet. “F-f-f-ix you. Mom-ee!”
She returned it to the boy’s empty palm. Jeremy’s fingers refused her offering, curling up like a dead spider’s legs.
Smack! She swatted his wrist.
“Bah-had ch-eye-lld! Cry! Cry! Cry!”
“Leave him alone!” Dwight threw his body against bonds.
“Bro-khen ch-ch-eye-llldhhh. Mom-ee f-f-fix you. Mom-ee!”
With the crazed countenance of an enthralled tiger, Laura stripped the Maverick’s cap from her son’s head and threw it to the ground.
No, no, no, no, no, NO! NO! NO! Look away! LOOK AWAY!
But it was too late. Dwight couldn’t unsee any of it.
Look away!
Couldn’t unsee what his beloved wife did to their baby boy.
Look away!
Couldn’t unsee Jeremy’s skull – the top of it cracked open – split apart, a glistening crimson melon in a blanched bone halo.
Look away!
Couldn’t unsee the circuitry, prongs, and copper wires sheathed in the supple brown sponge of his exposed cerebrum.
LOOK THE FUCK AWAY!
Couldn’t unsee his crippled fingers tickling the air, whilst his mother gently pushed her thumb deep inside his milky brain and stirred.
III
A park bench at Bionica Life’s campus provided a shady place to debrief. Jeremy hadn’t said a word since leaving the consultation.
“Well…” Dwight flipped open the blue folder, at least fifty pages of contract fanned through his fingers. “Guess we’re really doing it, huh?”
Jeremy shrugged.
“You don’t seem excited.”
Another shrug.
“Jer, it’ll take some time to get used to – a few days, a week at most. But then, we’ll have mom back! It’ll be like she never left, you know?”
Jeremy rustled. He watched a blackbird peck at a candy wrapper.
“Best of all,” Dwight continued, “Mom’ll be home in time to celebrate your birthday! I bet we can talk her into making her world-famous, deep-fried tacos. Would you like that, dude o’ mine?”
“It won’t be Mom!” Jeremy erupted, causing the blackbird to abandon its foil treasure and take flight. “Don’t call it Mom! Mom is dead! When you’re dead, you don’t make tacos! You’re dead!”
“Jeremy!”
“When you’re dead you’re s’posed to stay dead!”
The six-year-old crumpled over, head against palms.
Dwight wrapped his arm around the boy’s trembling shoulder. “I know it’s scary to think about but remember what the nice saleslady said: death is an option. We don’t have to choose it, Jer. It’ll be okay, I promise!”
“No, daddy, it’s not okay! Why can’t we jus’ let her live with the angels?”
Dwight slammed the folder shut.
“I’m doing this for us. People aren’t gone unless you let them go. You want to let Mom go? You want her to disappear forever?”
“Mom’s dead, Daddy! She alreadydisappear’d.”
“No, she didn’t! She’s right here. Right fucking here!” Whap! Dwight struck the folder against the bench. Jeremy flinched, grew smaller and paler. Technicians in white lab coats strolled by, enjoying the warm afternoon.
“I’m sorry. Daddy’s tired,” Dwight finally said, rubbing his eyes. “Let me explain it differently. Remember when I told you that anytime you missed Mom you should close your eyes and feel her in your heart?”
“Yes,” Jeremy squeaked. “I ‘member.”
“Well, it doesn’t work for me anymore, Jer. I try to feel her but I can’t. She’s supposed to be there, but she isn’t. She’s just…gone.”
“But, Daddy, she’s right here…” Jeremy lifted his father’s hand and placed it over his tiny beating heart. He smiled bright as the sun. “Feel it?”
Dwight yanked his hand away from the hopeful boy, stood up, and snapped the folder beneath his armpit.
“No,” he said, turning away. “I don’t feel anything.”
#
“Swwweeettt ch-ch-eye-llld,” Laura cooed, placing Jeremy’s ballcap over the gaping crevice in his head. She caressed his shoulder blade, the hitching madness in her eyes replaced with flawless adoration.
“Guuurhhhhk,” Jeremy moaned, tongue to lips. The boy lifted a shaky hand, and touched Laura’s wrist, stroking it the way he did the day she died.
“F-f-fix you. Mom-ee,” she said, placing her palm over his.
You’re going to do whatever it is that makes you most happy in life, Jeremy. Mommy will make sure of it.
Then, there was Dwight. She loved him, too, didn’t see? Planted him right next to his beloved son in one of their favorite spaces. Exactly where he’d want to be on a Saturday afternoon. All of them together. Just a bunch of mannequins in a shattered storefront window of second chances.
A perfect family.
Did you get what you paid for, Mr. Krasner?
He’d been a fucking fool.
“Laura?” he said, withering in the rocker, arms limp, too exhausted to shout or cry or fight anymore. “I’m broken…can you fix me, too?”
The synthetic let go of Jeremy’s hand. Her eyes glittered with frenzied euphoria. “Bah-hadd haz-buh-end,” she said, stepping toward him, crooked finger-wagging in schoolmarm condemnation. “Bro-o-kkhen haz-buh-buh-end.Mom-ee f-f-f ix you. Purr-fa-fa-eckt fa-muh-leeeee.”
“Yes…” Dwight stared at the cluttered floor, thinking about dead astronauts floating in the black nothing of space. “Fix me goddammit.”
“Cry! Cry! Cry!” Laura bolted into the unseen spaces of the den.
While she rummaged through her piles, clicking and clacking, Dwight watched the knot of oddities on the carpet shift with her movements. It was a hypnotic web of garage tools, smashed plastic casings, bits of circuitry, plugs, loose batteries, wires, and more wires and…
…holy shit…
the handgun.
The Smith & Wesson goosenecked from the heap.
She must’ve thrown it in the mix when she dropped off the rest of her junk!
Dwight stretched his pointer finger, felt the cold rub of the butt.
Shoot her in the face.
He pulled away from it.
Don’t you dare. Don’t you fucking dare.
Laura returned from whatever shadowy corner hid the power drill and climbed onto his lap. With her empty hand, she cupped his blistering cheek. “M-m-eye broh-ho-khen hazzbend,” she said, placing the gold-plated bit at the center of his forehead. “F-f-fix you? Mom-ee.”
Dwight nodded, shut his eyes, and tried one last time to feel the real Laura Krasner in the blank spaces of his heart. The drill squealed.
Look, I know you’re freaking out, but I really need you to be two things right now: brave and realistic. Can you do that? For me?
He mouthed yes, feeling a tornado touch down upon his brow.
Jeremy and I are lucky to have you, sweetheart. You always make sure things are absolutely perfect.
The bit pierced his skin, burrowed deeper into the porcelain wall of his skull. The blood on his nose and lips: a tepid, gushing river. He thought about Jeremy – his goofy, little outfielder – a child that would never again feel grass beneath his feet or chase a fly ball into the sun.
“You can’t redo reality just because you don’t like the present outcome, Dwight. That’s not how it works.
That’s not how it works.
That’s not how it works.
That’s not how it wo—
His eyes burst open.
“No, Laura, you’re wrong. That’s exactly how this fucking works.”
BOOM!
Shards of hydroxyapatite skull surfed on a wave of white sparks. Laura poured off his lap in a graceless heap, a broken windup doll, finding like company on the carpet with the rest of the busted scrap.
Jeremy’s body seized as foam dripped from his chin.
What good is a boy without his mother?
Dwight bent his wrist, lined up the shot.
No good at all.
BOOM!
#
From her lounge underneath the patio, Laura Krasner cheered when Jeremy caught the ball. Heckled when her hubby missed the mark.
“Hey, babe! How about some sauce for that meatball?”
Dwight ignored the color commentator in the floppy, straw hat, and retro round sunglasses. “Spread your legs, Jer!” he said, calling across the lawn. “Shoulder’s width! Bend your knees a little!”
The spindly ten-year-old locked-down a more appropriate stance for an outfielder. An eager fist hammered into mitt.
“Like this?”
Dwight nodded, winding up. “Here comes a fly.”
The baseball soared into the red horizon. Jeremy tracked it, squinting to deter the light of the setting sun.
3 – 2 – 1
Thud!
The ball hit the grass.
The fifth-grader slumped over, moaning.
Dwight sighed and pulled out his smartphone. He opened the Bionica Life application and selected Jeremy’s profile.
He requested a modest 2% improvement in athletic skills.
This will all be perfect soon.
Thanks for reading! Happy Father’s Day!
And remember to enjoy the moments you have.
They are already perfect.
@writingiswar