I’m waiting for my wife to wake up.
And I’m so fucking angry.
It’s funny, how long we work to not admit our anger, how long we work to perfect the art of swallowing our rage. Not me. Not anymore. I couldn’t hold this rage if I had to. If I wanted to. Which I don’t. This is not anger, this is a living thing, a breathing hatred that swirls inside me like a dragon. If I open my mouth too wide flames will blast out. This fury is my whole world now.
I’m going to kill her when she wakes up.
Writing this down may get me the electric chair—it proves pre-meditation after all— but I don’t care. What the hell do I have to live for? Why would I want to live? My son is gone. And it’s all her fault. But as long as she’s dead, as long as she suffers at her end, I’ll happily walk myself to the gas chamber and strap myself in. It will be worth it.
Our preacher says my son is in a better place. He says I must make my life a good one so I will see my son in Heaven. I nod, but I can’t live another forty or fifty years and spend every day mourning my son and how he should be by my side. More, there is no way in Hell I can let her exist knowing she’s the reason he’s gone. That isn’t fair to an absurd degree. She can’t be allowed to live.
She was on the phone when my son was killed. She admitted it. On the fucking phone. Texting or emailing her goddamned job or maybe scrolling through Facebook. That’s all she does anymore. She’s addicted to that thing. I’ve told her that, but she just laughs. She’s not laughing now. Oh sure, she’s grieving too, and maybe she’s carrying guilt. I hope so. I hope it’s fucking eating her alive.
She was on the phone and my four-year-old son got the front door open. He was so proud of being able to do it despite our telling him no, it’s dangerous, don’t do it. You know how kids are; everything becomes a game. He would unlock it and run out to see if I was home. He didn’t understand my going to work, he just thought I was outside. Kid logic. Out of sight, out of mind. Peek-A-Boo. He ran out several times in the past month, but we always got him back.
Well. I got him back. She was always too busy. On. Her. Phone. She said she can’t stand having notifications pending. Finally, I told her she had to be more careful, but she claimed that she was watching him, she was, but when I asked why she didn’t know he was outside her response was: “Well you got him. . .”
I haven’t trusted her in a long time. She’s too obtuse. No, that’s too nice. She’s too fucking stupid. But marriage is a machine that eats time and patience and hope and reality. I kept a sharp eye on my son when I was home, and I didn’t allow myself to think about what could happen when I wasn’t there. I asked God to watch them. Him. My son.
Was God watching when my son was run over by the truck? I know his fucking mother wasn’t.
The neighbors—people we don’t even talk to—came running when it happened. A stranger held my son as he died. I will never forgive her for that. Never. I was at work. I couldn’t be there, not even to witness, but she could have at least been the one to find him if she couldn’t be the one to stop him. How I wish she had been the one to find him. I wish she saw what she caused. A neighbor had my son’s blood on his shirt because he tried to help. My wife’s clothes were clean when I got home. How fucked up is that?
But oh my God she will not remain clean. As soon as she wakes up—
I couldn’t save my son, but I will goddamn sure avenge him.
I was last that day. He was in the morgue by the time I got home. His body. His pitiful body. They didn’t want me to look but I made them show me and I memorized everything. Even then I was planning, you see. The coroner—he wanted to keep quiet, but I made him tell me. Every bone in my sweet boy’s body was broken because his idiot fucking mother was too busy on her goddamned cellphone. He died like an animal in the street because she was on the internet liking and tweeting and lol-ing and fucking off!
They gave her a valium and that routine has gone on every day since. Four days now. I refused anything. Even drinking. I’ve had to be patient. I’ve had to wait for us to be alone. That’s what I told our families this evening, after the funeral, that I wanted to be alone with her tonight. And I do. But not to grieve. I wanted my son buried, I wanted him safe, finally safe. Safe from her, from the world, from what I’m going to do to his mother.
The family is supposed to return in the morning. What will they find? Of me, I mean. They will find her good and dead. That I swear.
I have a hammer by my chair. I used it to smash her phone. My God that was so enjoyable. I took it to the back porch, sat Indian style on the ground (my son’s favorite way to sit) and smashed her precious plastic and glass god to bits. Then I sat under the stars and sobbed. I cried for my son.
Every bone in his sweet little body was pulverized. When she wakes up, when she can feel, when she can see me, I intend to return the favor.
I have tied her to the bed. I haven’t taped her mouth shut but I will, after she’s awake. I don’t want her to suffocate in her sleep. That would be too good. There will be balance for my son.
I’m gonna start with her legs. I’m going to break them first. Then her arms. Then her jaw. Then I’m going to work my way around her body until I break everything, until she’s just a bloody sack like my son was. And after? I don’t care what happens after. But I hope this rage goes away. I hope when I watch her die, I find peace, but I don’t think it will happen. And I don’t care.
I do this of my own free will.
I do this for my son.
She’s waking up!
And I’m still so angry.
Paul Wilson lives in a suburban neighborhood much like the one he turned into a horror playground in his novel Hostage. He lives with his wife, kids, and two cats. He has worked a spectacular list of jobs including retail district manager, a 911 operator, and the head of a college security department. You can follow him on Twitter at Storydweller102 or email him at trucalling123@yahoo.com.
Published 2/10/22