A Self Made Monster (15 page)

He had again dreamed about his deceased brother David. In the dream, David made him swallow haloperidol, a powerful anti-psychotic drug. The haloperidol pulled Alex out of his catatonic state, but the process was painful—Alex felt ripped from a womb into the appalling world of his family’s worry-lined faces, their hushed despair, their glaring lamps and loud TV’s.

“You’re better now,” David said. “Let’s go outside for a walk.”

Frightened, Alex gripped David’s head and twisted it clockwise several times. When he could twist no further, he let go. The head spun counterclockwise as if spring-loaded, throwing off a spiral of blood.

The idea of stealing a supply of haloperidol hit him a mile out of Kalamazoo. He saw a billboard for Apex, a chain of pharmacies. “WE CARE MORE AT APEX!” the billboard declared in big block letters. Beneath the declaration was a photograph of an elderly couple smiling at an Apex pharmacist. The pharmacist’s broad smile was as white as his jacket.

Alex might not have had the idea if he had not feared what his appearance would be in thirty or forty years. He might not have the wrinkled skin and narrow sunken mouth of the elderly man on the Apex billboard. But he would look different: he imagined himself with an Asian eye, a Nordic profile, the smirking mouth of teenage boy, and the chronic cough of a drunk with TB.

The pharmacy on the corner of Grant and Wilson was old fashioned. Chocolates and a stack of newspapers were displayed in the front window. A modest rack of liquor ran along the rear wall. The teen cashier had left five minutes earlier. The pharmacist, jacket across his arm, was halfway out the door.

“I need a prescription,” Alex said with a broad Southern accent. Alex’s grungy fake beard and plaid hunting cap had rendered him a bit whimsical.

“Sorry sir, we’re closed.” The pharmacist, a hefty man in his early thirties, extended an arm toward the sidewalk. “Please come back tomorrow.”

“But I need—”

“There’s an Apex Drugs on the north side. They’re open until midnight.”

Alex drove a shoulder into the pharmacist’s chest. The pharmacist fell, and Alex shut the door.

“I need haloperidol.” Alex grabbed the man’s neck and yanked him to his feet.

“There’s a law that, that—” The pharmacist was frightened by the ease with which the nut lifted him. “I’ll need a physician’s prescription.”

“Shut up.”

“State law requires a—”

“Just shut up and get it.” Alex slapped the pharmacist.

Face tingling, the pharmacist walked gingerly to the back room. Alex followed. Pharmaceuticals filled two dozen gray metal shelves. Hands unsteady, the pharmacist reached for the top of the third shelf. He removed two white boxes. Each box held four two-hundred count plastic bottles of haloperidol. “Anything else?”

“Just one thing. A personal question.”

“Personal?”

“Two questions, really. First, what’s your name? Second, do you have any health problems?”

“No.”

“Your name is ‘no’?”

“Bruno.”

“Goodness,” Alex smiled. “What a charming Old World name.” Alex put an arm around Bruno’s shoulders, as if consoling a distraught friend. “Okay Bruno. Do you have bad headaches? Ulcers? Maybe respiration problems? What about cancer?”

Bruno tried to step away, but Alex tightened his grasp. “Any serious health problems in your family? What about extreme blood pressure? What about, oh—what about gout? Diabetes?”

Bruno feared that Alex was joking, perhaps leading up to a psycho punch line that ended with a knife. As Alex continued asking, Bruno realized Alex was serious. The realization frightened him further.

“You seem to be really healthy,” Alex said brightly. He hugged the pharmacist.

“Thank you.” Bruno stood stiffly as Alex’s bear hug briefly tightened, then sighed in relief when Alex stepped back. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths, fighting to stay calm. He did not want to startle the nut, who was happily shaking bottles of haloperidol like castanets. The crazy bastard’s going to leave, Bruno thought. I’ll call the cops a minute after he’s gone and he’ll wish…

The pain started at Bruno’s neck and tore throughout his head.

Bruno tried to loosen Alex’s mouth from his neck, but the struggle only deepened the pain. Still, he managed to get one foot against the wall. He set himself and pushed. Alex stumbled back two steps before regaining his balance. Bruno had pushed at the moment that Alex was wiping his bloody hands on the pharmacist’s pant leg.

Bruno stared at Alex, straining to grasp what he saw.

Alex sucked in a stringy piece of skin just as a clowning child sucks in a length of spaghetti. He chewed slowly, in an exaggerated manner, and noisily swallowed. Bruno probed the wound in his neck with a shaking pinkie.

“You just standing there with a hole in your neck!” Alex teased. “You should look in the mirror.”

Bruno felt divided into two parts: one was trapped inside his body and shook from the wound’s pain. The other stood outside his body, motionless and numb.

Bruno bolted only when he saw his blood on the floor. Alex attacked and forced a hand inside the wound. His fingers pushed past the slippery torn skin and muscle and found the carotid artery. He pulled.

As Bruno lie twitching, Alex squatted and clenched his fists. The blood turbo-charged him. He was higher by the nanosecond and felt like a kid on the world’s biggest, most brightly-lit Ferris wheel, manic with elation.

The Ferris wheel spun faster. Wind burned Alex’s face and G-forces juggled his stomach. The wheel’s lights blurred into a spinning red circle composed of thin, multiple queues. As the speed increased, the circle’s arc grew bigger and brighter. Alex could see nothing but the circle; everything else faded into a black background.

Alex squeezed his head and rocked back and forth: the Ferris wheel had raced beyond the point of mere fun, and he was suddenly anxious. The circle’s lines grew erratic and elliptical, and the black background was marred by tiny white spots, like stars on the night sky. Alex wished it would stop—the ellipses were throwing off sparks.

Alex found himself whispering, “Stop…stop…stop.”

Finally the spinning stopped. Wiping his mouth, struggling for breath, he looked at Bruno and recalled his latest dream about David.

Alex reached down and gripped Bruno’s head. He twisted: once, twice, three times. After the initial protest of noisy cervicals, the head turned freely.

Ron Daley was halfway home when he remembered. He trotted back toward the pharmacy, hoping Mr. Anderson was still there. Ron had gotten paid today. Yet when Mr. Anderson told him he could quit early tonight, Ron had yelled thanks and was through the door without his check.

The front door was locked. He was about to try the side door when he saw movement in the back. “Mr. Anderson I forgot my check!”

Mr. Anderson had a nosebleed. Then he saw that Mr. Anderson’s entire face was bloody. Then he saw that the bloody face did not belong to Mr. Anderson.

Ron sprinted across the street toward the corner pay phone to call the police. He was searching his pockets frantically for change when he heard shattering glass. The pharmacy’s front window was gone, save for a few jagged pieces that glimmered in the streetlights like dozens of knives. A passing car swerved to avoid the body that was suddenly in the street. Ron covered his ears as a pick up rear-ended the car. Quiet
Grant Street
was suddenly riotous with shouts, broken glass, and blood. A woman stood before the headless body and screamed. A pot-bellied man gripped her shoulders and tried to calm her, but she kept screaming.

“It’s all right,” the man kept whispering. He refused to stare at the headless corpse.

Ron heard a hollow
thunk
behind him.

Mr. Anderson’s head engaged Ron in a stare-down. Ron’s limbs went prickly and he could not avert his eyes from Mr. Anderson’s stare. He was still staring when the police car arrived two minutes later.

Alex was hiding under somebody’s mini-van. The damned kid, running across the street to the pay phone! Alex had to distract the kid, if only for a few seconds. The headless body had crashed through the front window with spectacular noise. Then the fender-bender, the screaming woman. It was perfect. On a whim, Alex had picked up the head and heaved it through the window. It bounced a couple times and landed a yard from the kid’s feet. Alex cackled at the bloody slapstick, even as a tiny inner voice demanded seriousness.

Running out of the pharmacy, Alex had dropped a bottle of haloperidol. He was about to grab it when he saw a cop car barreling down the street. Alex cut across several lawns and into an alley. He kept running until he saw the mini-van.

Now, as he fished through his shirt pocket for a cigarette, he heard the clicking of boots on cement. Someone in cowboy boots approached. The boots paused by the driver’s side, and Alex heard the jangle of a key ring. My goddamned luck, he thought, is finally getting better. The driver’s door swung open and the driver got in. As the driver pulled on the door, Alex extended his arm. The door slammed against his palm then bounced back.

“You fuckin’ kids! Get out from under the van,” Carl demanded. Last night, kids had egged his house. He had a mind to boot their asses across the street. The kids never tired of hassling him. Carl got out of the van, lowered himself to his hands and knees.

Carl was struck in the face. “I’ll kill you little shits!” He was struck again and fell back onto his haunches.

As he struggled to clear his head, Alex rolled out from under the van and, gripping Carl by his jacket, walked him to the driver’s side of the vehicle. Carl struggled to resist, but his head was ringing and he found himself shoved across the driver’s seat and into the passenger seat. Alex followed him in and occupied the driver’s seat.

“Where’s the corner pharmacy?” Alex demanded. His beard was caked with dried blood. So was his shirt.

Carl cursed his luck—the nut had been hiding right under his van.

Carl tried not to choke. The sergeant had told him the killer was probably a psycho.

“Which one?”

“The one that’s two or three blocks from here. The little brick one, on the corner.”

“That’s Bruno Anderson’s pharmacy. He’s my pharmacist.”

“Why don’t you direct me toward it?”

“Just take this street three blocks down, then turn left.”

Alex was halfway to the pharmacy when he saw the billy club. It was halfway under the passenger seat. He sighed and pulled over.

“We’re not there yet,” Carl said. He inched his hands toward the .38 on his right hip.

Alex noted Carl’s blue windbreaker: the words “
County
Sheriff
‘s Police” were emblazoned in yellow script above the jacket’s pocket.

“One goddamned nightmare after another!” Alex shouted. “You wouldn’t believe my fucking luck tonight. First the kid, then I drop one of the bottles, then you.” He faced the cop, eyes bugging. “To top it off, I choose to hide under your van. Why the hell don’t you have a police decal on the damned thing? What, are you ashamed of your profession?”

“What?”

“Ashamed?” Alex demanded. A laugh frolicked its way past his rage.

“I can help you, buddy. Just be calm.”

“I don’t think you really want to help me.” He glanced at the police scanner/phone, then saw a sheet of paper taped to the door of the glove box. Various police codes were printed on the paper.

“I do want to help you.” Carl held his pistol to Alex’s head. “Just stay calm, buddy.”

Alex tore the police scanner/phone handset out of its receiver, then tossed it over his shoulder into the back seat. The cop’s hand was unsteady, and the barrel trembled six inches from Alex’s face.

“Go ahead and shoot,” Alex dared.

“Get out of the van, buddy.”

Alex opened the door, slowly stepped out.

Carl sprang out of the passenger side and pointed the pistol at Alex’s head. He would make Alex lie on his stomach. Then he would cuff Alex’s wrists and ankles, use a resident’s phone, and wait for the backup.

“On the ground, buddy, and put your hands on the back of your head.” Alex obeyed, then asked the cop what street he was lying on. The cop laughed. “Brown.”

“It’s a nice neighborhood,” Alex remarked to the asphalt. The cop cuffed him. “Don’t go away, buddy,” Carl mocked. He was elated—already, he saw the headlines and the stories about how Carl Martinez, a rookie Sheriff’s cop, collared a genuine psycho killer. His wife Sherry would be so proud. She’d screw him morning, noon, and night for a month.

A middle-aged man, coffee mug in hand, answered Carl’s knock. Carl showed the man his badge.

“What’s wrong, officer?”

“I’ve apprehended a suspected murderer,” Carl stated in his best Joe Friday tone. “Call the sheriff, I’ll be right outside.” Carl held up a reassuring hand when the man gasped.

“Everything’s under control, sir. Just call the sheriff and give them your address. They’ll be here immediately.”

Mouth agape, the man ran to his phone.

Carl approached his car. He heard something metallic, and the hair on his neck raised.