Zombie (4 page)

At Tuesday’s group session Dr. B__ urged us to
speak from the heart
. There are eleven of us. Eyes are avoided.
O.K. men let’s get the ball rolling, who wants to begin?
There was a weird buzz at the back of my head. Kept looking back over my shoulder & shifting my ass in the chair but there was nobody behind me or nobody I could see.
Remember nobody’s judging anybody else. That’s the bottom line, guys
.

Fluorescent lights & some of them flickering. Cement-block wall painted mustard yellow & posters & fliers & sign-up sheets & a picture of Magic Johnson with some message on it & no windows except the one door with thick glass reinforced with wires like circuits of the brain & I’m wondering if it’s one-way glass & we are being observed like laboratory rats maybe videotaped? though when we came through that door that’s the same door we come through every week I would swear.

O.K. men let’s get the ball rolling, speak clearly & from the heart. Who wants to begin?

Bim goes first, Bim’s a white guy my age with a face like crumbly cheese & the Haldol tremors & a perpetual runny nose so there’s a glisten of snot in his nostrils like teardrops, once he gets talking & laughing & talking fast he can’t stop & I’m staring at the floor trying to think what Q__ P__ can say, three weeks in a row sitting here staring at the floor & deaf-&-dumb like a moron. If you don’t cooperate/communicate YOU’RE FUCKED. Next is this other white guy Perche in his forties always wears a plaid coat & necktie always grinning & trying to shake hands with everybody, saw me out on the street one day & called out QUEN-TIN! like we’re buddies & I stood there staring at him not eye-contact but chest-level & he stares at me & comes a little closer his hand held out to shake & I’m in my own space rigid & not-breathing & finally he backs off saying
Excuse me, I thought you were somebody I know
. & next there’s this fat guy, a kid younger than me with a beer gut all around his cowboy belt & pushing up toward his chin like a bloated frog, Frogsnout’s my name for him & he talks too fast too & sweats & pants & though I’m not listening I can’t help but hear; some bullshit about him
haunted by the memory of, can’t stop thinking of, so fucking sorry for
his sister’s kids he burnt up by accident pouring gasoline around the house & lighting it for revenge not knowing anybody was home & this takes a long time. & there’s the black guys of whom two are cool dudes I call Velvet Tongue & The Tease, these dudes true bullshit artists both on parole from
Jackson Q__ P__ could learn from but DON’T MAKE EYE CONTACT. So I don’t.

Forgot my morning meds & lunchtime & so on the way down here swallowed two ’ludes. Eating a double cheeseburger & fries & drinking Bud in the van, got a six-pack at a 7-Eleven & drank four beers straight, throat’s so fucking dry. Cruising the expressway & the riverfront & down by the projects. OFF LIMITS since sentencing. Taking a chance if a cop pulls me over & I’m drinking but no cop is going to pull me over, white guy with a neat haircut driving a van with O.K. headlights, taillights, safe within the speed limit & keeping to the right-hand lane. Q__ P__ got his driver’s license aged sixteen & always a damned careful driver.

So I’m cool & mellow & listening to the other guys or seeming so & Dr. B__’s frowning & nodding like they do, like they’re listening, too & taking it all in. & I’m not going to panic ’cause it’s my turn after the next guy. & I know I’m fucking up not
contributing to the discussion
as Dr. B__ calls it. & I know he’s already been giving me bad marks or??? on the reports.
Nobody’s going to judge you, men. Just speak from the heart. It goes no further than this room, O.K.?

My shoulders hunched like a vulture’s & I’m staring at my shoes which are jogging shoes stained like rust.
Quen-tin? How about you?
& I open my mouth to speak & there’s this voice comes out, it’s Q__ P__’s but like another guy’s too, somebody on TV maybe, or I’m imitating
Bim, Perche, Frogsnout, stammering saying how ashamed I was to betray the loving trust of my Mom & Dad & that was the worst part of what’d happened to me, not just this once but many times since the age of nineteen, though I had never been arrested before & never did anything
illegal
but many smaller things. (Why I said
nineteen
I don’t know, just an age that sounded O.K. It was aged
eighteen
in fact, the incident at Ypsilanti & how upset Dad & Mom were.) I wished I could turn the clock back to infancy I said! & start Time again. When I was pure & good. When I was with God. I said I believed in God but did not think He believed in me because I was not worthy. There is that way Mom’s face creases & collapses when she cries because she is getting old & my face collapsed like this & the guys were embarrassed & looked away except for Perche sucking it up like cum & Dr. B__ frowning & nodding. One of the black guys Velvet Tongue passed me a tissue but not looking at me & my voice was going fast now like a runaway trailer-truck down a mountain road. Said how sorry I was about the twelve-year-old boy I was accused of “molesting” (but did not supply details that he was
black & retarded & a natural zombie—
I’d thought!)—said I did not know what had happened exactly if I’d approached the boy myself in the alley back behind the dumpster where my van was parked or if the boy had followed me there &
picked me up
without my knowing. Because sometimes things happen to me I can’t comprehend. Too fast &
confused for me to comprehend. This boy looking so much older than twelve with eyes piercing like blades demanding money from me or he would tell on me, he demanded $10 & when I gave him $10 he demanded $20 & when I gave him $20 he demanded $50 & when I gave him $50 he demanded $100 which was when I lost it & screamed at him & shook him BUT I DID NOT HURT HIM I SWEAR.

By this time I was stammering & my face was wet with tears! I had not known there were tears inside my eye sockets so close to leaking & once begun it’s easy to cry & half the guys were looking away from me & the other half mainly white guys were looking & Dr. B__ was flush-faced like he’d come in his pants asking questions about the boy as if this was some kid I’d known like in the neighborhood not a total stranger & weird questions like had I
felt affection
for the boy & did I feel that
feeling affection was being manipulated
& that was why I
lost control
, it was
control of my own emotions
I had lost wasn’t it? & feared? & I was shaking now a little imitating Bim, the hand-tremors & twitchy mouth & my face shining with tears & I looked up at Dr. B__ for the first time daring to make eye-contact because the tears protected me & I said in a loud clear voice like it was a surprise to me & a wonder
—Yes doctor. I felt affection & that is why I lost control
.

After each of our sessions Dr. B__ fills out this report for the probation office, I know. We are not
allowed to see these reports which are confidential but that evening I was told something to make me hopeful, Dr. B__ pulling at his beard like it’s his dick & kindly smiling the way they do they’re making a gift to you of your own shit.
Quen-tin you are making true progress at last, a breakthrough, getting in touch with your emotions Quen-tin!

A true ZOMBIE would be mine forever. He would obey every command & whim. Saying “Yes, Master” & “No, Master.” He would kneel before me lifting his eyes to me saying, “I love you, Master. There is no one but you, Master.”

& so it would come to pass, & so it would be. For a true ZOMBIE could not say a thing that was
not
, only a thing that
was
. His eyes would be open & clear but there would be nothing inside them
seeing
. & nothing behind them
thinking
. Nothing
passing judgment
.

Like you who observe me (you think I don’t know you are observing Q__ P__? making reports of Q__ P__? conferring with one another about Q__ P__?) & think your secret thoughts—ALWAYS & FOREVER PASSING JUDGMENT.

A ZOMBIE would pass no judgment. A ZOMBIE would say, “God bless you, Master.” He would say, “You are good, Master. You are kind & merciful.” He would say, “Fuck me in the ass, Master, until I bleed blue guts.” He would beg for his food & he would beg for oxygen to breathe. He would beg to use the
toilet not to soil his clothes. He would be respectful at all times. He would never laugh or smirk or wrinkle his nose in disgust. He would lick with his tongue as bidden. He would suck with his mouth as bidden. He would spread the cheeks of his ass as bidden. He would cuddle like a teddy bear as bidden. He would rest his head on my shoulder like a baby. Or I would rest my head on his shoulder like a baby. We would eat pizza slices from each other’s fingers. We would lie beneath the covers in my bed in the CARETAKER’s room listening to the March wind & the bells of the Music College tower chiming & WE WOULD COUNT THE CHIMES UNTIL WE FELL ASLEEP AT EXACTLY THE SAME MOMENT.

Purchased my first ice pick, March 1988. Cruising the van along Rt. 31 & out to the Lake Michigan shore & through the little half-assed towns Stony Lake, Sable Pt., Ludington, Portage & Arcadia. In my down jacket, wool cap, my glasses with dark plastic shades slipped over them, a week’s growth of beard & keeping my voice low like it’s hoarse stopping at a crossroads store selling groceries plus hardware & it was no trouble making the purchase & nothing suspicious. Old guy watching TV by a woodburning stove & he rings up my purchase on an old-fashioned cash register & his face is wizened like a prune & I say, making a joke,
A man needs a fucking ice pick this time of year, huh?—fucking winter
, & the old guy blinks at me like he doesn’t know the English language so I say, grinning & making a joke of it,
These ice storms, huh?—fucking Michigan winter
& this time the old fart seems to hear or at least sneers his lip & agrees. & I’m thinking should he ever be asked to identify the purchaser of said ice pick & they show him a photo of Q__ P__ (shaven, with regular glasses & no cap) he’ll shake
his head & say
Naw, that don’t look anything like him
.

Parked the van overlooking the ice-jammed shore & the lake & the sky steely gray & a glare so you can’t tell where one ends & the other begins so you could climb up from Earth into Heaven if you believe in that kind of shit WHICH Q__ P__ DOES NOT! & I had the ice pick in my hand poking & prodding & thrusting into its target & so EXCITED suddenly with no warning I COME IN MY PANTS before I can fucking unzip, oh Jesus IS THIS A SIGN WHAT’S TO COME?

Mondays & Thursdays are trash pick-up mornings on North Church. So I drag the yellow plastic cans out to the curb by 7:30
A.M.
which is O.K. because I am an early riser not requiring sleep like weaker people. Wearing my sweats & a Tigers baseball cap & looking just ahead of me where I’m walking like I’m a guy minding my own business & there’s this voice out of the fucking sky!—there’s this soft humming voice!—& I almost didn’t hear then I heard it & whirled around like it’s Vietnam & I’m a hopped-up grunt like in the movies & it was one of the tenants!—just one of the tenants Ramid so polite on his way up to campus & hooded up like a little kid & with the face of a little kid & his eyes like chewy dates & he’s asking do I need some help? & I’m staring at him, there’s EYE CONTACT but only for a moment then I’m cool, I’m saying
no thanks it’s my job. But thanks
.

Dr. E__ asks
What is the nature of your fantasies, Quentin?
& I am blank & silent blushing like in school when I could not answer a teacher’s question nor even (everybody staring at me) comprehend it. Saying finally, so quiet Dr. E__ had to cup his hand to his ear to hear,
I guess I don’t have any—what you call “fantasies,” Doctor. I don’t know
.

At the time of BUNNYGLOVES, RAISINEYES, BIG GUY I did not have access to my caretaker’s quarters of course nor the cellar at 118 North Church. Only my van & the two-room place on Twelfth Street. The tub in the bathroom.

My procedures were crude & I was continually thwarted in my experiments. A radio had to be played loud, heavy-metal sound on WMWM out of Muskegon & sometimes fucking ads would come on, the intrusion of some stranger’s voice at a delicate moment. & if my hands shook or if I was ’luded-out & could not perform as I bid my hands to do like in a dream when you’re moving through glue. & if I got TOO EXCITED TOO FAST. Oh shit.

BUNNYGLOVES who I had such hope for, him being the first, convulsed like a madman when I pushed the ice pick at the angle in the diagram through the “bony orbit” above the eyeball (or whatever it was, splintering bone) & screamed through the sponge I’d shoved & tied in his mouth actually snapping the baling wire securing his ankles but he did not regain consciousness dying in twelve min
utes while I ran cold water on his face to wash away the blood & revive him. My first ZOMBIE—a grade of fucking F.

RAISINEYES lived for seven hours in the tub sometimes almost conscious & snoring or rattling his breath so I thought IT’S WORKING! IT’S WORKING! MY ZOMBIE! but I had to lift the eyelid of his remaining eye (I only “did” one) & secure it with tape, it never kept open by itself. I would move his arms & legs to get the circulation going. & handled & squeezed his cock (which remained limp & clammycool like a chicken’s innards) but NOTHING HAPPENED. & then it was over & SHIT WHAT A DOWNER.

BIG GUY was most promising for by then I believe I had learned to use the ice pick skillfully, it’s a skill you learn with practice, using a hammer like Dr. Freeman said instead of, what I’d been doing before, just pounding with the flat of my left hand, to drive the ice pick up into the “frontal lobe.” Also, BIG GUY for a part-nigger part-Huron Indian drop-out college basketball player-junkle-dealer from Lansing was weird, he was so
healthy
, I mean looked
healthy
, his hair thick & glossy-black & his bones so long & hard, his muscles, flat stomach & chest hair & his penis a length of blood sausage, his skin a deep rich plum-black I was crazy to lick with my tongue & my teeth to gnaw. Even his toes, his big toes!—JUST CRAZY FOR HIM. Yet BIG GUY let me down like the others for he never regained what they call
consciousness
after the operation & like RAISINEYES was breathing these deep shuddering snoring gasps
after I yanked out the sponge thinking he was choking on it.
Hey? Hey c’mon? You’re O.K. c’mon open your eyes?
But the left eye I’d gone into with the ice pick was shot & the right eye wasn’t much better, rolled back in his head like it wasn’t even an eye but something else. BIG GUY lived maybe fifteen hours I think dying as I was fucking him in the ass (not in the tub, in my bed) to discipline him as a ZOMBIE & I only comprehended he was dead when during the night waking needing to take a piss I felt how cold he was, arms & legs where I’d slung them over me & his head on my shoulder to cuddle but BIG GUY was stiffening in rigor mortis so I panicked thinking I would be locked in his embrace!

My first three ZOMBIES—all F’s.

Yet Q__ P__ did not give up hope. Nor have I to this day.